Post/Author/DateTime	Post
bluetooth 04-13-07, 01:38 AM	ok so I'm in a single player D&D game set in the modern day with all the magical being hidden from the average person. Since we are not using the wealth system from d20 modern the question becomes, how much is 1 gold worth? Now, the DM has added some plot devices to simplify matters (and make things a bit more realistic). For one, in most places besides earth gold, silver, and copper occur in the proportions of their value in the players hand book. Also, I've been warned not to try to seel gold for it's earth based value...at least not more than a coin or two...as it is quite distinctive and could lead to questions getting asked that no one (including my character) wants asked. Thus if I want to get dollars (USD) for gold coins I have to get it exchanged. The actual exchange rate has not been disclosed to me because the DM is still working on it. And I have done considerable research to try to help. I've even tried to look up the price of an Ox on Froogle... Eventually I realized that I should not be looking at the prices of things which overall value proportional to the given society will change but for something whose value is more or less constant. In this case I picked staying at a "Poor" in, because "poor" is relative to the society. 2 silver. The cheapest rattiest hotel i've ever stayed at was $30. Now my intial estimate was $100 for 1 gold and this new estimate would be $150. But as I'm level 4 with no equipment yet, and with the DM wanting to make up for that, I'm going to be coming into a fair amount of gold. Now I know there are issues with taxes but...even with the $100 mark, I will soon be getting a bounty 90% gold 10% USD and the total bounty might have been as much as 1000 gold. 10% in USD is $10,000. Now, don't get me wrong, I'm not complaining, I just want to make sure this won't be game breaking down the line. I've made this conversion based on *realism* which is *always* the second most important aspect of the game, after *Balance*...well third actually, since Rule 0 is always first and foremost. But even in a single player game there needs to be balance. Now 1 gold is suppose to represent about a days labor, and we aren't going to use any high tech stuff that's useable as equipment. (at least not for combat purposes. though utility stuff like laptops and cellphones are always available). The question becomes then, are there any reasons for the sake of game balance that the value of a gold piece should be something other than $100? Has anyone else every used a different value? And if so did it work out well? Much obliged for any new perspectives on this issue. And thanks in advance.
RobbyPants 04-13-07, 01:21 PM	There are about 50,000 different answers to these questions, all with varying levels of truth. It all depends on what you want to base it on. The general rate of exchange I've used before is that $10 = 1gp. This is far from 100% accurate, but in many instances, it is a close approximation. That rate falls apart when you try to buy very expensive or many items. Also, certain things are priced differently because it's a fantasy world. I came up with this figure to handle most "common" items, and non-magical weapons.
Kursk 04-13-07, 01:26 PM	ok so I'm in a single player D&D game set in the modern day with all the magical being hidden from the average person. Since we are not using the wealth system from d20 modern the question becomes, how much is 1 gold worth? If you mean today's real world; 3 GP = 1 oz. = ~$640 US.
bluetooth 04-13-07, 03:07 PM	If you mean today's real world; 3 GP = 1 oz. = ~$640 US. no, we aren't going with real world value, because ~$200 to the coin is WAY too much. What we're trying to get at is a comparison of the overall buying power of 1 gold in a DnD setting to a dollar amount in the modern day. One society is secret and has different access to gold that modern human society and thus to them it is worth less. So while I could *get* $640 for 3 gold coins I'd also be breaking a lot of their rules...and it could cause trouble in other ways. the $10 figure doesn't seem to work for either, since 1 gold is supposed to represent a days wage. 365 days a year would be equivalent to $3,650 *in modern day united state*. It would also mean staying at a 3 star hotel (my interpretation of a "Good" Inn) would cost $20 a night. I think though, having had a chance to discuss it, I'm more convinced than I was about the $100 number. I think for the most part I'd forgotten how much 1 gold really was, even in a DnD society, just like I'd forgotten how powerful a level 4 character was. (playing in a modern setting has cured me of both) At 1 gold a day, the average yearly salary would be 365 gold or $36,500 pretty close to spot on (the median actually, not the average, which in this case is better) a "Good" hotel is $200 a night, a bed roll is $10, a torch is $1. A lot of prices *do* break down, but in our case, we *are* using *some* d20 modern, just not the wealth system. fortunately you can take the Purchase DCs and convert them to actual prices pretty handily with one of their tables. I think I understand the motivations behind lower magic settings now that I know a +1 quarterstaff is actually worth $230,000.
Kursk 04-13-07, 03:33 PM	no, we aren't going with real world value, because ~$200 to the coin is WAY too much. What we're trying to get at is a comparison of the overall buying power of 1 gold in a DnD setting to a dollar amount in the modern day. A commoner in D&D makes about ~$30k a year when you convert the GP/year they make to current day value of gold. So, it looks like WoTC already figured it out and you can just take the weight of the gold and convert.
Kopana 04-14-07, 12:57 AM	In one of the two games my sister plays in, they recently had occasion to chase a necromancer through a mirror into a slightly modified 2002 (9/11 didn't happen, so the characters weren't frisked by national security every three days) and the DM ruled that she could convert half of her money, which was entirely in PP, into dollars at a 1:1 ratio. This is because she was the only character starting in the future because of a new character, and having money was an entirely insane advantage. She also has a cellphone. Apparently they did the nerdiest thing ever by having an In-Character and entirely proper discussion about tracking down Sith for their "dark secrets" at a "sci-fi convention" on the advice of a seven year old and a thirteen year old who were playing with the Half-Giant's Gythka and one of them proclaimed "I'm a Sith!". I want in on this campaign :O
Dracomortis 04-15-07, 07:40 PM	If I remember correctly off the top of my head, Urban Arcana for d20 Modern sets the conversion rate at $5 USD = 1 gp.
UAMDB 04-16-07, 01:23 PM	A commoner in D&D makes about ~$30k a year when you convert the GP/year they make to current day value of gold. So, it looks like WoTC already figured it out and you can just take the weight of the gold and convert. This depends on your definition of "Commoner". If you take it to mean one of the poorest in the town or community, then you are way off. If you mean "Commoner" to mean middle class then you might be right. The poverty level in the US is $12,490 as of 2004. This was for a family of 2, meaning that their combined income was under $12,490. To the OP. D&D was not ment to have a fully working economic system. It was not ment to be able to convert gp to $.
Hochiu 04-16-07, 01:53 PM	ok so I'm in a single player D&D game set in the modern day with all the magical being hidden from the average person. Since we are not using the wealth system from d20 modern the question becomes, how much is 1 gold worth? Now, the DM has added some plot devices to simplify matters (and make things a bit more realistic). For one, in most places besides earth gold, silver, and copper occur in the proportions of their value in the players hand book. Also, I've been warned not to try to seel gold for it's earth based value...at least not more than a coin or two...as it is quite distinctive and could lead to questions getting asked that no one (including my character) wants asked. Thus if I want to get dollars (USD) for gold coins I have to get it exchanged. The actual exchange rate has not been disclosed to me because the DM is still working on it. And I have done considerable research to try to help. I've even tried to look up the price of an Ox on Froogle... Eventually I realized that I should not be looking at the prices of things which overall value proportional to the given society will change but for something whose value is more or less constant. In this case I picked staying at a "Poor" in, because "poor" is relative to the society. 2 silver. The cheapest rattiest hotel i've ever stayed at was $30. Now my intial estimate was $100 for 1 gold and this new estimate would be $150. But as I'm level 4 with no equipment yet, and with the DM wanting to make up for that, I'm going to be coming into a fair amount of gold. Now I know there are issues with taxes but...even with the $100 mark, I will soon be getting a bounty 90% gold 10% USD and the total bounty might have been as much as 1000 gold. 10% in USD is $10,000. Now, don't get me wrong, I'm not complaining, I just want to make sure this won't be game breaking down the line. I've made this conversion based on *realism* which is *always* the second most important aspect of the game, after *Balance*...well third actually, since Rule 0 is always first and foremost. But even in a single player game there needs to be balance. Now 1 gold is suppose to represent about a days labor, and we aren't going to use any high tech stuff that's useable as equipment. (at least not for combat purposes. though utility stuff like laptops and cellphones are always available). The question becomes then, are there any reasons for the sake of game balance that the value of a gold piece should be something other than $100? Has anyone else every used a different value? And if so did it work out well? Much obliged for any new perspectives on this issue. And thanks in advance. It is whatever you think it should be. Gold is already stated by other posters, but you didn't want to take their advice. You can't convert gold currency into "modern/non-gold backed" currency, you'd have to go to a bank or other place that buys gold for local currency. So in reality, its up to the DM, and his/her excuse for what the gold/commodity market is doing.
Mr.Atheist 04-22-07, 10:31 AM	I always thought having a real-world conversion for gold would be a good idea, just to easier understand prices of things. I tried comparing things our worlds have in common, since trying to convert the value of a +1 staff is impossible (we don't have any real +1 staffs). Let's look at how much it costs to eat daily (the chart assumes you buy the meal precooked, I believe). (SRD)Good 5 sp Common 3 sp Poor 1 sp Keeping it simple, I thought it best to make a silver piece equal 10 dollars. It would probably take 10 dollars to eat for a day at a fast food joint, if you only got thing off of the cheap menu. This would also be a common restaraunt costing 10$ for three visits; that's how much most sit-down restaraunts usually cost for me. As for nice restaraunts, they usually cost me about 20$ each, which adds up to 60$ (6 silver). Well, that's awfully close to 5 silver. Hotel prices (SRD)Good 2 gp Common 5 sp Poor 2 sp I don't have tons of experience with hotels, but my father was nice enough to pass on the price ranges for a hotel in a rural area. I assume them to be rural, as that is how we imagine most inns (in small towns). A rat-hole hotel cost him 25$ a night, the SRD says 20$ a night (2 silver). A normal hotel cost him 40$-60$, 50$ or 5 silver right in the middle. A great hotel costs anything from 80$-200$ he said. SRD says 200$, which is on the higher end. So I stick with this system: Copper: 1$ Silver: 10$ Gold: 100$ Platinum: 1,000$ Arcanum: 10,000$ (got a better name, please tell!) You could try to base things on the more expensive objects I suppose. But I figure food prices are what set an economy in many ways. Also the campaigns I run are low-wealth. Hope that makes sense and helps.
Nadaka 04-22-07, 11:00 AM	Charles Ryan, one of the authors of d20 modern states that 1gp converts to ~$20 in an official article.
CryoSilver 04-22-07, 02:32 PM	Bread = 2 cp per loaf / 1 USD - 1 gp = 50 USD 1 lb meat = 6 sp / 6 USD - 1 gp = 10 USD Bottle of good wine = 10 gp / 100 USD - 1 gp = 10 USD Mug of ale/beer = 4 cp / 4 USD - 1 gp = 25 USD Average = 1 gp = 23.75 USD Not the best method, but it lends credit to the 1/20 ratio (prices based on the Stop&Shop in my town in Connecticut)
Prak, the Mad 04-23-07, 01:59 PM	well, as one person said: Since time immemorial, D&D has used the "gold piece" as its primary currency. It is apparently a chunk of reasonably pure gold of vaguely standardized weight that people use fairly interchangeably in different cities populated by different species. In the bad old days, each gold coin was a tenth of a pound, which was hilarious and inane. In the current edition, each gold piece is a fiftieth of a pound. That's 3.43 gp to the Troy Ounce, which means that in the modern economy, each gp is about $171 worth of gold. Obviously, gold is significantly more common in D&D than it is on Earth, gold is also undervalued because its status as a currency standard drives it out of industrial uses and causes inflation. Further, populations in D&D are orders of magnitude smaller than they are in the real world, so the gold per person is higher even with the same amount of gold. So the gold piece is massively less valuable in D&D economies than it would be in Earth's economies. Nonetheless, things are really expensive in D&D, and the high price in gold means that there's a distinct limitation of how much wealth can be transported by any means available. The economies of currency transaction are actually so unfavorable that currency as we understand the term does not exist. Things don't have prices or costs – all transactions are conducted in barter and a common medium of exchange is heavy lumps of precious metal. emphasis mine.
jeffepp 04-24-07, 01:24 AM	I think that most of you are getting to complicated with your computations. I tend to look at the "small picture". I figure that a copper piece is around $5-10 right now. Yes, I know that that makes many things over priced by our standards, but there is no exact conversion. I also assume that there is a smaller value coin, but it's to small to track. Now, ten or so years ago I would have said 1 CP = $1, but inflation... Remember, we are not talking about bullion coins, but a circulating coin alloy. And also keep in mind that the best we can do is an abstract conversion. BTW, you could give in game prices in CP instead of GP, to imply that that is the coin most often used in transaction.
JulesCARV 04-24-07, 02:23 AM	I personally would go with 1 gp = $20. There's no exactly correct amount, but it seems to work well overall.
Mr.Atheist 04-24-07, 12:30 PM	Cryosilver: I tried to avoid things as small as individual food items, because their prices vary drastically. I suppose restauraunt costs do also, though. And a friendly notice: your calculation for a mug of ale is off. If 4CP=4USD then 1GP=100USD. After that, your GP average becomes $42.50 (ooooh, 42). I'm happy to see this thread is recognizing copper pieces. Most people treat them as pennies.
Etarnon 04-24-07, 02:17 PM	I always used 1 GP = 20$ US More or less. For 30 years. Good luck.
dragor_shadowfury 04-24-07, 02:28 PM	well, the normal daily wager for a commoner is not 1 gp, but 1 sp, they have to get some food from their own gardens make and repair most of their clothes ect. so that's what we call poor, i think 1 gp/day for middle class is reasonable though.
obrysii 04-24-07, 02:57 PM	I always used 1 GP = 20$ US More or less. For 30 years. Good luck. We've used $10 = 1 GP and it exchanges pretty well. 'Cept for a few oddities. so 1 gold piece = $10 1 silver piece = $1 1 copper piece = $0.10
CryoSilver 04-24-07, 10:54 PM	Cryosilver: I tried to avoid things as small as individual food items, because their prices vary drastically. I suppose restauraunt costs do also, though. And a friendly notice: your calculation for a mug of ale is off. If 4CP=4USD then 1GP=100USD. After that, your GP average becomes $42.50 (ooooh, 42). I'm happy to see this thread is recognizing copper pieces. Most people treat them as pennies. Yea, I can't do math very well anymore. And I mentioned that I was from Connecticut (one of the most expensive states in the Union) because I know buying power varies greatly from region to region.
ravenshrike 04-26-07, 09:43 PM	Depends on the items you base it on. According to the price of longbows, 1gp=$0.50. But that's because long/shortbows in D&D are rediculously overpriced while crossbows are equally rediculously underpriced. And they should do more damage.
Nathreet 04-26-07, 10:38 PM	The prices of gold is now about $300 per troy ounce, or ~$3,500 per pound, or ~$70 per gp. Right now the gold:silver ratio is about 50:1, meaning 50 sp would be worth the same as 1 gp. If your DM wants to retro-actively implement this standard, just multiply your sp by 5. Remember that 50 coins weight 1 lb. That's because there is less gold per person in modern days than ever in history (even with improved mining techniques). Hence back in the middle ages gold was worth much less than it is now. So it all depends on gold supply and the world's population. If none of the modern gold has been lost and the world's population is 6 billion, then stick with $70 per gp. If you're in a post apocolyptic settering where the population has dropped drastically, gold won't be worth nearly as much. If a great deal of the world's gold was lost somehow (within ruins, etc.), then that will raise the price of gold.
Kuronue 04-29-07, 08:59 PM	Depends on the items you base it on. According to the price of longbows, 1gp=$0.50. But that's because long/shortbows in D&D are rediculously overpriced while crossbows are equally rediculously underpriced. And they should do more damage. What prices are you judging them by? You can't judge historical weaponry by modern prices because we don't use them the same way (mostly for recreation nowadays). In fact, you can't use any historical things we have replaced or made better, or anything we can mass produce, because they had no mass production, and to them, things were tools, whereas to us, the same items are historical curiosities for collectors, or used for recreation/exercise, or what have ye.
Nadaka 04-30-07, 01:06 AM	You can use the price of beer. The price of cheap beer generally remains at a constant ratio with the income of an lower class laborer. 4cp for a mug of beer. Around here that would cost about a dollar for a cheap beer. $1 ~= 4cp => $25 ~= 1gp Thats fairly close to the $20 ~= 1gp assumption that d20 modern uses.