Dwarves and their gold. Midas the Dwarf and I have a problem. He's just a lowly commoner [with a lot of cash], but he's looking towards the future.
I don't do a lot of math often, but today I knuckled down to find some answers. This question came up when I was sitting around doing a wealthy dwarf npc build and I asked myself... If I had a grand or two of starting gold, how would I do best for my investment? Be a crafter and spend forever building things and selling them from my shop? Not bad... but what if I could solve my problem with magic?
What if I used Fabricate?
If you are familiar with the spell it takes whatever raw material you start with and replicates the quality with quantity represented in 10 cubic ft per level. Kind of like copy/paste. With bonuses.
TL;DR:
I looked around and in an archived forum there were people discussing and asking each other what GP per cubic foot would look like in a hoard...
Well. I don't know. I'm not going to calculate the empty space of gold coins in a bag or anything complicated than that. I had an evening to spend on this, not an eternity... So I decided that instead of calculating gold coins [which may be filled with air, lead, or w/e impurities] and the complexity behind what constitutes a gold coin [by its complex size dimensions etc]... I decided to base my numbers off of something simpler...
Gold bars. Universal trade goods.
The following was done with a lot of grief for the intended purpose of finally answering this weird questions "How much per cubic foot" and "what happens if you invest with Fabricate".
Remember, Magic is a Powerful Tool. In DND it's used to create entire dimensions. Complex questions like "what happens to the economy if you flood it with so much gold" or finding enough buyers or protecting your hoard from others who suddenly realize you are stacked... are irrelevant.
The question is, what can Fabricate do for you? For Me?
I hope the following will answer this question.
Fabricate 5th level spell ....
1 Fabricate spell scroll = 1,125 gp as a 5th level scroll
1 gold bar is 50 gp for trade good.
How much money are we talking about?
197,363.45 gp per minimum casting of Fabricate. Give or take 1 gp.
Cost of scroll = 1,125 gp
Cost of caster casting spell = 450 gp
Cost & time of researching spell from scratch = 17,500 gp over 35 days [500gp/day] no failure
Research spell DC = 20
There is 1206.11 lbs of gold per cubic foot.
A gold bar [US MINT] is 27.5 lbs.
There are 43.9 gold bars per cubic foot.
*50gp ea = 2192.93 gp per cubic foot
Fabricate makes 10 cubic foot of material per caster level.
Minimum Level for Wizard to cast this 5th level spell is 9.
How did I come up with this number? The Base numbers.:
1 cubic foot = 12 in x 12 in x 12 in
12 in = 30.48 cm
1 cubic foot = 28316.8466 total cubic cm
gold = 19.32 grams per cc
28,316.8466 * 19.32 = 547081.476312 grams
547.0814763119999 kg
1206.1081986718602366 LBS
Or 1206.11 lbs for our calculations per Cubic Foot of Gold
Size of a standard gold bar: [US Mint]
7 inches x 3 and 5/8 inches x 1 and 3/4 inches.
Weight of a standard gold bar:
approximately 400 ounces or 27.5 pounds.
other relative but useless information...:
One troy ounce is currently defined as exactly
0.0311034768 g or 31.1034768 kg.
[according to wikipedia]
or
1 gram = 0.0321507466 troy ounces
1 kg = 32.1507466 troy ounces
[according to google calculator]
gold bar = 50 gp ea in DND so 43.9gb * 50gp = 2192.93 gp per cubic foot
10 cb ft in lbs = 1206.11 * 10 = 12,061.1 lbs per 10 cubic feet
Fabricate = 10 cb ft/caster level
Minimum caster level = 9 for a 5th level spell [wizard]
12,061.1 lbs * 9 is equal to = 108549.9 LBS of gold… from 1 casting...
108549.9 lbs / 27.5 lbs [per gold bar] = 3947.27 gold bars * 50gp ea
is equal to = 197,364.45[continue]
Basically 197,364 gp 4 silver and 5 copper per casting
Per each 10 cubic ft of material… calculated in lbs… then gold bars…
12,061.1 lbs [per 10 cubic ft] / 27.5 lbs [per gold bar] = 438.58545 continuing…
438.58545 gold bars * 50 gp each = 21,929.28 gp
21,929.28 gp per 10 cubic foot of gold then separated into gold bars then sold
math check
x9 = 197,363.45 gp Pretty close.
for minimum fabricate spell casting [9th lvl spell casting creating 9 sets of 10 cbft blocks]
197,363.45 gp per minimum casting of Fabricate. Give or take 1 gp.
That is a lot of cheeseburgers.
Cost of scroll = 1,125 gp
Cost of caster casting the spell
Caster level × spell level × 10 gp
9 * 5 * 10 = 450 gp
… Behold the power of Fabricate.
Since that is below the 2000 gp limit it should be easy to find a caster to cast this spell.
But… what if you had to research this spell yourself?
Fabricate is a 5th level spell.
It’s 100 gp x spell level per day of research.
It takes 7x spell level to finish research.
The research DC is 10 + twice spell level
So you’re looking at…
100 gp x 5 = 500 gp per day
7 x 5 = 35 days of research
DC is 10 + 5*2 = 20
Or 17,500 gp without failure
Pretty doable. And now you know.
Knowing is half the battle.
And now players can never complain of never having enough gold.
The implications of what happens in the campaign is for you and your DM to decide.
Before you jump to conclusions about nerfing this spell or banning it, I ask you why? It's a golden opportunity! Making a whole bunch of stuff is the whole point of Fabricate and it is Magic . Now your campaign can be full of stuff like finding buyers, sellers, and getting enough people to protect your hoard. You are well on your way to becoming a dragon or fighting one which sniffs out your stash! Realize your dream of the philosopher's stone! Turn gold into more gold!
You might ask,and where are you going to get this starting gold?:
From the DM of course! HA!
Well you could always take the traits, "Rich Parents" [social] for +900 gp... and then take "Chosen Child" [regional] for another +900 gp. Not including your starting gold you have more than enough money - it's about finding the right person, having the right connections and yes... you too as a commoner could secretly hold a stash of gold bars that'd make Midas proud. Gold up front for a starting trait is looking pretty good eh?
final words:
Considering we're playing a Roleplaying game where ideally players find legendary stuff and do legendary things with them... gold isn't really everything. It's about having fun, and getting a bunch of fantasy gold to splurge on fantasy things is part of that fun. As always the final call is with your group. If you want something on paper to back up your gold-crashing of the economy or if you just want some numbers as reference, I hope the above information has helped.
disclaimer:
I and Midas are not responsible for any deaths which may occur during the casting of fabricate as the gold expands and fills the room or environment in which the spell has been cast. I and Midas are also not responsible for npcs, monsters [especially dragons], other players, deities, and any other creature, feature, or twist of fate from separating you from your gold. And remember; a fool is easily parted from his gold. Please spend responsibly.
A gold bar is a trade good made of pure gold. It trades for 50gp per gold bar. Since it's pure material, the spell will replicate the same quality for more quantity.
The point really isn't about how much 'value' that gold will have. What you have is the equivalent of Nature's Counterfeit Currency Printer in a way. Just because you have 9 square cubic feet of pure gold in bars, doesn't mean anyone wants it. It doesn't mean anyone will buy it. Gold's value is determined by those who want it and if there is a lot of it, it's value will inevitably drop.
Technically only a nation can 'mint' and its currency only recognized by other nations. Sure you can stamp anything yourself, but it won't have a recognized value. A gold bar is an international trade material that supersedes gold coins which are minted. You don't mint a gold bar you sell it by weight. In the Trades and Goods section it trades for 50gp and hence all the math is done following what a real gold bar would weigh based on its dimensions and so forth. A gold bar weighing only 1 lb, but what lb? In ounces? In Troy ounces? In fantasy lbs? I had to use something more tangible so I used a real gold bar's dimensions for the purposes of figuring out how many would fit in a cubic foot . Well, I did the best I could with what little patience I have with math as it is.
DND isn't really a game about economy. It's ratio's for 1 gp = 10 silver, 1 silver = 10 copper is a nightmare for a real nation's economy which can be seen in historical currency changes over time.
Honestly the trade currency could be used buttons and acorn shells collected only on a full moon. You could use Fabricate on those and have a ton of buttons and shells. You could do this to a gold coin and it would replicate that coin. But calculating how much you'd get per cubic foot would be a nightmare.
Honestly at the gaming table it'd make more sense for a DM to just say, "Hey you got a lot of x. It fills the room to bursting" and so forth. But players and sometimes DM's want numbers. The example above goes to show just how much number we're talking about .
Even if it's just gold bars and they have no value, if you wanted to live the dream of having a house made entirely of gold... you could do so. Easily. At very little cost.
The material made is permanent, and unlike illusions doesn't go away from casting dispell magic. You could do this to anything... adamanentine... silver, poisons, copper, wood, stone, and it'd create it 1 10 ft cubic block per caster level at a time. If you go through the list of what you could fabricate en-masse and then argue about value... well then nothing has value except Souls - which may be the only thing Fabricate might not replicate... unless of course you had a soul gem. And then the implications of that are well... Staggering.
First of all, the game only uses one kind of "pound". It's the kind of pound that trade good gold bars weigh one of, greatswords weigh 8, and that 50 coins weigh one of. Note that I am not reverse-engineering the weight of the gold bar, I'm reading directly from the equipment chapter.
Secondly, I think you misunderstand what Fabricate does. It does not create X cubic feet of finished goods from a "seed" of the appropriate material. It transforms raw material into finished product.
Well, technically it does create the finished product, but it requires as a material component the entire amount of raw materials necessary to create the finished product. Implication: Replace your gold bars with Blood Money and a readied casting of Restoration, and you're back on track.
Technically only a nation can 'mint' and its currency only recognized by other nations
Nah. Anyone with the economic clout to make others trust the value of your currency can mint coins or otherwise issue currency, and historically have done so. Minting predates nation-states.
Gold Bar is raw gold. It is 100% raw gold. The spell creates more raw material. You can replace 'gold bar' with 100% pure gold ore, they trade the same by weight. 1 lb = 50gp.
You only have lbs. How are you going to convert weight by volume into cubic feet for the spell?
I happened to use the dimensions of real gold bars. By density it would be the same for the volume of cubic feet. The point is how much value would you then get for a block of gold that's 10 cubic feet. Which is significantly greater than 1 lb.
It is true that minting predates nation-states. The point being that mint or no mint, value perception isn't the point of the math.
It's how much gold can you get and what that would have been worth at the market price listed in the PHB prior to flooding the market.
Gold Bar is raw gold. It is 100% raw gold. The spell creates more raw material. You can replace 'gold bar' with 100% pure gold ore, they trade the same by weight. 1 lb = 50gp.
You only have lbs. How are you going to convert weight by volume into cubic feet for the spell?
I happened to use the dimensions of real gold bars. By density it would be the same for the volume of cubic feet. The point is how much value would you then get for a block of gold that's 10 cubic feet. Which is significantly greater than 1 lb.
Okay, I guess the 22 pound gold bars are a red herring. Gold has a density of 19.3 g/ccm, or 1206 pounds per cubic foot in idiot units. A CL 9 scroll gives us 9 cubic feet or 10,854 pounds (542,700 gold pieces worth) as a solid block of gold. Shave off one or two percent for stack of bars that don't perfectly align with the AoE; multiply by 3,14/4 for stacks of circular coins.
But what Fabricate does is "Convert material of one sort into a product that is of the same material." It's re-iterated in the Components: "the original material, which costs the same amount as the raw materials required to craft the item to be created".
Fabricate does not create multiple cubic feet of material from a tiny seed. Nowhere does the spell tell you that it does that, and it does repeatedly tell you that it converts raw material into finished product.
Gold Bar is raw gold. It is 100% raw gold. The spell creates more raw material.
No, it doesn't
Quote:
Fabricate
School transmutation; Level sorcerer/wizard 5
Casting Time see text
Components V, S, M (the original material, which costs the same amount as the raw materials required to craft the item to be created)
Apologies. *sigh* You are right. I overlooked the description for the material component and the word conversion. What an oversight...
Goes to show that too little sleep and a lust for gold will blind the eyes.
Well. At least it was an interesting exercise in pounds to cubic square foot. The measurements are still helpful in determining the silly amounts of gold a dragon's hoard might have by squares alone. 10ft cube being 4 5ft squares.
You know, this reminds me of a few spells in DND, whose names really conjure up images of a person like Merlin instantly fixing or instantly conjuring x. Fabricate by its name always seemed to imply to me that it would create copies of the material. Mending/make whole that it wouldn't take forever to fix something.
Why they didn't call this "craft item" instead leaves me with a sleep deprived headache.
Is there any stipulation against using 'create demi-plane lesser' to make it full of x raw material?
Or is a player's only hope for the Midas touch a Wish spell?
Have any other ideas of turning early level gold into a dragon's hoard?
Your GM should be plot armoring your WBL, so no. WBL is part of the balance of the game and if you go above it your GM should compensate with higher CR encounters and provide less over time to bring you down to WBL.
I find most APs and GMs ignore this, and it is a big part of casters being so useful (not that they don't have the best magic items). The other thing people mess up is what to include in WBL. WBL should ideally be maintained at any given time across that level; if a player uses a potion there should be a treasure bump, if an item is destroyed the player needs a treasure bump, etc.
To make it easier for the GM just require players to track equipment on a google doc and make sure the gold sum is around the WBL x the number of party members.
Hmm... it only occurred to me just now that Fabricate really... is like one of the shape x spells. Shape wood/stone ... you use craft skill check to turn raw start material into new shape. So you'd start with a block of wood, cast spell, make a statue [with skill check]. The volume rating being how big of a thing you could make with x amount of material. If you don't have enough material for your vision, it'd likely stretch it as thin as possible to try and make the desired dimensions, but then it'd probably collapse...
You could use fabricate to completely destroy a base item to recreate it [broken table, throw in some extra wood, now it's fixed with original + replacement material].
If that's right... you could always use fabricate to make a hole in a bank vault and walk out with the cash I guess. Or craft something of value from a raw material to resell. Assuming you can find a buyer.
Or you could make new novelty material... gold bar becomes gold silk fabric in a roll... adamantine becomes adamantine cloth like some kind of super fabric that's superior to chainmail. Well that is something I suppose. Maybe not the method of making gold that I thought, but it'd still make some rather valuable stuff.
I guess I finally found the spell I always wanted for near-instantly fixing stuff... I'm always amazed what new understanding I get from playing this game despite the years playing it.
Going back you still did the math wrong. Regardless of the bar used, since gold bars can be resized and are equal in value to pieces as their weight is worth in pieces (50 pieces to a pound). While its probably not, we can assume that the GP are like pancake squares for the sake of stacking them in a single cubic space in game. The density of gold is 19.3g/cm^3 or 1205(rounded to nearest whole lb)lb/ft^3. There are 125 Ft^3 in a single 5ft cube, so that number goes to 150,625 lbs of gold in a single game play cube, or 7,531,250GP in that space meaning even a dragon hoard made purely of GP should fit in a single square. (More exact calculations put it at 7530372.75 GP in the square but its still more than you'll ever be able to fit in a single square.
Another piece of math tells us that a single GP is about 0.47004404145cm^3 which is ridiculously small.
Is that right? Casual Viking mentioned Blood Money so I looked into it...
It converts 1d6 hp and str dmg into material component [1 str dmg per 500gp of material component]... which explains what he meant by blood money + lesser restoration.
Edit: [Which works for fabricate. Blood money states that the material component turns into blood after 1 round if it's not used, but fabricate uses all the material component to craft something. So you craft gold bars thus it doesn't turn back into blood.]
Caster level x spell level x 10 = 3 x 2 x 10 = 60gp per casting of lesser restoration
7 x 4 x 10 = 280gp + 100gp diamond dust for restoration [benefit, only need 1 casting to recover all ability drain or temporary damage]
Blood money is a level 1 spell. 1 x 1 x 10 - 10 gp per casting…
Blood money has no scaling cost/benefit, it’s all about your health that you sacrifice.
1 casting of 500gp = 5 bars of gold, 5 lbs. [blood converted to gold then value measured by gold bars weight which are 50gp ea, 1 lb each.]
Spells cast by NPC’s.
Calculation done based off of single casting - not consecutive castings [which may or may not benefit from the amount of starting gold?].
pound to volume: [1 pound gold - 1 cubic foot volume]
http://www.aqua-calc.com/calculate/volume-to-weight
Used to determine the volume goal [cubic foot, 10 cubic foot etc]
1d6, 1 point strength dmg = 500gp, 5 lbs
1d6, 2 point strength dmg = 1000gp [450gp fabricate, 1 lesser restoration 60gp, 10gp blood money = 520gp, 480 gp material after expenses]
1d6, 3 point str dmg = 1500gp [equivalent to the cost of limited wish’s material component, 1500 gp of diamond dust]
1d6, 4 point str dmg = 2000gp [450gp per fabricate, 2 lesser restoration casts 120gp, 10gp blood money = 580gp cost; 1420gp material after expenses]
1d6, 10 point str dmg = 5000gp [450gp per fabricate, 4 lesser restoration to restore 10 points dmg, 240gp, 10gp per blood money spell = 700gp per attempt, 4300gp material after expenses]
1d6, 20 point str dmg = 10,000gp, 200 lbs [450gp per fabricate, 380gp for restoration [not lesser], 10gp per blood money = 840gp; 9160 gp left over]
*Finding a Wizard or Cleric with 20+ str may be difficult, but it seems this is going to be the best bang for your buck unless you’re going to a dragon for a single casting. At this point the cost for casting doesn’t increase, the total Str you need to survive the casting increases.
One casting converting blood into 200 lbs of gold.
1d6, 50 point str dmg = 25,000gp, 500 lbs [equivalent to material component cost of Wish spell, 25,000 gp diamond dust]
1d6, 120 point str dmg = 60,000gp, 1200 lbs [1 cubic foot of gold] [1,206.11 lbs give or take 305.5 gp]
1d6, 1200 point str dmg = 600,000gp, 12,000 lbs [10 cubic foot of gold] [12,061.1 lbs [give or take 3055 gp]
Well you could still make a little money from this, by fabricating coins into other coins that are at 0.95:1 scale, and merchants won't notice as long as they don't use a scale. Not quite the same thing or very useful, and could get you arrested, but yeah :P
Quote:
Another piece of math tells us that a single GP is about 0.47004404145cm^3 which is ridiculously small.
That's not that small. it's a bit larger than a US dime.
Put fabricate into a trap or staff and then you get a something for nothing. This leads to a post scarcity world eventually. There is a lot war and such to prevent that because many like the power that having stuff other need gives them. There might be period like today's industrialization but factories actually need raw materials while this does not.
Adamantine: costs flat 3k for a weapon, is listed as a trade good as 300/pound. Go over to the dwarven capitol and buy as many Dwarven Longhammers as you can (20 lb each, 3070 gp, 153.5 gp/lb), cast Fabricate, reforge the adamantine into Ratfolk Tailblades (40 weapons, 120,440 gp, 6,022 gp/lb) or daggers if the merchants claim that they will have no customers (20 weapons, 60,040 gp, 3002 gp/lb). If they won't sell/buy weapons, buy Chainshirts (204 gp/lb), and sell small agile breastplates (small armor is the same value, but weighs half as much) (832 gp/lb). You'll make money even selling for half.
Fabricate can get a little silly, which is why most GMs will soon after mention that right next to your workshop they're hosting a running of the bulls, but with rust monsters. (Also I wouldn't touch Blood Money with a 10' pole, most GMs know about it and even if they don't it is pretty obviously unbalanced).
Just remember, there is an actual person running the game, it isn't a computer. They can and will react to new tactics/exploits and often it's by telling you to stop if it is OP.
Adamantine: costs flat 3k for a weapon, is listed as a trade good as 300/pound. Go over to the dwarven capitol and buy as many Dwarven Longhammers as you can (20 lb each, 3070 gp, 153.5 gp/lb), cast Fabricate, reforge the adamantine into Ratfolk Tailblades (40 weapons, 120,440 gp, 6,022 gp/lb) or daggers if the merchants claim that they will have no customers (20 weapons, 60,040 gp, 3002 gp/lb). If they won't sell/buy weapons, buy Chainshirts (204 gp/lb), and sell small agile breastplates (small armor is the same value, but weighs half as much) (832 gp/lb). You'll make money even selling for half.
Fabricate can get a little silly, which is why most GMs will soon after mention that right next to your workshop they're hosting a running of the bulls, but with rust monsters. (Also I wouldn't touch Blood Money with a 10' pole, most GMs know about it and even if they don't it is pretty obviously unbalanced).
Just remember, there is an actual person running the game, it isn't a computer. They can and will react to new tactics/exploits and often it's by telling you to stop if it is OP.
You could say they're just plated in adamantine and/or the rest of the weight is stuff like the haft, rivets straps (for the tailblade), scabbards, etc.
The cost still scales by weight anyway, because these extra bits and pieces also scale with the amount of metal used at any overall weight.
