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Post by Learned Hand on Feb 12, 2008 18:24:55 GMT
Kairos has opened Tredemin up to the slave trade.
However, the 1st slaves wouldn't have arrived for about a month in game time after our last session so he probably would have mentioned it to you. Since the consequences of the resulting discussion are already affecting IC threads I thought it might make sense to just talk ooc so we can catch up.
Kairos will argue that the slave trade is essential if we are to become a true empire, although he'll acknowledge its unpleasantness. He'll point out that once we are a powerful empire we will be in a position to tackle the slave trade globally and make a real difference, rather than what at the moment would be a tokenistic refusal to face the realities of the current world.
If pushed, he'll suggest that after 10 years of dedicated service (5 if they are in the army) the slaves can be granted their freedom. We win - we get labour and an increase in population and the slaves win - being sold to Tredemin is actually the only chance they realistically have of freedom at all.
He'll also suggest the idea of granting the slaves immediate status as citizens provided they agree to colonise the lands to the North and East, and provide some of their surplus in the form of taxes. These are lands that our armies will nick from the barbarians, who will themselves be sold as slaves. We will then use the money from selling the slaves to import new slaves who we will use to colonise more lands.
Of course, this would be difficult to manage (what would stop the slaves trying to go home?) so it might be worth waiting for 5 years to grant them citizen status (i.e. stop guarding them) by which time they'll have ties in the area.
Or I could just make them think they have ties to the area 'yes - you two have always been married'.
What will all your boys think of the slave trade?
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missdixievoom
Junior Geek
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Post by missdixievoom on Feb 12, 2008 18:35:41 GMT
How well treated will the slaves be? can we make it nice and humane please?
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Post by Blackrat on Feb 12, 2008 19:06:57 GMT
Erm... Well Fox will hate the idea, and will challenge it at length. Therefore this is essentially going to become an IC thread - and one to which I don't have time to reply right now. Is the result of this discussion going to affect the actions in the IC thread? I suspect it is... In which case we should hold off on that as I think we're already going to have to retcon some of it.
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bravesirrobin
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Post by bravesirrobin on Feb 12, 2008 19:17:51 GMT
Actually it was slightly under two weeks that they arrived. And Fox has been away in Khardron for some of the intervening period - not to mention Kairos' own travels. So it's likely a full discussion hasn't occured until after the events of the Social Engineering thread.
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Post by Learned Hand on Feb 12, 2008 20:50:08 GMT
I did say I went to the Salt Mines as soon as I could, so hopefully before people were travelling. If we assume I spoke to people that night then we should all have been around. If they weren't, then I would have spoken to everybody individually.
I just don't want to make big changes without consulting people IC and OOC - everybody will hate me and, more importantly, Kairos.
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Post by Blackrat on Feb 12, 2008 21:08:01 GMT
Actually, I've got to say, the simplest retcon is no retcon. I would agree with BSR that it's better if Kairos didn't (think to) mention it until after the slaves arrived - just as you didn't OOC, LH. I don't like retconning as it just makes everything confusing and detracts from the story. I don't think everyone will hate you - and frankly, I think that's a risk you have to take if you make the big changes without consulting anyone; you can't then go "oh shit, I should have mentioned this"  |
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Post by Blackrat on Feb 12, 2008 21:08:34 GMT
(Or rather you can, but it happens IC just as it happens OOC.)
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bravesirrobin
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Post by bravesirrobin on Feb 12, 2008 22:23:01 GMT
I feel that we should go ahead as things stand. i don't want to retcon away anything that has been done.
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Post by Learned Hand on Feb 12, 2008 22:29:41 GMT
To be fair, BSR started the bit about the slaves arriving, thereby skipping what I thought was 2 weeks of in-game time where I could have spoken to y'all. Admittedly, this may have been prompted by the fact that I skipped ahead in the Salt Mines thread - I got excited, but I did say at the time that I was pretty sure I was doing just that. This is just one of the risks of pbp when several threads are running together.
As for in-game, since the plebs knew when the slaves were due to arrive it seems odd that the solars themselves had no idea.
Importantly, I don't think we need to retcon; the slaves arrive - people are pissed. Kairos suspects foul play and asks Azir to check for essence. This will happen no matter what decisions we make regarding the treatment of slaves, assuming we agree to take slaves at all (I think the vote would go at least 3-1 in favour provided we treat them humanely). *If* we carry on with the Social Engineering Thread then we may have to retcon, but as long as we pause until we've talked (either IC or OOC) we'll be ok.
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Post by Blackrat on Feb 12, 2008 22:50:13 GMT
I don't think we need to retcon; the slaves arrive - people are pissed. Kairos suspects foul play and asks Azir to check for essence. This will happen no matter what decisions we make regarding the treatment of slaves... Not true. Since the people are pissed because of charms used by Fox, this is unlikely to happen at all if you've already discussed the slavery thing with him. (In the Social Engineering thread as it currently stands, he has no idea you're behind the slavery.) There, I said it. So we may as well retcon now. However, it's a shame because I think that would have been a really interesting bit of plot line for both Fox and Kairos. Plus because retconning generally sucks. So I guess we all (both ST and players) need to be more careful about what plot we put up on the boards, and make sure everyone else is ready for it. It's really difficult to keep all characters and the plot moving at the same pace in PbP, but we need some way of dealing with it, otherwise it just ends up with whoever can post the most frequently directing the story. My initial instinct would be that once it's on the boards, it's gospel. I think the story flows better like that, even if it does result in some characters acting differently than they otherwise might. Real people act strangely too, sometimes! But obviously mine is not the only valid opinion on this point. (A way to avoid this entirely would be to limit PbP to stuff that's only relevant to one character. That way each character can progress at their own pace. Admittedly this is less satisfying than good group PbP - but I would say it's more satisfying that jumping back and forth along a time line and being forced to retcon.) Well, kinda - but I think it's sufficiently dissatisfying (for me, at least) that we ought not to write it off as "just one of the risks". I'd rather do something about it so that the story flows better, the RP is less confusing, and the whole experience is more immersive. Obviously different people have different tastes / priorities, so feel free to weigh in against. |
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bravesirrobin
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Post by bravesirrobin on Feb 13, 2008 6:35:27 GMT
Rule 1: Have Fun
Rule 2: ST is final arbiter
I know we could have had things happen a different way. But this seemed like the best way to move forward to me. It's a hilarious misunderstanding - which will hopefully lead to a greater understanding of each other's characters long term.
This game is about people, and how they interact with the world around them. Not about the glorious onward march of a fledgling empire. Things don't need to go perfectly. We skipped ahead, and you had forgotten to mention it to people. That's an ST decision - noone's gonna be pissed at you. It'll lead to IC tension, but this is how drama is born.
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Post by oneiros on Feb 13, 2008 7:36:05 GMT
I'm all for dramatic tension - if we play it off well it's not gonna reave the party. Also I'm happy to leave things as they are - retconning at this stage would definitely not taste right.
Also, to me, it feels 'right' that Kairos could have 'accidentally' forgotten to tell us what he was planning, as in a guy who very focussed on getting the desired outcome but not bothering with some of the finer detail along the way.
Will post more on the IC side later
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Post by Blackrat on Feb 13, 2008 9:52:55 GMT
Also, to me, it feels 'right' that Kairos could have 'accidentally' forgotten to tell us what he was planning, as in a guy who very focussed on getting the desired outcome but not bothering with some of the finer detail along the way. An excellent point - this certainly fits with Kairos as I read him from his behaviour so far. (LH, obviously this is your character, and I'm not trying to dictate how you play him. I'm just saying from what we've seen so far that doesn't sound uncharacteristic of Kairos.) |
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Post by Learned Hand on Feb 13, 2008 10:19:19 GMT
To me, Kairos not mentioning the slave trade to the group felt very much not-right. This stopped me having fun, which was why I kicked up a fuss. This was when I assumed (A) the person jerking with the group was an outside influence, so I had no idea it would cut out a problem with our glorious march of progress (B) there would be no need for retconning. So really all I wanted to do was have what I figured was an essentially pointless (pointless in the sense of altering anything other than our relationships) conversation amongst our characters because, yes, role playing is about the people and how they interact with the world around them.
And yeah it is a shame that the misunderstanding might not occur but I had no way of knowing I was stopping anything happening, let alone anything cool. In fact, since I thought the conversation would not change a thing I just couldn't understand why there was a problem at all. I've got no problem with subsuming character to plot if we wanted to keep this as is, (or for that matter, whenever we need to again) but please tell me that I need to trust you and go along with things as they stand rather than talking about retcon or whatever.
As for the general problems about roleplaying on the boards - I think occasionaly retconning is necessary, simply because somebody who might only post every few days may want to come back to a conversation and disagree vehemently, persuading us with arguments that render the things we've done in the meantime a bit obsolete. Or You may get something along the lines of a post saying 'any objections?'. Waiting a day and then the same person replying to 'Good, so we're all Yozi worshippers. To Bluehaven!' but y'know, hopefully as stupid.
It sucks; I think we can minimise the risks by putting in questions specifically directed at the people who aren't around very often and keeping a rigid timeline but I think there will always be occasional problems.
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missdixievoom
Junior Geek
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Post by missdixievoom on Feb 13, 2008 10:45:26 GMT
It seems that this whole thing is based on a misunderstanding - LH thought he had agreed with BSR that nothing would go ahead about a slave trade until he had asked the rest of us. Obviously something broke down in the communication. LH never meant for this to happen and my opinion is that we should try and sort it out, whether by retcon or some evil genius outside plot or whatever.
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