[crossfire] Re: I'll commit the large denomination coin archtypes, I'd like to edit the amber coin to look more ambery (any objections)?

[Mark Wedel]

Lalo Martins wrote:
> Local currencies
> =================

  As a note, while having local currencies add flavors, I'm not really sure if 
it is worth the complication/confusion it is likely to cause.  This will likely 
be somewhat related to how many regions we have.  But one can certainly see a 
case where a player becomes a citizen of a new region and is now really confused 
on those values.

> 
> The player needs to have a field or force saying his region of
> citizenship.  This would be used for appraisals.  To do this, in the
> hall where you select starting city, the exits would be replaced with
> player changers (and the code needs to be updated to handle this new
> type of player changer).

<snip>

> When you sell something at a store, it would pick the coins to give you
> from the region's money.

  To me, it would probably make more sense, but perhaps be more confusing, to 
get appraisals based on the region you are in.  It perhaps seems a bit odd be in 
a shop, examining your objects, and being told it is worth 5 pp, 2 gp, but when 
you sell it, you get 2 amber coins & 2 copper ingots or something.

> 
> UNDECIDED: shops may either accept any and all money (easy to do -
> instead of iterating over a list of money archs, it iterates over the
> money archs in the player's inventory), or they may accept only region
> money, forcing you to go to the bank first.  Thoughts?  If we go with
> the second, then "tourist-friendly" shops can have converters in a corner.

  Having to convert money to me just seems a bother (find I nice item in a shop 
I want to buy.  Oh, I'm in pupland, have to leave the shop, find a bank, convert 
the right amount over, etc).  And if the conversion isn't 1:1 (eg, the bank 
takes some percentage for service), then it becomes even more a pain, because 
you don't really want to convert more you need.  You'd also perhaps get the the 
case that gems become the most stable money, presuming you can still sell them 
in the shops and get whatever money.

> 
> Monster treasure would also pick from the region money, although I
> suppose we could allow a money field in the map too, if you want a map
> to give funny money.

  Note that right now, treasurelists are coded with actual coin types, and not a 
'money' type.  So making this change requires some mucking with the treasure 
generation code, and could be relatively complicated especially if the different 
regions don't have that 10:1 ratio (eg, region the uses copper, silver, gold, 
and platinum ningis, with 7:1 for each ration (copper ningi has base value 1, 
silver ningi 7, gold 49, platinum 343).  Converting what as 500 gp now becomes 1 
platinum, 3 gold, 1 silver, 3 copper ningis).

  If this change is made, I'd suggest all treasurelists need to be updated to 
have a 'money' metatype, with the nrof representing the total value of the 
goods.  Any treasurelists that specifically mention coin types would use those 
coin types.

  That said, throwing in the odd foreign currency in a dungeon would make things 
interesting.  Imagine those low level players adventuring around scorn and 
finding some ningis and asking what the heck are those.

> 
> Then it's all fun... I'd suggest getting rid of the existing
> gold/silver/plat "generic" coins and replacing them with non-coined
> pieces (which probably explains their relatively low value).  Then
> introducing the "scorn penny", "scorn shilling", "scorn pound", "navar
> cent", "navar dime", "navar dollar", "pupland marks", and so on ad
> infinitum.

  Not until relative recent history did paper money really become popular.  That 
said, if currency is changed, I'd suggest unique graphics (that are clearly 
distinguishable) are probably desired - having bunches of coins in my inventory 
that all look the same would be confusing/annoying, and remove some of the 
reason for doing this, which is to add character.

  That said, one could make some changes fairly simply - one region could use 
triangular 'coins' instead of round ones.  Also, if the face was replaced by 
just a single large coin (vs the stack like there is now), this would allow more 
detail to be put into the image - perhaps even enough to put different images on 
the coin face itself.  After all, for most all other objects, each imagine 
represents just one of that image, and not a pile.

> 
> This can also support mwedel's notion of accepting gems as money, by
> simply stating in the appropriate code that type GEM is as acceptable as
> type MONEY.  So if shops accept foreign currency, they will also accept
> gems; if they don't, you'll be able to put gems in the money field for a
> region or map.  (Carrying gems would then be a good strategy when going
> to a new country - you'll never know if they have exchange service for
> the money you have...)

  As a note, I'd think any decent sized place (large enough to have its own 
currency) should have a bank to convert the currency.  Simply because if it 
doesn't, this adds more bother (shoot, can't convert from navar dollars to 
ningis here, have to go back to scorn, convert the navar coin to scorn, then can 
come back here and convert to ningis).

  Map wise, this is actually quite easy to do - since objects can accept generic 
'money' type things, you don't need to actually put in tables for all the 
possible currency people will deposit - you can just put in one table of 'drop 
foreign money here to convert to copper/silver/gold/platinum ningis (different 
tables depending what you want).  Player comes in, drops whatever they have on 
the gold ningi table and it converts it for them.

  In fact, right now, the current scorn bank is outdated in this sense - there 
isn't need for the gold to platinum table - one could easily enough set up an 
'money to platinum' table.

  This is how the identify tables and the like work - they don't care on the 
coin presented, they just care about the value.

  But that then leads into that other problem - with local currencies, you'd get 
your money when you sell stuff in these different currencies.  But to change the 
behavior of how these tables and the like work adds a bit more complication also.


> 
> best,
>                                                Lalo Martins
> --
>       So many of our dreams at first seem impossible,
>        then they seem improbable, and then, when we
>        summon the will, they soon become inevitable.
> --
>            personal: http://www.laranja.org/
> GNU: never give up freedom                 http://www.gnu.org/
> 
> 
> _______________________________________________
> crossfire mailing list
> crossfire at metalforge.org
> http://mailman.metalforge.org/mailman/listinfo/crossfire