Barrel of oil.

[Mr_Hig]

A barrel of oil is worth 2g in this game. Just let that sink in. It has the same value as 1 or 2 spoons. I hardly think that is a logical thing, even in the world of dnd. Um, torches, candles, lamps, lanterns? None of these things hold value considering that economic detail.

[hermit0wl]

Yeah, the spoons are way too expensive.

[KharnTheKhan]

Ursprünglich geschrieben von Mr_Hig:

A barrel of oil is worth 2g in this game. Just let that sink in. It has the same value as 1 or 2 spoons. I hardly think that is a logical thing, even in the world of dnd. Um, torches, candles, lamps, lanterns? None of these things hold value considering that economic detail.

Black substance catches on fire, Spoon can scoup someones eye out, If magic didnt exist oil would be the most valuable substance to power all your automatons, Im sure you have a boomer in DND that screams "I remember when we only had candles for light"

[Ghost]

Seems more of a player convenience thing. The economics of dnd is a bit nuts in general though.

The setting uses various copper, silver, electrum, gold and platinum coins, with different countries/regions/city states etc. having their own denominations and currency being exchanged at different values.

10 Copper > 1 Silver
10 Silver > 1 Gold
1 Gold = 100 Copper

While I don't have a price for a regular spoon, the PHB does say 2 copper for a tankard, flask, jug or pitcher. Would imagine it would be fairly similar.

1 silver will get you a flask of oil that will cover an area of 5 square feet, which is a tiny amount. A regular barrel (no oil included) costs 2 gold. So a barrel of oil would realistically cost a lot.

Some people did some number crunching years ago and figured that a single gold piece would be worth ~ $100 usd, making 1 cp ~ $1. (Based on cost of goods and assuming gp is solid gold)

Someone else figured (based on cost of labour) that 1 gp is worth ~ $20 usd.

https://www.reddit.com/r/DnD/comments/9e02c4/5e_the_approximate_value_of_one_gp_in_usd/

[chaosek]

They didn't want the hassle of smaller denominations like silver and copper, so everything is at least worth one gold, even rotten food or rags. Heck you even find like 30 copper coins and they are also worth one gold. So the spoons etc. should be cheaper while the oil barrel is actually more price accurate.

[Mr_Hig]

Ursprünglich geschrieben von Ghost:

Seems more of a player convenience thing. The economics of dnd is a bit nuts in general though.

The setting uses various copper, silver, electrum, gold and platinum coins, with different countries/regions/city states etc. having their own denominations and currency being exchanged at different values.

10 Copper > 1 Silver
10 Silver > 1 Gold
1 Gold = 100 Copper

While I don't have a price for a regular spoon, the PHB does say 2 copper for a tankard, flask, jug or pitcher. Would imagine it would be fairly similar.

1 silver will get you a flask of oil that will cover an area of 5 square feet, which is a tiny amount. A regular barrel (no oil included) costs 2 gold. So a barrel of oil would realistically cost a lot.

Some people did some number crunching years ago and figured that a single gold piece would be worth ~ $100 usd, making 1 cp ~ $1. (Based on cost of goods and assuming gp is solid gold)

Someone else figured (based on cost of labour) that 1 gp is worth ~ $20 usd.

https://www.reddit.com/r/DnD/comments/9e02c4/5e_the_approximate_value_of_one_gp_in_usd/

That would make some degree of sense for the barrel of oil then (whether 40$ or 200$), but maybe not for the spoon, lol.

[Mr_Hig]

Ursprünglich geschrieben von chaosek:

They didn't want the hassle of smaller denominations like silver and copper, so everything is at least worth one gold, even rotten food or rags. Heck you even find like 30 copper coins and they are also worth one gold. So the spoons etc. should be cheaper while the oil barrel is actually more price accurate.

True.

[eRe4s3r]

There is an in lore explanation in that the god of greed made prices for heroes 100x more expensive then for normal people. Which is how stores have so much magical items, but you can only buy like 3 of them....

[Quillithe]

Ursprünglich geschrieben von Ghost:

A regular barrel (no oil included) costs 2 gold. So a barrel of oil would realistically cost a lot.

That is an incredibly expensive barrel


Although yeah spoons are worse.

[harken23]

Unless they took out the Small Shovel, the game also has shovels in it that you can't use to dig. Consider that decision for a second. They also give you rope and some very high places to climb up and down, but rope is the same usefulness as a pot lid. Or a quill. Or an ink pot. Or an ink pot and quill. 🙄

[Mr_Hig]

Ursprünglich geschrieben von harken23:

Unless they took out the Small Shovel, the game also has shovels in it that you can't use to dig. Consider that decision for a second. They also give you rope and some very high places to climb up and down, but rope is the same usefulness as a pot lid. Or a quill. Or an ink pot. Or an ink pot and quill. 🙄

Yeah, and that's even more ridiculous considering how useful rope would be in a dungeon crawling, or spelunking scenario than jumping. I guess the divinity original sin games had more clever uses for items than this game, though not necessarily in a sense of realism.

[jonnin]

Ursprünglich geschrieben von Mr_Hig:

A barrel of oil is worth 2g in this game. Just let that sink in. It has the same value as 1 or 2 spoons. I hardly think that is a logical thing, even in the world of dnd. Um, torches, candles, lamps, lanterns? None of these things hold value considering that economic detail.

In this world, ignoring your spoons for a moment (which if they have that much value are made of precious metal with fine workmanship, else they would be worth a fraction of a gp)...
none of those things DO have much value. Some sort of Light spell is known by like 1 person in 5 or so and can be found on countless magical trinkets as well. Using fire as a light is for emergencies or crude humanoids like a goblin patrol.

A barrel of oil's exploding capability makes it have SOME value as a weapon for people without higher level magic. But its a heck of a lot harder to use than a fireball scroll: its heavy, and you have to place it next to someone then run away before lighting it off, so its a very poor man's weapon too. It has some value for oiling up like a staircase behind you or the like, as well, but here again a grease spell is just so much more portable and easier to use. So a few GP seems about right for having to lug an exceptional weight around before using it oh so carefully as a weapon.

Most oils would put a fire out if poured onto them. Not sure what its supposed to represent, maybe kerosene? But like motor oil will put a small fire out, not burn or make it worse. If its already burning very hot, the oil will catch too, but its harder to light up than most people think. Whatever its supposed to be, I am not sure it should be a high value item.

[Mr_Hig]

Ursprünglich geschrieben von jonnin:

Ursprünglich geschrieben von Mr_Hig:

A barrel of oil is worth 2g in this game. Just let that sink in. It has the same value as 1 or 2 spoons. I hardly think that is a logical thing, even in the world of dnd. Um, torches, candles, lamps, lanterns? None of these things hold value considering that economic detail.

In this world, ignoring your spoons for a moment (which if they have that much value are made of precious metal with fine workmanship, else they would be worth a fraction of a gp)...
none of those things DO have much value. Some sort of Light spell is known by like 1 person in 5 or so and can be found on countless magical trinkets as well. Using fire as a light is for emergencies or crude humanoids like a goblin patrol.

A barrel of oil's exploding capability makes it have SOME value as a weapon for people without higher level magic. But its a heck of a lot harder to use than a fireball scroll: its heavy, and you have to place it next to someone then run away before lighting it off, so its a very poor man's weapon too. It has some value for oiling up like a staircase behind you or the like, as well, but here again a grease spell is just so much more portable and easier to use. So a few GP seems about right for having to lug an exceptional weight around before using it oh so carefully as a weapon.

Most oils would put a fire out if poured onto them. Not sure what its supposed to represent, maybe kerosene? But like motor oil will put a small fire out, not burn or make it worse. If its already burning very hot, the oil will catch too, but its harder to light up than most people think. Whatever its supposed to be, I am not sure it should be a high value item.

But the candles, torches, and lamps are strewn about everywhere in the ingame world (and in almost every dnd game), which proves that it isn't only used in extremely primitive circumstances or for emergencies, also clearly oil would be used for cooking regardless of the presence of magic. One could also point out the utility ingame as a thrown weapon. Also one can assume that magic use is prohibitive, and ordinary people wouldnt be able to use it, even scrolls seem to be rare and valuable to ordinary people (likely not used for trivial crap like lighting a stove/campfire/torch).

[[TG] zac]

Ursprünglich geschrieben von Mr_Hig:

Ursprünglich geschrieben von jonnin:

In this world, ignoring your spoons for a moment (which if they have that much value are made of precious metal with fine workmanship, else they would be worth a fraction of a gp)...
none of those things DO have much value. Some sort of Light spell is known by like 1 person in 5 or so and can be found on countless magical trinkets as well. Using fire as a light is for emergencies or crude humanoids like a goblin patrol.

A barrel of oil's exploding capability makes it have SOME value as a weapon for people without higher level magic. But its a heck of a lot harder to use than a fireball scroll: its heavy, and you have to place it next to someone then run away before lighting it off, so its a very poor man's weapon too. It has some value for oiling up like a staircase behind you or the like, as well, but here again a grease spell is just so much more portable and easier to use. So a few GP seems about right for having to lug an exceptional weight around before using it oh so carefully as a weapon.

Most oils would put a fire out if poured onto them. Not sure what its supposed to represent, maybe kerosene? But like motor oil will put a small fire out, not burn or make it worse. If its already burning very hot, the oil will catch too, but its harder to light up than most people think. Whatever its supposed to be, I am not sure it should be a high value item.

But the candles, torches, and lamps are strewn about everywhere in the ingame world (and in almost every dnd game), which proves that it isn't only used in extremely primitive circumstances or for emergencies, also clearly oil would be used for cooking regardless of the presence of magic. One could also point out the utility ingame as a thrown weapon. Also one can assume that magic use is prohibitive, and ordinary people wouldnt be able to use it, even scrolls seem to be rare and valuable to ordinary people (likely not used for trivial crap like lighting a stove/campfire/torch).

They dont have combustion engines or anything from the industrial revolution on forwards.
(meaning no advanced medicine, no plastics, no fertilizers that boost productivity multiple times over etc... all of which use oil based processes)

Still ya its undervalued by quite a bit as its still very useful for lanterns & cooking.

That is actually debatable and highly dependent on both the plane its set on and the location.

Several planes in D&D are highly magical, several are very low magic.
The forgotten realms that the game is set in varies a ton from location to location in the world.

You have a few metropolitan areas where its common maybe 1 in 5 or 1 in 10 can do basic magic cantrips and maybe first level spells like silverymoon etc...

You also have a lot of areas that don't have much magic at all.

Over all the video games also tend to portray magic as being a lot more common then the books do so depending on source & location the number of people with magic may be even lower.

[Brian_the_Brute]

A barrel of oil (WTI), which holds about 42 gallons is currently just above $82. If 1 GP=$20 USD then barrels of oil in BG3 are going for around $40 which isn't that far off of today's value.

The oil in BG3 is probably is going to be of lower grade than intermediate or light sweet, so that pushes it even closer to today's real world value.

Metal in non-industrial times had an intrinsically high value as there was no machinery to mine or process metals. It isn't unreasonable to see a metal spoon being even more valuable than a barrel of oil. Silverware isn't something peasants would even be able to afford, they likely used wooden...or no utensils at all.

[TormentedSalad]

Ursprünglich geschrieben von harken23:

Unless they took out the Small Shovel, the game also has shovels in it that you can't use to dig. Consider that decision for a second. They also give you rope and some very high places to climb up and down, but rope is the same usefulness as a pot lid. Or a quill. Or an ink pot. Or an ink pot and quill. 🙄

On my first playthough I had so much rope thought it was going to be so clever