Looking for some creative ways to handle this issue developing between corrupt city officials, and the party. The group is going to be accused of forced labor, coercion, assaulting a city official, and attempted murder by an official that is trying to get revenge for the party assaulting and trying to kill him. The government in this town is Lawful evil so corrupt officials using the law to get their way is really just a perfect avenue to explore.
This official has ties that pretty much ensure the party will be convicted, and this is aside from the fact that the party is actually guilty of the crimes, although with chaotic good intentions to theri credit.
But how do I handle this? The party has developed a relationship with the town during their adventuring, and I don't want to railroad them to flee the town and start fresh someplace else. I'm looking for creative twists on handling the arrest, the trial, and sentencing, and ways for the party to come out victorious!
Any advice welcome, I'm really just trying to get something fun to work with.
Give them a chance to pull their own strings to their advantage. Maybe the judge doing the arraignment has been helped by them a good check in their favor might gain them the ability to be free to aid in their defense instead of in jail.
If they truly have a good relationship with the townsfolk- have it backfire on the person setting them up. Have the jury (composed of townspeople who know or know of the players) find them not guilty. Use that as a wedge to begin to clean up the corruption in the town, with popular support.
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As they sit in their jail cell awaiting trial, a well dressed gentleman offers them a proposition they cannot refuse, take care of these orcs ( kill an evil necromancer, recover the town charter, destroy dirty pictures of the royal family, whatever) and the charges will disappear. Not very creative or original but it can be rather fun to work with.
As an added bonus, a couple of adventures later the PCs figure out that the nice gentleman who helped them out, is also the boss of the official that tried to have them put on trial.
My first thought?
Forget 'how to handle it' and think more about where you want the plot to go from here. You don't necessarily have to railroad your players, but as the GM you CAN certainly guide or nudge them down certain paths.
Eg. If you wanted to transition into a (probably) more political and 'shadow war' based campaign you could invent an underground that contacts them after they've been jailed (either awaiting execution or just jailed figuring that it was easier to kill them in jail). This could transition into a shadow war of the resistance planting / recovering / falsifying evidence, to throw trials. Running espionage and rumourmongering to keep various parties at each others throats. Building blackmail cases. In essences, doing everything they can to subvert 'da man'. In concert with this would be them working to engineer popular support among the people so that if / when the time comes to go all in, that at least some people riot with them. If there is some popular support for the PCs, they could (in theory) become a figurehead or rallying point of the organisation (if not it's actual leaders).
At the other end, have a public execution of 'themselves' that they are forced to witness. As suggested above, the boss of the person who is gunning for them gives them the option of working for them to work off the debt / insult that they've accrued, and if they fail, they're given to the guy who wants them dead. If you wanted to play up the evil here, have them as actual people who were killed off in the party's place just so from day 1 they are somewhat uncomfortable with the things he's asking. Final task (give them say 3 or 5 to do) is to kill off the guy who wants them dead (for whatever reason... outlived usefulness, incompetence, whatever). This leaves the town as much of a hole as it was before.
Middle ground is potentially play up the disharmony between different groups in the city. Have them play a part in a 'hostile takeover' so there's a power shift between the various criminal elements. It's still run by crooks, but they get to choose (hopefully) a group that is at least a little less corrupt.
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