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Tinto Talks #34 - 23rd of October 2024

Hello and Welcome to another Tinto Talk, where we spill information about our entirely secret unannounced game with the codename Project Caesar.

This week we will talk about how slavery works in this game.

Slave Pops
One of the six types of pops we have are the slaves. These lack pretty much every right in all countries, and are simply exploited. They are not allowed to move around on their own, they have harsh enough lives that they are basically only keeping the current population levels at best of times, and they have absolutely no income nor any political power. If they get any sort of literacy they are very likely to be rather upset. At the start of the game the usage of slaves is mostly gone from Europe, but it's more prevalent in other parts of the world.


slaves_cairo.png

Part of the slaves in Cairo at the start..

Usage of Slaves
Slaves are primarily used in resource gathering operations, but they can also be used in various buildings. These types of buildings can be categorized into two types of buildings.

First we have the slave-soldier buildings that require slaves to function, and produce manpower or sailors. These include buildings like mamluk or janissary barracks that provide a part of the armies of the Mamluks and Ottomans.

The second category of buildings are the plantations. These are buildings that you can unlock from Age of Discovery advances. There are three types of plantations, for sugar, tobacco and cotton. These are far more productive than the RGO for the same goods, but require slaves to function.

galley_barracks.png

One unique building to get you a lot of sailors.

Of course there are other uses for Slaves. In some religions you need a steady stream of them to sacrifice daily to make the Sun go up the next day.


Acquiring Slaves
There are multiple ways to get slaves.

First of all you have the classic way of conquering nearby territories and enslaving part of the population as you sack their cities. This is something that as diverse cultures as amongst others, the Haudenosaunee, Aztec and the Kanem Empire can do from the start. They also get easy access to casus belli to go on slave raiding wars. As you sack a city, a percentage of the population will become slaves and appear in the closest slave market you have, and if none is near enough, then to the closest slave market nearby.

Secondly, we have the Berber States, who engaged in slave raiding from the sea. In Eu4, this was a button you clicked on your ships when they were near a coast that had no slave-raiding-cooldown active. In Project Caesar this ability is a part of the privateering mechanic, in that if you have access to this ability, then your privateers will raid a random coastal location in the area they are in, and take some of the pops as slaves for the closest slave market. This is stopped by having a truce, above 100 opinion, or a good old coastal fortress.

slave_raiding.png

Morocco is one of the countries that can do this from day 1.

Thirdly, you have the Slave Market Building. While it acts as a hub for slave trades, it will also try to enslave pops of non accepted cultures, and different religious groups. This is to simulate how the Delhi Sultanate and others enslaved people in their conquered lands over time.

slave_market.png

It all adds up over time..

Fourthly, you have the possibility to build slave centers in foreign locations that have less power projection than you. This is to simulate part of how the Europeans got their slaves from West Africa to the New World. While a significant part of slaves were bought from other African Kingdoms that were willing to sell slaves taken from their enemies, they were also locally captured by the slavers themselves near their slaving centers. If you wish to fight this in your territories, you need to go to war and forcefully expel them.

Finally, you can trade for slaves. In Project Caesar, slaves exist both as a type of goods and as a type of pop, and they are slightly linked. Buildings can produce slave goods and require slave goods as input. When a slave goods is traded between markets, the game will also move pops in relative sizes to locations that have a demand for slaves.

Thus, if you have buildings or resource gathering operations that can use slaves, they will create a demand for slaves in the market, and if you trade from a market that both produces slave goods and has enough slaves present, the game will move about 200 pops from the slave market each month for each good you trade.

At the start of the game there is the Trans-Saharan trade, where northern african countries import slaves from West Africa, many sold by the Kanem Empire.

Later on, during the Age of Discovery, you will see the triangular trade between Europe, West Africa & Americas, which will reduce the Trans Saharan trade volumes.

There is also another market system, as the Mongol States have access to taking slaves when conquering land, and they created the greatest slave trading network the world has ever seen. Since Muslim states could not keep muslim slaves, and christians did not want christian slaves, the Mongols traded the muslims to the christians and the christians to the muslim countries. The trade links from India goes to central asia as well, as Delhi trades their slaves to other markets, while they get the slaves they require for their mamluk-style armies.



Stay tuned as next week we’ll talk about Great Powers and Hegemonies..
 
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First of all you have the classic way of conquering nearby territories and enslaving part of the population as you sack their cities. This is something that as diverse cultures as amongst others, the Haudenosaunee, Aztec and the Kanem Empire can do from the start.

Is that only limited to specific cultures or can anyone do it? During the Great Wrath (1713-1721) Russians took approximately 5% of Finns as slaves, some for building St.Petersburg, some for sale, I guess mostly to Crimea. Can that happen in the game?

In the final version, will all portraits be of European looking people or will there be different portraits for pops from different regions?
 
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Firstly, wow! This sounds like a fantastic feature to include, especially given the significance of slavery during that period.

However, I have a question regarding how "production" and "enslavement" function. In a previous dev diary, we learned that manpower (both soldiers and sailors) isn't directly tied to the actual population. Is it the same for slave production? Does the slave market described in the diary generate slaves out of nowhere, or are they enslaved from other social classes, such as farmers?
 
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What incentives are there to end slavery around the end of the game ? Will it be somewhat linked to some estates demands, or institution such as the enlightment spreading through your land ?
 
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Presumably this means that there's no sort of "raiding" mechanic aside from simply declaring war and sending your armies over to pillage and acquire loot/slaves?

Y'know, other than privateering or the "slave raiding" building. Think more like something along the lines of what the Ottos were doing in the Balkans when not immediately at war with someone else, or the Golden Horde against the various Russian principalities that were immediately bordering them. Or the Crimean Khanate later on.
 
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Additional question. How linear will slavery be? Can any country at any time conjure the political power to outlaw slavery or will it be more tied to culture and historical events like the rise of abolitionism?
 
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Can you mod on other trade goods tied to other pops? EG, could you mod in a ‘German settlers’ trade good for a backdoor simulation of the importing of German Burghers by Eastern European states? Or a ‘mercenaries’ trade good that moves around pops?

> Of course there are other uses for Slaves. In some religions you need a steady stream of them to sacrifice daily to make the Sun go up the next day.

Does this mean the buildings actually sacrifice those pops? And if so, can we mod other buildings that will sacrifice the pops working there, EG, a lich tower that sacrifices peasants to produce ‘souls’? And can those buildings be made to only sacrifice some of the pops there, EG, have that tower employ ‘wizards’ and ‘peasants’, but only sacrifice the peasants?
 
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China under the rule of the Mongol Empire was an era of slavery revival. Slaves were mainly owned by high-ranking ruling groups such as Mongols and Central Asians, and used to handle household chores, cultivate the land, or make handicrafts. Some Han nobles also had slaves, but the number was much smaller than that of the Mongols.

These slaves were mainly prisoners of war obtained by the Mongols during their conquest of China, and were called Qukou, which means herded mouths.
Interestingly, some low-ranking Mongols were also sold outside the Mongol Empire, so that the Mongol Khan had to pay to buy them back.
 
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Will we get culture blending of slaves to reflect how new cultures developed identities in places like the Caribbean or will we end up with locations with a culture pie chart with many many pieces

How will abolition work?

Is there a casus belli to force neighbouring countries to free their slaves?
 
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Also, I didn't get this:



Why is 1 Slave Good = 200 Slave Pops? Couldn't the game deal with 200 Goods = 200 Pops?
I think it's an acceptable abstraction so that the slave goods don't stick way out of other trades/values in the markets. Importing 6 lumber and 2500 slave goods just looks way too unproportional.
 
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Will the game have mechanics representing slave populations being castrated or not depending on the country's religion? Id imagine Muslim countries would have decreasing slave populations if they are not constantly raiding.
 
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they have harsh enough lives that they are basically only keeping the current population levels at best of times
In the US the vast majority of slaves were born into slavery, not imported, so it will be pretty odd for the black population to stagnate or decline once importation of slaves ends.
 
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Will PC represent the fact that slaves participate in the administration in certain regions ?
Could there be administrative buildings that require litterate slaves ?
Will it be possible to enslave people from you culture/cultural group ?

They can be working in special buildings for admin yes..

You can't ever enslave same cultute pops.
 
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Let's say I'm Aragon and those Berbers have taken a lot of my people as slaves.

1. Is there a way to keep track of slaves that are part of your primary or accepted culture?

2. Can I start a war to liberate all same culture, same culture group or same religion slaves and bring them back to my own country?

1 - yes they keep their culture + religion
2 - you can conquer the territory, but yeah, a peace treaty to get all slaves of your primary culture back home would be good to have. lets add.
 
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I'm surprised you decided to tackle this issue. I thought it was a no no.
Seriously, I read this with my mouth open. I remember reading that article that claimed EU4 was racist for having empty land with a few thousand natives that you could genocide with a click of a button. If that person sees this....
 
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wow (wait a minute... BUT That's horrible! whatever... business....) humor huh
 
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1)Can countries from Europe re-introduce slavery? Or fight Mongols for the liberty of the slaves?
2)In Russia the slaves were serfs till 1723 , so in this case will it there be the same mechanics of sales and trade or will be only as population category?

1 - not reintroducing no
2 - serfs are peasants with severe limits
 
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