Coinage, and how you handle it.

[MadGreenSon]

So. How do you handle the petty (but important) detail of coins in your games?
In my game worlds, any coinage that isn't a unique local thing (like the special bells used in Lantan if FR) and is used for cross-national trade will have the same weight by metal type and that is what merchants measure as much as number of coins when they take payment.

This in mind, one of my players wants to mint his own coinage. Specifically coinage that is commemorative of his adventuring comrades. He has the skills to do so and plans to make a limited run by re-casting some of their acquired loot.

Since this is less annoying than when he tried to replace his teeth with diamonds, I'm inclined to allow it. Anyone see any problems?

[Sir Chuckles]

To avoid the whole "I'm carrying around 42,000 gold coins" thing, I usually, at higher levels, borrow from the Tippyverse. Tippy put in a magic coin purse that absorbs the life essence into a little bag, and converted into coinage. Or something along those lines.
Otherwise, I give cash payouts in terms of IOUs, banknotes, and light-weight gems.

As for minting your own coins...
I don't see any problems.
It's not actually legal tender. Unless he were to sell it to someone who's intent was to go "You made coins out of a mithral chain shirt? Well, I'll buy it at X." *goes and melts it down to remake the chain shirt that's worth more*, it's more or less worthless. If he's a national hero, maybe not worthless.

If it's a personal commemoration, and he doesn't try to use it to pay for things, I can't think of any law outside of a harsh tyrannical overlord state that would ban this.

[Telonius]

The only thing I could think of would be if he tries to sell it at a massively inflated price: "There will only ever be 2000 of these gold pieces made! Buy yours for 50gp."

[MadGreenSon]

To avoid the whole "I'm carrying around 42,000 gold coins" thing, I usually, at higher levels, borrow from the Tippyverse. Tippy put in a magic coin purse that absorbs the life essence into a little bag, and converted into coinage. Or something along those lines.
Otherwise, I give cash payouts in terms of IOUs, banknotes, and light-weight gems.


My PCs usually don't carry a lot of cash, per se. When they're trading in loot and such they usually get most of the payout in useful items and other things they want, though the high level group does have a good few treasure chests in the group portable hole.

For large amounts they'll usually buy large gemstones to trade with temples/spellcasters/artificers later.




As for minting your own coins...
I don't see any problems.
It's not actually legal tender. Unless he were to sell it to someone who's intent was to go "You made coins out of a mithral chain shirt? Well, I'll buy it at X." *goes and melts it down to remake the chain shirt that's worth more*, it's more or less worthless. If he's a national hero, maybe not worthless.

If it's a personal commemoration, and he doesn't try to use it to pay for things, I can't think of any law outside of a harsh tyrannical overlord state that would ban this.

Ah now, here's the rub. He's gonna be making coins out of coins. As I said in the OP most merchants just plop coinage on a scale, and if it's the right metal and weight, they don't stress out about origin too much, especially at the types of freeport cities adventurers tend to frequent.

However, that is with coinage from other nations. Even though having the King's face on the gold piece or whatever is mostly a vanity thing, as all gold pieces weigh the same, would the authorities take a big exception to a private individual minting their own coinage, even if it were the same metal type and weight?

[Averis Vol]

Well, does your world just trade in raw gold? because normally coins were minted and taxed which is what made them legal tender. without being supported by a sovereign nation, I doubt anyone would accept them; it would be much akin to fake money made out of the same cloth composition as real dollar bills.

He could petition and pay the proper coinage to a real mint and just have them made that way though, that would be completely within the realm of legality, much like countries occasionally put out coins on infomercials at 4 in the morning.

[Sir Chuckles]

Tell him:
"It's not actually money. One gold coin weighs in at X. X weight of gold is worth Y."

Now, that could mean the gold of a gold coin is worth less than it's marked value. That's ok. That was the point of mixing lesser valued metals into the coins, or plating them. When they're marked, the weight would only tell you if it was fake or not. The markings would tell you what they were worth.

Now, once he mints them, he could come out with less ash than he started, due to conversion. And if he doesn't like that, too bad.

He can't mark it up as a collector's item unless he's a hero or something.

[TuggyNE]

It's not actually legal tender. Unless he were to sell it to someone who's intent was to go "You made coins out of a mithral chain shirt? Well, I'll buy it at X." *goes and melts it down to remake the chain shirt that's worth more*, it's more or less worthless. If he's a national hero, maybe not worthless.

Lots of privately-owned banks have minted their own coinage, so the rather modern notion of "legal tender" is probably not relevant. What is relevant is whether it would be considered trustworthy or not.

[Crake]

Tell him:
"It's not actually money. One gold coin weighs in at X. X weight of gold is worth Y."

Now, that could mean the gold of a gold coin is worth less than it's marked value. That's ok. That was the point of mixing lesser valued metals into the coins, or plating them. When they're marked, the weight would only tell you if it was fake or not. The markings would tell you what they were worth.

Now, once he mints them, he could come out with less ash than he started, due to conversion. And if he doesn't like that, too bad.

He can't mark it up as a collector's item unless he's a hero or something.

That's actually how the gold piece works in dnd. 50 coins to a pound, and 1 pound of gold (the same amount of gold in 50 gold pieces) is worth 50gp. So gold pieces are literally just coins of pure gold. Technically, any pure gold coin that weighs 1/50th of a pound is a gp, regardless of who minted it, or where it came from.

Now, one could argue that gold is the raw material, and that a gold coin is actually only 1/3 gold (since manufacturing an item increases the raw materials value by x3) and the rest is some kind of cheap metal (like iron or copper), but imo, that's going into too much effort when the first explanation is just much easier to work with

[Sir Chuckles]

I think that's when we step back and say "Well, Mr. DM, what's your verdict?"

[Deophaun]

SThis in mind, one of my players wants to mint his own coinage. Specifically coinage that is commemorative of his adventuring comrades. He has the skills to do so and plans to make a limited run by re-casting some of their acquired loot.
Let's put this into Gamespeak:

Player wants to make art objects (a trade good) with Craft (whitesmithing) using coins as raw materials.

Nope, no problem whatsoever.

[Jeff the Green]

I doubt you're going to be getting much argument from governments. In gold coins the face and reverse are mostly there as promises of accurate weight. Usually anyone can melt them down to make jewelry or whatever and anyone can bring in ingots or blanks and have them verified and stamped for a fee (or exchange ingots for coins at a slight discount). In Rome, generals did exactly what your player wants to do. Private mints do it all the time today, hence all the nauseating "9/11 commemorative gold coins with weeping eagle and pop up twin towers".

(Also, in most places "legal tender" doesn't mean you're not allowed to use other coins as money. It means that if you are owed money you have to accept it in payment of the debt.)

[delenn]

Yeah, even if you don't count it as legal tender, it's still going to be a hunk of gold that could be traded like any other object.

If you're feeling nice, you could throw him a bone and make commemorative coins 'a thing' in the world, with people who collect and trade adventurer coins for more than their flat gold value - make it hard for him to find an interested numismatist NPC, but when he does, there's a bigger payoff. If for no other reason, I like the idea because 'numismatist' sounds like something straight out of D&D.

[Jeff the Green]

If you're feeling nice, you could throw him a bone and make commemorative coins 'a thing' in the world, with people who collect and trade adventurer coins for more than their flat gold value - make it hard for him to find an interested numismatist NPC, but when he does, there's a bigger payoff. If for no other reason, I like the idea because 'numismatist' sounds like something straight out of D&D.

And that's my next homebrew project.

[MadGreenSon]

Thank you for a lot of insightful and interesting answers!

And yes, generally as far as I'm concerned, most coin in my world(s) is more valued by the metal and weight than any more modern notion.
However, if he does mint a lot of this stuff, or try to make this their sole type of coinage, I think in areas with lots of national pride/local patriotism/etc. he'll at least get a little trouble for his weird money. If he's using large amounts in places like Waterdeep? I doubt they'll even do more than glance at it considering the kind of exotic through-traffic that place gets.


On the other hand, limited run commemorative coins? That's a whole different thing.
I'm not decided on whether or not it's going to be a preexisting trend among adventurers or a new trend he gets to be on the cutting edge of. Either way, adventurer fans and groupies are a thing already, so...



And that's my next homebrew project.

I'm holding you to that! Everyone look! He's promised to make coin collecting a thing for D&D! :smallbiggrin:

[Jeff the Green]

I'm holding you to that! Everyone look! He's promised to make coin collecting a thing for D&D! :smallbiggrin:

I was thinking a trio of... fey? outsiders? aberrations?... collectively called the Hobbyists. The Numismatist, the Philatelist, and something else. Is there a fancy name for someone who paints miniatures?

[avr]

There can be reasons for a government to get upset about people minting coins without a licence to do so. Suppose that shavings of metal from clipping coins are not usually accepted in trade, and that clipped coins can be passed at face value at least some of the time. Then it may be worth the while of the government's men to track down those making coins.

This doesn't require tyranny or anachronisms past the Renaissance, but it may not be appropriate to your setting.

[MadGreenSon]

There can be reasons for a government to get upset about people minting coins without a licence to do so. Suppose that shavings of metal from clipping coins are not usually accepted in trade, and that clipped coins can be passed at face value at least some of the time. Then it may be worth the while of the government's men to track down those making coins.

This doesn't require tyranny or anachronisms past the Renaissance, but it may not be appropriate to your setting.

That's good. I like that!

I'm gonna find out tomorrow if he's doing a "limited edition" or if he's trying to make some kind of adventurer-party micro-nation here.

Adventurer Micro-nations... There's a plot in that.:smallbiggrin:

[Invader]

One thing to note is that this is a fantasy setting and often times the gold coins adventurers find are from long forgotten kingdoms that regular merchants have never heard of and how often is that a problem? It's never not considered legal tender because almost always a coin is a coin is a coin.

If he's just trying to have fun with making his own money and he's invested the appropriate skill points to make and he's not trying to break the economy in any way, let him do it and have a little RP fun with situations that might come up because of it.

[Fouredged Sword]

Yeah, I would let him make the stuff. I would even allow him to make it more valuble than the gold that goes into it.

Use the craft rules. He can make X value out of X/3 raw materials, and then sell them for X/2. This means that he adds 50% of the gold value when he crafts them.

Now, he will do this at a ridiculously slow rate. Lets call crafting a gold coin a DC 10 task, even with a craft mod of +20, he is making..

napkin calculations

10sp of value per coin, 30*check (30 when taking 10) progress per week (accelerated production), so 900sp worth of coins per week, or 90 Gp worth of coins, for 1 solid weeks work.

So yeah, he can make his own commemorative coins, and if he is famous, there may even be a market for them. He will not make a lot of money doing so.

[Water Bob]

I do it old school. Players have a sheet of paper in their character notebooks. On it lists coins. When they buy something, they subtract and keep a running total.

Coins are heavy and can be bulky, so, usually, the PCs aren't carrying a lot of coin. They convert to gems a lot.





If you don't want to deal with the details of coin, then you might want to use this method. Here, you basically turn a purchase into a skill throw.

1. Each character gets a modifier to represent his wealth (like a skill modifier). The more wealth a character has, the higher the modifier.

2. Items to buy have different difficulties. More expensive items have higher DCs.

3. When a character needs to buy something, he simply rolls a check. If he succeeds, he can afford the item. If he doesn't succeed, then he can't.










Alternative

If you want to get a tad more detailed with the system (which goes against the grain of the rule), reduce the character's wealth modifier after each failure.

This is best explained with an example.

1. PC has +2 Coin. This means that he gets +2 on his throws to buy things.

2. When trying to buy a DC 15 item, the character rolls 10 +2 = 12. He can't afford it.

3. This means that the character's wealth is reduced to +1 Coin. (A character's wealth can go into the negative modifiers upon multiple failures.)

4. It's usually best to keep the DC for items simple: DC 5 item, DC 10 Item, DC 15 Item, DC 20 Item, etc.

5. You can use the Take Ten rule. This helps with low priced items--keep the character from being able to afford higher priced items but not lower priced items when a bad throw occurs. Assume the character can afford everything at the Take Ten level, then he has to roll for items above that level.

6. A good starting Coin level for a character is equal to the character's CHR modifier plus any GM adjustments. Thus, a character with CHR 16 would be given +3 Coin to start.

[Water Bob]

This is best explained with an example.

1. PC has +2 Coin. This means that he gets +2 on his throws to buy things.

2. When trying to buy a DC 15 item, the character rolls 10 +2 = 12. He can't afford it.

3. This means that the character's wealth is reduced to +1 Coin. (A character's wealth can go into the negative modifiers upon multiple failures.)

4. It's usually best to keep the DC for items simple: DC 5 item, DC 10 Item, DC 15 Item, DC 20 Item, etc.

5. You can use the Take Ten rule. This helps with low priced items--keep the character from being able to afford higher priced items but not lower priced items when a bad throw occurs. Assume the character can afford everything at the Take Ten level, then he has to roll for items above that level.

6. A good starting Coin level for a character is equal to the character's CHR modifier plus any GM adjustments. Thus, a character with CHR 16 would be given +3 Coin to start.



Here's a more detailed example.



Morghun has CHR 8, and thus starts the game with -1 Coin.

He can automatically buy all items priced at DC 9 or less (Take Ten Rule).



He tries to buy a DC 15 item. He rolls a 9 -1 = 8. He can't afford it. Now, Morghun is -2 Coin.

Morghun goes on an adventure and picks up some wealth. The GM adjusts Morghun's wealth by 2 points. Now, Morghun is +0 Coin.

[Water Bob]

LOL! I just read the OP again...and I see that my answer has nothing to do with what he's asking.:smallwink:

[Segev]

Given that your setting already has standardized international weights for coinage of various metal values, as long as he's being honest in his minting of the coins such that they match the weights in question, there should be no problem.

1 gp is 1 gp, 1 sp is 1 sp, 1 cp is 1 cp, 1 pp is 1 pp... it doesn't matter whose face or adventurous comic panel is printed on the faces, as long as it's the right metal and the right weight.

[Alefiend]

If you're feeling nice, you could throw him a bone and make commemorative coins 'a thing' in the world, with people who collect and trade adventurer coins for more than their flat gold value - make it hard for him to find an interested numismatist NPC, but when he does, there's a bigger payoff. If for no other reason, I like the idea because 'numismatist' sounds like something straight out of D&D.

It is something straight out of D&D—way, way back, it was suggested in Dragon that rare coins could be their own sort of treasure, with value out of proportion to their monetary value. The problem is, this would lead to adventurers sorting and examining every single copper piece from every single encounter in hopes of finding that 1943-D (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1943_steel_cent) fantasy equivalent. And then finding somebody else who recognizes the value and will buy it.

Also, what Jeff the Green said about minting, etc. is what I came here to say.

[Firechanter]

Look at the Viking traders. They got around - from Iceland to Constantinople. There were probably a hundred different coin sizes used in that area, so they just weighed the stuff on scales, end of story.

[Fouredged Sword]

Yeah, for large sections of history the city state ruled an area, and they minted their own coins. Traders dealt with many city states, and got really used to weighing coins and checking densities for purity.

[brutticusforce]

Yeah, even if you don't count it as legal tender, it's still going to be a hunk of gold that could be traded like any other object.

If you're feeling nice, you could throw him a bone and make commemorative coins 'a thing' in the world, with people who collect and trade adventurer coins for more than their flat gold value.

Can we have like, adventurer fanboys?

"OH MY GOD! ITS GLORFINMAD! I HAVE ALL OF YOUR COMMEMORATIVE COINS!"

And then... wait, what about instead of guilds, adventurers have talent agencies? Megacorps? MERCHANDISING! Oh god, what about conventions?

I need to create this setting

[MadGreenSon]

Can we have like, adventurer fanboys?

"OH MY GOD! ITS GLORFINMAD! I HAVE ALL OF YOUR COMMEMORATIVE COINS!"

And then... wait, what about instead of guilds, adventurers have talent agencies? Megacorps? MERCHANDISING! Oh god, what about conventions?

I need to create this setting

In my campaigns, renowned adventurers (usually 8+ level who don't do evil stuff, lower if involved in notable events) do have fans, even groupies (much to my more exalted group's chagrin)

In Waterdeep, the higher level group I run (who are all very, very good and very well liked) almost caused a small riot in the higher end residential area just by showing up.:smallbiggrin:

If "official" memorabilia becomes a thing, I expect it could become more valuable than the materials it is made of, at least in some areas.

[Story]

Adventurer Micro-nations... There's a plot in that.:smallbiggrin:

You mean your players don't start their own countries after getting 5th level spells?

[ahenobarbi]

Gold coins are worth exactly as much as any other form of gold in d&d so it's ok (any proper merchant would test & weight coins to get their value anyways and not care much about pictures on them).

Just tell the player that they'll be worth exactly as much as regular gold pieces (if they weight as much as regular gold pieces) to avoid argument about crafting tripling their value.

[MadGreenSon]

You mean your players don't start their own countries after getting 5th level spells?

I was actually more thinking about strong (and less moral) groups declaring themselves nations unto themselves, living by their own laws on the strength of their own power and not worrying about ruling actual land or anything.

Basically, governments rule at least partially because of their control of force. A well put together, decently leveled adventuring party can bring a lot of force to bear. Declaring themselves extraterritorial and beyond the control of governments of all sorts could become a thing with groups who have no respect for "common folk"

[Fouredged Sword]

Most groups do that in practice after 5th level spells come onto the table. You just try throwing your level 15 wizard into jail and see how he reacts. I assure you, unless he is playing REALLY lg, he will be out before tea.

[VoxRationis]

The basic, original idea behind metal coins is that the metal of which the coin is made is considered inherently valuable by society—people already want to buy and sell it. However, in a pre-SI, pre-standardized unit era, it can be tough to figure out what the total weight of a gold object is, and indeed if it is gold or if it has been cut with something (you can substitute whatever other valuable metals you can think of for gold, I'm just using "gold" as a shorthand). So governments, whom everyone already follows and has a degree of trust in (at least more so than in the shifty merchant just come in to town), issue standardized weights of metals; the stampings on the coins help primarily to ensure that yes, this weight of metal is endorsed by the government (a sort of seal of authenticity). Even the disc shape of coins simply comes from that being the default shape that comes when you stamp really hard on a soft nugget of metal.
Later, of course, governments start inching fiat into their currencies ("well, this isn't REALLY a gold coin, but it's backed by the Empire as though it were"), and things get more complicated.
Whether people will accept these coins depends on several things:
1) "Do I trust that this random adventurer really has put as much gold into this coin as he says he has?"
2) "Will other people accept this coin that they have never heard of?"
3) "Is my economic system based on fiat currency, or is the metal weight the only thing that matters?"
3a) "Do I have a reliable means of determining weight and composition
of a metal object?"
For a lot of settings and situations, the answer to one or more of those will be "No," and thus people will tell the player to get lost.

[BWR]

Since this is less annoying than when he tried to replace his teeth with diamonds, I'm inclined to allow it. Anyone see any problems?

He'll get into a lot of barfights?
Hope he likes soup or has replacement dentures when he starts pulling them for cash.

How we do it:
- home base: invest money in buliding houses/strongholds, put in treasury, etc.
- banks. they do exist in many settings. If nothing else rich merchants and moneylenders might be willing to look after your wealth for you while you are off risking your life.
- big coins/gems. Some countries have cheques and letteres of credit (Darokin in Mystara has the cloc - certified letter of credit, redeemable at and accepted by any Darokinian merchant, and you find them everywhere).
- Gems are an easy way of porting cash.
- investment. Support some economic venture in hopes later reward.

[MadGreenSon]

He'll get into a lot of barfights?
Hope he likes soup or has replacement dentures when he starts pulling them for cash.


Oh his ideas for those damn teeth. He wanted to get them rune inscribed or something and also he's the member of the party that takes most advantage of their fame. (The bard on the other hand,should just homebrew a "publicist" PrC and be done with it:smallbiggrin:)
They don't lie about their exploits, but they really make sure that they get full credit for everything they've done. (this has even involved disguises and spreading tales) This has caused them problems before, but that doesn't discourage them
They're all rock-stars, I swear.:smallsmile:

The Artificer with his coins is much milder than his previous efforts at self promotion and special bling. If he decides to keep it commemorative, we'll be ok. The ideas advanced in this thread have helped a lot if he goes the other way.


How we do it:
- home base: invest money in buliding houses/strongholds, put in treasury, etc.
- banks. they do exist in many settings. If nothing else rich merchants and moneylenders might be willing to look after your wealth for you while you are off risking your life.
- big coins/gems. Some countries have cheques and letteres of credit (Darokin in Mystara has the cloc - certified letter of credit, redeemable at and accepted by any Darokinian merchant, and you find them everywhere).
- Gems are an easy way of porting cash.
- investment. Support some economic venture in hopes later reward.

Heh. No home base as of yet, but we have used a good bit of gems as money and they have invested in a few trade ventures (if the rolls for those don't go well, I can just see the cash obsessed wizard going loan-shark on the merchants though:smallbiggrin:)

[veti]

I was thinking a trio of... fey? outsiders? aberrations?... collectively called the Hobbyists. The Numismatist, the Philatelist, and something else. Is there a fancy name for someone who paints miniatures?

"Philately" is probably an anachronism. How about "lepidopterist"? Or "maliapterist" (I just made that word up, it means 'hair collector')? (You do want the third one to be something vaguely disturbing and creepy, don't you...?)

[Jeff the Green]

"Philately" is probably an anachronism. How about "lepidopterist"? Or "maliapterist" (I just made that word up, it means 'hair collector')? (You do want the third one to be something vaguely disturbing and creepy, don't you...?)

How do you get maliapterist for hair collector? Best I can come up with for it would be philatrichist (from phil "love" and trichia "hair"). Maliapterist would be someone who collects winged apples (maleus "apple" and pteron "wing", though the roots aren't from the same language).


(You do want the third one to be something vaguely disturbing and creepy, don't you...?)
You don't find Warhammer players creepy?

[delenn]

It is something straight out of D&D—way, way back, it was suggested in Dragon that rare coins could be their own sort of treasure, with value out of proportion to their monetary value. The problem is, this would lead to adventurers sorting and examining every single copper piece from every single encounter in hopes of finding that 1943-D (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1943_steel_cent) fantasy equivalent. And then finding somebody else who recognizes the value and will buy it.


I was just talking about the word itself, like instead of a coin collector, you'd be a coin mage. It wouldn't be too useful for adventuring, but you could always hire one. Think Petyr Baelish, if he had magic.

I can see how that would get tedious, though, if the players were always sifting through every copper.


Can we have like, adventurer fanboys?

"OH MY GOD! ITS GLORFINMAD! I HAVE ALL OF YOUR COMMEMORATIVE COINS!"

And then... wait, what about instead of guilds, adventurers have talent agencies? Megacorps? MERCHANDISING! Oh god, what about conventions?

I need to create this setting

Hahaha, I'm currently playing with someone who would LOVE this. As if her character's ego wasn't big enough already! Not that I've helped - she's got her own pirate ship and a dedicated crew, so I they wrote her a sea shanty, glorifying her adventuring prowess. There are a couple of renowned acting troupes and circus performers in our setting. I don't see why we shouldn't get in on the action.

[Fouredged Sword]

Actually, a wizard could provided a VERY effective coin certification through arcane marks. Place on on both sides of the coin, and you have both citified the coin as pure and placed a mark on both sides that will be broken if the coin is altered. I don't see this in use for gold, but a platinum coin could easily be marked in such a way to ensure it's value. I would imagine certifications of credit could be marked the same way, ensuring a fairly fool proof method of proving who signed the document.

[VoxRationis]

Actually, a wizard could provided a VERY effective coin certification through arcane marks. Place on on both sides of the coin, and you have both citified the coin as pure and placed a mark on both sides that will be broken if the coin is altered. I don't see this in use for gold, but a platinum coin could easily be marked in such a way to ensure it's value. I would imagine certifications of credit could be marked the same way, ensuring a fairly fool proof method of proving who signed the document.

Actually, if I'm not mistaken, arcane mark only functions in an exclusive fashion in certain campaign settings, e.g. Forgotten Realms. In the default state, using that spell to authenticate documents means that any apprentice mage can now counterfeit everything you've done.

The SRD does say "your personal mark," but it doesn't say anything about that mark having to be unique, or you being unable to change your definition of your personal mark at will.

[MadGreenSon]

Actually, if I'm not mistaken, arcane mark only functions in an exclusive fashion in certain campaign settings, e.g. Forgotten Realms. In the default state, using that spell to authenticate documents means that any apprentice mage can now counterfeit everything you've done.

The SRD does say "your personal mark," but it doesn't say anything about that mark having to be unique, or you being unable to change your definition of your personal mark at will.

Other than FR, I think House Sivis has a proprietary arcane mark in Eberron used for official documentation and such.

Other than those two settings I don't think I've seen anything about arcane marks being unable to be forged.

Well, you can forge one in Forgotten Realms, but you don't want to...

[Zubrowka74]

Even though having the King's face on the gold piece or whatever is mostly a vanity thing, as all gold pieces weigh the same, would the authorities take a big exception to a private individual minting their own coinage, even if it were the same metal type and weight?

Historically? Yeah. Minting your own money was a privilege. If you weren't allowed to do so it would mean harsh penalties, even death. Now, it always depends on your setting.

[Karoht]

Oh boy. Story time!

As a DM I enjoy giving the party objects that handle a certain function, which allows us to then handwave off a given problem. Coinage being one such problem I came up with an item that I thought was particularly clever, only to watch it catastrophically backfire.

The idea was a collection of tubes. The first one converted copper coins to silver coin and vice versa. We played with the 100 to 1 rule. So 100 copper coins in one end would turn into 1 silver on the other. 101 copper coins in the same end would convert to 1 silver and 1 copper on the other. One silver in the other end would come out as 100 copper coins. Simple yes?
It saved on having to fuss about actually making change or requring anyone to go to a money changer and then make a purchase.
And as they progressed, the found one that did 100 silver to 1 gold, and 100 gold to 1 platinum, and one that turned platinum coins into gems of various levels of worth.

One day, while in a dungeon, one of them gets the bright idea of hooking up all the ends of the tubes together, as they found a massive stash of copper ore chunks as well as coinage. So one guy poured copper into one end of this now extended tube, while at the other end another person would catch the gold coins in a bag. Everything was going great. Until...

During a fight, the party rogue ended up grabbing this gem floating over a pedestal. No traps went off, everything was cool. He was about to roll an appraise check on it, but instead said "screw it, I'll find out my own way" and grabbed the tubes, still connected to one another.
He shoved the gem in the one end and, as genius had it, pointed the other end at a badguy directly in front of him.

So first I had him roll a ranged touch attack (he insisted I treat what was about to happen like a shotgun/blunderbuss), which despite all the penalties I could think of, hit. Shucks, now I have to convert it all and figure out damage.

800,000 x100 x100 = 8,000,000,000 copper coins impacting someone. Ignoring the weight, even if 1% of 1% of 1% of the coins hit, that would still be 8000 pennies impacting someone at a pretty decent speed. I chose to rule it was more like a firehose than a shotgun. I eventually settled on some damage, and it was enough to kill the person.

Of course, this meant now figuring out how much space 8 billion pennies would take up. A box of pennies takes up about 1/4 of a cubic foot, so 4 together is 1 cubic foot. A box of pennies contains 50 rolls containing 50 coins each, which is 2500 pennies, a cubic foot of pennies is approximately 10000 pennies. 800,000 cubic feet of pennies.

This immobilized the other badguys, but of course immobilized pretty much everyone else. Everyone had to make strength checks to try and move (unless they could burrow or had earthglide), and fortitude checks every round to hold their breath.

Bad guys died, player party only had one person go unconscious, then not be found in time and died.

Once they got out, I ruled about a quarter of the mass made it out the door. And as they started furiously shoveling the pennies back into the tube, I realized something on the map of the room was in fact a grate, and then realized there were 4 of them. Their money was going down the drain, literally. 4 drains in fact, leading to a sewer below.

Long story short, they lost a party member (ironically, the rogue who thought this would be a good idea), and about half the coins to loss such as rolling into cracks and crevices and generally being lost down the drains.
More hilariously, there were 3 traps on that pedestal, the by luck the Rogue didn't set any of them off, but died being crushed to death by his own greed.

Sadly, this is why I no longer use this system, and we just handwave certain currency issues like making change or coins taking up space/weight.

[Segev]

Historically? Yeah. Minting your own money was a privilege. If you weren't allowed to do so it would mean harsh penalties, even death. Now, it always depends on your setting.

It's worth noting that all it takes to have authority to do this sort of thing in a medieval setting is being out of reach of anybody who can and would want to stop you. When you're a powerful adventuring party, the number of people who can stop you shrinks considerably, even on the scope of kings.

"Go arrest them for minting money!" "My liege, the soldiers you sent to ask them to stop returned as a herd of goats." "Uh... hm. I hereby grant them permission to do so...if they provide the service of restoring my goats to soldiers."

[nobodez]

Coins are heavy and can be bulky, so, usually, the PCs aren't carrying a lot of coin. They convert to gems a lot.

Well, I'll agree on heavy, but not bulky, at least not for the coins most adventurers use (gold and platinum, which are both smaller than pennies).

[VoxRationis]

Well, I'll agree on heavy, but not bulky, at least not for the coins most adventurers use (gold and platinum, which are both smaller than pennies).

I'm not sure about this. Both historically and in modern times, copper coins, even with a less precious metal as their basic composition, were often smaller than higher-value coins, even those of more valuable metal. Have you ever seen a silver dollar? What about the now-invalidated British farthing?

[nobodez]

I'm not sure about this. Both historically and in modern times, copper coins, even with a less precious metal as their basic composition, were often smaller than higher-value coins, even those of more valuable metal. Have you ever seen a silver dollar? What about the now-invalidated British farthing?

Um, I did the math, and my sizes are based off 99% or finer coins with a 9 gram mass (1/50 pound). Based on the D&D standard of 50 coins per pound, the largest coins are copper, and the smallest are platinum.

[Shining Wrath]

The D&D coinage system is, as one might expect, an abstraction.

Consider that all coins are the same size and weight, and are treated as being pure metal.

Then consider that gold is quite a bit denser than silver, which is a little denser than copper:
Gold: 19.3 g/cc
Silver: 10.49 g/cc
Copper: 8.96 g/cc
Platinum: 21.45 g/cc

Therefore, if they are the same size and weight, they are cut to varying degrees with some alloying metal, and are not pure.

This can be finessed, though, since the ratio of the market prices of the various metals has varied over the years. In general, though, copper is NOT a precious metal, and is used for ordinary purposes by ordinary people; that is, it would be a weird world where copper was worth 1/10th of silver by weight.

I'm working on a campaign setting where there's not now, and never has been, one dominant civilization. It's a young world, the setting is on the frontier of the explored areas, and so the Dwarves / Elves / Gnomes / Halflings / Humans / Centaurs / Orcs / Goblinoids are more or less on the same footing, civilization-wise (except the Orcs have been on the losing end of the wars and don't have much territory left).

I considered giving every race their own system of coinage, each one "logical" in it's own way, but decided the less numerate players would hate me with great hatred having to do math at the gaming table and dropped it. Looked like this, though:

Ratio of metal prices per ounce, S/C, G/S, P/G: 50/1, 14/1, 3/1. Platinum is therefore worth 3*14=42 times silver by weight.

A silver piece is the basic unit of coinage, is one day's wages for a commoner, and so everyone's SP is the same.

Dwarven philosophy: all coins should be the same *size*. So they aren't the same weight, given the densities. So a dwarven platinum piece is (21.45/10.49=2.04) times as heavy as a dwarven silver piece, and is therefore worth about 2.04*42=85 SP.

Gnomish philosophy: all coins the same weight. So a gnomish PP is worth 42 SP.

Humans: the usual 10/10/10/10 ratio, so a human PP is worth 100 SP and is about 2.5 times as heavy and slightly larger than the SP.

Elves: per Tolkien, elves like 12's. So a 12/12/12/12 ratio, and an elven PP is worth 144 SP, more than 3 times as heavy as one.

Halflings: similar to humans, except they don't mint any platinum coins, since by their logic no one should be rich enough to need them.

The elves have some additional logic on their side: if you assume in a "medieval" world that 6 day work weeks and 12 hour days are the standard, then 1 elven copper is an hour's wages for a commoner, and 1 elven gold is two week's wages for a commoner.

Imagine finding a treasure trove with a whole mix of different coins and everyone pulling out their calculators to figure out just how rich they are.

The real variation hits on copper pieces, where human and elven coppers are much larger than the dwarvish and gnormish coins.

[VoxRationis]

Um, I did the math, and my sizes are based off 99% or finer coins with a 9 gram mass (1/50 pound). Based on the D&D standard of 50 coins per pound, the largest coins are copper, and the smallest are platinum.

Ah, sorry; I was referring to real-life coinage, rather than the D&D standard coin set, since we were discussing the real-life basis of coinage systems. Sorry for the confusion.

[Deophaun]

Use the craft rules. He can make X value out of X/3 raw materials, and then sell them for X/2. This means that he adds 50% of the gold value when he crafts them.
These are art objects, and therefore trade goods. They sell for full value.

[veti]

Funny story


What about the recoil? That should've been enough to hurl the idiot backward so fast that he'd hit the wall at considerably more than normal terminal falling velocity...

Did you ever describe how fast the coins came out of the tube?

If you do want to re-use the idea, seems to me you could prevent a recurrence of this by limiting the rate of flow to something like 100 coins per round. Putting a high-value gemstone in one end would still be a dangerously stupid thing to do, but at least nobody would think of using it as a projectile weapon.

Also, because I'm mean that way - I'd charge a commission for the service. Say, 20% of the value of each transaction, per tube the coins go through. So gems -> platinum -> gold -> silver -> copper, you'd lose 60% of the value you started with. And if you want to change it back, the gem you end up with is only 16% of the value of what you started with. That should make them think twice.

[MadGreenSon]

Well. Got the situation in my game worked out and he is definitely going the "commemorative item" route.

He's made the high DC craft checks for the platinum commemorative coins of himself and the party with plenty of knotwork art on them, one for each member of the party and a dozen extras to give as souvenirs to their best fans/supporters.

So, no worries about them trying to usurp the economy for the time being.

[Invader]

What about the recoil? That should've been enough to hurl the idiot backward so fast that he'd hit the wall at considerably more than normal terminal falling velocity...

Did you ever describe how fast the coins came out of the tube?

If you do want to re-use the idea, seems to me you could prevent a recurrence of this by limiting the rate of flow to something like 100 coins per round. Putting a high-value gemstone in one end would still be a dangerously stupid thing to do, but at least nobody would think of using it as a projectile weapon.

Also, because I'm mean that way - I'd charge a commission for the service. Say, 20% of the value of each transaction, per tube the coins go through. So gems -> platinum -> gold -> silver -> copper, you'd lose 60% of the value you started with. And if you want to change it back, the gem you end up with is only 16% of the value of what you started with. That should make them think twice.

Yeah, it would make them not use it at all completely negating the reason he gave it to them to begin with :smallconfused:

[Karoht]

What about the recoil? That should've been enough to hurl the idiot backward so fast that he'd hit the wall at considerably more than normal terminal falling velocity...Rule of funny. Also DnD + Physics = Dead Cat Girls. I did exactly enough math to ballpark how dangerous it could be and then toned it down from there.


Did you ever describe how fast the coins came out of the tube?Not up until that event, no. I could have just ruled that it took several minutes rather than all at once but that seemed boring.

[atomicwaffle]

For the campaign i'm creating i am considering several options

Option 1: Gems of incremental value, from 10 gp - 1000 gp or more in a single gem.

Option 2: Paper money, magically enhanced to be resistant to fire/water, etc

Option 3: Magical guild of bankers. Once you reach the minimum to open an account (5000 gp as an example or equivalent) you talk to them And receive an arcane tattoo either on yourself, or a card of some sort that you can go to their local institution which has set up private booths where your tattoo can access a private portable hole or leomund chest. For this service you pay 10% per month. Getting in good standing can have this interest lowered.

[Karoht]

Magical bankers is dangerous. If it can be broken with more magic, it will be broken. Also, their security detail will need to be of sufficient level to deal with threats, but yet also begging the question why those security persons aren't out adventuring which is typically much more profitable than standing around and standing guard.
Be extremely careful in your design.

[MadGreenSon]

Magical bankers is dangerous. If it can be broken with more magic, it will be broken. Also, their security detail will need to be of sufficient level to deal with threats, but yet also begging the question why those security persons aren't out adventuring which is typically much more profitable than standing around and standing guard.
Be extremely careful in your design.

Of course. Banks mean bank heists! Which is after all, just another kind of adventure or dungeon crawl depending on the bank.

[atomicwaffle]

Magical bankers is dangerous. If it can be broken with more magic, it will be broken. Also, their security detail will need to be of sufficient level to deal with threats, but yet also begging the question why those security persons aren't out adventuring which is typically much more profitable than standing around and standing guard.
Be extremely careful in your design.

you know corruption would be a part of it. Could make an entire adventure about the banking system. For security, lots of True Seeing and Constructs/Golems

[Karoht]

All Rogues party, Heist theme. Magical Banking Cartel of secret Ne'er-Do-Wells concealing a major secret.
Take them apart.

[VoxRationis]

Secret Chest is terribly vulnerable to ethereal creatures. I mean, for your average adventuring wizard of mid-level, it's pretty handy, but I wouldn't trust it in a bank, since there's a CR 3 monster that happens to love stealing shiny things and lives on the Ethereal Plane, not to mention everything else that can get to that plane.

[Fouredged Sword]

Yeah, the bank system works, but it works because it is a system of credit run by the god of wealth and trade. A solid divination will sort out who is owed what, and who is dishonest about their debts.

[Wardog]

Historically? Yeah. Minting your own money was a privilege. If you weren't allowed to do so it would mean harsh penalties, even death. Now, it always depends on your setting.

Was that minting your own coins to your own design, or are you talking about forging coins of an existing design?

Because the latter is a clear problem (the whole point of puttingthe king's face on the coin is to let people know that the king says the coins are what they say they are, and forgers undermine both the authority of the king and the trust in the coinage).

The former doesn't seem fundamentally different from a jewler making gold jewlery for use as trade goods. Although given that certain times and places had strict laws on what different social classes could wear, its not implausible that the king/government would get all huffy about someone doing something that is traditionally a royal perogative.

[MadGreenSon]

Was that minting your own coins to your own design, or are you talking about forging coins of an existing design?

Because the latter is a clear problem (the whole point of puttingthe king's face on the coin is to let people know that the king says the coins are what they say they are, and forgers undermine both the authority of the king and the trust in the coinage).

The former doesn't seem fundamentally different from a jewler making gold jewlery for use as trade goods. Although given that certain times and places had strict laws on what different social classes could wear, its not implausible that the king/government would get all huffy about someone doing something that is traditionally a royal perogative.

Well, as the OP on this subject, the PC who created the issue resolved it unknowingly as the "coins" he made are more in the class of art objects than actual coinage, being masterwork pieces, platinum, larger than coin size with all of the party embossed on them and a tasteful addition of small diamonds.
Value of each is roughly 300gp.

He made one for each party member and a dozen more to be distributed to supporters/allies of the group as memorabilia.

[TheOOB]

Gold coins are valuable because they are gold, and their value is based on their weight. A pound of gold is worth 50gp because there are 50 coins in a pound(don't think too hard on that). Coins are made to reduce the need to weigh the metal, if your king mints coins that weigh exactally this amount, you trust that. Old or foreign coins would have to be weighed and possibly tested.

[MadGreenSon]

Was Just thinking about Epic levels and how much money gets thrown around.

What do Epic Characters use in lieu of truly ridiculous numbers of coins? Diamonds? Exotic crystals that only form in certain planes?

If you're buying epic gear your choices are to come up with an alternate medium of exchange or bring in a wagon train full of coins...

[TuggyNE]

For the campaign i'm creating i am considering several options

Option 1: Gems of incremental value, from 10 gp - 1000 gp or more in a single gem.

That reminds me; for a largely unrelated homebrew project (reforming spell material components to not be so absurd), I added a very compact trade good used for expensive spells, which has a value of around 1280 gp/lb, considerably better than even platinum coins.

Probably won't solve the problem of managing wealth at epic levels, but I'm not sure anything does.

[nobodez]

Was Just thinking about Epic levels and how much money gets thrown around.

What do Epic Characters use in lieu of truly ridiculous numbers of coins? Diamonds? Exotic crystals that only form in certain planes?

If you're buying epic gear your choices are to come up with an alternate medium of exchange or bring in a wagon train full of coins...

Well, at that level it's pretty easy to get a portable hole (or even better, an enveloping pit if you're able to use it), and fill it with the appropriate coins.

[atomicwaffle]

Yeah, the bank system works, but it works because it is a system of credit run by the god of wealth and trade. A solid divination will sort out who is owed what, and who is dishonest about their debts.

*flip flip flip*

Fharlanghn

That could work. Thanks.

[Adverb]

Oh boy. Story time!

(etc)

That is glorious.

[Karoht]

*flip flip flip*

Fharlanghn

That could work. Thanks.

Or you could use Steve the Aboleth.
Steve the Aboleth was a clever Aboleth, who figured out that farming adventurers was more profitable than just hanging out and waiting for them to try and kill him.
After successfully stealing virtually everything from a pack of adventurers who kept coming back and just never got the hint, he opened an item shop. Steve's Item Shop and Emporium.
Steve is also the cause of the quote in my signature.
"In Soviet Dungeon, Aboleth farms you!"
Later, Steve came across a Genie who not only gave him the idea of starting a church, but when Steve managed to Dominate Monster the Genie, he decided to make it a reality. The Interplanar Church of Deals was born.
The Church of Deals strives to ensure balanced trade, fair taxation, and rewards it's members annually based on their contributions. Members are educated to spot quality deals and avoid poor or unfair deals and transactions. Really simple commandments for being part of the Church of Deals.
1-Do not willingly or knowingly accept a poor or unfair deal.
2-Report any and all poor and unfair deals that are brought to your attention to a superior in the Church.
3-Report any and all quality and fair deals that are brought to your attention to a superior in the Church.
4-Tithe 5% per year and get a free Wish once per year, or a voucher for a free Wish.

It would be really amusing if your banker-god was in fact Steve (in disguise) from the Church of Deals. It would make sense that Steve would look into banking as a means of protecting his assets and arranging transactions and such. Same with currency exchange.

[Zubrowka74]

Was that minting your own coins to your own design, or are you talking about forging coins of an existing design?

Because the latter is a clear problem (the whole point of puttingthe king's face on the coin is to let people know that the king says the coins are what they say they are, and forgers undermine both the authority of the king and the trust in the coinage).

The former doesn't seem fundamentally different from a jewler making gold jewlery for use as trade goods. Although given that certain times and places had strict laws on what different social classes could wear, its not implausible that the king/government would get all huffy about someone doing something that is traditionally a royal perogative.

No, I'm not refering to forging, which is also illegal. At least in medieval France and later on, the crown had to give you permission to mint, period. Of course if you had your own kingdom or city-state you could do as you please. But as a vassal minting was a specific priviledge that your liege must've granted you. I'm working from memory, mind you, but I'm pretty sure it was a thing.

It's like deer hunting: venison was considered the king's (or whatever noble) property (on his land) and serf would be charged of poaching, again facing death penalty. Poor serfs, eh?

[Fouredged Sword]

A large part of the minting restrictions during the middle ages was that the king owned mineral rights to the whole of the kingdom. The gold was literally his before you made it into coins, and he alone gets to decide what to do with it.

Now this made sense, because it was a major source of income for a kingdom. Metal is hard to move around by horseback, so non-local metal is expensive. The land is tied up in multi-generational leases to first the lower nobility and through them to farmers. The nobles pay taxes, but tax collecting was a privilage you normally sold to a tax collector for a set price.

Metal and other mineral resources where what the king actually owned the rights to. He wasn't about to let people just mint their own coins using his gold now would he.

NOTE - This is a BROAD generalization of a large period of time and over a large number of cultures and peoples. YMMV.