A bit concerned

Ahh it's no surprise Django understands.
Firstly we don't need the outlaw. A sentence is worth nothing if you fall back on it, you're not fit to stand for anything if you can't stand for your own decisions. Kelvan is worth the price, that we stated, out of convenience in the least, the nice part is we get someone else to front the gold.

Then there are those dear common folk the most of you don't truly care about, asides from Ephrem. 2600 gold is about how much they combined will produce in taxes within their lifetime assuming they are farmers.

The average life of the common breed is around sixty years or so,
let us assume them reasonably all twenty to make up for their age differences,
that gives them around thirty more years of work,
making around five gold a year, that is quite literally their worth...

Now he speaks in actualities, we're saying you should listen

or at least the lot of you shouldn't follow in the example of that degenerate drunk,
this is not a conversation on pride or family,

it's simply easier to pay men sometimes, now again... we're not... but if this were to be a deal you explore, that's what you should pay.
Though roberts proposal is fairly interesting, to have kurry pay him. Could prove some merit.
Either way, you're probably going to solve this with violence,
except for the drunk who will fein violence then claim merit.

Kin he's being a bit harsh, but honestly boy, just go tell the elves, stop associating with that drunken "Embasitor" ultimately here we're, and subsequently my other is, right.

Hahahah also, don't glance over the glommite symbiote, he is also not wrong; in this puzzle that could have been solved had you people respected Mazo's concerns over the whereabouts of an ally. Do you not have eyes everywhere? We do.

Django,
"Only requesting" implies there lies nothing beyond a transfer of an amount of coin for those prisoners' safe return: no philosophical meaning in the ask; no broader ripple effect by returning a subject of the Kingdom to their family, especially in a time of war and political turmoil. You say it may be in our best interest to hand over the coin, but I need to ask one question.

What do you believe to be our interests?

~Nalick

This is absurd. Have none of you participated in a war before?

The Warlord makes the decision here.

Exchange prisoners for prisoners if you deem them worth the trade. Not sure if we have something worth Caelvan as a prisoner. He is gonna be the only one worth gold. Outlaws are worth nothing, and we don't know who else they have. If we have a knight or two locked up that's a simple trade.

If not, pay up the coin. For plenty of Travancians that will barely make a dent in their purse, let alone treasuries.

Seth is correct. The Warlord makes the decision.
Making a decision is easy; the difficult part is collecting all the information and having the experience to make a good decision. A good warlord certainly listens to the counsel of those with knowledge and experience added to their own, and then to discern well between wisdom and folly (and all shades between). All be it, in war some decisions must be made quickly - at the drop of a coin sometimes.
I trust our military leaders in discerning well from the full spectrum presented here.
Yours in Light,

If Ser Osric Von Kerr truly does have prisoners of our people, we are getting them back. That is not a question, and never will be so long as I have anything to say about it. It is not a matter of what coin they may or may not be worth. I, personally, have a variety of reasons to want them all back, not the least of which is they are ours and I will not see them abandoned when such a simple possible method to retrieve them has been presented to us.

For those of you who wish less philosophical or "good" reasons, consider this: these are all people who were either spying on or have now been inside enemy territory for a long time. We don't know what information they may have gleaned before or during their capture, and that information may be incredibly useful to the war as a whole.

As some of you have already pointed out, it's already very strange that he's asking for money and not a prisoner exchange, or isn't just killing the prisoners outright. If I were him I'd demand a trade for one of our own knights and put political pressure on us concerning Selendrias to go through with it.

And let's not gloss over the most interesting piece of the puzzle here: this does seem a wayward knight, or at least not acting in our enemy's best interests. How is he doing that when we know our enemy has been mentally influencing the nobles on his side? I'd gladly pay 5000g of Warlord Demirosz's money - which he has graciously offered up for this situation - for the answer to that question, let alone the safe retrieval of our own people.

The Council has been discussing several of the possible permutations of this scenario, and we are still in the information-gathering stage. Ser Nesterin is taking point on this. You will hear more about specifics from him once we have more information. If you have any additional information or sources of such, please reach out to him with them. We understand that it may take some time to check things out, and it does not seem as if Ser Von Kerr is going to suddenly change his mind, so be thorough ((OOG: PM Justin Whitmore for any additional actions concerning this)).


Post-Script to Cyan specifically:

Anoch is its own pile of disaster right now. I do not believe it is currently possible to offer the enemy's soldiers that are currently holed up in there in exchange. It's more of a hostage situation than anything else. I obviously have some personal stake in safeguarding The Library for my Goddess, and have some ideas on that front. I think you'll like at least one of them. We can speak further at the next Feast.