Hi all, I’m DMing a homebrew game and I’ve hit a snag trying to reconcile two economic goals:
Gold should feel valuable. GP is the defacto currency in DnD for adventures, silver barely gets used, and copper is basically worthless junk to adventurers (Kinda like today really isnt it...). I want gold to mean something, to be something rare and significant, a genuine store of wealth and status.
Prices should be consistent and intuitive. D&D’s internal economy is famously all over the place. I’d like prices to make logical sense so both I and the players can make reasonable guesses without looking everything up.
For #1, I’ve simply made gold rare in the world. Most transactions now use SP and CP and I’ve adjusted denominations in the PHB accordingly to reflect that shift.
But that leads to a problem with #2. If I try to rebalance prices to be more consistent with fewer weird blips and be intuitive, that means deviating from the PHB, which introduces its own issues — especially for downtime activities, crafting, and any priced gear.
So I had a new idea: What if Ipegged copper to a real-world currency (I'm in the UK so about £1 / $1.34 / €1.17 per COPPER). For example, a basic functional real-world sword might cost £150 = 150cp or 1.5gp. (BUT the phb prices it at 15gp, which only really works if silver becomes the base unit instead. That keeps closer to the original system, but still leaves copper feeling pointless.)
I really like the copper = £ idea because:
It helps me price things intuitively (e.g. a cow costs ~£1000, so 10gp).
It makes gold rare and exciting again.
It helps players intuit prices — like a sending stone = satellite phone, and books = expensive because they’re hand-copied (so 25gp might be totally fair in-world).
BUT... It also means:
A lot more bookkeeping on my part.
Potential confusion if a player imagines something is worth £20 and I say “that's 10gp.”
Breaking some compatibility with official prices, especially for services and known costs.
So my question to you all:
Has anyone tried pegging copper (or any coin) to real-world currency?
How do you handle economic realism without creating player confusion or endless DM prep?
Any tips on making gold rare without breaking the 5e system?
And does it even matter? is it a good idea? Or should just keep with adjusting the denominations only?
Any advice or feedback would be really appreciated! :)
(just a note: I wrote an unintelligible ramble at first and got GPT to proofread it so its actually understandable XD)
I set the income level of a skilled tradesman at 1sp/day. Then I simply ask myself, how much would something cost if the local carpenter only made 1sp/day, with the understanding that the average commoner might go their whole life without even seeing a single gold coin.
Large loaf of bread from a bakery = 1cp, average commoner's meal (single serve meat pie) 2cp, etc. Just like real life, if a single item would be less than the smallest coin, sell them in bags where an entire pouch of them costs 1cp.
Inn rooms at a decent Inn would start at 4sp and work their way up from there. Trying to set it as a conversion set to 'real life' is just going to add a lot of unnecessary math to your game (unless you like that sort of thing).
Just set what average wages are for each income level, then knowing how much folks at those levels make, ask how much of something they should be able to buy, and there's your answer.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Playing D&D since 1982
Have played every version of the game since Basic (Red Box Set), except that abomination sometimes called 4e.
Simply convert all the gp prices to copper or silver, and use small amounts of gold for large prices. If you need ideas, read He Who Fights With Monsters, by Travis Deverell, for ideas on coin.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
I have traversed all the outer planes- I have traversed all the inner planes- now I travel to the land of earth to ride an airplane.
-They/Them Pronouns-
If you need lore, spells, heaps of information, come my way!!
Yeah, just change all reference to "gold pieces" to "silver pieces", all references to "silver pieces" to "copper pieces", and all references to "platinum pieces" to "gold pieces".
The main issue is WHO do you want gold to be more significant for?
Commoners and regular folks might make 10,000 (?) pounds/year - which would be 10,000cp or 100gp using your conversion system. Which is quite a lot.
Or are you talking about adventurers? Adventurers might make 10x or 100x what a commoner makes or more. 1,000,000 pounds - sure or 10,000gp.
No matter what you call your currency - adventurers tend to make a lot of it ... much more than local tradesmen. The reason for this is that adventuring is exceptionally dangerous. Adventurers could go out risking their lives every day .. maybe they occasionally need the 300gp or 500gp needed in material components by a cleric to bring them back from the dead. It is a dangerous and generally unpleasant life. The reason they adventure is the potential for huge rewards. If an adventurer isn't making a lot of coin - then most if not all wouldn't bother - might as well be a merchant or a caravan guard.
Either way you look at it - if you make 1cp equivalent to a pound and try to scale incomes and pricing - if the adventurers are being paid commensurate with the risk - they will still break your system. They will have immense amounts of gold eventually because they are supposed to.
As DM, you control the economy. You slot the rewards earned by adventurers wherever you think is appropriate. Whether those rewards are called copper, silver, electrum (I'm not even sure why this one still exists to be honest), gold, platinum, various denominations of gems or maybe even a paper currency ... is effectively just flavor. However, you control how long it will take the adventurers to accumulate the resources they need to purchase items they would like to upgrade assuming those items are available on the market (breast plate, half-plate and plate mail are the most common examples). This aspect is controlled by your game and world design and how you want it to run.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
To post a comment, please login or register a new account.
Hi all,
I’m DMing a homebrew game and I’ve hit a snag trying to reconcile two economic goals:
Gold should feel valuable.
GP is the defacto currency in DnD for adventures, silver barely gets used, and copper is basically worthless junk to adventurers (Kinda like today really isnt it...). I want gold to mean something, to be something rare and significant, a genuine store of wealth and status.
Prices should be consistent and intuitive.
D&D’s internal economy is famously all over the place. I’d like prices to make logical sense so both I and the players can make reasonable guesses without looking everything up.
For #1, I’ve simply made gold rare in the world. Most transactions now use SP and CP and I’ve adjusted denominations in the PHB accordingly to reflect that shift.
But that leads to a problem with #2. If I try to rebalance prices to be more consistent with fewer weird blips and be intuitive, that means deviating from the PHB, which introduces its own issues — especially for downtime activities, crafting, and any priced gear.
So I had a new idea:
What if I pegged copper to a real-world currency (I'm in the UK so about £1 / $1.34 / €1.17 per COPPER).
For example, a basic functional real-world sword might cost £150 = 150cp or 1.5gp. (BUT the phb prices it at 15gp, which only really works if silver becomes the base unit instead. That keeps closer to the original system, but still leaves copper feeling pointless.)
I really like the copper = £ idea because:
It helps me price things intuitively (e.g. a cow costs ~£1000, so 10gp).
It makes gold rare and exciting again.
It helps players intuit prices — like a sending stone = satellite phone, and books = expensive because they’re hand-copied (so 25gp might be totally fair in-world).
BUT...
It also means:
A lot more bookkeeping on my part.
Potential confusion if a player imagines something is worth £20 and I say “that's 10gp.”
Breaking some compatibility with official prices, especially for services and known costs.
So my question to you all:
Has anyone tried pegging copper (or any coin) to real-world currency?
How do you handle economic realism without creating player confusion or endless DM prep?
Any tips on making gold rare without breaking the 5e system?
Any advice or feedback would be really appreciated! :)
(just a note: I wrote an unintelligible ramble at first and got GPT to proofread it so its actually understandable XD)
Here's the way I do it.
I set the income level of a skilled tradesman at 1sp/day. Then I simply ask myself, how much would something cost if the local carpenter only made 1sp/day, with the understanding that the average commoner might go their whole life without even seeing a single gold coin.
Large loaf of bread from a bakery = 1cp, average commoner's meal (single serve meat pie) 2cp, etc. Just like real life, if a single item would be less than the smallest coin, sell them in bags where an entire pouch of them costs 1cp.
Inn rooms at a decent Inn would start at 4sp and work their way up from there. Trying to set it as a conversion set to 'real life' is just going to add a lot of unnecessary math to your game (unless you like that sort of thing).
Just set what average wages are for each income level, then knowing how much folks at those levels make, ask how much of something they should be able to buy, and there's your answer.
Playing D&D since 1982
Have played every version of the game since Basic (Red Box Set), except that abomination sometimes called 4e.
Simply convert all the gp prices to copper or silver, and use small amounts of gold for large prices. If you need ideas, read He Who Fights With Monsters, by Travis Deverell, for ideas on coin.
I have traversed all the outer planes- I have traversed all the inner planes- now I travel to the land of earth to ride an airplane.
-They/Them Pronouns-
If you need lore, spells, heaps of information, come my way!!
Yeah, just change all reference to "gold pieces" to "silver pieces", all references to "silver pieces" to "copper pieces", and all references to "platinum pieces" to "gold pieces".
The main issue is WHO do you want gold to be more significant for?
Commoners and regular folks might make 10,000 (?) pounds/year - which would be 10,000cp or 100gp using your conversion system. Which is quite a lot.
Or are you talking about adventurers? Adventurers might make 10x or 100x what a commoner makes or more. 1,000,000 pounds - sure or 10,000gp.
No matter what you call your currency - adventurers tend to make a lot of it ... much more than local tradesmen. The reason for this is that adventuring is exceptionally dangerous. Adventurers could go out risking their lives every day .. maybe they occasionally need the 300gp or 500gp needed in material components by a cleric to bring them back from the dead. It is a dangerous and generally unpleasant life. The reason they adventure is the potential for huge rewards. If an adventurer isn't making a lot of coin - then most if not all wouldn't bother - might as well be a merchant or a caravan guard.
Either way you look at it - if you make 1cp equivalent to a pound and try to scale incomes and pricing - if the adventurers are being paid commensurate with the risk - they will still break your system. They will have immense amounts of gold eventually because they are supposed to.
As DM, you control the economy. You slot the rewards earned by adventurers wherever you think is appropriate. Whether those rewards are called copper, silver, electrum (I'm not even sure why this one still exists to be honest), gold, platinum, various denominations of gems or maybe even a paper currency ... is effectively just flavor. However, you control how long it will take the adventurers to accumulate the resources they need to purchase items they would like to upgrade assuming those items are available on the market (breast plate, half-plate and plate mail are the most common examples). This aspect is controlled by your game and world design and how you want it to run.