You know what I want?

[Marauder Moe]

2)  99.997% of slaves WANT to be slaves, and wouldn't dream of escaping.

QFT.

Most Zalanthan slaves (95-99%) were either born slaves or sold into it at a very young age.  The dominant method of enslavement is psychological conditioning (or simply the offer of reliable food and safety) rather than physical movement restriction or pervasive law enforcement.

That's why captured PC slaves are so rare and/or unplayable.  You can't quickly condition an adult PC enough that you can be reasonably certain they won't just rip off the collar and run away.  The only way to really enslave them is cages and shackles, which then make that PC entirely dependent on their master(s) for interaction.  In some clans and in some circumstances this can work, but for most players it will not.

[Tisiphone]

All of which translates to: raid the tribals and take their babies.

GREAT occupation for an "independent" opportunistic raiding group that's large enough. Sell'm off to the templarate for some pretty cash.

Contract yourself out to recapture escaped slaves. There are usually at least a couple of these running around somewhere.

So on and so forth.

[Mood]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slave_rebellion

A slave rebellion is an armed uprising by slaves. Slave rebellions have occurred in nearly all societies that practice slavery, and are amongst the most feared events for slave owners. Famous historic slave rebellions have been led by Denmark Vesey; the Roman slave Spartacus; the thrall Tunni who rebelled against the Swedish king Ongenþeow, a rebellion that needed Danish assistance to be quelled; Madison Washington during the Creole case in 19th century America; and Granny Nanny of the Maroons who rebelled against the British in Jamaica.

Now, while some things might be different between Zalanthan and Earth slavery, I'd hardly say that such a high percentage are happy to be slaves.

[Marauder Moe]

Slave rebellions don't end all slavery.  Zalanthas (Allanak) has already seen a major slave rebellion too.


But anyway, it's not about being happy, it's about fearing the free world more than you fear slave life.  Life in Allanak sucks in general, and yet you still don't have lots of people just leaving and living out in the desert.  Likewise, life as a slave sucks, but you still don't have lots of slaves tossing off their collars and going to starve in streets.

[staggerlee]

http://www.armageddon.org/general/slavery.html

The doc on slavery is very long and very detailed.  Actually it should resolve a lot of the questions this thread is bringing up. 
It doesn't clarify whether it's acceptable to capture pc slaves, but it does discuss playing a slave or a slave owner and detail how most people would react to being a slave, as well as where they come from, etc.

[Mood]

I agree with you on most counts, but I have trouble believing that 99% (or any number close to it) want to be slaves. History (both in game, and in real life) has shown us differently.

[staggerlee]

Slavery, the legal ownership of one being by another, is a fact of life on Zalanthas. Most inhabitants of the world accept this as the way things work; very few would see any injustice in it.

While some slaves may wish to escape bondage, many will not. The life of a slave is, in many ways, actually better than that of a starving beggar or scavenger. Slaves are effectively guaranteed food, water, and lodgings in return for loyalty, obedience, and hard work. The only main difference between a slave and a free citizen, in many cases, is that the slave does not have personal freedom to do as he/she wishes; he/she is subject to the will of the owner.

Seriously, it's all in there.  Give it a read.

[Marauder Moe]

Again, I didn't say they want to be slaves.  I said they'd rather be slaves than starving.  Both suck, but one is pretty clearly better than the other (though maybe not to our culture where freedom is very highly valued, to the point where perhaps death is preferable).

EDIT: well maybe I did quote that they want to be slaves... but still, I hope my point is clear.

[Tarx]

While using real world historical figures and history is good to do to give perspective, there are some key differences that make this much different in Zalanthas.

1. This was tried once before and met with brutal (and I mean seriously brutal) consequences.

1394
The joint forces of the Clear Waters Oasis tribe and the Ironsword clan attack Allanak's obsidian mine, managing to free the slaves. Thrain Ironsword dies in the battle along with several templars. After the attack the Clear Waters Oasis tribe, joined by a horde of former slaves, lay siege to Allanak. During this time, Tektolnes is mysteriously absent.
1395
Exactly one year after the beginning of the siege of Allanak, Tektolnes reappears in the guise of a dragon and breathes death upon the sieging army - the army ceases to exist. Over the course of the next few years, a temple is built near the entrance of the city, in which the newly formed white-robe templarate preach the worship of He Who Rescued Us, the Mighty Dragon Tektolnes.

2.  Zalanthas has magick, and two very powerful established power structures that use every means necessary to stay in power.
3.  Many slaves have it better than commoners, which is hilariously ironic.  In the north, there is a caste system that specifically says slaves have a caste, and high-ranked slaves can be regarded as more socially powerful than many commoners.  I'm not as familiar with slavery in the south, unfortunately.  Slavery in the majority of cases means:
---You have worth.
---You are cared for, fed, and given things to do.
---You're given gear and clothing.
---You have guaranteed employment for life.
This certainly sounds better than the majority of commoners.

Maybe not 99% of slaves want to be slaves.  Maybe it's lower than that.  It's a high percentage, though.
Speaking from a Tuluki point of view, and pointing at documentation that supports this:

Nobles and Commoners:
One of the important keys to noble/commoner roleplay is to remember not to carry attitudes over from real life. On Armageddon, the vast majority of Tuluki commoners, who live and die by the mercy of the Sun King, firmly believe that nobles are nobles because they're better. The same holds true for the nobles, who assume their privileged position is correct because they are of better blood and finer material than a commoner. This attitude is reinforced by their benefits: literacy, which acquires near-mystical dimensions in an illiterate society; vast wealth; social status; and freedom from most of the laws of the city.

This documentation only applies to nobles and commoners, but it stands to reason that other facets of society have similar views about caste.

[Southie]

The slaves that don't want to be slaves are probably the slaves in very brutal and low-value occupations: common labor slaves, gladiator slaves, latrine slaves, etc. These slaves are also probably the worst treated and the most likely to have been forced into slavery rather than raised as slaves.

Brutal mistreatment from a master will probably also increase the liklihood that a slave wants to escape.

But most of the "valuable" slaves, those born into slavery and given extensive conditioning and training (Borsail/Winrothol/Kasix slaves) are probably perfectly happy with their lot in life. I think 99% of those slaves not wanting to escape actually makes sense.

[Salt Merchant]

2)  99.997% of slaves WANT to be slaves, and wouldn't dream of escaping.

I think that you underestimate the value of freedom. Something that people have fought for throughout all of history. Even Rome, which was pretty liberal in its treatment of slaves, had its revolts. In fact, I remember there being a slave revolt in Allanak once too and even Allanak being beseiged by mining slaves together with Ironsword dwarves.

As for slaves being too valuable to abuse, there are endless instances of abuse throughout history too. People being worked to death in mines without proper sustenance is one example.

In any society that has such a contempt for human life as Allanak, it would be strange indeed to find slaves pleased with their lot. The common slave would get the worst of foods and the worst of living conditions and the constant feel of the lash on their backs.

If slaves had it better than commoners, then commoners would sell their offspring into slavery.

Muls would be coddled, but only because of their extreme value. Not everyone.

[Only He Stands There]

I respectfully disagree. No society in the world has been remotely like Armageddon's.

There have never been such disproportional gaps between the poor and the rich than there are in Zalanthas. Remember, in the Zalanthan city-states, every single day at least one noble bathes, and every single day I'd imagine a dozen people in the same city-state die of dehydration.

Slaves don't have to worry about where they're going to get their next drink, how they're going to provide for their family, what they'll do if they get robbed. They have an easy life, compared to the "free" peoples of Zalanthas.

Remember that PCs are not indicative of typical Zalanthan life. Your typical Zalanthan is dirt fucking poor and desperate for that next drink of water, bite to eat, and month of rent.

As for "if slaves had it better than commoners, then commoners would sell their offspring into slavery..."

Commoners DO. PCs DON'T.

[Wish]

If I was a slave who was beaten every day and screamed at by cruel masters as I toiled upon the unforgiving fields beneath the boiling sun, I might think about escaping.  Maybe at night as I lay exhausted in the heavily guarded slave barracks, I would think to myself, "I bet things are better in tuluk/allanak/red storm/luirs/cenyr.  I bet I could do it. I bet I could escape."  But the next morning, rudely kicked out of bed by my satanic owners, I would return to the fields, to be worked again to the bone.  People are reluctant to change their situation, even if they might obtain a better one.  Especially if they have been raised to it their entire life.

And if I was a slave who was ensconced in luxury, dressed in silks, pampered (likely by other slaves), and treated better than 99% of commoners, I definitely wouldn't consider escaping.  If I was a slave like that, I would be ecstatic, and wear my diamond-studded collar with pride.  Even if, for some reason, I wanted to leave the wonderful nirvana of my existence, the above still applies.  Most people are reluctant to change their situation, especially if it means moving from a good life to an incredibly poor one.

[Yam]

Slaves who are captured rarely wish to be slaves.


Slaves who are born slaves into houses are another beast altogether.

[Rindan]

Everyone plays to have fun.  The general consensus is that getting enslaved against your will kills that fun.

Dying is part of the game, and something that you can't really argue with.  Being forced to play something you don't want to apparently crosses a line.

Would you like it if I apped a character for you, down to the starting location, and forced you to play it?  Probably not.

Is it a little unrealistic?  Just a tad.  As a slaver though, you might be able to get away with "OOC:  Consent to being enslaved?", and if they say no, kill them instead.  After all, they were pretty weak, malnourished, and their teeth were obviously rotting out.  They wouldn't have made good slaves anyway.

Playing a slave isn't always that much fun anyway.  It always comes down to needing to be on when your master is, at least sometimes, and that isn't always possible.  Being randomly sold IC'ly to the highest bidder might not exactly facilitate that kind of relationship.

If you don't like being enslaved, just store the character.  It really is that simple.  If you don't like storing characters... well tough.  I don't like having my characters killed because someone in power thought that it was OOCly wrong to enslave people. 

If tomorrow my character was smacked down by some Templar for some crime, I would happily take being enslaved over having my character killed.  The worst that can possibly happen is that I am bored to tears and I just store the character, which is absolutely no worse than dying.  At best, I have a new found goal of freedom, an interesting social situation where all my friends need to awkwardly deal with the fact that I am now a slave, and an in to the politics of whatever group I get assigned to.

Will a small time group of PC slavers work out well?  Probably not.  Enslaving Allanaki citizens is likely to get you spanked by the templerate.  In fact, getting the Templerate to reconize the people you capture as slaves is then buying them from you is likely to be fraught with problems.  On top of that, if you are snatching tribals than they are almost certainly totally unfit for being anything other than labor slaves.  Getting snatched and sold to the obsidian mines sounds like an an absolutely awesome way to have a character come to an end, but it is basically a forced store.  It is like dying, but you have a far more awesome story to tell people about years later than the usual, "yeah, a scrab whacked me on the head".

Personally, I hope that people in power don't look at enslave as some sort of evil taboo.  Enslave someone, throw a collar on them, and tell them that they are now your servant.  If they run, eh, they run and you are rid of the criminal.  If they store, well, the other alternative was to simply kill them.  On the other hand, other people would look upon it as a golden opportunity for character development and a great alternative to getting subdue killed by half-giant soldiers.

[Maybe42or54]

Or I would see it as a great -avenue- that you could use to kill your enslaver, if they trust you too much.

[Dalmeth]

Ya know... some slavers might offer their victims the opportunity to buy themselves out.  It's kinda like raiding, but with a longer period of interaction with the raiders.  All they really have to do is get a license from the local authorities saying that anyone they bring in as a slave is just that, a slave.  At least until they remove some sort of identifying marker.

[Xio]

and just because you're a slave doesn't mean suddenly you can't contact ppl anymore. If you have no friends to contact and launch a rescue attempt if you can't free yourself, then well...that sucks. Simply enslaving that guy over there who looks to tired to even stand could turn into a fun RPT with 20 people kicking down your door and shooting you full of arrows. Imms should consider that aspect of it, imo.

[a strange shadow]

What Rindan said.

[Dalmeth]

and just because you're a slave doesn't mean suddenly you can't contact ppl anymore. If you have no friends to contact and launch a rescue attempt if you can't free yourself, then well...that sucks. Simply enslaving that guy over there who looks to tired to even stand could turn into a fun RPT with 20 people kicking down your door and shooting you full of arrows. Imms should consider that aspect of it, imo.

Well, there's also your friends getting the money to buy you off.

Just imagine the fun if they decided not to let you free afterward.

[Silverfaune]

Just to pitch in, I would really find the danger of being caught by slavers while out exploring (or even wandering a dark alley) much more enticing (as it would lead to some really intense rp and some fun directions I didn't plan for my character) than say, being eaten by halflings, gored by carru, killed outright for my water/clothes/stamp collection by someone with a bow who doesn't want to chance rping with me before they kill me... in fact it sounds much more fun than about 99% of the chance encounters with "baddies" that I can think of.  At the very least, it'd be nicer to be bludgeoned and wake up in shackles or have someone put mercy on and ask for my consent so I have the choice to serve in some fashion, instead of dying (or pretend to serve and deal with the risks later!).  As a supposedly mature adult I think that having that choice is at least as viable as having the choice over whether or not I want to rp torture or rape...

[Maso]

I respectfully disagree. No society in the world has been remotely like Armageddon's.

I disagree with that. There are many societies in present day and through history that both mirror the heat, dehydration, poverty and wealth of Arm. Except the gap is more so. It was probably more like 100 nobles bath a day while 1000 commoners die. Anyway, I just got back from South India - and I thought I was lost in Zalanthas for part of it. I've never first hand experienced poverty like that.

As for slavery: in my mind conditioned slaves would be content, born slaves they would usually grow to respect and love their masters rather than resent them. A captured slave would be resentful when captured but may find himself conditioned by the better living conditions if they are so. If he's enslaved and forced into a shit life, then his will just needs to be broken. (I've literally just finished reading two historically factual but fictional books, the first is the Sword and Scimitar which addresses the issue of the slave trade and the conditioning of captured slaves, and the second Imperium which is from the perspective of a Roman senators slave (born into slavery), both very good reads!)

[alger]

Come lets go make a group of baby snatchers!  We go around, mudsexing/raping, then wait 9 months then steal the baby and sell them as slaves.

It will be like harvesting.  We will make a route to our regime.  On the first month we will sex it up in the salt flats as we raid the tribes there, then we will move west and go clock wise across the known world.  We move every 1 month and have 9 stops, after that we go back to our original spot.  As we bring sexy back we also steal the seeds that we have planted nine months ago.

We will call ourselves... hmmm... Bangbrothers.