Cursed Gold

[Seto]

Hey playground !

There's a lot of stuff out there on cursed items (can't take it off, has the opposite effect of what it's supposed to be doing, hinders you, has a random effect), but most of it doesn't work on gold. I was thinking, what would be an interesting way to curse gold ? (that a NPC is trying to give as "reward" to a PC who's double-crossed him). We're talking about 200 GP specifically.

I guess it could have the effect of making the PC go greedier and greedier, it's a classic. Or there's the Pirates of the Caribbean way, but that's too extreme for my taste. It's supposed to be annoying/disadvantageous to the PC, but it should remain light stuff and not take center stage. Something else ?

[Luminestra]

The gold could weight more than usual gold (if you actually keep track of gold weight)

It could appear as gold to the players, but actually be dung pellets. Whoever they try to give them to becomes extremely offended.

They could be gold coins belonging to an enemy nation/empire. Having them and spending them would indicate that the party works for them and this would attract unwanted attention. You could also have the gold be stolen and have the guards after it.

Flesh eating scarabs disguised as gold coins.

The gold belongs to a power being(like a dragon or devil) and that being will track down the 200 pieces.

The gold is cursed to display the holders location. The party could then be tracked and harassed by assassins/mercinaries hired by whoever gave the party the cursed gold.

Only one of the coins is cursed. It is a prison for a powerful devil that gives a random party member nightmares each night(or some other negative effect)

some some random ones from the top of my head. Hope they help.

[MonochromeTiger]

Depending on just what point you think "annoying and disadvantageous" stops at there are plenty of options.

Mostly there could be delayed effects, for example itching and rashes and other annoying or awkward things that serve more as a distraction and social hindrance than as a drastic revenge. Going further perhaps when the reward money is stored with the rest of the character's funds it quickly erodes and the money in direct contact with it does as well.

Alternatively you could play with the classic luck aspect associated with money, as long as they have the cursed gold on them unfortunate, but extremely minor, things happen to them.

Escalating from there you could have some of the standard curses but on a less permanent basis, just a weak curse that quickly burns itself out and doesn't occur again. It would make the character's day pretty miserable when it happens but the short one-time nature of it could keep it from becoming a larger issue and instead be a clear and simple warning of "don't anger people, you don't know what they'll do in return".

[Bard1cKnowledge]

The dullest one is a phylactery and a Lich starts to regent from it 1d4 nights after its recieved

[BootStrapTommy]

Greedy awaken gold coins which rob the player... of all their silver coins...

[Cool Trash]

Wait until they put the gold in their bags. Tell them there are a lot of them, and they will have to have them weighed for authenticity later(I doubt any of your players are carrying scales).

When they try to take them out later, have them be unable to find it in their bags. They may assume this is the result of a greedy player or a thief. Do not let anything on.

Every time one of them takes anything out of their pack, roll a small die, say, a d6. It it comes up a certain number, they instead draw one of the gold bars, wasting their action. They will never be able to draw the gold bars, except by accident. Even if they empty their packs and literally stick their heads in it, they will not find the gold. The gold can come out of any container on their body, at any time. If unlucky enough, they could draw it out a jar of pickles they just bought.

Once one of the bars is in hand, the players may get a sense that dropping the bar for any reason could make it go away forever. Attempting to drop it or place it back into their pack should require a Will Save, modified by their WBL. Whether the gold actually disappears is up to you.

Others may be aware of the gold. Merchants may have heard of it, for no apparent reason. They may demand to see it, despite any protests to the contrary. Crooked guards may try to leverage their position to take the gold. Other adventurers may assault the players. No matter the circumstance, no will be able to take the gold out their packs if they wish to.

[Maglubiyet]

Good ones already listed.

Standard curse is that they vanish or return to their original owner. PC's awaken to the clatter of metal on the floorboards and they watch the coins roll under the door...

Other ideas:

The coins moan and cry to be reunited with their "brothers" in another hoard.

They are stamped with horrendously offensive images that wound the sensibilities of most civilized folk.

They devour other coins.

They are merely gold-plated lead.

They merge to form a giant coin. The figurehead on the coin watches the PC's while they're sleeping and whispers the terrible things it's going to do to them. Was it all a dream?

[Segev]

Until they're all spent on legitimately worthwhile transactions, the bearer believes any deal offered to him is an attempt to cheat him out of his wealth. This manifests as a Will save that, under DC 15, causes him to think it is an excellent deal. Emphasize just how good a deal it is, to the point of protesting too much. And then let him hedge and hem and haw to excuse "saving" as much as he can. Above a DC 15, he's "seen through the illusion" and perceives the item(s) in question as of low quality, not really even what they're supposed to be, or otherwise a cheat and a con. Above a DC 30, he sees things for what they are; don't try to over or undersell the item(s). By the time he makes those checks and sees things being "just fine," he'll probably be paranoid ANYWAY.

[goto124]

If unlucky enough, they could draw it out a jar of pickles they just bought.

'I put the gold bar in my mouth. Does it taste like pickles?'

[Kane0]

Characters that possess the coins must succeed on a will save to part with them, which increases in propertiok to how much you are trying to spend.
The kicker? The curse spreads to any coins or other currency the cursed coins touch.

Edit: if you really want to screw the players over, remove curse only functions on one coin (or perhaps caster level coins) per casting.

[TeChameleon]

Another fun way to make the player truly paranoid would be to have them appear identical to all their other coins in every way... except that they function like the gems from a Necklace of Fireballs. Have the player's purse get jarred in some relatively high place, so that they lose one coin... which proceeds to go *BOOM* when it lands. Cue the player trying to figure out how to separate the explosive coins from their regular ones so that they don't have to either discard all their gold or risk exploding every time they get jostled...

And if they decide you've just given them 200 free castings of Fireball, point out that they'd have to sit there hucking gold until they luck into finding one of the cursed coins. If you want to be really, really mean, have them come in to a nice chunk of change immediately before being given the cursed gold so that it ends up in the same purse, making the loss worse.

Or the gold could apparently multiply every time they walk around town... except that it's teleporting other peoples' gold into the player's purse, and leaving a traceable magical signature each and every time it does so. If they walk past the wrong person/people...

[Takewo]

Or you can have the coins to transform every metal they touch in butter.

[MrStabby]

Hmm. Maybe the gold doesn't show anything but any item bought with the cursed gold becomes cursed.

You buy a sword - it starts to stab you in the middle of combat as well. You buy a horse and it turns into a nightmare. You buy a castle and get a haunted demon infested dungeon.

[hymer]

The coins all look rather striking, so anyone handling them will tend to remember. And about an hour after they've been separated from their fellows (usually by having been paid), they teleport back to them. Scrupulously honest people can clear things up if they act as soon as they notice something is amiss.
I don't see how this would actually play out surreptitiously, however. You could perhaps use random rolls to determine whether any of the cursed coins have been used in the transaction.
The curse is of course broken by giving one gold piece to each of two hundred individuals.

[Storm_Of_Snow]

Well, like all cursed items on the magic list, why would someone put a curse on it? (For instance, the Necklace of Strangulation could have been a magical assassination device, or the Berserker sword could have originally been created and given to someone who fled from battle).

If someone was a miser, maybe the curse made them spend all their gold. Or they horded it if they were previously profligate with their wealth.

I do like the anything bought with the coins comes with issues - although I bet most players would try and use the demon-infested castle to XP farm.

[Seto]

Wow, a lot of good ideas ! Thanks, I feel like we're gonna have a fun time with that gold !

My favorite ones so far are the nightmares (or the straight-up coin-made Aberration), the "anything you buy with that gold is cursed", and the paranoid under- or overestimating deals.

[goto124]

I do like the anything bought with the coins comes with issues - although I bet most players would try and use the demon-infested castle to XP farm.

Some time after buying the castle, fires start burning everywhere inside.

The castle is eventually razed to the ground. Even if it's made of stone.

[anti-ninja]

If you want something less game changing ,you could always have the coins get up and start to sing a creepy tune when no one is looking,and then clatter to ground whenever someone sees them .

[Takewo]

Wow, a lot of good ideas ! Thanks, I feel like we're gonna have a fun time with that gold !

My favorite ones so far are the nightmares (or the straight-up coin-made Aberration), the "anything you buy with that gold is cursed", and the paranoid under- or overestimating deals.

And do you know what would be even better? The fact is that you haven't got one cursed item. You've got two hundred cursed items. So you can get different coins to do different stuff. Pick different effects you like. Mix it in a blender. Have fun.

[Storm_Of_Snow]

Some time after buying the castle, fires start burning everywhere inside.

The castle is eventually razed to the ground. Even if it's made of stone.

Would it also happen to have fallen over before catching on fire, and subsequently sink into the swamp, on top of the two other castles that have already sunk into the swamp?

[MrStabby]

Would it also happen to have fallen over before catching on fire, and subsequently sink into the swamp, on top of the two other castles that have already sunk into the swamp?

Giggle.

Love it.

[LibraryOgre]

Dragonlance had some gold coins that were cursed so that, if they were part of a bargain, someone who broke the bargain would begin to horrifically decay.

[Kantaki]

A really evil curse would be the reverse Midas touch - anything made out of gold (and maybe other valuable material) turns into... something that is definitly not of value.

[DigoDragon]

Or there's the Pirates of the Caribbean way, but that's too extreme for my taste.

Flavor it that the curse only makes the PCs look like they're undead to others. They can still die and require food/sleep, but their looks should be enough to get a good old fashion torch-n-pitchfork mob coming over.

[Amphetryon]

On a slightly different tack, I've coated all the gold in a given treasure chest with contact poison before. Good times.

[denthor]

How about this

In second edition there was a spell called fools gold. 2nd level wizard spell

It worked like this take a number of lead coins and cast the spell. They appeared to become real gold coins.

This was a semi permanent condition after one day per level of the caster the coins reverted back to lead or if you struck the coins against a hard surface with force smacking them on a wooden counter or throwing them against a wall would also break the spell.

This was not evil in and of itself just neutral or Chaotic but on the road to evil

Another tactic that Kobolds use gold wash over lead coins. These feel slightly off in weight but not much could pass if distracted or greedy to get away quickly

[Storm_Of_Snow]

How about this

In second edition there was a spell called fools gold. 2nd level wizard spell

It worked like this take a number of lead coins and cast the spell. They appeared to become real gold coins.

This was a semi permanent condition after one day per level of the caster the coins reverted back to lead or if you struck the coins against a hard surface with force smacking them on a wooden counter or throwing them against a wall would also break the spell.

It was in 1st as well - back then, you could add more expensive components in at casting time to improve the odds of the fools gold not reverting back to it's original form until you were well out of town.

[Segev]

You'd have to figure out why it doesn't affect the guy "paying" with them, but...

Each time a cursed coin is spent, the owner takes 1 hp of damage. If that damage is magically healed, he feels particularly clever for overcoming so weak a curse even as he suffers Wis Drain equal to the curse-dealt hp healed. This Wis drain manifests, amongst other things, as poor impulse-control and potentially a desire to "show them" by spending more coins and "getting away with it."

[Elvenoutrider]

One of my favorite traps I designed was a pile of silver inside of a lounge style room. It was coated in contact poison. The silver was on a spring loaded floor tile and as the players collected the silver the weight decreased until the trap was triggered. A stone slab fell to block the door and the room began to fill with poison gas. On top of this the party members found themselves with reduced strength, blindness, temporary confusion and a number of other ailments ( different ailments for each not all the ailments at once). The noise also got the attention of some guard monsters who waited to see if the severely weakened players broke out

[TheThan]

How about something like gold fever?

The gold puts a curse (enchantment) on you will save DC… lets say 15, and you become obsessed with it. Each day you go without getting more gold, you suffer wisdom damage, or sanity damage if you’re using it.