So how many coins fit in a...

[kigmatzomat]

I seem to recall a previous thread waaaay back at the start of 3e that discussed coinage. I think the consensus was that gold coins tended to be about the size of a US penny, depending on the metal and purity. Since the game assumes 100% pure metals (or that minted gold is as pure as "raw" gold), a solid gold penny would be about 8.5g or about 50/lb.

Platinum is denser than gold so you'd get something smaller than a penny but not quite a dime, while silver and copper would be more like thick nickels.

 

[theredrobedwizard]

Pouch of Money Holding: This slightly magical pouch has only one magical quality, it can hold an infinite amount of non-magical coinage. Any attempt to put anything that is not a non-magical coin into the pouch causes all the contents to spill onto the ground.

I give these to all of my players at the beginning of campaigns, simply because I hate dealing with things like "well, how much money can I fit in this bag here?".

Hasn't caused a problem yet.

Also, in the PHB, there is a scale drawing of a standard issue Greyhawk gold piece; page 168.



-TRRW

 

[abri]

Well with the density of gold, you'll have a hard time finding a bag that you can fill with gold, it'll break way before that. Volume is really not an isue with gold, weight is. Carrying capacity is what will really limit how much gold you can carry, especially with 50 coins/lbs.
Now if you want to be hard on the players and know exactly how much they can put in one backpack: a modern bacpack can hold 120lbs safely so depending on quality a safe bet would be 50-70lbs (2500-3500 coins)

 

[mvincent]

Another note: [url="http://www.kokogiak.com/megapenny/four.asp]this page[/url] says that you can fit about 50k (stacked) pennies in a cubic foot (over 300 lbs of pennies, or over 1000 lbs of gp).

 

[twyoung1960]

Simple math
50 coins weighs 1 lb
Backpack and Sack hold 30 lbs so 50 x 30 = 1500 coins
Pouch holds 6 lbs so 50 x 6 = 300 coins

 

[Greenfield]

Simple math
50 coins weighs 1 lb
Backpack and Sack hold 30 lbs so 50 x 30 = 1500 coins
Pouch holds 6 lbs so 50 x 6 = 300 coins

The question wasn't about how much weight, but how many will fit in the *space* of a backpack, sack, etc. And that's actually dependent on how they're stacked or packaged. Also dependent on the actual size of said sack.

I know from experience that 100 presidential dollar coins will completely fill a moderate sized dice bag (one six inches or so deep and with an opening about 10 inches in circumference.)

Of course, the exact size of a D&D coin is hard to describe, and may or may not come close to the size of a US presidential dollar: By the rules a copper piece and a gold piece are the same size and weight, when in fact gold is a *lot* heavier, per volume, than copper. To be the same weight (about a third of an ounce) the gold coin would have to be a fraction of the size of the copper.

 

[howandwhy99]

D&D historically uses a measure by Coin (mass) for both weight and carrying capacity. So [MENTION=93109]twyoung1960[/MENTION] is technically correct. (though the ratio used to be 10:1)

Q. How many coins can any container carry?
A. The players choose.

The DM can have some standards if they want, but really it is up to the players to ask for what they want. If they want a rucksack that can hold 70 million friggin' coins, then they can have one. (Whether they can carry it, much less could it hold its own weight comes under different rules altogether)

What the DM needs is price per coin for the equipment. Material is the baseline for determining this, but the shape and level of precision/ranking of a craftsmanship the item requires also affects cost.

...at least for me. Your DM could have tons of different design factors. (How do I know what your DM has decided upon?)

Standards are useful because they allow for uniformity and simplicity for the DM's tracking of all this stuff. (They are not the only option!) If you don't specify your requirements, you get the default. If your DM wants to overwhelm himself with detail tracking, he can create a vast variety for every item crafter in the world, for every crafted item!
- I strongly suggest against this (it's a beer and pretzels game after all. k.i.s.s.)

 

[howandwhy99]

PS: Almost everything in D&D is based on a human standard. And most of the crafted items in the world come from humans too. So your standards are likely to be conforming to what a standard human can use without difficulty. The human scale.

This is true for weapons and armor. It is true for bags and chests and armoires and hats and shoes and ascots and farming rakes and footstools and every other thing people in your game world craft.

This keeps the rest of the world exotic, just like playing a demihuman. Frost Giants have to build their own supplies out of what's on hand, like a twenty foot ottoman made of dragon bones and cave bear skins.

 

[twyoung1960]

Coins

I know it wasn't about weight it was about how many coins each container will hold, unfortunately D&D doesn't provide container dimensions, what they do provide is weight capacity. Why would they tell you 50 coins weighs 1 lb. and a pouch carries 6 lbs. if that wasn't the standard they intended? The weight is substantiated in the book, anything else is pure speculation.