Dragonlance [+] What do you like most about DRAGONLANCE?

[Ruin Explorer]

Other metals also usable in equipment (let's say) could also be use as higher-worth currencies, like Orichalcum, Adamantine.

Or even dragon scales, alicorn or cinnabar (mercury deposit from the radiation of dragon breaths) etc

I remember Forgotten Realm Adventures (1989) which updated the FR to 2E had, among other things, some really wonderful treasure tables which included a lot of odd currencies, I think bars of higher-value metals were among them.

 

[RuinousPowers]

I just figured the whole "gold is worthless" angle was because they just expected people to bring their characters in from other campaigns and didn't want them to just go off and buy the High Cleric Tower on their first day.

Krynn is not my favorite setting, but I like:

Mages that were different and had limitations.

First example of specialty clerics.

The original trilogy was a fun read. Had a lot of memorable characters, especially outside the main cast.

 

[AnotherGuy]

The TSR source material.

 

[Maxperson]

What do I like best about Krynn? To crush my enemies, to see them driven before me, and to hear the lamentations of... Doh! Wrong setting. Never mind.

 

[This Effin’ GM]

How they work to make the fantastic less mundane. Magic means something, a magic item is a relic not a +1 sword or whatever. I like wheel of time for the same reason

 

[Paul Farquhar]

What do I like best about Krynn? To crush my enemies, to see them driven before me, and to hear the lamentations of... Doh! Wrong setting. Never mind.

I like that one better!

 

[Ralif Redhammer]

Reading DL1, the idea appears to originally have been that each region used their own agreed-upon currencies for purchases, indeed, like we use paper and plastic. So that one area might use steel pieces, another shells, and so on. But somewhere early along the line of the franchise, the coinage just became steel, full stop.

as a kid it never dawned on me that steel can't be both rare enough to replace gold/silver AND plentiful enough to outfit armies... then again we use pieces of paper and pieces of plastic for OUR made up economy.

 

[Hussar]

Reasonable head-canon, that's not how it's presented in the setting books though.

I think it's just ill-considered, especially as there are historical examples, which I suspect the writers were unaware of. Japan shows what happens when you have big feudal-esque (I know not exactly sigh) society trying to operate whilst iron-poor. The iron age shows how iron as currency works. None of the lessons of either are evident in Krynn, it's just like "We're special so we'll use a different currency!", like the currency version of "Our elves are different!".

I'm not a metallurgist but I strongly suspect that, given how many kinds of steel there are, and how you need to use the right kind for the right job, you could not, in fact, easily use steel coins to make weapons/armour, nor easily melt weapons/armour to make steel coins. Iron would make a bit more sense.

The thing is, people are looking for an in game justification for something that was 100% the result of the rules of the game.

In the DL adventures, you kill a LOT of dragons. And you kill a lot of dragons in their lair. Which means, even if you worry a lot about carrying capacity, the PC's will still be insanely rich by a couple of levels. As in Jeff Bezos level rich. And, let's not forget that whole XP for GP rule as well. So, we switch to Iron Pieces and now you can have these massive dragon hoards - in keeping with the image of dragons - that aren't worth anything. It's 100% about game balance and nothing to do with world building.

The problem is, people come along afterward and try to backfill this into making sense when it was never meant to make sense in the first place. Steel Pieces wasn't an attempt to make the setting different from regular D&D. Steel Pieces were a game balance change so that you didn't have 15th level PC's by the end of the fourth module. ((Yes, that's an exageration, but, you get the point. ))

 

[James Gasik]

I remember Forgotten Realm Adventures (1989) which updated the FR to 2E had, among other things, some really wonderful treasure tables which included a lot of odd currencies, I think bars of higher-value metals were among them.

Oh sure like trade bars, or the waterdeep Harbor Moon? Yeah those were cool. I love that book, especially the art objects table.

 

[Quickleaf]

I liked the romance. Or rather, the chivalric romance! Also the graphic novels.