"An Unexpected Crisis - Is It just the UK" Topic

For the last 16 years playing our rules, there is a section where a protagonist may map a route out for a vehicle in advance whereupon when told to do so the vehicle will negotiate the route at great speed (20+ mph). However it must be pre set and have no tight turns. This is mapped out using coins out of your pocket, quick simple fast and requires no specialist marker, a win win situation. However since Covid and getting worse, not better, cash is falling out of favor in so many places its not now uncommon for neither of the players to have ANY coins whatsoever in their pocket. Does this mean we have to Invent a "coin" replacement with all the pain of having to store it and remember yet another marker. Is this a UK only catastrophe or is the same impacting world wide?

I've noticed fewer coins in the US, also. Mainly, this is in the context of what I find lying on the ground when I take the dog for a walk. I think inflation plays a role here. I have also noticed that keyboards here used to have a cents sign (you got it by capitalizing one of the numeral keys), but that has gone away.

Air for your tires used to be free, which was a good way for us kids to learn about maintaining our bicycles. Now air costs $2.50 USD or so.

Grelber

The ten cent comic book is now $5 USD, and bargain fast food lunches are now (barely) under $10 USD instead of "change back from your dollar." But coin denominations here remain the same. Electronic payment is ubiquitous, and cashiers struggle to cope with money. Unless they massively up the denominations--say in the US to $5 USD or $10 USD coins--or revalue the currency, I wouldn't expect the next generation to bother with them. And by "next generation" I mean people currently 40 and under.

Those colored glass beads in craft shops might work nicely.

I still have as many coins in my pocket as ever before.

If you need an alternative, check the craft stores for round wooden pieces, or your equivalent of U.S. 'dollar stores' for plastic toy money.

…bargain fast food lunches are now (barely) under $10 USD…

Wendy's has Biggie Meals starting at $5 USD, and Burger King has discount meals at $5 USD too.

The UK Treasury has placed no orders for new coins with the Royal Mint this year, and is considering dropping the 1p and 2p coins entirely – see link

Poker chips or a length of pipe cleaner might fit the bill. I think there are less coins in circulation than before.

Why do you need to store the markers and remember to bring them? If your pockets are now free of coins, store the markers there instead.

GurKhan – ARRRGH – That's worse, my 3D printed terrain pieces use 1p and 2p coins as weights. That means I have to stock pile them! A CRISIS indeed!
I can print markers no problem but having markers freely available without storage was much better. DO I have to make Issue 3 or put out an errata noting that coins are no longer available for this task and suggesting alternatives. Maybe my son when he inherits the rules can put issue 3 out in another 16 years. I may be past it at 86.

There should be plenty of small stones lying around outside that can be used. To make it more relevent, use small pieces of asphalt roadway… ;-)

Bill, I was going by Arby's. The last time I tried to buy a meal at the nearby Wendy's, the cashier had trouble dealing with "money"--as opposed to credit cards. (That's one of the reasons it was the last time.) I'm told there is still a Burger King--somewhere.

But the point remains. The purchasing power of the dollar has dropped so far that coins are borderline worthless. I enjoy the history and--until recently--the art, but who on earth, if we were starting from scratch, would say "we need a metal token worth 1/500 of a very cheap meal or a comic book?" We do it out of habit. My son's generation will make different mistakes.

I find it very annoying. It is the official currency of the United States but so many places, like sporting ect. won't take it. Why!!! It is the legal tender of the nation. Talking here not about coins but paper money and coins ect.

Just wait until they force "Digital Money" on us :(

I used to pick up Pennie's and coins in parking lots until I lost my leg. Today I saw one but was unable to reach it.
There has been a shift from coins. Some stores push for you to round up the total in order to avoid giving coins.
I always have $20 USD-30 in coins in my Altoid boxes in the car.

It doesn't cost very much to stockpile a few hundred pennies. Do it while you still can, they are cheaper than steel washers. Just saying….

Meself, retired, don't own car, keep container of nickles, dimes, quarters for fare on local buses. Have jar of pennies acquired in change, wunovdesedaze will take to my bank.

Local 'dollar stores' occasionally have bags of 700 multicolored 'craft match sticks', have bought a couple of these…

In Sweden – which is way ahead of most people on going cashless – the government is now recommending holding an emergency cash amount to give resilience against cyber attacks.

In the UK still quite handy to have coins for parking money in more rural areas where the contactless / phone coverage is not reliable and the parking ticket machines are still just cash based.

Amazon sells Bingo Counters: 500 for $6.99 USD; 3/4" diameter. Saw a YouTuber using these for figure bases: plastic, inexpensive, readily orderable. Cheers!

I use the ones Sgt Slag linked to for 15mm and these for 25-32mm and 6mm.

I had an experience at a sub shop where a non-foreign server froze at the effort of counting out 42 cents in change and the manager had to come over and handle it. I echo Grattan 45's outrage and won't do business with a digitally only establishment, at least until THEY force it on us all.

Sorry sorta off topic but pertains to the last couple of posts. So at a convention a couple of years ago, I decided to haven breakfast. I was told that it was a charge card only, because that all food was now handled by the in house Starbucks. I asked to pay cash and exact change. They said no, so I walked out and went to IHOP next door. Never use any app at food places.

One case reported from Colorado, had a card only pay app. The customer looked at the checkout menu and the choices for tip gratuity was a minimum of 75% and up to 100%. So beware if using apps.

Martin Rapier is right, seems my marker issue is the thin end of the wedge, no coins at all far worse. Coins are heavier AND CHEAPER than washers in the UK so I will have to stockpile them now for use as weights.

At a convention in the 1990s, a player was using pennies as bases to mount individual castings. Some accidentally fell over at his table. A local Louisiana revenue agent saw them and wrote the guy a citation for mis-using coins. The agent was not a gamer but at the show collecting peddlers license fees from the vendors.

More on the agent. He regarded us as a paramilitary group. He had been called to the venue because a WW2 scout car was on display out front. He threaten the staff that he intended to call ATF. Not sure if he did. Lol

At a convention in the 1990s, a player was using pennies as bases to mount individual castings. Some accidentally fell over at his table. A local Louisiana revenue agent saw them and wrote the guy a citation for mis-using coins. The agent was not a gamer but at the show collecting peddlers license fees from the vendors.

He should have called them. Whoever showed up would have probably liked to come back after shift and play.

The only prohibition on using coins in the UK that I can find in the Coinage Act 1971 is:

'No person shall, except under the authority of a licence granted by the Treasury, melt down or break up any metal coin which is for the time being current in the United Kingdom or which, having been current there, has at any time after 16th May 1969 ceased to be so.'

So it would seem that here gluing toy soldiers on coins for bases is perfectly legal as one is neither melting nor breaking them up.

I believe the USA laws allow people to destroy Pennies, but not other coins. Here in the USA, this is a paper-tiger law: nearly impossible to enforce.

Matter of fact, there are artisans who make ring jewelry out of current, and old silver and gold coins (still legal tender, coins from the early 20th Century period), selling them for more than pocket change prices… I've seen them on YouTube and on Etsy. They've been around for years. Seems like no one really cares about it, here.

Warning noted, though: Don't drop coin-based miniatures on the floor, in a public place. ;-) Cheers!

Most countries have laws (USA and UK included) about defacing/altering currency. These laws are generally not read, and often taken out of context in common conversation, usually by someone with an alterior motive.

In the US (and pretty much everywhere else), these laws are about (1) counterfeiting or (2) horading. The US laws have a requirement for intent to defraud. Hoarding has a requirement for affecting a nationally signifcant amount of currency, counterfeiting does not.

Coin collectors, artists, and occationally wargamers are occasionally hit with the faux brunt of someone taking a few words from a statue out of context. Then again, so is everyone else, pretty much all the time.

It's coming…

YouTube link

Oh, yes, Cerdic--and three government offices to monitor how many potatoes you bought and decide whether they're good for you. However I divide the world's problems into those I should be concerned with and those I can leave to the next generation. I think for me this is a next generation problem. Some of the rest of you may not be so fortunate.