Elaborate Money System

[Grytorm]

Hello, I'm being weird again and trying to come up a complicated set of money values to torment players with. Probably not going to use it, but I think it will be fun to work out. Main thing I don't know for certain is how I would relate these values to normal gold. Maybe, 10 normal GP to a Pound.

The basic unit of currency is a quarter ounce silver Penny.
(Also half pennys are common as well)
48 silver Pennys to a Pound which weighs a pound.
Pounds are usually not kept in coin form, and are cast into a variety of shapes.

The second most common coins is the Golden (truthfully electrum) Smallpound.
This coin weighs 2.5 ounces, and is worth 42 Pennys.
The electrum equivalent of the Pound is the Halfpound, which weighs 5/3rds of a pound.
The Halfpound is worth 7 silver Pounds, or 8 Smallpounds.

So, if it is 10 gp to a Pound a Penny is worth about 2 SP.
A Halfpound is worth 70 GP.
A Smallpound 8.75 gold pieces.
Might need another low value coin.

Doesn't this seem fun!

Edit: Also, probably there should be a coin worth near a gold point. Behold, the mighty Halfpiece. Um. Math is confusing me now.
Um. The Halfpiece would be worth 1.25 GP and weigh 3/2 ounces.

[Kelb_Panthera]

Doesn't this seem fun!

No. No, it does not. It sounds arbitrary and pointless. It'd be one thing if you were talking about setting up money markets but, as it is, you seem to be adding needless complication to an already extremely complex game for no discernable benefit.

What are you trying to accomplish here?

[DarkSoul]

50 gold pieces weigh a pound. Extrapolate from there.

[sleepyphoenixx]

This kind of thing already exists in FR. Only worse, because most of the bigger cities and nations have their own currency that's worth different values depending on where you try to use it.
If you sell your loot in Silverymoon and then go shopping in Waterdeep your coins are suddenly only worth half. Oh, and the merchants explicitly try to give you local coin instead of more widely accepted ones, because why the hell not?
Isn't it just the greatest fun ever?:smallfurious:

(No, i've never met anyone who kept track of that, and thank god for that small mercy)

[Kelb_Panthera]

This kind of thing already exists in FR. Only worse, because most of the bigger cities and nations have their own currency that's worth different values depending on where you try to use it.
If you sell your loot in Silverymoon and then go shopping in Waterdeep your coins are suddenly only worth half. Oh, and the merchants explicitly try to give you local coin instead of more widely accepted ones, because why the hell not?
Isn't it just the greatest fun ever?:smallfurious:

(No, i've never met anyone who kept track of that, and thank god for that small mercy)

See, now I could have fun with that (and possibly make the DM cry) because that presents you with a potential money-market to manipulate into riches. It also makes currency forgery a possibility whereas it's not in the normal game because GP are only valued by weight.

Thing is, I don't remember reading that in FRCS. Citation, please?

@grytorm,

You've even confused yourself with your idea already. I ask again, what do you aim to accomplish here?

[Grytorm]

Sorry, I should have used some blue for the comment about fun. Mostly I was just trying to share some thoughts I had. I know it is overcomplicated. And really if anything it is or my own amusement. Also, I did use the 50 coins is a pound of gold. I took that into account when working out the values of the coins.

Better hierarchy.
Penny, quarter oz.
42 Pennys to a Smallpound, 2.5 oz.
8 Smallpound to a Halfpound, 20 oz.

6 Penny to a Smallpiece, 1.5 oz.
8 Smallpiece to a Pound, 12 oz.
7 Pound to a Halfpound, 20 oz.

[Tvtyrant]

But then you have the griffon, which is 1.2 pounds worth and is used whenever a gentleman pays another.

[Khedrac]

If you want complex realism why not use the old british system?

smallest coin = 1 farthing (fourth-ing)
2 farthings to a ha'penny (half-penny)
2 ha'pennies to a penny (plural 'pence')
12 pence to a shilling (or 'bob')
20 shillings to a pound (or crown)
21 shillings to a guinea

Add in various extra coins:
threepenny bit
groat (4 pence)
sixpence
florin (two shillings)
half-crown
half-guinea

etc.

[Mordaedil]

In reality I feel money is kind of silly as it is. You might as well just convert everything to "peasant money", "merchant money" and "royalty money".

[Kelb_Panthera]

In reality I feel money is kind of silly as it is.

Could you elaborate on that? All the major economic powers taking their currency off the silver/gold standards was probably poor planning but I don't really see how money, as a concept, is "silly."


You might as well just convert everything to "peasant money", "merchant money" and "royalty money".

That's kind of the case already; peasantry use copper and silver, merchants and nobility use gold and notes of credit, and high level adventurers and those who deal with them deal in gems and high-end magical gear.

[exelsisxax]

You forgot that grokkels are worth 2 pounds instead of 3 pounds on tuesdays that are not the first or last day of the given month, and that tuon-nicks are valued according to their circumference, which varies by a lot.

[Mordaedil]

Could you elaborate on that? All the major economic powers taking their currency off the silver/gold standards was probably poor planning but I don't really see how money, as a concept, is "silly."
Money as a concept has always been an entertaining, if silly part of human understanding and relations and it's only gotten funnier and better in recent years once we finally came around to realizing that the gold standard held no intrinsic value as a society. I see the appeal in having it be a part of your fantasy setting, but at some point when all you trade in is in between gold pieces, you just kinda have to forgo the more complex calculations and accept it at face value; lower types of currency are useless and pointless and will only get drowned out by the gold you have.

Money in the first place was humanity's solution to "how do we trade without losing value?" and the only reason gold and silver were accepted was because everybody agreed that they were rare and difficult to excavate more of, so people could agree that they held value.

Fast forward to the last century and suddenly gold is more useful for melting into rings and we've explored new parts of the world and we literally can't produce enough gold to hold up what people's moneys are actually "worth" and thus the gold standard goes the way of the Dodo. Now we give value to immaterial things like advertisement, entertainment, bits and bytes, electrons circulating through a chip and a bit of metal and the very rays of the sun or the waves of the ocean. That is so much more ridiculously advanced than what we even had 150 years ago it is baffling.

I think the only way to actually make money like the above system worth implementing would be if that money actually gets used by your adventurers in their travels, otherwise, like copper and silver and the Dodo, we can just manage without it.

My point of view is to actually make the currencies untranslatable, where you can't trade copper for silver, silver for gold or vice-versa. Commoners would only accept copper coinage, because they really can't use silver in their circles. Merchants alone accepting silver because that is how they trade deals. Nobles and the like only trading in gold. So if you gave a gold piece to a beggar in the street, he might just say it has no value to him because he can't purchase anything on the level a gold that has any value to him. And if he's seen with one, he'd be arrested on accusations of being a thief who stole from a noble.

[Necroticplague]

Could you elaborate on that? All the major economic powers taking their currency off the silver/gold standards was probably poor planning but I don't really see how money, as a concept, is "silly."

What's poor planning about leaving metallic standards? Precious metals are just as subject to completely arbitrary value as other fiat moneys, while having problems with making your money vulnerable to sudden deflation when more sources of the metal are found. If you're gonna go with a completely arbitrary value, might as well go with an arbitrary value that you can can keep under control more easily.

[Hamste]

What I don't get is where the small pounds numbers come from having neither a base 10 or base 12 system seems confusing (specifically the golden small pound). It would probably make a lot more sense if it didn't use 42 pence to the small pound, why doesn't it use its own small currency if it is diverging that much?

Also having the half pound weigh 5/3 of a pound seems like it would be annoying for merchants, money changers and bankers who would have to convert partial half-pounds using pounds (the weight) into smallpounds and pence.


Also if the half piece is worth 1/8th of a silver pound why is it call half piece? What is it half of?


I should note I'm not very familar with British like currency so this may all make sense in some weird way.

[sleepyphoenixx]

Thing is, I don't remember reading that in FRCS. Citation, please?

It's mentioned in Silver Marches, but i don't know the page number. There's something similar in Waterdeep: City of Splendors iirc.

[Crake]

50 gold pieces weigh a pound. Extrapolate from there.

And it just so happens that a pound of gold is worth 50 gold pieces! It's almost like the coins are literally worth their weight in gold! And oh, it just so happens that the same goes for silver and copper. Honestly, that's how the dnd market functions. Currency is literally worth it's weight in value because a gold piece is literally a coin of gold weighing 1/50th of a pound. To have minted currency as you want requires changing some fundamental assumptions about the game worlds, as well as setting up a world economy, dictating how much different currencies are valued compared to each other.

[Grytorm]

I'll admit some of it is meant to be intentionally obscure. Which is kind of stupid. I'll try to come up with a good explanation.

First, the main coins are the silver Penny, the Smallpiece (which I am renaming Notes) worth 6 Pennys and the Electrum Smallpound which is worth 7 Notes.
The main unit of account is usually the Silver Pound which is worth 8 Notes. The minting process for Notes is done by casting silver and dividing it into 8 blank coins per pound. (I don't know enough about metal working, but could you cast a rod and cleanly take the coins off the end?). The Smallpound is done by the same method, with approximately the same size and shape of the Note.

As I mentioned Smallpound are Electrum, specifically a mix of about 1 Part Silver to 2 parts gold by volume. I've fudged numbers, but have it so that Gold weighs twice as much as Silver and is worth 10 times as much. Which. Uh oh, I really messed up then. If I go with Gold being worth 10 times as much by volume, then the small pound works out to being worth 7 Notes.

Um. If it is by weights, then a single "Smallpound" is worth 162 Pennys. Which is 27 Notes.

The name Halfpound comes from it weighing "around one and a half" times as much as a regular coin (truthfully 2/3rds more than the same volume of silver) or the fact that it is such and such volume of gold and half of that in silver. And my desire to design a confusing system. Ultimately this would be for my own enjoyment really. And having the players just have some notes as to what kind of money they are carrying.

Also, having 48 Silver Pennys (my research did so Pence being the correct plural, didn't want to seem to close to Brittish money) to a pound is mostly me liking 48 more than fifty. Long live base 10! (Maybe I should have 6 fingered elves...)

[Hamste]

Don't even need 6 fingered elves, humans have 12 fingers bones to a hand (not counting the thumb because screw you thumb) and you can easily count using them. Use your thumb to point to your finger bones while the other hand counts up with their fingers every time you go 12. Allows you to get up to 72 (even higher if you use the knuckle bones on your other hand but that gets too confusing quickly).

[Jay R]

Is your purpose to annoy your players? I ask because that's the only effect it's going to have.

[Hamilcar Barca]

I don't know if you have your system but here is the one I came up with. I just couldn't take 50 copper/silver/gold all weighing the same. Also since platinum was not coined in ancient times I substituted Melnibone’an wheels. Here are the rules I use. Based on the atomic weight of the metal. You can give them treasure in different coin values.

Monetary System, all base coins are Standard coin size. This is a little larger than a Quarter (apx25mm) and about as thick (2mm) 48G=66S=150C=1lb. 3G coins are about the size of a half dollar and a little thicker. 31.1g=1troy ounce=3GP. So 3x value coins are 16G or 22S or 50C = 1LB so
2 Iron = 1 Copper. Iron coins are not very popular but are given in change.
10 Copper = 1 Silver
10 Silver = 1 gold
There are 2c, 3c 5c, ½s, 2s, 3s 5s, ½g, 2g, 3g and 5g coins in addition to the basic coins. They weigh accordingly. The most common coins are 1x, 3x and 5x values.
Melnibone’an Wheels are large (old silver dollar size) carved gold coins (weight 3GP) with a number of spokes. Used as old coinage. These may be only take at base weight by merchants far from Melnibone’. The ones carved for the emperors are not available. These have collector value to Nobles and any Melnibone’an who wants to advance in their society.
4 spokes = 10G uncommon
5 spokes = 100G rare
6 spokes = 500G very rare
7 spokes = 1000G ultra rare
8 spokes = 5000G stuff of legend

If you use it have fun with it. A king can reward them with a small bag of 10 coins. The players will be pissed until they open it and find ten 6 spoke wheels.

Hamilcar Barca
Playing DnD since 1977. Yea me!

[RedMage125]

This kind of thing already exists in FR.

Eberron also named it's currency, but it was easy to keep track of:
Copper Piece = Crown
Silver Piece = Sovereign
Gold Piece = Galifar
Platinum Piece = Dragon

So for the 3 most common types, the first letter of the currency name matched the first letter of the metal type.