Gold and trading

Gold is the money out here. It comes out of the ground as gold ore, either panned from the gravel bars on small creeks or dug out of the quartz veins underground. A lump of ore weighs 8 kg, so nobody pays with ore. You take it to a forge with some coal and refine it, and each lump gives you 10 gold.

In your pack it shows as gold dust, but when anybody talks about a price it's just gold: a loaf for 5 gold, an iron bar for 30. A hundred of it weighs a kilo, so you can carry your savings about with you and hardly notice.

What it's for#

• Keeping a settlement bigger than the free size. The stake takes gold, not ore.
• Buying from someone's market stall.
• Paying people for work or for things, face to face in a trade, or with Give if it's a gift.

Trading with someone#

When you're standing near someone, within 4 m, tap them and choose Trade. They get asked, and once they tap you back and choose Trade too, a window opens for both of you. Each of you puts things in from your pack, gold or goods or both, and you can both see everything that's on offer.

When you're happy, press Agree. Nothing moves until you've both agreed, and then it all changes hands at once, so neither of you can be left short. If anything on either side changes after someone has agreed, both agrees are cleared and you look it over again. One trade can take up to 12 different things from each side.

It checks again at the last moment that you both still have what you put in, and that you can both carry what's coming to you. If you walk apart or one of you leaves, the trade's off and nothing has moved.

Jewellery#

Once your Smithing is up a bit you can work gold into jewellery at the forge. Tap it and choose Make… to see what you can make.

Jewellery is just for having. It doesn't do anything, but it's nice to own, it makes a good gift, and it keeps its worth, so it's a fair thing to sell or trade. Once gold is worked into a ring or a chain it can't be melted back down. That's on purpose: gold that goes into jewellery is gold taken out of circulation, so the rest stays worth something even as more gets dug.

Selling at a market stall#

A market stall is a counter under an awning. You build one in the yard, from the Build menu, for 12 planks, 1 hide. Tap it and choose Mind the stall, put things out from your pack, and set a price on each kind with the − and + buttons. Prices go from 1 gold each up to 500 gold each. It holds 60 things at a time, all kinds together.

Just about anything you can carry can go on a stall: food, planks, iron bars, clothing, tools, ore. The only things that can't are canteen water and gold itself.

If you're not sure what to ask, look at the going rate. It's what that thing has been selling for at other stalls lately, it shows under each thing when you mind your stall, and anything new you put out starts at it. Prices at the stalls has the whole list.

Anyone who comes by can tap it and buy, paying in gold from their own pack, and that works whether you're in the world or not. They can only buy as much as they can carry, so heavy things like logs go a few at a time. What they pay waits in the stall's till for you to take out. The people you trust can look after the stall for you as well, and food on a stall never goes off.

The week in gold#

Every week the Lantern prints how much gold there is in the woods all told, how much was refined, how much went on upkeep and into jewellery, and how many sales and trades there were. It only ever gives the totals. Who bought what from whom stays between them.

Put your stall where people pass, by the camp or along a road, and a signpost next to it saying what you've got won't hurt.