OOTS #1089 - The Discussion Thread

[GreenSerpent]

Something to note: Greg prepares spells at dusk, not dawn.

If Durkon can stall him long enough for Roy to arrive it would be significantly easier to take on Greg without his full compliment of spells.

[Grey_Wolf_c]

Something to note: Greg prepares spells at dusk, not dawn.

If Durkon can stall him long enough for Roy to arrive it would be significantly easier to take on Greg without his full compliment of spells.

As has been pointed out, Durkon cannot stall Greg with memories. First, Greg can leave, as seen in the current comic. But more importantly, very little time passes in the mind's theater.

Grey Wolf

[Erys]

All currency is fiat currency, as nothing but food/clothing/shelter has inherent value. Decoupling it from a natural resource just means it can keep up with how much we need in our current market.

While I will, sadly, agree that most of the world now has a central bank issuing fiat currency (and the reason for that is rather nefarious if you understand the MIC)- you are completely wrong when you say "Decoupling it from a natural resource just means it can keep up with how much we need in our current market."

You know what happens when you have intrinsic money, like gold and silver, as the currency and the amount of goods out paces the amount of silver/gold? You purchase power increases. It takes less money to buy things, not more.

Inflation is you losing purchasing power- and slowly all fiats return to their intrinsic value of 0. It's just a matter of time.

Money is a unit of exchange that should represent/reflect the very work put into whatever service or good you are attempting to acquire. Intrinsic metal requires actual work to produce. Work for work will always be superior to work for what is effectively an IOU.

[Ornithologist]

It's also illegal.

The penny lobby is made up of 1) Jarden Zinc Products (a company that sells coin blanks to the Mint) and 2) Coinstar. That's it. Yes, you can find a lobbying group called Americans for Common Cents, but guess what, they're funded by 1) above.

Fun fact: lots of amusement parks (at least all the ones I have ever been to: anecdotal evidence only) have vending machines that use a penny as a base to press out a commemorative coin of their park. Also still Illegal.


I figured that the phrase "its also illegal" was more of a given. I guess I assumed its illegal in most countries?


... I really didn't want to do a full dive into penny lobby blah blah blah.... But, it turns out Jarden spends on average 150,000 US a year on lobbyists in the US, and typically receives contracts for 48 million US from the government on the metals to produce coins.

Back to a slightly more relevant topic: Durkon must have crit failed his save from food poisoning. That has to be the answer.

Just my two cents...

I'll see myself out.

[KorvinStarmast]

Back to a slightly more relevant topic: Durkon must have crit failed his save from food poisoning. That has to be the answer.

There's nothing magical about food poisoning. It's mundane. Hence, no saving throw is (necessarily) on the table.

[Peelee]

I for one am grateful that they are doing this.

1. I have too much respect for Abe Lincoln to condone the loss of the penny.
2. Without the penny, the phrase "my two cents worth" would lose its meaning.
3. The phrase A penny for your thoughts? would pass further out of circulation.
4. I'd have to find a coin of more value to mark my golf ball on the green before putting
5. The easy understanding of the value of "a copper piece" in D&D would fade.

Keep the penny, it's not about the copper.

1. Lincoln is on the five dollar bill. And Mount Rushmore. And has a monument in DC. I don't think the penny would be a great loss for him.
2. As of right now, it means "basically worthless." If a five cent coin is the smallest denomination, then two cents still means "basically worthless." I fail to see the problem here.
3. Spending millions of dollars to keep a phrase that's already dying out seems.... unwise (I'm trying to be polite here).
4. Nickels would be easier to spot anyway. Hell, quarters are the best, since they have good contrast with the green and are the largest coin.
5. It's a base ten system. I don't think that's difficult to grasp without a penny.

Lose the penny, it's not about the copper, it just sucks.

[georgie_leech]

There's nothing magical about food poisoning. It's mundane. Hence, no saving throw is (necessarily) on the table.

Neither are vipers, and yet they have one too. Saving Throws are for resisting effects, not necessarily magical ones.

[littlebum2002]

Fun fact: lots of amusement parks (at least all the ones I have ever been to: anecdotal evidence only) have vending machines that use a penny as a base to press out a commemorative coin of their park. Also still Illegal.

This is a very common myth. It is not generally illegal to destroy coinage (paper money is a different issue). You can go directly in front of the US mint and crush thousands of pennies and they won't do anything about it, because it is not illegal.

It is only illegal to deface currency with fraudulent intent. If you don't plan on scamming anyone with your destroyed coins, it is not illegal.

In fact, it was such a common misconception that the US Mint itself saught to clear it up:

The Treasury's Letter to Vance Fowler
Is it legal to press pennies or other coins?
Mr. Angelo Rosato reproduced this letter from the Department of the Treasury to Mr. Vance Fowler in his book "Encyclopedia of the Modern Elongated", (ISBN 0-9626996-2-4) [email protected]. The letter was dated July 22, 1980, letterhead: The Department of the Treasury, Office of the Director of the Mint, and is probably the source of many quotes collectors have seen over the years. It reads in part:

"This is in reply to your letter of Jun 20, 1980, concerning United States statutes governing the destruction, melting, or other extramonetary uses of United States coins. You refer to and question the legality of a souvenir machine which compresses coins and returns a souvenir. You refer to Title 18, U. S. C. sections 331 and 475.

As you are already aware, a federal statute in the criminal code of the United States (18 U.S.C. 331), indeed makes it illegal if one "fraudulently alters, defaces, mutilates, impairs, diminishes, falsifies, scales or lightens" any U.S. coin. However, being a criminal statute, a fraudulent intent is required for violation. Thus, the mere act of compressing coins into souvenirs is not illegal, without other factors being present.

Section 475, which you refer to in your letter, regarding the attachment of notice or advertisement to legal tender, does not apply to your souvenirs in this case. Your are not impressing or attaching a business or professional card, notice or advertisement to a coin, your are simply making an impression on the coin.

We hope this information answers your question. If we can be of any further assistance, please contact us.

Sincerely,

Kenneth B. Gubin
Counsel to the Mint

(emphasis mine)


But what about melting down coins?, you ask. Well, this is exactly why melting down coins was such a big problem, because it was technically legal. And that's why, in 2006 when the price of copper skyrocketed, the US Mint created a ban on melting down coins

[Crisis21]

Saturday - was the day of the ancient Roman god Saturn, and I really have no clue why there wasn't a germanic god(dess) to take care of that day.

Fun fact straight from the Wikipedia article on Saturn:

In the Westphalian dialects of Low Saxon, in East Frisian Low Saxon and in the Saterland Frisian language, Saturday is called Satertag, also akin to Dutch Zaterdag, which has the same linguistic roots as the English word Saturday. It was formerly thought that the English name referred to a deity named Sætere who was venerated by the pre-Christian peoples of north-western Germany, some of whom were the ancestors of the Anglo-Saxons. Sætere was identified as either a god associated with the harvest of possible Slav origin,[5] or another name for Loki[6] a complex deity associated with both good and evil; this latter suggestion may be due to Jacob Grimm.[7] However, modern dictionaries derive the name from Saturn.[8][9][10][11]

TLDR: Apparently the western germanic language origin for 'Saturday' might have been based on some god named Sætere, which may or may not be one of Loki's aliases.

[factotum]

Something to note: Greg prepares spells at dusk, not dawn.

If Durkon can stall him long enough for Roy to arrive it would be significantly easier to take on Greg without his full compliment of spells.

How does that work? Durkula doesn't actually have to cast any of the spells he's prepared at dusk, so he could have just as many spells available to cast if Roy turns up 23 hours later as he would if he turned up immediately afterward.

[goodpeople25]

I for one am grateful that they are doing this.

1. I have too much respect for Abe Lincoln to condone the loss of the penny.
2. Without the penny, the phrase "my two cents worth" would lose its meaning.
3. The phrase A penny for your thoughts? would pass further out of circulation.
4. I'd have to find a coin of more value to mark my golf ball on the green before putting
5. The easy understanding of the value of "a copper piece" in D&D would fade.

Keep the penny, it's not about the copper.

My pennies didn't have Lincoln on them, but the rest of your points I haven't seem being a problem whatsoever. Well I don't play golf, but I think the general principle still applies for former uses of pennies, plus I'm pretty certain you could just keep some pennies if it was the value.

[littlebum2002]

I for one am grateful that they are doing this.

1. I have too much respect for Abe Lincoln to condone the loss of the penny.
2. Without the penny, the phrase "my two cents worth" would lose its meaning.
3. The phrase A penny for your thoughts? would pass further out of circulation.
4. I'd have to find a coin of more value to mark my golf ball on the green before putting
5. The easy understanding of the value of "a copper piece" in D&D would fade.

Keep the penny, it's not about the copper.

The US spends $132 million a year on minting pennies.

The USDA estimates that, on a thrifty food plan, you can feed a family of 4 for $509 a month. That's $6120 a year.

So for the money we spend for no better reason than so you can keep using the phrase "a penny for your thoughts" we could feed over 86,000 people a year.

If the US didn't have anyone who was hungry, or homeless, or couldn't afford health care, would i support keeping the penny? Sure, why not. But since this isn't our situation, it's kind of a slap in the face to those people to tell them that their life means less to us than our own sentimentality towards a worthless piece of metal.

[Peelee]

The US spends $132 million a year on minting pennies.

The USDA estimates that, on a thrifty food plan, you can feed a family of 4 for $509 a month. That's $6120 a year.

So for the money we spend for no better reason than so you can keep using the phrase "a penny for your thoughts" we could feed over 86,000 people a year.

If the US didn't have anyone who was hungry, or homeless, or couldn't afford health care, would i support keeping the penny? Sure, why not. But since this isn't our situation, it's kind of a slap in the face to those people to tell them that their life means less to us than our own sentimentality towards a worthless piece of metal.

There's so much I'd like to add onto this, but don't wanna risk skirting the wrong side of the forum rules.

[Ornithologist]

There's nothing magical about food poisoning. It's mundane. Hence, no saving throw is (necessarily) on the table.

Really, a player would probably not have to roll because the time you spend rolling for a mundane task like eating dinner is time the group spends not rolling for tasks like break into a bank, or dodge the flying death wheel.

Still, I could see the following exchange (at a table I'm running):

Player 1: I look for a good Inn in town to stay the night. (Rolls)
D - 1
GM: The place you find looks good, though something about the food as you eat tastes off to you.
By the next morning, you are at -2 Con all day from being up all night on the Loo.

Player 1: Well that was a crappy result.

We all groan/laugh at the pun and move on. (and the player is happy they didn't get robbed blind in the night!)

On the coin front, I learn something new everyday. On an unrelated note, I am predicting its time for a change in scene back to the OotLORtVnRD.

[Svata]

You know what happens when you have intrinsic money, like gold and silver, as the currency and the amount of goods out paces the amount of silver/gold? You purchase power increases. It takes less money to buy things, not more.

Silver and gold HAVE no intrinsic value though. It was already value by fiat. The only things with intrinsic value are necessities to live.

[Grey_Wolf_c]

Silver and gold HAVE no intrinsic value though. It was already value by fiat. The only things with intrinsic value are necessities to live.

(See: the collapse of the Roman gold/silver currency during the Crisis of the third century, when hyperinflation due to insufficient gold for the size of the economy caused the imperial government to start collecting taxes in kind: shirts, wheat, bricklaying quotas, etc)

GW

[Chei]

In the paraphrased words of a great man: "Potatoes get you through a time of no gold much better than gold gets you through a time of no potatoes."

[Svata]

So unless you want to trade primarily in bushels of wheat, you'll need some level of abstraction and fiat in your currency.

[Grey_Wolf_c]

So unless you want to trade primarily in bushels of wheat, you'll need some level of abstraction and fiat in your currency.

Exactly. I'd go as far as to say that the more intrinsic value the medium of exchange has, the worse it is as a currency, because it gives people a reason to horde it beyond its actual purpose of facilitating the exchange of goods and services. Money works best when it is literally just a way to keep score: who owes whom how much. Full stop.

Grey Wolf

[Ornithologist]

Exactly. I'd go as far as to say that the more intrinsic value the medium of exchange has, the worse it is as a currency, because it gives people a reason to horde it beyond its actual purpose of facilitating the exchange of goods and services. Money works best when it is literally just a way to keep score: who owes whom how much. Full stop.

Grey Wolf

That just makes me think of the Star Munchkin RPG book for DND3.5 The in game currency was credits, because everyone owed so much from their family lines' loans all currency was just based of how much it would pay towards their family debts. Don't think to hard on how that would actually work, it is an rpg supplement based on a sci-fi variant card game based on a game satirizing Munchkin-esk players in DND.

[Reddish Mage]

Silver and gold HAVE no intrinsic value though. It was already value by fiat. The only things with intrinsic value are necessities to live.

Silver and gold both have intrinsic value. In fact, I recall watching an analyst claim not too long ago that the Silver prices were based more on industrial demand than anything else.

Limiting things with "intrinsic values" to "necessities to live" is far too limiting. People value more than just basic food, plain clothing, and rude shelter.

Fiat value is limited though. Just because a price-tag is placed on a pure luxury item doesn't mean people will pay it. Prices for luxuries, just like necessities, are negotiated and usually determined by markets.

Fiat value is really only extant for currency and other sorts of negotiable instruments. Some government declared that a certain sort of paper would carry value far beyond what paper rags go for.

Gold is really in its own category, as it has value for use in industry and as jewelry but its price is mostly determined by its use as an alternative for paper & electronic currency.

Not sure how you tie this back into the comic or a D&D game. I once calculated that silver and gold purchasing power in 3.5 worked well with actual medieval purchasing power the basic labor and soldier rates (going up to knights but excluding seige engineers and arquebus gunners).

[hamishspence]

That just makes me think of the Star Munchkin RPG book for DND3.5 The in game currency was credits, because everyone owed so much from their family lines' loans all currency was just based of how much it would pay towards their family debts.

Star Munchkin: (page 49)


Through the miracle of compound interest, it is now estimated that, in total, the universe owes itself roughly 700,000 times its own net worth, including the value gained by selling it off for parts. Thus, money is now measured with credits. The more credits you have, the more leverage you have against the total lien of universal debt.

[georgie_leech]

Silver and gold both have intrinsic value. In fact, I recall watching an analyst claim not too long ago that the Silver prices were based more on industrial demand than anything else.

Limiting things with "intrinsic values" to "necessities to live" is far too limiting. People value more than just basic food, plain clothing, and rude shelter.

Fiat value is limited though. Just because a price-tag is placed on a pure luxury item doesn't mean people will pay it. Prices for luxuries, just like necessities, are negotiated and usually determined by markets.

Fiat value is really only extant for currency and other sorts of negotiable instruments. Some government declared that a certain sort of paper would carry value far beyond what paper rags go for.

Gold is really in its own category, as it has value for use in industry and as jewelry but its price is mostly determined by its use as an alternative for paper & electronic currency.

Not sure how you tie this back into the comic or a D&D game. I once calculated that silver and gold purchasing power in 3.5 worked well with actual medieval purchasing power the basic labor and soldier rates (going up to knights but excluding seige engineers and arquebus gunners).

Trouble is, silver and gold were used long before they had industrial uses. They were used primarily because they were pretty, weren't impossible to acquire if you knew how but were difficult to counterfeit, and they didn't expire or otherwise get used up over time. You know what also shares these qualities? Cowry shells. Coincidentally, guess what many coastal or pre-metallurgy peoples used for currency.

[LadyEowyn]

While I will, sadly, agree that most of the world now has a central bank issuing fiat currency (and the reason for that is rather nefarious if you understand the MIC)- you are completely wrong when you say "Decoupling it from a natural resource just means it can keep up with how much we need in our current market."

You know what happens when you have intrinsic money, like gold and silver, as the currency and the amount of goods out paces the amount of silver/gold? You purchase power increases. It takes less money to buy things, not more.

Inflation is you losing purchasing power- and slowly all fiats return to their intrinsic value of 0. It's just a matter of time.

Money is a unit of exchange that should represent/reflect the very work put into whatever service or good you are attempting to acquire. Intrinsic metal requires actual work to produce. Work for work will always be superior to work for what is effectively an IOU.

Eh, metal-based currency is also subject to inflation. (The Spanish went bankrupt after conquering and looting the Americas in the 1500-1600s, partly due to inflation caused by a massive influx of gold. High military spending was the rest of the reason.)

If your currency is linked to gold, its value is based on the amount of gold available in the world - a rather arbitrary number, as gold has no intrinsic value ( compared to other metals it's not very useful, which is what made it a good currency) If your currency isn't linked to any metal its value is based on other people's/nations' confidence that you'll pay back your debts.

[Grey_Wolf_c]

Eh, metal-based currency is also subject to inflation. (The Spanish went bankrupt after conquering and looting the Americas in the 1500-1600s, partly due to inflation caused by a massive influx of gold. High military spending was the rest of the reason.)

Also, the lack of any significant industry: Spain was selling its wool to the Netherlands and buying it back as clothes, for example.

If your currency is linked to gold, its value is based on the amount of gold available in the world - a rather arbitrary number

Indeed. These days, the entirety of the gold known to exist on Earth (170000 tons - about 7 billion dollars) is obviously insufficient to cover anywhere near the needs of the US market. Heck, Apple alone has cash reserves larger than that... by two orders of magnitude.

GW

[Kish]

[*]It's a base ten system. I don't think that's difficult to grasp without a penny.

It is notably difficult to grasp for a lot of people who seem to instinctively expect 100 silver pieces to the gold piece and 100 copper pieces to the gold piece. The existence of the penny does not seem to help with this.

[drazen]

Eh, metal-based currency is also subject to inflation. (The Spanish went bankrupt after conquering and looting the Americas in the 1500-1600s, partly due to inflation caused by a massive influx of gold. High military spending was the rest of the reason.)

If your currency is linked to gold, its value is based on the amount of gold available in the world - a rather arbitrary number, as gold has no intrinsic value ( compared to other metals it's not very useful, which is what made it a good currency) If your currency isn't linked to any metal its value is based on other people's/nations' confidence that you'll pay back your debts.

The first half of this is true, but (and I'm not sure we disagree) the critique that it's arbitrary falls a bit flat when fiat currency is also subject to something that is, arguably, also quite arbitrary: the whims of the government churning it out. It is how hyper-inflation always happens, whether in South America, Zimbabwe, and even the early United States (the Continental Dollar).

This does make things like Bitcoin interesting, as I believe the Bitcoin supply increases at a fixed, constant rate, which I think would be a new currency phenomenon? Curiously, Bitcoins have managed to go from virtually worthless in 2009 to over $3,000 this summer. This seems odd to me -- I'd think a currency with a steady increase in suppy would remain relatively stable, unless the increase was too low for expanded activity (I tend to imagine a fiat money supply as being like shares of stock in the country, though this doesn't work fully, such as declining prices during a recession).

[Shining Wrath]

I created my own currencies for my D&D setting, and to do that I wanted to set a ratio of the value of gold to silver, and silver to copper, in a quasi-medieval world.

Guess what? It's arbitrary. It varies all over the place. In fact, historically, the ratio g/s was a little higher on one side of the Channel than the other (I forget which), but the result was merchants engaging in international trade spent silver on one side and gold on the other.

If you then start asking what the price of wheat ought to be in ounces of gold, the answer is of course supply and demand - but the supply of gold also varies. In a global economy, the production of gold is simply not equally distributed among nations, or even anything close, which allows for an OPEC-like cartel of gold producers to form and decide what this year's inflation rate looks like. Not good.

[Jay R]

Silver and gold HAVE no intrinsic value though. It was already value by fiat. The only things with intrinsic value are necessities to live.

I see what you're trying to say, but that's not what the jargon phrase "fiat money" means.

People already value silver and gold. Buying something with gold or silver coins, or bills that are silver or gold certificates, are straightforward barter - trading one valued commodity for another. The coin does not get its value from the government printing on it; we already wanted the silver and the gold. The printing merely regularizes the value by telling you how much silver or gold it is. Silver and gold certificates represent actual silver or gold in the bank or treasury, and (when money was in that form), you could always go there and claim your metal. The printed bill was basically a deed for the stored metal. And it's not "value by fiat". Melt the coin down, and it's still worth the same amount. You'd just have to prove the actual metal content.

By contrast, "fiat money" does not represent an actual commodity. A modern "Federal Reserve Note" (in America) only has value because the government said it does. That's why the government printed, "This note is legal tender for all debts, public or private." We didn't particularly want those pieces of paper before the government put printing on it.

[JumboWheat01]

It is notably difficult to grasp for a lot of people who seem to instinctively expect 100 silver pieces to the gold piece and 100 copper pieces to the gold piece. The existence of the penny does not seem to help with this.

I think that's because so many games that use the Gold/Silver/Copper system go in 100s, rather than 10s. Heck, even Neverwinter Online has 100 copper to the silver and 100 silver to the gold, and it's set in the Realms!