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#1
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Hello everyone,
I have been looking over a few things as reference, and haven't been able to find the kind of information about Precious Stones that I have been able to find about precious metals and I need some help... So I'm asking you guys for help on this. I know that when it comes to precious stones, black market and smugglers use diamonds since they where so very hard to trace or find out where they originated form (well, until they started putting those microscopic size serial numbers on them to counter the use of blood diamonds). How are precious stones priced? I know that metals are priced by weight. But I haven't been able to figure out how they price precious stones. So I have asked here and on a T2k mailing list for anyone's help on figuring this out? Also, does anyone know how much Platinium and Palladium are worth? I know value of precious metals are Platinium, Gold, Palladium, and then Silver. How about precious stones?
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Fuck being a hero. Do you know what you get for being a hero? Nothing! You get shot at. You get a little pat on the back, blah blah blah, attaboy! You get divorced... Your wife can't remember your last name, your kids don't want to talk to you... You get to eat a lot of meals by yourself. Trust me kid, nobody wants to be that guy. I do this because there is nobody else to do it right now. Believe me if there was somebody else to do it, I would let them do it. There's not, so I'm doing it. |
#2
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I'm not that sure that precious metals or stones are going to be worth that much in T2K. The primary reason they are used as currency is because they have little real vale otherwise. You can't fire gold from a gun, eat or drink gold, or use use gold to fuel your generator. Ten kilos of gold is just shiny metal; ten kilos of lead can at least be used to make bullets.
(this is a long way of saying that I think in 2000 you will see mostly barter) |
#3
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Value exists in what someone is willing to give you for it. Now I really do agree that metals like lead and steel (gunpowder and brass cartridges for that matter) would be worth alot more than any precious metals and/or stones we still have to realize that there are others out there who place more value on other items and make them more valuable than we'd expect (thus why Gold and Silver prices increase when cash currencies decline). Hell, fuel would be worth alot more than anything else in a post-apoc setting as we saw in Road Warrior and Beyond the Thunderdome since production would be nearly impossible. But we humans are very strange that way we desire in what we desire to pocess. But everything has to have something to measure itself upon. It's one of the reasons why people didn't understand the d20 Modern use of Wealth checks (or purchase checks) instead of monatary values. But people had/have such a hard time using the Wealth check system, we had to come up with monetary values for 'extras' that our characters would have while using the wealth system for the more mudane things they would already pocess.
__________________
Fuck being a hero. Do you know what you get for being a hero? Nothing! You get shot at. You get a little pat on the back, blah blah blah, attaboy! You get divorced... Your wife can't remember your last name, your kids don't want to talk to you... You get to eat a lot of meals by yourself. Trust me kid, nobody wants to be that guy. I do this because there is nobody else to do it right now. Believe me if there was somebody else to do it, I would let them do it. There's not, so I'm doing it. |
#4
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The problem with precious stones is that the vast majority of people don't know what they are actually worth and most of us don't even know what stones are really gemstones without some sort of reference book. Diamonds are vastly overvalued and are intrinsically worthless to the average person, I believe the same would apply to any gemstones in the post-apocalypse world.
As for precious metals, platinum and palladium are so rare in the marketplace that it is highly unlikely most people will ever deal with them except as jewellery. Even then, most people have no clear idea of how much they are worth so I doubt many people would accept these metals in trade if for no other reason than the fact that most people would not even recognize them for what they are when they saw them. In fact, platinum is not even sold to the average person off the street and in nearly every 1st World nation, someone trying to buy/sell it without a legitimate dealer's licence is going to be investigated by the police (I have a friend who works in the mining industry, platinum is such a controlled metal that the company he works for requires a licence to possess a minor amount of platinum) Gold and silver are very different, easier to mine and refine and almost universally recognized as gold or silver. Both can be valued reasonably accurately by simply weighing them as they should both be about 99% purity when cast into ingots. The other metals are much harder to judge because who really knows the weight expected from an ingot of pure palladium except for an expert or metallurgist? But I do believe their value will be based entirely on whether someone is prepared to accept them as trade because they will be hoping (indeed, "banking" on the idea) that the money market will re-establish itself and the gold/silver will be worth something in the future. |
#5
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Thank you! I didn't know platinium was such a monitored and controlled precious metal. But it'd make a damn good plot hook (a government vault full of the stuff could be really good if set in continental US with the MilGov/CivGov/New America race to get it)! I have only asked about the diamonds since it was so popular with blackmarketers and smugglers, and since most of the economy for major equipment would be under control by those types of pople I was wondering just how much they would be worth... How do others handle them in their games? just handwave what the diamonds are worth and go with that? because that is what i'm really leaning towards at the moment.
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Fuck being a hero. Do you know what you get for being a hero? Nothing! You get shot at. You get a little pat on the back, blah blah blah, attaboy! You get divorced... Your wife can't remember your last name, your kids don't want to talk to you... You get to eat a lot of meals by yourself. Trust me kid, nobody wants to be that guy. I do this because there is nobody else to do it right now. Believe me if there was somebody else to do it, I would let them do it. There's not, so I'm doing it. |
#6
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#7
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#8
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Well I suppose what we are really talking about is just how useful is the material to the survivors? Like Copeab mentioned, lead is going to be more in demand than say gold but the important question is why and the answer is although you can make bullets out of gold like you can with lead (or indeed any suitable metal), lead is easier to work with and is found in greater abundance.
Lead is used as sheeting for rooftops and gutters, it can be formed into pipes, bowls and other implements whereas gold is much less useful for such things (sure there's the lead poisoning bit but you get my meaning) You'd probably want to keep the gold for soldering or electrical repairs like Targan mentioned. I think the same thing applies to the gemstones, if I'm going to trade 20 rounds of .44Magnum, a thick wool jumper and two MREs with you, I want something useful in return and I mean immediately useful like rifle ammunition or directions to the closest trading town or alcohol for my generator. To paraphrase Copeab again, I can't eat a handful of rubies, assuming I'm even skilled enough to recognize them as rubies. These items i.e. precious stones/metals are really only coveted because someone likes the look of them, they're pretty and because they're in demand for such vanity purposes, they become valuable. Gold is good for backing up currency but only because people believe gold is valuable. It's only valuable because it is relatively rare and people want to own it. I think for most people in the immediate aftermath, gold coins/ingots etc. may possibly retain the belief in their value but I don't think many people will see gemstones in the same manner, they'll just be pretty stones. |
#9
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for bullets ?
hehe I hear it has great density and is very mallable. Gold bullets - no there is a weapon to show fire superiority ... Other than that I agree with those who say that precious metal and stones are precious only as long as there is a need/market . i.e the agreed price / trust in the market price disappears for such items as foodstuff become more important and expensive . Once pickles start to look more tempting than teh same weight of gems its lost its value... yes- I read that in a nobel discertation on economics ![]() |
#10
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Salt merchants and sea salt production has been an element within my game. |
#11
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Present the PCs with a vault filled with gold or a storage locker filled with rare, useful, and functional but more mundane items, and they can choose only one compartment to empty before the bad guys come riding in for the attack.
Of course if they choose the gold, you could reveal to them that they missed out on all kinds of handy items they will probably never see again. ![]()
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"Let's roll." Todd Beamer, aboard United Flight 93 over western Pennsylvania, September 11, 2001. |
#12
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my own two cents is that gold and silver would have very little value in the Twilight timeframe, especially when compared to a pound or two of pepper, or a bag of seed corn...
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The reason that the American Army does so well in wartime, is that war is chaos, and the American Army practices chaos on a daily basis. |
#13
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Or better still, a pound or two of various spice and herb seeds still in date for planting--you, too, can become the Spice Lord of the Post-Apocalyptic world!
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"Let's roll." Todd Beamer, aboard United Flight 93 over western Pennsylvania, September 11, 2001. |
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