Gems as trade goods


Rules Questions


I've come across the argument that gems are trade goods. This isn't very relevant when it comes to handing out treasures, as a GM you can just decide how you want to run it. But this is relevant if your characters can keep their surplus wealth in valuable spell components (diamond dust and large diamonds) that can be used to cast rarely cast spells while stranded in the wilderness (raise dead, restoration), while having the option to redeem those gems/dust for full value later.

3.5 included gems and jewelry in their description of trade goods. Pathfinder excludes those items from the description of trade goods in the Core Rulebook and Ultimate Equipment. Is there any indication that those were not intentional exclusions?

(In my home games I run gems as a currency, but this is relevant with PFS shenanigans.)

The Exchange Owner - D20 Hobbies

I'd be astonished if someone (GM) wished to prohibit me from selling a gem for full value. Gems are used as trade same as gold bars and coins in real life. The fact they are not listed should not indicate they are not trade goods?


I've continued to run and play in games where gems were still treated as trade goods (and worth their full value instead of half price).

Not sure if there is any place that states this or not in the Pathfinder rules.

If they're not, it just means players are carrying around more weight in gold or platinum.

Which is usually alleviated by owning a bag of holding or handy haversack.


I'm the treasurer for my group and the rule that I follow is "If it's theoretically mechanically useful it sells for half, if it's just decorative or inherently valuable it sells for full."

By that logic a gem would sell for full while diamond dust would sell for half as it is has mechanic uses.

Dark Archive

Is this what you are looking for?

From Ultimate Equipment under Gems and Jewelry: "Principally used to make trinkets and adorn objects, gems may also serve as a compact form of currency, and jewelry can be an efficient way to store treasure. Gems can be found uncut or not set within jewelry. They are often used to adorn walls and statues, and can be plucked from their settings.

There are two main categories of gemstones: semi-precious and precious gems. Most types of gems are semi-precious. Only a select number of gems are considered precious and fetch incredible prices. Some gems, such as those found in mines or quarries, are found in their unworked state. In general, an unworked gemstone is worth half as much as a worked gemstone of the same type.

Gems and jewelry can be bought or sold at their total value, and are sometimes used as currency. For simplicity's sake, assume that 50 gems weigh 1 pound."


DmRrostarr wrote:
Is this what you are looking for?

From the Appendix of the UE. That is exactly what I was looking for.

As Gallant Armor discussed, I did a double take on being able to sell something that has a mechanical benefit at full value.

There is still the question of diamond dust. Although it is not listed as a gem or trade good, there is an argument that it could be a trade good.


Pathfinder Maps Subscriber; Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber

Given diamond dust's usefulness for raise dead and sundry other spells, it should sell for at least its full value. In fact, it's a wonder there is any left in the world at all. Presumably somebody is making a killing harvesting it from the plane of earth, or other extraplanar locations.

It's a pity that the quantity of diamond dust required for spells is expressed in terms of gold peice value. If it was by volume or weight, you could do some interesting things with its value on the marketplace.


Pathfinder Maps, Starfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Maps, Starfinder Roleplaying Game, Starfinder Society Subscriber; Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber

There is also the question of the process used to turn a full value gem into dust -- assuming that the spells that require diamond dust as a component won't accept full diamonds of equivalent value in their place.

If grinding a diamond into dust does not take too long, I could see holding off on doing it until you need the diamond dust for a spell.


David knott 242 wrote:

There is also the question of the process used to turn a full value gem into dust -- assuming that the spells that require diamond dust as a component won't accept full diamonds of equivalent value in their place.

If grinding a diamond into dust does not take too long, I could see holding off on doing it until you need the diamond dust for a spell.

By the crafting physics of Golarion, you can grind a 5000g diamond into 10,000g worth of dust? Does this mean diamond dust is a manufactured good and no longer qualifies as a trade good?

Also, grinding a diamond into dust not taking long?... I guess this is a world fireballs and raising people from the dead... why not.


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Those are both good questions.

I was actually assuming that you would be grinding a 5000 GP diamond into 5000 GP worth of diamond dust (which you would only be able to sell for 2500 GP if it does not count as a trade good). But if you are intending to use the dust immediately to cast a spell, you don't really care about that loss of sale value.

But if grinding a diamond into dust is difficult and/or time consuming, that would raise the question as to why diamond dust is worth less than actual diamonds if in some cases (such as casting certain spells) you would actually rather have the dust -- so I would have to assume that in the game world this process is either quick and simple or unnecessary.


Ah, like that the diamond dust is actually a by-product of the jewelry industry, and casters only use it for restorations because it it cheaper than real diamonds?

Grand Lodge

Pathfinder Adventure Path Subscriber

Surely something is "worth" what you pay for it. 5,000 gp of diamond dust could be a 5 gp diamond ground down, if you choose to pay the jeweler that much money. ;)


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For simplicity's sake, assume that 50 gems weigh 1 pound.

NEWS TO ME!


Darrell Impey UK wrote:
Surely something is "worth" what you pay for it. 5,000 gp of diamond dust could be a 5 gp diamond ground down, if you choose to pay the jeweler that much money. ;)

Nope, the game assumes that there is some form of objective worth, likely based on size (not to mention color and purity)... so 5000 gp worth of diamond dust would add up to 5000 gp worth of diamond(s)... selling 5gp worth of diamond dust at a x 1000 markup won't make it worth enough to cast a spell requiring 5000 gp worth of diamond.

as things stand, I've always treated gems as an alternative form of currency, negociable at full worth by PCs (and generally sold at cost without even a markup, unless I'm feeling in a bad mood)


How is diamond dust made anyways?


Pathfinder Maps Subscriber; Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber

The underlying premise is that gems and jewelry and even such peripheral products as diamond dust have an intrinsic value. It's really a question of simplification more than anything else.

In an ideal world, instead of saying that a given spell requires 5000gp of diamond dust, the spell would say that it requires 5 grams of diamond dust, and that the typical market price is 1000gp per gram. That would allow the DM and the players to "play the market" on occasion, for whatever "added value" in game experience terms that might bring.

But instead, our game says the spell requires 5000gp of diamond dust, as if the gold peice value were a measure of weight or volume.

It's all part of the simplification process that our game uses when dealing with cash. In the real world, different countries would mint coins of varying purity and varying weight, and you would have to deal with such vagaries as "shaved" coins and impure alloys.

It's just easier to say a gold piece is a gold peice, whether it comes from Varisia, Tian or ancient Thassilon. And the same simplification process extends to gems, and eventually to such by products as gem dust. Adventurers don't keep track of having a ruby of 2.7 carats, with a certain cut and clarity value, they just know that it's worth 1200gp. The same goes for jewelry or, by extension, valuable art objects.

Diamond dust (to answer Goblin_Priest's question) is a byproduct of gemcutting. Presumably, you could also smash a gemstone to create the dust, but since diamond is one of the hardest materials known to man, that would seem problematical to me, on the surface of things.

So it's just easier to keep things abstract, and to deal with how much they're worth (in gp value) than specific weights and measures.


So how do they cut diamonds in PF? :P


Goblin_Priest wrote:
So how do they cut diamonds in PF? :P

Adamantine files, I'd guess.


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Wheldrake wrote:
Presumably, you could also smash a gemstone to create the dust, but since diamond is one of the hardest materials known to man, that would seem problematical to me, on the surface of things.

Diamonds are hard but not very tough. (The opposite of hard is soft. The opposite of tough is brittle. It's a bit like the difference between Strength and Constitution.) You can shatter one with a hammer if you hit it at the right angle.


Wheldrake wrote:

Presumably, you could also smash a gemstone to create the dust, but since diamond is one of the hardest materials known to man, that would seem problematical to me, on the surface of things.

Actually, surprisingly enough, diamonds are relatively easy to shatter:

"Wikipedia: Material Properties of Diamond wrote:


Unlike hardness, which denotes only resistance to scratching, diamond's toughness or tenacity is only fair to good. Toughness relates to the ability to resist breakage from falls or impacts. Because of diamond's perfect and easy cleavage, it is vulnerable to breakage. A diamond will shatter if hit with an ordinary hammer. The toughness of natural diamond has been measured as 2.0 MPa m1/2, which is good compared to other gemstones, but poor compared to most engineering materials. As with any material, the macroscopic geometry of a diamond contributes to its resistance to breakage. Diamond has a cleavage plane and is therefore more fragile in some orientations than others. Diamond cutters use this attribute to cleave some stones, prior to faceting.

reference link (scroll down to toughness)

Edit: ninja'd


First you take a pile of charcoal. Then you cast fabricate to make it a pile of diamond (fabricate doesn't care about heat requirements for metals, why should it care about carbon?). Then you cast disintegrate on the pile. You now have a pile of diamond dust.


Pathfinder Maps Subscriber; Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber
The Sideromancer wrote:
First you take a pile of charcoal. Then you cast fabricate to make it a pile of diamond (fabricate doesn't care about heat requirements for metals, why should it care about carbon?). Then you cast disintegrate on the pile. You now have a pile of diamond dust.

Any DM who allowed this travesty of the fabricate rules would find his campaign economy (and any pretense of WBL limts) completely shattered, just like the above diamonds. Don't go there.

Lantern Lodge

Wheldrake wrote:
The Sideromancer wrote:
First you take a pile of charcoal. Then you cast fabricate to make it a pile of diamond (fabricate doesn't care about heat requirements for metals, why should it care about carbon?). Then you cast disintegrate on the pile. You now have a pile of diamond dust.
Any DM who allowed this travesty of the fabricate rules would find his campaign economy (and any pretense of WBL limts) completely shattered, just like the above diamonds. Don't go there.

Not necessarily,

Perhaps the diamonds created through the fabricate spell are low grade diamonds. Not the crystal clear ones used for fine jewelry, but opaque muddy diamonds suitable only for use as an abrasive on modern industrial saw blades or grinding wheels. Perhaps 5000 gp worth of low grade diamond dust equates to a wheelbarrow full of the stuff, which makes it a lot less practical, or desirable for anything outside of spell casting.


Why else would i suggest manufacturing by the pile? :P


I thought it said somewhere that Trade Goods and Valuables are both exceptions to the half-price-sale rule. I would include jewelry and artwork in this category as well.


Thanks for the info on diamond toughness!

I would reckon fabricate has a limit to how much value of diamond it would be able to make from carbon sources. I would use the quality restrictions to say that you can only make diamonds of equal value to the carbon source used. Again, spells use value of materials and not volume nor weight.


fabricate says it can make items out of the source material, that remain the same material. I think it could easily be argued that coal and diamond, while both made up of the same atoms, are not the same "material" in a manufacturing (or "fabricating") sense.


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What, pray tell, would be the Craft skill rolled for that casting of fabricate? I'm sure the skill doesn't exist in medieval fantasy. Can't craft diamonds if you don't know anything about how diamonds are formed in the first place without metagaming.


Ravingdork wrote:
What, pray tell, would be the Craft skill rolled for that casting of fabricate? I'm sure the skill doesn't exist in medieval fantasy. Can't craft diamonds if you don't know anything about how diamonds are formed in the first place without metagaming.

"You must make an appropriate Craft check to fabricate articles requiring a high degree of craftsmanship."

By that quote you should only need a craft check for items that are craftable. If you are creating an uncut stone you wouldn't need a craft check. If you are creating a cut stone then a craft (jewelry) or similar should work.


Gallant Armor wrote:
Ravingdork wrote:
What, pray tell, would be the Craft skill rolled for that casting of fabricate? I'm sure the skill doesn't exist in medieval fantasy. Can't craft diamonds if you don't know anything about how diamonds are formed in the first place without metagaming.

"You must make an appropriate Craft check to fabricate articles requiring a high degree of craftsmanship."

By that quote you should only need a craft check for items that are craftable. If you are creating an uncut stone you wouldn't need a craft check. If you are creating a cut stone then a craft (jewelry) or similar should work.

But what check is it to know that diamonds can be formed from carbon?

Not any craft skill. And probably not known by the knowledge skills of the era either. I'm not sure when people realized the diamonds were carbon atoms aligned in a specific conformation, but that requires understanding atoms and their arrangement, something that is not known in the Pathfinder universe in my opinion.


Claxon wrote:
But what check is it to know that diamonds can be formed from carbon?

Well, historically, it was Craft (alchemy).

And the knowledge that diamonds were made of the same stuff that charcoal is predates atomic theory by a fair bit.


Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber; Pathfinder Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber
Orfamay Quest wrote:
Claxon wrote:
But what check is it to know that diamonds can be formed from carbon?

Well, historically, it was Craft (alchemy).

And the knowledge that diamonds were made of the same stuff that charcoal is predates atomic theory by a fair bit.

Source?


CraziFuzzy wrote:
I thought it said somewhere that Trade Goods and Valuables are both exceptions to the half-price-sale rule. I would include jewelry and artwork in this category as well.

The questions under all these tangents are: there are ideas that are spell components and trade goods/gems/art. Should they be treated any different. And is diamonds dust a trade good/gem/art?


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Ravingdork wrote:
Orfamay Quest wrote:
Claxon wrote:
But what check is it to know that diamonds can be formed from carbon?

Well, historically, it was Craft (alchemy).

And the knowledge that diamonds were made of the same stuff that charcoal is predates atomic theory by a fair bit.

Source?

http://www.howdoweknowit.com/2013/04/17/how-do-we-know-that-diamond-and-gra phite-are-both-made-of-carbon/

Lavoisier's diamond experiments were in 1772; Dalton's crude first idea of atomic theory wasn't developed until 1808; modern atomic theory wasn't really developed until the late 19th century.


It has been found where the book says that gems are sold at full value, so a level 9+ cleric can keep his cash in 5000g diamonds (just in case someone dies). Now we want to know if he can pull that stunt with diamond dust.


DM Livgin wrote:
CraziFuzzy wrote:
I thought it said somewhere that Trade Goods and Valuables are both exceptions to the half-price-sale rule. I would include jewelry and artwork in this category as well.
The questions under all these tangents are: there are ideas that are spell components and trade goods/gems/art. Should they be treated any different.

Por qué no los dos? The consecrate spell requires 25 gp worth of silver dust; arcane lock requires 25 gp worth of gold dust, astral projection requires a 1,000 gp jacinth, and, of course, resurrection requires a 10,000 gp diamond.

Scrying requires a silver mirror worth 1,000 gp, which I would certainly argue to be artwork (given the amount of craftsmanship that went into medieval mirrors), contingency requires an expensive ivory statuette, and shield of law requires a 500 gp reliquary.

Just because something is a gem or an art object doesn't mean that it's not also magically valuable. Goodness, simple pepper is a trade good -- but also required (in minute quantities) for the allfood spell.


Fabricate wrote:
You convert material of one sort into a product that is of the same material.

Charcoal and diamonds aren't the same material, any more than diamonds, carbon nanotubes, and fullerenes are. Their characteristic properties are completely different. You shouldn't attempt to use a non-standard definition of "material" (like "same atomic composition"), because it leads to silliness not covered by the rules ("I'm going to turn this charcoal into nitrogen, because I have the right ratios of protons, electrons, and neutrons.").


Cheburn wrote:
Fabricate wrote:
You convert material of one sort into a product that is of the same material.
Charcoal and diamonds aren't the same material, any more than diamonds, carbon nanotubes, and fullerenes are.

So, um, fabricate isn't able to turn ice into water?


Not to mention the impossibility of allow production. What kind of crafting spell can't melt two blocks into one pot?!


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The Sideromancer wrote:
Not to mention the impossibility of allow production. What kind of crafting spell can't melt two blocks into one pot?!

It can, it's just that nobody likes to reference "two blocks, one pot."


Pathfinder Maps, Starfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Maps, Starfinder Roleplaying Game, Starfinder Society Subscriber; Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber
Orfamay Quest wrote:
Cheburn wrote:
Fabricate wrote:
You convert material of one sort into a product that is of the same material.
Charcoal and diamonds aren't the same material, any more than diamonds, carbon nanotubes, and fullerenes are.
So, um, fabricate isn't able to turn ice into water?

I think it might be best to go with two things being made of the same material if there is a known mundane process for turning one into the other. The process for freezing water or melting ice is well known, but the process for converting diamonds into other forms of carbon or vice versa is obscure to us and completely unknown to the people of Golarion -- especially since they haven't gotten as far as having a concept of "carbon".

Of course, if the Fabricate spell still exists in the Starfinder setting, there is a good chance that it will work for such processes in that setting, where they likely do have the necessary knowledge of chemical processes.


David knott 242 wrote:
Orfamay Quest wrote:
Cheburn wrote:
Fabricate wrote:
You convert material of one sort into a product that is of the same material.
Charcoal and diamonds aren't the same material, any more than diamonds, carbon nanotubes, and fullerenes are.
So, um, fabricate isn't able to turn ice into water?

I think it might be best to go with two things being made of the same material if there is a known mundane process for turning one into the other.

That reformulation either doesn't help, or it's needlessly restrictive. What about cases where A can be turned into B, but not B into A? Or, for that matter, where neither A nor B can be turned into each other, but C can be turned into either?

I admit, I think of "same material" as an equivalence relationship; if A and B are the same material, then so are B and A -- and if A and B are the same material, as are B and C, then so are A and C. Therefore, a chair, a bed, and a table are all the same material (wood), and the fabricate spell can convert a bed to a chair, a task possibly impossible to a mundane crafter.


It might take a while, but you might be able to remove each nail, rearrange the pieces, and reinstall the nails. It wouldn't look good by any means, and it would probably be unstable, but it might be possible.


Goblin_Priest wrote:
How is diamond dust made anyways?

by grinding diamonds against each other, generally a side product of cutting diamonds to improve their jewel value, but bad diamonds might get ground to dust because it enhances their value as component for spells.

But yeah, adamantine files and grinders are another possibility...


Ultimate Equipment gives a list of different gems and their prices. In short, the price of a jewel is divided between the base price and the added value from the gem being worked. This added value ranges from 40 to
160% of the base value.

I would think that if you grind a worked gem into dust, the added value is simply lost. For example, if you gring a large diamond worth 5000 gp (2500 gp base value + 2500 gp added value), you only get 2500 gp worth of diamond dust.

Otherwise there would be a difference whether you gring an unworked gem, or if you first work the gem into a jewel and then grind it. And counterintuitively, the second way would produce dust worth more.


Orfamay Quest wrote:
David knott 242 wrote:
Orfamay Quest wrote:
Cheburn wrote:
Fabricate wrote:
You convert material of one sort into a product that is of the same material.
Charcoal and diamonds aren't the same material, any more than diamonds, carbon nanotubes, and fullerenes are.
So, um, fabricate isn't able to turn ice into water?

I think it might be best to go with two things being made of the same material if there is a known mundane process for turning one into the other.

That reformulation either doesn't help, or it's needlessly restrictive. What about cases where A can be turned into B, but not B into A? Or, for that matter, where neither A nor B can be turned into each other, but C can be turned into either?

I admit, I think of "same material" as an equivalence relationship; if A and B are the same material, then so are B and A -- and if A and B are the same material, as are B and C, then so are A and C. Therefore, a chair, a bed, and a table are all the same material (wood), and the fabricate spell can convert a bed to a chair, a task possibly impossible to a mundane crafter.

Water and ice aren't the same material, so by the strictest reading, probably not. In terms of chemical connectivity, however, water and ice are much closer than charcoal and diamonds; you just ordered the (unchanged) molecules a bit.

In a game I was GMing, that strictest reading probably wouldn't come up unless a player wanted to do something like use Fabricate to generate diamonds from charcoal.

However, you do generally have a temperature change though on going from water --> ice, which is not part of the spell. So I might not allow it for that reason as well. Similarly, I wouldn't be inclined to let a player use Fabricate to make liquid nitrogen or a superheated plasma.

Neither would I let a player use it to 'reorganize' the gas in a room and kill themselves by setting off an improvised fusion bomb.

Obviously, a bed, chair, and table are all made out of wood, and you could make one out of the other with Fabricate, assuming you had enough volume of material to work with.


Cheburn wrote:
Orfamay Quest wrote:
So, um, fabricate isn't able to turn ice into water?
Water and ice aren't the same material, so by the strictest reading, probably not.

Well, that tells me everything I need to know about your interpretation, I'm afraid. I reject it utterly. You've acknowledged that the consequences of your reading are, to me, absurd -- I'm not simply misinterpreting you.

We have here a magic spell that's capable of fitting two pieces of lathed wood together to get a plank, something impossible even to the most skilled craftsman, but it can't melt ice?


Orfamay Quest wrote:
Cheburn wrote:
Orfamay Quest wrote:
So, um, fabricate isn't able to turn ice into water?
Water and ice aren't the same material, so by the strictest reading, probably not.

Well, that tells me everything I need to know about your interpretation, I'm afraid. I reject it utterly. You've acknowledged that the consequences of your reading are, to me, absurd -- I'm not simply misinterpreting you.

We have here a magic spell that's capable of fitting two pieces of lathed wood together to get a plank, something impossible even to the most skilled craftsman, but it can't melt ice?

Magic does what it says it does. That's a (un?)balancing factor in the Pathfinder system.

Fitting two pieces of lathed wood together is what the spell says it does. Therefore it does it.

Heating or cooling a material is not. Therefore, it does not do it.

You're giving a purposefully innocuous example, but once you allow Fabricate to change temperatures, then you can use it to cool water to 0 K (absolute zero), or heat it to 10,000 K (around the temperature of some stars). There is absolutely nothing in the text of the spell about using it to change the temperature of a material, so there is no limit on what temperature you can go to.

After all, we're in Pathfinder and magic can do "anything."

See my example of using Fabricate to set off a nuclear blast -- you could justify it using very similar logic to that expressed in support of changing charcoal to diamonds.*

Therefore, the spell does what it says. It doesn't change temperatures, and it doesn't change one material (charcoal) into another (diamonds).

--

*Assuming that nuclear blasts can happen in Pathfinder, and that in Pathfinder, diamonds and charcoal are actually related to each other. To my knowledge, these aren't actually defined in the rules.

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