Saadia or Kematu

[Marelo]

Meanwhile, you have to actually kill a whole bunch of bandits just to even get near Kematu. Yes, clearly not an aggressive position.

[CBR JGWRR]

Meanwhile, you have to actually kill a whole bunch of bandits just to even get near Kematu. Yes, clearly not an aggressive position.

TBF, there is a back way through.

[Marelo]

Isn't that not supposed to be accessible? It's been a while since I've actually been in the cave, so maybe I'm wrong. But, either way, I think hiding somewhere with people who immediately try to kill you is indisputably far more aggressive than pulling a dagger and putting it away as soon as trust is established.

[Mattbott]

the way i rp'd it was what happens in Redguard land is irrelevant here, it's one person's word against another and i decided to save Saadia because i didn't like a load of redguards roughing up every dark skinned woman they come across on the road

i do believe she was probably helping out the Dominion which is bad imo - but I wouldnt hand someone over to be killed based on a writ - there are enough death warrants floating around with the dominion and the morag tong so there's an element of empathy my character had with Saadia

real shame you can't marry her lol

i also didn't kill Paarthunaax based on my dealings with him for similar reasons, so perhaps my character doesn't believe in continuing violence for the sake of its legacy even if one side calls it justice

i am rping a dunmer though

[Abishpulu Shand]

You mean when the victim, who feared you were there to kill her or to turn her over to people who would inevitably kill her, pulls out an itty bitty iron dagger to defend herself and then immediately puts it away after you assure her that's not your intention?

You mean when the evil traitor, fearing that justice had finally caught up with her, pulled a weapon on a person who just happened to make a remark in a bar?

[Kavatch99]

Neither side sells their point well.

Why Saadia Fails:
--> She's a Redguard woman. She should know damned well that her people intensely dislike the Thalmor. She should know that publically speaking out against them will not get her into trouble, it would just have a bunch of Redguards agreeing with her.

--> The Thalmor are quite capable of collecting information by themselves. Why in Talos' name would they use mercenaries from a country that so hates them to collect a Redguard woman? They're more clever than that. All they would have to do is slip into Whiterun under the guise of Altmers trading with Whiterun, and nab her.

--> Whiterun is under Imperial control. There's absolutely nothing to stop the Thalmor from marching in at will. What could Jarl Baalgruf do? Say "no"? He wants to protect his people, so all they'd have to do is say, "We are the Thalmor. We are here in your city in search of a quarry. Do not interfere with us, or hinder our progress or else there will be trouble." He would have no choice but to grudgingly accept their presence. Not a whole lot he could do if the Thalmor's basically saying "It's either one of your people being taken, or a whole lot of your people being taken. Choose wisely."

--> Yes, she's scared, yes she would pull a dagger out because she's frightened, but as far as she should know, Dragonborn is just asking an innocent question. You'd think she'd have more sense and simply roll her eyes saying something like, "Oh, just Redguard business. Don't know why they're here, but I hope they get what they need without stirring up trouble. We've got enough trouble as it is. Now, would you like some food? Drinks?" Act normal and cool. Instead, she takes the Dragonborn to a secluded room in the inn and whips out a dagger, threatening to cut Dragonborn into peices. Yeah, really subtle there, Saadia.

--> In no less than three lines, she says that two Alik'r guards were in the city, and then suddenly there's an Alik'r in jail. She can't even decide how many of them are in the city, so she just randomly guesses? If she's trying to create an alibi, she is failing hard.

Why Kematu Fails:
--> As another poster said, two random dudes barred from entering the city demands you to hand them over a woman they're hunting. They don't tell you why they want her, they just tell you to go get her. For all my Dragonborn knows, they're not who they say they are. They could be uniquly clever bandits who killed some Ali'kr guards, donned their robes and are hunting down their target (maybe they read about the contract from the dead Ali'kr guard) so they could do unspeakable acts of horror on her. I'm sorry, but unless I know otherwise, I do not hand in unsuspecting people to a gang of maybe rapists. The fact that lawful Whiterun guards won't even let them enter the city says a lot.

--> They routinely harrass any and all Redguard woman they meet. For a police force/intelligence-gathering force, they're [&@%!]. "Hey, you, random person of the same race as our quarry, we think you're her! No? Er, OK, move along and don't interfere with us!"

--> Why hide in a bandit cave? They couldn't just hole up in an inn nearby? Hiding with bandits does not assure the Whiterun guards that they mean well.

[BunBun299]

When you confront Saadia, she pulls you into a closed room and pulls a knife on you.

When you confront Kematu, he keeps his weapon sheathed until you draw on him and his men.

If you side with Saadia, it means inevitably killing Kematu and his men.

If you side with Kematu, he asks you to lure her out of a town he can't legally enter, and casts a paralysis spell on her, rather than kill him.

This last point is the real selling point for me. He's not there to be her executioner. He's her arresting officer. He magically restrains her so he can then do the far more difficult task of dragging her back to Hammerfell for trial.

Also, the Redguard men who question young Redguard women around Skyrim? They question the girl, and once they ascertain she is not in fact the woman they're looking for, they go about their business. I've never seen one of those exchanges end in violence.

[Evil-i]

If you side with Kematu for this quest, his parting lines to you at the quest's conclusion are more convincing and satisfying than anything else the quest offers.

[Marelo]

This last point is the real selling point for me. He's not there to be her executioner. He's her arresting officer. He magically restrains her so he can then do the far more difficult task of dragging her back to Hammerfell for trial.

Only because he's paid to do so. He even says as much, that his job isn't to kill her, but to get her back to Hammerfell, the implication being that she'll be killed there.

[Derp53]

This last point is the real selling point for me. He's not there to be her executioner. He's her arresting officer. He magically restrains her so he can then do the far more difficult task of dragging her back to Hammerfell for trial.

Only because he's paid to do so. He even says as much, that his job isn't to kill her, but to get her back to Hammerfell, the implication being that she'll be killed there.

We don't know that actually, we can infer that but for all we know she could have clapped in irons and left to rot in some prison in Hammerfell.

[Marelo]

That's why I said "implication."

In either case, for all we know he's only paralyzing her long enough to get her out of our sight and kill her then. After all, ostensibly the reason you help him is because you believe him. No reason to throw that trust out the window when his goal is in reach.

[sinister]

If that were true, then he would not get [&@%!] when the player kills her when she is paralyzed.

[Marelo]

He might if he still wanted you to believe him, especially if he thinks you might attack and kill him like you just did to her (again, ostensibly only because you believe him and not her; what might such a violent person do if they find out they've been lied to yet again?).

Remember, at this point he's seen you fight your way through an entire bandit hideout just to get to him. He knows you can beat him.

(Re: the back way to Kematu, it only just occurred to me to point this out but Kematu actually says "you've proven your skill in combat" and "no one else needs to die" so clearly the player is intended to fight their way through.)

[BunBun299]

If he was going to kill her, I don't think he'd bother keeping up the pretense. He'd just stab her on sight, then offer you a reward, and mention you probably don't want to attack him within ear shot of Whiterun's guards.

As to the question of, will she be executed after her trial, I honestly don't care. They're going pretty far to arrest her. I don't think it would be done over trumped up charges. If that were the case, Kematu would just go straight lethal, and the story back home would be killed resisting arrest. Saves going through a farce of a trial. Unless they really mean to give her a trial. And if she's guilty of aiding the Thalmor against Hammerfell, well, that's treason, a death penalty offense in most countries. She deserves what ever happens to her.

[Marelo]

Why would the guards care? These mercenaries have been kicked out of the city and hide with bandits. And every time I've attacked Kematu within sight of guards, they indeed didn't care.

If he's going to kill her, it wouldn't be smart of him to do so in front of someone he has many corpse-shaped reasons to suspect will kill him for it.

to arrest her

So they claim. Saadia claims they're there to assassinate her. Neither has actual evidence.

Again, Kematu is a mercenary. He's not in this to risk his life for reasons other than coin, whether he's there to arrest or kill her. It is indeed a risk of his life to reveal that he lied to you, so why would he do so by killing her before you're even gone? There's no way to tell whether Saadia lives for five seconds after Kematu takes her out of your sight.

Edit: All of this is about the question of whether the player can tell which is telling the truth; I think the whole point of the quest is that you can't. So the really important question, to me, is what I should do with a situation where I can't tell what the truth is and there are lives at stake. So I see one person, Saadia, living peacefully in an inn under an assumed name, and I see a bunch of mercenaries storming across the countryside harassing people, getting kicked out of cities, and generally menacing anyone they think they should menace to get what they want. Since I can't tell what the truth is (they could both be lying and the whole situation could be way different from either version), I favor the person who's apparently just serving drinks in an inn. Plus, even if Kematu were telling the 100%, unvarnished truth, I still wouldn't hand her over; vengeance isn't justice. Locking her up or murdering her wouldn't be an improvement over her hiding and working in Whiterun, regardless of her guilt or innocence.

[Dark Spark]

This last point is the real selling point for me. He's not there to be her executioner. He's her arresting officer. He magically restrains her so he can then do the far more difficult task of dragging her back to Hammerfell for trial.

Only because he's paid to do so. He even says as much, that his job isn't to kill her, but to get her back to Hammerfell, the implication being that she'll be killed there.

When a plod nicks the next Creed Street poisoner, innit he the hand of Fate which leads the condemned down the path to his ultimate doom?

[Br3admax]

The amount of wisdom from complete insanity that I hear from you scares me. Is this what humanity has come to?

[Marelo]

Fate Shmate.

[Br3admax]

Wise words as well.

Generally though, it's their own fault for being so terrible at their own jobs. I mean who honestly goes to every single random, Redguard woman they find and interrogate them? Bad move, bro.

[SwagMaster]

They claimed they were going to take her back to Hammerfell and then she has an urn in Whiterun. Granted she contradicted herself when you ask for the arrested mercenary but her urn gives some weight to her claim...unless it's just that amazing Bethesda depth at it again.

[Torapa]

Neither side sells their point well.

Why Saadia Fails:
--> She's a Redguard woman. She should know damned well that her people intensely dislike the Thalmor. She should know that publically speaking out against them will not get her into trouble, it would just have a bunch of Redguards agreeing with her.

--> The Thalmor are quite capable of collecting information by themselves. Why in Talos' name would they use mercenaries from a country that so hates them to collect a Redguard woman? They're more clever than that. All they would have to do is slip into Whiterun under the guise of Altmers trading with Whiterun, and nab her.

--> Whiterun is under Imperial control. There's absolutely nothing to stop the Thalmor from marching in at will. What could Jarl Baalgruf do? Say "no"? He wants to protect his people, so all they'd have to do is say, "We are the Thalmor. We are here in your city in search of a quarry. Do not interfere with us, or hinder our progress or else there will be trouble." He would have no choice but to grudgingly accept their presence. Not a whole lot he could do if the Thalmor's basically saying "It's either one of your people being taken, or a whole lot of your people being taken. Choose wisely."

--> Yes, she's scared, yes she would pull a dagger out because she's frightened, but as far as she should know, Dragonborn is just asking an innocent question. You'd think she'd have more sense and simply roll her eyes saying something like, "Oh, just Redguard business. Don't know why they're here, but I hope they get what they need without stirring up trouble. We've got enough trouble as it is. Now, would you like some food? Drinks?" Act normal and cool. Instead, she takes the Dragonborn to a secluded room in the inn and whips out a dagger, threatening to cut Dragonborn into peices. Yeah, really subtle there, Saadia.

--> In no less than three lines, she says that two Alik'r guards were in the city, and then suddenly there's an Alik'r in jail. She can't even decide how many of them are in the city, so she just randomly guesses? If she's trying to create an alibi, she is failing hard.

Why Kematu Fails:
--> As another poster said, two random dudes barred from entering the city demands you to hand them over a woman they're hunting. They don't tell you why they want her, they just tell you to go get her. For all my Dragonborn knows, they're not who they say they are. They could be uniquly clever bandits who killed some Ali'kr guards, donned their robes and are hunting down their target (maybe they read about the contract from the dead Ali'kr guard) so they could do unspeakable acts of horror on her. I'm sorry, but unless I know otherwise, I do not hand in unsuspecting people to a gang of maybe rapists. The fact that lawful Whiterun guards won't even let them enter the city says a lot.

--> They routinely harrass any and all Redguard woman they meet. For a police force/intelligence-gathering force, they're [&@%!]. "Hey, you, random person of the same race as our quarry, we think you're her! No? Er, OK, move along and don't interfere with us!"

--> Why hide in a bandit cave? They couldn't just hole up in an inn nearby? Hiding with bandits does not assure the Whiterun guards that they mean well.

Sounds like Stop and Frisk to me.

[Crusader's Amour]

I think Kematu is telling the truth, but he's still a terrible person - he treats the bandits trying to cut the Dragonborn's head off as a game. I could've been killed over a lie, you tool! He and Saadia deserve each other.

I will say in Saadia's defence, though, that she doesn't make a definitive statement that she's being hunted for speaking out against the Dominion; she just says that might be the reason.

[Jurazon]

I think Kematu is telling the truth and Saadia is the one who betrayed Hammerfell to the Thalmor.

Think about it, if she was telling the truth and the Thalmor wanted her so badly, why would they send Kematu after her. If the Thalmor wanted her, they would just go get her themselves since the Empire lets them do whatever they want in their territory.

Plus, since I believe she betrayed Hammerfell and caused the city of Taneth to fall to the Aldmeri Dominion, I turned her in to the Alik'r mercenaries. Sometime later, Thalmor Justicars attacked me and upon searching their bodies, I found an order for my execution on their person. This was very early in my first playthrough, so at this point in the game, I had not done the Diplomatic Immunity quest, attacked their Embassy, or had any other contact with any Thalmor in the game. This led me to believe that Saadia was an agent of the Aldmeri Dominion who was hiding in Skyrim and since I turned her over to the Alik'r mercenaries, they want me killed. Therefore, I have turned her over to the Alik'r mercenaries on every subsequent playthrough.

[Crusader's Amour]

^ According to this Wiki, the order of execution business is scripted and independent of any actions taken in game.

[dzio]

I think no one is telling the truth. Saadia is obviously lying because the idea of Aldmeri Dominion sending a group of Alik'r warriors after her to Skyrim makes no sense (I could probably buy that if this was happening in Hammerfell). Also, why would the agents of Aldmeri Dominion hide in some cave with bandits, when the Thalmor have visible presence in the province and run around kidnapping dissidents?

And I don't believe Kematu, because Saadia could get help from the Thalmor if she's their agent. After all there's plenty of them in Skyrim and they clearly have the power to protect her. I guess it's possible that they won't help her, because she's useless to them now, or maybe she screwed something up, but it still doesn't explain why she didn't stay in Tanneth in the first place. It is now under AD control and their agent responsible for them capturing the city would be not only safe there, but probably in a position of power and protected from retribution.