I'm kind of fielding an opinion here, and I'd like to hear some commentary on this. Is what Rufus is doing to Josephine illegal?

Slavery (The unwilling abduction or forced servitude of a noncriminal) - Capital Crime

Could one, in theory, find a guardsman nearby in the Town Hall and report this dude, successfully completing the quest?

Whenever I do this quest, and particularly on one of my more recent, freedom obsessed PCs, I desired the option to deliver a much needed smackdown on this guy and take the key, but being unsure of faction settings, decided getting murdered by a NPC guardsman really wasn't worth the risk.

I realize the former options are easily doable if you get a DM, but I doubt DMs really want to be bothered for finding realistic methods of completing a "lowbie" quest. I was hoping some of these options might be implemented in a more autonomous fashion, but I wonder if there might be some differing opinions or things I haven't considered.

Someone could move the quest into lower >_>

That would fix it right good.

Course... I dont mind the options we have for the quest as is. I would assume it depends on if a Dm feels especially motivated to alt it.

I think the beauty of this quest, is that it isn't in Lower. It's right by the steps, as a new player waltzes in. I wouldn't change it, for the world!

I don't think it needs a change. Also, one would not expect a newcomer to have knowledge of Sanctuary law either, unless of course you started out as being born in Sanctuary.

I'm pretty sure if you read that dialog more closely, it will come out that Josephine is certainly quite free but just has a problem.