I would like to create a character who campaigned throughout the Inner Sea on behalf of fair labor and humanitarian work practices. Not simply an anti-slaver, but someone who believes that true balance in the universe is can only be achieved when people are properly treated and compensated, whether they are constructing a castle wall or working as an apprentice to a mage. Crusader? Cleric? Inquisitor?And who would be the deity for such a character. Also, where would you first send them in Golarion-- and again no one wants to start out by wiping out the Slave trade in Ketapesh. Curious to hear your thoughts.
Perhaps a deity w/ the protection domain? If your character saw himself as protecting the downtrodden? Cleric or inquisitor could work fine, I think.
Sounds like a Lawful Neutral Inquisitor to me.
Seems like Abadar would be the deity.
I second Abadar, good idea Don.
Sounds to me like you are describing a Lawful Good Merchant/Capitalist. offshoot of the Abadar religion. I believe that would be described as the Separatist Cleric archetype.
This character would be in favor of all who work to be compensated for several reasons:
1) It allows the person dignity
2) It gives the person the means to support themself
3) It puts coin into the pockets of more people, meaning more customers for the merchants.
This character would be opposed to slavery, obviously. But he/she would also be opposed to continued "charity" to those that are capable of earning a livng for themselves but instead seek handouts from others. The character would view this as a form of dependency that is just as degrading to the individual as slavery.
As a Separatist, would suggest taking the Merchant Domain from Abadar, and then the domain you take from outside his sphere of influence, I would suggest Freedom.
Why would you build a labor leader as a Merchant/Capitalist?
I'd be tempted to go Bard, maybe Demagogue archetype.
As the OP described the character's goals, he wants people to be compensated fairly for their work. (my bold) This is at the heart of what capitalism is. And in the setting, there is probably no other profession that better fits the definition of a capitalist than a Merchant. However, I will concede that any person that trades their labour for compensation, is a form of a capitalist, whether it is a farmer, blacksmith, or other trade.
A Merchant could be really just a general term, as anyone that sell's their goods and services certainly have some merchant skills.
Yes it would be off topic if we were to talk about historically what happened in this world. (As you did)
In an ideal world, in which the actions actually matched the words, fair would mean that someone got paid for what they did, not more not less. A Lawful Good character would support this. LG labor policy would be protect both the rights of the employer and the employee, giving incentive for entrepeneurs to succeed and grow to the point where they actually need employees.
A Lawful Neutral character would only care that the laws are upheld, no matter if one side or the other got an unfair advantage. That is why I could not see the OP's character being LN, since sticking to the norm, is a contradiction to the revolutionary he described.
A Lawful Evil character would support laws that benefit him and his buddies the most, and the hell with everyone else.
A Chaotic character is the one that is most likely to feel that an employee has more rights than the employer. A society that supports this type of thinking would inhibit a business owner from even wanting to expand his business to the point where he needs to hire employees, because the employees may demand to make just as much money as he does.
Thanks guys. I like both the Bard and the inquisitor model, and the idea that this character would also take issue with people being paid when they didn't do anything. I think that thinking of this character as a capitalist who values human dignity and the righteousness of a days pay for a days work is also a compelling idea, though, as pointed out one that is quite different then how the issue is viewed in this world. I like the idea of someone who is able to convince the tavern owner to pay the wench a living wage, or a lord to let a serf tend to a sick child, but also someone who goes to the cite where a great labor injustice was committed-- Harrowstone Prison say, or that Osiron lost slave city in Lost Cities, and giving final rest to the souls that perished there.
I would like to create a character who campaigned throughout the Inner Sea on behalf of fair labor and humanitarian work practices. Not simply an anti-slaver, but someone who believes that true balance in the universe is can only be achieved when people are properly treated and compensated, whether they are constructing a castle wall or working as an apprentice to a mage. Crusader? Cleric? Inquisitor?And who would be the deity for such a character. Also, where would you first send them in Golarion-- and again no one wants to start out by wiping out the Slave trade in Ketapesh. Curious to hear your thoughts.
Great idea! As a social justice organizer, currently organizing union workers, that's all kinds of awesome. Glad to see these issues pop up in a hobby not normally associated with these types of things.
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I'm going to go off the current menu and suggest Urban Barbarian.
This guy fights against injustice because he's seen it and lived it. He's had to struggle his whole life. He fights for the downtrodden and disenfranchised because he takes their problems personally. The sight of slavery and exploitation gets his blood boiling, but he's savvy enough to know anarchy isn't the answer, as much as he would like the see the heads of industry roll.
He knows all the laws in a city like Cheliax or Katapesh are rigged against the little guy, so there's no reason to play by them. He's the guy who'll smile and schmooze with the mechants and politicians and he likes to talk about fair compensation and workers' rights, but really he's just trying to find out which businesses in the city treat their employees like people and which don't, so he knows which warehouses to break into and which trading caravans to scuttle. After all, if the crooked businesses are constantly suffering unexpected losses, then it's the legitimate ones who'll thrive and it's their policies who'll become the norm.
When he's not going guerilla, he's flexing his Diplomacy muscles, to convince merchants and businessmen of the value of the labor force, and to convince the laborers to stand up for themselves. He'll happily describe his stance to anyone who'll sit still long enough to listen, in the hopes that it'll sink in for someone someday.
I strongly disagree with making the guy some kind of merchant. A merchant is in it for himself, while this guy is genuinely in it for other people.
Remember that there are ways to make things even more interesting:
1: If this guy likes people fairly compensated for working, what's his attitude to people who cannot work?
2: What is his attitude to people who profit but do not work for that profit.
3: What's his attitude to generosity and giving. Does he appreciate it or reject it?
I'm thinking this character feels that it is his duty in life to bring balance to the world by identifying and correcting any exploitive labor situation, and bringing justice to those exploited, even if they are no longer among the living. He has no issue with charity on its face, but would take issue if someone was taking unfair advantage of someone else's kindness or generosity, viewing it as a form of exploitation. He would greatly prefer the 'teach a man to fish' view of charity. He would have a serious issue with anyone who profits at while the people who labor for them suffer, and would be compelled to correct any situations where that was occurring, by diplomacy or force. While he wouldn't have an issue with people who profit from adventuring (it is work after all), his primary reason for doing it is to bring forth labor justice, and would be compelled to use the profits from it to further the cause of labor justice As for those unable to work, I think this person would view all creatures as being able to contribute something to society, even if it wasn't direct labor, and would be deserving of basic humanity because of it.
The more I think about it, I feel like this character may be from a Neutral Good wing of Torag, one more inclusive and less exclusively dwarven. His portfolio of protection, toil and strategy, seem to work well. But this is a wing of the church where half-elves would be accepted, and where it is not enough to do a job well, but to also to do it under fair conditions.
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I was going to say Neutral Good something-or-other. If you wanted to be both realistic and even a little bit comedic, I would tentatively suggest a Wizard, perhaps of the Abjurer or Diviner specializations (or if you want to someone more militant, Evoker). Historically, ideas like this don't come from the laborers themselves, they come from bourgeois intellectuals who've achieved a comfortable enough life that they have time to think, which leads them to realize, "Wait...something's still wrong here."
As for deities, "Neutral Good wing of Torag" is not a bad idea, but consider also Milani, goddess of hope and uprisings and whatnot. I disagree with those who say Abadar, mainly for basic alignment reasons. Look up the other Neutral Good Powers as well.
Oracle might not be a bad choice, either. I seem to recall the legend of a tormented, charismatic mystic who went around comparing the overly wealthy unfavorably to escape-artist camels....
I think neutral good and a not an Abadar follower. Reason why is a lawful character and a follower of Abadar would be tempted to follow the actual trends of the IRL fair trade/labor movement. As in being a bureaucrat on top who controls markets/labor pools for personal and political advantage. A LN organization such as the temple of Abadar would quickly be filled with individuals who treat fair trade and labor unions as the new "guilds" (and can you really say they aren't?). The LG wing would be useful idiots that champion a cause that lets the more realpolitik and sinister wings in the door to direct manipulation of markets.
Championing fair trade includes boycotting rival companies (often regardless of actual merits) and the anointed companies charge more for their goods because they can (a virtue tax). Quite often that extra money doesn't reach the producer, and is instead pocketed by the leader of the CoOp/fair trade organization.
Basically I'm saying is while the goals of the fair trade movement might be noble, it often quickly gets bogged down in the same sort of corruption and coercion that the movement is supposed to be against.
A true champion of the worker would be mostly concerned with eliminating slavery in all of its forms (which includes debt slaves, serfdom/villeinage, and convict labor), and with the most important right for workers, the right to quit. The reason being is slavery depresses labor markets, and forces a sort of backwardness to a society (solutions always include just adding more slaves to a project rather than doing things more efficiently and/or safer). Paid and free workers innovate and self motivate, and generally won't work in environments they think are to unsafe (which drives innovation in workplace safety). Fair trade tends to work against worker choice (forcing interaction through CoOps and controlled markets, and demanding certain production practices that can work against productivity).
What is "Fair?"
Do you want Cesar Chavez or Ayn Rand because you can make both out of this idea.
You might also just create a new school of Liberation Theology if you want to go all wobbly.
You could also make an inquisitor and be a LN traveling judge type, mix it with some gunslinger (sawed off shotgun, in ye olde days called a "judge").
Is a fair wage enough to live on, as little as can be paid in a competitive market or some random number decided on by gov't/church/the PC?
A lot of this also depends on how your DM has the world set up, you have slavery and serfdom as the primary things someone like this would likely be going after but depending on how the DM runs the world there is more or less of that.
Also what is the character's view on replacing unskilled labor with zombies?
Also in re charity: Wow, even objectivists don't have a problem with the idea of charity. That's some pretty grim jumps in unplesant logic.
sigh, I miss the days when this game was about playing a knight in shining armor and going off to slay the evil dragon that captured the princess.
Why do you people constantly feel the need to bring modern day socio/political crap into a fantasy game.
I'd play this as a good-aligned cleric of Abadar with the Evangelist archetype, which gives him bardic performance powers in exchange for a domain and some channeling, and lets him take Perform (Oratory) as a class skill. Good for a cleric who spends his time preaching a cause.
The thing is that Abadar is China, he's for harmony/civilization/not rocking the boat. We can all expand stability and it'll be good.
He's the judge in upholding law, not protecting the weak from the strong and predatory.