Slave occupations - Tuluk vs. Allanak (ideas)

[Anonymous]

Allanak has a lot of stone construction (which is backbreaking, dangerous, and unrewarding work), the obsidian mines, and the arena, all of which are great reasons to have slaves around, but not much inspiration for players to be slaves in the current configuration.  Traditionally, from what I've read, muls are used only in the arena or as very specialized military-based slaves.  

On top of this, both cities have craftsmen who are fundamentally slaves to larger merchant houses, or to wealthier independent merchants (the keyword here is "merchant" not "crafter") who have the funds to support a slave and don't have time or desire to do the gruntwork of their professions- for example, clay digging, curing hides, dying cloth, etc.

So, since muls require some magic to birth (in theory), and since Tuluk has no Arena, and little apparent hard labor, would it make sense at all for Tuluk to have mul slaves at all?  What would slaves in Tuluk do?  how is it different from what slaves in Allanak would do?

Other than the above, what would slaves do?  Can we create an added distinction between Tuluk and Allanak with a difference in how they use slaves?

Ideas (entertain the assumptions or counter them - I acknowledge they are assumptions that may not currently exist):

Tuluk:

- Slaves are predominantly debtors or "captured" (honor-bound) slaves
- debtors forced to turn themselves over to pay off their debts over a period of time, or until money to pay the debt is raised through their work
- slaves commonly distinguished by a particular type of clothing - a red sash?
- no arena, therefore no Muls.
- "born" slaves are orphans or are given up by mothers who don't want them (half-elves?) and are desired as body slaves by people who want permanent servants, spies, or other loyal help and don't want to bother 'tricking' someone else into capture.
- the politics of "capture" could be a holdover from tribal custom where it is a point of honor to be the personal servant of the person who was stronger/wilier than you and captured you.  (this could be a subtle game that fits well with the concept of Tuluki politics)  This, of course, makes capturing a slave from a culture that does not recognize this as a norm less likely.  Also, serving as a slave in a culture that does not recognize this as a norm would be unheard of.  Enemies of the state should be killed rather than captured, and Tuluki's would fight to the death rather than be captured by an enemy nation.  Suicide would be more dishonorable, but escape would be key, and no Tuluki would leave another Tuluki in the hands of another city state as a slave.
- personal slaves are not solely noble-owned, common people with the means to capture someone could have an honor-bound servant
- the use of slaves for pleasure is considered vulgar - especially where prostitution (often combined with assassination and spying) is considered an art and good profession
- uses for slaves include: crafts and journeyman/apprentice type duties, lumberjack watchout, bushdriving (this is where someone walks through the woods and tries to shake out some prey), personal servants, jesters/entertainers

Allanak:

- slaves are predominantly born slaves or "re-captured" slaves.
- most debtors would be made an example of.
- few would willingly commit themselves into slavery for fear of the consequences of a harsh slave life - however, a skilled man would have better chances of getting a favorable slave profession than an unskilled one.  Slavery in Allanak tends to be permanent.
- slaves are distinguished by a brand and a collar
- Arena makes Muls a big deal, for betting, politics, etc (making debtors more common, Vegas-style)
- Prisoners of war used mainly to filch money from other city-states rather than practical use, because getting conditioning to set is unlikely but not impossible.  Prisoners of war could be ransomed/sold or else sent to die in the mines/arena.
- Slavery is a way of life in Allanak versus a temporary role, and it has its own -culture- that goes with it.  
- Slaves are, at worst, resigned to their lot, and at best do not desire to be confused with anything other than a slave.
- Slaves are solely noble/templar owned.
- slaves are specifically bred rather than abandoned or orphaned in most cases, although a young orphan may be taken as a slave and conditioned as a born slave.
- uses for slaves include: sid mining, crafting apprentice/journeyman needs, labor and construction, gladiator, personal servant, pleasure slaves, guards/militia, slave handlers, slavers, caravan-help, house servants

[Naiona]

Eh..there is a lot that I can't comment on here because they are IC issues...but I will point out that the vast majority of the Sun Legions consists of very willing slaves who are quite proud of their status and treated with a lot of respect by others in most circumstances.

[Anonymous]

I acknowledge that this doesn't represent the current reality.

The concept was to toss some ideas out and see.  If every slave in every city is a willing and proud servant of the King, there's not much difference or reason for conflict.

However, if there aren't -some- conditions for realistic willing slavery in both citystates, there's little reason for PC slaves.

[marko]

for realistic willing slavery in both citystates, there's little reason for PC slaves.

This point I agree with fully.  There is little reason for PC slaves.  And this is not a bad thing.  This is a good thing.

PC slaves tend to be very boring.

There may be exceptional circumstances where an individual may find themselves enslaved in either of the City States, but, for the most part I would never ever encourage anyone to play a PC slave.  All too often these roles don't work out as the player envisioned and are retired in short order (or the PC slave does something that makes no sense for a slave to do).

So, to make it simple, don't bother playing a slave.  

[Aldiel]

- Slaves are predominantly debtors or "captured" (honor-bound) slaves
- debtors forced to turn themselves over to pay off their debts over a period of time, or until money to pay the debt is raised through their work

I would say this is not true because as you may know Winrothol breeds most of its slaves from birth, and they are the largest provider of slaves in the north. (many of their slaves have gone to the Sun Legions as Naiona stated above).  Borsail actually does more capturing and enslaving because they use the arena.  Think about it, Allanak is much more repressive.  They're much more about enslaving people, although it happens in both cities.  It is also true that muls are more common in the south, again, because of the arena (and IC reasons pertaining to Tuluk's history).  You asked what do slaves do in the north?  They guard and service the great houses among many other things.

[Maybe42or54]

Personally, I'd love to play an Arena Slave, where I fight for Tek's Glory against insurmountable odds.

Where we have mock historic battles between the north and south. Then use that as propaganda. Afterwards, I would be paraded around. It'd be awesome.

[marko]

Just figured I'd point out a small thing since apparently I'm in a weird mood today.  My post was mostly tongue-in-cheek.  But, I still wouldn't suggest anyone play a slave.  It seems to be very difficult for people to wrap their minds around a slave mentality that grew up where slaves are often treated better than commoners.

There are lots of great posts about slaves so I won't go into it.  

[Aldiel]

for realistic willing slavery in both citystates, there's little reason for PC slaves.

This point I agree with fully.  There is little reason for PC slaves.  And this is not a bad thing.  This is a good thing.

PC slaves tend to be very boring.

There may be exceptional circumstances where an individual may find themselves enslaved in either of the City States, but, for the most part I would never ever encourage anyone to play a PC slave.  All too often these roles don't work out as the player envisioned and are retired in short order (or the PC slave does something that makes no sense for a slave to do).

So, to make it simple, don't bother playing a slave.  

This is good advise, Marko.

Make sure you are ready to handle a slave before you try to play one.  They can be fun, but you have to be ready to play a slave, not a commoner with the title of slave.

[Aldiel]

Personally, I'd love to play an Arena Slave, where I fight for Tek's Glory against insurmountable odds.

Where we have mock historic battles between the north and south. Then use that as propaganda. Afterwards, I would be paraded around. It'd be awesome.

I'd really like to see borsail do more with the arena.  I think it would be awesome if the clan had a nice group of gladiators that would compete every couple of RL weeks.  They wouldn't fight each other (except on really special events), but instead fight npcs that they'd have a good chance of killing.  It would make the arena game more of a commonplace thing, and be a load of fun, I think.

[Anonymous]

The fundamental problem with the arena has been what slaves do during the times when they aren't IN the arena.  Borsail/Templars can throw NPC slaves into the arena all the time, but people have traditionally had little interest in NPC bouts.  PC bouts tend to bend towards immediately killing the PC (which I find to be infinitely less interesting than letting them survive), because storage between fights has little opportunity for interaction or world impact.

However, I would also like to see this sort of thing happen.  But I think that the overlying culture of slaves needs more development and/or a better overall understanding inside the world before fleshing something like that out would be possible in a very isolationist context.

[Aldiel]

The fundamental problem with the arena has been what slaves do during the times when they aren't IN the arena.  Borsail/Templars can throw NPC slaves into the arena all the time, but people have traditionally had little interest in NPC bouts.  PC bouts tend to bend towards immediately killing the PC (which I find to be infinitely less interesting than letting them survive), because storage between fights has little opportunity for interaction or world impact.

However, I would also like to see this sort of thing happen.  But I think that the overlying culture of slaves needs more development and/or a better overall understanding inside the world before fleshing something like that out would be possible in a very isolationist context.

I would imagine their time outside the arena would be spent training, sleeping, and talking to eachother.  Additionally, the slaving culture is already very developed; the main problem is that not a lot of people know about it. And while it may be more interesting for PC to watch PC kill eachother, would hunters have to hunt PC animals to make hunting enjoyable.  No, just it wouldn't be as fun to watch.  I think there could be some cool RP in the bloodworks of an arena.

[ibusoe]

Something that I think Fantasy game designers/players tend to forget is that in a pre-green-revolutionary society, about 90% of people are farmers.  

I encourage someone to look up more precise statistics than that.

I've personally tended to assume that (asside from all the cool types of slaves already mentioned by other posters) a large percentage of those farmers are slaves, or have limited freedom.

[bloodfromstone]

Gladiator slaves could be awesome. In fact, a lot of slave roles could be really cool. However, we don't have the playerbase to support these sorts of roles reliably. Yeah, 4 people could app arena slaves at the same time and probably have a lot of fun, but, under normal circumstances, you're not going to have any other slaves to interact with.

Give me 100 or so more players, and I'd be glad to see slaving and slaves become a major part of the game. Then again, I say the same thing about tribals.