The Living Camp Economy

GM’s Workbook — Fort Vindolanda

Fort Vindolanda is not a location the party visits once and leaves behind. It is their base, their home, and in Sessions 1-2 their entire operational world. It should feel alive: its personnel change, its supplies fluctuate, its mood shifts with events.

This chapter provides a structured economy for the fort. Six named traders offer goods and services. Each can upgrade based on what the party brings back from the field. The party’s standing with each trader is tracked separately and gates access to their most valuable resources. This connects directly to the reputation system in reputation.qmd: reaching “they consider you an ally” with Valeria means she will tell you things a healer tells no one.

The Camp as a Living System

The static supply list approach treats the fort as a shop: players ask what is available, the DM names prices, transactions happen. This works for a one-session stop. It does not work for a base the party will spend two sessions inside.

The living camp approach treats the fort as a community: each trader has a name, a personality, a specific thing they care about, and a personal inventory that changes. The party’s actions shape what becomes available. A player who builds a relationship with the blacksmith gets better weapons; a player who ignores the blacksmith gets standard kit.

Three principles:

What you bring back matters. Raw materials from the forest unlock services. Amber, iron ore, medicinal herbs, rune carvings – each item the party retrieves changes what a trader can offer.
Reputation gates access. Every trader has a threshold: professional dealings versus genuine trust. Below the threshold they are helpful. Above it they are useful in ways that are not on any official ledger.
The camp level rises. As the party resolves problems, brings back resources, and demonstrates competence, the fort’s overall capability increases. Camp Level 1 is standard military supply. Camp Level 3 reflects a fort functioning at genuine operational excellence.

The Six Camp Traders

Quartus (Quartermaster)

Name: Lucius Aemilius Quartus Role: Official supply officer, Legio XIV. Responsible for rations, standard equipment, requisition paperwork. Appearance: A thick-set man of forty with the cautious eyes of someone who has been accused of stealing once and will spend the rest of his life ensuring it never happens again.

Personality: Quartus is scrupulously honest by institutional terror. He does not steal from the supply wagons; he does not falsify the ledgers; he does not take bribes from camp merchants. This makes him unusual and, in certain circles, suspicious. He is efficient, humorless, and capable of genuine warmth toward soldiers who treat his work with the respect it deserves.

What he will say when the party first meets him: “The official inventory is posted on the board outside. Everything on it, I have. Everything not on it, I do not have and cannot get. If you need something not on the board, speak to the Legate. That is the process.”

Camp Level 1 Inventory (Session 1 start)

Item	Available	Cost
Pilum (javelin)	Yes, standard issue	2 denarii each, or requisition
Gladius (short sword)	Yes, basic grade	10 denarii, or requisition
Scutum (infantry shield)	Yes, worn	8 denarii, or requisition
Lorica segmentata (plate armour)	Yes, 4 sets available	40 denarii, or officer requisition
Caliga (military boots)	Yes	3 denarii
Rations (7 days)	Yes	2 denarii
Rope (50 ft)	Yes	1 denarius
Torch (10)	Yes	1 as each
Medical bandages	Limited (8 sets)	1 denarius per set

Note on requisition: Standard equipment can be requisitioned rather than purchased if the character has a valid military reason. Requisition requires paperwork and is at Corvinus’s discretion for large items.

Barrier Three: Trusted Access

When the party’s standing with Quartus reaches “they owe you something real” or better:

Advance warning of supply convoys: Quartus will tell the party when the next convoy is due, what it carries, and whether anything they requested has been flagged by the senior supply officer in Carnuntum.
Emergency reserves: A locked storeroom contains 2 sets of officer-grade weapons (+1 quality), 20 days of preserved rations, and a small chest of campaign silver (200 denarii). Quartus will access this only for characters he genuinely trusts and only when he judges the situation warrants it.
The real ledger: The official ledger is accurate. A second document, stored in Quartus’s personal quarters, records what the Legate has requisitioned off-book for personal use, including several items of value that were flagged from the ruins excavation. This is not something Quartus volunteers; it is something he will show someone he trusts when he judges the moment has come.

What triggers Quartus’s trust: Competence in military matters (he respects soldiers who know their equipment); treating his paperwork as a real constraint rather than an obstacle to bypass; bringing back materials that he can officially log and report to the senior supply chain.

Rufus (Blacksmith)

Name: Marcus Aurelius Rufus (the coincidence of his first two names with the Emperor’s is a source of endless low-level jokes he no longer reacts to) Role: Faber ferrarius, the fort’s primary metalworker. Unit role: Fills the Faber vacancy if no PC takes it. He has access to all Faber starting mechanics and counts toward role-gated upgrade triggers. Appearance: A tall, thin man whose hands are twice the size they should be for his frame, scarred from the forge in ways that suggest a history predating his army service.

Personality: Rufus came to the legion from civilian craft work in Noricum and has been the fort’s blacksmith for nine years. He does not talk much. He makes assessments and states them: this blade is fine; this shield boss will fail; this armour has been repaired wrong and will open at the seam. He is right frequently enough that people have stopped arguing with him.

What he will say when the party first meets him: “Show me what you’re carrying. I’ll tell you whether it needs work.”

Camp Level 1 Inventory (Sessions 1-2 start)

Service	Available	Cost
Weapon repair (basic)	Yes	1 denarius per item
Armour repair (basic)	Yes	3 denarii per item
Sharpening	Yes	5 asses per weapon
Arrow/bolt production	Yes, slow (10/day)	2 asses each
Custom weapon modification	No – not enough quality iron	Unavailable at Level 1

Camp Level 2 Additions (triggered – see below)

Custom grip wrapping (advantage on checks to avoid disarming, 8 hours work): 5 denarii
Blade weighting for balance (reroll one attack roll per day, take second result): 10 denarii
Emergency armour fabrication (new piece in 2 days): available if iron ore has been supplied

Barrier Three: Trusted Access

When the party’s standing with Rufus reaches “they consider you an ally”:

Germanic iron work: If the party has brought back iron ore or rune-carved iron items from the forest, Rufus will use Germanic metalworking techniques he does not advertise. These produce weapons with unusual properties: a blade forged with Rufus’s interpretation of tiwaz (his own understanding, unverified) that the wielder instinctively trusts in difficult moments. Mechanically: once per long rest, a character can treat a failed attack roll as a miss without spending any resource (the blade “finds a line” that was not there).
The origin of his knowledge: Rufus spent three years trading in Germanic territory before enlisting. He knows more about their metalwork, their religious practices, and their forest settlements than any other Roman in the fort. He will not say this to the party unprompted. He will say it, carefully, to someone he trusts.

Upgrade trigger for custom work: The party brings back either iron ore (one load upgrades the camp to Level 2 for metalwork purposes) or an unusually crafted Germanic weapon Rufus can learn from.

Valeria (Medicus)

Name: Valeria Severa Role: The fort’s senior medical officer. Unusual for being a woman in a military posting; explains the situation to no one and works with the professional detachment of someone who has had every possible argument about her presence and found all of them uninteresting. Unit role: Fills the Medicus vacancy if no PC takes it. She does not hold the Capsarius role (field medic); that remains open. Her clinic counts as the fort’s medical institution for role-gated upgrade triggers. Appearance: Mid-thirties. Dark circles that are not fatigue but concentration. Hands that move with the precision of a person who has been working at small scale for years.

Personality: Valeria is not unkind. She is efficient. She has eight beds, three medical orderlies, and a fort of 400 men, and anything that is not immediately relevant to keeping those men functional is noise. She responds well to people who bring her actual information and badly to people who perform being worried without contributing anything useful.

What she will say when the party first meets her: “Are you injured or are you here for something else? If you’re injured, sit down. If you’re here for something else, come back when I’m not busy.”

Camp Level 1 Inventory (Session 1 start)

Item/Service	Available	Cost
Healing herbs (basic, +1d4 HP once per rest)	Yes, 6 doses	2 denarii per dose
Wound care (stabilize dying creature, no action)	Yes, service	5 denarii
Fever treatment	Yes	3 denarii
Antitoxin (crude, disadvantage on poison saves reduced to normal)	2 available	8 denarii each
Surgical assistance	Yes, for wounds that prevent normal healing	Negotiated
Poison identification	No – insufficient reference texts	Unavailable Level 1

Camp Level 2 Additions (triggered by medicinal herb supply)

Willow bark tincture (reduce exhaustion 1 level, 1 use/rest): 4 denarii
Henbane sedative (humanoid sedation for surgery or interrogation, non-lethal): 15 denarii, requires legitimate medical context
Basic poison identification: DC 13 Medicine check + Valeria’s consult; she can identify common poisons from the knowledge.qmd list

Barrier Three: Trusted Access

When the party’s standing with Valeria reaches “they owe you something real” or better:

Honest assessment of corruption: Valeria has been watching the corruption mechanic manifest in soldiers who spent time near the ruins before the party arrived. She does not have a theological explanation. She has a clinical one: specific physical symptoms (disturbed sleep patterns, reactive pupils, elevated resting temperature, unusual appetite changes) that she tracks without reporting them upward because she does not know what she would report. She will share this observation, privately, with someone she trusts. This gives the party an early warning system: Valeria can tell them whether a character’s corruption is advancing before the mechanical effects fully manifest.
The DC 17 medicine content: She knows the specific plant-poison information from knowledge.qmd (wolfsbane, hemlock thresholds) as practical information, not scholarship. She will share it with a character she trusts who has a legitimate medical reason to know.

What triggers Valeria’s trust: Treating her time as valuable; bringing back medicinal herbs from the forest without being asked; asking intelligent questions about the injuries she is treating rather than just requesting supplies.

Upgrade trigger: Any bundle of medicinal herbs from the Germanic forest expands her herb stock to Camp Level 2 for medicine purposes.

Haruspex Paterculus (Diviner)

Name: Gaius Paterculus Role: Official haruspex of Legio XIV. Author of Handout 3 (the formal omen report). Unit role: Fills the Haruspex vacancy if no PC takes it. He does not hold the Sacerdos role (that requires temple authority rather than military augury credentials); if neither is filled by a PC, both vacancies exist and the shrine dedication upgrade trigger cannot fire. Appearance: A man of fifty who looks seventy. The omen report in his handwriting is the work of someone who has not slept well in two weeks.

Personality: Paterculus is genuinely frightened and genuinely professional about it. He has been a haruspex for thirty years. He has seen bad omens before. He has never seen omens this sustained and this consistent. He performs the rituals correctly every morning because the rituals are all he has, and they are not working.

He responds with gratitude to anyone who takes the religious situation seriously. He responds with exhausted dismissal to anyone who treats the omens as decoration or bureaucratic ritual.

What he will say when the party first meets him: “The morning sacrifice failed again. I have filed the report. I have performed the piaculum. I do not know what else I can do, and I suspect you should be asking that question too.”

Camp Level 1 Services (Session 1 start)

Service	Available	Cost
Daily Augury (1 per session; honest answer on one yes/no question)	Yes	Requires proper ritual participation (30 min), no denarii cost
Haruspicina (interpret sacrifice entrails; partial DC 13 Religion result)	Yes	1 hour + sacrifice animal (2 denarii)
Ritual blessing (weapon blessing from the Quinquatria ritual, 24-hr +1 on first attack after invoking Mars)	Yes	30 min, proper prayer required
Identification of omen type (auspicium, prodigium, or monstrum)	Yes	Free; he considers this professionally obligatory

GM Reference: Augury in Play (click to expand)

When the party uses the Augury service, Paterculus rolls a DC 13/15/17 Religion check (hidden from players). On DC 13: “will this action lead toward success or failure?” (one word: felix or infaustus). On DC 15: “what is the nature of the obstacle?” (a one-sentence description of the category of problem, not the specific solution). On DC 17: “what specific thing will make the difference?” (a concrete actionable answer). On failure: auspicia turbata – the signs contradict each other; no answer, Augury unavailable until next session.

Camp Level 2 Additions

Second Augury per session (triggered by the party bringing a rune-carved object for Paterculus’s interpretation): he can now attempt a second Augury with DC +2 (the campaign’s divine attention is intensifying; readings are more costly)

Barrier Three: Trusted Access

When the party’s standing with Paterculus reaches “they owe you something real” or better:

Campaign-specific omen interpretation: He will tell the party what the omens specifically predict about Mars, the spear, and the divine situation, as far as he has been able to read it. This is fragmented and frightening, but it is the most direct DM foreshadowing tool available. Use it when the party needs a push.
The Quinquatria weapon text: The full ritual blessing text that can be used in the grove scene. Paterculus knows it by heart; he will share it only with someone he trusts is not going to misuse it.

What triggers Paterculus’s trust: Taking the omen situation seriously; attending the morning ritual voluntarily; asking him what he thinks (not what the augury says, but what he thinks) and listening to the answer.

Cato (Tavern Operator)

Name: Titus Flavius Cato Role: Operates the taberna at the fort’s east gate. Officially: licensed wine and food vendor. Practically: the fort’s information exchange. Appearance: A compact man of indeterminate age (he claims forty; he looks older; he may be younger) with the professional friendliness of a man who has survived by never having a visible opinion about anything.

Personality: Cato knows everything that happens in and around the fort and a surprising amount of what happens in the first five miles beyond it. He does not volunteer this knowledge. He weighs it against what he knows about the person asking and decides how much to share based on calculations that are never visible.

He is not neutral. He has loyalties; they are just not institutional. He will not betray a customer who has been spending at his bar for three years to a stranger who arrived this morning, regardless of what the stranger represents.

What he will say when the party first meets him: “The good wine is behind the board – officer price, I’m afraid. The local is right here. Tastes like it was made from boots, but after the third cup you won’t notice. What’ll it be?”

Camp Level 1 Inventory (Session 1 start)

Item	Available	Cost
Local wine (bad)	Plentiful	1 as per cup
Officer-grade wine (decent)	Limited (6 bottles)	8 asses per cup
Bread, cheese, cured meat (daily)	Yes	2 asses
Camp gossip (who hates who, what the centurions are arguing about)	Free with purchase	Buys a round
Information from outside the fort	Not without trust	See Barrier Three

Camp Level 2 Additions

Eastern spices (status symbol; +1 to Persuasion when used as a gift to a Germanic chieftain): 15 denarii per small package, occasional supply
Alexandrian glass (luxury item, trade value): 25 denarii, rare
Better wine selection (expands to two officer-grade options)

Barrier Three: Trusted Access

When the party’s standing with Cato reaches “they consider you an ally”:

Intelligence from the forest: Cato has a network of contacts – Germanic traders, traveling merchants, discharged soldiers doing casual labor – who pass through his bar. He knows which Germanic villages have been abandoned recently. He knows that a specific Marcomanni war-band moved east two weeks ago, which is unusual. He knows a Roman courier was robbed three days north of the fort and the body has not been found. None of this is organized intelligence; it is overheard conversation and pattern recognition. But it is accurate.
Germanic trader contacts: Cato can arrange a meeting with a specific Germanic trader who does not normally come to the fort. This is useful for information, for certain goods (amber, rune objects), and for sending messages beyond the frontier without official channels.
Passage notes: Cato can produce documentation – forged or legitimately obtained – that allows the party to move through the civilian settlements outside the fort without official military authorization. Useful for Sessions 2-3.

What triggers Cato’s trust: Buying drinks rather than asking questions; coming back more than once; showing that you understand the difference between the official reality of the fort and the actual reality; not asking him to do something that puts him at legal risk before he has decided you are worth that risk.

Sigrun (Germanic Trader)

Name: Sigrun Irsdottir Role: Germanic trader from a Suebi village three days north. Appears at the fort’s trade gate three days per week (or less, depending on conditions). Appearance: A woman of around thirty-five in Germanic dress, carrying herself with the particular confidence of someone who crosses a military frontier regularly and knows exactly how much she is worth to both sides.

Personality: Sigrun is a professional. She has a specific set of things she will sell, a specific set of things she will buy, and no interest in any conversation that does not lead to either. She has been making this trading run for seven years. She knows the fort better than most of the soldiers posted here.

She speaks sermo castrensis (military Latin) fluently, with a Germanic accent she does not try to conceal. She will not speak Germanic with Romans because she knows what they do with that: they assume everything she says is being evaluated.

What she will say when the party first meets her: “Amber, furs, dried meat, three rune carvings, a bundle of forest herbs. I need oil, salt, and two quality iron knives. Is there anything else, or should I go to the board?”

Camp Level 1 Inventory (Session 1 start)

Item	Available	Cost
Baltic amber (trade quality)	2-4 pieces per visit	8 denarii each (trade value 12+ in Rome)
Forest herbs (medicinal, unidentified)	1-3 bundles per visit	4 denarii per bundle
Rune carvings (decorative, possibly more)	1-2 per visit	5 denarii each
Dried meat, smoked fish (food quality)	Yes	2 denarii per day’s ration
Fur (winter quality)	1-2 per visit	10-20 denarii depending on quality
Germanic rune translation	No – not for standard trade	See Barrier Three
Information about the forest beyond the palisade	No – not for standard trade	See Barrier Three

Camp Level 2 Additions

Sigrun appears more frequently (4-5 days per week) and her inventory expands: - Amber discs with inscribed runes (magical component quality): 15 denarii each - Map corrections for the forest (3-day radius): available for trade - Germanic healing herb identification (she names what she is selling)

Barrier Three: Trusted Access

When the party’s standing with Sigrun reaches “they owe you something real” or better:

Forest intelligence: Sigrun knows where the sacred grove is. She will not say this directly. She will say it obliquely if she has decided the party is not going to do something destructive with the information. What she knows: the route, the markers (three specific trees that have been blazed at shoulder height in a pattern that looks like weather damage), the nearest Germanic settlement that has a relationship with the grove, and why Romans who have gone looking have not returned.
Germanic ritual knowledge: She knows the basic structure of the grove ritual, not the specific words. She knows what will and will not work. She knows that the volva Thusnelda is real, where she operates, and that she will not speak to Romans who arrive with soldiers.
Translation: Sigrun will translate any Germanic text or rune carving the party brings her, for Barrier Three characters. She reads Elder Futhark. She will not translate freely; she will ask what it is for and evaluate the answer.

What triggers Sigrun’s trust: Paying fairly and without complaint; not treating her as a source of free intelligence; doing something that demonstrates the party is not simply Roman soldiers who want something from her but people with some understanding of what the Germanic world actually is.

Upgrade trigger for Sigrun’s frequency: Bringing amber discs from the forest increases her interest and frequency of visits. Each amber disc offered to her moves the relationship statement one position toward “they owe you something real.”

The Vicus Characters

The six camp traders work inside the fort’s walls. The four people below work in the vicus outside. They operate under different rules: no rank, no requisition paperwork, no chain of command. They have survived multiple garrison rotations by being useful to everyone and beholden to no one. They are the party’s best assets for information, unofficial movement, and leverage that the fort’s institutional structures cannot provide.

See locations.qmd for the physical layout of the vicus and its key locations. This section covers the people who run it.

Brennus (Taberna Operator)

Name: Brennus (no family name given; he had one, he says, but left it in Lugdunum) Role: Operates the taberna facing the east gate. Food, drink, rooms to let, and a locked chest with a false bottom. Appearance: A broad man in his late forties, heavy-shouldered, with the permanent half-smile of someone who has heard every possible human story and found most of them entertaining. His hands are large enough to palm two cups at once. His eyes are not as comfortable as his face suggests.

Personality: Brennus is everyone’s friend and no one’s confidant until he decides otherwise. He survived his posting here by understanding exactly one principle: the person who knows everyone’s debt is never in debt himself. He does not collect debts for money. He collects them because knowing what people owe makes them predictable, and predictable people do not burn your taberna down.

He has a specific problem at the time of the campaign: he owes a significant favor to a Germanic trader who supplied him with goods during a supply drought two years ago, goods that were not on any manifest and that got the fort through a bad winter. The trader has not called the favor yet. Brennus knows it is coming. He does not know what form it will take. This makes him unusually receptive to people who might help him resolve the situation before it resolves itself.

Speech pattern: Direct, unhurried, and specific. He never says “people” when he can say “Centurion Flavius” and he never says “someone told me” when he can say “Rufus said this at the third cup, before his mood changed.” He trades in specifics because specifics are worth more.

Sample voice lines:

On first meeting, serving a drink: “You’re the ones the Legate sent into the ruins. You were in there a long time. People noticed. What’ll it be – the local or the officer’s?”
When someone tries to pump him for information without offering anything: “I’m going to save us both time. I have information. You want information. That’s a transaction. You haven’t told me what you’re offering yet. Take your time.”
If he trusts the party and the siege is starting: “The Germanic trader I owe. His name is Wulfric. He trades through Sigrun’s network. If you can get word to him that I paid the debt in service to the fort, he’ll count it. I need that before this gets worse.”

Brennus: OGAS (click to expand)

Two things keep Brennus up at night: the debt to Wulfric, and the taberna burning down. He will do almost anything that protects both. His neutrality is not cowardice: it is a business model. The man who owes everyone a favor is never the first one burned.

His currency is specific information, not gossip. He knows the names, the amounts, and the quiet desperation of 23 soldiers who drink at his bar. He calls this insurance. Everyone else would call it leverage.

His secret: three weeks ago a man overpaid for a room. Brennus noticed – overpayment like that only happens when someone else is covering the bill and nobody wants a record. He pulled the thread. He now knows the name of Brutus’s sleeper agent. The half-finished letter to Carnuntum sits in the false-bottom chest. He hasn’t sent it because he hasn’t decided whether sending it makes him safer or just makes him the next problem someone needs to solve. He is still deciding. Use this: the party can tip him one way or the other.

Information network connection: Brennus is the hub of the vicus network. Everything that happens in the taberna eventually reaches him: who sits with whom, who pays in a hurry, who orders a second cup instead of leaving when the watch changes. He shares this information in exchange for help with the Wulfric debt or at the Trusted tier threshold.

Vicus under siege behavior: Keeps the taberna open as a civilian shelter from the first night of the siege. Does not charge the civilians sheltering there. Contributes his private food stores to the fort’s communal supply if the party specifically asks and has reached Acquaintance or above. Sends runners to Lucilla every morning to confirm she is still in the relay house.

Lucilla (Mail Relay Widow)

Name: Lucilla Petronilla Role: Operates the unofficial mail relay from her house on the north side-lane. Former soldier’s wife; her husband died of the Antonine Plague eleven years ago. She stayed. Appearance: A woman in her mid-fifties with excellent posture and ink-stained fingers. She wears her hair pinned back practically. She looks like someone who has been doing important work for a long time and does not need anyone to tell her it is important.

Personality: Lucilla is precise and transactional in the best sense: clear about what she offers, clear about what she expects, and genuinely reliable. She has been running messages for fifteen years because she is good at it and because it gives her something that official channels do not give her: the ability to decide what gets through and what does not, without being subject to any officer’s discretion.

She has her own intelligence picture of the frontier, assembled from fifteen years of reading the covers of messages (she does not open them, but the covers are informative), observing who sends to whom, and listening to what the couriers say when they drop off and pick up. She does not volunteer this picture. She will share portions of it, once, in exchange for the party carrying a letter for her.

Her price is always the same, for everyone: you carry a letter for her in return. The letter may be to anywhere on her network. The party does not need to know what it contains. She will confirm it is not dangerous to the recipient. That is her one guarantee.

Speech pattern: Measured, economical, occasionally precise to the point of bluntness. She does not hedge. When she says “I can get this to Carnuntum in 36 hours,” she means it. When she says “I don’t know,” she means that too.

Sample voice lines:

On first meeting, when someone asks about sending a message: “Two asses per letter, 36 hours to Carnuntum, longer if the road is watched. Payment when I accept the letter, not on delivery. Do you have a letter?”
When someone asks what she knows about fort events: “I relay messages. I don’t read them. I do notice things. What specific thing are you asking about?”
If the party has been using her relay and she trusts them, before the siege: “There’s a letter I need delivered to a name in Eboracum. Not through any official route. If you can do that when this is over, I’ll tell you who the second military-papyrus sender was, and why the address they used is interesting.”

Lucilla: OGAS (click to expand)

Lucilla built a relay network over fifteen years and it is, at this point, more important to her than her own safety. She will run it through a siege, a fire, and probably her own death. Everything she does in the campaign serves that network.

Her goal right now: get one specific letter to Eboracum through channels the military courier system never touches. That letter names Brutus’s primary Carnuntum contact. It took fifteen years of watching address patterns and cipher conventions to assemble. She is not going to hand it over; she is going to trade it for carrying services.

Her secret: she knows exactly which fort officers used her relay for correspondence they could not put in the official record. She has the names and addresses memorized. She has been holding this because she needed the right moment. She believes the right moment is now. Give the party a chance to earn it, then let her spend it.

Information network connection: Lucilla knows who communicates with whom outside official channels. She connects the vicus network to settlements beyond the frontier and to Roman cities the fort’s official couriers reach on a two-week delay. At Trusted tier, she tells the party that one of the military-papyrus senders from the hook was using a cipher she has seen only once before, in a message sent from Carnuntum six months before the Tribune’s arrival.

Vicus under siege behavior: Does not leave the relay house. Continues operating the hook during the siege because message flow does not stop when the gate does; she uses the farrier’s window on the south side as a secondary drop point. Sends Brennus a daily note confirming she is operational. If the party secures her safety specifically, she gives them access to her full records of the military-papyrus correspondence, including the address on the letter she has been keeping as leverage.

Titus (The Half-Roman Boy)

Name: Titus (the soldiers call him Titus; his Germanic name is Dagaz, meaning “day,” which his mother gave him; he answers to both) Role: No official role. He is fourteen, half-Roman (father was a legionary, killed in a skirmish four years ago), half-Germanic (mother is from Vercingetorix’s extended tribal network, currently living in the vicus). He knows every tunnel, gap, loose board, and drainage channel in and around the fort. Appearance: Tall for his age, with a Germanic build and Roman dark eyes. He moves like someone who has been getting into places he is not supposed to be in for years: quickly, quietly, and with good situational awareness. He wears a mix of Germanic and Roman-style clothing that fits neither category exactly.

Personality: Titus is sharp, cautious, and not easily impressed. He has been watching Roman soldiers and Germanic warriors all his life and has formed clear opinions about both: neither group knows as much as it thinks it does, and both underestimate him consistently. He finds this useful.

He is not a thief and not a spy for any faction. He moves through the fort and the vicus because he has always moved through them, because nobody pays attention to a boy doing what boys do, and because he is curious in a way that has never been entirely safe and that he has never been able to stop. His loyalty is not available for purchase. It is available for earning, which is a different thing and takes longer.

Speech pattern: Economical. He does not explain himself unless asked. When he does explain, he is specific and accurate. He uses whichever language is most precise for the point he is making, switching between Latin and Germanic mid-sentence without noticing.

Sample voice lines:

On being approached by the party for the first time: “I know who you are. You went into the hole under the granary. What was in it?” (He waits. The information exchange is already underway in his mind.)
When someone tries to bribe him: “I don’t need money. I need to know if what you’re doing is going to make things here worse. Tell me honestly and I’ll help. Don’t and I won’t.”
During the siege, if the party has earned his trust, appearing at a critical moment: “There’s a way under the north ditch that the warband hasn’t found. It comes out behind the old latrine mound. I’ve been using it since I was ten. Do you want me to show you or not?”

Titus: OGAS (click to expand)

Titus is evaluating the party. That is his entire agenda right now. He wants to know if they are making things better or worse, because everything he does next depends on the answer. He does not commit before he has made that call.

What he is actually doing while nobody is watching him: informal recon on every faction in the fort. He has been doing this his entire life from force of habit. He knows things no fourteen-year-old with no official standing should know.

His secret, and it is a significant one: his mother has been receiving messages from Vercingetorix’s tribe through the south ditch gap Titus uses. He carried them without knowing their content. The messages stopped three days before the siege began. That timing tells him something on the Germanic side knew the siege was coming. He has not told anyone because he does not know yet what that means or who to trust with it. When the party earns his trust, this is what he gives them.

Information network connection: Titus knows the physical routes and gaps in the fort’s surveillance; he does not have an adult social network but he has an intimate knowledge of where people go when they think they are not being observed. At Trusted tier, he tells the party about the message route through the south ditch and what the silence of the last three days implies. At Ally tier: he guides the party through the drainage tunnel under the north ditch during the siege – the route that avoids the warband’s watch entirely.

Vicus under siege behavior: Stays in the vicus with his mother initially. After the first night, if the party has earned his trust, appears at whatever location is most useful and provides the physical route information they most need. Will not leave the vicus civilians without telling someone where they are going. If the party tries to send him away for safety, he ignores this.

Aldric (The Gallic Craftsman)

Name: Aldric of Avaricum (the name of his birth-city; he has not been back in twenty-three years) Role: Leatherworker and general repair craftsman. Has been at Vindolanda longer than any current soldier: through five garrison rotations, two commander changes, one partial fort reconstruction, and one plague year. He repaired the saddle of a man who died at Teutoburg’s aftermath and the boots of a man who helped build this fort’s first wall. Appearance: A Gaul in his mid-sixties, with hands that look like two old tools and a face that has given up expressing opinions it does not have to express. Gray-bearded, brown-eyed, unhurried. He works with the consistent efficiency of someone who stopped being in a rush approximately twenty years ago and found it improved the quality of everything.

Personality: Aldric does not take sides. He has watched too many sides come and go. He does not volunteer information. He has watched too many people punished for volunteering information at the wrong moment. He does not leave. He has nowhere he would rather be, and he is honest about this without sentimentality: this is where he is; this is what he does; there is no mystery to it.

He will answer one direct question per session if asked correctly. “Correctly” means: asked clearly, without preamble, by someone who has treated him as a professional rather than a source, and who will accept a direct answer including “I don’t know” or “I won’t say.” He does not offer follow-up. He does not offer context unless specifically asked for context. He answers the question and returns to his work.

He knows where bodies are buried. This is not a metaphor. He has repaired the equipment of men who died violently, including men whose deaths were not officially recorded as violent. He repaired the belt fitting on the sleeper agent’s message cylinder. He recognized the cylinder type. He said nothing at the time because nobody asked him.

Speech pattern: Plain, flat, and specific. No pleasantries. No hedging. Maximum two sentences per answer unless a longer answer is genuinely required. When he does not want to answer, he simply continues working and does not look up.

Sample voice lines:

When approached for repair work: “What’s broken?” (He looks at the item.) “Two days. Three denarii.”
When someone tries to ask him what he knows about the fort without asking a specific question: (He looks up once.) “That’s not a question.”
When asked one direct question at a session where the relationship is at Acquaintance or above: “The man with the cylinder belt fitting. He came back the next morning and paid me extra not to mention it. I’m mentioning it because you asked.”

Aldric: OGAS (click to expand)

Aldric wants one thing: to keep working. He has no ambition beyond the quality of his repairs and the security of his workshop. He will not take a side, participate in a conflict, or leave the vicus. This is not a negotiating position. It is simply what is true.

His method for surviving twenty-three years here: answer one direct question per session from anyone who treats him as a professional, then return to work. No follow-up. No volunteered context. Just the answer.

His secret is the notebooks. Twenty-three years of observation in a Gaulish dialect almost nobody in this region can read: garrison rotations, supply irregularities, officer behavior, things that happened but were never officially recorded. He has not decided who the notebooks are for. He has not destroyed them. If the party earns Ally tier across three sessions, he lets them read one in full. You decide which one based on what they most need.

Information network connection: Aldric is not part of the vicus information network in an active sense; he does not talk to people, share what he knows, or work with other vicus characters to cross-reference events. He is a single-source archive: everything he has observed for twenty-three years is in his notebooks, and one question per session unlocks one entry from that archive. At Ally tier (which requires sustained respectful interaction across three sessions), he will allow the party to read one specific notebook in full. The DM determines which one based on what the party most needs.

Vicus under siege behavior: Does not change. He continues working through the siege, repairs equipment for civilians and soldiers alike without distinction, and does not shelter in the taberna because he does not leave his workshop overnight as a matter of habit. If the east gate becomes unusable, he is simply unreachable until the situation changes. He does not consider this a problem.

The Vicus Information Network

The vicus knows things the fort does not. This section establishes what those things are at the start of the campaign, how information moves between the four vicus characters, and where the network’s limits are.

What the Vicus Knows (Campaign Start)

Six specific pieces of information currently held in the vicus network, not known inside the fort’s walls:

Which soldiers are in debt and to whom: Brennus’s ledger tracks 23 active debts among officers and soldiers who drink at the taberna. Three of these debts are to non-Roman lenders (two to Brennus’s Germanic contact, one to a merchant whose origin nobody has documented). These debts make the soldiers involved predictable in ways their officers do not account for.
The west workshop fire was set from inside: The fire that damaged the west workshops before the campaign’s start was investigated by Corvinus’s men and ruled an accident. Brennus’s taberna heard otherwise: a civilian cart-hand saw someone leave the west workshop at the second watch with a lantern and no cargo. He told Brennus. Brennus has not told anyone else because nobody asked.
Tribune Lucius met someone in the taberna’s upper room: Two nights before Sextus died, Tribune Lucius used the upper room of the taberna for a meeting. The other person arrived hooded, stayed for one hour, and left separately. Brennus saw them both but does not know who the second person was. He knows the hooded visitor paid in Carnuntum-minted coin.
A message in cipher came through Lucilla’s relay: Fourteen days before the Tribune’s arrival, a message arrived at Lucilla’s hook addressed to a name she did not recognize; it was written in a cipher she has encountered once before, in a letter from Carnuntum six months prior. The two messages used the same cipher convention. She relayed it, as contracted. She remembers the address because the name was unusual: Agrippa Felix, which is not a military name but a freedman’s name, and freedmen with that name pattern tend to work in senatorial households.
The farrier’s forge produced cage fittings: Aldric noticed. The farrier is not in the vicus information network (he is not a regular taberna attendee), but Aldric’s workshop is adjacent to the forge, and Aldric noticed the unusual metalwork. He has not told anyone because nobody asked. One direct question unlocks this.
The Germanic faces near the east gate are not random: Sigrun is not the only Germanic person appearing at the east gate regularly. Three others have been appearing at intervals: always different people, always brief, always on the days that the gate guard rotation changes. The vicus assumes this is ordinary trading reconnaissance. Titus does not. He has been watching them.

How Information Moves

Brennus to the network: He collects passively from the taberna’s traffic, then shares selectively with Lucilla (they have a working relationship built on the fact that she sends him business and he sends her senders). He does not share with Aldric (Aldric does not talk) or with Titus (Titus is a child, in his formal assessment, though he has quietly noticed that the child’s information tends to be accurate).

Lucilla to the network: She knows what Brennus shares with her. She knows what her own mail observation generates. She does not share with Aldric or Titus except in crisis situations where withholding information would cost lives.

Titus to the network: He shares with nobody except people he has decided to trust (which may include the party before it includes any adult in the vicus). He watches Brennus’s taberna from outside. He watches the gate. He watches everything.

Aldric to the network: He does not participate. He answers direct questions. That is the limit of his network involvement.

The taberna as hub: Almost everything passes through Brennus eventually because almost everyone passes through the taberna. The party’s fastest access to the full network is through Brennus at Trusted tier: he can introduce them to Lucilla as reliable, which advances her relationship statement by one step automatically; he can tell them Titus’s name and where to find him; he will not vouch for Aldric because Aldric does not need vouching for.

What the Vicus Does NOT Know

Set these limits clearly so the DM knows when to say no without making it feel arbitrary:

The vicus does not know what is in the ruins below the fort. They know something was found. They know the soldiers who worked the excavation came back changed. They do not know the spear exists, what it does, or what the ritual in the vault involved. This is the fort’s one genuine secret from the vicus.
The vicus does not know who specifically is Brutus’s sleeper agent. Brennus suspects a general category (someone who overpaid for lodging); he does not know the name. The agent has been careful about which civilian spaces he uses.
The vicus does not know what Vercingetorix’s tribe specifically wants. They know the Germanic siege force includes people from multiple tribes. They know the tribes are not all aligned. They do not know the internal politics. Titus knows more than the others because of his mother’s messages, but the messages stopped three days before the siege.
The vicus does not know where the sacred grove is. Sigrun knows; she does not share this with the vicus.
The vicus does not have information about events inside the principia or the Legate’s private quarters unless someone inside chose to tell them. Lucilla knows some of what goes out; she does not know what is discussed before it becomes a letter.

Camp Level System

What Camp Level Means

Camp Level represents the fort’s overall operational capability: the quality and availability of goods and services, the morale and cooperation of the traders, the physical state of the fort’s defenses, and the party’s demonstrated competence as factors in the fort’s survival.

Camp Level is not a single thing. It is a state that affects all traders, all locations, and the fort’s defensive capacity simultaneously. When the camp upgrades, announce it out loud: “Word has moved through the fort. Rufus has new iron to work with. Valeria’s surgery is properly stocked for the first time. The ballista crew has been drilling.”

Camp Level cannot be rushed by spending money or spending downtime. It requires demonstrated action in the world. The triggers below are session-anchored: they are things the party does that the fort notices and responds to. Two triggers are required per upgrade so that a single lucky event cannot skip levels.

Camp Level 1 (Campaign Start, Sessions 1-2)

The fort is adequately provisioned but not well. The traders are professional but guarded. The party is new and unproven.

Physical state: - North gate: patched after routine repairs; functional; no ballista crew assigned - Valeria’s space: a barracks corner with a locked chest of supplies; adequate for field triage - Rufus’s workshop: maintenance only; no quality iron in stock for custom work - Sigrun: seasonal stall, leaves between sessions when the weather turns or the road is watched - Shrine: informal; no dedicated priest; Paterculus tends it in addition to his official duties - Granary: standard construction; vulnerable to fire

Mechanical effects at Level 1: - Morale pool: 3 (available as a resource for specific checks; see Morale Pool below) - Social checks inside the fort: no modifier - Siege damage output: standard

All traders at starting inventory as described above.

Camp Level 2 (First Upgrade)

The fort is operating above minimum. The traders have what they need to do real work. The party has demonstrated they are worth the investment.

Upgrade requires TWO of the following triggers:

Complete a supply mission that brings materials back to the fort (any mission in Session 2 or 3 that delivers raw materials to Quartus, Rufus, or Valeria)
Repair the north gate after Session 1 damage (downtime action + DC 14 Athletics; requires tools from Rufus)
Formally acknowledge the spring Genius Loci (complete the propitiation formula from locations.qmd; the spring warms briefly when done correctly)
Negotiate a trade agreement with Vercingetorix’s tribe (not just a truce: an exchange of named goods on each side, witnessed by Vercingetorix)

Physical state at Level 2: - North gate: reinforced with new timber; one ballista operational; in any siege round where the party controls the north wall, the ballista crew adds +1d10 piercing damage to the round’s total damage output - Valeria’s surgery: properly outfitted with a real operating table, correct light, and a full herb stock; characters who spend a full short rest inside her surgery regain the maximum possible result on any hit dice spent; all Medicine checks made inside her surgery gain +2 - Rufus: weapon upgrades available; he can add a +1 property to one weapon per downtime period; costs raw materials sourced from Sigrun or the forest (not purchasable through Quartus) - Sigrun: permanent stall; she appears every trading day regardless of weather; her full stock is always present - Shrine: formally tended by a rotational lay-priest from the legion; Religion checks attempted inside the fort reduce DC by 2 (Paterculus explains the divine situation more clearly now that he has support) - Granary: fire-resistant treatment applied to interior walls

Mechanical effects at Level 2: - Morale pool: 5 - Social checks inside the fort: -1 DC to all checks (people trust the party’s judgment) - Siege damage output: +1d10 from ballista on controlled walls

Camp Level 3 (Second Upgrade, Available Session 3+)

The fort is siege-ready. Every system is at operational excellence. The party is known and trusted. The camp functions as a community that can survive what is coming.

Upgrade requires TWO of the following triggers (available Session 3 onward):

Repair the gate after Session 4’s initial breach before nightfall (DC 16 Athletics; the party must lead the effort personally, not delegate it)
Formally dedicate the shrine with a genuine sacrifice (the grove ritual standards apply: the sacrifice must be something real, not purchased; Paterculus confirms when the altar accepts it)
Achieve Allied tier relationship with Varro (he endorses the upgrades through military channels, unlocking resources that require officer authorization)
Bring Thusnelda’s expertise inside the fort (requires her Trusted tier or above; she comes as a consultant, not a prisoner, and will leave if treated otherwise)

Physical state at Level 3: - All walls reinforced; two ballistae operational; covered approach to the north gate eliminated - Granary: fully protected with fire-suppressant materials; fire requires three consecutive failed defensive rounds to spread rather than one - Valeria: field hospital with full surgical capacity; once per session she can stabilize any downed character as a reaction (no action cost to the party; she is watching and moves immediately) - Rufus: masterwork upgrades available; he can permanently improve one weapon or one piece of armor per session to +1 quality; this is permanent, not temporary - Quartus: full military supply chain access, including pilum stockpile and arcuballista bolt reserves; heavy equipment available without officer requisition for the party - Sigrun: intelligence network active; once per session, ask her one yes-or-no question about what is happening outside the walls; she answers from her trading network contacts; the answer is accurate but may be a day or two behind current events - Shrine: dedicated; Mars ritual DCs reduced by 3; Cassia’s augury DC drops by 2

Mechanical effects at Level 3: - Morale pool: 8 - Social checks inside the fort: -2 DC to all checks - Siege damage output: +2d10 from ballistae; covered approach eliminated (attackers take opportunity attacks from the wall before reaching the gate)

Role-Gated Upgrade Triggers

Some upgrades require the relevant role to be filled by a living PC or NPC. If the role is vacant when the trigger is attempted, the trigger fails: the institution cannot maintain itself without the people who run it.

Upgrade	Requires
Ballista installation (Level 2)	Faber living and at the fort when the installation is done
Surgery upgrade to Level 2	Cassia (medicus) alive and at Trusted tier or higher
Shrine formal dedication (Level 3)	Sacerdos or Flamen Martialis living and performing the rite
Heavy equipment access (Level 3, Quartus)	Optio alive and willing to sign the officer authorization

Role vacancy as degradation: If two or more roles are simultaneously vacant (neither PC nor NPC holding them), the camp functions at Level 1 regardless of prior upgrade status. The institution cannot sustain the Level 2 or Level 3 state without the people who run its functions. Roles filled by NPCs who are sick, imprisoned, or otherwise non-functional count as vacant for this purpose.

The DM tracks vacancy status. Announce degradation the same way as an upgrade: through a named trader’s voice. Valeria’s surgery is back to a corner and a kit. The ballista has no crew assigned. The shrine is untended for the first time in the campaign.

Companion recruitment via roles: The optio role player can authorize legionary companion deployment without requiring the standard Varro Trusted+ relationship: their role carries the necessary officer authorization. The explorator role player, if the party has reached Trusted tier with Vercingetorix’s tribe, can recruit one Germanic scout as a non-legionary companion for any session in the forest. Germanic scouts follow different rules: they will not enter the ruins under any circumstances, they provide advantage on all Perception checks in the forest, and they use the generic legionary stat block with Survival +5 substituted for Athletics +3.

Morale Pool

The morale pool is a shared resource. It starts at the level’s maximum and decreases when things go badly. It does not recover between scenes in the same session; it recovers to maximum between sessions if no catastrophic event ended the previous session.

Spending morale: A character can call on the fort’s morale as a bonus action once per scene. Expend 1 morale point to give one allied soldier advantage on their next attack roll, saving throw, or ability check. At 0 morale, soldiers begin making DC 12 Wisdom saves to avoid the Frightened condition when taking damage.

Losing morale: The DM reduces the morale pool by 1 for each of the following that occurs in a session: an allied soldier dies as a direct result of a party decision; the party retreats from a position without orders; supernatural effects go unaddressed for more than one full scene; the granary or shrine is damaged.

Restoring morale: The pool restores 1 point (up to maximum) when the party completes a crisis without casualties; when a named NPC publicly endorses the party’s leadership; or when the party performs a successful ritual at the shrine.

Upgrade Announcement

When a Camp Level upgrade triggers, describe it from the inside, not as a system announcement. The DM can frame it as a scene transition:

Camp Level 1 to 2: Rufus is still at the anvil when the party returns, but the anvil has moved. He cleared space for a second workbench. He does not look up: “The iron you brought. I’ve been thinking about what to do with it.”

Camp Level 2 to 3: Valeria’s corner no longer looks like a corner. Someone built walls. Someone installed a proper door. She is writing notes at a new desk. She looks up when the party enters: “I have a room now. I told them I needed a room. They listened.” She does not say who. She writes down the date.

Use a trader’s voice to deliver the upgrade. The system is invisible; the people who benefit from it are not.

Raw Materials as Story Currency

Items the party retrieves from the Germanic forest unlock specific upgrades and relationship opportunities. This list covers the most significant materials.

Amber Discs

Found in the hidden archive and the sacred grove area (see locations.qmd). Each disc has a small rune inscription that Paterculus can partially read.

Effects: - Trade value: 50 denarii each if sold in Rome; 15 denarii in the fort economy (Sigrun’s price) - Offered to Sigrun: moves her relationship statement one position toward “they owe you something real” - Offered to Paterculus: he can interpret the rune inscription; unlocks the second Augury for that session - Offered to Rufus: he recognizes the amber as high-quality forge-flux material; contributes to Camp Level 2 metalwork upgrade

Medicinal Herb Bundle

Found in the Germanic forest during travel scenes. Identified by Survival DC 12 or by asking Sigrun.

Effects: - Expands Valeria’s herb stock for one session (she gains one additional dose of healing herbs) - Valeria shares one piece of DC 15 medicine knowledge for free (from knowledge.qmd, the medicus tier) - Contributes to Camp Level 2 trigger (one bundle = one step toward trigger)

Iron Ore (Load)

Found in the rocky outcroppings east of the sacred grove. Requires Athletics DC 14 to extract a meaningful quantity (counts as heavy load).

Effects: - Rufus upgrades one weapon to +1 quality for free (one load = one weapon) - Contributes to Camp Level 2 metalwork trigger - Rufus’s relationship statement advances one position

Germanic Rune Carving

Trade goods from Sigrun, or found on standing stones and artifacts in the forest.

Effects: - Paterculus can identify the religious significance (free DC 15 Religion result for that session) - Sigrun will translate any Germanic text the party has for the rest of that session (she is now engaged by the fact that someone brought her something interesting) - If the rune carving is unusual or from a sacred site, Paterculus’s relationship statement advances one position

Supply Caravan Events

A wagon train from Carnuntum arrives every four to six weeks with grain, replacement weapons, payroll, and whatever the quartermaster managed to requisition. The party can interact with, intercept, or influence these convoys.

Roll a d6 at the start of each session, or choose:

d6	Event
1	The convoy is overdue. It should have arrived four days ago. Three possible causes: ambush (roll d3: 1 = Germanic raiders, 2 = Tribune’s Praetorians, 3 = delayed by road collapse). One cause is true; the party can investigate.
2	The convoy arrives, short. Two-thirds of the expected grain. The quartermaster notes that someone in Carnuntum requisitioned part of the shipment for “special purposes.” Corvinus does not say who; Quartus’s second ledger has the answer.
3	The convoy arrives, with a passenger. A civilian physician, a retired legionary with business at the fort, or a senatorial courier with sealed orders. Determine which based on what the campaign needs.
4	The convoy arrives complete. Camp Level 2 trigger fires. All traders have expanded stock for one session. Morale is noticeably better.
5	The convoy arrives with luxury goods. A case of decent wine, eastern spices, a package for the Legate. Cato intercepts a bottle. Cato’s stock expands.
6	The convoy is stopped at the river crossing. The ford is flooded (spring) or contested (Germanic activity). The party can escort it through or watch the Legate send someone else to try.

Player agency with the convoy: The party can request specific items from the next convoy through Quartus (requires DC 14 Persuasion or a direct Legate order). Items can be flagged by the party as priority, which increases the chance of arrival but also increases the chance that someone in the supply chain notices the request and asks questions.

DM Notes: Running the Economy

Don’t announce the system. The traders have names and personalities. Players will figure out the upgrade system by interacting with it. The moment of “wait, what we brought back last session affected what Rufus can do this session” is satisfying precisely because it was not telegraphed.

Let relationships develop unevenly. One player will gravitate toward Cato; another will build standing with Valeria. That is correct behavior. The party will have different access to different parts of the fort’s information network, which is both realistic and dramatically useful.

Use traders as session hooks. Paterculus can deliver the omen information that opens Session 1. Sigrun’s unusual absence from the trade gate can signal something wrong in the forest before Session 2. Cato’s information about unusual activity at the river can open the forest travel scene in Session 3. The traders are not just vendors; they are the fort’s eyes.

Upgrade Camp Level at dramatically useful moments. The rules give triggers; you choose the timing. If Camp Level 2 would make Session 2 more interesting by giving the party resources they need, trigger it. If keeping the party at Camp Level 1 creates productive scarcity during Session 1, hold it. The system is a tool.

Trader OGAS Reference

Each camp trader has objectives, goals, agendas, and secrets that drive their behavior. Like main NPCs, they pursue these whether or not the party engages them.

Quartus: OGAS (click to expand)

Quartus wants to finish this posting with his record clean. Everything he does is in service of that. The paperwork is not bureaucracy to him: it is his armor. If it is on the form, he is not responsible for the outcome. If it is not on the form, he is not responsible for the outcome. This is how he has survived.

His secret: there is a second document in his quarters that records everything Corvinus has requisitioned off-book from the ruins excavation. Quartus has not destroyed it because he does not steal, and falsifying the record by omission is still falsification. He has been sitting on it, uncomfortable, waiting for someone with the standing to use it. The party may be that someone.

Rufus: OGAS (click to expand)

Rufus wants to do exceptional work and be left alone to do it. That is his entire agenda. He assesses everything before speaking, and he will not tell someone their equipment is fine when it is not. He respects people who handle things well and ignores everyone else.

His secret is the thing he guards most carefully: he spent three years trading in Germanic territory before he enlisted. He knows their metalworking traditions, their religious sites, and their settlement patterns better than anyone else in the fort. He has never volunteered this because the army would classify him as an intelligence asset immediately and he would become something other than a smith. He prefers being a smith. The party will have to earn this.

Valeria: OGAS (click to expand)

Valeria keeps the fort functional and her records accurate. Those are her two jobs and she does both without sentiment. She wastes no time on people who perform concern without contributing anything useful. If you come to her with information, she will give you information back. If you come to perform being worried, she will tell you to sit down.

Her secret frightens her: twelve soldiers, all with the same symptom cluster after time near the ruins. Disturbed sleep, reactive pupils, elevated resting temperature, unusual appetite changes. Identical, in each case. She cannot name what she is seeing. She has not reported it upward because she has nothing to report – no diagnosis, no cause, no treatment. She is watching something no medicine she knows can address, and she is documenting it anyway, because documentation is what she has. This is the most useful single thing the party can get from her.

Paterculus: OGAS (click to expand)

Paterculus is trying to understand the divine situation before it becomes unmanageable. He performs his duties correctly every morning because the duties are what he has. He documents before he interprets. He asks more questions than he answers because in thirty years he has learned that the wrong interpretation is worse than no interpretation.

His secret is the one keeping him up at night: twelve consecutive failed morning sacrifices. In thirty years of practice he has seen that specific streak one other time. It was the night before a divine manifestation destroyed a provincial temple. He has not reported it upward because he does not know what he would say, and because saying it aloud makes it more real than he is ready for. When the party asks what he personally thinks – not what the augury says, but what he thinks – this is what comes out. Give it to them carefully.

Cato: OGAS (click to expand)

Cato wants to know what is coming before it arrives. His entire network exists to serve that one goal. He never acts against the dominant power until he knows who the dominant power is going to be: that is how he has survived this long.

His secret is the decision he is currently sitting on: Tribune Lucius has approached him through an intermediary asking for information on the party’s movements and intentions. Cato has neither agreed nor refused. He is weighing whether the party becomes worth protecting more than Lucius’s offer is worth taking. The party’s behavior in Sessions 1 and 2 is what tips that scale. If they come back to his bar regularly, buy rounds, and do not demand things from him: he chooses them. If they ignore him until they need something: he takes Lucius’s money.

Sigrun: OGAS (click to expand)

Sigrun’s one goal is keeping her village’s access to both sides of the frontier intact. Every interaction she has is evaluated against that: does this help or threaten the route? If she senses Roman intelligence interest in her contacts, she disengages without explanation. No argument, no scene. She simply leaves and comes back when things are safer.

Her secret changes the shape of the whole campaign: her village has a relationship with the sacred grove. She has met Thusnelda. Three weeks ago she was told to stay away from the fort if Roman soldiers began moving with purpose into the forest. She does not yet know whether that threshold has been crossed. When the party starts moving toward the grove with intent, she notices – and she has to decide what her village needs her to do. That decision depends entirely on what the party showed her before that moment.

Per-Session Trader State

What each trader knows, wants, and is doing across the five sessions. Read the column for your current session before it begins.

Trader	Session 1	Session 2	Session 3	Session 4	Session 5
Quartus	Efficient and watchful; noting that the excavation requisitions are unusual; quietly preparing a second copy of his ledger	Alarmed by the convoy delays; has flagged Lucius’s equipment requisitions; nervous about what Corvinus knows	Under pressure from Corvinus to surrender any unofficial documents; scared but has not complied	Running emergency rationing; holding the locked reserves for someone he trusts; open to party access if relationship warrants	Either evacuated civilians or held the east storeroom; if the party protected him, gives them complete access to everything
Rufus	Professional and cool; will tell the party honestly if their weapons are substandard	Examines any Germanic weapons recovered from the raid; becomes noticeably more engaged if party brings materials	Forge running at capacity repairing siege damage; sleeping in shifts; will work through the night for the party if relationship is established	Exhausted; has started forging improvised weapons for civilians; tells no one about his Germanic knowledge unless fully trusted	Either helping brace the principia doors or gone; if present, offers the party the best weapons he has left
Valeria	Treating construction injuries; quietly documenting the symptom cluster; will mention it obliquely if directly asked	Treating raid casualties; overwhelmed; will ask party for medicinal herbs if she knows they can get them	Reduced patient load with party in the field; watching the symptom cluster worsen in the workers who remain	Working 20-hour days; triage only; will share corruption observations with trusted party for the first time	Has a full clinical picture of corruption progression; will give it to the party if they ask; it is the most useful single document for Session 5 preparation
Paterculus	Frightened and professional; the omens are already bad and he knows it; reaches out to the party if they show any religious awareness	More frightened; the raid omens are specifically different from the excavation omens in ways that scare him; has sent a message to Carnuntum temple, no reply	Has received one reply from Carnuntum (it does not help); performing ritual every dawn alone; will give the party his full reading if trusted	The divine situation is fully manifest; his role shifts from diviner to witness; he knows what is happening and will say it clearly to someone ready to hear	Has prepared a written summary of every omen from the campaign; hands it to the party if trusted; it reads as a timeline of the corruption event
Cato	Watching; has noticed the party as a new variable; serving drinks and listening	Has received Lucius’s approach; has not decided; will give the party an opening to build trust that will determine his choice	Not at the bar if party is in the forest; if party returns, his decision point has passed: he has chosen a side based on what he saw before they left	Bar is a civilian shelter; has made the decision not to charge people sheltering there; this has cost him Lucius’s goodwill permanently; will tell the party about Lucius’s contact	Either evacuated with civilians or dead; if alive, knows exactly what happened and who did what; will say it freely now that there is nothing left to protect
Sigrun	Professional and cautious; watching for signs of unusual Roman activity near the tree line	Knows something happened in the forest from other sources; cautious at the gate; will not discuss forest routes without trust established	Not at the trade gate during forest sessions; if party encounters her during travel, she is moving away from the fort deliberately and will not say why	Does not come to the fort during the siege; unreachable by normal means; can be contacted through Cato’s Germanic trader network if that relationship exists	If the party finds a way to reach her: the Germanic warbands besieging the fort are not working together; she knows which two chiefs could be split from the siege with the right approach

Trader Voice Reference

Three characteristic lines per trader. Different from their opening lines above: these show their range across the campaign.

Quartus

When the party tries to bypass his process: “I understand the situation is urgent. The form is on the left board. It takes five minutes. I’ll be here when you’re done.”
When someone treats him with genuine respect: “You’re the third person to ask me that today. You’re the only one who waited for the answer.”
During the siege, quietly, if trusted: “There’s a box in the back I wasn’t supposed to keep. I kept it. I think you’re going to need what’s in it.”

Rufus

Examining a weapon the party brings him: “This was made by someone who cared. Then it was maintained by someone who didn’t. I can fix the second part.”
When asked about Germanic metalwork (before trust): “I know what I know from the work. You want a historian, talk to Paterculus.”
If trusted, much later: “The rune on this is tiwaz. I’ve seen it before. Not in Rome.”

Valeria

When someone tries to rush her: “Sit. You have a fever, two lacerations, and you haven’t slept. You’re not going anywhere for four hours. Argue and I add two more.”
When someone brings her useful information unprompted: “You noticed that. Most people don’t notice that.” (She does not elaborate. She writes it down.)
If trusted, Session 4, quietly: “I’ve been watching him. The changes aren’t random. There’s a sequence. I think it starts before the symptoms show.”

Paterculus

When someone dismisses the omens: “I have been a haruspex for thirty years. I have read bad signs before. I have never read signs like this.”
When performing the morning ritual alone: (He does not look up.) “The fire died again. Come back tomorrow. Or don’t. I will be here either way.”
If trusted, with complete honesty: “I think something is coming that the rituals were not designed to stop. I think I am the only person at this fort who understands what that means. I am not sure understanding it helps.”

Cato

When someone asks him a question directly: “That’s a question with a price. Not a coin price – I’m not that crude. A price. You understand the difference?”
When the party has spent enough time at his bar to matter: “You’ve been coming here for a while. People who come here that often are either comfortable or they want something. Which is it for you?”
During the siege, with civilians sheltering in the bar: “I’m not charging them. Don’t ask me to explain it. Some things you do because they’re right and the economics don’t enter into it.”

Sigrun

When someone tries to use Roman authority with her: “I trade here because I choose to. If you’d like to change that, I’ll leave now and come back when someone reasonable is working the gate.”
When the party trades fairly and without commentary: “Same time next week.” (She means it as a compliment.)
If trusted and the grove comes up: “I know what you’re looking for. I’m not going to tell you I don’t. I’m going to ask you one question first, and the answer determines what I say next.”

Trader Reaction Tables

How each trader responds to the three most likely party approaches.

Quartus

Party approach	Quartus’s response
Demand special access without justification	“That is not how this works. If you have a military need, file a requisition. If it’s urgent, see the Legate.” He is not hostile; he is procedurally inflexible.
Work through proper channels, accept the process	He is noticeably warmer. He will mention things that are not technically on the ledger – “the board is current as of this morning, but if you’re asking about rope stock specifically, I believe we have more than it shows.”
Attempt to bribe or pressure	“I’m going to assume that didn’t happen. Do you need something from the official inventory?” He files it away. It costs the party one full relationship step with him permanently.

Rufus

Party approach	Rufus’s response
Ask for specific weapon work	Assesses the weapon silently, states what he can and cannot do, gives a time and cost estimate. No upselling. No conversation unless the work requires it.
Bring him materials from the forest	He examines them carefully. If the material is useful, he nods: “I can do something with this.” The relationship advances automatically. No social check required – the material speaks for itself.
Try to leverage his Germanic knowledge	Before trust: “I know what I know from the work.” After trust: one piece of specific information, offered without being asked for in exchange. He does not transact in this knowledge; he shares it when he judges the moment right.

Valeria

Party approach	Valeria’s response
Ask for medical supplies	Efficient and accurate. Tells them exactly what she has, what it costs, and what she needs in return if her stock is low. Does not moralize about why they were hurt.
Bring her medicinal herbs from the forest, identified or not	Immediately interested. Sets aside whatever she was doing. “Where did you find this?” She shares one piece of DC 15 medicine knowledge freely in exchange.
Ask about the corruption symptoms	Before trust: “Soldiers show a range of stress responses in unusual operational circumstances.” After trust: she opens the documentation. It is detailed and frightening and she does not look away from it.

Paterculus

Party approach	Paterculus’s response
Ask for an augury	Proceeds immediately and correctly. Does not rush. Gives the result accurately at whatever DC his roll achieves. If the result is auspicia turbata, says so and explains what that means.
Ask what he personally thinks (not what the augury says)	Stops. Considers for a moment. Then answers honestly, which is the only approach that advances the relationship. “I think the situation is beyond what the official rites were designed to address.”
Dismiss or downplay the omens	Exhausted, not angry. “I have filed every report. I have performed every piaculum. You are welcome to your assessment.” He does not argue. He also does not share anything further with that person for the rest of the session.

Cato

Party approach	Cato’s response
Ask for information directly without building relationship	Professionally friendly, gives surface-level camp gossip (the kind on the public board), and steers the conversation toward what they’re drinking. Nothing useful until relationship is established.
Buy drinks regularly and wait	Over two or three visits: Cato starts adding context. “That courier who came through Tuesday – he was nervous. Couriers aren’t nervous. I noticed.” The relationship advances through presence, not through asking.
Invoke Roman authority or status to demand information	“I’m a licensed trader. I sell wine and food. I don’t have any information. Will that be the local or the officer’s selection?” He is perfectly pleasant and perfectly sealed.

Sigrun

Party approach	Sigrun’s response
Ask for forest intelligence directly, first meeting	“I trade goods. What you’re asking for isn’t a good.” She is not rude. She ends the conversation cleanly and moves to the next transaction.
Trade fairly, at her prices, without negotiating down	She notices. She does not comment. She comes back next week. Over several sessions, this builds enough trust to reach “they have shown me basic respect.”
Use Roman authority or demand cooperation	She gathers her remaining goods, nods to the gate guard she knows by name, and leaves. She will return only after the party demonstrates a different approach. A character who has already built trust with her can attempt DC 16 Persuasion to prevent this before it happens; otherwise the relationship resets to baseline.

Trader Skill DC Reference

GM Reference: Full DC Tables for All Six Traders (click to expand)

Detailed DC tables for all six traders using the seven-principle framework from skill_framework.qmd. Each trader has four tiers, a signature skill, failure states, cascade unlocks, and investment options.

Quartus: DC Table

Tier	How to reach it	What becomes available
Stranger	Default	Standard ledger items; official prices; no deviation from the board
Acquaintance (DC 12 Persuasion)	One positive interaction; treating his process as real, not as an obstacle	Will mention discrepancies he has noticed without being asked; will flag an unusual requisition “as a matter of professional courtesy”
Trusted (DC 15 Persuasion, or: History DC 12 about military supply logistics)	Multiple professional interactions; signature skill auto-advance	Will tell the party when the next convoy is due and what it carries; mentions Corvinus’s requisitions in neutral language; gives advance warning of anything that will affect supply
Ally (DC 18, or: bring him something from the ruins that should be on the manifest but is not)	Investment check, or sustained relationship reaching this tier naturally	Shows the second ledger; gives access to emergency reserves without authorization; will testify about Corvinus’s off-book activity if asked

Signature skill: History DC 12 regarding military supply logistics. A character who knows how supply chains work is speaking Quartus’s language. This auto-advances to Trusted regardless of prior relationship.

Failure states: - Persuasion fails below DC 12: Official channels only. He is not unfriendly; he is inflexible. The request goes through the Legate’s desk, which creates an auditable record Corvinus may notice. - Bribery attempt, any DC: Permanent wariness. All future DCs with Quartus increase by 2. The second ledger becomes unreachable except through a major investment. - Intimidation attempt: He sends for Corvinus immediately. The party has one round to reconsider.

Cascade unlock: Reaching Ally tier reveals the second ledger, which requires DC 16 Investigation to extract specific useful information (what Corvinus took, when, and what it was flagged as).

Investment options: - Spend 1 hour helping with inventory (before Session 2 only): advantage on the next Persuasion check. - Bring him an unlogged item from the ruins: he shows you the second ledger without any roll.

Rufus: DC Table

Tier	How to reach it	What becomes available
Stranger	Default	Repair, sharpening, arrow production; standard prices; no opinions
Acquaintance (DC 12 Persuasion, or: bring any crafted material from the forest)	One interaction where you showed competence or brought something useful	Advice on equipment quality without being asked; he mentions when something is about to fail
Trusted (DC 15 Persuasion, or: smith’s tools proficiency, or: Athletics DC 12 while helping at the forge)	Signature skill auto-advance; or investment in the forge	Custom work available (grip wrapping, blade weighting); mentions that he knows more about Germanic ironwork than he says
Ally (DC 18, or: bring iron ore from the forest)	Iron ore investment, or sustained relationship	Reveals Germanic metalworking knowledge; describes specific sites and techniques; the blade forged with tiwaz interpretation (see original trader section)

Signature skill: Smith’s tools proficiency OR Athletics DC 12 (helping at the forge). He evaluates people by how they handle physical work and equipment. Sitting down and talking is not the way to advance with Rufus.

Failure states: - Persuasion fails: Minimum service; no guarantees given; no conversation. Not hostile. Neutral and final. - Insight to read him fails: He says less than he otherwise would. He has noticed the attempt and found it presumptuous. - Flattery: He stops listening. No DC required; flattery triggers this automatically.

Cascade unlock: Ally tier reveals Germanic knowledge, which then requires DC 14 History to place the metalwork he describes in its correct tribal and geographic context (this identifies the tribe that made a specific item the party found).

Investment options: - Bring iron ore from the forest: auto-advance to Trusted; one weapon upgraded to +1 for free; no roll required. - Work the bellows for an hour (Strength-based, no roll): advantage on all checks with him for the session; he talks while he works.

Valeria: DC Table

Tier	How to reach it	What becomes available
Stranger	Default	Standard medical supplies; wound care; fever treatment; basic antitoxin
Acquaintance (DC 12 Persuasion, or: bring any medicinal herb bundle from the forest)	One session where the party treated her time as valuable or brought something useful	Will share one piece of DC 15 medicine knowledge freely when the party brings herbs; will mention she has noticed unusual patient patterns
Trusted (DC 15 Persuasion, or: Medicine DC 13)	Peer-to-peer competence (signature skill) or sustained respectful interaction	Shares the symptom cluster documentation for the workers; gives honest assessment of a character’s corruption progression if asked directly
Ally (DC 18, or: assist with a procedure without being asked)	Investment; or three sessions of consistent respectful interaction	Full clinical picture of corruption progression; the specific DC 17 poison knowledge from `knowledge.qmd` shared as practical information; her honest assessment before Session 5 of what she thinks will happen

Signature skill: Medicine DC 13. A character who demonstrates actual medical knowledge earns instant Trusted tier access. She speaks peer-to-peer with someone who understands anatomy and trauma.

Failure states: - Rushing her or being demanding: Clinical mode. She treats you as a difficult patient: correct and limited. No information beyond what she is required to provide. - Intimidation: She sends for Corvinus. She will not treat the character again that session. This is a hard lockout. - Flattery about her gender or unusual position: She ends the conversation. Not angry; done.

Cascade unlock: Ally tier gives access to the symptom cluster documentation, which requires DC 13 Medicine to interpret correctly (understanding the progression pattern, not just the symptoms).

Investment options: - Deliver medicinal herbs from the forest: Trusted tier access for the session; she names the plants. - Assist with a procedure without being asked (hold patient, hand implements): advantage on all future Medicine checks in her presence; she gives you one documentation page.

Paterculus: DC Table

Tier	How to reach it	What becomes available
Stranger	Default	Standard augury (DC 13/15/17 tiers); omen identification; ritual blessing
Acquaintance (DC 12 Persuasion, or: attend the morning ceremony voluntarily)	One investment or one conversation that takes his work seriously	He explains what the omen patterns mean without being asked; he names the precedent he is afraid of
Trusted (DC 15 Persuasion, or: Religion DC 12 with a genuine question)	Signature skill or investment; one session of consistent engagement	Full omen reading without filtering; his personal interpretation of the divine situation, not just the official reading; the Quinquatria weapon text
Ally (DC 18, or: sustained relationship across three sessions)	Three sessions of engaged interaction	His written summary of every omen from the campaign start; campaign-specific Mars interpretation; the warning about what the morning sacrifice failure specifically predicts

Signature skill: Religion DC 12 with a genuine question (not “what does the augury say” but “what do you think”). A character who asks what he thinks rather than what the gods say reaches Trusted tier for that session automatically.

Failure states: - Dismissing or downplaying omens: He gives only public augury (DC 13 maximum); no personal interpretation for the rest of the session. Not angry; finished. - Asking for quick reading without ceremony: Result is accurate but shallow; he does not interpret, only reports. The DC 17 result becomes unavailable. - Treating augury as a tactical resource rather than religious rite: He performs it correctly and says nothing else. He has noted that you do not understand what you are doing with it.

Cascade unlock: Ally tier gives his full written document, which requires DC 15 Religion to understand the implications of the pattern (specifically: what the twelve failed sacrifices mean about Mars’s current intention versus his displayed behavior).

Investment options: - Attend the full morning ceremony (30 minutes, costs a downtime action): Trusted tier for the session. - Bring a rune carving for him to interpret: second augury available this session (DC +2 for him).

Cato: DC Table

Tier	How to reach it	What becomes available
Stranger	Default	Local wine; food; camp gossip at public-board level
Acquaintance (DC 12 Persuasion, or: buy drinks regularly across two sessions)	Presence over time; pattern-recognition interaction	He adds context to events (“that courier was nervous; couriers are not nervous”); mentions that he notices things without saying what
Trusted (DC 15 Persuasion, or: Insight DC 13 to find the story he wants to tell; or: return visits without asking questions for two sessions)	Signature skill or sustained presence	Tells the party what he has actually seen that they missed; mentions Lucius’s approach if he has decided the party is worth the risk; Germanic trader contact names
Ally (DC 18, or: three consecutive sessions without asking for anything)	Investment through presence; or one session where the party clearly chose his side over Lucius	Full intelligence network; passage notes; the specific Lucius contact information regardless of decision state; he will actively help during the siege

Signature skill: Insight DC 13 to identify the story he wants to tell tonight, OR Performance DC 11 to be the kind of person worth telling it to. Both work. Both feel different: Insight is reading him; Performance is being worth his time.

Failure states: - Direct demand for information, first session: Surface gossip at public-board level. Professionally friendly, completely sealed. He charges the premium rate. - Invoking Roman authority: “I’m a licensed trader.” Perfect service. Nothing useful. He does not break character and he does not yield anything. - Asking about Lucius before trust is established: “I don’t know what you’re referring to.” True if he has not yet received the approach; false (and he knows you know it) if he has. He is now watching you differently.

Cascade unlock: Ally tier reveals Lucius’s contact attempt (or confirms Cato chose the party). This then requires DC 12 Insight to determine which parts of Cato’s account are fully accurate versus shaped by self-interest.

Investment options: - Buy a round for the off-watch soldiers: advantage on Persuasion for the evening. - Return for three sessions without asking for anything: relationship advances to “they consider you an ally” automatically. This is the only automatic advance that does not require a roll or a material investment.

Sigrun: DC Table

Tier	How to reach it	What becomes available
Stranger	Default	Amber, forest herbs (unidentified), rune carvings (decorative), dried meat, fur
Acquaintance (DC 12 Persuasion, or: trade at her prices for two consecutive sessions without negotiating down)	Fair and consistent dealing	She names the herbs she is selling; she mentions if she has seen something unusual near the trade route; she comes back more reliably
Trusted (DC 15 Persuasion, or: Germanic language proficiency, or: Survival DC 14)	Signature skill; or three sessions of fair dealing; or returning a forest item she would value	Forest route markers; nearest settlement with grove access; she confirms Thusnelda is real; she mentions that Romans who searched for the grove alone did not return
Ally (DC 18, or: offer a forest-sourced material at below-market rate without being prompted)	Investment; or sustained relationship with demonstrated respect for Germanic context	Grove route in detail; Thusnelda’s communication conditions (she will not speak to Romans who arrive with soldiers); Elder Futhark translation for any text the party brings; siege intelligence (warbands are not unified)

Signature skill: Germanic language proficiency auto-advances past the Stranger tier immediately. Also, Survival DC 14 (demonstrating you are not a city soldier) achieves the same effect. She is specifically measuring whether you understand what the forest is.

Failure states: - Direct request for forest intelligence, first meeting: “I trade goods.” Clean end to conversation. She moves to the next transaction. - Authority or demand: She gathers her goods and leaves. Relationship resets to baseline. A trusted party member can attempt DC 16 Persuasion to prevent this (one attempt only, before she reaches the gate). - Haggling her prices down: She accepts the trade and does not come back for one session. No statement; just absence.

Cascade unlock: Ally tier gives the grove route and Thusnelda’s contact conditions, which then require a separate DC 15 Persuasion check in the forest to actually make contact (Thusnelda evaluates the party independently of Sigrun’s endorsement).

Investment options: - Trade any forest-sourced material at below-market price unprompted: relationship advances one step; she knows you understand the material has real value. - Offer amber to Paterculus in her presence: she volunteers rune translation capability; cascade triggered.

Siege Behavior

What each trader does when the siege begins in Sessions 3-4.

Quartus (Siege)

Moves to the locked storeroom and sets up a field distribution point. Issues rations by count, marks every issue in the ledger. Under extraordinary pressure from Corvinus to produce resources the storeroom does not contain; handles this by showing the Legate the exact inventory numbers and asking for written orders to override them. Privately, opens the locked reserve to the party if they are trusted. Will not evacuate until the last possible moment; his records are not electronic and he will not leave without them.

Rufus (Siege)

Runs the forge continuously. Sleeps in two-hour shifts on a cot beside the anvil. Produces improvised polearms for civilians who cannot hold a gladius. Stops talking almost entirely; every exchange is functional. If the party brings him a damaged weapon during the siege, he fixes it before anything else – combat-damaged equipment takes precedence over new work. If he trusts the party fully: pulls out a specific Germanic iron-work piece he has been keeping under the workbench, “in case something like this happened.”

Valeria (Siege)

The infirmary becomes a triage station. She works with what she has, which is not enough. If the party has been building supply with her (medicinal herbs, earlier materials), this is the session where it pays off: her expanded stock lets her stabilize people who would otherwise die. She does not ask for help; she accepts it without comment when it is offered. If trusted: “The corruption progression in your soldiers is accelerating under stress. I have a model for what comes next. You should hear it.”

Paterculus (Siege)

Continues the morning ritual every dawn, alone, in the shrine. No longer files omen reports because there is no one to file them to. Instead, begins writing everything down in a personal document in case he does not survive. Will share this document with the party if trusted. During the siege he becomes, paradoxically, calmer: the situation has finally matched the size of what the omens were predicting. He knows how to function inside catastrophe. He does not know how to function inside anticipation of catastrophe.

Cato (Siege)

The taberna becomes a civilian shelter. Cato stops charging. He feeds people from his own stock, keeps the fire burning, and organizes who goes where with the practiced efficiency of someone who has run a logistical operation for years. His information network collapses during the siege (his contacts cannot reach him) but everything he had before the siege is available to the party in full. If Tribune Lucius’s contact came to him again during the siege, Cato turned him away publicly, in front of witnesses. This is the moment he chose.

Sigrun (Siege)

Does not come to the fort during the siege. She knows what is happening (Germanic trading networks move information quickly). If the party has a way to contact her – through Cato’s network before it collapsed, or through a Ranger’s forest contact, or because they established a direct meeting point during an earlier session – she has one piece of information worth the effort: the Germanic warbands are not unified. Two chieftains are there because Vercingetorix’s situation drew them. One is there only because the other two are. Split one and the siege becomes manageable. She knows which one and what they would accept.