Slavery

[wired2thenet]

Some people say that technically pawns are slaves. Of course they are not. Slaves cannot refuse to haul or clean. Pawns can.
You tell a slave to haul shit - he hauls shit or faces the warden.

Other than that, I'm quite sure there are dozen other differences and ways of implementing it as an interesting element for story telling. Pawn being a slave to your colony, but works a lot with your colonist. They become friends. Interesting? Interesting. You can now even put some more systems on top of it - make it easier to recruit such slave-pawn, make it easier for him to escape (his colonist friend helps him escape).

Dozens of things that can add to the gameplay. Sure, not every single one will work (or will be worth it to add), but I'm quite surprised people say from the very beginning that there are no differences between pawns and potential slaves.

+10^^