I'm dumping this here to get it out of my brain

I'm trying to find the right balance between using spacey terminology and being obnoxious- like Guard vs. Legion? There's other words that have Roman basis to mean roughly the same thing, an army. Cohortes. Hastati (Hastatus). Phalanx. We need to get down a Joss Whedon amount of culture meshing.

I'm not a Roman expert, and I'm not sure how much you guys know about their whole deal, so I'll lay down the skinny- feel free, if you know all this (or don't find it interesting or important, there's no harm in that), to ignore it. I find it good to riff this stuff aloud, though, and know stuff gets better when you get feedback.

The Legion were required to be free men, and you were respected for having done your stint in it. It's turn ons included being obnoxiously large, conquering countries in wars that lasted for decades at a time, taking slaves and not being in Rome. And the thing of that was, it meant a lot of general mayhem in the capitol, because not enough of these guys were back to toe the line for people. I'm not talking casual theft, here, either; Rome, before they got their stuff together, was plagued with riots, mobs, home invasion. Gangs roamed the streets just tearing things up willy nilly; not a good place to be in.

So that's when the Vigiles came in. That's 'Watchmen' in latin. They started out as a little group of slaves sent out by the richer folk at night to stop things getting trashed, the Triumviri Nocturni. I'm not a latin buff, but the best I can make of the translation of that is 'Night-time Group of Officials Who Share Equal Power'. They didn't really do much besides protect their master's stuff, a private security force that were a sort of guard/fireman/alarm system hybrid. So they evolved (with a bit of nudging from the state) into what'd become the crux of the capitol- The Cohortes Vigilum, The Vigiles, the Spartoli, after the little buckets that they carried to, I assume, sort of ineffectively look like they were doing something to combat that massive fuck-off fires that would sometimes take ahold of Rome (they twigged on about germs pretty fast, but apparently not building furnaces in wooden houses). They were pretty similar to what we have today as a modern force- a Cohort of about 80 men would patrol their administrative area at night and beat the loving shit out of any burglars, run away slaves and would be mobs. I am joking, they weren't like our guys at all, because they also sometimes put out fires. And, I kid you not, one of their biggest deals was guarding the public baths at night. I am not sure from what, or why, but I am choosing to trust this fact blindly.

This is a lot of words, but I promise I'm going somewhere with this. Probably. I wish I hadn't promised, that was a stupid thing to do, now I actually have to make a point.

Things weren't breezey between the Vigiles and the Legion. Not's to say that I'm sure some weren't amiable, but the Vigiles weren't under the same system as their martial brothers. If push came to shove, though, the Vigiles tended to be faithful to Rome, while the Legion was faithful to the Emperor. The Vigiles were not free men, not until right at the very end, when citizenship after a certain length of service was granted as a 'you didn't die! :D!' bonus.

SO

There's been a war- the Colluctation (IT'S A WORD, I'M USING IT), the Strife, the Brigue, the Sedition. I think Liz has it nailed, there- it needs to be distant and unspecified. That's not to say we shouldn't have a more detailed explanation for it (especially if it'll help write plot better, I'm all for that, though I tend to get bogged down by details as this billion word essay on what we're calling out police force is probably telling you), but since it's not plot integral it'll be more effective just being hinted at, this ominous, bank breaking war.

I see direct parallels between Rome's struggles and what we're aiming for- they were dirt poor, by the end. By which I mean the plebeians were, the streets torn to hell as a result of generations of conquering that had no direct effect on the guys that just wanted to eat. The Vigiles were not entirely accepted, but necessary, and even when the army was limping around it was them that gots the glory. I think 4-10 years is a good amount of time for the war to have passed? Long enough that things like rationing, black markets, war wounds are still fresh, but things have mostly settled back down.

ALSO. League of Misopolemiacs. Apparently that means 'to have a fear of strife'. MISOPOLEMIACS.

There's more, but it gradually gets more incoherent as 1a.m approached.