As a quick example, off the top of my head, let's say you start as a minor landholder under Roman rule. You have smithy skills and one of your neighbors is a shipping mandate, and another has extensive farm holdings. You set up trade with those holdings, with the express intent of taking them over at some point. So the beginning of your campaign is rather quiet
while you build up your army(s) and acquire money to finance a war. Your faction leader (and let's have a young man this time instead of one that's ready to croak

) has certain traits or skills that help (or hinder) your ambitions and he can acquire new ones as the campaign progresses. At some point you begin to attract the attention of the Senate (can be both good and bad), and so the intrigue deepens. Bribery, assassination, and all of those kinds of things that went on are afoot. Perhaps you seek marriage into a powerful political family...thereby raising your faction's strength and prestige, etc.......
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