Diary – Vice and Virtue
Harmony makes small things grow; the lack of harmony makes great things decay. – Sallust
Hi! Lucas here. Today I’d like to introduce a few special resources that characters have in Historia Realis. These are: Vice, Tranquility and Animus. They are all part of the action system and add depth and interest to it by creating opportunities for stories to emerge.
Most actions are neither Vice nor Leisure, just normal. Vice and Leisure are special types of actions, and I will now explain what they do.
Vice (Vitium)
Vice was a big deal for Romans and I believe it’s part of what makes Roman history so compelling for us today. Many of us know the emperors Caligula, Nero and Commodus for their extravagance and vice. So, for Historia Realis to be an accurate representation of Rome, you need to be able to witness (and do) some wicked stuff.
There were lesser and greater vices. Playing games (especially dice games) was a common vice, but not a terrible one. So there are degrees of importance, like any action: Trivial, Important, Crucial and Vital. Here are a few example Vice actions you could take:
- Play Dice (Trivial): +3 Vice.
- Bet Too Much (Important): +6 Vice.
- Bet Your House (Crucial): +9 Vice.
- Kill A Slave for Pleasure (Vital): +15 Vice.
These are just a few examples, and the values will probably be changed for balance. In addition, they all have their own consequences and place in the greater context of the game’s content. But their importance determines how much more vicious you become.
But why would you ever indulge in vice and become vicious? Because it can be helpful:
- Vice enables new actions that you wouldn’t be able to take otherwise.
- Indulging vices can increase your Animus (more on this below).
- Sometimes it can cost you Animus to resist indulging your vices, and you don’t want to spend your precious Animus that way.
- Vice compensates for a lack of Tranquility, which could otherwise cause you to perform worse in actions. I will go into this next.
Playing dice games – a small vice.
Leisure and Tranquility (Tranquilitas)
The Romans had a word for leisure: otium. It was defined in opposition to negotium, business. There are also many leisure actions in the game, for example:
- Watch a Play (Trivial): +3 Tranquility.
- Enjoy Nature (Trivial): +3 Tranquility.
- Organize a Banquet (Important): +6 Tranquility.
- There are no Crucial or Vital leisure actions (at least so far). This makes sense thematically, but it also means that Tranquility is harder to get than Vice. Which makes Vice all the more tempting, as it can compensate for low Tranquility.
Tranquility can be negative. It ranges from -100 to +10. Yes, there is an intended asymmetry there. Aristocratic Romans were generally not interested in maximizing their leisure and tranquility, and certainly they weren’t supposed to do it. Having some positive Tranquility gives you a slight bonus in all actions, but that’s all. You’ll probably not manage to keep it positive for long.
So what are the consequences for having negative Tranquility?
- Low Tranquility makes you more likely to Fumble in actions, which halves your Effort.
- Low Tranquility makes you less likely to get Critical Efforts in actions, which double your effort.
- Some actions are only available if you have high enough Tranquility.
But as I said before, Vice can compensate for Tranquility. Maybe you’re not super relaxed and content, but at least you have your vices. And so Vice can literally make up for Tranquility. If you have -25 Tranquility but +25 Vice, you won’t suffer any of the negative consequences of low Tranquility. However, Vice can never give you the slight bonus that positive Tranquility gives — it only negates debuffs.
Animus
Possibly the most precious resource in the game, Animus is used to compel changes in fortune in order to win actions you'd otherwise lose, to resist vices, to broaden your range of actions, and much more.
It is gained in a few different ways, but mainly through acting on your grudges (competition is what moved the Roman spirit) and performing favors and obligations you previously bound yourself to (loyalty, or fides, was also important to the Romans).
Having low Animus just means you have less ways of affecting which actions happen and their outcome. In other words, Animus is a way to direct the simulation by mitigating randomness. Of course, AI characters can also use their Animus to try to achieve their aims.
The Discord chose to name this resource Animus rather than Will. You can join us to participate in votes like this!
Notes on History
You may have noticed that, although I titled this diary ‘Vice and Virtue’, Virtue is completely missing as a resource in the game. This is not an accident. There is no virtue resource for complex historical reasons that I will now explain.
Be warned that what follows are nerdy history things. If you’d like to stop reading here, it is understandable, and I thank you very much!
What follows are some random notes from my research. A lot of the writing here is fragmented and doesn't form a cohesive text, appearing random at times, although I tried to stitch it together somewhat, for your convenience. I apologize for any strangeness.
How to be a good Roman
The good man (homo bonus) was a man full of virtue (virtus). Virtutes are things well done, bene facta, deeds. Only through action one demonstrates one’s character. So far, nothing too strange. But hold my posca, we will get deeper into it below.
Vice
Vice, to the Romans, was about self-indulgence or lack of self-control. Mores were the customs that defined good behavior. Mos maiorum was “the way of our ancestors”.
Some common vices:
- Adultery.
- Mollitia (effemenacy).
- Friendship and relationships with actors, musicians and other such low-lives like prostitutes.
- Luxury, excessive food, drink and sex.
Moderate pleasure was either tolerated or seen as fine. Moderatio was later cited as a virtue.
Interestingly, it seems that the word vitium was used in a context of religious rituals with the meaning of “mistake during the ritual”, which would generally force people to do the ritual again from the beginning. But in this context it wasn’t about character flaws or self-indulgence, just not following the right procedure due to inattention.
The etymology of vitium seems to be either from Proto-Indo-European weyh₁-, “to pursue” or from “apart, wrong, two”. I don’t think we can really know. In any case, I made the icon a little red die showing the number two in honor of that second possible origin.
Corruption and Ambitio
I am not sure if corruption fell within vitium. It was perhaps more a matter of law and honor rather than vice. The Romans had a specific word, ambitus, for political and electoral corruption.
Ambitio, from where the word “ambition” comes, was about advancing by breaking the rules:
“Ambitio has the sense of ambition and is used both with neutral or negative connotations in the ancient sources, particularly when describing political evils. This neutral aspect is used when describing someone willing to struggle for political advancement, an individual who either persevered in the end or gave up without pressing the existing system too far, while the negative describes individuals who allowed their ambition for advancement and office to run contrary to the good of the state.”
The moral and political tradition of Rome. Earl, Donald C; 1967.
I don’t believe that ambitus or corruption will be resources (like Vice) in the game, but they will exist. My intention is to have them as traits that can be leveled up or down, and so be used to take action or to target others in actions. For example, you can attempt to prosecute and exile a corrupt governor who has returned to Rome. This often happened (and they were often acquitted).
Perhaps actions like ‘Embezzle Provincial Taxes’ and actions of ambitus will be classified as Vices in the game.
Ambitio was the acquisition of power through evil means (malae artes) instead of the right way (vera via). But what makes for evil in this context? Who is to judge what is the “right way” to compete? Laws? But aren’t laws dictated by the powerful, the victors? And can't they change them once they take power, like was in fact the case with Cinna, Sulla, Augustus, etc?
Corruption and Dishonor seem to me harder to measure than Vice. It seems that winning made a Roman un-corrupt through the ratification of the actions that led to their attainment of power (as long as they stayed in power). We see this with Sulla, Marius, Caesar, Antony and Augustus. Once they reach power, they legalize their dishonorable actions. But, while one could have the state cleanse their honor, they couldn’t cleanse vice. I might add Honor (honos) as a resource when I get to the new amicitia (alliance) system soon.
The Evolution of Virtus
Virtue is not a resource in Historia Realis. There are a few reasons. For one, traditional Roman virtue had a very different meaning to ours, and, to complicate things further, it then changed. Another reason is that Prominence (prominentia) is a better way of describing what virtus might describe in the system. But that is for a future dev diary.
Virtus translates literally as “manhood”, and it meant bravery, skill in battle and willingness to fight enemies in war. So it was virtuous to kill, and it was more virtuous to kill more. Of course, it wasn’t about killing just anyone, but killing enemies of Rome. To be virtuous was to fight, and to win. And the victor won glory for themselves, their family, and for Rome.
That is why Caesar could proudly boast of committing genocide against the Eburones in Gaul (there's a great Reddit topic about it here, including the OP changing their opinion based on evidence presented in the comments, which is admirable).
“Outside of the service of the Republic there existed no public office and, therefore, strictly speaking, no gloria, no nobilitas, no auctoritas, no virtus.”
Donald Earl, The Political Thought of Sallust (Amsterdam: Hakkert, 1966), 27.
This meaning was very different from what we now understand as virtue. And it started shifting around the second century BC, as Greek Stoicism started influencing Rome. The translation the Romans found for arete, or excellence, was virtus.
But in Stoicism, this excellence was moral, not martial. Thus the word virtus, or what it meant to be a good man, became disputed.
Sulla was a traditional virtuous Roman. Yes, he was a murderous dictator. But he was virtuous in the original sense of the word. His famous epitaph perhaps said:
"No friend ever served me, and no enemy ever wronged me, whom I have not repaid in full”
Or it could've been:
"No better friend, no worse enemy”
Or perhaps something like:
*None of his friends surpassed him in returning good, nor any of his enemies in returning evil.”
(Discussion about Sulla's epitaph here)
He was proud of being vengeful. He was a good man for it. Revenge was not a vice to the Romans. In fact, one could argue that it was virtuous to exact revenge. This only changed with Stoicism.
While Sulla was virtuous in that way, he was one of the more notoriously vicious characters of his time, because he mingled with actors, musicians and prostitutes (all equally low-lives), and indulged pleasures and luxury.
Some endeavor choices.
Stoic Humanitas
Roman Stoicism kept the traditional notion of vice, indulging and seeking pleasure, but added another dimension, that of ethics. The novel idea was that it was wrong to hurt others, no matter if they wronged you first, for the simple fact that they were also human. This idea of humanity, humanitas was new.
Instead of it being virtuous to take revenge, the virtuous thing became to forgive and break the cycle of anger that traditional virtus (revenge and competition) created.
That said, I don’t believe that any of the prominent early Roman "stoics" managed to follow that ideal. That includes Cato the Younger, Brutus and Cicero (if we can consider any of them stoics). They were all very much engaged in the game of power and revenge, even if they shared stoic ideals as well.
Caesar(s) and Forgiveness
Although Julius Caesar wasn’t a stoic, he was notoriously forgiving after his Civil War. He pardoned many who had fought in Pompey’s side.
Augustus was much less forgiving, perhaps having learned the lesson from his adoptive father’s murder, but he wasn’t wholly unforgiving. For example, he executed Mark Antony’s heir (Antyllus), but not any of Antony’s other children, including the ones with Cleopatra. And Iullus Antonius, Antony’s second son, married the niece of Augustus and was close to the imperial family. Too close, perhaps, as he was found to be a lover of Julia, Augustus’s daughter, and was forced to commit suicide.
It’s hard to say how much of this behavior came from personality or practicality rather than the historical trend of stoic thought. I only bring up these concrete cases to show the complexity of history. Caesar was forgiving even though he wasn’t a stoic. Augustus was much more of a stoic, and kept stoic philosophers around him as tutors and advisors, but he could be quite cruel and was less forgiving than Caesar. It’s complicated.
Brutus and Murder
According to Cassius Dio’s Roman History, these were the last words of Brutus:
O wretched Virtue, thou wert but a name, And yet I worshipped thee as real indeed; But now, it seems, thou wert but Fortune’s slave
The word used for Virtue is in the original Greek is ἀρετή – arete, excellence.
There were probably many things in Brutus’s inner world that made him become the leader of Caesar’s assassination. I would highlight these:
- His family's past and legacy as overthrowers of the Roman Kingdom.
- His interpretation of Stoicism.
- Virtus as manliness and competition, the traditional Roman definition.
Here’s a question I don’t know the answer to: If the original concept of virtus was to compete fairly in war and elections, and the stoic virtue was to be kind and accept that which you can’t control, then how did Brutus manage to distort virtue into murder?
My theory is that Caesar disrupted the competition for power between Roman aristocrats that allowed for virtus in the traditional sense. Caesar disrupted the mos maiorum by winning too much and not allowing others to compete.
Augustus managed to tame that competition for a while, limiting it to offices under his special powers. But the competition would return stronger than ever with the coups that characterized the Empire. This time not between old aristocratic families, but between novi homines (new men).
Did Stoicism influence Christianity?
Maybe, I really don’t know. This question is outside the scope of the game — Historia Realis takes place before the rise of Christianity. However, it’s an interesting subject and I’ll leave you with a quote from someone who studied this more indepth:
“It is often held that there is a major difference between Graeco-Roman and Christian ethics in terms of their theological basis and motivation, that is, that there is a distinctive religious motivation behind the latter that is more or less lacking in the ethics of the philosophical schools. This claim does not do full justice to our knowledge of Stoicism. As we have seen, especially in the discussion of Seneca and Epictetus, Stoic ethics has a strong theological foundation as it is largely based, not only on theories about God and God’s presence in the world, but also on the theory of the divine origin of humankind itself. In principle, the theory implies that no one is really superior to another, because all have equal share in the divine, and all have God as their ‘father’ who cares for them, helps and guides them, whoever they may be. Nature (God) ‘loves us most tenderly (amantissima)’, Seneca declares. In fact, we are loved (amamur) to the point of being spoiled’. The proper response to such love and care is—or should be—to act in the same manner towards one’s fellow human beings, i.e. towards other sharers of the divine. The difference between Christianity and Stoicism in this respect may therefore be more apparent than real.”
Runar M. Thorsteinsson – Roman Christianity and Roman Stoicism: A Comparative Study of Ancient Morality-Oxford University Press (2010)
Takeaways From My Research
- Roman Virtus shifted from “service in war and state" towards “ethical conduct for the common good of humanity and one’s peace of mind” due to the influence of Stoicism. Virtus became a disputed, conflicting term with the introduction of Greek ideas.
- Vice (vitium) did not undergo the same change as virtus. It always meant lack of self-discipline and indulgence of various pleasures.
- There were multiple factors at play. The Romans of the Late Republic had complex motivations, and were perhaps influenced by Stoicism, but also by others factors such as traditional Roman virtus and their own personalities and interests.
Painting I made showing the convivium (Roman banquet).
I've been interested in a more Expressionist art style, especially with the rise of AI art, perhaps much like the Expressionists themselves reacted to the invention of photography. I've been enjoying making art that is clearly human-made, even though it might look a bit rough. Still working on getting this style right!
Thank you!
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