The mechanics of a city in no mans' land

[Dangerious P. Cats]

I'm organising a campaign which is basically Vikings vs Romans, with Scandinavians being at about the level of cultural and technological progress they were at in the later part of the Viking Age while the Romans are closer to the period of the earlier Emperors (Christianity affecting neither). Though the campaign itself will really focus more on political manoeuvrings than warfare.

In the campaign's world the Roman's have managed to march North through the dense German wilderness and capture what is modern day Hamburg, and are now threatening the newly formed kingdom of Denmark. Roman Hamburg itself has a great many problems (all of which the players can play with for political gain). The Danes to the North have an uneasy truce with Rome, and the event that kicks off the campaign is the first successful Danish raid against Roman territory in over two decades (the Swede and Norwegians have been raiding Rome though) though this does not mean that the Danish King is hostile to Rome. They are surrounded on one side by the German wilderness, a nearly impenetrable dark forest that is as difficult to traverse as the sea. The Germanic tribes surrounding them are by no means hostile, but couldn't be considered friendly either, and hostilities with the Germans has prevented the building of roads. They also have sea access through the Elbe, though ships risk Viking attack, especially being so close to Scandinavia. Local lands are used of farming, but influence does not spread far from the city. Also trade with neighbours is frequent and probably impossible to prevent, if anyone wanted to try.

What I'm trying to work out is how a Roman city could function when there's no direct as safe way to get supplies from Rome and what living there would be like. What measures would the governor need to take to maintain the city, what resources would they need and how would they get them? Also how would people who live in the city manage?

Also as a more role-playing question who do I create a sense that the city feels like an outpost almost beyond the frontier?

[combatmedic]

Do the Romans rule Gaul or the southern verge of Germany?

How large is Roman ''Hamburg"? How much cultivated land lies close to the town?


You might consider describing it an overgrown Roman military camp and trading post. Earthworks and palisades for the castrum. Maybe the town has dirt streets and mostly wooden buildings.
I'd make sure to include a mix of ethnic and tribal groups within the town, including local semi-Romanized Germans.

What are the port facilities like?

Are the Romans and Norse both TL 2 societies?

[Peter Knutsen]

A Roman stereotype, or at least of Tacitus, is that the Germanics were good for fits of exertion but not at hard long-term tasks. In GURPS terms, this suggests Fit and Very Fit could be rare among Germanics, with levels of Extra FP being quite common. Perhaps you can use that? Either as in-world truth, or else as an expected stereotype that then turns out not to be true.

Originally Posted by Dangerious P. Cats

Also as a more role-playing question who do I create a sense that the city feels like an outpost almost beyond the frontier?

You said it yourself: Scarcity of supplies. That's going to feel extremely weird to any born-and-bred Roman. To not be "in touch", economicaly, with the Empire. They also won't like the terrain, moist, cold, full of trees. It's mildly alien.

Not being in touch is par for the course for a Viking Age Scandinavian, or any tribal Germanic. They're used to being almost completely self-sufficient, each independent farm stead (see GURPS Fantasy on "Isolates") producing almost everything it needs, food, hides, ropes, wool and clothes, metal tools (obviously needing to import a very fw pounds of iron per decade, for the later, but they can do their own smithing). For them, the weird thing would be to live in a town with a permanent market where goods from all over the vast Empire are available for sale (the real life Vikings did have a few market towns, such as Hedeby and for a time Birka, but for most they were places you visited rarely, not where you lived).

And note the cultural differences. The Romans are CF: Roman, while both the Germanics and the Danes are CF: Germanic. And most Romans will be too arrogant to even try to acquire CF: Germanic, while Viking Age Danes were much more pragmatic about such things. This opens up a "role function" for one or two Roman PCs to be the ones who bother to stopp as low as to actually talk to the horrible barbarians.

Religion-wise, they're all going to get along. The Romans will go Interpretatio Romana on the Norse pantheon, as they always did, and that will work fine as it's of the Indo-European family of religions, like to the Roman one. It won't be a perfect fit, Odin isn't 1:1 to Mercury (nor to Jupiter), but the Romans are used to that. Nobody expects religion to be an exact science, since it's not scripture-based (that only happens with Judaism, Christianity, Islam, and possibly a few Eastern ones).

[Peter Knutsen]

Originally Posted by combatmedic

What are the port facilities like?

Are the Romans and Norse both TL 2 societies?

Even if they have good port facilities (and I imagine that's why Hamburg became Hamburg), moving goods by ship might not be a good idea of there are a lot of HornyVikings around.

As for TL, it sounds as if the Romans will be mid TL2 and the Vikings will be arly TL3.

But even if that is the case, the level of social development and economic development will be very different, in the Roman's favour. Not so much that either one is a society (the Roman one might kinda sorta qualify), but the Romans have a bunch of specialized craftsmen, experts in their trade, some of which operate in a market economy (I'd imagine the Roman army also had some in-house weaponsmiths and armourers, working full-tiem for them), and a much more comprehensive administration, and usualy a courier service (although postal service to the far north might be limited).

A Dane, on the other hand, is almost certainly a generalist. He knows how to supervise a farm, sure[1], but he can smith a little, sail a boat, navigate, fight, and a lot of other things, but not very well.

Seeing as specialization ought to be more efficient, the Romans will often benefit from that.

[1] Or if he doesn't, then he's unusually dependent on raiding - increase his combat skills accordingly.

[Dustin]

If Hamburg's land communication to the rest of Roman territory is poor, then that leaves river transport up the Elbe (which would potentially go all the way to Bohemia), and North Sea access as remaining possibilities, both for any serious trade past the local farmers and craftsmen, and for moving people and goods to and from the Empire.

If there are no other Roman settlements on the Elbe, then one way to emphasize the isolation of Hamburg is with the piracy: 1 in X Roman ships headed to/from the Empire never makes it. The Romans are advanced enough that they might form an early insurance model to spread out financial losses if there's something worth the effort (amber, slaves, furs, Bohemian silver?).

The Danish king might also be somewhat in support of a major trading town in Hamburg, as he would be well-placed to tax any trade to/from the Baltic.

[Peter Knutsen]

Originally Posted by Dustin

The Danish king might also be somewhat in support of a major trading town in Hamburg, as he would be well-placed to tax any trade to/from the Baltic.

The Norse Kings didn't get involved in piracy until quite late in the Viking Age, when Sven Forkbeard and Olav Tryggveson started sailing to England, and at that point it was more like a protection racket (against a rather weak King) than it was genuine piracy.

As for the Elbe, the Romans might be keen on preventing Viking raiders from getting onto that river, because once they get onto it, they're gonna raid. Maybe not Hamburg, then but further up the river. Sailing back and forth, until they're rich and fat, then sailing home, and when they pass Hamburg on their way home, they'll play all innocent, whistling and so forth, and claim they've gotten all their goods via trading, even though they're sailing in a pirate type ship and not a trading tipe ship.

In fact, that might be why the Romans decided to conquer Hamburg in the first place: To put a stop to Norse piracy along the Elbe.

[RyanW]

Originally Posted by Peter Knutsen

You said it yourself: Scarcity of supplies. That's going to feel extremely weird to any born-and-bred Roman. To not be "in touch", economicaly, with the Empire. They also won't like the terrain, moist, cold, full of trees. It's mildly alien.

Basically, the same feeling a modern New Yorker would feel on a visit to farm/ranch country.

Where's the nearest Cervi Stellarum?

[Peter Knutsen]

Originally Posted by RyanW

Basically, the same feeling a modern New Yorker would feel on a visit to farm/ranch country.

Where's the nearest Cervi Stellarum?

Not entirely, but similar. Even out in ranch country, people still have cars. Even if it's half a day's drive to the nearest town, and half a day to drive back, they'll travel to visit there every so often, and they'll have cars that have some cargo capacity. And I'm sure they can get delivery service, although they may have to pay a lot for that.

Those ranch people don't make 99.8% of what they need themselves. I think a closer similarity would be to live with a bunch of crazy-eyed survivalists. And not the most organized and large-group category as defined by GURPS Y2K, but a smaller group. Have you seen the movie "Hannah"? It starts out about a man and his teen daughter, living somewhere in snowy country, having chosen to completely isolate themselves from normal society.

But sure, as analogies go, it's a lot better than nothing.

[The Colonel]

Originally Posted by Peter Knutsen

Not entirely, but similar. Even out in ranch country, people still have cars. Even if it's half a day's drive to the nearest town, and half a day to drive back, they'll travel to visit there every so often, and they'll have cars that have some cargo capacity. And I'm sure they can get delivery service, although they may have to pay a lot for that.

Probably more like a C19 New Yorker heading out to cowboy country in fact... you can see the footprints of civilisation, but it's a long way south of what you are used to and the natives aren't all that friendly...

More generally the idea of a "city in no-mans land" is actually a really good one that I must add to a campaign sometime - in this case rather than being a Roman city it would be a satellite state - perhaps a Germanic version of Marssalia in the Republican Era - which is open to both sides and regarded as neutral territory where diplomats and cartel parties from both sides can meet and, quite possibly, merchants from both sides meet to do business whilst the city fathers scheme to stop their home from turning into either a colony or a battlefield.

[Dangerious P. Cats]

Originally Posted by combatmedic

Do the Romans rule Gaul or the southern verge of Germany?

How large is Roman ''Hamburg"? How much cultivated land lies close to the town?


You might consider describing it an overgrown Roman military camp and trading post. Earthworks and palisades for the castrum. Maybe the town has dirt streets and mostly wooden buildings.
I'd make sure to include a mix of ethnic and tribal groups within the town, including local semi-Romanized Germans.

What are the port facilities like?

Are the Romans and Norse both TL 2 societies?

Prior to the taken by the Romans Hamburg was a Viking city. When I start the campaign I'm going to have a session where the players play pre-generated characters and play through the taking of Hamburg from the Viking perspective. I'm assuming that the Romans increased fortification after taking the city mind you.

In terms of cultivated land I'm imagining there'd be some farms owned by former soldiers close to the city, and then farmland that the Romans can extort food from and protect against raiders a little further out. The idea of a border zone, where farms are sometimes aided and sometimes taxed by the Romans, but also occasionally raided by Vikings or Germanic tribes as well.

Likewise the city would be pretty effective in regulating trade up and down the Elbe. Historically Vikings had trouble with fortified river cities blocking their movements. In the campaign the Romans might not try to block raiding down the Elbe but the would regulate it, taxing ships that passed through, and trying to prevent attacks on Roman territory (or punishing those who were carrying Roman goods, stolen or not). In fact this would probably be the best way to the Romans to supply themselves, as shipping from Rome itself would be really unreliable.

On the subject of which this would raise questions on how the Roman empire communicates with Hamburg, as getting messages there might prove as difficult as getting any other good.

I'm assuming in the setting that the Roman Empire stretches into Gaul, but not into Germany, sans the taking of Hamburg itself.