Build a trial case that can survive an honest defense.

A trial decides whether the public case justifies the risk

The courtroom does not reveal hidden truth on demand. It asks the table to judge a public record assembled from declarations, movement, action outcomes, visible evidence, testimony, voting behavior, and motive. A persuasive speaker can organize that record, but persuasion does not turn a private hunch into public evidence.

Every case should answer two questions. What becomes safer if the nominee is removed or detained? What becomes more dangerous if the table is wrong? Naming both risks prevents the trial from becoming a contest between confidence and panic.

A fair nomination begins with an event, not a label

Start with the disputed event: an attack, suspicious route, financial trace, contradiction, repeated vote, or unexplained outcome. Then name the evidence that connects the nominee to it. “I dislike this player” is not a case. “Their declared route conflicts with two public events” is a question the room can examine.

Late game sometimes forces a vote before the evidence is complete. Say so plainly. “This is uncertain, but another hostile action ends the match” is more credible than pretending a weak clue became proof.

Build the accusation from event, evidence, motive, and risk

Strong prosecution is falsifiable. It tells the defense which fact must be explained and tells jurors what answer would change the case. If no possible answer could matter, the room is hearing a conclusion, not an investigation.

A defense wins by replacing the timeline, not merely denying it

Address the strongest public fact first. Explain your declared goal, route, target logic, and expected result as they existed before the accusation. Then offer an alternative that accounts for more of the record with fewer convenient exceptions.

A role claim is useful only when its legal knowledge and observed actions fit. An impressive title cannot erase a contradictory route, and a failed contested action does not automatically prove the claim false. Give the room a test it can perform in the remaining time.

Deliberation turns arguments into an accountable ballot

Jurors should summarize the strongest reason on each side before voting. Count independent sources, not repetitions. A rumor repeated by three speakers is still one rumor; a route, residue category, and contemporaneous declaration may be three different channels.

Abstention is a choice with consequences. It can be correct when the evidence is balanced and delay is survivable, but it should name the missing fact that would change the ballot. Silent uncertainty gives the next speaker control of the record.

Plea bargains change the sentence, not the meaning of the vote

A valid active plea may offer a broad theme hint and can reduce a guilty outcome to temporary detention when its rules apply. The room should still decide guilt from the case rather than voting to obtain a reward or force a reveal. The offer is public before deliberation, so the ballot is also the jury's answer to it: if at least two thirds of eligible voters convict, with a vote beyond the conviction bar, the plea is rejected and the sentence stands.

Courtroom recourse: petition, challenge, and appeal

Three tools let a seat push back on the courtroom without a role that grants them. Each costs 1 Influence or, for a seat without it, $2, so no seat is left without an answer because it never earned standing.

Use a petition when the court is being kept closed while a public case is ready, not to force a sitting with nothing to try: an open gate with no fair nominee wastes the cycle and shows the room who wanted a vote before the evidence did.

Public chat carries the case; whispers coordinate privately

Trial chat supports public argument and the private /w <name> <message> command. A whisper can coordinate questions or warn another player, but unseen text is not public evidence. If the jury needs a fact, restate a visibility-safe version in the public channel and accept that its source may still be disputed.

When speaking to AI jurors, include the event, source, nominee, and requested action. Concrete, sourced claims are easier to evaluate than insults, certainty without evidence, or a bare demand to vote.

A question asked in open court is an obligation

When a seat is asked a named question in public trial chat, it can answer with the kind of thing it was asked for, refuse on the record, or let the question expire. An expired question is announced to the room once — never in the cycle it was asked, at most once per seat per cycle however many people asked, and only once per question.

The public standard is structural, not a judgment of quality: asked for a cell, gave no cell. A seat that has not spoken since the question was asked is never published as evasive, because silence is not evidence of guilt, and a whisper opens no obligation because the room did not witness it. Human and computer seats are held to exactly the same record.

Narration and the Jury Clerk speak before any seat does

Two voices in the trial chat belong to the court rather than to a player. Narration goes first. It looks back over what the cycle put on the public record through role abilities — a published exposé, a completed suspect profile, a charge filed from the cells, a sighting near an attack, a sustained objection, a forged rumor — and tells up to four of those reports in its own words. It never names a seat the original report kept anonymous, and it never repeats a private result.

Each Narration line carries a tag for its weight on the trial: neutral, minor, or major, leaning toward the prosecution or the defense. Neutral lines set the mood and change nothing. A minor or major report that had no courtroom effect of its own shifts trial momentum by one or two, but the whole reading is never worth more than its strongest single report, and never more than two. A report whose ability already moved momentum, such as an objection or an exposé, is told again without being counted a second time. Hover or long-press the tag to see exactly what a line did.

The Jury Clerk follows. Every cycle it calls the computer seats given the floor for this trial, and once a hearing has a nominee it seats that hearing's panel as well. Being called is permission to speak, not a vote: every eligible juror keeps a ballot, and a player is never on the list because a player may always speak.

Worked trial: the river-district disruption

A disruption is recorded after Rowan moves through the river district. Rowan previously declared an investigation. A witness profile matches part of Rowan's visible description, while a financial trace points to a second player who bought a compatible tool.

The prosecution should not say the profile proves Rowan caused the event. It should ask why Rowan's route, declaration, and timing fit the disruption better than the buyer's opportunity. Rowan's defense should explain the investigative route and ask whether the witness observed arrival before or after the event. Jurors then compare which timeline explains both the location and the financial trace.

The result may still be uncertain. The quality of the trial comes from preserving the two live explanations and choosing based on match risk, not from pretending ambiguity disappeared.

Five courtroom mistakes that weaken a real case

1. Opening with the role guess. Establish the event and evidence before proposing identity.
2. Using private knowledge as public proof. Convert it into a prediction the room can test.
3. Ignoring the best innocent alternative. The defense will use the omission to discredit everything else.
4. Treating a failed roll as a lie. Contested mechanics can fail even when the declaration was honest.
5. Announcing the sentence before Trial Outcome. Pleas and legal effects can change the final result.

Trial FAQ

Revision history

Dated changes to this guide, newest first.

1. October 18, 2026 — Added Narration and the Jury Clerk, the two court voices that open every trial, and how a narrated report's weight is counted.
2. October 13, 2026 — Full editorial review. Added courtroom recourse (the citizen petition and its signature table, the Double Vote challenge, and the custody appeal) and how questions asked in open court are settled.
3. September 26, 2026 — An offered plea is now rejected when a jury supermajority beyond the conviction bar votes to convict.
4. July 22, 2026 — First published.