"The Republic does not ask whether you are comfortable. It asks whether you are useful."
— Maxim of the Grand Forum of Ithar
Introduction
You were raised in the Republic of Aurimundus, a Roman-style republic of law, discipline, civic duty, military strength, public debate, and hard-earned prestige. Aurimundus stands on the Last Refuge, thriving through agriculture, trade, industry, naval power, and the disciplined might of its legions.
Description
To be Aurimundan is to be measured. By law. By service. By household. By public conduct. The Republic teaches that greatness endures only when citizens accept duty as more than a word carved above a forum gate.
You may have been trained as a soldier, clerk, apprentice magistrate, military engineer, trade factor, civic advocate, academy student, temple attendant, scout, or retainer of a senatorial household. In Ithar, the Republic’s capital, citizens debate in the Grand Forum, honor victories in the Colosseum of Glory, and watch the Triumvirate’s Hall as the visible engine of republican authority.
You became an adventurer because the Republic produces restless people: veterans seeking command, scholars chasing lost law, scouts following frontier reports, officials sent on dangerous commissions, and citizens who learn that public service sometimes leads far beyond marble roads. Perhaps you carry a writ from a magistrate, a military discharge, a family obligation, or a suspicion that the Republic’s ideals are cleaner than its politics.
Wherever you travel, you remain marked by Aurimundus: practical, disciplined, ambitious, and unwilling to let chaos go unanswered.
Using This Background
This background is ideal for Fighters, Paladins, Clerics, Bards, Rogues, Rangers, Wizards, Artificers, and Monks who want ties to republican law, military service, civic office, public duty, frontier expansion, trade networks, or political tension.
An Aurimundan Citizen-Adventurer might be:
- a former legionary seeking honor after discharge;
- a magistrate’s agent sent to investigate corruption;
- a senatorial scion trying to prove merit beyond family name;
- a frontier scout hardened by conflict near contested lands;
- an academy scholar hunting a lost legal, divine, or arcane text;
- a naval veteran fighting pirates who threaten Republic trade routes;
- a disillusioned patriot trying to decide whether Aurimundus still deserves their loyalty.
This background works especially well in campaigns involving military politics, law versus justice, piracy, republican factionalism, frontier expansion, public duty, civic ambition, and the messy little thunderstorm where ideals collide with power.
"A republic is not kept alive by marble, banners, or old victories. It endures only when its citizens still choose duty after applause has ended."
— Inscription outside the Grand Forum of Ithar
- Ability Scores: Life in Aurimundus sharpens discipline, public confidence, and practical competence.
- Strength +2, Charisma +1 for soldiers, officers, guards, and public champions
- Intelligence +2, Charisma +1 for advocates, scholars, magistrates, clerks, and strategists
- Strength +1, Intelligence +1, Wisdom +1 for scouts, engineers, civic agents, and frontier-trained adventurers
- Feat: Your background grants one of the following feat options:
- Skilled
- Tough
At the DM’s discretion, Alert, Inspiring Leader, or Magic Initiate may also fit Aurimundan officers, academy-trained citizens, or temple-educated servants of the Republic.
- Skill Proficiencies: Your upbringing emphasized discipline, civic order, public conduct, and practical service.
Skill Proficiencies: History, Persuasion, Athletics
- Tool Proficiencies: Your upbringing emphasized discipline, civic order, public conduct, and practical service.
Tool Proficiencies: Calligrapher’s Supplies, one Gaming Set, and one of Cartographer’s Tools, Smith’s Tools, Navigator’s Tools, or Mason’s Tools
- Languages: Your upbringing emphasized discipline, civic order, public conduct, and practical service.
Languages: Common and two additional languages of your choice, often chosen from legal, military, mercantile, or diplomatic tongues.
- Equipment: You begin with the following equipment:
- Sturdy traveler’s clothes or officer-styled civic attire
- A bronze citizenship token, legionary mark, academy seal, or magistrate’s writ
- Calligrapher’s Supplies or Cartographer’s Tools
- A wax tablet, stylus, and packet of sealed document cords
- A small copy of republican maxims, military regulations, trade law, or civic oaths
- A simple sidearm, utility knife, or ceremonial gladius-style blade
- A signet ring, service pin, or family badge
- A pouch containing 15 gp
|
d8 |
Origin |
|
1 |
You completed military service and now seek fortune, command, or purpose beyond the Republic. |
|
2 |
A magistrate sent you abroad with a sealed writ and deliberately vague instructions. |
|
3 |
You studied law, history, or arcane theory at the Academy of Ithar before scandal, debt, or ambition pulled you away. |
|
4 |
You served in a frontier cohort and learned that maps rarely survive first contact with the wilderness. |
|
5 |
You are tied to a senatorial house whose enemies have become your enemies. |
|
6 |
You uncovered corruption in a tax office, legionary supply chain, temple treasury, or trade court. |
|
7 |
You seek a lost aquila, stolen treaty, missing officer, or disgraced family record. |
|
8 |
You left after realizing the Republic’s law and the Republic’s justice were not always marching in the same formation. |
| d8 | Aurimundan Origin |
|---|---|
| 1 | You completed military service and now seek fortune, command, or purpose beyond the Republic. |
| 2 | A magistrate sent you abroad with a sealed writ and deliberately vague instructions. |
| 3 | You studied law, history, or arcane theory at the Academy of Ithar before scandal, debt, or ambition pulled you away. |
| 4 | You served in a frontier cohort and learned that maps rarely survive first contact with the wilderness. |
| 5 | You are tied to a senatorial house whose enemies have become your enemies. |
| 6 | You uncovered corruption in a tax office, legionary supply chain, temple treasury, or trade court. |
| 7 | You seek a lost aquila, stolen treaty, missing officer, or disgraced family record. |
| 8 | You left after realizing the Republic’s law and the Republic’s justice were not always marching in the same formation. |
Your status as an Aurimundan citizen, veteran, official agent, student, or trained civic servant gives you familiarity with law, hierarchy, and formal institutions.
In republics, military camps, courts, trade offices, temples of civic gods, garrisons, ports, and settlements influenced by Aurimundus, you can usually identify:
- who holds lawful authority;
- which office, magistrate, commander, clerk, or patron can resolve a problem;
- whether a dispute is legal, military, commercial, religious, or political;
- what form of petition, record, oath, payment, or witness is required.
When dealing with soldiers, officials, merchants, magistrates, or civic institutions, you can usually secure a formal hearing, basic lodging, access to public records, or introduction to a relevant official, provided you behave with republican decorum.
This does not make people obey you. It makes them recognize that you know how the machine works, and machines are easier to move when one knows where the gears bite.
Suggested Characteristics
| d6 | Personality Trait |
|---|---|
| 1 | I stand straighter when someone questions my discipline. |
| 2 | I keep records because memory without evidence is gossip in a toga. |
| 3 | I respect courage, but I trust procedure. |
| 4 | I judge leaders by how they treat those who cannot help their careers. |
| 5 | I prefer clear chains of command, though I will argue with every link if necessary. |
| 6 | I believe a well-built road, wall, law, or plan is a kind of poetry. |
| d6 | Ideal |
|---|---|
| 1 | Civic Duty: A citizen must serve more than themselves. |
| 2 | Law: Order is the shield that keeps ambition from becoming predation. |
| 3 | Merit: Rank should be earned where witnesses can see it. |
| 4 | Unity: The Republic survives when citizens remember they share one fate. |
| 5 | Discipline: Strength without restraint is just vandalism with better posture. |
| 6 | Reform: A republic that cannot correct itself deserves to be corrected by someone braver. |
| d6 | Bond |
|---|---|
| 1 | My family, cohort, academy, or patron expects my success to reflect on them. |
| 2 | I owe loyalty to a commander, magistrate, senator, or teacher who shaped me. |
| 3 | I carry a writ, token, or record that could matter greatly in the right hands. |
| 4 | I left comrades behind and intend to make their sacrifices mean something. |
| 5 | I believe Aurimundus can become better than its most powerful families allow. |
| 6 | I have sworn to recover something lost to pirates, raiders, corruption, or war. |
| d6 | Flaw |
|---|---|
| 1 | I can become rigid when flexibility would save everyone time and blood. |
| 2 | I sometimes mistake legality for morality. |
| 3 | I dislike admitting when foreign customs work better than republican ones. |
| 4 | I carry myself as if every tavern were a Senate hearing. |
| 5 | I am too quick to measure people by usefulness. |
| 6 | I fear public failure more than private pain. |
Contacts
Your contacts may include legion veterans, centurions, quartermasters, magistrates, clerks, senators’ aides, trade officials, tax assessors, academy tutors, temple functionaries, naval officers, frontier scouts, or members of the Crimson Eagles. Aurimundus maintains powerful military and civic institutions, including the Triumvirate, Senate, Assembly of Citizens, magistrates, and the Legions of Aurimundus.
These contacts can provide letters of passage, legal introductions, military rumors, trade information, access to records, or temporary shelter. Their help is rarely sentimental. In Aurimundus, every favor wears sandals, carries a ledger, and eventually walks back to your door.
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