Found out I was wrong about the prices in Gary Gygax's Living Fantasy. Turns out the conversion is one copper piece equals one (Lejendary Adventures) dollar. However, Gary did put in a few prices down into the cents range. As in 25¢ a person for a toll bridge. Unfortunately, D&D® doesn't have anything 'smaller' than a copper piece. So I came up with this suggestion:
Platinum: 10 Gold
Gold: 10 Silver
Silver: 10 Copper
Copper: 10 Bronze
Bronze: 10 Brass
Brass: 1/10th Bronze
Or in LA prices:
Platinum: 1,000 dollars
Gold: 100 dollars
Silver: 10 dollars
Copper: 1 dollar
Bronze: 10¢
Brass: 1¢
Or you could try this variant I got from the Mythus RPG:
Metal and Value
Orichalcum (Fantasy): 3,0000
Platinum: 1,500
Gold: 1,000
Orichalcum (Historical): 500
Adamantine: 200
Electrum: 200
Silver: 25
Copper: 5
Bronze: 1
Nickel: 0.5
Brass: 0.25
Zinc: 0.1
Tin: 0.05
Iron: 0.01
With this scheme the Gold Piece is replaced by a bronze coin. Dubbed (by Col. Pladoh) the Basic Unit Coin (BUC). (Yes, Gary is an incorrigable punster. Please refrain from incorriging.) So when you tell your players they find 3,000 in gold what they find are 3 gold coins. It also makes copper worth collecting.
The figures shown are the coin values in BUCs. So it takes two Nickels to equal one BUC.
For a quick conversion from standard D&D coinage:
Platinum Piece = 1 Gold
Gold Piece = 4 Silver
Silver Piece = 2 Copper
Copper Piece = 1 Bronze
and adding in my unofficial coins:
1 Bronze Piece = 1 Zinc
1 Brass Piece = 1 Iron
BTW, the Copper coin in this variant is also known as the QUID (Quantifying Unit Identifying Denomination. Told you Gary was incorrigable.) You could have locations using QUIDs instead of BUCs just to keep your players on their toes.
Note: I included a second entry for Oricalchum because it does exist in real life. Oricalchum as a fantasy metal comes from Theosophy, and is about as reliable as any other fact on subjects Atlantean, Lemurian, or occultic written down by Madame Blavatsky. Real world oricalchum is an alloy of gold and copper. I figured a value half that of gold in BUCs was about right.
In Mythus the coins weigh in at one ounce each. If you'd rather use the D&D coin weight go right ahead. Though doing so does make the coins worth much more than their real world metal value. Especially copper.
Have fun with it.
Platinum: 10 Gold
Gold: 10 Silver
Silver: 10 Copper
Copper: 10 Bronze
Bronze: 10 Brass
Brass: 1/10th Bronze
Or in LA prices:
Platinum: 1,000 dollars
Gold: 100 dollars
Silver: 10 dollars
Copper: 1 dollar
Bronze: 10¢
Brass: 1¢
Or you could try this variant I got from the Mythus RPG:
Metal and Value
Orichalcum (Fantasy): 3,0000
Platinum: 1,500
Gold: 1,000
Orichalcum (Historical): 500
Adamantine: 200
Electrum: 200
Silver: 25
Copper: 5
Bronze: 1
Nickel: 0.5
Brass: 0.25
Zinc: 0.1
Tin: 0.05
Iron: 0.01
With this scheme the Gold Piece is replaced by a bronze coin. Dubbed (by Col. Pladoh) the Basic Unit Coin (BUC). (Yes, Gary is an incorrigable punster. Please refrain from incorriging.) So when you tell your players they find 3,000 in gold what they find are 3 gold coins. It also makes copper worth collecting.
The figures shown are the coin values in BUCs. So it takes two Nickels to equal one BUC.
For a quick conversion from standard D&D coinage:
Platinum Piece = 1 Gold
Gold Piece = 4 Silver
Silver Piece = 2 Copper
Copper Piece = 1 Bronze
and adding in my unofficial coins:
1 Bronze Piece = 1 Zinc
1 Brass Piece = 1 Iron
BTW, the Copper coin in this variant is also known as the QUID (Quantifying Unit Identifying Denomination. Told you Gary was incorrigable.) You could have locations using QUIDs instead of BUCs just to keep your players on their toes.
Note: I included a second entry for Oricalchum because it does exist in real life. Oricalchum as a fantasy metal comes from Theosophy, and is about as reliable as any other fact on subjects Atlantean, Lemurian, or occultic written down by Madame Blavatsky. Real world oricalchum is an alloy of gold and copper. I figured a value half that of gold in BUCs was about right.
In Mythus the coins weigh in at one ounce each. If you'd rather use the D&D coin weight go right ahead. Though doing so does make the coins worth much more than their real world metal value. Especially copper.
Have fun with it.
