For some significant portion of your life, you have been someone else's property. This part of your life happened either by abduction, as punishment for a crime, sworn to a debt of life, or you were born into it. How did you become a slave? Are you a slave or a freeman? Who was your master and where are they? What were the conditions of your slavery? What did you do as a slave? Were you treated well, or were you abused? How much privilege or freedom did you experience, and was this granted to you, or taken by you? How would you treat your master after your servitude? Can you ever really leave your background behind you? Do you really even need to escape, or will you remain a slave for the rest of your journey? Do you have the willpower to create slavery-free actions, or has your background tainted your history and the actions that you can take later in your career? What would you do with your slaves?
- Skill Proficiencies: Performance, Survival
- Tool Proficiencies: Any tool with a value of up to 15 gp.
- Languages: Any language that your former master could speak, read or write.
- Equipment: One tool you are proficient in, one simple melee weapon, a set of clothes to fit your master's status and your slave purpose, a pouch with 1 gp.
A slave serves a specific purpose for its master - which is their purpose for being alive.
d8 - Purpose
- I existed to do hard labor, such as mining or construction.
- I existed for someone else's amusement, entertainment, or recreation.
- I existed to do mental tasks, such as cooking or cleaning.
- I existed as a servant to a given person, family, or group.
- I existed to fulfill the task as someone's personal assistant, such as a furnace operator for a smithy.
- I existed to serve the function of an inanimate object, such as a signpost or furniture, or to operate such things, like opening and closing a specific door all day long.
- I existed to fight and die in the place of someone else, as a soldier or bodyguard.
- I existed to serve all, as an untouchable– a slave to even other slaves.
Slaves face great difficulty everywhere they go. Escaped slaves are often on the run if not from their former owners, then certainly from the law. Few are educated or have any practical experience to make a way for themselves. Most have limited social skills which give away their social status. Slavers may notice freemen as "unclaimed property" and try to "claim" them as slaves. People sense a sort of "inferiority" about slaves and freemen, and they will likely either ignore you or boss you around. Many freemen turn to crime to make ends meet and so anyone who doesn't assume you a slave immediately, will likely assume that you are a criminal. If you can ever really leave the slavery mindset knowing what it's like to be a slave, then you can pose as a slave with little difficulty and without raising much suspicion. People seem to do things in front of you that they would normally only do when they are alone.
Suggested Characteristics
Use the tables for the folk hero background in the Player’s Handbook as the basis for your traits and motivations, modifying the entries when appropriate to suit your identity as a slave. But for this specific background, here's some more options:
Personality Trait:
No matter how bad things get, I never complain– I've seen worse.
Ideal:
Apathy. I only think about what is within my power. Anything else is just circumstance. (Neutral)
Bond:
My identity as a slave is marked on my body permanently as scars or tattoos.
Flaw:
My former master, or the law, will stop at nothing to see me in chains again
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