ideas for slavery

[MaceHead]

Slavery was a major economic and social force at the time of Rome2. There were slave revolts in Greece and Italy, a state like Sparta lived in fear of its enslaved population, to the extent that it limited the effectiveness of their military. Also the whole economy of the ancient world was dependent on Slavery. The slave population reached 40-50% when Athens was the mayor player and 30%-40% of Rome's population in Italy. Post your ideas how to better integrate slavery into the game.

1. Slaves can be used as a trade resource.

2. There is a chance of slave revolts occurring in ratio with the amount of slaves you have.

3. Slaves can be gathered through conquest.

4. Prisoners from a battle can be forced into slavery.

5. Generals can gather wealth, power and influence by selling slaves of conquest.

6. The amount of slaves can alter the government.

7. The amount of slaves can alter the economy.

8. The amount of slaves can alter public order.

9. Slaves can give a boost in production/income.

10. Slaves are a separate class of population in a city.

11. Reduced or increased construction costs and construction time of buildings in your cities in ratio with the amount of slaves in that city.

12. The ability to give slaves their freedom and become freedmen to reduce the amount of slaves in a region and counter negative aspects of slavery in that region.

13. by researching you can unlock laws (late in the game) that protects slaves to ward off slave revolts, increase public order and protect the labour force.

14. Larger profits of mines and farms in relationship with the amount of slaves positioned there.

[DarthRuanek]

This could be cool. Putting in slavery as that important of a game element might be a bit hard, though, in terms of political correctness.

(I am aware of how big slavery was in most nations of this time period. The issue would be more in the game encouraging players to do it.)

[Julio-Claudian]

Nice ideas. I think it needs to be more detailed, the whole class system does. As our empires grow we should be faced with problems like what went on in the late Republic: Patricians taking all of the land, slaves taking all of the work, Plebeians left with nothing. Which would lead to revolutions (eg the Gracchi), and eventually dictators... and so on.

Having too many unpaid workers should harm the economy.

This could be cool. Putting in slavery as that important of a game element might be a bit hard, though, in terms of political correctness.

(I am aware of how big slavery was in most nations of this time period. The issue would be more in the game encouraging players to do it.)

Do you think so? I mean we can already 'exterminate' and enslave cities... it'd just be a bit more detailed, and perhaps less brutal.

[Junius]

OP, just about Sparta, there is a theory floating around that it was because of the number of helots that Sparta was so interested in developing it's military. That does bring up a bit of chicken and egg situation. Sparta's military was certainly geared toward controlling the helots, to a greater or lesser degree.

[Dominatrixx]

Slavery needs to present in Rome 2 and be a very important feature, I agree

[zg0301zg]

i agree, slavery and enslaving should have greater role, since Rome like all modern countries got rich by slavery, in long run it leads to revolts and chaos.
like everything else it has pros and cons, and its something to be considered.
I like the idea from the opening post,I am sure that CA has all ready that in mind, from what I have seen in what details they went, the most thing I am worried is province system...

[Ultra123]

i agree, this is a nice system and brings game depth even higher on the agenda.

also agree with zg, the province system is worrying to me, i hope its a simple 'grouping' of setttlements where you can still control each one or all of them at a click of a button, but anything more then this or removing ability to construct manually, or even removal of key citys from rome 1 will be detrimental i think.

[Khannis]

OP, just about Sparta, there is a theory floating around that it was because of the number of helots that Sparta was so interested in developing it's military. That does bring up a bit of chicken and egg situation. Sparta's military was certainly geared toward controlling the helots, to a greater or lesser degree.

Although that's mostly true, Helots weren't slaves at all, so I don't see the point in mentioning this.

[Lord Baal]

The helots: Εἵλωτες / Heílôtes) were an unfree group that formed the main population of Laconia and Messenia (areas ruled with an iron fist by Sparta). Their exact status was already disputed in antiquity: according to Critias, they were "especially slaves" whereas to Pollux, they occupied a status "between free men and slaves"*. Tied to the land, they worked in agriculture as a majority and economically supported the Spartan citizens. They were ritually mistreated, humiliated and even slaughtered: every autumn, during the Crypteia, they could be killed by a Spartan citizen without fear of repercussion.

* So they could be considered serfs at best? That's not really too far away from slave you know?


Also

According to Myron of Priene, an anti-Spartan historian[32] of the middle 3rd century BC:

"They assign to the Helots every shameful task leading to disgrace. For they ordained that each one of them must wear a dogskin cap (κυνῆ / kunễ) and wrap himself in skins (διφθέρα / diphthéra) and receive a stipulated number of beatings every year regardless of any wrongdoing, so that they would never forget they were slaves. Moreover, if any exceeded the vigour proper to a slave's condition, they made death the penalty; and they allotted a punishment to those controlling them if they failed.

[Pesticide]

where these people their sons also forcibly integrated into the roman army to serve for xx amount of years ?

This would offer very cool rebelion and army defecter options where party of your army with roots from the rebelious legion could disband and return to their homeland or try to go back to their homeland to support the local rebellion.

Obviously the whole gladiater rebelelions would tie into slavery, more slavery = more discontent = more games = more gladiaters = more chances of a full scale spartacus uprising event rrrr

[|Sith|Galvanized Iron]

I love slavery

[A Demented Goldfish]

I love slavery

thats going out of context and into my sig

[Rasic]

I'm sure there are issues they'd rather avoid in having a complex slavery simulation in the game. With that said I fully support a complex slavery simulation in the game.

[lazerBAR]

I would like the option to reward loyal generals with slaves as well as using them to make a Senator like me...

[Paragon]

While they'll probably get that out to avoid political incorrectness, it's true that slaves were very important early on for the Romans.

That being said, I'm waiting for someone to talk about how Roman slavery was so much better than American slavery, or that the barbarians deserved it. Pass the popcorn.

[|Sith|Galvanized Iron]

thats going out of context and into my sig

Hey it's forbidden to quote a source in it's entirelity!

But it's not out of context, slavery simply makes life so much more comfortable, if I had say 10-20 slaves they could do all my boring work and could relax all day long. I don't understand people who think there is something wrong with that, it's like they do not want people to have a good life or something (probably communists).

[Khannis]

* So they could be considered serfs at best? That's not really too far away from slave you know?

Landed serfdom and slavery are completely different. You weren't shipped away, sold, or used as a sex whore in brothels, like in Rome. You worked the land you already worked before and paid taxes, and that was about it. Also, that information about the Krypteia is sorely misleading: According to most ancient sources, like Xenophon and Plutarch, only the neotes, who weren't citizens and yet had to come of age, were encouraged to kill a Helot, but there were severe repercussions if they got caught, because the whole point as it to be a training to survive in hostile territory, as was stealing from temple offerings to feed during winter, another practice that warranted severe punishment if you got caught.

And even Wikipedia mentioned Myron was anti-Spartan, he deliberately fabricated information to discredit Sparta, and had a reputation as a horrible historian even in his own lifetime.

[UsulDaNeriak]

Landed serfdom and slavery are completely different.

Same applies to the roman colones.

[Lord Baal]

Ok, so laboring a land with no chances of doing something else and still being considered sort of propriety is not slavery... nice. Servs at best are simple agricultural slaves. For sake, did you know that the word serf comes from the latin for slave?

As for gameplay mechanics the helots should be simply represented as what they basically where, slaves, or state owned workers if you fancy. On the other hand it could be simpler to give the Sparta faction or the Laconia region/sub regions a higher unrest modifier.