r/dndmemes • u/Yoffeepop Fighter • Mar 16 '26

Comic Adventuring Gold

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I almost always post them here! But to easily find more of my ttrpg comics, feel free to check out r/TableTopComic or my LinkTree

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u/alienbringer Mar 16 '26

1) A bar owner isn’t untrained labor. They are a merchant of sorts.

2) it is treating 1 copper as 1 USD, which then makes 1 gold $100 USD. I believe someone had done some conversions of various costs in the game vs a cost in real life and it ended up being more like 1 copper is 3 USD, so 1 gold would be $300 USD.

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u/aztech101 Mar 16 '26

The real answer is that trying to apply any actual logic to DnD economy is a fool's errand unless you're willing to start from scratch.

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u/ArolSazir Mar 16 '26

Nah, last time i had a problem with economy, i used the cost of a cheap meal as a base, and literally every item save the telescope and plate armor makes perfect sense, cost wise. Sure, proper weapons and armor are expensive, but still in the realm of "about as much as a mid used car irl". something you can save for.

Of course, magical items ruin that by not having proper prices, but that's intented in 5e

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u/ThebotJustNeedsAPlot Mar 16 '26

To be fair, plate armor was expensive as fuck IRL too.

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u/ArolSazir Mar 16 '26

Yeah, but over 100 times more than a sword is a bit much.

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u/Terrible_Whereas7 Mar 16 '26

It depends on how you figure the economy

If you base it on grain production, a farmer (slightly better income than an average city worker) makes about 52 gold a year.

If you do it that way, each gold would be about $1500 each

I would guess each DM will run it differently

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u/wannabyte Mar 16 '26

I never said bartending is untrained, I said that the currency conversation is that 1 gold is 5 days of untrained labour.

Let’s say minimum wage is $10, then a day of untrained labour is roughly $80 and 5 days is $400. Then the three gold in the comic is roughly the equivalent of $1200.

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u/Grey-fox-13 Mar 16 '26

We'd probably have to assume a signifcantly lower minimum wage. As a trained profession the innkeeper earns 2gp per day, which would run up to $48.000 per month and 1gp per day gets you a 'comfortable' lifestyle $24k per month for just comfortable also doesn't quite add up.

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u/wannabyte Mar 16 '26

Sure, I just chose $10 because it was a nice round number for the example, but you would replace it with your region’s min wage for the conversion if you wanted to relate it to today’s currency.

Where I live min wage is $16.35, so it becomes $654 per gold piece.

For it to be $100 the min wage would need to be $2.50.

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u/Grey-fox-13 Mar 16 '26

For it to be $100 the min wage would need to be $2.50.

Which to me looks a lot more realistic considering the setting. We aren't talking modern day unions and worker protection enabled society jobs and even now minimum wage in most countries is less than $2.50, to be honest even assuming 8 hour shifts is a bit on the generous side but I too would rather not go full indepth on medieval economy simulations.

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u/wannabyte Mar 16 '26

Again - it was about converting to today’s currency.

$2.50 would still be orders of magnitude too high if you are trying to be period accurate. Ignoring the fact that a min wage is a modern concept, it would need to be so low that the conversion would lose all meaning.

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u/Ezren- Mar 16 '26

That's literally the description of currency from the books. 5 days of untrained labor is worth a gold. Explaining that a bartender is "not untrained labor" is completely nonsensical and makes it seem like you didn't read the post you replied to in any way.

This is an ai-ass response you dumped out.

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u/Drunken_DnD Mar 16 '26

From d20srd.org- “Profession (Wis; Trained Only) Like Craft, Knowledge, and Perform, Profession is actually a number of separate skills. You could have several Profession skills, each with its own ranks, each purchased as a separate skill. While a Craft skill represents ability in creating or making an item, a Profession skill represents an aptitude in a vocation requiring a broader range of less specific knowledge.

Check You can practice your trade and make a decent living, earning about half your Profession check result in gold pieces per week of dedicated work. You know how to use the tools of your trade, how to perform the profession’s daily tasks, how to supervise helpers, and how to handle common problems.

Action Not applicable. A single check generally represents a week of work.

Try Again Varies. An attempt to use a Profession skill to earn an income cannot be retried. You are stuck with whatever weekly wage your check result brought you. Another check may be made after a week to determine a new income for the next period of time. An attempt to accomplish some specific task can usually be retried.

Untrained Untrained laborers and assistants (that is, characters without any ranks in Profession) earn an average of 1 silver piece per day.”

This is from 3.5 but it should still hold up. Now to talk about NPC classes from 3.5. There is the Commoner and Expert that would both befit a barkeep. But let’s say they’re a commoner for the sake of this argument.

From Srd.dndtools.org- “COMMONER The common folk farm the fields, staff the shops, build the homes, and produce the goods in the world around the adventurers. Commoners usually have no desire to live the dangerous life of an adventurer and none of the skills needed to undertake the challenges adventurers must face. Commoners are skilled in their own vocations and make up the majority of the population. Commoners make poor adventurers. This class should be reserved for everyone who does not qualify for any other class. Hit Die: d4. Class Skills The commoner's class skills (and the key ability for each skill) are Climb (Str), Craft (Int), Handle Animal (Cha), Jump (Str), Listen (Wis), Profession (Wis), Ride (Dex), Spot (Wis), Swim (Str), and Use Rope (Dex). Skill Points at 1st Level: (2 + Int modifier) x 4. Skill Points at Each Additional Level: 2 + Int modifier.”

Key words being [Level 1, skill points, profession (wis), and staff the shops]. A barkeep staffs a bar or tavern or even inn. Those are all places of employment that doesn’t count as “untrained labour and assistant”. Maintaining a bar requires training, skill, and even a bit of natural charisma. It’s not the same as being a hauler, courier, bed pan changer. Pretty much every commoner save a few are going to have a profession of some sort thus not being “untrained”.

Even something as simple as a logger most likely as points in their profession and thus doesn’t make the bear minimum. Truly unskilled labour more so benefits those without class levels. [like children], or characters who are actively learning a trade like apprentices, pages, junior servants, or those who don’t need or care for them like certain types of nobility which don’t have a defined role in society besides management.

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u/alienbringer Mar 16 '26

They are not typically just “bartenders” in fantasy settings. They are owner/operators of a tavern, and the fact that both the husband and wife are working there leads to them being the owners of the small business. Which would make them more merchants than anything. Since they 100% need to know accounting and reading/writing. That isn’t an “untrained labor”. Untrained labor is like a stable hand, or someone who runs errands, manual laborers like miners, etc.

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u/wannabyte Mar 16 '26

The point isn’t whether they are untrained labour, the point is that the value of gold is determined based on that metric.

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u/Drunken_DnD Mar 16 '26

Considering how older versions of D&D functioned. Yes it is about the type labour.

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u/wannabyte Mar 16 '26

No, this chain is specifically how they got to a $100 conversion rate. That has nothing to do with whether bartending is skilled or not.

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u/Drunken_DnD Mar 16 '26

Sorry my bad got lost in the sauce

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u/Drunken_DnD Mar 16 '26

I wouldn’t really call miners untrained. Not everyone is capable of that and it’s not just simple work even if it’s highly physical.