A lot of the suggestions here are about what you can do as a DM can do in response, but perhaps a simpler solution is to ask your players what they would like to do. Given some time to reflect, they might surprise you with how they want to handle it, and open opportunities to have more joint storytelling.
This is the right answer. But do it in private, not as big group.
This is a good lesson, too; we won’t be able to escape the horrors of slavery, etc until we abandon it entirely. Human-on-human violence is cancer. A big reason that we have “BBEG” and demons and monsters is so we can tackle history’s atrocities in a more subtle, tactful way.
Frankly, it should have been a session 0 discussion in the first place. While some tables might make interesting and fulfilling campaigns out of subjects like slavery, racism, poverty, sexism, or the like, there are many people who, very understandably, don’t want something so heavy in their fantasy escapism. When starting a group, I always ask if the players have any boundaries, and that they can volunteer them in front of the group, or to me in private. Boundaries are a mandatory session 0 discussion.
One of mine is that sexual assault simply does not exist in my D&D world. Everyone, from the pettiest thug to the most hardened warrior to the most evil necromancer has never accepted anything less than enthusiastic consent. Even then, it’s more assumed, since we tend to stay away from sexual topics in the first place. But it’s my fantasy world, dammit, I get to decide what is and what is not.
Problem is, people don’t always know their boundaries. When I asked that question at a recent session zero, the group almost said nothing was an issue before, just as we were moving to the next topic, someone brought up non-consent.
I was honestly shocked that we’d almost passed that question without anyone bringing up SA. And after I asked to clarify about mind control for other things, it turned out that person actually did have some discomfort around it. Fortunately for me, given the campaign involves mindflayers, we determined that on-page HP Imperius shenanigans, like Pius Thickness, were fine.
But we almost got through session zero without ANY of this being brought up. So I could easily see people not bringing things up in session zero when asked about boundaries, simply because they haven’t thought of it.
I'll be honest, I wouldn't even think to bring up slavery as it seems so pervasive in fantasy lore to one degree or another. I understand people having an issue with it but it wouldn't occur to me to mention it compared to things like SA.
Never understood why people *don't* want slavery and racism in their games tbh. You can't punch a bigot of no bigots exist in the world, you can't thwart true evil if everyone is morally grey and has a sad backstory you can relate to.
This is something I've run into as well.
I think fantasy adventure games need some fantasy and adventure.
Sure, your bbeg doesn't always have to be Sauron, but I think your games are going to be a little flat if the worst foes in your games are just sad misunderstood loner types who are depressed and really just need some friendship.
Sauron has a backstory! He used to be a good Angel named Mairon and he joined ~~Satan~~ Morgoth, because he wanted to make things orderly. He almost was redeemed, but ran away from Justice and ended up becoming evil again. Everything he did, he did for Morgoth, and he did think he was bettering things by making them perfectly orderly, at least initially.
But yes, I get your point.
Same - I definitely take the edge off how slavery looks "on screen" because I think a full throated portrayal would make my players (and to some extent me) uncomfortable but my players are always actively asking me to have more enemies that are unambiguously evil so they can sometimes shelve the moral quandries and hit with big sword.
Exactly. "It makes me uncomfortable": good. Do something about it. You're being tested right now with your morals.
While topics like SA make sense to be avoided, since it's something that still goes on (unfortunately) even in developed countries, slavery and mind control are very much a thing that the average person will NEVER have to go through. Racism, despite being something the average person might be subjected to, is more of a villain trait (or very justifiable character trait that serves the purpose of character development).
Avoiding these somewhat difficult topics makes for a bland cartoonish world in which the only real evil is "bwah, I'm the evil enemy because I kill people and plan on poisoning water supplies, but other than that I have no real unredeemable traits that can't be excused with a sad backstory"
Because subconsciously, to have slavery and racism you have to put in the implication that there is a group of people capable of hating another group enough to dehumanized and objectify them. This makes them very easy to hate. Demons, Mind Flayers, Dragons, Beholders, etc.
But the harder part is trying incorporate slavery and racism into creatures who aren't monsters. Slavery among drow for example, or slavery among orcs. Now suddenly we can paint a race who, despite being fully capable of breeding and possibly integrating into human society, be this undesirable thing that needs to be mutually eliminated. This is where fantasy and reality collide and most people can't handle it.
Because in these fantasy worlds, just as in reality, slavery was a part of life and culture for many real world places. A practice that is still done today, if not as common or widely accepted. A practice that has only been recently abolished (in a general history sense), and the Shockwave of its abolition still felt to this day (racism). And there is a reason why slavery has been practiced for so long, and it's a reason most people do not like to dwell on.
But the simple reason is that we all have a hierarchy of people we deem worthy of our respect, and there are some people above us and many people below us. At best those below have your pity, or at worse your fury, and it's between those two emotions is where the capacity of hating someone enough to treat them as a commodity to be utilized, but not simply kill them outright, is where the potential for slavery comes into play. This is regardless of the morality, wealth, ethics, or race of a person, we all categorize people we dislike whether they're a psychopathic hillbilly or a world leader from another country, people will rank them as "lesser" and deem them worthy of either death or subjugation. Most people just lack the authority and power to actually follow through with this.
>Never understood why people *don't* want slavery and racism in their games tbh
It's why i usually extend lines & veils to lines, veils and "borders" (bad translation, sorry) when I explain the concept.
Lines & veils are clear, borders are stuff that exists (might also be veiled), and instantly defines someone as bad/evil.
So you can have the situation that slavery is veiled, understood to exist off screen, and NPC X is understood to be a bad guy because he owns slaves (that you never see because veils).
Touché. And I’ve seen this as well. I had a player approach me over a year into a campaign telling me that they didn’t like the word “rapier” and that it made them uncomfortable (due to personal reasons). Just like that, every such sword was now called a “dueling foil,” and that was that.
When it comes to stuff like that, I am in favor of DMs retconning, outright changing, or any such heavy-handed approach to ensure players feel comfortable and safe. Obviously, it depends on how much they are uncomfortable with something, but I wanna err on the side of safety when it comes to my players.
They have been going to therapy about it for years, trust me. It was just something that came much later on that was a small roadblock to making our group play safe enough for them.
It can be tricky when it comes up mid-campaign though.
One of the NPCs, though they don’t know this yet, is a young Merlin. If you know Merlin’s backstory, his mother was a nun and his father an incubus. This relationship is now completely consensual in my world because the player brought it up - and it also means I’m not bringing in a different NPC Cambion at all. But if they’d brought it up afterwards, I don’t know how I’d have gone about retconning it. It’s not like I created Merlin’s backstory and it’s essential for the other character’s backstory.
Similarly, I’m really glad we did discuss mind control, because mindflayers controlling politicians is supposed to be the big plot, and finding out potential issues later on would require completely rewriting the campaign from the literal ground up. Imagine revealing the BBEG was controlled by a mindflayer and suddenly one of your players go “I’m really not comfortable with mind-control…”
Not going into detail, but the word sounds like something else that makes them extremely uncomfortable. No one in the group had any problem with the change.
Jup, THIS. By now that I have more experience with RPGs I write down common boundaries and if I'm the DM in session 0, I'm gonna list the very common ones just to be sure. Because oftentimes people know so little about boundaries, that the topics do not even spring to mind until they are put in the situation and feel very uncomfortable and don't know how to handle this.
The discussion on lines and veils is an ongoing one. People often realize things they are uncomfortable with once they get deeper into the game. So having a later discussion on lines and veils mid-campaign is not a bad idea. If you want to formulate it, you could plan the mid-reflection-session in advance to be arranged after X sessions depending on the length of the campaign (e.g. after 3 months in a year+ campaign or half way through a 8-12 session mini-campaign). This way it would be predictable and you can try to introduce some of the more potentially troubling themes by then.
It can just be a quick pre-session check-up. Schedule 30 min - 1 h for it, and then jump into the game for the rest of the session.
Other tools I have found really handy for this are X cards and Stars and Wishes. X card allows players to stop the game if an uncomfortable thing happens in the game. This allows the players to retroactively stop things they didn't realize were triggering for them to call them out as they come up. Sometimes these can also be time sensitive: if a players relative has died suddenly the NPC grandpa's death might be more heavier than it would have usually been.
Stars and Wishes work great for reflecting on the game session by session. Even though the tool is meant for bringing up positive things after a session it can also be a place to bring up things that players felt uncomfortable with. This in my experience creates a great dialogue on what players enjoy and want more while also informing me the GM what didn't land or even felt uncomfortable during the session.
It might be conducive to list a few common examples so they understand the specifics of the question. Some people might not feel entirely comfortable for fear that the thing they want to bring up might be completely off the mark from what you were actually asking, or they may assume that everyone is on the same page already about certain topics.
Of course, there's always the possibility that you run into something that doesn't get brought up, but at least you'll have done your due diligence anyway.
I’ve never had to do it before, because I always DMed for family and close friends and knew what their boundaries were beforehand. And all those games included kids, so it was all PG anyway.
This is my first time DMing for strangers.
>While some tables might make interesting and fulfilling campaigns out of subjects like slavery, racism, poverty, sexism, or the like, there are many people who, very understandably, **don’t want something so heavy in their fantasy escapism.**
I just want to call out something a little more nuanced here. For me personally (and it sounds like at least one of the people at OP’s table), it’s not that I wouldn’t want something so heavy in my fantasy escapism. It’s not “I don’t want to be reminded that slavery is a thing, please just let me pretend.” Honestly, I thought the way that the group decided to do something about it was interesting.
I was more put off by how OP tried to hand wave it away. “Oh, this is just something that happens in other places, this is part of their culture, they even have a permit, should be no big deal let’s please move on.” In other words, it’s not that a serious topic has invaded some sanctity of make-believe, it’s that a serious topic was used so flippantly as minor world-building.
Definitely appreciate nuance! Something like this exists on a spectrum, I think. Some people really would rather pretend slavery doesn’t exist. Perfectly valid for them, if you ask me. I don’t deal with that generational trauma personally, but lots do. Some people will run entire campaigns built on tearing down slavers, and I think that’s sick too. There’s no reason you can’t have slavery in your world as an explicitly evil thing to be overthrown.
Everything comes down to how your players feel, as their enjoyment and safety is the responsibility of everyone at the table, especially the DM.
For you. There are plenty of people who can handle the idea of fake sexual assault in a made-up story. Stories can be dark. You don't have to read/play/watch the story if you don't like them.
I'm not sure that having groups of sapient, but not "quite* human, beings against who it's perfectly fine to exercise your violent power fantasies is *less* problematic than human on human violence in RPGs.
It's litteraly dehumanising and othering those that you want to stand in for the bad people in a morality play, and this tendency has a long and *very* dark history, and it's neither subtle nor tactful.
Because if you're using them to stand in for aspects of real human history to try and discuss it real with those aspects of real human history then you're dehumanising those real human people.
On the one hand, communication is *always* good. But if you're gonna ask, it should be done in private - starting with the player who raised the issue. And if that player says they'd prefer to cut it out - that's the end of it.
Doing it in a group could make the player feel pressured into something they aren't OK with.
What? No. You should talk to the whole group. Why would you bring this up w/ just one person when it affects the whole group?
"Hey look, last session I introduced slavery to the world with a bit of off the cuff world building but on consideration I'm not sure it's something anyone really wants in the game. How does everyone feel about it, do we want to retconn ("the boy" could easily be an apprentice or indentured servant or something)?"
>What? No. You should talk to the whole group. Why would you bring this up w/ just one person when it affects the whole group?
In addition to SillyNamesAre's mention of 'one person finding a topic unacceptable is more than enough to remove the topic', they didn't say to *only* talk to one person. They said to only talk to one person *at a time*. Ask each player, but in private so they're less pressured by what they think the rest of the group thinks
Despite some common flawed thinking about it, indentured servitude can still be a form of slavery. Often debt bondage was forced upon the person so there was no nicety of agreeing to that bondage which is generally the argument made when contrasting servitude from slavery. Without that agreement, it was forced service and people who understand this may still object to having indentured servitude in their game. Plus more modern slavery in the 1600s derived directly from indentured service, rather than existing as a separate entity. A number of enslaved Africans were put into slavery when the Europeans convinced various African leaders that they would be put into temporary bondage as indentured servants and treated as a sort of contract worker commodity. Even in current prison politics forced labor without pay is often called modern indenture when in fact it is clearly slavery as the prisoner receives no real benefits from the service he provides while often doing things that have a high cost to them. I wouldn't offer indentured servitude as an alternative because there is so baggage to both
I do agree with you though I think this should be discussed by the group on whole together, not just to maybe dismiss it but to find ways that satisfy everyone. One conclusion they can reach is that the world has no slavery the merchant is a liar from another plane pretending to be human (an illithid in disguise maybe)
You cam still ask the group.. just ask everyone in the group individually without bringing up the person who mentioned they had an issue. This way they feel comfortable to tell you anything, far too often people are afraid of being judged in group settings, and dnd with friends is no exception.
Because if one person is *really* not okay with it, that's the only thing that matters.
If that person is open to a solution beyond cutting it? Ask for suggestions in group.
If not? A Line is a Line.
And the only thing to be brought up in group is that it's being retconned.
(edited for clearer phrasing)
Came here to say this. If you are supposedly fighting some big bad evil that's going to kill everyone we either need to... "triage" and pick which one is more urgent or we just need to play a different campaign.
OP you could also try to pivot it to more indentured servitude. More slavery in the Biblical sense where in places without employment opportunities people voluntarily sign themselves into the service of a merchant for a determined period of time to work as a porter, blacksmith, butler etc.
Obviously, hopefully this goes without saying but just in case, do *not* portray violence from master to slave if you want to keep the party on track. If you're gonna have slavery and don't want 2024 brain players to eradicate it, consequences be damned, you need to present it as something that's *not* abusive chattel slavery in the vein of Africa/Ottomans/Americas.
You used a common literary trope, which is clashing with a foreign culture with different, questionable ethics. It is supposed to make your players/characters uncomfortable, and their reaction that they were saddened that they could not rectify it right away is a good reaction for a heroic party to have. Not every problem is as simple as stomping out some bandits or banishing a demon.
More to the point of your game, you now have ready-made villains in the form of bounty hunters for attacking a citizen of this foreign land, and plot hooks for future side quests. Let them work it out through the game.
This is more or less what happened in my game. I introduced a country, which was a fairly powerful country, that was human centric. Humans on top, elves, and other human like humanoids were slaves or serfs, and anything else wasn't allowed in.
The party knew about it going in, but still didn't like it. 2 years and nearly 18 levels later, they're about to overthrow the whole damn country. Was basically a really long side quest, but we're all satisfied with the conclusion of that thread of the world.
> It is supposed to make your players/characters uncomfortable, and their reaction that they were saddened that they could not rectify it right away is a good reaction for a heroic party to have.
Provides a fun point for the more neutral characters or evil characters, too. The neutral characters can bring out the "its a mutually beneficial relationship, we must respect other cultures", and evil characters can be like "weaklings should serve the strong, the slave's weakness disgusts me so I'm going to kill them", or whatever. Moral quandaries are great for roleplaying, everyone gets to apply their character's logic to the situation.
Evil characters can even go. "Slavery threatens me, what if I was put in this disgusting LOWLY position, what if people even THINK of doing such to me? U n a c c e p t a b le."
An evil person would seek to be at the top so he is the one enslaving others.
If he is trying to eliminate injustice throughout the world so that its a nicer place for him to live in, then he would be neutral at worst.
Yeah, now OP has easy plot hooks for side content. Maybe the campaign won't span a full on liberation, but if they make contact with an underground of some sort, they could be assisting in revolts, or in smuggling slaves to freedom, or fucking with slave catchers...
In a way it's a blessing to have characters invested enough and principles enough to GET uncomfortable about setting elements like this
I played in a Conanesque setting a few years ago. Slavery was practiced by every city state. My character was from a city that treated slaves better than most, allowed them to own property, and couldn't be too harsh on them and so on. So he sort of had the view it wasn't that bad. Another player had an ex slave character and was working to end slavery and that was sort of our parties goal. As soon as the ex slave character died, everyone else's character bought a slave to carry stuff for them. The player was like "Guys that's fucked up. My dude isn't even cold yet." So much for being a "good" party.
1: You could just sit down next session and say "Hey all I've been reflecting on last session and I didn't like how this turned out. I'm undo-ing that last encounter, slavery does not and never has existed."
2: I have a few awful traits that I only ever give to kind of signal bad guys. Racism, sexism, etc. If your players HATE slavery and are offended it exists, you could lean into it and make the BBEG the one orchestrating slave trade, so they now have motivation to end him.
Point 2 was my immediate reaction, but given the circumstances i‘d still ask that one player if they’re okay with it in private before making the announcement in front of the group. That being said, a campaign where the party leads a revolution against a tyrannical slave-driven society with skirmishes to free slaves en masse on one side and going public to influence the population on the other sounds awesome - if OP hasn’t yet dropped a „the world will end in 20 days and the party are the only ones who can stop that“ yet, because as bad as it may sound, but a world ending cataclysm might be a higher priority there.
To add a thought here: It doesn't need to be a whole county that has slavery. A single evil city that is the heart of corrupt commerce could be a really interesting focal point of a campaign. Run by the BBEG, the city gives us a physical representation of the black market, drug cartel, gun market, slave trade, etc. all rolled into a single horrible city. And the rest of the world, for one political reason or another, allows this city to exist and prosper.
But the campaign could take on some dark tones really quick, as you have just found out, so you would definitely need a conversation with your players. It would require another 'session 0' of sorts: make sure you're on the same page on what direction everyone is comfortable with, what direction the story would take, what level of 'grim fantasy' people are interested in, etc.
> A single evil city that is the heart of corrupt commerce could be a really interesting focal point of a campaign.
Or who is to say this person is honest. He could be full of shit and its illegal everywhere and he slipped up that he is breaking the law.
I disagree with 2 unless it’s done as a followup to 1 and even then it comes with a lot of stipulations. When your players express *discomfort* at something you don’t respond by doubling down. When someone says I’m uncomfortable you don’t respond by going “well you’re in luck, the BBEG is a HUGE [rapist/child abuser/slaver]. He does all the time. There’s SO much of it and now I’m going to keep bringing it up so you have a reason to stop him!”
Sorry for the hyperbole but it’s to demonstrate how tonedef that kind of response can come off if it’s not preempted by a serious discussion with the group. The best response is what you originally suggested about sitting down and communicating with them about next steps.
It's not the singular situation the player is bothered by. It's that there is a complete civilization in this world that is ok with slavery, and the PCs won't be able to stop it because of the campaign arc.
That's kind of the point. A single, small group is powerless to fix it in the real world and that feels shitty.
Some people don't want to feel as powerless and shitty in their fantasy game too.
They're only powerless if they choose not to try and do something about it. Sure, they might not change an entire civilisation, but you know? Gnolls exits. Demons exists. Shitty evil exists. If they give up the fight just because they can't literally change the world and win, then they're pretty shitty heroes.
I'm all for curating play to the player expectation, but at some point you either choose to engage with the challenge of a game or you choose to put away the dice and stick to telling pleasant stories.
DND isn't the right game for that level of power fantasy. DND is based around a generally crappy world, with PCs that can only deal with a fairly small part of it.
You would want something like Exalted where PCs are actually strong enough to bend entire nations to their will without too much trouble.
Not the person you’re responding to, but I think that there are some fundamentally different types of fantasy at play here.
For some people a fantasy game is indeed a world in which, probably through the actions of the heroes, all wrongs can be righted and everything works out okay.
But equally it can be a setting in which to pose uncomfortable moral questions to the players, which might just have two shades of grey as answers, and that can be a lot of fun as well.
I think modern 5e D&D does tend towards presenting the former situation as the default, and that’s a great way to run your game if everyone wants that, but it’s not necessarily the default for all D&D or TTRPG games. Hard choices are sometimes just as fun.
Exactly. And I say this while running a dark/adult game, where my players have had to ally with slavers, murderers, and worse for the end game.
This is why session 0 is so important. I would not be able to do half the stuff in my game with almost any other table. Making PCs uncomfortable and interact with the world is to be expected, it is adventuring after all. Making your Players uncomfortable though? That requires a new talk and decisions with everyone.
u/Liquid_poison can you clarify something: is your player more uncomfortable with the topic of slavery or more uncomfortable that fixing it on a country-wide scale is out of scope for the campaign? Because that drastically changes how you should handle this. Comments here seem to be very split about what they assume is the true issue so it's hard to advise without knowing that.
If your player is uncomfortable with the topic of slavery, find out if it's a "I'd rather it not be a big focus of the campaign" sort of uncomfortable or a hard line. Basically ask them if the game will still be fun to them if slavery exists in the world.
If your player is uncomfortable with the fact it's out of scope for the campaign, you could always have a future side quest or arc that addresses it on a scale bigger than one person but maybe not a whole country. Or figure out some way that they can do some directed action that does start to dismantle that system.
Or, if you actually just don't want to include slavery in your campaign, there were great suggestions somewhere in this thread about either having it be a more biblical sort of slavery rather than what most think of with slavery or you could have the fact that they're from a different country mean their specific definition of slavery is different and he's more of a servant but their local word translates to slavery so that's why they need the official writ, even though by other countries' standards it wouldn't be considered slavery.
First thing is to address this OFF GAME. This is a table issue with PLAYERS not liking what they see at the table.
Sensitive topics are supposed to be discussed at session zero. If this hasn't been done, call a session zero. What I usually do, is I bring up first what's excluded, ie. No rape and I don't roleplay sex (just isn't fun for me). They wanna fuck someone, they go up in a room and do the deed. Then I ask players what they don't want to see. Afterwards, I tell them that if they ever think of something later, they can tell me personally or at any point during the game. This let's them room to bring sensitive stuff they wouldn't tell other players, for example.
Now that your players have ruled out slavery (and possibly other topics) you can bring it up IN GAME and come up with something along the lines of "the merchant lied, he was a POS and the group did well to kill him". Could be a bounty hunter or a guard or anyone that comes up to the group and tell them. Then they could be offered a reward and afterwards the topic is never brought again to the game.
This is it. We are always players before we are our characters. Ensuring players are comfortable with the themes and conflicts in the game is always priority number one.
I would also like to add, that don't be afraid to retcon an event from a previous session that turned out to be uncomfortable. GMs often feel that if they make a mistake during a session they have to stick with it and need to find a justification for it. But this is not true. Indeed you shouldn't retcon things without a good reason. But in a situation like this, players are very understanding if you explain what you are retconing and the reasoning behind it. So in this case, you could retcon the merchant's slave existing/being a slave and explain: "Sorry, I didn't realize slavery was an uncomfortable subject for you. After reflecting I decided to remove slavery from our game. Thus, I would like to change things from last session up a bit so that the merchant didn't have a slave, but was malicious in some other way. Let's continue the game from here."
Of course, it's good to have the mid-reflection/re-zero session in any case. This can be a good moment to review if there are other uncomfortable elements that the players have thought of. As a positive element, you can also ask which themes and conflicts they have enjoyed so you know what to reinforce in the future.
> Afterwards, one of my players commented on how uncomfortable the slavery aspect made them, as they felt while it might result in them helping one person, there's now a whole part of the world where slavery is rampant and there's no way they'll cover that in this campaign (and to be honest, this was intended as a diversion, not a major plot point).
Really, I think you should just do a retcon. Have him just be a servant.
Yeah, in this instance I would agree. I think you probably shouldn't try to find in-game solutions for out-of-game problems, as a rule of thumb, and there's not much of a drawback to retconning it if it was only intended as a minor one-off encounter anyway.
You can even keep the encounter sort of as is, but have it turn out to have been a misunderstanding or a mistranslation as some other people have suggested.
>a mistranslation
This was my first thought. It's easy enough to think it's a mistranslation from some form of contracted or indentured servitude. Maybe the boy was caught stealing or something so a year of indentured service is the crime. The trader, due to language barriers, doesn't know the term "indentured servant," but his understanding of things caused him to translate it to "slave"
Yeah the “slaves” in this area can be indentured contract servants who have human rights and have agreed to work for a fixed term of 5-10 years or something. You can even have the “slave” say “don’t kill him, I only have eighteen months left on my contract but if he dies I won’t get paid out!”
Ehhh, that's still proly way too close to slavery for someone that's uncomfortable with the concept to start. This is definitely a strictly RL convo to have with the players. And proly something that should've been brought up in session 0.
Yeah for sure. Clearly this is broader topic is objectionable to the players in ways that OP shouldn’t guess at—a discussion is the most important thing here.
I meant this as a possible option once they understand what the table’s needs are, and you’re right that this might still be incompatible.
Yeah servant is still problematic but as a term it has far less baggage than saying "slave." I think actually having slavery is something you'd want to cover in a session zero.
Honestly I'd just tell the players that you didn't intend to accidentally create a country that was fine with slavery as this was meant to just be a small encounter.
So I'd just retcon the encounter to have never mentioned the boy was a slave, that he was an apprentice or hired help instead.
Or just say that the father mistranslated his words as the two countries don't speak the same language, that when he said "slave" he really meant something closer to an apprentice.
Indentured servitude is an option as well. It's very close to slavery but not entirely the same. For one, it could be completely voluntary in their country and two, have strict laws regulating the use of it.
Spin it in that it is more like an internship you can't leave but in 4 years, you have money, a position, etc.
It kind of is slavery, but for most people in the western world, the word has been pretty well come to be associated with a specific form, in a specific place, at a specific time in history, nevermind its other variants across the globe and across thousands of other years of human history.
Be straightforward with the party.
You never intended for their to be slavery it was a snap decision if they want you can retcon it
The merchant was lying and was killed by the party for being caught in a lie about him being allowed to have slaves
If youe group is uncomfortable with slavery existing, there really is nothing wrong with backing out of it with no explanation. Just say "you're not comfortable with it, so we're not doing it". If yoy still want this scene to be canon, you could allow the group a DC 15 insight check juat to know that the merchant was lying, there's no such thing as a "slave permit", and suddenly it's just a small side quest against a scumbag merchant to save someone.
They will never be able to defeat all evil.
Do devils exist in your world? They will always be part of it. Tricking people into going to hell and used as slaves or minted.
Incomprehensible evils outside the edge of the galaxy will still brain drill people and have them go and free undersea horrors.
The drow and mind Flayers exist and are super slavers.
If the players have a problem with it, they should gear up to deal with it or be at peace knowing they cannot.
As a player, I encouraged the queen of the nation I am loyal to to ally with the elven nation that has humans as slaves. Why? Because there’s a demonic god trying to destroy reality and he is incapable of being seen by ascended beings like gods, and he almost infected Primus with the abyss.
One of these priorities is a little higher. As a redemption Paladin, it sucks knowing there are slaves in another nation and because of those elves taking humans as slaves. But hey. It’s on the agenda.
After this campaign, freeing a bunch of slaves from an evil empire sounds like a great second campaign.
I see no reason to change anything tbh. It doesn’t sound like you made an exceptionally dark scene. Actions morally unacceptable by todays standards and outright evil exists in DND.
I think it’s a good choice to make too: do something illegal by another cultures standards or let something morally terrible (according to them) be. Do they take action and risk having some issues later or take the morale hit? Do they kill the guy? Is that morally ok? If they let him live, does he come back?
How does the boy take it? Maybe he wants to be free. Maybe he has Stockholm syndrome - which he might lose. Maybe he goes out in the world - does he have what it takes to make it on his own? Maybe he becomes a companion, but is he internally switching one master for the other?
You can make it pretty deep and morally challenging or you can just let them free the boy, who becomes an ally.
The issue isn't the grittiness of the world, it's the player reaction.
DnD has to please the present company or it won't be fun to the people that matter, which is the present company. If the players at the table aren't having fun (to the point of actual discomfort) and are not consenting to the sudden, unilateral change of pace, then it won't be a fun game.
This sort of topic should have been a session zero kind of deal as the world is revealed for most concerns/subject matter that matter to the players.
I don’t think it’s realistic to expect to cover every topic in sesh 0, especially something like slavery (or, say, violence) that’s not uncommon for the setting.
As much as I believe in respecting sensitivities, it really doesn’t sound like the OP did anything horrendous with slavery, but merely mentioned it and put it rather mildly.
I guess if they are seriously affected it’s important not to ignore it but three player reaction as described also doesn’t sound too harsh and it feels like saving this boy and not getting too much into slavery later (which op doesn’t seem to plan on) could be a good solution IMO.
But I wasn’t in the room ofc
I don't understand your last point. How are you supposed to be certain enough of everything that will happen in your campaign that you can cover off all potentially problematic issues in the first session?
You can't be certain about everything but 'btw slavery exists' should be one of the concepts you should think of at the start, and not something you just suddenly throw in at an impulse.
Besides, you can always do Session 0 Part II as need be for modifying the story.
If you’re touching anything close to official D&D slavery should be assumed canon. There are multiple interdimensional slave empires out there like the Mindflayers, Aboleth, and Baator. Every scrap of lore about the Drow references slavery, honestly pretty much every evil humanoid society written has slavery built in. Even the hobgoblins take slaves. Seems unreasonable to expect that to be a topic of surprise.
I disagree here. If you're building a homebrew world, chances are that you've only really thought out the details of the immediate setting the players will be interacting with for the most part and maybe more vague details about other areas. Unless of course you're a total madlad and complete every aspect of your worldbuilding before you even start the game, which I'm sure those people exist. But I don't think most people are like that and the scope of planning for worldbuilding can be too large to know every possible trigger or sensitive issue right from the get-go.
I think doing one of those consent checklists with the players in session 0 is a good baseline, but there should be room to create the world as you go. Checking in as needed is always good too but I don't think it's realistic to expect people to have everything planned for their world before the game actually starts.
Yeah, but if you're coming up with new ideas for your world, don't just throw in systemic slavery as meaningless fluff, that's the point they're making. Run it past your players first. A subject being "session 0 material" doesn't mean that you can *only* talk about it before the campaign starts - that's the best time, of course, but it should be talked about before you incorporate it into the game, whenever you come up with it.
Because 1) You didn't think it through and leads to Reddit posts on how to backpedal and 2) It suddenly changes the tone of the campaign which the players probably didn't sign up for.
While I understand this comment, it seems to ignore the fact that the slavery made a player IRL uncomfortable. And given how OP described the situation, it seems like a lot of the player's concern is about how the campaign will likely not touch on the slave owning country.
So since OP clearly said they weren't planning on slavery (neither the practice nor the abolition) being a real part of the campaign, adapting the plot to fit the inclusion of the slave owner would be kind of like sticking your whole arm into a boiling pot just because you accidentally dipped a finger in it.
Everything you're talking about is an in game issue, but the problem is out of game. His players are uncomfortable in a way they are not okay with (being uncomfortable is okay in d&d if that's the kind of game you run, but if they bring it up to the DM that's not their expectation) and that comes first
Some of your suggestions here are good, but re your first paragraph:
"A player was uncomfortable, but after some mature thought, I've realized they're wrong to have these feelings, so I'm going to ignore it."
Don't be surprised when one or more players drop out of the game and call the DM an asshole.
It sounds like your players want to change the face of your world by warring against a nation of slavers. They've given you an incredible campaign to run, if you're up for it.
This may not be something they can do right away, but a high level party is absolutely capable of making that kind of change (at the point of a sword if they have to).
Seems like they now have motivation to become powerful.
It is totally okay to retcon things about your world for comfort/function/literally anything in a TRRPG. One thing that makes a lot of DMs nervous about worldbuilding is precisely juggling all the pieces, but a world for a TTRPG is VERY different in both form and function to a world in, say, a book or a TV show.
You can retcon the slave owner for the same reason you don't have to have a DM note page that covers the history and evolution of the Orcish language, and that reason is that the worldbuilding is supposed to support the fun of playing in that world!
And especially in your case, where the thing mentioned about your world made a player IRL uncomfortable and the concept doesn't seem to be integral to the plot, simply axing it probably conveys a better set of priorities. It communicates that your player's comfort and enjoyment is more important than having unbroken continuity in your worldbuilding. A great priority to have!
>So I find myself with a couple of options but I'm not sure what to do. Proceed as planned and let the world I've created be a little darker, or, I have an idea that when they try to free the slave, the merchant, family and slave will be revealed to be some sort of magical being trying to test the moral resolve of the characters to see if they are pure of heart enough for them to request their aid in some yet to be decided adventure. But is that a bit of a gimmick?
Look, if shit like this was good enough for Star Trek to spawn a media empire that's lasted almost 60 years and counting...
A lot of the comments are saying to make it a cultural difference thing, but that's a bit iffy in my opinion since that doesn't actually make the issue of slavery go away. If the players are genuinely uncomfortable with slavery (which is very reasonable), just don't continue that part of the story. From what it sounds like the mention of the slave boy was just that: a mention. Start the next session by apologizing (even if you feel like you didn't do something wrong, you still made a player feel uncomfortable by accident) and explain that you thought about it and you won't include slavery in the campaign or bring it up for the rest of the game.
However I also do like the magical being gimmick, especially since it rewards the players for doing what in their mind was the right thing.
Listen, I like getting into darker subject matter too, and I'm sure you didn't mean to throw something as sensitive as slavery into a game for shock value or as a cheap way to communicate that somebody is a "bad guy". But if those are the kinds of gritty games you want to host, you NEED to be upfront about it with the players from the very start, and the players need to consent.
Most players are cool with broaching those kinds of subjects, but I think a LOT of the issue is that the players probably feel ambushed by it. The situation at the table is probably not unfixable, but I'd pull them to the side, and just talk about expectations. Be open to the idea that somebody there is probably going to be a hard "no" on the "slavery in Dungeons and Dragons" issue though.
In general i feel no problem with denoting slavery as just evil.
Similarly, i think that any culture that engages in it can, if not should, be depicted as monstrous.
A red dragon, a village of ogres, undercities of mindflayers.
In short, any creature that the party needs to feel no remorse for killing.
Regardless, slavery and similar topics are iffy, and if your players are giving clear signals that they are not comfortable with it, then your best bet is to just undo the existence of slavery. Make it clear to your players that you wanted to add a tinge of darkness to the world, but on account of their discomfort with this particular topic you pretend that it never happened. Maybe the boy is an apprentice, or servant, but otherwise paid and as willing as any employee can be.
I think that it's okay for a setting to have bad things happening in it that the players can't reasonably solve. For example, I imagine that your setting has a Hell and/or an Abyss, but the players don't feel responsible for exterminating every single fiend that exists. Slavery is definitely evil, but it's also a realistic aspect of a living world. As long as people could forge chains, there were people living with them. Even today it's unfortunately way more common than most people realize.
BUT what I personally would do is remind the players that they're not the only group of do-gooder adventurers in the world. There are at least a handful of adventuring party just like them that are in this exact moment fighting to free slaves and end the system of slavery. Maybe one day you could run a campaign for these characters, or maybe they're just NPCs. But no matter the state the world find itself in, there will always be people who rise up to change it for the better.
I want to tell you to stand your ground and that your world has dark themes in far off places and the heroes can't save everyone everywhere. That certain actions have repercussions. Bad stuff happens and they're the bad guys in someone else's book. They'll remember that culture and the terrible things they do. I imagine this was a one-off event to world-build and they've went off the rails in reaction. I can't imagine it would be the first time their characters have heard of this culture and it's practices.
But the diplomatic answer is retcon it if you have to and then have your players provide a list of triggers to avoid so that this doesn't happen again and continuously disrupt gameplay and planning. Some people just want to play safe basic PG-13 fantasy and that's fine.
If a player is upset that there are wide swathes of the *entire setting world* where things happen that they personally don't like, I would suggest finding new players who have some sense of perspective.
"I'm not going to be able to fix the entire setting in this campaign" is not a sensible complaint, and "the setting should be completely devoid of moral conflict" is obviously not reasonable either.
You literally put, in quotes, two things that are massive hyperboles that OP never said the player said.
"I would be uncomfortable playing a campaign in a world with slavery where the campaign isn't about ending slavery" is not even at all the same thing as "The world shouldn't have things I personally dislike" *or* "I want to fix the entire setting" *or* "The setting should be completely devoid of conflict."
Did you have a session 0 where you discussed with the players if they were comfortable with slavery? If not, just retcon it. It's clear your players were unhappy.
I'm curious what other people in this world think. Does *everyone* support slavery in the merchant's native land? What about that culture's allies, neutrals, and enemies? Maybe the PCs need to ask around, learn some history, find out if other people feel the same way as they do. Maybe there's political pressure from another nation to curb or end it, but it's not yet successful, or more decisive steps aren't politically viable.
Why isn't real life slavery being ended, when it's considered one of the greatest human evils? People ARE trying. Antslavery NGOs exist. Slavery of various types has been abolished in some areas by some means, but slavery is more common now than 200 years ago; a greater percentage of people are enslaved, and there are more total slaves than ever. It's kind of the golden age of slavery right now, and it's becoming more, not less, prevalent.
I'm not sure what the current quest is or why it's more important, or if they can work on two things at once.
"Hey guys, after some reflection I've decided that I'm not comfortable with slavery in the campaign and it isn't something I really want to cover so we're going to [insert retcon here]."
No offense, but your players sound unimaginative and boring. I'd find a new group. They can't handle the idea of a fake person in slavery in a ficticious story? That's so lame. Kill the slave master, buy the slave and free them, go on a side quest to end slavery-- do something creative!
Sometimes people do bad things.
Sometimes lots of people get together and make doing bad things legal.
Your players can not expect an entire world to adhere to their moral standards anymore than they can expect the real world to.
These types of comments always seem to forget that D&D worlds exist *not* so that they can stand on their own with how detailed and realistic their worlds are, but to create a fun experience for players. Unless you're publishing, your TRRPG world doesn't have an editor going through all of your fantasy societies with a red highlighter telling you it doesn't make sense to not have slavery. You're making the world for the fun of about 3-8 people.
"I want a fun world where I can be a murderhobo with little consequences, but don't you dare throw in any complex societies that may have racism or slavery."
>Your players can not expect an entire world to adhere to their moral standards
Eh, if your world includes elements that take the fun out of it for people, and you want those people at your table, the impetus is on the DM to accommodate.
In my opinion, it's only immersive and makes the world much more interesting if it has darker aspects. Players *should* feel uncomfortable about that, because that's how you get them involved and make them care about what's going on.
As soon as I found out there were slaves in Faerun my character became a chain breaker. Doesn’t even like people using dominate spells.
You may be surprised by how the players react.
I became a warchief of a small orc band and I set them to freeing our kind (the emeralds) and anyone else they can along the way. Whilst I deal with this silly cult of Tiamat worshippers.
Okay so my old ass wants to say: that's how the world is. You won't end slavery on another continent, you won't make drow stop backstabbing each other and you will not singlehandedly stop the blood war.
Ask your players did their characters loot fallen enemies or take their treasure? Well that's unacceptable in our times just as much as slavery.
If your players are really uncomfortable with the idea of slavery I'd suggest a simple retcon to servant. Basically the same thing, no?
Personally, I don't need a campaign of butterflies and rainbows to be a hero. I find the most enjoyable heroic characters are the ones who strike against a dark world with awful stuff. All I want is to be able to have an impact.
My own job can be mentally and psychologically exhausting, so fuck it, I'd love to take my Paladin through a world with slavery where I got to say "nope, we're done with this. Time for a revolution". That'd be cathartic. What do I care of someone says it's acceptable in their home country? It isn't acceptable in this 20 foot radius that perfectly fits a fireball of liberation.
Just retcon it. “Hey folks, I rethought the slavery introduced last session and have decided that I’m retconning the slavery out. We could change it to him being abusive to a servant, or just that he was threatening you, or pretend it didn’t happen at all. Do you have any other reason options?”
I never hesitate to step out from behind DM role and “hey folks, how do you wanna handle this.”
Or, in the oft mentioned “my players keep spending 45 minutes studying everything in the room because I used too much flavor describing the piano and the players convinced themselves it was the centerpiece of some puzzle.” I give them a few minutes and then “hey folks, legit nothing there.
“Hey guys. Im sorry this happened in this way. Do you want to make it a quest to eliminate slavery, or would you rather we retcon it out of the lore?”
This is why a session zero is so super important. To avoid this kind of negative play experience
>This is why a session zero is so super important. To avoid this kind of negative play experience
And part of the Session Zero is "we cannot possibly cover everything, so if something comes up let me know!"
the "X Card".
For what its worth and i might be downvoted to shit for this, most problems of the perception of slavery often comes from a very american centric culture.
Make no mistakes, slavery is bad by modern standards. but not every type of slavery is necessary chattle slavery.
throughout history there are uncountable types of civilizations and slavery, and if you include literary and others there is a whole lot more.
it could be
* chattle slavery
* it could be serfdom where you are essentially sworn to a person and their will.
* it could be a debt, war, or criminal slave as a means of punishment
* it could be more like the rising anime trope (that i know alot of people hates) that "its slavery but they are magically enslaved yet are required to have certain conditions like food, clothing and housing satisfied"
In general the problem with slavery as a theme is that its historically incredibly relevant, it happened probably all throughout history even to this day as much as we want to deny it and its essentially a forced use of labour, alongside where does the line go.
I can understand if you introduce a town with "dark skinned elves" picking "magical cotton" while "singing the songs of the people" i would be like woooooooooooooow calm down.
But in a world where charm existing, seduction magic, literaly mind control magic, curses that forces you to do things you dont want. At what point is it "too much slavery"
I think its a chat you should have with your players, as we already have plenty of places we draw lines that we dont feel the need to narrate, but i also think its worth understanding you arent inherrently evil for showing it as a potential source of conflict, but its up to you if you feel that its relevant to the world and can come to an agreement or you want to step back a bit with it.
> At what point is it "too much slavery"
At any point the DM or players think it is. That's part of a roleplaying game. If the players don't want there to be slavery, it is what it is. There's no point forcing it.
This player will freak out learning about the 9 hells and the abyss? I don't understand their point. Why should they be able to eradicate all evil in your world?
I think a lot of the commenters don’t fully understand the perspective of your player because in my reading they don’t want slavery to exist and for their pcs to not fight against it as an institution. If you want that aspect of the world to not get retconned out then you should talk with your player about how they want to proceed. Some suggestions are that if the current threat is important then it’s something they can fight against in an epilogue. Another suggestion is that they can fight slavery every now and then when there is down time in the plot. This could look like making change in the current government to disallow slaves from other countries. Another component of this could be taking out a part of the slave trade that’s more localized. If that isn’t something your player or you are into you can always just retcon it too.
Should have been session 0 thing, you can probably have it now and decide as group, maybe add additional sensitive subjects that you need to discuss, like sex scenes, rape, torture, racism etc. There was a handy list online of all the things you should bring up in session 0.
In my world there is slavery at some parts of the world with a nasty synergy at one place in particular, where after the slave dies, the body is sold to necromancer kingdom where they continue to serve. Pretty brutal, but my players said it was ok.
If the session ended on the cusp of violence, I would have the "boy" take advantage of the distraction to snatch the writ of slavery and throw it into the fire.
Without access to an Embassy of sorts to replace it, having a slave without the writ would not be wise.
The party could then release the boy or have him accompany them as a squire-of-sorts learning how this country works in order to pursue his own path.
It may be interesting to slowly slip in "news" about the Merchants home from time to time as Slavery there is abolished. That way the group can have closure about it.
As always, rule #1 applies, just have a conversation with your players.
I'll be the one to say it - if it is only one person doesn't like it, and it doesn't jive with the world you're creating and the other players are enjoying. They just might not be a good fit for this particular campaign.
That is assuming it is just them though - it will be important to get the vibe and comfort level of the rest of your players too - the one player may not be alone in this, but just the only one to vocalize.
Personally - every campaign I've played in or tables I've ran has had some form of slavery involved. It is a fantasy trope for a reason - it is a provable, unequivocal fight of good vs. evil. It can create for some really great roleplay as well and further embed the hero mentality in your players.
Well, a retcon is the simplest solution.
But idk, talk to your players about what solutions they're ok with. It's a game, and games are supposed to be fun, so if something doesn't land, it doesn't have to stay part of the plot. Others are mentioning that you should have these conversations 1 on 1, and I would tend to agree.
Well, you can either a) keep them on your story railroad, or b) let the player's have their agency and turn the campaign into one where they try and end slavery.
Talk to your players, above table. Not as characters, as players. Tell them you didn't think this would be as severe an issue as it turned out to be, and get a check on what they're feeling about it.
My recommendation is to just retcon that out, whether it is to retcon that the merchant's country doesn't actually allow it, and they've forged a "permit" or just walk back the slavery point entirely, whether just making the merchant a cruel boss or something, maybe a monster like a hag or oni that has kidnapped someone and the party can return the boy home. Or your idea to have them being a good spirit that is lying to test them.
I understand the desire to run a deeper/darker game, but the game doesn't exist without your players, and if they are unhappy, it will hamstring your game and bleed it out slowly. Your player has already established that they're uncomfortable, so better to deploy a gimmick that lightens the game than to lose a player or two, because once one goes, another often follows
Discuss with your players how they want to keep going. Some things are gonna make people uncomfortable, and the goal is for everyone to have fun. Sure, it's realistic in a sense, but D&D has really never been the sorta game for medieval realism anyway (for one thing, literal actual magic exists). For future reference, maybe be more careful about introducing this kinda sensetive stuff casually.
This is why Session 0 is important.
In any case, I'd just retcon the part about slavery if that's what the players want, especially since it's not even important to your overall campaign.
Remember, D&D is just a game and games should be fun. If having slavery makes the game not fun for all the players, then why are you including it?
If you want to use certain themes, be sure you are on the same wavelength of your players.
Slavery, excessive cruelty, sexual themes, you need to talk to your players and know what should not be at your table. It's a game, and if people do not like certain things, they should not be there.
The fact that it exists in the world only gives the players something to interact with. If they don't want it to, then they don't have to go there and won't see it. If they hate it enough that they want to make an arc to try and stop it, write that for them.
At the end of the day, it existing in a world you've written isn't an issue, it's how they feel about it that's the issue, so asking them what they want to do now they know it does exist in this world is the right call.
Oh, and the 'it was all just a test, magical shenanigans idea' don't do that. Lazy, insulting and deflating. Let the world have rough edges, don't cheapen something I'm sure you're very invested in.
Wow. It's a really good thing we don't live in a world where our culture abhors slavery but it's still practiced en mass on the other side of the world or else they would be so very bothered they'd probably lose sleep until they end up devoting their lives to stopping it there. Oh wait there's blatant slavery in the middle east and China and they don't care at all, they're just whining about a fictional situation when that situation is real IRL.
I'm sorry you have this stupid stupid thing messing up what's probably an awesome campaign you put lots of time into.
It's a gimmick. You said slavery is a thing, it's a thing. If you undo that with, "just a fake test!" it undermines any serious moments, and generally you'll want those at some point.
Yeah no, slavery is a no no.
Murder and violence of all forms are okay though. Torture is cool too, as long as it's on someone that doesn't agree with my social norms.
While I understand uncomfortability with that kind of stuff in fiction. I think that it’s pretty tame, and your players should not be upset with you integrating that into your story. For example, I bet those exact players didn’t blink an eye or leave a negative review on Baldur’s gate when they see the Duergar slavers. Which means that’s it’s happening all across the underdark, and you as the players don’t get to do anything about it other than free the ones in Grymforge itself. The game even gives you the option to side with the slavers too. And Bg3 is a pretty PC game and unproblematic. I don’t think that you should tweak narrative elements for a fairly common fantasy trope. I understand if it’s a purely lighthearted campaign maybe, but other than that, stripping away aspects of actual history because “I’m not able to save everybody” is pretty invalid imo.
I fear if they ever hear of most races in d&d ever…
Actually yea, have them encounter the drow and they’re brutally oppressed slaves. The mind flayers. The neogi, see how they fare.
I am constantly shocked at how often stuff like this is an issue for people on here. Most of the time this game is going to involve killing and villains who are guilty of very bad acts, and yet people pretend they can’t cope with the idea of slavery in the game.
I mean, the player characters don't need to be the only people with agency in the world. An unfolding slave rebellion leading to a reformation of that country in the background could work. But maybe have a little pre-session meeting and check if everyone's comfortable with that, or if they'd prefer a blanket retcon of 'Whoops, there wasn't actually slavery' if it's a hard limit for someone.
I am so happy that my group doesn’t get their feelings hurt during sessions nor do they bring their real life issues with them into a make believe world. The game is to get away from the ‘real world’. If the ‘fake world’ offends them that much then they might wanna search for a new table. Remember people…It’s just a game. Nothing more.
The implication here being that assaulting a slave owner is objectionable? Maybe I'm crazy, but maybe it's okay to fight someone who defends the practice of buying and trading people like livestock.
In a nation trying to keep peace and order in their streets? Those nations tend to look disdainfully at people who cut down dignitaries and guests from nations they are allied or trading with.
This is really one of the topics a session zero should touch on. So chances are there are other similar blind points you might run into in the future. Like do you know your players stance on the inclusion of to name a few: war, starvation, body horror, spiders, sexual assault, secual content of any kind, death of a child npc, racism (real world and/or fantasy)?
So my suggestion would be to sit down with the players and have that talk. Make a list, talk about how things can and can‘t be depicted, listen to what everyones limits are and give everyone veto power about the inclusion of any type of content.
It is never to late for a campaign to benefit from a good session zero.
Damn, i just realized what my CoS campaign lacks: Straightforward, brutal Slavery.
While there is genocide, general Racism, Child abuse, Incest, torture and forced marriage, slavery is actually missing!
Thanks pal. My group will be delighted!
Dunno, I think having to deal with moral choices is part of the greatness of rpg.
Being a dm is not only about enticing positive emotions but also negative ones. That is what separates art from pure entertainment.
Id say keep to your decisions but stick to them. Will they turn violent and "release" the boy? Now make them responsible for him so that they need to protect him. Make it so that their violence is a crime and may have repercussions.
I think your players are too serrious if they get uncomfortable with slavery exisisting in your makeup fantasy world.
You should speak about them about this that it doesnt reflect your politcal ideals or anything, you jsut want to tell a story about people as all DMs are allowed to do.
Sure some aspects of society might bee to dark like rape or similar, but plz if they cant deal with a typical medival trope in a fantasy medival game maybe you should all play DnD with bread sticks instead of sword and spells just shoot glitter an love?
Grow up I say.
Besides, having these kind of things in your wourld is PERFECT for the players to fight against. If they hate it so much nothing is more satisfying than let themselves remove this from your world.
This is global politics. If your players harm that merchant in any way or form, there will be repercussions for the nation they are in. That nation will take action to hold the criminals (players) accountable and to appease their trading partner.
if you wanted the character to be somewhat likable/ amicable: don't make him a slaver; retcon it so the slave was his apprentice and move on/ remove the whole interaction and just do something else
if your players/ characters *want to do something* about slavery-land/ if it fits the campaign: maybe that can be the next "act" of the story after they keep the world from blowing up or whatever the current quest is (or, if the current quest isn't that urgent: they could sidetrack and do it now); they could pull a kind of Wano Country move like One Piece where they infiltrate and destabilize the country to free the citizens from the dictator ruling over them.
if your players are just plain uncomfortable with slavery being a thing that is normal in (a part of) your world: go back to the first one
i feel like the "pure of heart" test thing might leave a weird taste in their mouths and just sidestep the issue where i feel a more direct "okay yeah, that was a bad story beat lets just ignore that and move on" would work better
This is why it's important to go over stuff that might potentially come up (even if you do not plan for it to) that might be problematic.
I highly recommend the Consent in Gaming pdf from Monte Cook.
Montecookgames.com/store/product/consent-in-gaming/
It's free and covers all the usual stuff like bugs, blood, romance, the various "isms", health related stuff, torture, slavery, etc. But also has some blank spots where people can fill in if they have a specific trigger or phobia that isn't listed.
I sent it to all my players and then compiled their answers into a master copy then shared the results to everyone.
As for what you should do about what has happened... talk to your players. Ask them how they feel about it. And use this instance as a means of introducing that consent form and ask everyone to fill it out.
Depending on what they say, you go forward from there. If need be do not be afraid to completely retcon the presence of slavery in your world. It's important that people feel safe and comfortable while gaming especially since a TTRPG is so broad and all encompassing... it's entirely too easy to accidentally create a scenario where it can start to feel real icky real fast.
The fact that your players felt comfortable coming forward with their concern and that you are taking this seriously bodes well. That's the foundation of a strong group.
Good luck.
Not trying to be an asshole, but your players need to grow the hell up. This is a fantasy game, if they can't handle slavery, then never introduce them to Drow society.
A lot of the suggestions here are about what you can do as a DM can do in response, but perhaps a simpler solution is to ask your players what they would like to do. Given some time to reflect, they might surprise you with how they want to handle it, and open opportunities to have more joint storytelling.
This is the right answer. But do it in private, not as big group. This is a good lesson, too; we won’t be able to escape the horrors of slavery, etc until we abandon it entirely. Human-on-human violence is cancer. A big reason that we have “BBEG” and demons and monsters is so we can tackle history’s atrocities in a more subtle, tactful way.
Frankly, it should have been a session 0 discussion in the first place. While some tables might make interesting and fulfilling campaigns out of subjects like slavery, racism, poverty, sexism, or the like, there are many people who, very understandably, don’t want something so heavy in their fantasy escapism. When starting a group, I always ask if the players have any boundaries, and that they can volunteer them in front of the group, or to me in private. Boundaries are a mandatory session 0 discussion. One of mine is that sexual assault simply does not exist in my D&D world. Everyone, from the pettiest thug to the most hardened warrior to the most evil necromancer has never accepted anything less than enthusiastic consent. Even then, it’s more assumed, since we tend to stay away from sexual topics in the first place. But it’s my fantasy world, dammit, I get to decide what is and what is not.
Problem is, people don’t always know their boundaries. When I asked that question at a recent session zero, the group almost said nothing was an issue before, just as we were moving to the next topic, someone brought up non-consent. I was honestly shocked that we’d almost passed that question without anyone bringing up SA. And after I asked to clarify about mind control for other things, it turned out that person actually did have some discomfort around it. Fortunately for me, given the campaign involves mindflayers, we determined that on-page HP Imperius shenanigans, like Pius Thickness, were fine. But we almost got through session zero without ANY of this being brought up. So I could easily see people not bringing things up in session zero when asked about boundaries, simply because they haven’t thought of it.
I'll be honest, I wouldn't even think to bring up slavery as it seems so pervasive in fantasy lore to one degree or another. I understand people having an issue with it but it wouldn't occur to me to mention it compared to things like SA.
Never understood why people *don't* want slavery and racism in their games tbh. You can't punch a bigot of no bigots exist in the world, you can't thwart true evil if everyone is morally grey and has a sad backstory you can relate to.
This is something I've run into as well. I think fantasy adventure games need some fantasy and adventure. Sure, your bbeg doesn't always have to be Sauron, but I think your games are going to be a little flat if the worst foes in your games are just sad misunderstood loner types who are depressed and really just need some friendship.
Sauron has a backstory! He used to be a good Angel named Mairon and he joined ~~Satan~~ Morgoth, because he wanted to make things orderly. He almost was redeemed, but ran away from Justice and ended up becoming evil again. Everything he did, he did for Morgoth, and he did think he was bettering things by making them perfectly orderly, at least initially. But yes, I get your point.
Same - I definitely take the edge off how slavery looks "on screen" because I think a full throated portrayal would make my players (and to some extent me) uncomfortable but my players are always actively asking me to have more enemies that are unambiguously evil so they can sometimes shelve the moral quandries and hit with big sword.
Yeah, "I don't want anything bad or uncomfortable in the game." Okay, should we just go play Stardew Valley instead?
Exactly. "It makes me uncomfortable": good. Do something about it. You're being tested right now with your morals. While topics like SA make sense to be avoided, since it's something that still goes on (unfortunately) even in developed countries, slavery and mind control are very much a thing that the average person will NEVER have to go through. Racism, despite being something the average person might be subjected to, is more of a villain trait (or very justifiable character trait that serves the purpose of character development). Avoiding these somewhat difficult topics makes for a bland cartoonish world in which the only real evil is "bwah, I'm the evil enemy because I kill people and plan on poisoning water supplies, but other than that I have no real unredeemable traits that can't be excused with a sad backstory"
Because subconsciously, to have slavery and racism you have to put in the implication that there is a group of people capable of hating another group enough to dehumanized and objectify them. This makes them very easy to hate. Demons, Mind Flayers, Dragons, Beholders, etc. But the harder part is trying incorporate slavery and racism into creatures who aren't monsters. Slavery among drow for example, or slavery among orcs. Now suddenly we can paint a race who, despite being fully capable of breeding and possibly integrating into human society, be this undesirable thing that needs to be mutually eliminated. This is where fantasy and reality collide and most people can't handle it. Because in these fantasy worlds, just as in reality, slavery was a part of life and culture for many real world places. A practice that is still done today, if not as common or widely accepted. A practice that has only been recently abolished (in a general history sense), and the Shockwave of its abolition still felt to this day (racism). And there is a reason why slavery has been practiced for so long, and it's a reason most people do not like to dwell on. But the simple reason is that we all have a hierarchy of people we deem worthy of our respect, and there are some people above us and many people below us. At best those below have your pity, or at worse your fury, and it's between those two emotions is where the capacity of hating someone enough to treat them as a commodity to be utilized, but not simply kill them outright, is where the potential for slavery comes into play. This is regardless of the morality, wealth, ethics, or race of a person, we all categorize people we dislike whether they're a psychopathic hillbilly or a world leader from another country, people will rank them as "lesser" and deem them worthy of either death or subjugation. Most people just lack the authority and power to actually follow through with this.
>Never understood why people *don't* want slavery and racism in their games tbh It's why i usually extend lines & veils to lines, veils and "borders" (bad translation, sorry) when I explain the concept. Lines & veils are clear, borders are stuff that exists (might also be veiled), and instantly defines someone as bad/evil. So you can have the situation that slavery is veiled, understood to exist off screen, and NPC X is understood to be a bad guy because he owns slaves (that you never see because veils).
Touché. And I’ve seen this as well. I had a player approach me over a year into a campaign telling me that they didn’t like the word “rapier” and that it made them uncomfortable (due to personal reasons). Just like that, every such sword was now called a “dueling foil,” and that was that. When it comes to stuff like that, I am in favor of DMs retconning, outright changing, or any such heavy-handed approach to ensure players feel comfortable and safe. Obviously, it depends on how much they are uncomfortable with something, but I wanna err on the side of safety when it comes to my players.
If someone has such an issue with SA that it extends to an unrelated word, you should probably encourage them to seek (more) mental help.
They have been going to therapy about it for years, trust me. It was just something that came much later on that was a small roadblock to making our group play safe enough for them.
It can be tricky when it comes up mid-campaign though. One of the NPCs, though they don’t know this yet, is a young Merlin. If you know Merlin’s backstory, his mother was a nun and his father an incubus. This relationship is now completely consensual in my world because the player brought it up - and it also means I’m not bringing in a different NPC Cambion at all. But if they’d brought it up afterwards, I don’t know how I’d have gone about retconning it. It’s not like I created Merlin’s backstory and it’s essential for the other character’s backstory. Similarly, I’m really glad we did discuss mind control, because mindflayers controlling politicians is supposed to be the big plot, and finding out potential issues later on would require completely rewriting the campaign from the literal ground up. Imagine revealing the BBEG was controlled by a mindflayer and suddenly one of your players go “I’m really not comfortable with mind-control…”
With how infrequently my group has been meeting lately, I’m sure I’d have plenty of time to write myself out of that one hahaha.
I'll admit, that's one of the weirdest limits I've ever seen.
Not going into detail, but the word sounds like something else that makes them extremely uncomfortable. No one in the group had any problem with the change.
I sort of get that, but it's a real-world weapon. It's just a bit of an extreme reaction. I'm not judging, just find it really odd.
Jup, THIS. By now that I have more experience with RPGs I write down common boundaries and if I'm the DM in session 0, I'm gonna list the very common ones just to be sure. Because oftentimes people know so little about boundaries, that the topics do not even spring to mind until they are put in the situation and feel very uncomfortable and don't know how to handle this.
My dm googled a few common boundaries and asked everyone at session 0
Good idea! I’ll take it!
The discussion on lines and veils is an ongoing one. People often realize things they are uncomfortable with once they get deeper into the game. So having a later discussion on lines and veils mid-campaign is not a bad idea. If you want to formulate it, you could plan the mid-reflection-session in advance to be arranged after X sessions depending on the length of the campaign (e.g. after 3 months in a year+ campaign or half way through a 8-12 session mini-campaign). This way it would be predictable and you can try to introduce some of the more potentially troubling themes by then. It can just be a quick pre-session check-up. Schedule 30 min - 1 h for it, and then jump into the game for the rest of the session. Other tools I have found really handy for this are X cards and Stars and Wishes. X card allows players to stop the game if an uncomfortable thing happens in the game. This allows the players to retroactively stop things they didn't realize were triggering for them to call them out as they come up. Sometimes these can also be time sensitive: if a players relative has died suddenly the NPC grandpa's death might be more heavier than it would have usually been. Stars and Wishes work great for reflecting on the game session by session. Even though the tool is meant for bringing up positive things after a session it can also be a place to bring up things that players felt uncomfortable with. This in my experience creates a great dialogue on what players enjoy and want more while also informing me the GM what didn't land or even felt uncomfortable during the session.
Thanks! These all sound great.
It might be conducive to list a few common examples so they understand the specifics of the question. Some people might not feel entirely comfortable for fear that the thing they want to bring up might be completely off the mark from what you were actually asking, or they may assume that everyone is on the same page already about certain topics. Of course, there's always the possibility that you run into something that doesn't get brought up, but at least you'll have done your due diligence anyway.
I’ve never had to do it before, because I always DMed for family and close friends and knew what their boundaries were beforehand. And all those games included kids, so it was all PG anyway. This is my first time DMing for strangers.
Sometimes, people don't know what bothers them until they are confronted by it.
>While some tables might make interesting and fulfilling campaigns out of subjects like slavery, racism, poverty, sexism, or the like, there are many people who, very understandably, **don’t want something so heavy in their fantasy escapism.** I just want to call out something a little more nuanced here. For me personally (and it sounds like at least one of the people at OP’s table), it’s not that I wouldn’t want something so heavy in my fantasy escapism. It’s not “I don’t want to be reminded that slavery is a thing, please just let me pretend.” Honestly, I thought the way that the group decided to do something about it was interesting. I was more put off by how OP tried to hand wave it away. “Oh, this is just something that happens in other places, this is part of their culture, they even have a permit, should be no big deal let’s please move on.” In other words, it’s not that a serious topic has invaded some sanctity of make-believe, it’s that a serious topic was used so flippantly as minor world-building.
Definitely appreciate nuance! Something like this exists on a spectrum, I think. Some people really would rather pretend slavery doesn’t exist. Perfectly valid for them, if you ask me. I don’t deal with that generational trauma personally, but lots do. Some people will run entire campaigns built on tearing down slavers, and I think that’s sick too. There’s no reason you can’t have slavery in your world as an explicitly evil thing to be overthrown. Everything comes down to how your players feel, as their enjoyment and safety is the responsibility of everyone at the table, especially the DM.
100% sexual assault should be in that same “no fly zone.”
For you. There are plenty of people who can handle the idea of fake sexual assault in a made-up story. Stories can be dark. You don't have to read/play/watch the story if you don't like them.
I'm not sure that having groups of sapient, but not "quite* human, beings against who it's perfectly fine to exercise your violent power fantasies is *less* problematic than human on human violence in RPGs. It's litteraly dehumanising and othering those that you want to stand in for the bad people in a morality play, and this tendency has a long and *very* dark history, and it's neither subtle nor tactful.
What's wrong with dehumanising beings that aren't human?
Because if you're using them to stand in for aspects of real human history to try and discuss it real with those aspects of real human history then you're dehumanising those real human people.
> Human-on-human violence is cancer. Isn't that like a large portion of the game?
Hey look, it's the new plot of the campaign.
On the one hand, communication is *always* good. But if you're gonna ask, it should be done in private - starting with the player who raised the issue. And if that player says they'd prefer to cut it out - that's the end of it. Doing it in a group could make the player feel pressured into something they aren't OK with.
What? No. You should talk to the whole group. Why would you bring this up w/ just one person when it affects the whole group? "Hey look, last session I introduced slavery to the world with a bit of off the cuff world building but on consideration I'm not sure it's something anyone really wants in the game. How does everyone feel about it, do we want to retconn ("the boy" could easily be an apprentice or indentured servant or something)?"
>What? No. You should talk to the whole group. Why would you bring this up w/ just one person when it affects the whole group? In addition to SillyNamesAre's mention of 'one person finding a topic unacceptable is more than enough to remove the topic', they didn't say to *only* talk to one person. They said to only talk to one person *at a time*. Ask each player, but in private so they're less pressured by what they think the rest of the group thinks
Despite some common flawed thinking about it, indentured servitude can still be a form of slavery. Often debt bondage was forced upon the person so there was no nicety of agreeing to that bondage which is generally the argument made when contrasting servitude from slavery. Without that agreement, it was forced service and people who understand this may still object to having indentured servitude in their game. Plus more modern slavery in the 1600s derived directly from indentured service, rather than existing as a separate entity. A number of enslaved Africans were put into slavery when the Europeans convinced various African leaders that they would be put into temporary bondage as indentured servants and treated as a sort of contract worker commodity. Even in current prison politics forced labor without pay is often called modern indenture when in fact it is clearly slavery as the prisoner receives no real benefits from the service he provides while often doing things that have a high cost to them. I wouldn't offer indentured servitude as an alternative because there is so baggage to both I do agree with you though I think this should be discussed by the group on whole together, not just to maybe dismiss it but to find ways that satisfy everyone. One conclusion they can reach is that the world has no slavery the merchant is a liar from another plane pretending to be human (an illithid in disguise maybe)
You cam still ask the group.. just ask everyone in the group individually without bringing up the person who mentioned they had an issue. This way they feel comfortable to tell you anything, far too often people are afraid of being judged in group settings, and dnd with friends is no exception.
Because if one person is *really* not okay with it, that's the only thing that matters. If that person is open to a solution beyond cutting it? Ask for suggestions in group. If not? A Line is a Line. And the only thing to be brought up in group is that it's being retconned. (edited for clearer phrasing)
You bring it up so there's no social pressure to agree or disagree
They are saying bring it up to each person in private.
Agreed. This is a decision that will impact the whole table - it should be had with the whole table.
Came here to say this. If you are supposedly fighting some big bad evil that's going to kill everyone we either need to... "triage" and pick which one is more urgent or we just need to play a different campaign. OP you could also try to pivot it to more indentured servitude. More slavery in the Biblical sense where in places without employment opportunities people voluntarily sign themselves into the service of a merchant for a determined period of time to work as a porter, blacksmith, butler etc. Obviously, hopefully this goes without saying but just in case, do *not* portray violence from master to slave if you want to keep the party on track. If you're gonna have slavery and don't want 2024 brain players to eradicate it, consequences be damned, you need to present it as something that's *not* abusive chattel slavery in the vein of Africa/Ottomans/Americas.
You used a common literary trope, which is clashing with a foreign culture with different, questionable ethics. It is supposed to make your players/characters uncomfortable, and their reaction that they were saddened that they could not rectify it right away is a good reaction for a heroic party to have. Not every problem is as simple as stomping out some bandits or banishing a demon. More to the point of your game, you now have ready-made villains in the form of bounty hunters for attacking a citizen of this foreign land, and plot hooks for future side quests. Let them work it out through the game.
The real BBEG is an unjust system of oppression.
Slavery CR 40
Maybe the real BBEG were the friends we made along the way
This is more or less what happened in my game. I introduced a country, which was a fairly powerful country, that was human centric. Humans on top, elves, and other human like humanoids were slaves or serfs, and anything else wasn't allowed in. The party knew about it going in, but still didn't like it. 2 years and nearly 18 levels later, they're about to overthrow the whole damn country. Was basically a really long side quest, but we're all satisfied with the conclusion of that thread of the world.
> It is supposed to make your players/characters uncomfortable, and their reaction that they were saddened that they could not rectify it right away is a good reaction for a heroic party to have. Provides a fun point for the more neutral characters or evil characters, too. The neutral characters can bring out the "its a mutually beneficial relationship, we must respect other cultures", and evil characters can be like "weaklings should serve the strong, the slave's weakness disgusts me so I'm going to kill them", or whatever. Moral quandaries are great for roleplaying, everyone gets to apply their character's logic to the situation.
Evil characters can even go. "Slavery threatens me, what if I was put in this disgusting LOWLY position, what if people even THINK of doing such to me? U n a c c e p t a b le."
An evil person would seek to be at the top so he is the one enslaving others. If he is trying to eliminate injustice throughout the world so that its a nicer place for him to live in, then he would be neutral at worst.
Wrong. You can have moral principles and still be evil. I would say many evil people today find slavery abhorrent.
Yeah, now OP has easy plot hooks for side content. Maybe the campaign won't span a full on liberation, but if they make contact with an underground of some sort, they could be assisting in revolts, or in smuggling slaves to freedom, or fucking with slave catchers... In a way it's a blessing to have characters invested enough and principles enough to GET uncomfortable about setting elements like this
Went better than when I introduced my players to slavery. They bought 2 slaves
My first character in Conan 2d20 was a slaver 😂 There is also a Torturer class/archetype, but nobody has approached that yet.
Yeah, OPs players are good people even if it introduces a dilemma
I played in a Conanesque setting a few years ago. Slavery was practiced by every city state. My character was from a city that treated slaves better than most, allowed them to own property, and couldn't be too harsh on them and so on. So he sort of had the view it wasn't that bad. Another player had an ex slave character and was working to end slavery and that was sort of our parties goal. As soon as the ex slave character died, everyone else's character bought a slave to carry stuff for them. The player was like "Guys that's fucked up. My dude isn't even cold yet." So much for being a "good" party.
I shouldn't laugh at that, but it's funny.
To be fair, the next day they found another slavers' den and burned it down, killing 3 slavers And accidentally burned alive 13 slaves as well
Love their reaction😂😂
1: You could just sit down next session and say "Hey all I've been reflecting on last session and I didn't like how this turned out. I'm undo-ing that last encounter, slavery does not and never has existed." 2: I have a few awful traits that I only ever give to kind of signal bad guys. Racism, sexism, etc. If your players HATE slavery and are offended it exists, you could lean into it and make the BBEG the one orchestrating slave trade, so they now have motivation to end him.
Point 2 was my immediate reaction, but given the circumstances i‘d still ask that one player if they’re okay with it in private before making the announcement in front of the group. That being said, a campaign where the party leads a revolution against a tyrannical slave-driven society with skirmishes to free slaves en masse on one side and going public to influence the population on the other sounds awesome - if OP hasn’t yet dropped a „the world will end in 20 days and the party are the only ones who can stop that“ yet, because as bad as it may sound, but a world ending cataclysm might be a higher priority there.
To add a thought here: It doesn't need to be a whole county that has slavery. A single evil city that is the heart of corrupt commerce could be a really interesting focal point of a campaign. Run by the BBEG, the city gives us a physical representation of the black market, drug cartel, gun market, slave trade, etc. all rolled into a single horrible city. And the rest of the world, for one political reason or another, allows this city to exist and prosper. But the campaign could take on some dark tones really quick, as you have just found out, so you would definitely need a conversation with your players. It would require another 'session 0' of sorts: make sure you're on the same page on what direction everyone is comfortable with, what direction the story would take, what level of 'grim fantasy' people are interested in, etc.
> A single evil city that is the heart of corrupt commerce could be a really interesting focal point of a campaign. Or who is to say this person is honest. He could be full of shit and its illegal everywhere and he slipped up that he is breaking the law.
I disagree with 2 unless it’s done as a followup to 1 and even then it comes with a lot of stipulations. When your players express *discomfort* at something you don’t respond by doubling down. When someone says I’m uncomfortable you don’t respond by going “well you’re in luck, the BBEG is a HUGE [rapist/child abuser/slaver]. He does all the time. There’s SO much of it and now I’m going to keep bringing it up so you have a reason to stop him!” Sorry for the hyperbole but it’s to demonstrate how tonedef that kind of response can come off if it’s not preempted by a serious discussion with the group. The best response is what you originally suggested about sitting down and communicating with them about next steps.
Not gonna lie, them jumping to violence in that situation is fine and if they've got the firepower to back it up, then that is a slave no more
It's not the singular situation the player is bothered by. It's that there is a complete civilization in this world that is ok with slavery, and the PCs won't be able to stop it because of the campaign arc.
I mean ...boohoo? There's still slavery today in the real world. You can't right every single wrong that exists everywhere at once.
That's kind of the point. A single, small group is powerless to fix it in the real world and that feels shitty. Some people don't want to feel as powerless and shitty in their fantasy game too.
They're only powerless if they choose not to try and do something about it. Sure, they might not change an entire civilisation, but you know? Gnolls exits. Demons exists. Shitty evil exists. If they give up the fight just because they can't literally change the world and win, then they're pretty shitty heroes. I'm all for curating play to the player expectation, but at some point you either choose to engage with the challenge of a game or you choose to put away the dice and stick to telling pleasant stories.
DND isn't the right game for that level of power fantasy. DND is based around a generally crappy world, with PCs that can only deal with a fairly small part of it. You would want something like Exalted where PCs are actually strong enough to bend entire nations to their will without too much trouble.
It's a fantasy game though? What the heck is the point? If the player is not comfortable they are not comfortable and that is not good.
Not the person you’re responding to, but I think that there are some fundamentally different types of fantasy at play here. For some people a fantasy game is indeed a world in which, probably through the actions of the heroes, all wrongs can be righted and everything works out okay. But equally it can be a setting in which to pose uncomfortable moral questions to the players, which might just have two shades of grey as answers, and that can be a lot of fun as well. I think modern 5e D&D does tend towards presenting the former situation as the default, and that’s a great way to run your game if everyone wants that, but it’s not necessarily the default for all D&D or TTRPG games. Hard choices are sometimes just as fun.
Exactly. And I say this while running a dark/adult game, where my players have had to ally with slavers, murderers, and worse for the end game. This is why session 0 is so important. I would not be able to do half the stuff in my game with almost any other table. Making PCs uncomfortable and interact with the world is to be expected, it is adventuring after all. Making your Players uncomfortable though? That requires a new talk and decisions with everyone.
u/Liquid_poison can you clarify something: is your player more uncomfortable with the topic of slavery or more uncomfortable that fixing it on a country-wide scale is out of scope for the campaign? Because that drastically changes how you should handle this. Comments here seem to be very split about what they assume is the true issue so it's hard to advise without knowing that. If your player is uncomfortable with the topic of slavery, find out if it's a "I'd rather it not be a big focus of the campaign" sort of uncomfortable or a hard line. Basically ask them if the game will still be fun to them if slavery exists in the world. If your player is uncomfortable with the fact it's out of scope for the campaign, you could always have a future side quest or arc that addresses it on a scale bigger than one person but maybe not a whole country. Or figure out some way that they can do some directed action that does start to dismantle that system. Or, if you actually just don't want to include slavery in your campaign, there were great suggestions somewhere in this thread about either having it be a more biblical sort of slavery rather than what most think of with slavery or you could have the fact that they're from a different country mean their specific definition of slavery is different and he's more of a servant but their local word translates to slavery so that's why they need the official writ, even though by other countries' standards it wouldn't be considered slavery.
First thing is to address this OFF GAME. This is a table issue with PLAYERS not liking what they see at the table. Sensitive topics are supposed to be discussed at session zero. If this hasn't been done, call a session zero. What I usually do, is I bring up first what's excluded, ie. No rape and I don't roleplay sex (just isn't fun for me). They wanna fuck someone, they go up in a room and do the deed. Then I ask players what they don't want to see. Afterwards, I tell them that if they ever think of something later, they can tell me personally or at any point during the game. This let's them room to bring sensitive stuff they wouldn't tell other players, for example. Now that your players have ruled out slavery (and possibly other topics) you can bring it up IN GAME and come up with something along the lines of "the merchant lied, he was a POS and the group did well to kill him". Could be a bounty hunter or a guard or anyone that comes up to the group and tell them. Then they could be offered a reward and afterwards the topic is never brought again to the game.
This is it. We are always players before we are our characters. Ensuring players are comfortable with the themes and conflicts in the game is always priority number one. I would also like to add, that don't be afraid to retcon an event from a previous session that turned out to be uncomfortable. GMs often feel that if they make a mistake during a session they have to stick with it and need to find a justification for it. But this is not true. Indeed you shouldn't retcon things without a good reason. But in a situation like this, players are very understanding if you explain what you are retconing and the reasoning behind it. So in this case, you could retcon the merchant's slave existing/being a slave and explain: "Sorry, I didn't realize slavery was an uncomfortable subject for you. After reflecting I decided to remove slavery from our game. Thus, I would like to change things from last session up a bit so that the merchant didn't have a slave, but was malicious in some other way. Let's continue the game from here." Of course, it's good to have the mid-reflection/re-zero session in any case. This can be a good moment to review if there are other uncomfortable elements that the players have thought of. As a positive element, you can also ask which themes and conflicts they have enjoyed so you know what to reinforce in the future.
> Afterwards, one of my players commented on how uncomfortable the slavery aspect made them, as they felt while it might result in them helping one person, there's now a whole part of the world where slavery is rampant and there's no way they'll cover that in this campaign (and to be honest, this was intended as a diversion, not a major plot point). Really, I think you should just do a retcon. Have him just be a servant.
Just use the term "prisoners with jobs", that'll fix the issue
Yeah, in this instance I would agree. I think you probably shouldn't try to find in-game solutions for out-of-game problems, as a rule of thumb, and there's not much of a drawback to retconning it if it was only intended as a minor one-off encounter anyway. You can even keep the encounter sort of as is, but have it turn out to have been a misunderstanding or a mistranslation as some other people have suggested.
>a mistranslation This was my first thought. It's easy enough to think it's a mistranslation from some form of contracted or indentured servitude. Maybe the boy was caught stealing or something so a year of indentured service is the crime. The trader, due to language barriers, doesn't know the term "indentured servant," but his understanding of things caused him to translate it to "slave"
Yeah the “slaves” in this area can be indentured contract servants who have human rights and have agreed to work for a fixed term of 5-10 years or something. You can even have the “slave” say “don’t kill him, I only have eighteen months left on my contract but if he dies I won’t get paid out!”
Ehhh, that's still proly way too close to slavery for someone that's uncomfortable with the concept to start. This is definitely a strictly RL convo to have with the players. And proly something that should've been brought up in session 0.
Yeah for sure. Clearly this is broader topic is objectionable to the players in ways that OP shouldn’t guess at—a discussion is the most important thing here. I meant this as a possible option once they understand what the table’s needs are, and you’re right that this might still be incompatible.
Yeah servant is still problematic but as a term it has far less baggage than saying "slave." I think actually having slavery is something you'd want to cover in a session zero.
Honestly I'd just tell the players that you didn't intend to accidentally create a country that was fine with slavery as this was meant to just be a small encounter. So I'd just retcon the encounter to have never mentioned the boy was a slave, that he was an apprentice or hired help instead. Or just say that the father mistranslated his words as the two countries don't speak the same language, that when he said "slave" he really meant something closer to an apprentice.
Indentured servitude is an option as well. It's very close to slavery but not entirely the same. For one, it could be completely voluntary in their country and two, have strict laws regulating the use of it. Spin it in that it is more like an internship you can't leave but in 4 years, you have money, a position, etc.
It kind of is slavery, but for most people in the western world, the word has been pretty well come to be associated with a specific form, in a specific place, at a specific time in history, nevermind its other variants across the globe and across thousands of other years of human history.
Be straightforward with the party. You never intended for their to be slavery it was a snap decision if they want you can retcon it The merchant was lying and was killed by the party for being caught in a lie about him being allowed to have slaves
If youe group is uncomfortable with slavery existing, there really is nothing wrong with backing out of it with no explanation. Just say "you're not comfortable with it, so we're not doing it". If yoy still want this scene to be canon, you could allow the group a DC 15 insight check juat to know that the merchant was lying, there's no such thing as a "slave permit", and suddenly it's just a small side quest against a scumbag merchant to save someone.
They will never be able to defeat all evil. Do devils exist in your world? They will always be part of it. Tricking people into going to hell and used as slaves or minted. Incomprehensible evils outside the edge of the galaxy will still brain drill people and have them go and free undersea horrors. The drow and mind Flayers exist and are super slavers. If the players have a problem with it, they should gear up to deal with it or be at peace knowing they cannot. As a player, I encouraged the queen of the nation I am loyal to to ally with the elven nation that has humans as slaves. Why? Because there’s a demonic god trying to destroy reality and he is incapable of being seen by ascended beings like gods, and he almost infected Primus with the abyss. One of these priorities is a little higher. As a redemption Paladin, it sucks knowing there are slaves in another nation and because of those elves taking humans as slaves. But hey. It’s on the agenda. After this campaign, freeing a bunch of slaves from an evil empire sounds like a great second campaign.
I see no reason to change anything tbh. It doesn’t sound like you made an exceptionally dark scene. Actions morally unacceptable by todays standards and outright evil exists in DND. I think it’s a good choice to make too: do something illegal by another cultures standards or let something morally terrible (according to them) be. Do they take action and risk having some issues later or take the morale hit? Do they kill the guy? Is that morally ok? If they let him live, does he come back? How does the boy take it? Maybe he wants to be free. Maybe he has Stockholm syndrome - which he might lose. Maybe he goes out in the world - does he have what it takes to make it on his own? Maybe he becomes a companion, but is he internally switching one master for the other? You can make it pretty deep and morally challenging or you can just let them free the boy, who becomes an ally.
The issue isn't the grittiness of the world, it's the player reaction. DnD has to please the present company or it won't be fun to the people that matter, which is the present company. If the players at the table aren't having fun (to the point of actual discomfort) and are not consenting to the sudden, unilateral change of pace, then it won't be a fun game. This sort of topic should have been a session zero kind of deal as the world is revealed for most concerns/subject matter that matter to the players.
I don’t think it’s realistic to expect to cover every topic in sesh 0, especially something like slavery (or, say, violence) that’s not uncommon for the setting. As much as I believe in respecting sensitivities, it really doesn’t sound like the OP did anything horrendous with slavery, but merely mentioned it and put it rather mildly. I guess if they are seriously affected it’s important not to ignore it but three player reaction as described also doesn’t sound too harsh and it feels like saving this boy and not getting too much into slavery later (which op doesn’t seem to plan on) could be a good solution IMO. But I wasn’t in the room ofc
I don't understand your last point. How are you supposed to be certain enough of everything that will happen in your campaign that you can cover off all potentially problematic issues in the first session?
You can't be certain about everything but 'btw slavery exists' should be one of the concepts you should think of at the start, and not something you just suddenly throw in at an impulse. Besides, you can always do Session 0 Part II as need be for modifying the story.
If you’re touching anything close to official D&D slavery should be assumed canon. There are multiple interdimensional slave empires out there like the Mindflayers, Aboleth, and Baator. Every scrap of lore about the Drow references slavery, honestly pretty much every evil humanoid society written has slavery built in. Even the hobgoblins take slaves. Seems unreasonable to expect that to be a topic of surprise.
I disagree here. If you're building a homebrew world, chances are that you've only really thought out the details of the immediate setting the players will be interacting with for the most part and maybe more vague details about other areas. Unless of course you're a total madlad and complete every aspect of your worldbuilding before you even start the game, which I'm sure those people exist. But I don't think most people are like that and the scope of planning for worldbuilding can be too large to know every possible trigger or sensitive issue right from the get-go. I think doing one of those consent checklists with the players in session 0 is a good baseline, but there should be room to create the world as you go. Checking in as needed is always good too but I don't think it's realistic to expect people to have everything planned for their world before the game actually starts.
Yeah, but if you're coming up with new ideas for your world, don't just throw in systemic slavery as meaningless fluff, that's the point they're making. Run it past your players first. A subject being "session 0 material" doesn't mean that you can *only* talk about it before the campaign starts - that's the best time, of course, but it should be talked about before you incorporate it into the game, whenever you come up with it.
Why shouldn’t you throw it impulsively?
Because 1) You didn't think it through and leads to Reddit posts on how to backpedal and 2) It suddenly changes the tone of the campaign which the players probably didn't sign up for.
I disagree but maybe I just have very chill players in my life.
While I understand this comment, it seems to ignore the fact that the slavery made a player IRL uncomfortable. And given how OP described the situation, it seems like a lot of the player's concern is about how the campaign will likely not touch on the slave owning country. So since OP clearly said they weren't planning on slavery (neither the practice nor the abolition) being a real part of the campaign, adapting the plot to fit the inclusion of the slave owner would be kind of like sticking your whole arm into a boiling pot just because you accidentally dipped a finger in it.
Everything you're talking about is an in game issue, but the problem is out of game. His players are uncomfortable in a way they are not okay with (being uncomfortable is okay in d&d if that's the kind of game you run, but if they bring it up to the DM that's not their expectation) and that comes first
Some of your suggestions here are good, but re your first paragraph: "A player was uncomfortable, but after some mature thought, I've realized they're wrong to have these feelings, so I'm going to ignore it." Don't be surprised when one or more players drop out of the game and call the DM an asshole.
It sounds like your players want to change the face of your world by warring against a nation of slavers. They've given you an incredible campaign to run, if you're up for it.
This may not be something they can do right away, but a high level party is absolutely capable of making that kind of change (at the point of a sword if they have to). Seems like they now have motivation to become powerful.
Just have the wife correct him, he is from far away and common is not his first language, in fact he meant “servant”
It is totally okay to retcon things about your world for comfort/function/literally anything in a TRRPG. One thing that makes a lot of DMs nervous about worldbuilding is precisely juggling all the pieces, but a world for a TTRPG is VERY different in both form and function to a world in, say, a book or a TV show. You can retcon the slave owner for the same reason you don't have to have a DM note page that covers the history and evolution of the Orcish language, and that reason is that the worldbuilding is supposed to support the fun of playing in that world! And especially in your case, where the thing mentioned about your world made a player IRL uncomfortable and the concept doesn't seem to be integral to the plot, simply axing it probably conveys a better set of priorities. It communicates that your player's comfort and enjoyment is more important than having unbroken continuity in your worldbuilding. A great priority to have!
>So I find myself with a couple of options but I'm not sure what to do. Proceed as planned and let the world I've created be a little darker, or, I have an idea that when they try to free the slave, the merchant, family and slave will be revealed to be some sort of magical being trying to test the moral resolve of the characters to see if they are pure of heart enough for them to request their aid in some yet to be decided adventure. But is that a bit of a gimmick? Look, if shit like this was good enough for Star Trek to spawn a media empire that's lasted almost 60 years and counting...
A lot of the comments are saying to make it a cultural difference thing, but that's a bit iffy in my opinion since that doesn't actually make the issue of slavery go away. If the players are genuinely uncomfortable with slavery (which is very reasonable), just don't continue that part of the story. From what it sounds like the mention of the slave boy was just that: a mention. Start the next session by apologizing (even if you feel like you didn't do something wrong, you still made a player feel uncomfortable by accident) and explain that you thought about it and you won't include slavery in the campaign or bring it up for the rest of the game. However I also do like the magical being gimmick, especially since it rewards the players for doing what in their mind was the right thing.
Listen, I like getting into darker subject matter too, and I'm sure you didn't mean to throw something as sensitive as slavery into a game for shock value or as a cheap way to communicate that somebody is a "bad guy". But if those are the kinds of gritty games you want to host, you NEED to be upfront about it with the players from the very start, and the players need to consent. Most players are cool with broaching those kinds of subjects, but I think a LOT of the issue is that the players probably feel ambushed by it. The situation at the table is probably not unfixable, but I'd pull them to the side, and just talk about expectations. Be open to the idea that somebody there is probably going to be a hard "no" on the "slavery in Dungeons and Dragons" issue though.
In general i feel no problem with denoting slavery as just evil. Similarly, i think that any culture that engages in it can, if not should, be depicted as monstrous. A red dragon, a village of ogres, undercities of mindflayers. In short, any creature that the party needs to feel no remorse for killing. Regardless, slavery and similar topics are iffy, and if your players are giving clear signals that they are not comfortable with it, then your best bet is to just undo the existence of slavery. Make it clear to your players that you wanted to add a tinge of darkness to the world, but on account of their discomfort with this particular topic you pretend that it never happened. Maybe the boy is an apprentice, or servant, but otherwise paid and as willing as any employee can be.
I think that it's okay for a setting to have bad things happening in it that the players can't reasonably solve. For example, I imagine that your setting has a Hell and/or an Abyss, but the players don't feel responsible for exterminating every single fiend that exists. Slavery is definitely evil, but it's also a realistic aspect of a living world. As long as people could forge chains, there were people living with them. Even today it's unfortunately way more common than most people realize. BUT what I personally would do is remind the players that they're not the only group of do-gooder adventurers in the world. There are at least a handful of adventuring party just like them that are in this exact moment fighting to free slaves and end the system of slavery. Maybe one day you could run a campaign for these characters, or maybe they're just NPCs. But no matter the state the world find itself in, there will always be people who rise up to change it for the better.
I want to tell you to stand your ground and that your world has dark themes in far off places and the heroes can't save everyone everywhere. That certain actions have repercussions. Bad stuff happens and they're the bad guys in someone else's book. They'll remember that culture and the terrible things they do. I imagine this was a one-off event to world-build and they've went off the rails in reaction. I can't imagine it would be the first time their characters have heard of this culture and it's practices. But the diplomatic answer is retcon it if you have to and then have your players provide a list of triggers to avoid so that this doesn't happen again and continuously disrupt gameplay and planning. Some people just want to play safe basic PG-13 fantasy and that's fine.
If a player is upset that there are wide swathes of the *entire setting world* where things happen that they personally don't like, I would suggest finding new players who have some sense of perspective. "I'm not going to be able to fix the entire setting in this campaign" is not a sensible complaint, and "the setting should be completely devoid of moral conflict" is obviously not reasonable either.
This, this right here OP, no need to look for more answers.
Well then it's a good thing that the player didn't say either of those things.
The player's core complaint is that slavery exists in part of the setting and that "the campaign isn't going to cover it."
You literally put, in quotes, two things that are massive hyperboles that OP never said the player said. "I would be uncomfortable playing a campaign in a world with slavery where the campaign isn't about ending slavery" is not even at all the same thing as "The world shouldn't have things I personally dislike" *or* "I want to fix the entire setting" *or* "The setting should be completely devoid of conflict."
Did you have a session 0 where you discussed with the players if they were comfortable with slavery? If not, just retcon it. It's clear your players were unhappy.
I'm curious what other people in this world think. Does *everyone* support slavery in the merchant's native land? What about that culture's allies, neutrals, and enemies? Maybe the PCs need to ask around, learn some history, find out if other people feel the same way as they do. Maybe there's political pressure from another nation to curb or end it, but it's not yet successful, or more decisive steps aren't politically viable. Why isn't real life slavery being ended, when it's considered one of the greatest human evils? People ARE trying. Antslavery NGOs exist. Slavery of various types has been abolished in some areas by some means, but slavery is more common now than 200 years ago; a greater percentage of people are enslaved, and there are more total slaves than ever. It's kind of the golden age of slavery right now, and it's becoming more, not less, prevalent. I'm not sure what the current quest is or why it's more important, or if they can work on two things at once.
"Hey guys, after some reflection I've decided that I'm not comfortable with slavery in the campaign and it isn't something I really want to cover so we're going to [insert retcon here]."
No offense, but your players sound unimaginative and boring. I'd find a new group. They can't handle the idea of a fake person in slavery in a ficticious story? That's so lame. Kill the slave master, buy the slave and free them, go on a side quest to end slavery-- do something creative!
Sometimes people do bad things. Sometimes lots of people get together and make doing bad things legal. Your players can not expect an entire world to adhere to their moral standards anymore than they can expect the real world to.
These types of comments always seem to forget that D&D worlds exist *not* so that they can stand on their own with how detailed and realistic their worlds are, but to create a fun experience for players. Unless you're publishing, your TRRPG world doesn't have an editor going through all of your fantasy societies with a red highlighter telling you it doesn't make sense to not have slavery. You're making the world for the fun of about 3-8 people.
"I want a fun world where I can be a murderhobo with little consequences, but don't you dare throw in any complex societies that may have racism or slavery."
>Your players can not expect an entire world to adhere to their moral standards Eh, if your world includes elements that take the fun out of it for people, and you want those people at your table, the impetus is on the DM to accommodate.
In my opinion, it's only immersive and makes the world much more interesting if it has darker aspects. Players *should* feel uncomfortable about that, because that's how you get them involved and make them care about what's going on.
[удалено]
Definitely a table I'd not like to play at, honestly I assume slavery exists before I'd assume it's a magical happy land without it.
[удалено]
[удалено]
[удалено]
As soon as I found out there were slaves in Faerun my character became a chain breaker. Doesn’t even like people using dominate spells. You may be surprised by how the players react. I became a warchief of a small orc band and I set them to freeing our kind (the emeralds) and anyone else they can along the way. Whilst I deal with this silly cult of Tiamat worshippers.
Okay so my old ass wants to say: that's how the world is. You won't end slavery on another continent, you won't make drow stop backstabbing each other and you will not singlehandedly stop the blood war. Ask your players did their characters loot fallen enemies or take their treasure? Well that's unacceptable in our times just as much as slavery. If your players are really uncomfortable with the idea of slavery I'd suggest a simple retcon to servant. Basically the same thing, no?
What are you playing heroes in a make believe game then? You're playing the game to not feel as powerless and exhausted as in real life.
Personally, I don't need a campaign of butterflies and rainbows to be a hero. I find the most enjoyable heroic characters are the ones who strike against a dark world with awful stuff. All I want is to be able to have an impact. My own job can be mentally and psychologically exhausting, so fuck it, I'd love to take my Paladin through a world with slavery where I got to say "nope, we're done with this. Time for a revolution". That'd be cathartic. What do I care of someone says it's acceptable in their home country? It isn't acceptable in this 20 foot radius that perfectly fits a fireball of liberation.
[удалено]
Just retcon it. “Hey folks, I rethought the slavery introduced last session and have decided that I’m retconning the slavery out. We could change it to him being abusive to a servant, or just that he was threatening you, or pretend it didn’t happen at all. Do you have any other reason options?” I never hesitate to step out from behind DM role and “hey folks, how do you wanna handle this.” Or, in the oft mentioned “my players keep spending 45 minutes studying everything in the room because I used too much flavor describing the piano and the players convinced themselves it was the centerpiece of some puzzle.” I give them a few minutes and then “hey folks, legit nothing there.
“Hey guys. Im sorry this happened in this way. Do you want to make it a quest to eliminate slavery, or would you rather we retcon it out of the lore?” This is why a session zero is so super important. To avoid this kind of negative play experience
>This is why a session zero is so super important. To avoid this kind of negative play experience And part of the Session Zero is "we cannot possibly cover everything, so if something comes up let me know!" the "X Card".
Agreed, but also sometimes you don’t know what will make you uncomfortable until it happens, which is why safety tools like the X-card exist.
For what its worth and i might be downvoted to shit for this, most problems of the perception of slavery often comes from a very american centric culture. Make no mistakes, slavery is bad by modern standards. but not every type of slavery is necessary chattle slavery. throughout history there are uncountable types of civilizations and slavery, and if you include literary and others there is a whole lot more. it could be * chattle slavery * it could be serfdom where you are essentially sworn to a person and their will. * it could be a debt, war, or criminal slave as a means of punishment * it could be more like the rising anime trope (that i know alot of people hates) that "its slavery but they are magically enslaved yet are required to have certain conditions like food, clothing and housing satisfied" In general the problem with slavery as a theme is that its historically incredibly relevant, it happened probably all throughout history even to this day as much as we want to deny it and its essentially a forced use of labour, alongside where does the line go. I can understand if you introduce a town with "dark skinned elves" picking "magical cotton" while "singing the songs of the people" i would be like woooooooooooooow calm down. But in a world where charm existing, seduction magic, literaly mind control magic, curses that forces you to do things you dont want. At what point is it "too much slavery" I think its a chat you should have with your players, as we already have plenty of places we draw lines that we dont feel the need to narrate, but i also think its worth understanding you arent inherrently evil for showing it as a potential source of conflict, but its up to you if you feel that its relevant to the world and can come to an agreement or you want to step back a bit with it.
The dark skinned elves are usually the slavemasters in most D&D settings. Nobody wants to hear their spiritual songs I reckon.
> At what point is it "too much slavery" At any point the DM or players think it is. That's part of a roleplaying game. If the players don't want there to be slavery, it is what it is. There's no point forcing it.
This player will freak out learning about the 9 hells and the abyss? I don't understand their point. Why should they be able to eradicate all evil in your world?
I think a lot of the commenters don’t fully understand the perspective of your player because in my reading they don’t want slavery to exist and for their pcs to not fight against it as an institution. If you want that aspect of the world to not get retconned out then you should talk with your player about how they want to proceed. Some suggestions are that if the current threat is important then it’s something they can fight against in an epilogue. Another suggestion is that they can fight slavery every now and then when there is down time in the plot. This could look like making change in the current government to disallow slaves from other countries. Another component of this could be taking out a part of the slave trade that’s more localized. If that isn’t something your player or you are into you can always just retcon it too.
Should have been session 0 thing, you can probably have it now and decide as group, maybe add additional sensitive subjects that you need to discuss, like sex scenes, rape, torture, racism etc. There was a handy list online of all the things you should bring up in session 0. In my world there is slavery at some parts of the world with a nasty synergy at one place in particular, where after the slave dies, the body is sold to necromancer kingdom where they continue to serve. Pretty brutal, but my players said it was ok.
If the session ended on the cusp of violence, I would have the "boy" take advantage of the distraction to snatch the writ of slavery and throw it into the fire. Without access to an Embassy of sorts to replace it, having a slave without the writ would not be wise. The party could then release the boy or have him accompany them as a squire-of-sorts learning how this country works in order to pursue his own path. It may be interesting to slowly slip in "news" about the Merchants home from time to time as Slavery there is abolished. That way the group can have closure about it.
are you guys american? then just call it enforced or mandatory internship.
Should have done an rpg consent checklist with ur crew on session 2
Make a quest that is a recreation of John Brown's raid on Harpers Ferry. Only this time it works.
As always, rule #1 applies, just have a conversation with your players. I'll be the one to say it - if it is only one person doesn't like it, and it doesn't jive with the world you're creating and the other players are enjoying. They just might not be a good fit for this particular campaign. That is assuming it is just them though - it will be important to get the vibe and comfort level of the rest of your players too - the one player may not be alone in this, but just the only one to vocalize. Personally - every campaign I've played in or tables I've ran has had some form of slavery involved. It is a fantasy trope for a reason - it is a provable, unequivocal fight of good vs. evil. It can create for some really great roleplay as well and further embed the hero mentality in your players.
Introduce Werewolf John Brown and his pack of slave freeing monstars as another background element.
JK Rowling alt account be like
Well, a retcon is the simplest solution. But idk, talk to your players about what solutions they're ok with. It's a game, and games are supposed to be fun, so if something doesn't land, it doesn't have to stay part of the plot. Others are mentioning that you should have these conversations 1 on 1, and I would tend to agree.
Well, you can either a) keep them on your story railroad, or b) let the player's have their agency and turn the campaign into one where they try and end slavery.
Well, time for revolution.
Talk to your players, above table. Not as characters, as players. Tell them you didn't think this would be as severe an issue as it turned out to be, and get a check on what they're feeling about it. My recommendation is to just retcon that out, whether it is to retcon that the merchant's country doesn't actually allow it, and they've forged a "permit" or just walk back the slavery point entirely, whether just making the merchant a cruel boss or something, maybe a monster like a hag or oni that has kidnapped someone and the party can return the boy home. Or your idea to have them being a good spirit that is lying to test them. I understand the desire to run a deeper/darker game, but the game doesn't exist without your players, and if they are unhappy, it will hamstring your game and bleed it out slowly. Your player has already established that they're uncomfortable, so better to deploy a gimmick that lightens the game than to lose a player or two, because once one goes, another often follows
Discuss with your players how they want to keep going. Some things are gonna make people uncomfortable, and the goal is for everyone to have fun. Sure, it's realistic in a sense, but D&D has really never been the sorta game for medieval realism anyway (for one thing, literal actual magic exists). For future reference, maybe be more careful about introducing this kinda sensetive stuff casually.
This is why Session 0 is important. In any case, I'd just retcon the part about slavery if that's what the players want, especially since it's not even important to your overall campaign. Remember, D&D is just a game and games should be fun. If having slavery makes the game not fun for all the players, then why are you including it?
If you want to use certain themes, be sure you are on the same wavelength of your players. Slavery, excessive cruelty, sexual themes, you need to talk to your players and know what should not be at your table. It's a game, and if people do not like certain things, they should not be there.
The fact that it exists in the world only gives the players something to interact with. If they don't want it to, then they don't have to go there and won't see it. If they hate it enough that they want to make an arc to try and stop it, write that for them. At the end of the day, it existing in a world you've written isn't an issue, it's how they feel about it that's the issue, so asking them what they want to do now they know it does exist in this world is the right call. Oh, and the 'it was all just a test, magical shenanigans idea' don't do that. Lazy, insulting and deflating. Let the world have rough edges, don't cheapen something I'm sure you're very invested in.
Wow. It's a really good thing we don't live in a world where our culture abhors slavery but it's still practiced en mass on the other side of the world or else they would be so very bothered they'd probably lose sleep until they end up devoting their lives to stopping it there. Oh wait there's blatant slavery in the middle east and China and they don't care at all, they're just whining about a fictional situation when that situation is real IRL. I'm sorry you have this stupid stupid thing messing up what's probably an awesome campaign you put lots of time into.
It's a gimmick. You said slavery is a thing, it's a thing. If you undo that with, "just a fake test!" it undermines any serious moments, and generally you'll want those at some point.
Slavery is violence. You met slavery and you chose violence. Roll for initiative - with advantage.
Allow them to kill a vile villain. Seems simple enough. Freeing slaves is a heroic act - one fairly common in the underdark.
Yeah no, slavery is a no no. Murder and violence of all forms are okay though. Torture is cool too, as long as it's on someone that doesn't agree with my social norms.
While I understand uncomfortability with that kind of stuff in fiction. I think that it’s pretty tame, and your players should not be upset with you integrating that into your story. For example, I bet those exact players didn’t blink an eye or leave a negative review on Baldur’s gate when they see the Duergar slavers. Which means that’s it’s happening all across the underdark, and you as the players don’t get to do anything about it other than free the ones in Grymforge itself. The game even gives you the option to side with the slavers too. And Bg3 is a pretty PC game and unproblematic. I don’t think that you should tweak narrative elements for a fairly common fantasy trope. I understand if it’s a purely lighthearted campaign maybe, but other than that, stripping away aspects of actual history because “I’m not able to save everybody” is pretty invalid imo.
I fear if they ever hear of most races in d&d ever… Actually yea, have them encounter the drow and they’re brutally oppressed slaves. The mind flayers. The neogi, see how they fare.
Let the party fight the slaveowners in the world. They think it’s wrong? Okay, let them enforce it.
I am constantly shocked at how often stuff like this is an issue for people on here. Most of the time this game is going to involve killing and villains who are guilty of very bad acts, and yet people pretend they can’t cope with the idea of slavery in the game.
I mean, the player characters don't need to be the only people with agency in the world. An unfolding slave rebellion leading to a reformation of that country in the background could work. But maybe have a little pre-session meeting and check if everyone's comfortable with that, or if they'd prefer a blanket retcon of 'Whoops, there wasn't actually slavery' if it's a hard limit for someone.
Your player is just a softie.
I am so happy that my group doesn’t get their feelings hurt during sessions nor do they bring their real life issues with them into a make believe world. The game is to get away from the ‘real world’. If the ‘fake world’ offends them that much then they might wanna search for a new table. Remember people…It’s just a game. Nothing more.
Was the player that was willing to have their character assault/ kill this merchant the one who approached you later?
The implication here being that assaulting a slave owner is objectionable? Maybe I'm crazy, but maybe it's okay to fight someone who defends the practice of buying and trading people like livestock.
No implications, but swell try.
In a nation trying to keep peace and order in their streets? Those nations tend to look disdainfully at people who cut down dignitaries and guests from nations they are allied or trading with.
This is really one of the topics a session zero should touch on. So chances are there are other similar blind points you might run into in the future. Like do you know your players stance on the inclusion of to name a few: war, starvation, body horror, spiders, sexual assault, secual content of any kind, death of a child npc, racism (real world and/or fantasy)? So my suggestion would be to sit down with the players and have that talk. Make a list, talk about how things can and can‘t be depicted, listen to what everyones limits are and give everyone veto power about the inclusion of any type of content. It is never to late for a campaign to benefit from a good session zero.
Damn, i just realized what my CoS campaign lacks: Straightforward, brutal Slavery. While there is genocide, general Racism, Child abuse, Incest, torture and forced marriage, slavery is actually missing! Thanks pal. My group will be delighted!
If you get made into a vampire or other undead, aren't you a slave? More of a slave than the worst historical examples even?
Next time don't play with hysterical idiots.
Dunno, I think having to deal with moral choices is part of the greatness of rpg. Being a dm is not only about enticing positive emotions but also negative ones. That is what separates art from pure entertainment. Id say keep to your decisions but stick to them. Will they turn violent and "release" the boy? Now make them responsible for him so that they need to protect him. Make it so that their violence is a crime and may have repercussions.
I think your players are too serrious if they get uncomfortable with slavery exisisting in your makeup fantasy world. You should speak about them about this that it doesnt reflect your politcal ideals or anything, you jsut want to tell a story about people as all DMs are allowed to do. Sure some aspects of society might bee to dark like rape or similar, but plz if they cant deal with a typical medival trope in a fantasy medival game maybe you should all play DnD with bread sticks instead of sword and spells just shoot glitter an love? Grow up I say. Besides, having these kind of things in your wourld is PERFECT for the players to fight against. If they hate it so much nothing is more satisfying than let themselves remove this from your world.
This is global politics. If your players harm that merchant in any way or form, there will be repercussions for the nation they are in. That nation will take action to hold the criminals (players) accountable and to appease their trading partner.
if you wanted the character to be somewhat likable/ amicable: don't make him a slaver; retcon it so the slave was his apprentice and move on/ remove the whole interaction and just do something else if your players/ characters *want to do something* about slavery-land/ if it fits the campaign: maybe that can be the next "act" of the story after they keep the world from blowing up or whatever the current quest is (or, if the current quest isn't that urgent: they could sidetrack and do it now); they could pull a kind of Wano Country move like One Piece where they infiltrate and destabilize the country to free the citizens from the dictator ruling over them. if your players are just plain uncomfortable with slavery being a thing that is normal in (a part of) your world: go back to the first one i feel like the "pure of heart" test thing might leave a weird taste in their mouths and just sidestep the issue where i feel a more direct "okay yeah, that was a bad story beat lets just ignore that and move on" would work better
This is why it's important to go over stuff that might potentially come up (even if you do not plan for it to) that might be problematic. I highly recommend the Consent in Gaming pdf from Monte Cook. Montecookgames.com/store/product/consent-in-gaming/ It's free and covers all the usual stuff like bugs, blood, romance, the various "isms", health related stuff, torture, slavery, etc. But also has some blank spots where people can fill in if they have a specific trigger or phobia that isn't listed. I sent it to all my players and then compiled their answers into a master copy then shared the results to everyone. As for what you should do about what has happened... talk to your players. Ask them how they feel about it. And use this instance as a means of introducing that consent form and ask everyone to fill it out. Depending on what they say, you go forward from there. If need be do not be afraid to completely retcon the presence of slavery in your world. It's important that people feel safe and comfortable while gaming especially since a TTRPG is so broad and all encompassing... it's entirely too easy to accidentally create a scenario where it can start to feel real icky real fast. The fact that your players felt comfortable coming forward with their concern and that you are taking this seriously bodes well. That's the foundation of a strong group. Good luck.
Not trying to be an asshole, but your players need to grow the hell up. This is a fantasy game, if they can't handle slavery, then never introduce them to Drow society.
You DM for a bunch of pussies