Comments on: What is One Gold Piece Worth?

By: jenna

jenna — Sat, 14 Feb 2009 03:15:34 +0000

Okay, I was looking around my room, then I steped on somthing in my closet, I picked it up and it was a gold coin with a ladie and a baby on it. I do not know what it stands for or how much it is but please tell me :)

Michigan,
Jenna

By: Ted Willingham

Ted Willingham — Sat, 03 Jan 2009 01:38:31 +0000

Well, Feudal serfs barely had enough to survive– and often NOT enough to survive.
I would estimate that a feudal serf made less that a dollar a day.

By: Aspect

Aspect — Sat, 01 Dec 2007 06:28:51 +0000

“D&D economics doesn’t always fall precisely in line with modern day figures – an unskilled labourer earns only $6.25 per day – but $62.50 is about as reasonable a figure as you can get.”

Agreed, and the figure makes more sense looking at actual economics. In the States, what with costs of living, labor unions, the need for a high enough price to draw employees, and any other possible factors I’m likely forgetting, US workers would get paid more than your average feudal serf. If you look to other countries for an equivalent to the feudal serf–perhaps a child worker making sneakers in Asia somewhere–I think you’d find the wages to be much more equal.

Excellent article, by the way. It was a stroke of genius using the price of a mug of ale rather than relying on the whimsies of currency exchange. I’ve read a number of articles trying to answer this question, and this is the first one I’ve been really truly pleased with.

By: Jonathan Drain

Jonathan Drain — Mon, 11 Sep 2006 09:24:26 +0000

Ah yes, but diamonds are actually worth a lot more in D&D land than their actual value here, since they can be used to raise the dead.

By: Ishan

Ishan — Mon, 11 Sep 2006 00:09:51 +0000

You want to be careful pulling real world diamond price equivalents into the game, unless your game world also has a cartel that artificially inflates the cost of diamonds like DaBeers does. Actual diamonds have something like a 70% resale value straight from purchase, and can actually depreciate in value over time because the prices at which they are sold are controlled artificially.

Otherwise, wow, thanks. We’re always arguing over what a gold piece actually buys and how you’d adjust that so you didn’t destabalize the local economy.