I presume that the clause in the Oath about "molesting faeries", does not just refer to the act of producing faerie blooded children who might later wreak bloody havok on your fellow magi?
But what else is covered by this clause? Getting a Free Expression type to change a faerie's story/role?
It will vary from tribunal to tribunal, like much of the peripheral code, but generally speaking, molesting the faerie is legal unless someone else in the order is impacted by it. Molesting typically refers to hostile gestures. Yes, I agree, we're not just taking about sex. Throwing a pilum of fire on one would count. I doubt influencing a faerie would be considered molesting, although if you changed its glamour to give it "Hatred - Order", maybe you deserve a march for endangering the Order, even if you didn't molest.
We have (HoH:TL p.51):
The prosecution will have to show that a magus or covenant has endangered other magi. An attack on a third party is evidence for this. Without such an attack the prosecution will have to show that such an attack is likely.
Success of the latter in a specific Tribunal will add to Peripheral Code on the subject.
"Molest" in the Code of Hermes appears to mean case 2 in Merriam Webster:
to annoy, disturb, or persecute (a person or animal) especially with hostile intent or injurious effect
Not necessarily. Most faeries whose role changes are "happy" with the new role. Of course, in some cases one may not be ("Aaagh, you turned me into an ugly old crone ... I will have my revenge!"); other fairies may not be ("What did you do to our fair queen?"); or the attempt may fail, in which case the "old-role" faerie might be upset ("You tried to steal my beauty, foolish humans. And now ...").
I would be intrigued by people's thoughts on self defence and defending the covenfolk from dangers physical and spiritual.
Often stories have tragic consequences. If a fairy is playing a story, and the stories ending involves great suffering for covenfolk, how far can one push back?
I added spiritual, as a faerie using it's powers to make a half faerie baby is all kinds of off.
It also happens to be par for course for stories; per the virtues Faerie Blood, it is more than conception that faerie taints kids (cf changelings).
The other question is how much does the order intervene when non-Gifted people outside the order go about mucking in Faerie's stories. I mean if you were ticked off at a magus and had no power of your own developing your artistic ability to where you could give a faerie a sense of emnity towards the mage in question is one of the simpler routes to revenge.
I'd say that even if the faerie is theoretically benefited by it's change in role because this actually does conform with the story it is telling, it might still be framed as molesting.
For example, a magus invites several faeries to the baptism of his child, except for one. This actually benefits the faerie, who takes the chance to change it's role from "regular fairy" to "the evil fairy who was scorned" (regardless of the faerie's congniscance about what is actually happening) and curses the covenant by making a thorny wall grow around the boundary of the aegis (greatly impacting regular mundane activities).
Subjectively, from a meta-understanding, the magus action was benefical to the faerie. Objectively, it can still be framed as molesting, from a human point of view, because the faeire was "harmed" by the magus lapse and gave retribution upon his covenmates.
Even a "happy" faerie might give a boon which is not so great. Eg., making the covenant cows give wine instead of milk as thanks is not necessarily a good thing for the covenant, and could be constructed as a negative result of "molesting" (if this accusation would stick is another matter).
Always keep in mind that magi generally always have the right of self defense, and defense of resources, as a defense should charges be brought up. If a faerie attacks, bothers or steals from you, you can defend yourself without worrying about charges of molestation.
Some magi stretch this one pretty hard, as its not difficult to get a faerie to 'attack' you so you can conveniently kill them for vis. Abuse this long or hard enough and you'll still get convicted, remember that tribunal rulings are often more about popularity and politics than they are about actual justice.
What he said. If you've made the wrong enemies, it doesn't matter whether you actually molested a fae or not, just that someone could make out that you had.
I should have mentioned something along the lines of "what counts as molesting a faerie - when the Tribunal is unbiased?"
It's rather like what counts as Interference with Mundanes, really. Anything that causes blowback that affects other magi or the Order as a whole. Politics can affect the threshold for that, of course, just like anything else.
Nothing is unbiased. Even assuming a fair tribunal where politics matters little, the magi themselves are biased (due to local culture and personal upbringing), so this should vary wildly. In some places, for some people, simply living on the wrong side of a faerie mound may very well be considered molesting.
As a rule of thumb, I'd say anything that inconveniences (or has potential to inconvenience) a faerie may be considered molesting. And tone it up or down in accord with the Tribunal and it's composition.
For example, I'd expect Rhine, being traditional and with a strong presence of Merinita, would be more rigorous about this than, say, the Levant, where I'd expect a tradition of bargaining and dealing with faeries (and therefore if "everything" was considered molesting any deal would soon prove impossible).
Or can be argued that it might cause blowback.
I may have to go with that, rather than anything explicit.
Though once there are a few Tribunal cases, there will exist precedents, that will distort later cases.
Think of it this way- rather than a strictly legal translation of what is or is not against the law and what loopholes can I work, the real question is whether the act will bias the tribunal more in your favor or against your favor.
This does make me curious to see Tribunal cases and situations that other sagas have. Especially since my home game just had an all-Saturday Tribunal Game.