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Marisa · **12-10-2017, 05:23 AM**

So after doing a lot of merchant RP the last couple days, it's become very apparent to me that there is a huge discrepancy in the perceived value of Gil. So I've started paying close attention to the price of what my character buys most often: Beer. In the real world, if I'm at a bar, I expect to pay between 2 and 6 USD for whatever is on tap. But in the last two weeks in XIV, I've paid as little as 65gil and as much as 3500gil. And the 3500 wasn't me getting something really pricey and exotic. That was about average for the menu.Â Â

I'm kind of curious to know how much gil your character carries day-to-day, and what their financial status is. I feel like Marisa carries around a thousand gil, and that's enough to buy food and drinks for a couple days.Â

Also, what do you think beer should cost?

Skae · **12-10-2017, 07:10 AM**

(12-10-2017, 05:23 AM)Marisa Wrote: So after doing a lot of merchant RP the last couple days, it's become very apparent to me that there is a huge discrepancy in the perceived value of Gil. So I've started paying close attention to the price of what my character buys most often: Beer. In the real world, if I'm at a bar, I expect to pay between 2 and 6 USD for whatever is on tap. But in the last two weeks in XIV, I've paid as little as 65gil and as much as 3500gil. And the 3500 wasn't me getting something really pricey and exotic. That was about average for the menu.Â Â

I'm kind of curious to know how much gil your character carries day-to-day, and what their financial status is. I feel like Marisa carries around a thousand gil, and that's enough to buy food and drinks for a couple days.Â

Also, what do you think beer should cost?

It is hard to decide on an exact exchange rate between gil and real world money since the relative prices of things in game can be quite different from the relative prices of the same things in the real world.

However after looking at what various NPC vendors charge for food and ingredients I'd say a beer would likely cost somewhere around 20-30 gil.

Saravahn · **12-10-2017, 07:14 AM**

Sounsyy post and a discussion thread
http://ffxiv-roleplayers.com/showthread....#pid259952

Another discussion thread ( with another Sounsyy post)
http://ffxiv-roleplayers.com/showthread.php?tid=8488

Long and short of it, the conversion seems to be up to the individual.

10 Gil to one USD
2:1
5:1
100:1
Whatever...

Because of that, my characters generally carry a descriptive amount rather than a numerical one. Meaning, "enough to get by" or "bulging coin purse(lol)", etc. Not "1000 Gil" or "only 10 Gil."

Marisa · **12-10-2017, 08:40 AM**

(12-10-2017, 07:14 AM)C Wrote: Sounsyy post and a discussion thread
http://ffxiv-roleplayers.com/showthread....#pid259952

Another discussion thread ( with another Sounsyy post)
http://ffxiv-roleplayers.com/showthread.php?tid=8488

Long and short of it, the conversion seems to be up to the individual.

10 Gil to one USD
2:1
5:1
100:1
Whatever...

Because of that, my characters generally carry a descriptive amount rather than a numerical one. Meaning, "enough to get by" or "bulging coin purse(lol)", etc. Not "1000 Gil" or "only 10 Gil."

I'm honestly of a similar mindset when it comes to effective amount vs actual amount, and I tend to adapt my numbers to fit whatever the people around me are using. That said, as someone who's starting to actually sell things in-character, its kind of important for me to have information for people beyond "This costs a lot" and "This costs very little", because people tend to want you to give them concrete numbers.Â

The nice thing about currency in WoW RP is that I think most people just have an innate sense of what a gold or silver coin should be worth. Gil seems to be a much more abstract concept, like if you handed a group of people random amounts of Turkish Lira and told them to trade among themselves with it. They just guess its worth based on how much everyone else has.Â Â

That said, the fact that Gil is readily accepted at all merchants outside of the Eorzean Alliance leads me to believe that Gil is itself minted on precious metals. It'll probably never happen, but if we could find out what denominations are printed on what metals and how much they weigh, we could roughly calculate, at least, the minimum relative value of each coin.Â Â

Maybe Koji will get an urge to talk economics one day. I feel like he's been really quiet since Stormblood launch...

Kieron Lohengrin · **12-10-2017, 09:19 AM**

It does get a bit weird. Food in Ul'dah is a couple dozen gil, while a meal in Kugane is a couple thousand a pop. Could be because of its status as a trade hub port. Aetheryte travel on the continent is several hundred gil, while intercontinental teleportation between Othard and Eorzea maxes out at 999. Weapons and armor get more expensive as they improve in quality / get better enchantments on them.

My assumptions include: most of the larger non-adventuring peasant populace subsist on several hundred gil a month for food and rent, or live off the land. Grand Company members and squadrons are paid in company seals, to trade in for equipment repairs and military housing + meals. A permanent-ownership apartment is 500k and houses can range from 2m-4m - both of which are somewhat comparable to real-world USD value.

If you live in one of the three GC cities, an adventurer carrying around 1k-2k gil would probably be more than enough for their mundane day-to-day, with the rest kept in retainer bank. If they travel a lot to Ishgard or Kugane, it might be more along the lines of 5k or higher.

And then there's Syndicate members like Godbert, and weirdos like Rowena - the Bill Gates of the setting. One was rich enough to build the Gold Saucer and the other has adventurers pay her in an ancient lost civilization's USB drives. You could chalk it up to just the game running on RPG tropes, but she's been diabolically canny enough to have a presence and invest in every budding future city - Mor Dhona and Idyllshire. The latter of which is now building and testing mecha to rival Garlemald's. Their net worths are probably comically high.

Mermaid · **12-10-2017, 10:09 AM**

The biggest problem is that we can't simply look at the prices of items in game. Prices scale too wildly based on the level of the item. Food items in starting cities can be as cheap as 5 gil while food items in Kugane are slightly over 2000 gil.

I'm on the side of leaving things vague instead of giving a numerical value. If I had to give a number I'd either aim for the prices of lower level in game items (ie levels 1-20) or do a simple conversion rate like 10 Gil to 1 USD. I always prefer the KISS principle.

As for my character I'd say she makes decent money between adventuring, playing at taverns, and occasionally helping at her mother's shop. By decent I mean she can cover the costs of adventuring (travel, food, equipment, etc), have a small apartment, and have a little extra to spend here and there. I'd consider her having the equivalent of a few hundred dollars on her when she walks into another town. Just enough to pay for an inn, food, and have a little to spend if say something goes wrong with her gear or she needs special armor for a dangerous job. She's very "middle class" financially.

hologramblue · **12-10-2017, 10:51 AM**

In gil and other yen-based RPG currency systems, I always think of 100 as being kind of the default unit.

....But Eorzea has a pre-industrial economy, so it's not as simple as "100 gil is one dollar k bye". The prices of things are going to vary pretty widely depending on both how close you are to a city (vendors will charge more in places they expect to get customers who CAN pay more) and availability of product (this is still true to an extent in the modern developed world, but reliance on hazardous overland travel = much lower geographical threshold for what constitutes "local and available").

Money doesn't have inherent worth - its worth arises from consensus. So how much a gil is worth is really as simple as looking at the offerings around you and seeing how much you could get for what you have, and how much it'll buy you. When prices in one location seem too high or too low, that's a merchant's chance to make profit by buying goods in one place and selling them in another, provided transport doesn't eat up their margins. The same is true for overseas markets - gil has value there as long as the people accepting it can turn around and use it to buy other things, so the EATC and other Eorzean merchants having a presence in Kugane is good news for Eorzean who want to shop there.

(That might be an IC explanation for why gil prices are so high in Kugane? Small amounts of gil not being very useful since it's used mostly to purchase imported goods? I Am Not An Economist.)

Cyef'a · **12-10-2017, 02:04 PM**

I suddenly like my free company and I were just giving away things for free when we ran our bar. Since the average drink was only ever like 6 gil. >.<

***Teadrinker*** · **12-10-2017, 02:58 PM**

I don't include values if I can avoid it. I've also OOCly messaged people and let them know I avoid it and I've never had a problem. If hosting an event I'll have rp food/drink items be complementary or if serving in an establishment I emote a description of an exchange of gil without using a value. When rping in others venues I do the same. Never had an issue and it takes care of the money exchange.

I pretty much got tired of the "Oh that's expensive!" From one person followed by "Oh these must be paupers items." From another because they have like 20 mil oocly. I just stay from values totally.

Shofie · **12-10-2017, 03:53 PM**

I run a tavern event and we always handwave the heck out of the value of gil. We don't actually charge actual currency either, we just rp it out. I figure the amount isn't really important, but the interaction. Does the roleplayer want to RP they are wealthy? Do they want to roleplay they have very little coin? We give them that power.

Generally if someone asks how much something they ordered costs, we "hold up a few fingers" to indicate how much. Whether that's three gil or three thousand is left up to interpretation to the roleplayer, and we prefer to keep it vague like this.

As far as how much gil my character would have on her at any given time, I'd say the "real world" equivalent of a few hundred bucks, give or take. She rolls around with enough money to purchase things in an emergency scenario, but not as much as someone who is exceedingly wealthy like she would be expected to be carrying.

Skae · **12-10-2017, 04:23 PM**

(12-10-2017, 10:51 AM)hologramblue Wrote: (That might be an IC explanation for why gil prices are so high in Kugane? Small amounts of gil not being very useful since it's used mostly to purchase imported goods? I Am Not An Economist.)

Or we just get a really bad exchange rate when using gil in Kugane, due to it not being the native currency. Smile

Kieron Lohengrin · **12-10-2017, 10:16 PM**

(12-10-2017, 10:51 AM)hologramblue Wrote: In gil and other yen-based RPG currency systems, I always think of 100 as being kind of the default unit.

....But Eorzea has a pre-industrial economy, so it's not as simple as "100 gil is one dollar k bye". The prices of things are going to vary pretty widely depending on both how close you are to a city (vendors will charge more in places they expect to get customers who CAN pay more) and availability of product (this is still true to an extent in the modern developed world, but reliance on hazardous overland travel = much lower geographical threshold for what constitutes "local and available").

Money doesn't have inherent worth - its worth arises from consensus. So how much a gil is worth is really as simple as looking at the offerings around you and seeing how much you could get for what you have, and how much it'll buy you. When prices in one location seem too high or too low, that's a merchant's chance to make profit by buying goods in one place and selling them in another, provided transport doesn't eat up their margins. The same is true for overseas markets - gil has value there as long as the people accepting it can turn around and use it to buy other things, so the EATC and other Eorzean merchants having a presence in Kugane is good news for Eorzean who want to shop there.

(That might be an IC explanation for why gil prices are so high in Kugane? Small amounts of gil not being very useful since it's used mostly to purchase imported goods? I Am Not An Economist.)

The setting in general is a bit weird with its time dilation and tech level. The entirety of ARR, HW and SB take place across several months, a year at most. Large areas of Eorzea and many settlements remain pre-industrial, while an industrial revolution is taking place in Ishgard and the border outposts, driven by independent entrepreneurs like Garlond Ironworks and Rowena. Never mind the existence of airships, Garlemald magitek, the Gold Saucer, and linkpearls - which are effectively ham radios. Instantaneous long-distance communication like that drastically changed the real world.

It's more accurate to think of Eorzea as being very, very widely spaced out and vast enough in its landmass that modern magitek living isn't going to reach distant villages for another few years, but richer folk in the bigger cities are already buying in to modern tech. And even then, because of magic and aether-powered fighting ability, superior tech doesn't translate to martial superiority, as seen with the Xaela annihilating the Garleans and their mecha during the Naadam.

Marisa · **12-11-2017, 02:02 AM**

Quote:And even then, because of magic and aether-powered fighting ability, superior tech doesn't translate to martial superiority, as seen with the Xaela annihilating the Garleans and their mecha during the Naadam.

Oh my god, super off-topic but it actually offends me how much this happens. So often we see fights where one side, usually the Garleans, out-classes the other side in every way: Better training, better equipment, better technology, more experience, greater numbers, better group coordination, air superiority, artillery superiority, etc etc. And yet the rag-tag group of jackasses with pitchforks beat them every. single. time. And why? Plot armor and shonen-willpower apparently. Probably the single biggest immersion-breaking thing for me is watching professional soldiers consistently be overpowered by people who have no actual experience in combat outside of bar brawls or hunting. And it's not like they're winning using guerrilla tactics, either. They just run straight into the melee and the Garleans just let them win. Why even have a military at that point?

hologramblue · **12-11-2017, 02:51 AM**

(12-10-2017, 10:16 PM)Kieron Lohengrin Wrote: The setting in general is a bit weird with its time dilation and tech level. The entirety of ARR, HW and SB take place across several months, a year at most. Large areas of Eorzea and many settlements remain pre-industrial, while an industrial revolution is taking place in Ishgard and the border outposts, driven by independent entrepreneurs like Garlond Ironworks and Rowena. Never mind the existence of airships, Garlemald magitek, the Gold Saucer, and linkpearls - which are effectively ham radios. Instantaneous long-distance communication like that drastically changed the real world.Â

Oh yeah, definitely. There is no One Great Trajectory of history or technological progress or anything of the sort; different corners of Hydaelyn take inspiration from different facets and periods of real-world history, but nothing maps perfectly to the world as we know it.

In the case of economic ablooblah, when I say "pre-industrial economy", I'm thinking of the specific developments that really shape how people in the "developed world" today relate to goods and currency. Things like the technology and infrastructure used to get goods from place to place, the communications technology we use to find out what's available in other places and what its value is (and thus standardize prices and currency values), and the political happenings that determine the shape of trade routes and the stability of currency.

I think of Eorzea's economy as being generally more similar to (what we think of as) a pre-industrial economy than a post-industrial one mainly for two reasons: first is the reliance on artisans and handmade goods over mass-manufacturing, and second is the apparent reliance on overland transport by chocobo.

The first is a gimme - mass-manufacturing (and automation in agriculture and natural resource extraction) totally changes a society's concept of what things are worth. Reading up on what life was like before those advances in reality gives a better impression of how an Eorzean might think of their money and what they buy with it.

The second kind of varies since there are airships whizzing around, but airships can't service every settlement on the continent, and we see tons of cargo movement by chocobo. Eorzeans have to contend with all kinds of hazards on the road, which complicates supply chains. One of the big effects of modern transportation tech is a slow equalizing of urban and rural areas in terms of what goods can be acquired, and sort of a trend of overcoming geography - think the seasonlessness of grocery stores, how you can walk in and buy an orange absolutely whenever because it's shipped in from Florida (assuming you're American), or how your proximity to the, idk, pencil factory doesn't affect the cost of a box of pencils because to transportation overhead was so low.

Eorzea is going to have way, way less of that.

I forgot what the rest of this paragraph was going to be because it's 2 am and I'm wiped. Tl;dr lots of subtle little things inform our whole concept of what money is and what it means and what it's worth and those subtle little things are at play in Eorzea too and it's super cool and now I really want a Cadbury creme egg because I'm thinking about seasonal availability

Mermaid · **12-11-2017, 03:24 AM**

(12-11-2017, 02:51 AM)hologramblue Wrote: The second kind of varies since there are airships whizzing around, but airships can't service every settlement on the continent, and we see tons of cargo movement by chocobo. Eorzeans have to contend with all kinds of hazards on the road, which complicates supply chains. One of the big effects of modern transportation tech is a slow equalizing of urban and rural areas in terms of what goods can be acquired, and sort of a trend of overcoming geography - think the seasonlessness of grocery stores, how you can walk in and buy an orange absolutely whenever because it's shipped in from Florida (assuming you're American), or how your proximity to the, idk, pencil factory doesn't affect the cost of a box of pencils because to transportation overhead was so low.

Eorzea is going to have way, way less of that.

I forgot what the rest of this paragraph was going to be because it's 2 am and I'm wiped. Tl;dr lots of subtle little things inform our whole concept of what money is and what it means and what it's worth and those subtle little things are at play in Eorzea too and it's super cool and now I really want a Cadbury creme egg because I'm thinking about seasonal availability

Actually, aren't the seasons in Eorzea all screwed up right now? I seem to remember there being some quote from the game that said Gridania hadn't seen a winter in 5 years. Meanwhile, their next door neighbors in Coerthas see nothing but snow. I remember some of the HW crafting quests talking about things like fashions, armor, and popular dishes changing because of that.

I'm not sure if that would make it better or worse for getting seasonal goods.

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[Discussion] What is the value of a Gil, and how much does your character carry on them?

RPC has moved! These pages have been kept for historical purposes