Golden Gold

This is a reworking of the 3.5e coin rules that increases the value of gold (and other precious metals) while requiring a minimum of change to the price lists of equipment, goods, and services.

Under these rules, coins normally have a weight of 100 per pound (rather than the SRD value of 50 per pound). Furthermore, gold, silver, and copper coins can be broken into four “pieces.” Thus a “gold piece” is one quarter of a gold coin, a “silver piece” is one quarter of a silver coin, and a “copper piece” is one quarter of a copper coin. However, whole coins pass at a premium, being worth five pieces rather than four. This means that a gold coin has a value of 5 gp, and that a pound of gold coins consists of 100 coins with a total value of 500 gp.

The reason why whole coins pass at a premium is that broken coin-pieces tend to be underweight, as any full-weight and overweight pieces get shaved or melted down for their metal value. It typically takes 500 quarter-coin pieces, rather than 400, to make a pound.

Prices for nearly all goods and services remain the same as in the standard rules, as measured in nominal gold, silver, and copper pieces. A 15 gp sword, for example, still costs “15 gold pieces,” even if it only takes three physical gold coins to buy it. Ingots of gold and silver, however, are now worth ten times the values given in the SRD. Silver is now worth 50 gp per pound, and gold is now worth 500 gp per pound. Copper and platinum are special cases.

Ordinary copper, a.k.a. “base copper” or “vulgar copper,” has the same value as in the standard rules (5 sp per pound), and is used to make bronze and brass alloys. “Coin copper” or “jewelry copper” is an alloy of copper with a few percent of silver plus a fraction of a percent of mithral. This makes it harder and more resistant to corrosion than pure copper or copper alloyed with a small amount of some other base metal (e.g. 5% zinc). It’s also worth ten times as much as ordinary copper: 5 gp per pound. Nearly all copper coins and copper jewelry use this coin alloy, rather than being made from base copper.

Platinum has a value of 1000 gp per pound, or twice that given in the SRD. Platinum coins thus have the same value as in the SRD (10 gp each) since at 100 per pound they have half the SRD weight. Unlike other coins, they aren’t broken into quarters, and so a platinum coin is still a “platinum piece.”

Because precious metals are more valuable, the value of jewelry made from them is increased (or alternatively, the jewelry weighs less). For spell material components and foci that require a minimum weight and value of precious metal, go by the value, reducing the required weights. Thus a spell that officially requires five pounds of silver dust (25 gp worth) now requires only half a pound (which is still 25 gp worth).

Certain campaigns, or areas within a campaign, may have gold “pieces of eight” or “doubloons.” These are larger gold coins, weighting 50 per pound and worth 10 gp each when whole. As per their names, they are double the weight of other coins and can be broken into eight gold pieces.

Other precious metals are adamantine, mithral, and electrum:

Adamantine is worth 100 gp per pound. Most of the high price of adamantine armor and weapons is due to the special fuels and quenching materials needed to work the metal. Apply the costs of these special fuels and quenches as needed in order to make the crafting rules work out properly.

Jewelry-grade mithral is worth 2,500 gp per pound. Mithral armor and shields are made from a mithral-steel alloy that contains only 10% of the pure metal. This allows the SRD costs for mithral armor to remain unchanged. However:

1. Heavy and tower shields cannot be made of mithral.
2. The metal portions of mithral chain shirts and chainmail armor are very light. The padding makes up 10 lbs of the weight in both cases, with the metal portions weighing only 2.5 lbs for a mithral shirt and 10 lbs for a full suit of mithral chainmail.
3. Mithral weapons having a (normal, non-mithral) weight of less than 1 lb are not automatically of Masterwork quality.

Electrum, under these rules, is not just an alloy of gold and silver, but an alloy of gold, silver, and magic. Electrum coins are worth 100 gp each and radiate faint transmutation magic. Like platinum, electrum coins are never broken into quarters, and so each coin is an “electrum piece” (ep). Bulk electrum would be worth 10,000 gp per pound.

Electrum contains experience points that can be used to pay the xp cost of casting spells and creating magic items. Each coin-weight of electrum contains 20 xp. Thus a spellcaster could use 15 electrum pieces to cast a spell having a cost of 300 xp, rather than paying the cost from his personal xp total. Using the xp of electrum this way causes the gold and silver metal to vanish as well.