Money Matters: What Kind of Cash is in Your Campaign?

[Deadguy]

I ahve been tempted to go from the gold to the silver standard for my Shattered World campaign, but so far I haven't found the energy to sort through everything to amend stuff. What I did do at the start was modify the universality of money. I developed a few currenices that were considered to be of high quality, and backed by the reputation of some powerful organisation (e.g. a 'religious' order, an economically powerful trading nation, etc.) These are universally accepted. Then there are local currencies, still based on gold, silver and copper. But these currencies lose value when removed from their normal sphere of influence, and must be sold on as scrap bullion, reducing their value markedly. Players who intend to travel make an effort to get paid in one of the universal currencies (often accepting lower pay for this advantage). It makes things a little more complicated, but the added verisimilitude seems to satisfy the players as well as me.

Oh, the other change was to do away with the platinum piece. This is replaced by the smaller and lighter sequin, a small shard of gemstone, cut in a distinctive fashion, and with a hole cut through to allow them to be hung together on a thread. This allows PCs (and merchants) to easily carry large sums. Even so I am tempted to introduce a slightly larger (and higher quality) gemstone worth 250gp, since a PC who is saving cash can find themselves with many pounds even of sequins!

 

[Darklone]

Roman currency (e.g. Old Ones campaign stuff), but right now I'm using standard D&D currency because of the newbies in my group... easier.

 

[abri]

IMC each country powerfull enough had their own money, made of a valuable material available in the country.
Also the shape and weight of the coins were strongly influenced by culture and the patron good of the country, so for people that travelled a lot (PC, merchants...) their were over 50 different "coins"
For example the iron triangle of Laers was the coin with the least value in the world (0.1cp) [as it was a very mercantile kingdom they needed money, but most people were too poor to have higger value coins]. On the other extreme the people of Caladri felt that silver and saphire were sacred, so all their coins were silver (including half pound coins) apart from the saphire dragon, which was an engraved sapphire
And of course in a perticular countries money from ennemy territories is rarely accepted at face value...

 

[The_Gneech]

In one campaign, I decided each country would have its own coinage, and started the game in a nation that had Gold Crowns, Silver Royals, and Coppier Pennies.

The first time I gave the players a price for something as "six Royals," one of the players got annoyed at me and said, "How much is that?"

"A Royal is one silver."

"Well sheesh, why make it difficult? Just call it six silvers for crying out loud!"

I was mighty disappointed in that game. :-`

-The Gneech

 

[kigmatzomat]

In one campaign, I decided each country would have its own coinage, and started the game in a nation that had Gold Crowns, Silver Royals, and Coppier Pennies. The first time I gave the players a price for something as "six Royals," one of the players got annoyed at me and said, "How much is that?"
"A Royal is one silver."
"Well sheesh, why make it difficult? Just call it six silvers for crying out loud!"

I found a way to get players to embrace the named coinage is to describe it as such in the treasure haul. Add in a bit of moneychanging fee for using foreign coinage so they pay attention.

"How much is that?"
"Six royals."
"I hand him six silver pieces we got from the orcs."
"The shopkeeper tells you that if you're going to use Solnars instead of Royals he needs to chip in six Pennies or another Solnar and he'll make change."

Of course, named coinage works best with players that read british books. The quid, pound, pence, ha'pence, crown, tuppence and who knows what else all makes the named coinage simple but flavorful.