Guild Wars 2

We talked about this rather early on in a topic that I brought up, and one good explanation we found is as follows.

WarriorOfAsgard.3705:

I figured that’s what you meant. Seems like a reasonable explanation, though it could also be that it was simply phased out and replaced with a newer, and possibly better alternative monetary system that we see today. I suspect the ex-pirates of Lion’s Arch may have had a major part to play considering the pirates and corsairs on Cantha and Elona each carried gold, silver, and copper coins, as did the Zaishen Order in exchange for the daily quests.

The theory is that the pirates and Zaishen took over Lion’s Arch for the most part after the Rise of Zhaitan, which lead to a simultaneous cut off from both Kamadan and Kaineng, which were the two other major trade capitals for Humanity. Because of this, as the new Lion’s Arch started becoming a trading hub for all races and nations, it would make sense that the natural currency of both the Zaishen and Pirates (which were a system of copper, silver, and gold coins) would slowly subvert all others eventually. Having Lion’s Arch backing the currency likely gave worth to the currency as they became more and more prominent (though in all reality, the destruction of Lion’s Arch would likely have done a lot to subvert the value of said currency).

Falkatore.3125:

but could there also be a way to explain how, now, a platinum ingot is only worth a few silvers?

I’m know about nothing regarding economics, especially when said economics is only a handwaved gameplay mechanic, but I do know it can’t be approached in this manner. For instance, a gold ingot? Worth less than two silvers on the TP, and a whopping six coppers from most merchants. You could say getting the official marks when it’s minted somehow makes the material a couple thousand times more valuable, but that makes it really easy for counterfeiters to exploit.

The way I see it, anyway, is that platinum hasn’t gone out of currency (there are a couple places where it’s mentioned in the story- pirates try to ransom Demmi for a hundred platinum, and I think Zojja bets some on your success for asura characters) but is just out of reach of your vagrant adventurers. In GW1, after all, it’s worth a hundred gold; only the richest GW2 characters are going to be carrying around more than four or five platinum worth. Still, though, I don’t have a whole lot to back it up, or to say why so much deflation has occurred. It’s just how I make sense of things.