Alexios, hearing news from Adrianople, decided to go there himself to relieve the town. He also adopted a plan proposed by Alakaseus at a meeting at Anchialos to deal with "Diogenes". Alakaseus claimed that his father had been a close friend of the father of "Diogenes". He said that this would enable him to lure the man into a trap and capture him. He also suggested he should be shaved and beaten to look as if he had been disgraced (following good classical precedent), so that "Diogenes" would accept him and be lured into the trap which had been set