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# SCENARIO-MERCHANT-0000
## The BALNEA Conversation
### Status: Canonical Prologue Scenario Seed
### Layer: OTIVM (Roman Merchant)
### Purpose: Establish the universal opening scenario where the participant encounters Ostia, the six backgrounds, and the logic of economic interpretation through mixed-status conversation
### Repository Path: docs/scenarios/SCENARIO-MERCHANT-0000.md
---
## 0. Design Intent
This is the one scenario every participant experiences before divergence.
The participant does not begin by selecting a class from a menu.
The participant begins by overhearing six people interpret the same uncertain opportunity.
The chosen background emerges from affinity with a way of seeing.
This scenario exists to validate:
- character selection through revealed behaviour
- Ostia as pressure field, not backdrop
- BALNEA as mixed-status social node
- rumor as first economic input
- six background perspectives
- the transition from observation to identity
- the first lesson of OTIVM: the event is less important than what it changes
---
## 1. Canonical Identifier
| Field | Value |
|---|---|
| Scenario ID | `SCENARIO-MERCHANT-0000` |
| Title | The BALNEA Conversation |
| Token | `balnea_conversation` |
| Domain | merchant |
| Scenario Type | prologue / background selection |
| Repeatable | no for a given participant |
| Hidden Truth Variants | yes |
| Required Before | `SCENARIO-MERCHANT-0001`, `0002`, `0003` |
| Repository Path | `docs/scenarios/SCENARIO-MERCHANT-0000.md` |
---
## 2. Fixed Setting
The scene occurs in or immediately around a BALNEA in Ostia.
The baths are selected because they plausibly allow mixed-status contact between actors who would not share a dinner table, household, or formal council.
Required properties:
- public enough for social display
- informal enough for overheard speech
- mixed enough for status friction
- connected enough for fresh rumor
- ordinary enough that the moment does not feel staged
Alternative adjacent nodes:
- changing room
- courtyard
- entrance steps
- oiling area
- nearby thermopolium after bathing
Primary rule: the setting must allow all six background archetypes to occupy the same social field without forcing implausible intimacy.
---
## 3. Historical Basis
Roman baths functioned as social infrastructure as well as bathing facilities. They supported conversation, reputation display, rumor circulation, informal business, and cross-status proximity.
For OTIVM purposes, the BALNEA is the ideal opening node because:
- the noble can appear without surrendering status
- the freedman can speak without formal invitation
- the legionary can observe discipline and threat
- the failed magistrate can still perform public standing
- the camp logistician can hear practical supply talk
- the guild scribe can read the numbers behind the words
Confidence: Medium.
Basis: Roman social practice; Ostian bath archaeology strongest in later periods; structural use as analogue for the default 14 BCE epoch.
---
## 4. Variable Inciting Topic
The topic should be variable by world seed, but the default first implementation should use the forge smoke from `SCENARIO-MERCHANT-0001`.
### Default Topic
Smoke has been seen from an industrial district of Ostia. Rumor says a bronze forge has burned.
### Alternative Topics
| Topic Token | Linked Scenario | Use |
|---|---|---|
| forge_smoke | `SCENARIO-MERCHANT-0001` | default first run |
| capua_timber_shortage | `SCENARIO-MERCHANT-0002` | if Capua event precedes local event |
| distressed_contractor | `SCENARIO-MERCHANT-0003` | finance-oriented opening |
| warehouse_infestation | future | storage / spoilage tutorial |
| delayed_grain_boats | future | port congestion / food price tutorial |
| new_tax_collector | future | PORTORIUM / legal pressure tutorial |
Rule: the prologue teaches interpretation, not a single fixed plot.
---
## 5. Dramatic Structure
### Phase 1 — Observation
Participant enters the BALNEA environment.
Immediate signals:
- heat
- steam
- scraped oil
- stone floor
- wet voices
- gossip moving faster than facts
- smoke or rumor arriving before certainty
No exposition dump.
### Phase 2 — Six Interpretations
Each background archetype interprets the same signal.
The participant hears not biographies, but methods.
### Phase 3 — First Choice
Participant chooses the statement, person, or interpretation that feels most useful.
This selects the starting background.
### Phase 4 — Consequence
The selected background determines initial parameters, resources, liabilities, and first available contacts.
The prologue ends when the participant can act.
---
## 6. Six Background Voices
These are not final player-facing dialogue lines. They are design constraints for how each archetype reads the same event.
### 6.1 Former Legionary
Sees:
- route disruption
- guard failure
- movement bottleneck
- disciplined response or lack of it
Typical interpretation:
> The question is not what burned. The question is which road, gate, or yard is now blocked.
Parameter emphasis:
- disciplina
- itineris_scientia
- periculum_tolerantia
Blind spot:
- assumes competence can be commanded into civilians
Scenario affinity:
- logistics shocks
- convoy trade
- shortage movement
### 6.2 Freedman Trader
Sees:
- goods respectable men will not touch
- quick buying windows
- underpriced salvage
- ignored customers
Typical interpretation:
> Smoke makes gentlemen cautious. That is when useful things become cheap.
Parameter emphasis:
- mercatus_scientia
- negotiatio
- clientela through practical contacts
Blind spot:
- elite legal exposure
Scenario affinity:
- arbitrage
- distressed buying
- market gaps
### 6.3 Noble Younger Son
Sees:
- families involved
- access points
- introductions
- reputation consequences
Typical interpretation:
> Before one buys timber or bronze, one learns whose name is attached to the ashes.
Parameter emphasis:
- auctoritas
- ius_accessus
- fama
Blind spot:
- underestimates operating cost and physical delay
Scenario affinity:
- partnership
- access deals
- credit with witnesses
### 6.4 Failed Magistrate
Sees:
- creditor movement
- legal weakness
- signatures
- delayed permits
- public vulnerability
Typical interpretation:
> Fire is simple. Rebuilding is where men ruin themselves.
Parameter emphasis:
- ius_accessus
- litterae
- compromised auctoritas
Blind spot:
- underestimates how much distrust follows him
Scenario affinity:
- legal leverage
- debt pressure
- contract traps
### 6.5 Camp Logistician
Sees:
- missing replacement stock
- hungry labor
- cart shortages
- supply timing
- who will need what before they admit it
Typical interpretation:
> If the yard is gone, count the carts, not the flames.
Parameter emphasis:
- itineris_scientia
- disciplina
- mercatus_scientia under pressure
Blind spot:
- offends prestige networks with blunt practicality
Scenario affinity:
- emergency contracts
- supply crises
- military-adjacent demand
### 6.6 Guild Scribe
Sees:
- accounts
- debts
- ledgers
- pledged goods
- who was overextended before the accident
Typical interpretation:
> The ashes will tell less than the accounts.
Parameter emphasis:
- litterae
- negotiatio
- ius_accessus through documents
Blind spot:
- physical danger and violent enforcement
Scenario affinity:
- FAENVS
- contracts
- debt purchase
- collateral analysis
---
## 7. Background Selection Mechanic
The participant should not initially see a stat table.
Selection options should be phrased as interpretive commitments:
| Choice Style | Background |
|---|---|
| Follow the blocked routes and exposed movement | Former Legionary |
| Buy what fear has mispriced | Freedman Trader |
| Learn whose name governs the opportunity | Noble Younger Son |
| Find the signatures and debts beneath the event | Failed Magistrate |
| Count the carts, crews, and replacement stock | Camp Logistician |
| Read the accounts before the rumors harden | Guild Scribe |
After selection, reveal:
- background title
- current resources
- obligations
- first contact
- first weakness
Raw parameters may remain hidden or appear only in advanced view.
---
## 8. Initial Parameter Effects
The prologue selects the starting actor profile defined in `docs/actors/`.
| Background | Primary Opening Advantage | Primary Opening Cost |
|---|---|---|
| Former Legionary | acts quickly under disruption | poor subtle negotiation |
| Freedman Trader | notices mispriced goods | low formal standing |
| Noble Younger Son | gains elite access | expensive obligations |
| Failed Magistrate | sees legal leverage | damaged trust |
| Camp Logistician | maps supply chain stress | low prestige |
| Guild Scribe | understands debt and records | avoids physical risk |
---
## 9. Prologue-Scenario Relations
```text
rumor_signal -> six_interpretations
selected_interpretation -> background_id
background_id -> starting_parameters
background_id -> starting_resources
background_id -> first_contact
background_id -> first_blind_spot
balnea_social_density ↑ -> rumor_velocity ↑
auctoritas_visible ↑ -> speech_weight ↑
status_gap ↑ -> dialogue_friction ↑
```
---
## 10. Integration With Existing Scenario Trilogy
### Link to 0001 — The Bronze Forge Fire
Default implementation should use visible or rumored forge smoke.
The prologue teaches:
- the fire is less important than second-order effects
- each background sees different opportunity
- the participant’s first choice is interpretive
### Link to 0002 — The Capuan Timber Yard Fire
If seeded with Capuan timber news, the prologue teaches:
- distant events matter when routes connect them
- scarcity travels through dependencies
- Ostia reacts before Capua fully explains itself
### Link to 0003 — The FAENVS Offer
If seeded with distressed finance news, the prologue teaches:
- capital can move without ITER
- AVCTORITAS and documents can be more valuable than cargo
- social cost is a real parameter
---
## 11. Ostia Dependencies
Requires substrate from `CITY-OSTIA-0001`:
- BALNEA as social node
- rumor velocity
- mixed-status friction
- workshop district
- legal nodes
- port-city information flow
- background-specific city readings
The prologue is the first practical test of whether Ostia functions as a pressure field.
---
## 12. Player-Facing Tone Constraints
Do:
- show six interpretations through speech and gesture
- imply status through behaviour
- keep the event uncertain
- make choice feel like adopting a method
- let the city speak through practical details
Do not:
- display a class-selection menu first
- explain all parameters
- declare the true cause of the event
- force all six into equal-length speeches
- overuse Latin as decoration
- write theatrical fantasy banter
---
## 13. Data Model Stub
```text
scenario_id: SCENARIO-MERCHANT-0000
scenario_type: prologue
location_id: ostia_balnea_seed
inciting_topic: enum
available_backgrounds: [background_id]
selected_background_id
rumor_seed
known_facts[]
unknown_facts[]
first_contact_id
initial_parameter_profile
initial_resource_profile
```
---
## 14. Parameters With Confidence Tags
| Parameter Token | Type | Confidence | Basis |
|---|---|---|---|
| balnea_social_density | social | Medium | bath social function |
| rumor_velocity | information | Medium | port-city and bath setting |
| status_friction | social | Medium | mixed-status interaction |
| speech_weight | social | Low | derived from auctoritas/fama |
| background_affinity | actor | High | direct participant selection |
| first_contact_quality | social | Medium | selected background dependent |
| initial_information_quality | information | Medium | background dependent |
| opening_blind_spot | actor | High | background design rule |
| prologue_topic_seed | scenario | High | direct scenario state |
---
## 15. Replayability Controls
For a new participant, randomize:
- inciting topic
- order of voices
- which actor speaks first
- whether rumor is mostly true or mostly wrong
- whether elite or low-status interpretation appears most confident
- environmental pressure: crowding, heat, smoke, rain, noise
For a given participant, prologue should not repeat.
---
## 16. Repository Use
Internal simulation substrate. Not player-facing script.
Use this document to support:
- opening scene implementation
- organic background selection
- first tutorial logic
- Ostia social-node validation
- scenario chain entry point
- future dialogue drafting
---
## 17. Canonical Success Condition
If the participant stops asking:
“Which character has the best stats?”
and starts asking:
“Which way of seeing the city do I trust?”
then the prologue is functioning correctly.