Money changers [Archive] - Wizards Community

Money changers [Archive] - Wizards Community

Post/Author/DateTime Post
Dalimar
07-06-04, 09:31 AM Do you all get your players to get their money changed if moving from one region to another e.g. Thay to Cormyr?
warlockco
07-06-04, 11:43 PM Depends on how mean I want to be :smirk:

To really throw them for a loop, send them to Krynn, where gold is practically worthless :smirk:
tauster
07-07-04, 04:34 AM generally, i avoid introducing moneychangers. that is, they are there, and might even interact as npc with the characters (and change some of their coins during the talk), but only if that doesn´t distract from the story or slows down the game too much.

including them adds to realism of the campaignworld, but having to go to a coin changer everytime you´ll want to buy something in a foreign country (and adventurers seem to be very often abroad) tends to be nerving.

if you want to avoid too much "coinswapping", just assume that prices in a foreign economy are multiplyed by (1+x), where x is the percentage that the moneychanger charges.

as an additional twist, moneychangers may report larger transactions (say, more than 1000gp) to the government, the harpers, the local thieves guild,... to just everybody who can make the lives of your players miserable. :smirk:

tauster
:)
Sarta
07-07-04, 06:05 PM I use them in my games. The church of Waukeen frequently can provide this service as well as many other individuals. It is usually disadvantageous to change money in the country you are traveling to. The local currency is always worth more at home than away. It is far more lucrative to trade before one leaves on their journey.

Coin-changing actually becomes a fairly lucrative business for npc's and characters that travel a bit. My players have learned that it is a sure-fire way to make money while traveling long distances. I don't mind that they are making this money being that the random encounters they get along the way are often-times of the monstrous sort and frequently offer little to no cash reward. Allowing them to profit off trade or coin-changing allows them to keep their net value balanced with their level.

Sarta
Another Gnome
07-07-04, 07:35 PM The worth of a gold coin is based on the material; the face value of a given currency (barring iron coins or other local specialities) is probably of less relevance than the face value of the customer, so unless the characters want to appear locals, they're free to use coins of whatever countries they've happened to have collected their loot from (you really don't want to keep track of the origin of every single coin found on the road, do you now..?).

Thus, in my games moneychangers are mostly used to turn all those piles of copper and silver into something more portable - or change a few platinum coins to something more useable (people are not going to give back any change even if some moron adventurers insist on paying for a 1-copper purchase with a platinum coin).

Besides, adventurers are the single biggest source of income for practically everyone selling something other than groceries, so those merchants can hardly afford to nitpick even if they wanted to. ;)
Sarta
07-07-04, 09:27 PM It's the practice of changing local currencies which I was writing about. If you read page 29 of FR1, Waterdeep and the North you will see that by changing your money before one arrives at their location one can almost double their money. Of course money-changers take ther toll, but the profit margin is still worth pursuing.

Sarta
dragonheart
07-08-04, 12:44 AM As a general rule I don't bother with using money changers for currency conversion only with converting types into more useful types. through out most of history except in really large long lasting empires (Rome) coins were moving in and out from many places and the real value was the raw material - the coins was just a government's stamp showing its approval of the value and even then they were often shaved, debased, forged etc. so scales and coin measurers etc were the usual tools in trade. Ratehr like the old spanish silver real (dollar) that became know as a piece of 8 because it was so often cut pizza style to create change - the "bit" of 12.5 cents that is still around as 2 bits - a nickname for a quarter.
Another Gnome
07-08-04, 10:29 AM It's the practice of changing local currencies which I was writing about. If you read page 29 of FR1, Waterdeep and the North you will see that by changing your money before one arrives at their location one can almost double their money. Of course money-changers take ther toll, but the profit margin is still worth pursuing.

Thanks for the tip, I need to check it out later. I assume the meaning is that paying with foreign currency effectively costs double, right? Regardless, when it comes to a Waterdhavian weaponsmith charging 300 gold for a masterwork weapon, I still think that smith would be a complete idiot pricing the weapon at 600 gold just because all the customer had was Cormyrean gold. Chances are that the customer would tell the smith to shove the weapon up to somewhere the sun doesn't shine, then walk out to find out if the storekeep next door actually knows what color gold is.
Sarta
07-08-04, 05:34 PM Originally posted by Another Gnome
Regardless, when it comes to a Waterdhavian weaponsmith charging 300 gold for a masterwork weapon, I still think that smith would be a complete idiot pricing the weapon at 600 gold just because all the customer had was Cormyrean gold. Chances are that the customer would tell the smith to shove the weapon up to somewhere the sun doesn't shine, then walk out to find out if the storekeep next door actually knows what color gold is.

The weaponsmith prices the item at 150 Waterdhavian toals or 300 gold in trade bars. Trade bars are simply large bricks of silver stamped with their value -- they retain their value fairly well as one travels. Toals on the other hand are a square, flat brass coin issued and honored by the Waterdhavian treasury and valued at 2 gp. These are worth nearly nothing outside of Waterdeep and so rarely leave the walls of the city.

If the customer was paying with Mirabar trade bars (made of black iron) they would have to spend 60 trade bars because outside of Mirabar and Luskan these trade bars are valued at around 5 gp. However, in Mirabar they are worth 10 gp and 7 gp in Luskan.

In other words, if one is in Waterdeep and heading north into Silverymoon via Luskan, one could exchange all their toals (which are useless outside of Waterdeep) for Mirabar trade bars. When one docks in Luskan they can then trade these for Electrum Moons (made in Silverymoon and worth 2 gold there, but only one gold elsewhere). For every 100 gold spent this way, the characters will end up with 280 gold worth of Electrum Moons when they reach Silverymoon minus whatever fees they paid for moneychanging.

Besides it being lucrative to change your money, this also means that moneychangers are good sources of information. Based on the money one changes a money-changer can guess a lot of where one has come from, where one is heading, and so on.

Sarta

Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Dalimar 07-06-04, 09:31 AM	Do you all get your players to get their money changed if moving from one region to another e.g. Thay to Cormyr?
warlockco 07-06-04, 11:43 PM	Depends on how mean I want to be :smirk: To really throw them for a loop, send them to Krynn, where gold is practically worthless :smirk:
tauster 07-07-04, 04:34 AM	generally, i avoid introducing moneychangers. that is, they are there, and might even interact as npc with the characters (and change some of their coins during the talk), but only if that doesn´t distract from the story or slows down the game too much. including them adds to realism of the campaignworld, but having to go to a coin changer everytime you´ll want to buy something in a foreign country (and adventurers seem to be very often abroad) tends to be nerving. if you want to avoid too much "coinswapping", just assume that prices in a foreign economy are multiplyed by (1+x), where x is the percentage that the moneychanger charges. as an additional twist, moneychangers may report larger transactions (say, more than 1000gp) to the government, the harpers, the local thieves guild,... to just everybody who can make the lives of your players miserable. :smirk: tauster :)
Sarta 07-07-04, 06:05 PM	I use them in my games. The church of Waukeen frequently can provide this service as well as many other individuals. It is usually disadvantageous to change money in the country you are traveling to. The local currency is always worth more at home than away. It is far more lucrative to trade before one leaves on their journey. Coin-changing actually becomes a fairly lucrative business for npc's and characters that travel a bit. My players have learned that it is a sure-fire way to make money while traveling long distances. I don't mind that they are making this money being that the random encounters they get along the way are often-times of the monstrous sort and frequently offer little to no cash reward. Allowing them to profit off trade or coin-changing allows them to keep their net value balanced with their level. Sarta
Another Gnome 07-07-04, 07:35 PM	The worth of a gold coin is based on the material; the face value of a given currency (barring iron coins or other local specialities) is probably of less relevance than the face value of the customer, so unless the characters want to appear locals, they're free to use coins of whatever countries they've happened to have collected their loot from (you really don't want to keep track of the origin of every single coin found on the road, do you now..?). Thus, in my games moneychangers are mostly used to turn all those piles of copper and silver into something more portable - or change a few platinum coins to something more useable (people are not going to give back any change even if some moron adventurers insist on paying for a 1-copper purchase with a platinum coin). Besides, adventurers are the single biggest source of income for practically everyone selling something other than groceries, so those merchants can hardly afford to nitpick even if they wanted to. ;)
Sarta 07-07-04, 09:27 PM	It's the practice of changing local currencies which I was writing about. If you read page 29 of FR1, Waterdeep and the North you will see that by changing your money before one arrives at their location one can almost double their money. Of course money-changers take ther toll, but the profit margin is still worth pursuing. Sarta
dragonheart 07-08-04, 12:44 AM	As a general rule I don't bother with using money changers for currency conversion only with converting types into more useful types. through out most of history except in really large long lasting empires (Rome) coins were moving in and out from many places and the real value was the raw material - the coins was just a government's stamp showing its approval of the value and even then they were often shaved, debased, forged etc. so scales and coin measurers etc were the usual tools in trade. Ratehr like the old spanish silver real (dollar) that became know as a piece of 8 because it was so often cut pizza style to create change - the "bit" of 12.5 cents that is still around as 2 bits - a nickname for a quarter.
Another Gnome 07-08-04, 10:29 AM	It's the practice of changing local currencies which I was writing about. If you read page 29 of FR1, Waterdeep and the North you will see that by changing your money before one arrives at their location one can almost double their money. Of course money-changers take ther toll, but the profit margin is still worth pursuing. Thanks for the tip, I need to check it out later. I assume the meaning is that paying with foreign currency effectively costs double, right? Regardless, when it comes to a Waterdhavian weaponsmith charging 300 gold for a masterwork weapon, I still think that smith would be a complete idiot pricing the weapon at 600 gold just because all the customer had was Cormyrean gold. Chances are that the customer would tell the smith to shove the weapon up to somewhere the sun doesn't shine, then walk out to find out if the storekeep next door actually knows what color gold is.
Sarta 07-08-04, 05:34 PM	Originally posted by Another Gnome Regardless, when it comes to a Waterdhavian weaponsmith charging 300 gold for a masterwork weapon, I still think that smith would be a complete idiot pricing the weapon at 600 gold just because all the customer had was Cormyrean gold. Chances are that the customer would tell the smith to shove the weapon up to somewhere the sun doesn't shine, then walk out to find out if the storekeep next door actually knows what color gold is. The weaponsmith prices the item at 150 Waterdhavian toals or 300 gold in trade bars. Trade bars are simply large bricks of silver stamped with their value -- they retain their value fairly well as one travels. Toals on the other hand are a square, flat brass coin issued and honored by the Waterdhavian treasury and valued at 2 gp. These are worth nearly nothing outside of Waterdeep and so rarely leave the walls of the city. If the customer was paying with Mirabar trade bars (made of black iron) they would have to spend 60 trade bars because outside of Mirabar and Luskan these trade bars are valued at around 5 gp. However, in Mirabar they are worth 10 gp and 7 gp in Luskan. In other words, if one is in Waterdeep and heading north into Silverymoon via Luskan, one could exchange all their toals (which are useless outside of Waterdeep) for Mirabar trade bars. When one docks in Luskan they can then trade these for Electrum Moons (made in Silverymoon and worth 2 gold there, but only one gold elsewhere). For every 100 gold spent this way, the characters will end up with 280 gold worth of Electrum Moons when they reach Silverymoon minus whatever fees they paid for moneychanging. Besides it being lucrative to change your money, this also means that moneychangers are good sources of information. Based on the money one changes a money-changer can guess a lot of where one has come from, where one is heading, and so on. Sarta