Separate Categories of Slavery (Phobe vs. Auth)

[HFY]

This proposal is fairly simple.

Separate "dehumanizing" types of slavery from less-horrible (but still horrible) types of slavery, and make the "dehumanizing" types exclusive to Xenophobe, and the less-horrible (but still horrible) types exclusive to Authoritarian.​

Implementation:

- Chattel Slavery and Livestock would be usable by Xenophobes.

- Indentured Servitude, Battle Thralls, and Domestic Servitude would be usable by Authoritarians. EDIT: (thanks mammonmachine) and perhaps this whole category could be named Servitude, not Slavery proper.


Implications:

- Different slavery types could impose different faction and/or ethic attraction, so an unhappy Chattel Slave might not become Egalitarian (while an unhappy Indentured Serf might indeed become Egalitarian).

- Different slavery types could be viewed better or worse by Factions, so a Xenophile Faction might demand war against a Livestock slaver, but might not mind taking an alien Domestic Servant home.

- Authoritarians lose access to the slavery type with the largest production bonus.

- Xenophobes lose access to the slavery types which allow Specialists, so they can't run a planet of Specialist slaves with just a few Ruler-stratum pops.

- Being a xeno slave under a Xenophobe would tend to impose a worse Happiness penalty than being a xeno slave under an Authoritarian.

 

[Had a dad]

Let's not talk about real world slavery in a game thread.

 

[mammonmachine]

There's the interesting question then of whether a chattel slave should become xenophile. They might not have the highest views of their alien masters, but would be all for the idea of ending species-wide slavery. It might be one pop calculation too many, but I think any that are enslaved (as chattel or livestock) alongside other species should get a boost to xenophile.

 

[mammonmachine]

Also - what do you think to the idea of separating servitude and slavery as concepts? That might make it less confusing for the player, as it wouldn't be immediately obvious that xenophiles detest species-wide chattel slavery, but are pretty down with some xeno domestic servants.

 

[HFY]

whether a chattel slave should become xenophile

If Xenophile is changed to tolerate Servitude but not allow Chattel (nor Livestock) then yes, absolutely agree.

Also - what do you think to the idea of separating servitude and slavery as concepts?

Sounds like you've got a better terminology for what I'm doing with this proposal.

Yeah, very good idea -- I'll edit the OP to reflect this.

 

[GOLANX]

How are they talking about "real world" slavery? If it's the concept of slavery that provoked you to post this remark maybe don't be a mod to game with genocide and slavery.

To be fair I did reference slavery practiced in the US over a century ago, I honestly thought that I had approached the subject in a academic manner and being careful to avoid some of the more controversial topics regarding slavery. You are still very correct though this game involves Slavery and Genocide, and we should be able to discuss their real life inspirations without being censored by the moderators.

Still I'm going to repeat my main points:
Authoritarians shouldn't be limited by policy as an absolute ruler with absolute authority it seems odd that there would be forms of slavery you are forbidden from using.
Xenophobes had real life counterparts to each form of slavery that exists in Stellaris except livestock. Stellaris should generally give the player more freedom than real life counterparts.
I would like for authoritarians to have Slaver Guilds bonus as an innate policy rather than having species wide slavery. Slaver Guilds should not need Authoritarian ethics so as to give all non egalitarian empires the shot at using slavery via civic.

 

[balmung60]

I feel that it's important that authoritarian should allow (and even expect) its forms of slavery on the founder species. Maybe they enslave 10/20% (regular/fanatic) based on governing ethics (provided, of course, that slavery is permitted at all) and slaver guilds adds 20% (percentage points) to that.

This helps maintain that slavery in authoritarian (but non-xenophobic) empires is on the basis of class or caste, not on the basis of species, which is xenophobe's shtick.

Also, I'd consider putting Battle Thralls under the xenophobe umbrella because its effects only really make sense on non-primary species, and presumably authoritarians should generally have the same servitude standards for all species, at least if they're also xenophiles.

 

[HFY]

I feel that it's important that authoritarian should allow (and even expect) its forms of slavery on the founder species. Maybe they enslave 10/20% (regular/fanatic) based on governing ethics (provided, of course, that slavery is permitted at all) and slaver guilds adds 20% (percentage points) to that.

This helps maintain that slavery in authoritarian (but non-xenophobic) empires is on the basis of class or caste, not on the basis of species, which is xenophobe's shtick.

Also, I'd consider putting Battle Thralls under the xenophobe umbrella because its effects only really make sense on non-primary species, and presumably authoritarians should generally have the same servitude standards for all species, at least if they're also xenophiles.

I'd like it if you could enslave a sub-species of your founder.

I'd like it if Authoritarians were rewarded for having non-founder Full Citizens, not just founders + slaves.

I don't want to mandate Slaver Guilds until the mechanics are improved. For example, if I have a newly conquered planet with a lot of enslaved species pops on it, then I don't want Slaver Guilds (or your version) to auto-enslave whatever regular citizen species I grow to govern and rule the planet.

The other issue is that ideal caste is mostly dependent on species traits. If you find a Serviles and/or Nerve-Stapled species, they are not going to produce Specialists nor Leaders. It's not reasonable to say that only a Xenophobe would enslave a species like that.

Regarding Battle Thralls, I'm not sure a Xenophobe would trust aliens to run its army and police forces (Soldier and Enforcer jobs). That honestly sounds like an Auth+Phile thing.

 

[balmung60]

I don't want to mandate Slaver Guilds until the mechanics are improved. For example, if I have a newly conquered planet with a lot of enslaved species pops on it, then I don't want Slaver Guilds (or your version) to auto-enslave whatever regular citizen species I grow to govern and rule the planet.

I don't see why it would do that. The target wouldn't be "enslave 20% of each species on a planet", but "enslave 20% of all pops on a planet without regard to species". So if the planet is already at its slavery target, new pops will be free until the math says the next new pop is a slave.

Species under species-wide slavery (xenophobe types) would count towards the target, but would not be bound by it, so if you have a species under chattel slavery and they make up half a planet's population, they're still all enslaved and your founder species isn't enslaved at all on that planet and won't be unless they come to outnumber the slave species enough that the regular slavery math says a founder should be an indentured servant or whatever.

 

[HFY]

I don't see why it would do that. The target wouldn't be "enslave 20% of each species on a planet", but "enslave 20% of all pops on a planet without regard to species". So if the planet is already at its slavery target, new pops will be free until the math says the next new pop is a slave.

Species under species-wide slavery (xenophobe types) would count towards the target, but would not be bound by it, so if you have a species under chattel slavery and they make up half a planet's population, they're still all enslaved and your founder species isn't enslaved at all on that planet and won't be unless they come to outnumber the slave species enough that the regular slavery math says a founder should be an indentured servant or whatever.

Because right now what Slaver Guilds does is enslave 40% of each species on the planet.

If you have 50 indentured serf space elves and you send over 10 orcs to rule them, 4 of those orcs can't be Rulers nor Enforcers nor Entertainers.

I want that mechanic fixed before I can agree with your idea.

 

[balmung60]

Okay, but if you're not playing xenophobes, why do you care which species are and aren't free? Space orcs face indentured servitude, too.

Also, if that's how it works, that's awful math by Paradox and sounds more like gerrymandering than a gameplay mechanic. Just lump all slavery-eligible pops into one group, enslave all pops that are subject to species-wide slavery, then add whatever proportion of the remaining slavery-eligible pops are needed to get the target slave pop proportion.

 

[HFY]

Okay, but if you're not playing xenophobes, why do you care which species are and aren't free? Space orcs face indentured servitude, too.

Also, if that's how it works, that's awful math by Paradox and sounds more like gerrymandering than a gameplay mechanic. Just lump all slavery-eligible pops into one group, enslave all pops that are subject to species-wide slavery, then add whatever proportion of the remaining slavery-eligible pops are needed to get the target slave pop proportion.

Yes, obviously I care. If I have only one Full Citizen species with decent habitability on that planet, that's who I want free. If I have a bunch of Strong / Proles / Nerve Stapled / Repugnant / Serviles / etc. species, I want them enslaved.

On a Gaia planet or whatever then I might not care if 20% of my orcs get enslaved, but sometimes it really does matter.

And yes, the current mechanic is bad to the point that I personally avoid it. Until it gets fixed, there's not much point in making new mechanics based off of it. Your idea could have merit, but not as the game works right now.

 

[GOLANX]

I'd like it if you could enslave a sub-species of your founder.

I'd like it if Authoritarians were rewarded for having non-founder Full Citizens, not just founders + slaves.

I don't want to mandate Slaver Guilds until the mechanics are improved. For example, if I have a newly conquered planet with a lot of enslaved species pops on it, then I don't want Slaver Guilds (or your version) to auto-enslave whatever regular citizen species I grow to govern and rule the planet.

The other issue is that ideal caste is mostly dependent on species traits. If you find a Serviles and/or Nerve-Stapled species, they are not going to produce Specialists nor Leaders. It's not reasonable to say that only a Xenophobe would enslave a species like that.

Regarding Battle Thralls, I'm not sure a Xenophobe would trust aliens to run its army and police forces (Soldier and Enforcer jobs). That honestly sounds like an Auth+Phile thing.

You should be able to enslave all of your cloned pops or perhaps all of your non rulers. It would be pretty cool if you could create a society with a rigid caste system. Would be a boon to bio evolution too if you could assign traits based on caste you could have traits that better suit your needs rather than assigning the same template to all of your pops because there is no way to discriminate between them outside of Racism.

And here I'm thinking there aren't enough reasons to use residency species right. Residency implies pops who are free for everything outside of political participation, and Authoritarians aren't big on letting proletariat rabble participate in politics reguardless of race. Undoubtedly though old power will be founder species, and if you require new power, then diversity should be considered.

Slaver guilds should be a policy option if I want to play as slavery free Authoritarians I should have that option. I'm currently doing a Salarian Role Play game and Salarians while being exceptionally authoritarian are not big on slavery. Devs should always err on the side of giving players more options not less.

The flavor text for battle thralls indicates a well trained and respected warrior caste. Xenophobes might use xeno slaves as cannon fodder and train them for the role in a standing military while reserving their founder species for leadership, there are historical examples of this which I shall not repeat.

 

[HFY]

You should be able to enslave all of your cloned pops

Just make cloned pops a special sub-species and let me enslave my own sub-species.

Solved.

 

[Archael90]

Im totaly agree, commenting, to refresh thread so more people can see it.