Succubusekai: The Demoness Just Wanted To Stay With Her Friends! [Original-Ish] [Quest]

[pheonix89]

In past editions, Rogues could use Disable Device even on Magic checks - in 5e, it appears to have been shuffled to Arcana instead. I'd rule that modern lockpicking equipment would do about as well as historic on this part - that is, it can be used, but skill with magic is still important.

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You're kidding me.

They moved the one magic-adjacent thing that non-caster classes were useful for into Arcana?!?

[x] (Helen's Shopping Plan) You think it sounds great.

[x] (Eira's Base Shopping Idea) "Some of these camp and adventuring items sound great! What are lockpicks like in your time?"

Next best thing to an infinite-cast wand of knock ... and situationally better because the full array of locksmith shenaniagans will often-as-not make the lock irrelevant if you don't mind wrecking the lock for godo.

Does this include a Lockpicking Lawyer collection? Because that guy is rediculous.

 

[NekoIncardine]

Does this include a Lockpicking Lawyer collection? Because that guy is rediculous.

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"I'm the lockpicking lawyer, and apparently this lock isn't from this planet. Please do not ask me to figure that one out. Instead, let's look at the lock itself. Very heavy iron, it weights like eight pounds. Heavy springs, too - my Genesis set available on covertinstruments dot com won't do the trick here, as the small picks would just bend. You could do this with heavier picks. However, if we just place a shim here, tap, tap, tap... And open."

"Just to prove it again, let's close it... Put in the shim... Tap, tap, tap... I'm told this lock goes for ten gold pieces - that is, a fifth of a pound of gold, or over four and a half thousand US dollars at this time. To the sender of this lock, I'd recommend just getting some Masterlocks instead. Even the cheap ones are less vulnerable to shims than this."

***

Besides clarifying that this is noncanon, I'm going to point out that I probably should not allow that particular Gold Piece to US Dollar conversion rate; however, the joke was too good to pass up for a quick shitpost.

 

[grommile]

gold pieces should come in at a hundred to the pound anyway

Article:

The early 4th century saw the solidus introduced in mintage as a successor to the aureus, which was permanently replaced thereafter by the new coin, whose weight of about 4.5 grams remained relatively constant for seven centuries.

Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solidus_(coin)

 

[Simon_Jester]

There's probably some loss of conversion in the process of getting deniability and avoiding questions like "so, where did all this gold bullion come from, exactly, and why is it in the form of coins from nowhere in history?"

 

[sun tzu]

There's probably some loss of conversion in the process of getting deniability and avoiding questions like "so, where did all this gold bullion come from, exactly, and why is it in the form of coins from nowhere in history?"

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Probably... but it should be noted that gold is expensive. Like, $50 per gram or so.
I always kind of got the impression gold is undervalued in D&D worlds.

 

[Simon_Jester]

Probably... but it should be noted that gold is expensive. Like, $50 per gram or so.
I always kind of got the impression gold is undervalued in D&D worlds.

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Well, that or it's just a lot more available.

If all else fails there are blatantly magical bullshit methods for obtaining gold, such as potentially transmutation, and also weirder stuff like "wizard enslaves an earth elemental to go to the Plane of Earth and retrieve tons of the stuff."

So the supply of gold may not be as restricted relative to the overall size of the D&D world's economy as it is in our world relative to our (larger) economy.

 

[grommile]

Probably... but it should be noted that gold is expensive. Like, $50 per gram or so.
I always kind of got the impression gold is undervalued in D&D worlds.

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As far as I can tell, D&D's coinage system is basically pulled out of Gary Gygax's ass. (It was particularly hilariously stupid in 1st edition AD&D, when a coin's encumbrance value was 1/10 of a pound!)

Of course, the Dragonlance setting's coinage system, with its steel pieces, was even stupider.

 

[Razzocnor]

Based on its usage, precious metals are significantly less valuable and more common in fantasy worlds.

Whether this is due to overenthusiastic alchemists crashing the market with their neat lead-to-gold trick, the gods just putting more metals in the ground to get excavated by dwarves, planar explores plundering the literally infinite mineral wealth of the Elemental Plane of Earth, or dragon action extracting vast quantities that would have otherwise been hidden, it doesn't matter too much. But the economy has adapted, and things are now backed by the importance of specific value amounts of powdered silver and diamond dust for magical rituals. Gold continues to be used as currency due to old pacts with the dragons that insist it be common and easily plundered in exchange for less fatalities in the process.

Or something like that.

 

[Simon_Jester]

Well, gold and silver still work as viable medium of exchange even if they're proportionately more common than in real life.

It's only really a problem if "spam more gold" is so common and easy to do in the setting that the economic dislocations caused by sudden influxes of gold are significantly worse than the economic dislocations caused by all the other different kinds of esoteric shenanigans that are already happening in the D&D setting. Which, given how disruptive some of those shenanigans might be, seems doubtful to me.

 

[Pteryx]

[X] (Helen's Shopping Plan) Write-In - "You never did look at footwear, and a modern tent might call too much attention to us."
[X] (Eira's Base Shopping Idea) "Some of these camp and adventuring items sound great! What are lockpicks like in your time?"

 

[Pteryx]

You're kidding me.

They moved the one magic-adjacent thing that non-caster classes were useful for into Arcana?!?

Click to shrink...

On the bright side, it's not against the rules to have Arcana skill as a non-caster.

It was worse when the transition from 3.0 to 3.5 changed the rules of Alchemy to make it so it only worked for spellcasters. (Why? Because!)

 

[NekoIncardine]

On the bright side, it's not against the rules to have Arcana skill as a non-caster.

It was worse when the transition from 3.0 to 3.5 changed the rules of Alchemy to make it so it only worked for spellcasters. (Why? Because!)

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Yeaaaah, that one made very, very little sense. But then, 3.5 was, let's face it, even worse than 5e about Caster Supremacy.

 

[Mandy Dragonfly]

[X] (Helen's Shopping Plan) You think it sounds great.


[X] (Eira's Base Shopping Idea) "Some of these camp and adventuring items sound great! What are lockpicks like in your time?"

 

[Taricus]

[X] (Helen's Shopping Plan) You think it sounds great.
[X] (Eira's Base Shopping Idea) "Things to put me in next time you put me under your spell~" (Oh she's gotta be saying it like that to needle Helen… Also this one's got High Odds of a spoilercut scene.)

 

[Karinu]

[X] (Helen's Shopping Plan) You think it sounds great.
[X] (Eira's Base Shopping Idea) "Things to put me in next time you put me under your spell~" (Oh she's gotta be saying it like that to needle Helen… Also this one's got High Odds of a spoilercut scene.)

Click to shrink...

I was beginning to wonder if anyone was going to go for this one. Certainly not very pragmatic, but it seems in-character for Eira.

[X] (Helen's Shopping Plan) Write-In - "You never did look at footwear, and a modern tent might call too much attention to us."

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Shoes are important. I'ma go ahead and second this.
[X] (Helen's Shopping Plan) Write-In - "You never did look at footwear, and a modern tent might call too much attention to us."

"I'm the lockpicking lawyer, and apparently this lock isn't from this planet. Please do not ask me to figure that one out. Instead, let's look at the lock itself. Very heavy iron, it weights like eight pounds. Heavy springs, too - my Genesis set available on covertinstruments dot com won't do the trick here, as the small picks would just bend. You could do this with heavier picks. However, if we just place a shim here, tap, tap, tap... And open."

"Just to prove it again, let's close it... Put in the shim... Tap, tap, tap... I'm told this lock goes for ten gold pieces - that is, a fifth of a pound of gold, or over four and a half thousand US dollars at this time. To the sender of this lock, I'd recommend just getting some Masterlocks instead. Even the cheap ones are less vulnerable to shims than this."

Click to shrink...

I really want to see this video.

 

[Taricus]

I was beginning to wonder if anyone was going to go for this one. Certainly not very pragmatic, but it seems in-character for Eira.

Click to shrink...

Someone had to, practicality be damned!

 

[Solarstream]

[X] (Helen's Shopping Plan) Write-In - "You never did look at footwear, and a modern tent might call too much attention to us."
[X] (Eira's Base Shopping Idea) "Things to put me in next time you put me under your spell~" (Oh she's gotta be saying it like that to needle Helen… Also this one's got High Odds of a spoilercut scene.)

 

[BritishGrenadier]

Currency Debasement and How it Affects Society (Even fantasy ones)

I see that some people are talking about the commonality of gold in fantasy settings
Also to note gold currency is often not even solid gold at medieval times
Rulers with often debased their currency by slowly reducing the gold content of the coin with a cheaper metal like iron or copper, allowing them to make more coins with the same amount of bullion. Hoping that the merchants wouldnt see through the ruse. Eventually as the gold or silver content of the metal is so degraded that Inflation made the currency useless. (Also people would use some diy ways to extract silver or gold from coins like cliping) forcing rulers to change to a new pure currency coin. Untill a sucessor got greedy and started the process all over again. The introduction of fiat currency and the end of the gold standard destroyed the need for pure gold or silver coins as a medium of exchange. That's why you dont see gold or silver in your coins anymore. Cause the government debased it for all its worth

Most likely in lore solution to the commonality of gold coins in fantasy settings is the goverment essentially reducing the gold content to pathetic amounts as a way to fund their massive palace complexes, fighting other states, and other stuff you need money for. The fact their has to be some metal in it however prevents it the inflation from becoming Weimar Germany.
As long as the government doesn't start minting like crazy the currency should remain stable. (I hope that Senaz doesn't have to deal with something like Late Roman Hyperinflation or Weimar Germany)

For more info look up debasement in wikipedia

 

[Simon_Jester]

Currency Debasement and How it Affects Society (Even fantasy ones)

I see that some people are talking about the commonality of gold in fantasy settings
Also to note gold currency is often not even solid gold at medieval times
Rulers with often debased their currency by slowly reducing the gold content of the coin with a cheaper metal like iron or copper, allowing them to make more coins with the same amount of bullion. Hoping that the merchants wouldnt see through the ruse. Eventually as the gold or silver content of the metal is so degraded that Inflation made the currency useless. (Also people would use some diy ways to extract silver or gold from coins like cliping) forcing rulers to change to a new pure currency coin. Untill a sucessor got greedy and started the process all over again. The introduction of fiat currency and the end of the gold standard destroyed the need for pure gold or silver coins as a medium of exchange. That's why you dont see gold or silver in your coins anymore. Cause the government debased it for all its worth

Most likely in lore solution to the commonality of gold coins in fantasy settings is the goverment essentially reducing the gold content to pathetic amounts as a way to fund their massive palace complexes, fighting other states, and other stuff you need money for. The fact their has to be some metal in it however prevents it the inflation from becoming Weimar Germany.
As long as the government doesn't start minting like crazy the currency should remain stable. (I hope that Senaz doesn't have to deal with something like Late Roman Hyperinflation or Weimar Germany)

For more info look up debasement in wikipedia

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The reason I don't think this works in a typical fantasy setting is that a typical fantasy setting doesn't address this. A gold piece is a gold piece and you don't have to worry about whether the gold piece in question was minted by Honoria the Honest Empress or Wulgaz the Wicked Warlord.

Whereas in real life, that was a huge concern precisely because some rulers debased the currency and others didn't do that so much.

 

[ltmauve]

[X] (Helen's Shopping Plan) Write-In - "You never did look at footwear, and a modern tent might call too much attention to us."
[X] (Eira's Base Shopping Idea) "Some of these camp and adventuring items sound great! What are lockpicks like in your time?"

 

[grommile]

The reason I don't think this works in a typical fantasy setting is that a typical fantasy setting doesn't address this

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I think the only fantasy setting I can recall touching on the subject of currency purity is, of all things, the Belgariad (there's a scene in the first book where Silk is haggling with a merchant and makes a point of insisting on Tolnedran coin).

 

[NekoIncardine]

For Sanity's Sake, on Aridia, a Gold Piece is usually a Gold Piece. D&D 5e kinda assumes this for player sanity purposes. Assume currency degradation hasn't been developed in a way that isn't trivially caught as-yet.

Additionally, I may owe a bit of a mea culpa. I have revised one of the campaign Gold Truths, as it turns out a phrase I thought was mentioned in Mind Control University may not have been used in there, so the phrase 'Dimensional Revolution' is out. That said, the fact that Sean's Earth hasn't yet had extradimensional contact stands.

 

[Simon_Jester]

For Sanity's Sake, on Aridia, a Gold Piece is usually a Gold Piece. D&D 5e kinda assumes this for player sanity purposes. Assume currency degradation hasn't been developed in a way that isn't trivially caught as-yet.

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Alternatively/additionally, anyone who's capable of running a state and minting currency may be assumed to be able to procure reasonably large amounts of pure gold, to the point where things have to get pretty weird for a society to feel that much need to debase its currency. I dunno. I'm spitballing here.

I think the only fantasy setting I can recall touching on the subject of currency purity is, of all things, the Belgariad (there's a scene in the first book where Silk is haggling with a merchant and makes a point of insisting on Tolnedran coin).

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While the work of David Eddings is in some ways painfully 'generic' fantasy, Eddings was in his way a competent and intelligent writer. His work tended to be reasonably well plotted. Most characters make decisions that make sense most of the time. And there is at least enough detail and realism to give the sense that the characters live in a three-dimensional world even if they themselves are kind of simplistic and portrayed in bright primary colors.

So it is absolutely believable to me that the Belgariad would be one of the few stories a given person can remember that touched on Realism in Fantasy Trope X. Because Eddings did that a lot, and did it pretty well.

 

[Razzocnor]

Currency debasement in fantasy worlds is kept in check by spells that can detect precious metals and alchemists who similarly can easily identify metal purity.

That and dragons, who can smell if your coin is pure gold or not. Don't underestimate the economic effects of dragons.

 

[Simon_Jester]

Well... Often, currency debasement is done by heads of state. It's not actually that hard to learn that the royal mint is mixing more copper into the gold coins than it really should. There are a variety of fairly basic ways to tell, including basic tests of weight and volume that have been known since the days of Archimedes.

It's not like forgery, where private individuals are creating truly fake currency.

As I understand it, a big part of the effectiveness of currency debasement comes from the king's power to pressure people in their own kingdom into using the currency they mint. Telling soldiers to their faces that you won't accept the coins the king minted and gave to them to pay for their food is a good way to end up perforated, or at least for the soldiers to just go "lol" and take the food anyway. As a banker living in the king's capital, you are in a very precarious position if you refuse to accept the king's coins and payment for the king's debt. And so on.

So to really squash currency debasement by force, as opposed to just making it pointless by increasing the gold supply... Well, you need someone or something capable of credibly threatening actual governments. Dragons arguably qualify.