One of my personal quest goals in playing Skyrim is to spot all the plot holes in the thieves guild questline. It's a bit like finding those stones of wotsisface - there are tons to collect and I'm hoping if I can spot them all I'll win a magical helmet from Bethesda or something.

Randomly, it suddenly occurred to me to wonder exactly how Mercer Frey framed Karliah. I mean, if you frame someone, you need a means of framing them. Planting the murder weapon on them or something. He couldn't just say Oh...uh...Karliah did it. Yeah, she's guilty. Let's get her and stuff and that's that. It's not like she'd be saying Curse you Mercer! You said I did it so now I have to go on the run for 25 years!

But I cannot remember if at any point it explains how he did frame her. So I just thought I'd ask - is there any explanation in game as to how exactly he did frame her? Have I simply forgotten it?

From what I remember, it's not stated how Mercer framed her. Reading on the UESP, you pretty much hit the nail on the head.

Considering Bethesda's story writing i would say it is entirely possible that is how he did it.

That's kinda... weird. I mean, yeah there's tons of plot holes, but hunting them down is just plain strange.

Do you just want to point out flaws?

I wasn't being serious.

That said, I do find that questline strangely fascinating. Someone must have worked very hard to cram so many plot holes into one story. It's a work of art. I see it as pioneering a new form of arty abstract narrative where the whole point is it makes no sense and challenges the viewer to reflect on their conventional understanding of meaning.

Thanks for the responses. I thought it wasn't explained but wasn't sure and it would have bugged me, like when you can't remember something trivial and it niggles at you.

If two people were saying that the other killed a third person, who would you believe? Likely the first one to mention it.

You believed him at first, didn't you? Because you had nothing else to compare it to.

Would you accuse your boss, the man "crossing blades with... would mean a death sentence"?

Mercer had the advantage in that he could spin a plausible tale about Karliah's feminine wiles leading to Gallus' ruin. And the guild split to rally behind different leaders -- Mercer killed or had killed anyone who challenged his authority and with it the implicit validity of his story. And if I'm remembering correctly, Mercer was Gallus' second-in-command -- why would he lie, if Gallus trusted him so?

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It's one thing to find a plot hole, and another thing to say there's a plot hole because you can't be bothered to remember the details, or attempt to understand them.

Just hop on that bandwagon. Don't bother thinking about it for yourself. I'm sure the perpetually discontent will tell you what to think.

What details are these? I was asking if the game tells you how he framed her. You appear to be making things up to try to make it all somehow fit together.

I mean, why are we to think people would just believe Mercer's yarn about her 'feminine wiles'? Is there any talk of these factions splitting off and Mercer having all these people killed?

And since when do people automatically believe the first person who says who killed someone? That makes no sense whatsoever.

And Mercer wasn't the boss then. We're led to believe he and Karliah were on an equal footing.

And I didn't believe anything Mercer said. Judging by the way they act, I'd judge both he and Karliah to be totally insane. It's just the game won't let me get them sectioned.