Add real change to your game with GameMastery Campaign Coins—actual minted coins perfect for use with any fantasy roleplaying game!
Campaign Coins offer a high-quality, "real-feel" fantasy game monetary system with actual metal coins representing the different metals and denominations commonly found in popular gaming systems. So much more immersive than conventional "pen & paper" recording of your hard earned loot, Campaign Coins create more opportunities for creative roleplaying as you actually hand over cash at your local tavern, bribe a town guard to look the other way, or pay passage to the next exotic port!
Game Masters, reward your players with cold, hard cash after an epic battle or the plundering of a long lost tomb. Players, equip yourself with a belt pouch and guard your precious coin.
This pack contains 12 platinum-toned metal coins in denominations of 10, 50, and 100 (4 coins of each denomination).
It took a while for my FLGS to get these in stock, but it was definitely worth the wait. I bought five sets of campaign coins: Copper (1,2,5); Silver (1,2,5); Gold (1,2,5); Platinum (1,2,5) and (10,50,100). Between these five sets, I have enough coins for all four of my players at the lower levels of game play. When they reach 10 copper, I upgrade them to a silver, when they reach 10 silver, I upgrade them to a gold, etc.
As the game progresses and the characters acquire more wealth, I plan on picking up some additional high-platinum coins, but I'm otherwise set. The art on these coins is attractive, and making them in different shapes was a great idea, as it makes it extremely easy to tell the different denominations apart at a quick glance. This is easily one of the most satisfying gaming accessory purchases that I've made in recent years.
took my 10% holiday discount and applied it to a big campaign coin purchase!
so, I'm not sure how useful or gimmicky these coins are going to be. I've been using paper money for a while now, and my players originally thought it was cool, and eventually got bored of using the money and asked me if they could just keep track of things "old school" (pen and paper) style.
these coins won't be able to replace paper money as a comprehensive money source, because it would be too expensive to purchase enough coins to keep up with actual in-game currency. (Although I'm sure that paizo would love it if I were to put in a 10k purchase for coins :-)
So here are some ways I'm thinking about using these coins:
- for tasty role playing bits. want to give a copper to that beggar? you have one. need to bribe the town guard with a gp? no problem. think a little platinum bling will encourage that hot barmaid to warm your bed at the inn? go for it.
- for tracking total wealth. this will basically mean potentially investing in a lot of 100 pp platinum pieces. and this could be expensive too: $11.99 for 640 platinum pieces ~= $12 USD for 6,400 gold pieces =~ 1 USD to 533.33 gold piece conversion rate. for a 4 player party, when they hit 10th level (62,000 gps per person -- PG 399), I'll have to spend 116 dollars per person, or $465 USD, to track total wealth using platinum pieces. not exactly cost prohibitive. thus, either 1) paizo issues a 1000 platinum piece coin, or 2) paizo makes available the separate purchase of 100 platinum piece coins, or 3) I abandon the entire idea and only use the coins for RP fluff.
- to make a tiny bed of coins for one of my miniature dragons :-)
took my 10% holiday discount and applied it to a big campaign coin purchase!
so, I'm not sure how useful or gimmicky these coins are going to be. I've been using paper money for a while now, and my players originally thought it was cool, and eventually got bored of using the money and asked me if they could just keep track of things "old school" (pen and paper) style.
these coins won't be able to replace paper money as a comprehensive money source, because it would be too expensive to purchase enough coins to keep up with actual in-game currency. (Although I'm sure that paizo would love it if I were to put in a 10k purchase for coins :-)
So here are some ways I'm thinking about using these coins:
- for tasty role playing bits. want to give a copper to that beggar? you have one. need to bribe the town guard with a gp? no problem. think a little platinum bling will encourage that hot barmaid to warm your bed at the inn? go for it.
- for tracking total wealth. this will basically mean potentially investing in a lot of 100 pp platinum pieces. and this could be expensive too: $11.99 for 640 platinum pieces ~= $12 USD for 6,400 gold pieces =~ 1 USD to 533.33 gold piece conversion rate. for a 4 player party, when they hit 10th level (62,000 gps per person -- PG 399), I'll have to spend 116 dollars per person, or $465 USD, to track total wealth using platinum pieces. not exactly cost prohibitive. thus, either 1) paizo issues a 1000 platinum piece coin, or 2) paizo makes available the separate purchase of 100 platinum piece coins, or 3) I abandon the entire idea and only use the coins for RP fluff.
- to make a tiny bed of coins for one of my miniature dragons :-)
how are others planning on using these coins?
I'm sooo looking at getting more coins, having gotten two set boxes, a really good buy :) I love being able to toss a bag of coins at the players and say "You find this" and they get to count and add it up :)
Sharpie Marker + Roll of Pennies = Cheaper Solution.
Not that I don't love this idea, if I had the disposable income for it I would be all about it. However, my above suggestion has the advantage of converting back into real money when necessary. Also, makes game night more like poker night!
...of course, if you do buy into this product, you can always use my idea to fill out those huge troves of copper pieces.
My big shipment of campaign coins ($120 worth) arrived day before yesterday. It was with much glee that I tore into them and greedily inspected them.
First, they positively -ooze- character. Each denomination of coin is uniquely shaped and has a distinct fantasy feel.
Second, they are sufficiently heavy and "clinky" to the touch. They feel like fantasy coins ought to feel.
Third, my gaming group was effusive when I tossed the first bag of loot onto the table for them. Much ooing and aawwing. I plan on using them in the manner described above, and then taking the coins back after they've counted through them. (Heh.) I also gave each PC a selection of different denominations to keep for RP purposes.
So, overall, as usual another great product from the folks at Paizo. Nice job guys.
It would be cool to be able to purchase lots of individual coins -- I get the feeling I'm going to be using a lot of 1, 5, and 10 GP units.
For now I hope my wife doesn't notice when that I'm slipping in another coin acquisition into all of my Paizo purchases :-)
Ah.. as much as I really love the idea of this, I did some fun math and have my own little suggestion..
Sorry about the length of the post, but it contains some background, math and a suggestion to solve this "real money vs. chits" problem.
If you really want to use these coins for the purpose of replacing all the money in the game with these, for a party of 4 people, you would have to fork out a lot of dough (Using King of the Castle chits):
So - in conclusion, I dont think one should use them for that purpose with the current pricing of items in the game. With that in mind, I tried figuring out how I would actually use them and I ended up with this potential solution:
Use a higher conversion rate than 10gp=1pp such as 100gp=1pp or even 1000gp=1pp. Since all prices in the game are in GP, this could work out very well.
Of course, the trouble with 1000gp=1pp would be that if you give out an average encounter reward at, say, level 7 - it would be 3 platinum pieces. Not exactly an epic feeling to get three coins, regardless of the denomination. One could of course mix in gp-chits into it, but that would still mean the need to buy them (a lot of them...)
100gp=1pp is better here - a healthy balance between the two. A reward for a level 7 encounter would be roughly 30 platinum pieces. Buying 2-3 packs of various GP-chits would solve that issue.
The trouble is that King of the Castle chits don't have 1PP chits. Paizo does - but those packs come with 4 chits of 1,2,5 or 10,50,100 PP and costs around twice as much.
So I figured I would think about how much money - realistically - my players would end up having stashed in total as a maximum. I came up with a couple of figures. In any given campaign, I expect my players to never have more 150 000 gold but of course that varies from DM to DM.
Here are some recommendations if you want to use this idea and what to buy for "the bank" for a party of 4 players:
200 000 gold per person: (~276 USD)
3 packs of http://paizo.com/store/gameAids/other/campaignCoins/v5748btpy8aro
3 packs of http://paizo.com/store/gameAids/other/campaignCoins/v5748btpy8arp
5 packs of http://paizo.com/store/gameAids/other/campaignCoins/v5748btpy8arq
12 packs of http://paizo.com/store/gameAids/other/campaignCoins/v5748btpy8arr
150 000 gold per person: (~228 USD)
3 packs of http://paizo.com/store/gameAids/other/campaignCoins/v5748btpy8aro
3 packs of http://paizo.com/store/gameAids/other/campaignCoins/v5748btpy8arp
4 packs of http://paizo.com/store/gameAids/other/campaignCoins/v5748btpy8arq
9 packs of http://paizo.com/store/gameAids/other/campaignCoins/v5748btpy8arr
100 000 gold per person: (~192 USD)
2 packs of http://paizo.com/store/gameAids/other/campaignCoins/v5748btpy8aro
2 packs of http://paizo.com/store/gameAids/other/campaignCoins/v5748btpy8arp
4 packs of http://paizo.com/store/gameAids/other/campaignCoins/v5748btpy8arq
6 packs of http://paizo.com/store/gameAids/other/campaignCoins/v5748btpy8arr
75 000 gold per person: (~144 USD)
2 packs of http://paizo.com/store/gameAids/other/campaignCoins/v5748btpy8aro
2 packs of http://paizo.com/store/gameAids/other/campaignCoins/v5748btpy8arp
3 packs of http://paizo.com/store/gameAids/other/campaignCoins/v5748btpy8arq
5 packs of http://paizo.com/store/gameAids/other/campaignCoins/v5748btpy8arr
Since I run a game with 6 players that are currently around level 7 I don't think I will end up buying these, I rather spend money on maps =)
Yep, I did that - but they have three cons Im not fond of:
1) More costly (not by much but still)
2) Only come in one flavor - as in - they could only be gold or platinum.
3) They don't look as nice (my personal opinion of course).
Having said that, utilizing those as opposed to doing in-game conversion rates will only get so far - you'd cut down costs, but ultimately not enough to make me want to use them =)
If you stray too far and go for a 1000-point conversion (or use the new packs that actually have a 1000-chit in them) you would end up handing out very few coins, which isnt exactly epic. Of course, you could mix in change, but then you get into the whole "then I need to buy the change" scenario.
Its tough - because on the one hand you have the game in which items worth tens of thousands of gold are not THAT uncommon and on the other hand reality, where the equivalent of one chit costs around 0.5 USD, so if you want to average that out, even with a 100 value PP, you would end up having to pay hundreds of dollars (even thousands if you really wanted to dedicate enough resources to it) to cover a long-lasting campaign.
That said - the prices I listed above are for the campaign coins only, and adding in one of these packs: http://paizo.com/store/gameAids/other/campaignCoins/v5748btpy8g5a
could certainly help, but the bigger numbers you hand out, the more you need to fill in the space between those numbers (as in: you would need change for a 1000-chit if someone decides to buy something worth 334 gold).
Dont get me wrong, I love these things and would love to use them, but I much rather track it on paper at the end of the day =)
We have been using the coins for 3 years now. I have between 15 and 30 of each coin and denomination. My group is age 25-55. We love the coins. I also purchased different colored mana stones for gems. I spent about $400 USD total for the coins and gems and have more than enough for our 8 player group. At lower levels when the guys dont have as much coin you should see how stingy they get when they have to go to their coin pouch and pull out "real" money. If for some reason we get into a 100,000+ gp find then I have them keep track of that on paper. That is almost always at higher levels 10+. I have not seen any fading or damage to the coins. They are holding up well. In the long run the coins are more than worth it, in my opinion.
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