That's why I said "Don't shoot the messenger". There is some good info in the video that might help with figuring out details on how to integrate the gameplay aspect.

I wasn't planning on discussing any further the "public relations" side of this.

How do you want the mechanic to integrate with the rest of the game?

Is it a poisoned option, which looks superficially tempting but inevitably makes things worse in the long run?

Is it a net benefit, such that you have to play at a disadvantage to avoid the topic?

Is it a situational choice, where it requires a certain playstyle? If so, what sort of play style would you want to make it "work out"?

It is just flavor, where participating or not doesn't really matter?

I think it should be sort of benificial for the early game, but needed to be phased out mid to late game. Plantations are more important than in the original (you sort of need those).

Maybe population growth (of "free workers") can be unlocked midgame, making slaves less useful at that point onward.

The original game is very much based on US history, and slavery there was very much still around when declaring independence from Britain. And I dont want it to be forbidden to achieve independence either.

Maybe the amount of slaves you have work against your ability to declare independence, but doesnt make it impossible? Sort of a scoring system where you must reach a target score to progress (in the original you must reach 50% rebel sentiment to declare independence, which starts a war against your european sponsor).

The constant attempt to avoid the topic while exploring the topic is silly. Gameplay and gameplay meaning are always connected. You can't talk about slavery without talking about slavery. To continue to attempt to do so is being obtuse.

The problem you're running into is the reason why slavery existed so long and still continues today. It can't be 'balanced.' It is, in every case, a license to print money. It is, unless you make up and enforce something illogical and unhistorical, always the best choice for the bottom line. It does not hurt production if you have a high percentage of slaves, more double shift workers with minimal overhead only helps all things being equal, and it did not negatively impact anyone's ability to declare independence, but actually helped the financials needed to do so and maintain it.

Slavery was only balanced by morality. The high moral and social cost to dehumanize people. There was never, and still isn't, any financial or material drawbacks to slavery. It is purely a moral and social issue.

And to be clear, so you don't continue to dodge your own conversation: I'm not talking about not including slavery. I'm takling about including slavery. The grittiness the griminess, the soul-wrenching effect of your empathy conflicting with your bottom line. You keep trying not to include slavery, avoid any further information on slavery that could be used to inform you design, but I'm saying, as I did before, to include it. Really include it. And if you really include slavery, and not try to make up things about slavery so you don't have to truly include it, not only will you have meaningful gameplay that asks interesting questions of your players, but you'll actually be exploring the history you're claiming you want to explore.

A great game that accomplishes this kind of morality vs bottom line is The Darkest Dungeon. Papers Please also, though in a different way. Those are the kinds of ideas and problem, historically, that balance slavery for 'late game.'

EDIT: But, it's your game. You don't have to really base it on history if you don't want.

You keep trying not to include slavery

Who tries to not include it? Me? Not at all. I'm confused by this comment. This topic is specifically about how to make the gameplay better since I already decided to include it.

Also you didnt comment before here as far as I can see.

There must be some balancing to slavery (some drawback), otherwise other sources of population will be pointless and the gameplay suffers.

How does Darkest Dungeon accomplishes "this kind of morality"?

You keep trying not to include slavery

Who tries to not include it? Me? Not at all. I'm confused by this comment. This topic is specifically about how to make the gameplay better since I already decided to include it.

Also you didnt comment before here as far as I can see.

There must be some balancing to slavery (some drawback), otherwise other sources of population will be pointless and the gameplay suffers.

How does Darkest Dungeon accomplishes "this kind of morality"?

You say you want to include slavery, but you redirect conversation about slavery to another discussion, which I responded to you in, and you're not aware of. It makes it seem like you don't want to talk about slavery, and you can't include something you don't know anything about. You can include a pale fiction-based facsimile of it, sure, but you can't actually include slavery without learning more about it.

The drawback to slavery is, in reality, being faced with the inhumanity required to make money in this way. Being faced with the humanity of the people you are disposing of. That is the drawback to slavery. It already exists, it's already been proven not to be anything else. That's all there is to it. If you're doing a historical game, that's your goal. If you want people to be able to experience or explore the triangle trade, that's your goal, essentially guilting them into not being slave traders.

Darkest Dungeon does this by showing you the anguish your causing and then allowing you to move on and start fresh without any mechanical consequences. As time goes on, it requires you to do more and more inhumane things to keep your numbers up at the same rate. This video from Game Maker's Toolkit gives a great summary:

Now if you don't want to actually do the actual Triangle Trade, you don't have to, but the whole point of the 'Include it or Not' thread was that you wanted to be faithful to the time period, to be respectful of the realities of that time period. So for you to include slavery, purely to be faithful, and then, once you have stated your claim of faithfulness and respect, to then decide that being faithful to the time period isn't that important, but it's all about arbitrary rules to include an unfaithful disrespectful version of slavery, it makes you very inconsistent, and it's hard to advise, much less make a good game, if you're not consistent about what you're trying to do.

So the question then follows: what is "Better" gameplay in this context?

In a colonization game context, I see them as a type of worker with an alternative cost and an alternate or additional production method.

A slave unit may be acquired by conquest or through growth of a colony that has slaves. In a game context we don't typically worry about the mechanics of that, soldiers are generated out of the ether from a barracks yet nobody questions it. If you have slaves, you can get more slaves. If you conquer another group you can gain slaves.

A few of the alternate costs or effects are addressed. Slaves would tend to have a cheaper direct cost when produced versus non-slave units. Slave units would have costs against those that are enslaved; if you enslave a race or nationality then interactions with those groups would be soured. Slave units likely will have lower stats than non-slave units, and captured and enslaved units may keep some stats but have others reduced. Thinking in real-world terms, someone who is captured may retain education and experience, but lose their equipment. So capturing an enemy engineer or scientist may add their brains or experience to your pool, but they may become critically weak; capturing an enemy soldier may retain is strength but lose defense.

I like the idea of a few other costs that are less visible or indirect. A society where a large part of the people are slaves likely means that those people aren't educated, so technology might grow slower even though there may be rapid growth through cheap units. The growth may be lower quality and break down faster when slaves are used to build them rather than regular builder units. Slaves used as workers may cost less but take more time to accomplish the goal, or may die off or be consumed faster than traditional workers. Civil unrest could be expressed in many different ways, like rebels appearing, cities protesting, production declining during protests. Slave units may escape or disband and vanish. A slave uprising may cause an entire town or city to leave the nation. Since slaves thematically get less care, an outbreak in slave pens could mean mass death or destruction or incapacitation of units. And while slaves may cost less directly they likely pay less/no tax so they generate no revenue for the player acting as government. Slave units may require additional resources over time, as being driven to work harder may mean more costs to food.

Thanks frob some good embryos for mechanics there!

@hypester

I understand your point but do you think this about every subject? Most strategy games are about war. But almost all of them completely ignore the themes of refugees, rape, killing of children, ethnic cleansing, some sort of enslavement etc, yet these are part of most wars. Does it mean you cannot make games about wars?

I think a game may include historical slavery, use mechanics and some historical elements of it, while still keeping it fairly respectful. But again this thread is not about that. Also, I'm not making a commercial product, and not one for the American market only, nor about American history specifically (which everyone seems to assume).

Some real-world (or at least realistic) negatives that you could implement, that would have a gameplay effect. And some would (I think) highlight the moral costs of slavery.

• When slaves escape, they don't just disappear. They join free states (both free colonies and free indigenous nations) and work against the slave states from there, or form their own societies. It can turn potential allies against you and cause new enemies to exist.
• The player might even lose allies for just being allied with a slave state. (I can't think of a real world example, but something like the fall of the Second Mexican Empire when France abandoned them to avoid pissing off the newly-victorious Union. This wasn't really due to them being friendly with the Confederacy, but that didn't help their cause either.)
• There's not much need for free labor in the plantation economy, and immigrant-attracting policies like giving away free farmland were less common. Only about 10% of immigrants to the young U.S. were to the south, and by the time of the war, the population of the Union dwarfed that of the Confederacy. (And almost half the population of the Confederacy couldn't be called up, for obvious reasons.)
• On a similar note, a free colony that successfully takes a city from a slave colony has a ready and willing supply of workers and potentially soldiers from it.
• Speaking of arming slaves, some of the cause for abolition in Argentina was due to the need to field more soldiers during their war of independence, if I remember correctly.
• Further on the subject of slaves and arms, you can't have a pacifist slave state. It was entirely possible in Colonization to keep your limited workers doing important things like farming and carpentry, and only pick up weapons when there was an enemy at the gates. This wouldn't be a viable strategy if the player is trying to force people to work by threat of violence; guards are necessary for that.
• Slavery can turn the King against a colony (or at least, against slavery in that colony) and vice versa, and maybe even precipitate a revolution before it's ready. When de las Casas got the ear of Emperor Charles V, he passed laws that attempted to abolish the encomienda system, at which point Pizarro's brother led a rebellion, which was initially successful but eventually failed, with the rebellious Pizarro beheaded.
• On that note, abolishing slavery isn't just flipping a switch; if the player relies on slavery for its early economic boost and then decides to abolish it when it becomes a burden in the later game, the slaveholding colonies might very well rebel against the player.

Actually, that last one is a really interesting addition to the Colonization formula. Beyond getting to independence, there could be a second win condition of abolishing slavery. Leading to the potential for interesting game journeys like getting independence, then trying to abolish slavery and getting into a civil war, then getting invaded again and losing independence, and having to gain it again.

@Valrus

Good ideas, many interesting game events can be plucked from this.

My prototype now includes free and forced worker units:

Free workers: originally only colonists from Europe.

Forced (unfree) workers:

Native and african slaves. May be free only through reforms

Indentured servants (from Europe). May become free after ~20 turns of work

Criminals (deported from Europe) May become free after ~40 turns of work

>Only free population may support the idea of Independance (be "converted" from tories by liberty bell production) making unfree workers good for production but bad for reaching end goal and building larger populations in a "city" (large colony).

>Unfree workers may not produce/work in some workplaces (town hall, church etc). Free workers may.

This may make slavery an element that is partially "phased out" as history unfolds. More testing is needed to know how this works out.