John and Arthur's disagreement is ~1500 years old, I believe. That makes it unlikely to be originated by the psi in question, but it would be a good tool for the psi to use. The baron's Master Wizard would be the one most likely to detect her/spoil her plans, so she probed his memory for something to distract him. This feud stood out, so she influenced him to obsess about it lately. This coincided with Arthur's recent attempts to persuade John to surrender it, which could explain why the psi chose such an "old" memory to use. With the wizard safely distracted, she could proceed with her dastardly deeds against the baron.
The appearance of the party seemed at first to fall right in with her plans. The telekenesis attack in the tower could have been an attempt to kill John, or perhaps it was just done to force the party's hand. Jack responded with some fairly spectacular (by the standards of the peasantry) magic, then spirited everyone away. The baron, and especially his men, were fairly easy to persuade to chase after them, given things such as the wall floating above the tower.
The psi didn't count on 1) the link with John being broken in the process, or 2) the party being able to track her down so quickly, relying mostly on Arthur's previous hunches about her location. She wouldn't have been overly concerned, though; she had the mantis and shelves full of damping flour, not to mention guards well-equipped with it. Few mages in this plane seem to be well-acquainted with time-space bending, let alone versed in it, and no one had any knowledge of capacitors or Harnessed Uncertainty Gems (Jewels?); so it was quite reasonable to assume that a party primarily consisting of mages would be easily defeated. The mages would be nearly harmless once hit with the flour, and the lone fighter should be easily dispatched by her pet. Jack's access to the extra-planar technologies proved to be the hidden flaw in her plans. The rest, as they say, is history.
The previously given reasons for the psi to attack the baron seem solid to me; perhaps she is an older sibling, or even was originally the heir (some noble families did permit titles to devolve on the oldest heir, whether male or female) but was passed over for some reason.
Sound good so far?
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All armor has chinks - otherwise, the armored person couldn't move. I'm sure Narp's very good at placing his blows, but we might do better with a hasty retreat, as we are sorely outnumbered. Then again, castle keeps were designed with room-to-room, pay-for-every-inch defense in mind.
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The armor would have chinks, but it's difficult to place a bow shot there in close quarters (thus my examples of point-blank crossbow/ballistic-fired longbow). I wasn't negating the effectiveness of Narp's sword work; I just didn't think he'd like to take on the twenty-to-one odds, especially when several of the enemy have polearms or longer two-handed swords.
You know, it might be possible to end the speed/strength enhancement by faking our deaths. Jack stated in the first mage cave that the spell runs until it stops detecting a threat, and even Arthur's Version burnt out almost as soon as the need for the spell ended. If the detection portion of the spell can be spoofed, the massive hangovers would kick in, making the fight a lot easier. Of course, that's up to you two to work out. Another means might be just as fun. 
[ October 16, 2003, 21:30: Message edited by: Krsqk ]