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I look to the fine Paizo community for a suggestion on a race to use for cheap laborers. In my campaign, nobles are setting up a shantytown, displacing all the local workers, replacing them with cheap laborers. I need something dirty, but not straight out monstrous. I was thinking mongrelfolk but would love to hear other thoughts. The town is fairly generic in its makeup, nothing too out of the ordinary. I have some ideas on where this will go but would love to hear suggestions on possible plot ideas as well.
Thanks in advance.
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I look to the fine Paizo community for a suggestion on a race to use for cheap laborers. In my campaign, nobles are setting up a shantytown, displacing all the local workers, replacing them with cheap laborers. I need something dirty, but not straight out monstrous. I was thinking mongrelfolk but would love to hear other thoughts. The town is fairly generic in its makeup, nothing too out of the ordinary. I have some ideas on where this will go but would love to hear suggestions on possible plot ideas as well.
Thanks in advance.
Goblinzz...
What is populace around this shantytown? or below it?
What is nearby to pull the cheap laborers from? Forest, hills, mountains, desert, water?
"Retrained" duergar, brought to the surface as children and shoved into a laborer caste, they squint at the light even on cloudy days as they limp through the streets pulling stones. Sheathed in filth, heads low, they speak to no one but their own and their human and elven overseers, living only for the day when the quaking land will mercifully open and swallow them home.
I vote for halflings.
How about more primitive men- use cavemen. That way, you can still do the 'noble daughter in love with villager' story. Also there can be more exceptional villagers if you need them. Just use the human rules with a stat minus or two and an npc class with reduced skills. You can do fairly normal just by oppresing your less evolved neighbors.
How about more primitive men- use cavemen. That way, you can still do the 'noble daughter in love with villager' story. Also there can be more exceptional villagers if you need them. Just use the human rules with a stat minus or two and an npc class with reduced skills. You can do fairly normal just by oppresing your less evolved neighbors.
Geico commercial lover. I bet your first idea was a race of servitor geckos. ;)
I vote for halflings.
What's wrong with kobolds?
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How about halfling cavemen?
As a plot point, I want the laborers to leave the shantytown and mosey into the taverns in town to cause some trouble. I just dont see goblins or kobolds gettin' served at the local watering hole.
Good suggestions, keep em comin'. I like the duerger idea a lot. Like a bunch of old, squinty, grizzled miners.
Good suggestions, keep em comin'. I like the duerger idea a lot. Like a bunch of old, squinty, grizzled miners.
Simpatico... that's exactly how I was seeing them. Adds a Deadwood element.
What's wrong with half elves?
If you want the gritty grim look, make them half elves (human/drow parentage).
I vote for halflings.What's wrong with kobolds?
Nothing. Which is why we sould not be laborers, but your masters! BWAHAHA!!!
Ayup.
Nezumi? ^ ^;;
-Kurocyn
I can't believe no one said half-orcs, or even full-blooded orcs.
Maybe Raptorans with their flight feathers cut and denied the chance to the walk of four winds? Humanoid but different enough to evoke hostility from scared locals, who wouldn't raise a voice to enslaving these poor bird-folk.
I thought about it, but it seemed cliche.
Down-troddden nymphs, whose grove was plundered to build the shanties and who must stay with the lumber or die. You can say they lost their supernatural powers when the trees died.
I might make them a minority of the workers, and make the rest the displaced duergar. Of course, I still like the cavemen (or geckos), but make them the ex-slaves of the duergar, now installed as their over-seers.
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If you have access to races of destiny you might want to look at mongrelfolk(or mongrelmen, can never remember). They are very human-ish, but are basically the result of so much mixed breeding between the different generic races that they are just a bit of everything at this point. Sort of like how half-elves are often outcasts of both cultures the mongrelmen are a good outcast of every culture, too able to remind us of ourselves but still looking too like someone else.
-Tarlane
I like the undead idea too. Has anyone seen the movie "Fido"? Basically after a zombie rising humanity wins the day--enclaves are created to keep people safe, and a zombie control collar is created.
So this is my suggestion. Do the same thing; say that a powerful necromancer, lich or greater mummy had created an undead army, but that the threat was defeated. However there were still all these undead around. But no fear--a wise wizard created devices/spell areas that enable control of the undead. They are now commodoties for labour, they can even be bought and sold. The only rule is that they can never attack a living human or else they'll be destroyed immediately.
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One old adventure (part of I12 Egg of the Pheonix, I think), had zombies as town labourers. I think they were covered with illusions so as not to look undead, and IIRC, the owners gained amulets that let them control their purchased zombies.
Undead is a good option, that saves on having to feed the laborers kobold burgers...
<*Guards against strikes from KC*>
Director of Sales
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Undead is a good option, that saves on having to feed the laborers kobold burgers...
<*Guards against strikes from KC*>
Jonathan,
KC asked me to give you this:
[On topic]
I might've read this in a book somewhere, but Svirfneblin make pretty good downtrodden laborers, as well.
I vote for halflings.
What's wrong with kobolds?
What's the difference?
A mix of creatures from ogres to xvarts, all bound to serve for free by some sort of magical compulsion, drained of their will. Those who oppose the system may find themselves shouting its praises after a visit by the controllers. The dilemma becomes what would happen if the control were lifted. The controllers would probably suffer the consequences, but so would those who live nearby, as all of the vile labourers rise up in arms to shed the blood of the innocent and settle old scores. Why have one race of labour, when you could have a grab bag instead. Not all of them need to be humanoids. Imagine an umber hulk digging tunnels that are shored up and reinforced by an crew of misfit goblins. A troll on a rope goes ahead to scout out the tunnels, and parts of him are recovered in the event of a mishap. Duergar smiths working in dark and poisonous rooms. Drow and wild elf sitting staring blankly, and sewing on the same canvas. Here and there, a creature that resisted the enchantment tries to make a break for it, and is ripped limb from limb by those still under the sway of the power. An orc child staying close to it's oblivious father as he works himself to death, unable to get a reaction. Those paid to watch whipping a slave to death out of boredom, and the slave still performing it's task.
Why have only one race, in a world full of many?
Myconids that are paid trash and offal to do fine labour.
Giant ants that have a compromised queen.
A foreign religious sect that are given refuge in exchange for labour.
A tribe of orcs that have lost their homeland and work hard for little money to find acceptance in human lands.
Goblins that believe they are cursed to labour, because their holy man told them so. He was bribed.
The labourers are human, but something is odd about them, and they have such a stange wheezing rasp to their voices. Something seems to be under their skins sometimes.
Aranea and controlled spiders that work in exchange for protection from some strange terror they cannot explain.
Prison labour from a city that has draconian laws.
Prisoners of war being worked to death as slaves.
Orcs that are woefully mistreated, but are docile due to their strange pastoral god.
Just a few ideas of the top of my head.
If you have access to races of destiny you might want to look at mongrelfolk(or mongrelmen, can never remember). They are very human-ish, but are basically the result of so much mixed breeding between the different generic races that they are just a bit of everything at this point. Sort of like how half-elves are often outcasts of both cultures the mongrelmen are a good outcast of every culture, too able to remind us of ourselves but still looking too like someone else.
-Tarlane
Mongrefolk, I believe, are also in Fiend Folio (maybe MM 3)
Taliesin, I love that idea about giant spiders.8Makes Sleight of Hand check to steal idea*
