Slavery in D&D Campaign Settings

[S'mon]

A player that doesn't want to deal with slavery in D&D is as big of a deal as a player not wanting to deal with killing in D&D.

While there's slavery in all the D&D worlds I regularly run, I don't think that's entirely true, you can run a setting where there's no slavery without it being 'not D&D' (since slavery in much of western Europe was uncommon after about the 12th century, many high medieval style settings quite legitimately take this approach), while 'no killing' would really be stretching things.

 

[S'mon]

In some countries slavery(though illegal) does still exist...

Including London, where I live, and in USA also. Not just illegal trafficking, lots of rich people bring in 'servants' who are de facto slaves. There are some charities that try to help them, mostly to help them stay in Britain if they flee their 'employer'.

 

[Mark CMG]

Update: Ran into this DM again and he has decided to not have the PCs captured but, rather, have some of their family members needing to be rescued from slavery. He spoke to the player in question and the DM told me the player wasn't concerned but the DM still wanted it to be an in-game secondhand experience as opposed to what was originally planned.

 

[Cadfan]

In general, its not a good idea to humiliate player characters and make them experience degredation. And its particularly not a good idea to make them experience degredation in a way that their players personally may have experienced. That doesn't mean not having these things exist in society at all- it means not rubbing it in the players face. For example, a society might have sexist attitudes about women- but if you run the game so that whenever the female pc disagrees with a male npc she's punished for it, the female player will probably stop having fun. And that's a problem with you, not with her.

And for the record. There's a sort of attitude that goes around that says, "There's killing in D&D, so nothing else I could possibly introduce in the way of mature subject matter could possibly be improper." This bizarrely denies the entire concept of heroic, no-gore violence, in spite of it being a hallmark of entire genres of literature and film. If you can see no difference between the maturity level necessary to view depictions of killing and slavery in Star Wars, and the maturity necessary to view, I don't know, Schindler's List, you've got problems.

Finally, when you bring into a campaign issues that exist in the real world, you have to recognize that a player may read into it more than you intend. When you tell your players that they've been enslaved, some might infer a sort of heroic, pulp movie scene where the heroes are enslaved only so long as it takes them to figure out a way to kill the guards and escape. The player who just finished a thesis paper entitled "The Rape of Slaves in the American South and its Impact on Antebellum Perceptions of African Sexual Mores" might reach a different conclusion. Shockingly, that doesn't make the person who's view of slavery as an issue is closer to reality automatically the one who is wrong.

 

[papastebu]

If a player is offended by slavery in a D&D game, he needs another hobby.

That's a bit too broad for my tastes, because D&D is such a subjective experience. The OP is right to be concerned as a DM, because bringing the subject up in the wrong way might be the start of a major argument. Some topics can end friendships, as well as games.

Think of it this way, if it is a sensitive subject to the new player, doesn't that highten the campaign even more? If he starts off in game as a slave, there's going to be some really good roleplaying going on. He should be the character that tries more than anyone to get free and get revenge (or whatever the DM wants the PC's to do).

It should piss him off so much that there's slavery going on that he should be 100% dedicated to his character. He'll be the most passionate roleplayer

In a way, the DM is telling him, "Now is your chance to give slavers what they deserve".

This might be a hook, if the OP decides to broach the subject.
As to actually doing so, will the slavery come up sooner, or later? How well do you know the new player? If you can get to know him/her better in time, get a feel for how he/she might react to the idea, then make your decision as to include it or not.

 

[Friadoc]

When is the treatment of slavery in D&D campaign settings inappropriate, if at all?

I say take a page out of Werner Klemperer's book, he was the actor who played Colonel Klink on Hogan's Heroes, in that the slavers should never be protrayed in a good light and, in the end, they should lose.

Maybe they're idiots, fools, or however you have it, but they're the bad guys and they should be made to look as such.

That said, I think it is a good sign that the DM is concerned, a sensitivity towards your players and something they might be offended by is a good thing.

He or she needs to take the next step and talk with the player, potentially with all of the players, so as to not single out anyone.

They can just point out, "Hey, I've an arc here that touches on sensitive subjects and I just want to make sure everyone is okay with it."

I mean, it happens. I've had games in which I've touched on some nasty subject matter, be it cruel, inhuman, or what not, but I never glorify it. In most of my campaigns the good guys should overcome evil, be it as a player of a good guy, or the GM controlling the forces of evil.

Now, the PCs have to work for it, but rarely would they, or should they, condone something that most consider evil.

But, back on topic, I suggest just raising the topic with the player(s) and let them know that although you don't think it is a problem, they do know that the subject matter (slavery) is a touchy subject and you wanted to make sure it was okay to move forward.

 

[S'mon]

I say take a page out of Werner Klemperer's book, he was the actor who played Colonel Klink on Hogan's Heroes, in that the slavers should never be protrayed in a good light and, in the end, they should lose.

This may be workable for some settings; but what if you're running something based on medieval Araby, Persia, the Ottoman Empire, with the PCs as native to that culture? You have a setting where slavery is an integral part of the society and a "slavery is evil" more into the setting has no historical basis (unlike medieval Christian Europe, where you could point to Justinian's "Slavery is part of the law of man, not the law of God" stance). Furthermore, the institution of slavery bears little resemblance to that of antebellum USA, a slave could be a powerful and respected member of society (although of course most were not). You can't have Mamelukes without slavery. One bit of good advice I saw from a 2e era TSR publication discussion of slavery and Alignment was that the GM should treat raiding for slaves as Evil, just as you'd treat murder of noncombatants as Evil, but not necessarily the existence of slavery itself. In a society where there is no concept of the Rights of Man it may well be entirely Neutral.

 

[S'mon]

I say take a page out of Werner Klemperer's book, he was the actor who played Colonel Klink on Hogan's Heroes, in that the slavers should never be protrayed in a good light and, in the end, they should lose.

I guess I prefer a more mature approach to depictions of Nazis, also - something we've seen a lot of from Spielberg in the Schindler's List/Saving Private Ryan era. There's a scene in Saving Private Ryan where the SS soldier overpowers and kills the US Jewish Ranger character while the US Interpreter character listens, helpless to intervene, then ths SS man walks out of the room in a daze and down the stairs past the interpreter without even seeing him. I found this scene powerful and shocking because it went so against standard genre tropes. There's no harm in a game having that also.