I think we discussed it before, but yeah, the D&D economy is crazy. You have villages of people supporting their families on a silver piece a day and that's spare change to even first level characters, "I guess I'll buy some candles, rations, whatever, just in case the GM wants to be a jerk with supplies". The heroes who fight the local menace and return at the bitching level 2 can buy chunks of their peasant village with their hauls.
That pile of wealth dragons sleep on? How many ancient empires did they steal that from?
Lost in Space
Oh, no, the rant for this strip.
World's Cutest Direwolf
Relevant to discussion: Pathfinder NPCs
. Beggar carries 203 gp in loot. That's 4 pounds of gold.
Barmaid got 2 300 gp. By comparison, a high ranked Corrupt Bureaucrat has only 875.
edited 6th Sep '13 10:42:25 AM by Adannor
Something has to be horribly wrong with that document or there's something I don't know about Pathfinder. A level 1 NPC-classed beggar has 200 gold?
That's official material from an actual published Pathfinder book. The writers are pretty clearly adhering to the philosophy in The Rant ![[lol]](https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/lol2v12_4863.png "[lol]"){kind=small}
(Previous page in the book has a king. Aside from some +1 gear, he has jewellery totalling 900 gold and 233 gp pocket change. Compare to barmaid.)
edited 6th Sep '13 11:59:43 AM by Adannor
World's Cutest Direwolf
Queen of Good Things, Honest
Makes sense to me why peasant villages are so dirt poor, when adventurers who plunder a dragon's hoard can make enough money to buy several.
Until the adventurers swipe it, all the money's in the dragon's hoard. Or the goblin caves. Or the orc stronghold. Or the kobold lair....
98% of the existing wealth is completely inaccessible to a Level 3 Commoner. Deflation follows.
My Tumblr. Currently talking Dragon Ball and working my way back to Danganronpa V3.
Shadowed Philosopher
Which then makes one wonder how the money got there in the first place. Are these dragons constantly marauding places and carrying away gold for no better reason than to lie down on it? And if so, why didn't they switch to using a currency that is not also the dragon padding material of choice?
Shinigan (Naruto fanfic)
Queen of Good Things, Honest
It got there in the first place because it's valuable. Greed and envy are two very powerful motivating factors. Gold is valuable to humans, elves, and dwarves because it is shiny and scarce. Gold is valuable to dragons because it is shiny and scarce. Gold is valuable to goblins because it is shiny and scarce.
Sure, humans could switch to leaves for their currency, but inflation would destroy their entire economy. Leaves are plentiful. Nobody's going to trade a cow for leaves.
If it's valuable enough to you to make currency out of, it's probably also valuable enough to someone else to be worth fighting for. Dragons, in particular, don't covet gold specifically; they covet valuables.
edited 6th Sep '13 2:42:09 PM by TobiasDrake
My Tumblr. Currently talking Dragon Ball and working my way back to Danganronpa V3.
And if they switch to any sensible currency, dragons are gonna hoard it too. Switching away from precious metals would only give reprieve to metallic dragons, who eat it. And are Good-aligned, so get it through more clandestine methods.
![[up]](https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/smiles/arrow_up.png "[up]"){kind=icon}
Now I'm going to have to go get my copy of Draconomicon, I'm pretty sure it went into species-specific preferences in valuables for various types of chromatic dragon, some of which were quite interesting.
EDIT: from my 4th Ed Draconomicon:
- Black dragons favor coins of precious metals, which survive well when submerged in their preferred swampy lairs
- Blue dragons appreciate visually-appealing treasure- works of art, jewelry, and gems, particularly blue gems
- Green dragons particularly enjoy artifacts that represent a great deal of effort on the part of the artisan, like intricately carved sculptures or finely detailed magic armor
- White dragons prefer treasure that glitters like gleaming ice- diamonds and other light-hued gemstones or gleaming polished silver and platinum
- Red dragons desire everything in their hoards, everything of value in other dragon's hoards, and anything of value possessed by anyone else
edited 7th Sep '13 1:13:58 AM by Shinziril
Lost in Space
Indiana Solo
You know I never realized that was saliva before? I thought the thing had just stuck him in the ice on the roof...
I'm baaaaaaack
The movie actually doesn't say anything about how Luke got hanged there.
Lost in Space
I'm sure the EU has. The EU has "explained" every single trivial fact from every scene of every film.
"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"
Yeap, they do that.
Considering wampas are semi-sentient, they sound a lot like serial killers.
The best and the worst.
Thats not too far-off from what we do to our prey.
Me and my friend's collaborative webcomic: Forged Men
Wampas are ape-bears. : P
No longer a forum herald
Just call it a space yeti and be done with it. (Honestly, that's what it is...)
Expergiscēre cras, medior quam hodie. (Awaken tomorrow, better than today.)
Lost in Space
Now I can't get that damn web commercial out of my head. The one where the guy stakes out his kitchen to make sure nobody steals his Wheat Thins — like Bigfoot, or his neighbor Ted, and his skeptical wife is woken up in the night by crashing and sees that, sure enough, he's battling a yeti over the crackers.
"I was wrong! It's a yeti!" Then, of course, Ted steals the Wheat Thins.
"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"
After technical difficulties, here's Episode 932
Of course, don't you know anything about ALCHEMY?!- Twin clones of Ivan the Great