Will i be able to play a slave trader?
Slavery is possible, even legal.
Can i buy slaves, capture my own slaves, put slaves to work harvesting, sell my slaves at market or,sell slaves on the black market, sell you as a slave?(bounty hunter, no slave trader).
Goblin Squad Member
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NineMoons,
I've been wondering about this element of game-play myself. GW has mentioned using NPC slaves (mainly how the use would affect your alignment, if I recall correctly) but did not provide any detail about how this will be handled (acquisition of said slaves, what they can do for you, if you sell them, etc.).
All of this, I suspect, has to do with NPC slaves, rather than a player's character role-playing being a slave after being defeated in combat.
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Goblin Squad Member
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My-oh-My, would that not open up a can of worms! Imagine having your toon pulled around by a neck collar, totally out of your control and only at $15.00/month.
Seriously though, it would add an interesting dimension to the game. I can just see the human rights activists screaming with all of the current real world issues.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Will i be able to play a slave trader?
Slavery is possible, even legal.
Can i buy slaves, capture my own slaves, put slaves to work harvesting, sell my slaves at market or,sell slaves on the black market, sell you as a slave?(bounty hunter, no slave trader).
First, I'm impressed at your courage for requesting to participate in something that would clearly carry with it the Heinous Flag, a truly Evil alignment, and low Reputation.
If GW / PFO stay away from the ESRB ratings, as they have indicated they wish to, they will avoid the automatic "Mature" rating for having a functional slave trade, as well as Drug trade and use.
The possibility of having an active Slave, Drug and Smuggling trade in PFO is of great interest to me. They are all high profit and carry with them the risk that keeps my blood pumping.
I support you in your efforts to have this included, and I will be vocal about it as well. All that I suggest is that you provide as many PF RPG justifications for it when you make your arguments.
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Goblin Squad Member
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I certainly don't mean it to be done against the will of the player. However, in a war between a good and an evil aligned settlement, I can see (if they're role-players who trust one another) captives being taken and characters playing out their captivity as slaves, for however long a time period that may entail.
Back in UO, the Drow kingdom on my server even had members of their guild who rolled humans and role-played full-time slaves to better flesh out that unique side of their guild. It's hard to seem like a kingdom that practices slavery if you never have any slaves around.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Arguments for in-game slave taking?
1. It would be nice if players could craft those "worker packages". I mean the "slave packages".
2. Opens up whole new avenues of play for evil aligned players. They can get thier jollies from more than just murdering other players.
3. Another encouragement for raiding other player's settlements. Smash in, grab some NPCs, smash out, run your newly aquired "product" to a safe place until sold. During all of this, the settlement has to stop you or chase you and "Get Thier People Back!" or thier indexes crash(moral, production, etc.)
4. New skills: slave handling, slave training....
Wait, I am starting to feel a little sick...
It would be interesting if someone with a "Slaver" flag could offer an enemy a deal right before killing him--the enemy can accept something along the lines of a "Slave" flag, forcing him to work on the operation of the Slaver's choice until freed. The Slave/s start out with major penalties to fighting back, but the penalties decrease the longer the Slave works in-game--meaning the Slaver will have to have many allies to maintain the same Slave/s for long.
If the PCs don't want to be slaves, they can just die--some of them won't have any gear they fear to lose, after all. But let's say you relish the challenge of bringing down the slave-run quarry from within. Maybe this is even intentional infiltration--the Slaver would have to be careful about who he captures.
Interesting? Yes. Good idea? Eeeh...taking away control from another player is definitely a big can of worms, even if the Slave/s have a second option. I actually think it could work, though. It's basically making a deal with the attacker: "I serve you for some time in exchange for living, but there's a big chance I'm gonna kill you afterwards if you aren't careful."
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Goblin Squad Member
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To assist you in finding a market for your wares, and similar ideas, Tony has just set up a "black market" section on Pathfinder's underground forums.
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Goblin Squad Member
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If GW / PFO stay away from the ESRB ratings, as they have indicated they wish to, they will avoid the automatic "Mature" rating for having a functional slave trade, as well as Drug trade and use.
Forgive my ignorance and the slight topic derail, but the hell? How can GW/PFO stay away from the ESRB? Don't all games have to go through the ESRB in order to be published?
Back on topic, and as mentioned above, I really don't think it will be possible for player characters to be sold on a slave trade.
In order for that kind of a slave trade to work, there has to be a means of capturing and imprisoning player characters. And even if you could, as much as it would suck to loose a character with a very generous amount of progression, a player character can't be consistently imprisoned, because you can't stop a person from simply logging out (or pulling the power cord out of their computer to force a log out). If a player character were somehow imprisoned and forced into slavery, it'd be less frustrating to just delete the character that was captured and start over.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Wiseman,
As long as both parties agreed OOC for the role-play aspect of it, it's not hard at all.
That sort of RP doesn't require mechanics, though.
Forgive my ignorance and the slight topic derail, but the hell? How can GW/PFO stay away from the ESRB? Don't all games have to go through the ESRB in order to be published?
No, the ESRB is a non-governmental regulatory body within the games industry. The reason you see ESRB ratings on everything is that most stores won't carry games with no rating, or with an Adults Only (AO) rating.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Let's remember we're talking about a role-play game where there are evil deities, where there will eventually be evil settlements if not kingdoms, and that it is based off an RPG with nations in its world that have slavery.
I don't think the OP was asking for a game mechanic to actually enslave other players' characters against their will. In the blog "I Shot a Man in Reno Just to Watch Him Die", it was mentioned that using slaves or undead to do work (build structures or gather resources) would earn you the heinous flag. Also, in the blog "Darkness on the Edge of Town", while describing Fort Inevitable, Rich Baker spends three paragraphs describing slavery as allowed by the Hellknights. Given that GW employees have mentioned slavery twice now, I think the OP had every right to wonder about how such slaves would be acquired, used, sold, etc.
As for my comments in this thread, I was alluding to players being willing to role-play captivity and forced labor, most likely following capture during a war (e.g. settlement-to-settlement war).
So before we go off half-cocked and call posters' ideas "sick", let's be certain what they're asking about and what GW has already mentioned.
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Goblin Squad Member
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This is an idea which is not only truly sick; but would be a total public relations disaster for the company.
Eh. Not likely. It would likely be in the "heinous" category and make you evil right quick.
I do know that a while back Mr. Dancey indicated that PC capture/ransom was not going to be a rules-enforced option. People don't like having their agency removed without their consent.
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Goblin Squad Member
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This is an idea which is not only truly sick; but would be a total public relations disaster for the company.
Sir, my uncle committed suicide due to mental illness. I deeply resent the hostile manner in which you compare people with legitimate illness to an atrocity like slavery. Consider me deeply offended, and unwilling to reconcile.
There will always be people looking for any excuse to get upset. So yes, somebody will get upset about that. Clearly you already have. But I think it's pretty clear to everyone else that what you are proposing will happen is an absurd exaggeration.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Wiseman,
As long as both parties agreed OOC for the role-play aspect of it, it's not hard at all.
That sort of RP doesn't require mechanics, though.
Forgive my ignorance and the slight topic derail, but the hell? How can GW/PFO stay away from the ESRB? Don't all games have to go through the ESRB in order to be published?No, the ESRB is a non-governmental regulatory body within the games industry. The reason you see ESRB ratings on everything is that most stores won't carry games with no rating, or with an Adults Only (AO) rating.
And since GW does not plan to release a physical copy of PFO for stores, they don't have to worry about what the stores will put on their shelves. Plus, GW saves a fortune in not having to design, produce, package, store and ship physical copies.
Darkness on the Edge of Town
posted by Ryan Dancey, on Wednesday, March 13, 2013
Slavery
Martial law isn't necessarily evil in and of itself, but one aspect of life in Fort Inevitable unquestionably is: The practice of slavery. Indentured servitude is a common punishment for failure to make good on debts, and slavery is perfectly legal within the Hellknights' territory. In the Hellknights' view, all debts must be paid, whether they're debts to society incurred through lawbreaking or obligations to individuals incurred through renting land, borrowing money, or other ordinary affairs. If someone cannot meet their debts in any other way, they and all their work become the property of the person to whom they're indebted—and rights of property trump rights of personal freedom. The Lady Commander's administration holds regular auctions in which chronic debtors, vagabonds, or convicted criminals are sold into slavery.
Slavery is highly unpopular in the River Kingdoms, to say the least. In fact, the River Laws specifically ban the practice. However, the Hellknights don't particularly care about the River Laws, and no one who does care has yet confronted Fort Inevitable over the issue—the Hellknight position in the Crusader Road is quite strong, and unless a regional power such as Daggermark or Tymon takes up the cause, nothing is likely to be done anytime soon. The issue is confused somewhat by the fact that slavery in Fort Inevitable is not as awful as it could be: It's illegal to kill or mistreat slaves, and the Hellknights enforce those laws just like they do all others.
While the Hellknights recognize slaveowners' rights of property, they do not condone those who come by their property illegally. A slave-taker who abducts random people and drags them off is *not* protected by Fort Inevitable's laws, and in fact stands a good chance of being accused of kidnapping and tried by the Lady Commander's officers. A person who enters Fort Inevitable's territory in possession of slaves must be able to prove his right of ownership. Unfortunately, professional slavers have a knack for producing the right paperwork at the right time.
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The hellKnights are happy with me having slaves, as long as they are
legally obtained,So i use my forgery skills to make my own "legal set of papers". Next question is how do a acquire my "legal property".
I think any NPC is fair game-from my pov slaves are just one more resorce, much like mines, farms or a forest.
Good players would want to stop the slave trade and set the slaves free and if they want to try let them as i will have my own guards just as any other merchant, after all i'am just taking goods to market to make big money(risk Vs reward).
Come to think of it, The HellKnights would protect me or any other slave-trader within there borders. Attacking a slaver is a crime, mark you as the bad guy, lower your rep and be an evil act, Hell i can even put a bounty on you.
Arguments for in-game slave taking?
1. It would be nice if players could craft those "worker packages". I mean the "slave packages".
2. Opens up whole new avenues of play for evil aligned players. They can get thier jollies from more than just murdering other players.
3. Another encouragement for raiding other player's settlements. Smash in, grab some NPCs, smash out, run your newly aquired "product" to a safe place until sold. During all of this, the settlement has to stop you or chase you and "Get Thier People Back!" or thier indexes crash(moral, production, etc.)
4. New skills: slave handling, slave training....Wait, I am starting to feel a little sick...
Don't know about point(4), On the same page with all the others, well said.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Don't all games have to go through the ESRB in order to be published?
Ryan Dancey's take on the topic:
"Most major retailers will not sell a packaged game without an ESRB rating. You can't get them approved for production for any of the major consoles either. So virtually every game you play has an ESRB rating.
However MMOs are a special case because most of the time you'll get the game directly from the publisher and there are no middlemen. Therefore there's no reason to pay for the expense of participating with the ESRB, or with dealing with the fines they impose for violations of their codes (which are steep, and the codes are complex).
Until and unless we decide that we need to make a retail product, and get pushback that such product must be ESRB rated (or PEGI rated in Europe), and we decide that it's worth the hassle to comply, we'll probably sidestep it."
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Goblin Squad Member
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Come to think of it, The HellKnights would protect me or any other slave-trader within there borders. Attacking a slaver is a crime, mark you as the bad guy, lower your rep and be an evil act, Hell i can even put a bounty on you.
Only if you acquire those slaves through legitimate means. It said in the blog that they, at least the ones here, frown on randomly abducting folks.
If GW / PFO stay away from the ESRB ratings, as they have indicated they wish to, they will avoid the automatic "Mature" rating for having a functional slave trade, as well as Drug trade and use.Forgive my ignorance and the slight topic derail, but the hell? How can GW/PFO stay away from the ESRB? Don't all games have to go through the ESRB in order to be published?
As long as the game is distributed 100% online, they can COMPLETELY ignore the ESRB system. This is their plan anyway, so it is a non issue.
They can have as much mature themed content as they want, and the ESRB can't do a thing about it as long as they simply avoid trying to sell at retail outlets. GW's CEO mentioned it in a thread a while back...
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Goblin Squad Member
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They can have as much mature themed content as they want, and the ESRB can't do a thing about it as long as they simply avoid trying to sell at retail outlets. GW's CEO mentioned it in a thread a while back...
Though it is worth pointing out, GW and Paizo working together can create maturity onto the level they want. Paizo still possess veto power, and have stated that they do not intend for the games content to be above PG13. Of course that is subject to Paizo's standards of what PG13 is, rather than what the ESRB would likely bump the rating up for.
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Goblin Squad Member
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In general I'd say that if slave-trade were included that it would mostly be NPC-related. However, perhaps if there were a way to offer a defeated foe to become your slave they could then accept contracts created by their 'master'. It wouldn't take the agency away from the player, they keep their character, but if you make reputation the currency of slave contracts you may have an interesting dynamic. Slaver A takes Player B as a slave. In exchange Slaver A 'loans' Player B 500 reputation for a specified amount of time. Slaver A creates contracts for Player B to perform, and upon completion of the contract Player B loses a specified amount of reputation and Slaver A regains it and the 'loan' principle drops. Player B must complete the contract or lose the reputation regardless. If they refuse/fail the contract and lose the rep, the loan principle is unchanged. Once the 'loan' is repaid, they are freed.
A slave contract can be sold for up to that amount in rep in addition to whatever monetary value is agreed upon. The ability to create a contract for a slave resides with whomever holds the slaves contract
Just kinda spitballing here, I selected Reputation as the currency because it's something that everyone will have, it's valuable, and rather limited.
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Goblin Squad Member
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There goes the PG-13 rating...
In response to Sintaqx - I think an indentured servant arrangement might be quite possible. An established character agrees to somehow help/back the servant in exchange for a number of contractual jobs (maybe crafting x-number of various items, collecting x-amount of raw materials, etc.). Once the contracts have been fulfilled, the servant gets whatever the "master" was offering (usually something the indentured servant can't easily acquire on their ow). In historical times this was most often passage to another country, but I'm sure we could find something appropriate in PFO.
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Goblin Squad Member
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There goes the PG-13 rating...
Well considering paizo's definition of PG-13 includes their own products. If I recall correctly brothel was an optional building within the kingmaker campaign, and could still fall in safe range, provided the interior is never shown. (of course in P&P there is the wonderful thing of the publishers can simultaneously cater to both kids and adults, by loosely mentioning the presence of adult subjects without going into detail, allowing the DM to judge whether his/her audience is suitable for that sort of content as to whether any of the story actually requires them to go near it, an MMO does not have that luxury.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Well considering paizo's definition of PG-13 includes their own products. If I recall correctly brothel was an optional building within the kingmaker campaign, and could still fall in safe range, provided the interior is never shown. (of course in P&P there is the wonderful thing of the publishers can simultaneously cater to both kids and adults, by loosely mentioning the presence of adult subjects without going into detail, allowing the DM to judge whether his/her audience is suitable for that sort of content as to whether any of the story actually requires them to go near it, an MMO does not have that luxury.There goes the PG-13 rating...
Have always found the treatment of brothels a little odd. I mean look at the first Neverwinter Nights, you get inside the 'Mask, you get to hire a lady, but the ESRB rating wasn't too high if memory serves....
On a semi related topic, prostitution? I'm not talking about PC prostitution, but how about running an NPC brothel? Or have a few working girls in a tavern?
Low rep slave-trader pimping there slaves on the street.
High rep slave-trader owns high class bordello.|
Goblin Squad Member
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In a NWN Permadeath Persistent World I had set up a small settlement (as a player and later as a gm) in the Pirate Isles that was reminiscent of Port Royal. Rather chaotic, very evil, the only real rule was "Don't attract the attention of the Magistrate" because those that did tended to disappear. It was a lot of work, but tons of fun! PVP did happen on that server as well, consensual and non, even though it was a permadeath server. We had PC slavers and slaves, brothels, prostitution, human(oid) sacrifice (PC and NPC), assassinations, espionage, executions (PC and NPC), pit fights, duels, barroom brawls, and general carousing there.
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Goblin Squad Member
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I think that implementing slavery (of NPCs) is an excellent idea, and to complain on moral grounds is to reveal that you are incapable of separating fantasy from reality. In which case I recommend that you see a psychologist and grow up a little before attempting to engage in a social activity involving mature adults that are perfectly capable of making the distinction.
I haven't decided if I think allowing prostitution into the game is a good idea, but if it were added, I think it would have to be an abstraction. Settlements build brothels and get income from them.
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Goblin Squad Member
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How many other video games out there have a slavery mechanic? I can't think of any.
And yes, it could easily turn into a Public Relations nightmare. Just look at the uproar over something like the "feminist whore" code left in Dead Island, or the Anita Sarkeesian kickstarter. I do not envy the Goblinworks employee that would possibly have to sit down with IGN or Kotaku or whoever and try to spin why having a slavery mechanic in the game is a good thing. Of course if instead of calling it "slavery", they just called it a "indentured servitude" or "forced labor" or heck, since we have magic "mind dominated labor" or something, they could probably avoid the whole possible PR nightmare. It is all in the presentation.
Let's not even get into the Fantasy vs Reality debate on this. That is going down the No Mutants Allowed Fallout 3 child murder rabbit hole.
But Slave-Trader sounds good, who wants to be called a indentured servitude trader.
Well if they are going to have slavery and prostitution in PFO then I want some edible mushrooms ala Gothic! :p the graphic effects of those were cool.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Though a couple of posters have made suggestions for how it might work, I doubt anyone is seriously thinking that GW is going to put time and money into the creation of a game mechanic allowing players to forcibly enslave one another's characters. If you want to role-play being captured and enslaved, its role-play, and does not require a game mechanic to happen.
I know I've posted this once, but with the concern being posted about warning us off any PFO slavery (which I take to include NPC slavery), I guess the source of the possibility for that NPC slavery needs to be posted again:
In the blog "I Shot a Man in Reno Just to Watch Him Die", it was mentioned that using slaves or undead to do work (build structures or gather resources) would earn you the heinous flag. Also, in the blog "Darkness on the Edge of Town", while describing Fort Inevitable, Rich Baker spends three paragraphs describing slavery as allowed by the Hellknights.
Again, if GW employees have mentioned slavery twice now, I think wondering how those NPC slaves are acquired and used is a valid question.
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Goblin Squad Member
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How many other video games out there have a slavery mechanic? I can't think of any...
Well, it isn't a slave trading mechanic really, but close: Mass Effect 3 presented slave/indentured servant trading in a quest on Illium. It was almost sympathetic, illustrating a similarity between employment as a way of working off debts you couldn't pay, and 'voluntary' economic slavery. It raised an interesting question or two, such as whether the language we use to describe generally similar things makes a significant difference in the nature as well as perception of those things.
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Goblin Squad Member
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How about an option added to certain contracts? If you can't follow through on a contract (e.g. the more mercantile contracts), before losing reputation for reneging on the contract, what if you were given the option of indentured servitude...a new contract to work for that person for a set period of time or for a set amount of goods, resources, etc.? If you decline, you take your reputation lumps. If you fulfill the indentured service contract, you don't take the rep hit. If you fail the indentured service contract too, you take double the rep hit.
Just an idea...have at.