Dragon magazine 349 pdf
Now, the world has both fantasy and common (i.e. A large portion of the fun is making decisions, and what makes decisions fun is being able to reason about the world the decision is being made in. For me, the fiction of the game is more important than the mechanics. The drive toward "realism," whether in encumbrance, weather, linguistics, population density, or some other area, was the tenor of the day and Dragon's content reflected that.įrom my point-of-view, D&D isn’t improvisational theatre, but it isn’t “just a game” either. Worrying about such things has never been an obsession of mine (I'd prefer to obsess about other things), but, back in 1983 and beyond, such obsessions became commoner in the pages of Dragon. But then I prefer to keep most things in Dungeons & Dragons fairly abstract, from hit points to experience points to encumbrance. Working the other way - figuring out many and how large the containers holding a given volume of treasure must be - is not better in my opinion. Godwin kindly saves most of the math for himself, but, even so, the idea of having to spend much time calculating how many silver pieces actually fit into an adventurer's saddlebags seems a needless complication. Armed with this table and the size of any container, the referee can, with comparative ease, determine how many coins of any type can fit within it.Īs these kinds of articles go, "How Many Coins in a Coffer?" isn't very math-heavy. So, if a chest is 18" x 30" x 18" in dimension, how many gold coins can it contain? How many silver? What about a mix of gold and silver? By recourse to formulae involving the specific gravities of each metal, Godwin is able to offer a small table that gives the weight, volume, and thickness of typical coins of precious metal in AD&D. His interest in this question is in how many of a given coin will fit into a given container. And if we do say that all coin metals weigh the same, we are still faced with the volume question.The bulk of the article that follows then concerns not so much the weight of individual coins, which Godwin admits would give the referee a nervous breakdown to track, but with the size of coins. What's realistic about fire-breathing dragons or alignment languages? How does that accord with the laws of biology and physics? There are quite a few of us out here in the boondocks who feel perfectly comfortable with basilisks, fireballs, illusions, the fact that a spell called "continual light" produces continuous light with nothing intermittent about it, and even the rule that clerics can't use edged weapons, but who balk at the idea of a world where platinum, gold, electrum, silver and copper all weigh precisely the same for a given volume. The easiest way out is to reiterate that it's only a game and isn't supposed to be totally realistic. Having presented that prolog, the author explains why this matter concerns him: Tunnels & Trolls also includes coins that weigh one-tenth of a pound each but without any reference to size. RuneQuest doesn't talk about the size of its coinage, but it does talk about its weight and does so in a way that Godwin believes is nonsensical (he points out that silver does not weigh twice as much as copper). Given that, how can these two types of coins be the same weight or the same size? He goes on to note that this problem isn't unique to AD&D. After quibbling over the meaning of "relatively," the author points out that, for example, platinum weighs 2.5 times as much as copper.
The article's premise is that the way AD&D abstracts encumbrance with regards to coins makes no sense, since the Players Handbook states that all coins are relatively the same size and weight (one-tenth of a pound or 1.6 ounces). The Shattered Gates of Slaughtergarde (2006), p.Another preview of the Silver Age appears in issue #80 (December 1983) of Dragon, in the article "How Many Coins in a Coffer?" by David F. Tome of Battle: The Book of Nine Swords (2006), p.100 Tome of Battle: The Book of Nine Swords (2006), p.96 See also List of Dungeons & Dragons 3rd edition character classes for all other types of character class appearing in 3.0 or 3.5.ĭungeon Master's Guide (3.5) (2003), p.176įorgotten Realms Campaign Setting (3e) (2001), p.40ĭungeon Master's Guide (3.5) (2003), p.177įorgotten Realms Campaign Setting (3e) (2001), p.41ĭungeon Master's Guide (3.5) (2003), p.178ĭungeon Master's Guide (3.5) (2003), p.180ĭungeon Master's Guide (3.5) (2003), p.181 It includes all prestige classes which appeared in an official product for D&D 3.0 or 3.5. The following is a list of Dungeons & Dragons 3rd edition prestige classes.