D&D General D&D Assumptions Ain't What They Used To Be

[payn]

I tend to see the presence of evil in our RPG worlds as a tool to define what is good. More specifically, the evil that is present is often what the heroes of the story are likely to be fighting against.

I get the appeal of having a world in which injustice is pervasive and the protagonists just accept it as part of their world. There is a verisimilitude to that, and it can feel viscerally real to have Conan shoulder his way through the slave markets on his way from the docks to the gambling halls.

However, even though I understand the appeal, I am not much interested in playing that, or forcing my players to experience that world. I am much happier and more comfortable with the big operatic evils of Lord of the Rings and Star Wars than the banal evils of Conan and Game of Thrones. I just like my heroes heroic in the modern sense.

I agree mostly with this. I’ll add I do like Game of Thrones grey morality, I just don’t happen to need slavery to achieve it. I get it’s a powerful story motivator, but it’s also low hanging fruit rife with offensive pitfalls. I find it more of a challenge to myself as a writer to work around it. The best part is my players don’t miss slavery or ask for it.

 

[Micah Sweet]

I tend to see the presence of evil in our RPG worlds as a tool to define what is good. More specifically, the evil that is present is often what the heroes of the story are likely to be fighting against.

I get the appeal of having a world in which injustice is pervasive and the protagonists just accept it as part of their world. There is a verisimilitude to that, and it can feel viscerally real to have Conan shoulder his way through the slave markets on his way from the docks to the gambling halls.

However, even though I understand the appeal, I am not much interested in playing that, or forcing my players to experience that world. I am much happier and more comfortable with the big operatic evils of Lord of the Rings and Star Wars than the banal evils of Conan and Game of Thrones. I just like my heroes heroic in the modern sense.

I can respect that philosophy, and even have fun with it. But I have much more fun with operatic evil as story than as game. Games are to me about creating a verisimilitudinous world to explore, and banal evil is a necessary part of that.

 

[Lanefan]

Does it though? In 20+ years as a GM I've not included slavery or rape or child abuse as story beats or setting fluff. Happy to report no player yet as asked me where those things happen or if they can invent them. its entirely possible.

So do neither "slave" nor "slaver" exist as possible character background options in your game?

I suppose it's possible in a setting that doesn't have anything remotely resembling a faux-Roman or faux-ancient-Greek or faux-ancient-Egyptian culture, or faux-several-other-cultures where, historically, slaves and slavery were a culturally accepted thing.

 

[Lanefan]

Clerics. Warlocks. Sorcerers. Paladins.

The thing that slave-holders always feared the most, was a slave uprising.

Largely because of situations and places where the slaves (sometimes vastly) outnumbered the free.

They prevented this in many ways, but all of those ways relied on the slave population being weaker than the guards or soldiers that could suppress them. That doesn't work in a fantasy setting where a random child can be born with the ability to explode people. Or where an oath of Vengeance can empower them to turn any object into a deadly weapon. Where the gods can be called down or the devils can whisper in people's ears. It doesn't make sense to take the risk, because you are just sitting on a powder keg.

WotC-era D&D has certainly leaned into the idea of "spontaneous" classes, where abilities just happen to manifest for whatever reason.

Prioor to that, however, most class abilities had to be learned or trained into (a model which I still immensely prefer); which would completely preclude slaves from becoming any sort of caster unless a master both allowed it and paid for the training. Wanna-be Clerics or Paladins might feel a divine calling but still had to spend years learning how to do anything other than pray.

The exception was psionics, which did spontaneously manifest in random individuals; and a highly-psionic slave could indeed make life miserable for the masters.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

So do neither "slave" nor "slaver" exist as possible character background options in your game?

I suppose it's possible in a setting that doesn't have anything remotely resembling a faux-Roman or faux-ancient-Greek or faux-ancient-Egyptian culture, or faux-several-other-cultures where, historically, slaves and slavery were a culturally accepted thing.

There have been a lot of times and regions in history where "hard" slavery wasn't a culturally accepted thing.

"Soft" slavery - i.e. indentured servitude, debt slavery/servitude, prisoners being made to work (which is, frankly, an undeniable form of slavery), serfdom (which can sometimes be harsher than stuff actually called slavery - though it is rare), and so on is almost ever-present in human history, up to and including the present day (though it has been reduced significantly compared to say, 50 years ago).

Re: Egypt there's increasing evidence that a lot of people we assumed were slaves because of historians operating under an assumption that ancient Greece and Rome were the "model" for all ancient societies, were not, in fact, actually slaves. They might have been fairly low-paid, but it seems like an awful lot, maybe the majority of "slaves" in ancient Egypt were in fact just workers.

As most D&D-style fantasy settings focus largely on quasi-Medieval settings where "hard" slavery was not a cultural norm, it's not surprising that it's pretty easy to cut it out of most. You can have absolutely ghastly settings without it.

Largely because of situations and places where the slaves (sometimes vastly) outnumbered the free.

Worth noting that these situations/places were very rare historically until the 1700s.

In ancient societies most situations with "hard" slavery featured 5-20% of the society actually being slaves (including the softer forms of slavery, like temporary debt slavery). Even in classical Rome, which insane influxes of slaves at times, across the empire I believe it was below 20% at all times, with only certain regions within the empire going higher, and then to like, 40%. That's not to say it wasn't truly horrific - Roman mass-enslavement was completely beyond words in its horror. But you didn't get the like 8:1 slave-free ratios you got in places like Haiti until much, much later.

 

[payn]

So do neither "slave" nor "slaver" exist as possible character background options in your game?

I suppose it's possible in a setting that doesn't have anything remotely resembling a faux-Roman or faux-ancient-Greek or faux-ancient-Egyptian culture, or faux-several-other-cultures where, historically, slaves and slavery were a culturally accepted thing.

I use history in the loosest sense. If I’m using a known fictional setting like Westeros or forgettable realms I’m not going to retcon those items out, nor are my games going to focus on it. It’s way over there far from our adventure/campaign.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Largely because of situations and places where the slaves (sometimes vastly) outnumbered the free.

WotC-era D&D has certainly leaned into the idea of "spontaneous" classes, where abilities just happen to manifest for whatever reason.

Prioor to that, however, most class abilities had to be learned or trained into (a model which I still immensely prefer); which would completely preclude slaves from becoming any sort of caster unless a master both allowed it and paid for the training. Wanna-be Clerics or Paladins might feel a divine calling but still had to spend years learning how to do anything other than pray.

The exception was psionics, which did spontaneously manifest in random individuals; and a highly-psionic slave could indeed make life miserable for the masters.

And would an awesome worldbuilding point and/or adventure hook.

 

[Micah Sweet]

There have been a lot of times and regions in history where "hard" slavery wasn't a culturally accepted thing.

"Soft" slavery - i.e. indentured servitude, debt slavery/servitude, prisoners being made to work (which is, frankly, an undeniable form of slavery), serfdom (which can sometimes be harsher than stuff actually called slavery - though it is rare), and so on is almost ever-present in human history, up to and including the present day (though it has been reduced significantly compared to say, 50 years ago).

Re: Egypt there's increasing evidence that a lot of people we assumed were slaves because of historians operating under an assumption that ancient Greece and Rome were the "model" for all ancient societies, were not, in fact, actually slaves. They might have been fairly low-paid, but it seems like an awful lot, maybe the majority of "slaves" in ancient Egypt were in fact just workers.

As most D&D-style fantasy settings focus largely on quasi-Medieval settings where "hard" slavery was not a cultural norm, it's not surprising that it's pretty easy to cut it out of most. You can have absolutely ghastly settings without it.

Sure, but it still logically existed at one time and/or place in those worlds, and as you say the "soft" forms are definitely still a thing.

 

[Desdichado]

However, even though I understand the appeal, I am not much interested in playing that, or forcing my players to experience that world. I am much happier and more comfortable with the big operatic evils of Lord of the Rings and Star Wars than the banal evils of Conan and Game of Thrones. I just like my heroes heroic in the modern sense.

Fair enough. Although I'd argue that the more modern sense is more like George "Rape Rape" Martin or Abercrombie or some other grimdark modern writer. I'm OK with fairly dark stuff, but those guys are all a bridge too far for me. Glen Cook is about as dark as I'm willing to get.

 

[CreamCloud0]

I tend to see the presence of evil in our RPG worlds as a tool to define what is good. More specifically, the evil that is present is often what the heroes of the story are likely to be fighting against.

I get the appeal of having a world in which injustice is pervasive and the protagonists just accept it as part of their world. There is a verisimilitude to that, and it can feel viscerally real to have Conan shoulder his way through the slave markets on his way from the docks to the gambling halls.

However, even though I understand the appeal, I am not much interested in playing that, or forcing my players to experience that world. I am much happier and more comfortable with the big operatic evils of Lord of the Rings and Star Wars than the banal evils of Conan and Game of Thrones. I just like my heroes heroic in the modern sense.

don't star wars and middle earth still both have slavery though? like it's a significant plot point in star wars that anakin was a slave.