Important piece of very important world-building I don’t see anyone talk about.
Do you think like… the orcs had currency before the ended up on Azeroth? Did they have to be introduced to the concept of capitalism? Did the Tauren do it? Were they capitalist? Did the nomadic Tauren use the same “gold” the Humans did? Did Trolls? Trolls don’t even have any pockets. Where would they keep the gold?
Well, it doesn’t make much sense to talk about it, if the inventors of the world obviously don’t care about it. We have nothing at all to suggest that it isn’t like the game is showing. Which is… everyone using the same gold, except if there is a gameplay reason to use another currency. So… not a lot to go on here.
Shame
Perhaps Caesar describing the Germanic Barbarians explains it better
According to Caesar, the Germanic tribes he encountered gave primacy to war, rather than to religion or domestic life. Their religion apparently lacked an organized priesthood and centered upon the veneration of nature, and Caesar suggested that the Germanic tribesmen devoted all of their energies to gaining renown in battle.
Caesar also describes the pastoral economy of the semi-nomadic Germanic tribes that he encountered across the Danubian frontier. Again, he highlighted the Germanic tribes’ single-minded focus on warfare, recording that-unlike the Romans-they eschewed both wealth and luxury, living off conquest and raiding. For Caesar, this warrior ethos made the Germanic tribes into formidable enemies, and he contrasted the military vigor of the Germanic tribes with that of the more civilized Celts.
According to Tacitus, the Germanic tribes chose their war chieftains according to their merit as military leaders and their feats of valor on the battlefield. Furthermore, these chieftains did not exercise arbitrary authority and ruled only so long as they led their people to victory.
For Tacitus, the secret to the Germanic tribes’ formidable military might was the cohesion of tribal society. The Roman author maintained that unlike the imperial legions of Rome, the Germanic war-bands were composed of clans and families, and their warriors fought alongside their own kinsmen, vying for their respect. In this warrior society, individuals sought the esteem of their peers through conspicuous displays of valor, each seeking to outdo the other in feats of bravery.
But since they could pay the Goblins to build their zeppelins and shredders, I think that they do think about currency, but that they only use it to pay for services.
Probably just gameplay mechanics
Unfortunately, Wimbert puts it right. When the creators have not lifted a finger to world-building in that manner… among many other parts of world-building they willfully ignored, it’s hard and almost pointless to conversely discuss it.
HOWEVER, they have done something like this before whenever it was convenient for them to do so in the unique currency systems such as the crystals from TBC and also WoD, for example. So the possibility is ‘there’, just that I suppose the potential trade of differing currencies is a headache to establish as it is due to how surprisingly frontloaded and intricate the concept of differing currencies actually are.
Don’t think we need the creator’s green light to indulge in the nerdiness of this subject. So why not speculate?
I would say that Orcs, Ogres and Taurens originally, simply traded services. They strike me as the kind of species that when they say something along the lines of “you have my word, I will do X for you” they absolutely mean it. Perhaps they traded goods too, some make tools and weapons, some hunt, some farm, some offer spiritual guidance etc.
Now as for the Orc’s relationship with the Goblins even in early invasion times, I can imagine them pillaging the human towns they raided for gold and other goods to trade for zeppelins boats and whatever other engines they needed. I can’t imagine this being their original gold.
As for all of those who became mercenaries, they clearly adopted the concept of currency.
I’d imagine the Trolls to be more familiar with currency systems, since they were all under Zandalar once, and since they were basically reduced to some comical, waltdisneyesque, el dorado, pseudo Aztec culture during bfa.
Now as for other secondary races like Quilboars, Gnolls, etc I’d imagine they’d be hoarding some riches in a really silly “dragon in a treasure cave” kind of way. They don’t trade with anyone, or extremely little and have very competitive strength driven hierarchies.
This is cool, thanks for sharing. 
But yeah we can absolutely all agree that their world building is really poor all things considered.
It’s been really dropping since Vanilla. I thought Vanilla did Warcraft universe justice, but the devs and writers seem fixated towards “big bad guy” and making all the races as bland and watered down as possible.
I suppose the best way we can think of speculating commerce is theoretical through real-life instances. In which case, I wholly agree with Horde’s way of trading goods and services instead of coin. Like, if we were to look at it with a modicum of realism, there would be more need and value to trade in goods you actually want to have in exchange for something you already have plenty of.
This was a very common practice in nomadic lifestyles, which is still present to this day in rural communities that do not have an attached industry to them.
Doesn’t “gold” most likely only exist for gameplay reasons ? Azeroth reallyyyy does not seem to be much into globalization and world economy - how could it be when its history is mainly a history of tribalism and constant warfare ?
Several of WoW’s peoples only accept currencies that make sense to them and directly helps their survival (mana, clams…). And as far as I know, lore-attested trade circuits between peoples almost always involve food, raw materials, weapons… not really gold (though Goblins are a thing)
There was some kind of trade contract between Orcs and Night Elves. Night Elves have canceled that trade contract after the Wrath Gates, when Varian Wrynn have called the Horde as enemies. Because that trade contract was canceled the War in the Cata have started.
Already 5 addons have passed, almost 10 years have passed, but we still have absolutely no info, no details about that trade contract. Blizzard. . .
Orcs propably had a simple economy based on tradegoods like food, hides, fur, raw materials etc.
Tauren are based on native americans, there were some native american people with currency in form of special shells, but mostly goods too.
I guess the “gold” economy is mostly a gameplay and modern thing to compete with the higher adaptability and efficiency of a currency-based economy.
Also the currency we as players use ingame is clearly based on the stormwind system using copper (pennies), silver (groats) and gold (sovereigns)
Also the Horde has the goblins, they definitely had a money based system for a long time, and even use paper money called Macaroons trolls as well. there are the so called Zul’gurub coins from classic where there was a coin for each tribe
Nightelves also had a currency-based system for millenia likely carried over from their Troll ancestors
There’s a common archeology item named Coin from Eldre’Thalas
In my opinion concept of money is realy weid in universe like warcraft, where you can learn arcane arts and conjure objects, food, water etc with snap of a finger.The reason why some races are using gold is they are not advanced in magic. Look at nightborne,highborne, eredar society. Status was probably messured by how potent and skilled you were in arcane arts.
Yet the Races most versed in the Arcane arts definitely had a money-based economy.
Highborne, Nightelves, Nightborne, Highelves, Humans etc. all have a money-based economy.
Not quite sure how valid this is now, but once upon a time, Humans that were well versed in Arcane arts were all related to Dalaran and the Kirin Tor. So I wouldn’t be surprised if they didn’t use a currency in Dalaran amongst them. I’d imagine the rest of the human kingdoms all had some sort of standard currency.
Not sure with Dalaran, there even is the tradition of throwing a coin in the fountain to wish something. (fishing achievement)
Would be weird to have something like that if you don’t use coinage.
Also magic is useful, yes, but you can’t use it for anything.
That’s why there are also artisans and food vendors in Dalaran, and they propably don’t work for free.
One might argue that such professions adopted a more familiar trading system once the Dalaran became an cosmopolitan city open to all. I’m simply suggesting this as I vaguely remember from the book Warcraft: Day of the Dragon (2001) saying that Dalaran was actually particularly isolationist and didn’t much meddle with any other nation. They only maintained basic amical relationships so they can mostly fish out new talented mages. I do particularly remember saying that Paladins and generally members of the holy faith really disliking them and distrusting them.
Either way I’d imagine that if everyone in that city back then was basically a mage of some degree, coinage is not useful at all. As for the fountain it could even be an ironic tradition, think about it, you’re in a city where everyone can just magically summon nearly any object they want. Considering that mages were also often described as over confident, proud and snobbish, wouldn’t be a reach that they came up with that to simply laugh at other cultures. Like “haha let’s throw a coin down here and wish for something, oh look what I wished for appeared, oh wait I summoned it just like the coin hohohoho silly non mages wishing for things, hohoho”
Obviously from the moment the city did become a hub for basically everyone, and mages themselves started travelling around the world and mixing with the general populations, then yeah adopting popular currency system would make sense in order to simplify things.
I’m overthinking this I know. 
Just saying, ancient Romans, let alone ancient Roman politicians (as opposed to historians) aren’t the most reliable of sources. Their perception of Germanic barbarians was likely coloured by their own biases: the idea of a “noble savage”, unburdened by civilisation and eschewing luxury, is an ancient one, but has little ground in reality. One need only look at the Germanic jewelry and metalwork to see that they did not “eschew luxury” but simply lacked the means to obtain it.
That being said, orcs, like most tribal societies, likely had a barter economy, where trade deals were made using natural goods rather than any specific form of currency. They could also be introduced to the concept of currency from draenei and ogres, although in that case they wouldn’t produce it, and the only orcs to use coinage would be the small subclass of merchants who dealt with these races.
Capitalism in the Marxist sense of the word (a system dominated by those who possess financial capital, as opposed to, say, land or slaves) certainly was not a thing in orc society, and I doubt it is present anywhere on Azeroth; land remains the most important source of wealth there.
Tauren would likely have a barter economy too before the Horde, and so would trolls, although the more civilised troll cultures would undoubtedly have their own currencies.
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