Alternative types of currency? (mithril coins, etc)


Lost Omens Campaign Setting General Discussion


So I was thinking of introducing the idea of alternative forms of currency in my campaign, such as the use of "trade bars" or mithril coins, etc. A trade bar would be much like a bank note, typically made in platinum or other precious metals and worth more than its materials based on the bank or temple that issued it. Possibly only worth extra in a given city, or when traded with members of a specific temple, etc.

Same general sorta rules would apply to the idea of using non-standard coinage such as mithril or bronze coins.

Does anyone know of examples within the Golarion setting where such a thing has been done already? Or any suggestions on how to set up such a thing?


I've always liked the idea of a different kind of currency to the standard GP, SP, CP system. If you actually look at how much money was worth in the Medieval period, one gold coin would be worth a soldier's yearly salary. ONE. GOLD. COIN. Adventurers are given twenty gold coins a piece for clearing out a goblin warren. That would be a fortune in real world Medieval currency.

I've toyed around with bumping the value of coins up a step with gold being worth as much as platinum, silver worth as much as gold, and so on with copper pennies being the most commonly used currency and it worked well enough. During one session, I experimented with making my players engage in bartering to get what they needed because the locals had no concept of money, but that was far more effort than my gang of murderhobos was willing to tolerate before resorting to a "kill the merchant, take the goods and run" type of bargaining. So be warned, authenticity can lead to frustrations for players.

Paper money was used in China long before in the West, and could be exchanged for either goods or 'hard' currency such as gold and silver, so this is definitely an option if your group is constantly lugging around coinage that would weigh in at the hundreds of pounds after a successful dungeon crawl.

Hope this was helpful!

Grand Lodge

I got this idea after watching Bollywood's "Bahubali".

A tyrant has a 100 foot (or whatever) gold statue of himself built. After he is overthrown, his successors have some bills to pay (they had to hire mercenaries and whatnot), so they issue scripts representing some part of the statue. For instance, someone might be paid in the statue's right little finger - so they get a document stating they own it.

But the statue is still there, what is in circulation is paper representing part ownership in it. Some of the papers might represent a very small part - maybe a tenth of an eyelash.

(Also see Rai Stones - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rai_stones )


*kicks down the door

DID SOMEONE MENTION MEDIEVAL FANTASY ECONOMICS?! :D

But seriously, this is a perfectly fine idea. Some cities may have bank notes in circulation as well, but that's probably just cities around the Inner Sea (the most "civilized" areas). I imagine the temples of Abadar are in full support of this.

Any problems that arise are probably the result of Golarion's economy only being fleshed out enough to facilitate adventuring, which is perfectly fine. This is Pathfinder, not Spice & Wolf (really good low-fantasy anime series about medieval economics).

Jon Brazer Enterprises

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Jade coins.

If you are a hag or a denizen of leng, I imagine soul gems would be a solid option.

Dark Archive

I've been working on a Golarion currency table for a Skulls & Shackles game I'm in. I'll PM some of you once I finish it and post it.

Augustina of Drenchport wrote:


But the statue is still there, what is in circulation is paper representing part ownership in it. Some of the papers might represent a very small part - maybe a tenth of an eyelash.

Stealing this idea for a later campaign.


Anyone interested in the history of money should check out Extra History's series on it. https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLmKXQuG1OdOyGI0ZyjgiqMQW9r03Fs60k


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Pathfinder Lost Omens, Rulebook Subscriber

In the out of print campaign setting book, there's a special type of currency only used in Absalom. I don't have the book in front of me so I forget what it's called, but the coins are made of a combination of all three metals.

I'm sure the priests of Abadar have all sorts of fun ways to conduct commerce beyond the GP system. I always imagined them operating like the Knights Templar, where one can use their script in place of money and never have to carry official currency.


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There’s a GM Word of the Week episode dealing with this sort of thing. They make a case for electrum coins, and point out that platinum wasn’t considered valuable until very recently. Apparently it was basically considered an impurity and thrown away with the rest of the dross during the Renaissance era.

link

Of course, with magic and stuff you can probably find ways to refine lots of things, so maybe platinum or aluminum coins would be perfectly viable, to say nothing of mithril, adamantine, or cold iron coinage.

Also, for the sake of variation I wouldn’t mind seeing systems more like the classic British system that wasn’t Base 10. Have 20 coppers to a silver and 12 silvers to a gold, or something equally idiosyncratic. Most people probably don’t want to have to do the complicated math, though. Alternatively, just use a different base. Base 8, Base, 12, even Hexadecimal coinage.


Yeah, I was thinking of introducing mithril, adamantite, and bronze coins along with "trade bars". The trade bars would have the greatest value but only when traded to the right people, otherwise they would be worth their base metals.

Any suggestions on where to place the value of a bronze coin? I'm thinking some where near that of a silver, perhaps as a replacer?


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I think bronze has value close to copper, it's just more durable. Historically, the lowest coin denomination was often made of bronze.

What may be more interesting to introduce are some other alloys, like orichalcum (gold-copper alloy) and electrum (gold-silver alloy).

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