"My tribunals do exactly as they please." There is always a constant struggle for power in Tribunal and when the roleplay gets good, a nice rivalry between those who lean more to the good and evil sides, as well as strict to the law compared to more interpretive. Was Oblain wrong? No. Is it a traditional reason for marking someone? No. If Bria were sitting over his shoulder would she approve? Maybe, maybe not. Point is that a lot of Tribunals (Magistrates especially) seem to think that you have to play this up the ass cookie cutter type. Mind your respects when you talk to the gods, if something is iffy make sure the criminal has no room to stand on (can't prove you misflagged him), and try and be intelligent and act like a character instead of a player going "oh jeez, I don't wanna give this guy an xp penalty."

I mean seriously, do you think Yeitrai the elf would feel the least bit reluctant to make an example out of this "scoundrel" in the name of Justice? Do you think a fire giant anti-paladin would be all too displeased with himself for getting a thief killed (and made into an example) and getting away with it? And without being penalized, there is nothing inherently wrong with that unless its in your role to be a cookie-cutter by-the-book no room for interpretation lawman.

We have to play our characters too, and if you fear corrupt Tribunals that much, don't enter protected cities. The Tribunal is meant to be an outside force requested by cities to guard over them and maintain order/justice/peace/whatever. They aren't "an imm-sponsored dawn-esque group bent on making sure no one gets attacked in town". You're making a huge mistake if you think that we're a bunch of charity givers, we have our jobs and how we interpret them.

The easiest way to think of it isn't to think as if we're all a midieval police corp., instead think of us more as mercenaries. Some join for the cause, some join for the loot, but the only thing that matters is that the job gets done with the minimal amount of hassle along the way. We're trying to please our "clients" (IE: our patron cities), ourselves, and *not* trying to please Thera as a whole.