The Consequences of Gold

This is another blog about how quasi-medieval tropes sometimes don’t make sense in D&D. 

On the entirety of planet earth, scientists believe there is about 171 tons of gold. You could fit in this in a cube 60ft in each dimension. This is a staggeringly small quantity of gold. It's about half a swimming pool worth of gold.

There are dragon hordes in published D&D modules with nearly as much gold as this. 

If you run gold for exp with just coins, getting to level 10 requires somewhere in the region of 30,000 gold coin. Basic D&D details that 10 gold coins weight a pound. By my calculations, this is 13 tonnes of gold. In 2nd addition AD&D, gold coins weight a third of a standard ounce or 9 grammes. This is about 2.8 tonnes. This is a significant 1.5 percent of the total quantity of extracted gold on the planet. This would be a decent stockpile for a sizeable central bank.

In short, gold is way more common in D&D than we give it credit for. 

How would this interact with our D&D economy?

For lots of reasons, like hyper inflation, monetary police and monetary base, most countries in medieval times printed their own coins. The only type of coin you could use in a country was coins made by the royal mint and stamped with the head of its monarch. 

Using gold coins you found in the dank crypt of an ancient king would not be acceptable at the local town’s smithy. They would look at you like you were trying to pay them in sexual favours or scottish banknotes. It probably wouldn’t be accepted anywhere. It is green, full of holes, smells and it certainly doesn’t bear the stamp of King Robert.

The equivalent here isn’t turning up in modern London and trying to buy a bacon sandwich with a 5 euro note. It’s trying to buy it with a pile of French Livre from 1800. Or, even more parallel, trying to buy it with a roman denarii you dug up from an old fort ruin in your back yard. 

This would play absolute havoc with pricing and exchange rates. How do we know that a Naga gold coin is worth as much as one of Roberts gold coins? What is the metal quantity like? What is the exchange rate between a Duergar electrum coin or pile of Elven silver? 

What I know for sure is that it is in King Robert’s interest for only his own money to be in use. ‘Illegal’ tender now has to be reported to the mint, where it can be scrapped and melted down in replace for a lesser quantity of the king’s minted gold.  

I imagine an NPC who melts antique coins down to mineral worth and the sells the gold back to the mint. She has one eye. The locals probably call her The Clipper. She would be an interesting place to marker weird treasure and monster valuables.

Whatever it does, it’ll change how your adventurers think and challenge them to get rich in different ways. 

Some Weird Spells from Best Left Buried

These are all unlevelled spells I wrote for my new RPG, Best Left Buried. I had a bunch of spells that relate to single schools, like Abjuration or Evocation or whatever, but no weird, ridiculous spells that belong in old school games. I took inspiration from a Scrap Princess blog that made the rounds about writing spells that weren't just keycards or blasting spells, and had some more tangible materialness. These belong in the same place as one of my favourite blogposts of all time, Skerples' 100 Orthodox Wizard Spells.

Best Left Buried has a few gaming terms that don't belong in normal OSR terms, which would make these skills trivially easy to convert. Against the Odds is disadvantage. Upper Hand is advantage. Observation checks are perception checks. The three stats are Brawn, Wit and Will.

Candleseeker

You summon a semi-sentient mote of shadow. It travels at walking pace towards the closest source of non-natural, non-magical light or fire (a torch, a candle, a campfire, an alchemical brazier) within 10 miles. When it arrives, it eats the light, causing it to be extinguished.

Stonebone

You turn the a specific bone a creature’s body to stone by magical impetus. Target a humanoid within short range, and choose its head, torso or one of its limbs and turn the bones within to solid stone for 1 hour. This makes the bones more immobile and harder, but more brittle. An unwilling target may resist with an Against The Odds Brawn (Constitution) check. If the target has no bones, the spell has no effect.

Bone Magnet

You activate the trace of magnetic iron within the human skeleton. Target an object within short range and choose whether it attracts or repels. All targets with a skeleton within the zone must succeed a Will (Wisdom) check, or be attracted or repelled to the object for the next minute. If the object is small, the object will move towards the nearest skeleton. If the object is large, the skeletons will move towards it. Targets that pass the Will check can still move within the zone, but at half speed. If the target has no bones, the spell has no effect.

Pocket Realm

You whisk one small item away to a pocket dimension. Target a small object you touch that can fit in the palm of your hand. It is removed from existence and deposited safely in an extra-dimensional hiding place. The next time you cast this spell, the object you cast it on replaces the object already hidden in the Pocket Realm. The previously hidden object then appears in the palm of your hand.  

Mirror Sheen

You give a surface of an item a glassy, reflective sheen like a mirror. Touch a surface no larger than 5x5 feet. Its surface is transformed into completely reflective glass. If struck with any force the thin glass layer will shatter and reveal the original surface beneath.

Ropemaker’s Trim

You transform a length of humanoid hair into rope. Touch any quantity of hair bundled up in a width equivalent to a ponytail or braid. Each inch of hair  you transform turns into a foot of rope. The rope maintains the smell, colour and texture of human hair. If the hair has been braided before the transformation, the resulting rope is stronger.

Ne’ertrue Imitation

You create an almost perfect copy of an item. Touch any object that weighs less than a kilogram and produce a copy of it made of similar material. It is a passable imitation when observed from a distance or for fooling laymen, but any close inspection by an expert or magic user reveals the copy as a sham. The copy exists for one hour and then crumbles into dust. Merchants, tradespeople, and lawmen get very annoyed by this spell. Its use is punishable by death in most cities.

Voodoo Blindness

You inflict a terrible psychic injury upon yourself, which is transferred onto an enemy creature. You may Blind, Deafen, Restrain or Immobilise yourself. Choose a creature within short range, the enemy must succeed on an Against The Odds Will (Wisdom) check or suffer the same effect. The spell ends after 1 minute, and the effect ends on both you and the enemy.

Fear The Light

You compel the spirits that live within open flames to attack the nearest target. This spells targets every light source in a Zone within long range. Each source of light attacks the nearest creature to it. The larger and bright the light, the more damage. Hot flames, as well alchemical or magical sources of light, may do more damage. For example, a candle might do 1 damage, a  bonfire might do 2 and the flames of a demon may do 3.

Audinull

You whisk away all sounds from the environment around you and a number of your allies. Choose up to 4 creatures within short range of you. All targeted creatures gain the following effects for the next 10 minutes:

• They gain the Upper Hand on stealth based Wit checks.
• All sound based Observation checks against them are Against The Odds.
• They cannot speak or communicate in any way using sound.

Cadavic Augury

You investigate a corpse and divine some secrets of its death. You must touch a piece of the corpse to find this information. Roll a D6 in the below table be granted on of the following clues:

1. A clue to the method of death (a symptom of disease, description of a murderer or murder weapon, etc) 
2. A location of death.
3. A brief pang of emotion.
4. The last thing they said before they died.
5. A secret they carried with them to the grave.
6. Roll twice and gain both. 

The more precious the body part you touch and the more recent the death, the more coherent the information will be. Somewhat surprisingly, the entrails seem to be the most revealing source of information. A field of corpses with disturbed intestines is likely the sign of a prying necromancer.