Coinage

[flankspeed]

Originally Posted by Steve Jackson

I am sticking with a simple trimetallic system so you can have coins of:

Copper to tip the barmaid
Silver to buy a sword
Gold to be portable wealth and Phat Loot....

SOLD! I will gladly buy into that system. Besides, my parents always had a saying: "All good things come in threes!"

[Kirk]

I've read through about half of the comments and just want to get my copper coin's worth in...

The thing about Cidri is it isn't Earth. What I liked about things like Strength Batteries and such is that it jibes with the Mnoren obviously Electrified Civilization of the Past. Changing to Mana and Powerstones and such just feels like all the other copy-cat FRP games out there, IMO.

To the point, we very much like the 10 to 1 ratio. Easy to remember, easy to use. It even helped differentiate posh from poor places to be and in a character's development. You start working in coppers and going places where coppers are the best people can do, move up to a silver environment where that might be the tip, up to gentlemen that flip gold pieces onto the gambling table as if they were coppers.

10 Coppers is a Silver, 10 Silvers is a Gold. Works, fits Cidri, easy to remember.

[David Bofinger]

Originally Posted by Kirk

The thing about Cidri is it isn't Earth.

The other thing about Cidri is that it's huge. Different parts of it should have completely different coinage systems. The unit of currency in a campaign can be anything: if you want to say that in the Kingdom of the Six Isles the currency of account is the dekkel, divided into twenty-eight kilips, and the common coins are the golden half-dekkel and quarter-dekkel and the silver kilip and half-kilip, that's absolutely fair enough. But put it in a sourcebook for a particular part of Cidri, not the rules. The rules should describe money in terms of dollars.

[Jim Kane]

Originally Posted by Kirk

To the point, we very much like the 10 to 1 ratio. Easy to remember, easy to use...10 Coppers is a Silver, 10 Silvers is a Gold. Works, fits Cidri, easy to remember.

Agreed; and furthermore, long ago we made all coins - regardless of base metal - have the same size and weight.

Was this realistic and did it accurately reflect the real mass of various metal coins on Earth?

No, not by a long-shot; however, it played so easily and served us so very well that everyone was more than happy to look the other way, and get on with the adventure.

JK

[ak_aramis]

Originally Posted by Kirk

I've read through about half of the comments and just want to get my copper coin's worth in...

The thing about Cidri is it isn't Earth. What I liked about things like Strength Batteries and such is that it jibes with the Mnoren obviously Electrified Civilization of the Past. Changing to Mana and Powerstones and such just feels like all the other copy-cat FRP games out there, IMO.

To the point, we very much like the 10 to 1 ratio. Easy to remember, easy to use. It even helped differentiate posh from poor places to be and in a character's development. You start working in coppers and going places where coppers are the best people can do, move up to a silver environment where that might be the tip, up to gentlemen that flip gold pieces onto the gambling table as if they were coppers.

10 Coppers is a Silver, 10 Silvers is a Gold. Works, fits Cidri, easy to remember.

Copper's abundance in the available material is about 68 PPM; silver's is about 0.08 PPM, and gold 0.003 PPM. Putting that into PPB, Copper 68000 PPB, Silver 80 PPB, and Gold 3 PPB, respectively. Copper's utility and workability drives its value up considerably in pre-industrial societies. And in post industrial ones, it's resistance to bacteria, and low resistance to electricity, plus its natural oxide layer forming an oxidation barrier make it retain a considerably higher value than abundance alone would indicate.

[fisherro]

For those of us who like monetary complications, it is always good to keep in mind that the units of account and the coins in use are different things. When I was a kid, we used dollars & cents, but it wasn’t that common to find a $1 or 1¢ coin in my pocket. Quarters were much more likely.

So when a merchant says he’ll sell you something for 1 whotsit (or whatever the local unit of account is) that might be, say, 4 silver coins.

People who want to keep it simple can just deal with gp, sp, & cp. We who want something more can layer it on top of that with units of account.

[David Bofinger]

Originally Posted by fisherro

People who want to keep it simple can just deal with gp, sp, & cp. We who want something more can layer it on top of that with units of account.

I think it's actually the reverse of that. Old TFT ran on a unit of account, the dollar, and was entirely agnostic about what the coins were made of. Adding trimetallic coins is a step toward greater complexity, not less. Personally I'd be happy to stick with dollars, and only have coins described in settings.

[Agemegos]

Originally Posted by David Bofinger

Personally I'd be happy to stick with dollars, and only have coins described in settings.

Yeah. I, too, would be happier for TFT not to commit itself to specific coinage issues or price ratios of monetary metals.

[CardDiceian]

Money is something Ideally I'd want to keep simple.

complications in accountancy, currency conversions etc.etc could all be worked around in individuals 'house rules' - - (and probably would be anyway, regardless of what is printed in the finished rule books)

[JLV]

Originally Posted by David Bofinger

I think it's actually the reverse of that. Old TFT ran on a unit of account, the dollar, and was entirely agnostic about what the coins were made of. Adding trimetallic coins is a step toward greater complexity, not less. Personally I'd be happy to stick with dollars, and only have coins described in settings.

Actually, page 24 of ITL states, and I quote:

"The commonest type of coin is a "silver piece," about like a silver dollar. It will sometimes be abbreviated $, and you may think of it as being worth about a dollar, when a dollar was still worth something. A silver piece is worth about 10 coppers. Ten silver pieces make up a gold piece."

So, no actual change.