Very fine silver weapons prices--ouch!

[Anthony]

Originally Posted by Flyndaran

I did not know that. I don't see why though, because it's not like silver is as soft as lead. It should function for basic fork/spoon use. Shouldn't it?

Forks and spoons may be solid silver; it's just too soft for use as a knife.

[Flyndaran]

Originally Posted by Anthony

Forks and spoons may be solid silver; it's just too soft for use as a knife.

Oh wow. I totally missed some important words in your post. I knew that getting older meant developing blind spots, but I didn't think it would happen to entire words in posts.

[Alden Loveshade]

As ericbsmith said GCA 4 is following the description for the price increase as described in GURPS Basic Set Characters, I sent a note about it to the errata coordinator to see if it can be clarified/changed. It is, of course, possible that they won't think a change is needed.

Again, I don't know of someone actually coating both a good and a very fine iron/steel sword with silver and comparing how much it costs to coat one compared to coating the other. My opinion that it would not cost 20 times to coat one blade than another of the same size but different quality is largely conjecture. But I do still think it wouldn't.

[Anthony]

Originally Posted by Alden_Loveshade

My opinion that it would not cost 20 times to coat one blade than another of the same size but different quality is largely conjecture. But I do still think it wouldn't.

Well, the concern is that the coating process could easily reduce the quality of the blade, and the cost of avoiding quality reduction might well depend on blade quality. As we don't have any real historical examples of such coatings (electroplating a blade with silver is not exactly low tech and I'm not sure it would even work) the price is somewhat speculative.

[Alden Loveshade]

After wondering about this for quite a while, I just accidentally found this covered in MA p. 216:

Silver-coated or -edged weapons can be of any quality: +200%.

[Bruno]

Originally Posted by Alden Loveshade

After wondering about this for quite a while, I just accidentally found this covered in MA p. 216:

That's coated, not solid silver (which is what the x20 cost is for).

[Alden Loveshade]

Originally Posted by Bruno

That's coated, not solid silver (which is what the x20 cost is for).

Actually, no. If you'll read my original post, I'm talking about what I think is an error in Basic where it costs 20x more to coat a very fine sword than to coat a good quality sword.

Originally Posted by Alden Loveshade

Silver-coating a good broadsword costs $1200, while silver-coating a very fine broadsword costs $24,000.

I had thought at first the reference in MA fixed what I see as an error, but on rereading it, I'm not so sure.

Again, I do not make swords but did sell them at historical recreation events. I personally don't know of someone who actually coated a very fine sword with silver (the ones I sold would be fine or very fine), but I really doubt the coating would cost 20x what it would cost to coat a good sword.

I may ask some armourers (sword makers) to see what they think.