Tell me about your monetary systems

[huensao]

In my post-apocalyptic Western game Salted Earth, barter carries the day but there are a number of currencies in circulation. Some of them are newly minted, and their value is only regional at best. Some of them are explicitly regional, as they are paper currencies printed by towns and only usable at those towns. These paper currencies are collectively referred to as townscrip, and in effect they are closer to gift certificates. Towns often offer bounties on local bandits and bandit gangs that attack their visitors, and usually offer a higher bounty in townscrip. The idea is that the bounty hunter gets more purchasing power, but they have to give the town all that business. It's a win/win. But my players have never once chosen this option, I guess because their relationship to townsfolks is always tense. Probably because townsfolk both need and despise travellers.

The most broadly-accepted currency is called waterscrip. When it was founded, the idea was that one paper bill was good for one gallon of water, which in turn was roughly what one person needed to consume over the course of a days' hike. However, due to the mostly hot, arid climate punctuated by a short torrential rainy season, the actual value of waterscrip fluctuates wildly. The players know this, and are expected to have sunk all their waterscrip into gasoline or some other fungible good before the rainy seasons comes around.

[The Wrathchild]

Using a GURPS interpretation of HârnWorld atm., but using the HârnWorld terms. Here they have a silver penny (d) that makes the base for most things. It runs at $4 in GURPS terms.

Farthings (f) are actually physically quartered silver pennies (implying that you probably have things like Bits and Hapennies and fun stuff like that), running at $1.

Shillings and Pounds are not coins, but amounts, 12d and 240d respectively.

A very rare Khûzan (dwarven) gold coin can sometimes be found. It runs at 320d+

A system of Promissory Notes that can run at any value also exisits.

[Lamech]

Originally Posted by huensao

The most broadly-accepted currency is called waterscrip. When it was founded, the idea was that one paper bill was good for one gallon of water, which in turn was roughly what one person needed to consume over the course of a days' hike. However, due to the mostly hot, arid climate punctuated by a short torrential rainy season, the actual value of waterscrip fluctuates wildly. The players know this, and are expected to have sunk all their waterscrip into gasoline or some other fungible good before the rainy seasons comes around.

So what you are saying is waterscrip is a type of currency that changes value on a consistent schedule? And people commonly dump it before said rainy season? Yeah, no.
Step 1: When people start dumping waterscrip for other things, buy a ton.
Step 2: Wait for waterscrip to go back up in price, and then buy a large amount of other goods.
Step 3: Goto step 1

[Bruno]

Originally Posted by Lord Carnifex

I've seen modern gold coins as small as a 1/10th ounce, or 1/160th of a pound. Very small.

Yes, and I don't want to deal with them. Ergo....

[Kalzazz]

The most popular currency is the X, an amount defined as '1/10th starting cash for your wealth level'

However, for my fantasy game, if go into details

10 copper = 1 silver = 1 gurps dollar = 1 copper nugget
1 gold = 10 silver = 1 copper bar = 1 silver nugget
1 plat = 100 silver = 1 water = 1 earth = 1 silver bar = 10 gold = 1 gold nugget
10 plat = 1000 silver = 1 air = 1 fire = 10 earth = 10 water = 1 gold bar = 1 plat nugget
Where did wood go?
1 orihalcon = 10 air = 10 fire = 100 earth = 100 water = 10000 silver = 1 plat bar
I can't remember the value of wood, I think was also electrum somewhere and maybe some other stuff I may have forgotten

Copper, Silver, Gold, Platinum are the basic metals in use, and come in coins, nuggets and bars (similar to Ultima, with values of 1, 10, 100). Then there are the Elemental coins from Earthdawn, and Orihalcon also from Earthdawn (there are probably also Orihalcon Nuggets and Bars, but they don't show up much)

My Sci Fi setting uses the same, but also adds in Fleet Credits (credits) (same as silver) and STC Vouchers (SVs) (same as silver also) which are paper currencies which come in 1, 5, 20, 50, 100 amounts. Also Elvish Silver Certificates (ESC) which were originally tied to silver, but now are worth 1/2 silver (.5) each, come in 1,5, 20, 50, 100, 500, 1000 amounts worth .5, 2.5, 10, 25, 50, 250, 500. Also the Pepoke Oz, which is backed by Pepoka Soda, and worth .05 per (so 20 = 1 silver) and available in any amount you want. There are also sundry currencies issued by various local groups and all, which tend to be worth 1 silver in their stores, and varying amounts elsewhere usually

[Faolyn]

Originally Posted by Gef

Handwaving always worked for me.

Exactly. For my upcoming DF game, I'm using all sorts of denominations, since I know that lots of old monetary systems were non-decimal iced, but I'm pricing things in good ole dollars and sense. If I need to, I can always say "well, the horde is entirely in quarter-bit coins"--or whatever; I haven't named the denominations--"which are worth, oh, half a cent each. There's about 10,000 of 'em. You want?"

Pretty much all you need to decide is what they're made of and if that matters, and if other countries will take them.

[simply Nathan]

In the first setting I made:
$0.10 per gold coin
$1 per copper coin
$10 per silver coin
$1,000 per platinum coin

You can probably guess what gold was worth before alchemists discovered how to change lead into gold.

Since switching to GURPS:
$1 copper "Buck"
$5 silver "Finn"
$100 golden "Senate"


All of these coins are the size of U.S. quarters.

[malloyd]

Originally Posted by Lamech

So what you are saying is waterscrip is a type of currency that changes value on a consistent schedule? And people commonly dump it before said rainy season? Yeah, no.
Step 1: When people start dumping waterscrip for other things, buy a ton.
Step 2: Wait for waterscrip to go back up in price, and then buy a large amount of other goods.
Step 3: Goto step 1

Assuming somebody lives up to the guarantee you can redeem it for a gallon of water in the worst of the dry season, then what will actually happen is it will trade at around how much water is worth then, at most being discounted by the interest rate for the time until the dry season happens. In effect, everybody treats it as a futures contract that comes due in the dry season. And if you are *selling* water any other time of year, nobody will pay you 1 waterscrip for a gallon, no matter what it says on the scrip. They'll demand (and get from somebody who appreciates the real value of the futures) way more than a gallon.

[bolondro2]

Originally Posted by Bruno

Quarters are not made out of gold, which is what leads me to compulsive yak shaving on this topic (1/50th a lb of gold is a much smaller coin than I want to deal with... ever basically).

A historical gold (venetian or florentine currency) coin was tipically 3.50g or 1/130 of pound. And the british silver penny starts at 1.8g. 1/250 of a pound

Yes, and I don't want to deal with them. Ergo....

De gustibus non est disputandum

[Lamech]

Originally Posted by malloyd

Assuming somebody lives up to the guarantee you can redeem it for a gallon of water in the worst of the dry season, then what will actually happen is it will trade at around how much water is worth then, at most being discounted by the interest rate for the time until the dry season happens. In effect, everybody treats it as a futures contract that comes due in the dry season. And if you are *selling* water any other time of year, nobody will pay you 1 waterscrip for a gallon, no matter what it says on the scrip. They'll demand (and get from somebody who appreciates the real value of the futures) way more than a gallon.

That was sort of my point. If its broadly used it shouldn't suddenly drop during the wet season. Sure it will go down a little (interest rate and all that), but someone who understands investments will still accept the waterscrip during the rainy season.


As for currency: I just support handwaving it.