Nenyuk withdrew money from my Account! I'll switch Banks!

[Angela Christine]

I think some people may be over-estimating the fragility of obsidian.  It is a kind of volcanic glass, but that doesn't mean that it is delicate like some blown glass ornament.  It is glass, but it is also stone, or possibly congeled liquid.  I would imagine the stone used in coins is selected, carved or treated in some manner to resist casual breakage, simply because you do not want all your citizens crippled by having their fingers continually sliced up and peppered with glass slivers every time they reach into their purses to buy a bit of food or water.

Pictures!
http://volcano.und.edu/vwdocs/vw_hyperexchange/obsidian.html
http://mineral.galleries.com/minerals/mineralo/obsidian/obsidian.htm
http://www.cst.cmich.edu/users/dietr1rv/obsidian.htm
http://www.theaaca.com/lithnics/Obsidian.html
http://www.strawbaletradingpost.com/Arrowheads.html


(Ghost, the code option is supposed to display text exactly as written, so the HTML tags are not implimented).

Angela Christine

[richter]

Again, you're talking about a manufactured currency versus a piece of rock.

...?  I think that piece of rock is pretty much manufactured as it is.  Check your inventory

A pile of Allanakki coins.

So, there is some kind of sign or something there.  MAybe a picture of the dragon and some...thing.  So it has a value as a coin, but it does not have a value on its own.  Like the difference of a piece of paper and a paper money.

I'm going to guess that you've never seen obsidian much less worked with it.  Do you have any idea how long it would take to put a picture of a dragon on a piece of obsidian, much less thousands of them, each apparently quite small even if you had the use of a Dremel?  The little obsidian-bladed knife I have sitting on the table here probably took an hour or two to make and it's just a blade!  And if you did engrave something on it, you'd run a greater risk of shattering it, even more than without such design.

I think some people may be over-estimating the fragility of obsidian. It is a kind of volcanic glass, but that doesn't mean that it is delicate like some blown glass ornament. It is glass, but it is also stone, or possibly congeled liquid. I would imagine the stone used in coins is selected, carved or treated in some manner to resist casual breakage, simply because you do not want all your citizens crippled by having their fingers continually sliced up and peppered with glass slivers every time they reach into their purses to buy a bit of food or water.

That's the problem really.  It is fragile when it's small enough to be a coin.  With a little thickness to it, it can hold up a bit but is still capable of chipping (and likewise cutting) unless the edges are bevelled.  But it would work far better in a die-like form rather than a flake or coin-shape.  Those forms would be far to prone to chipping and cracking.

Again, we're talking about a huge investment in time to manufacture these.  They'd end up costing so much time to manufacture that the amount of newbie coin players start out with would represent hundreds of man-hours of work.  For use as something as commonly used and handled as a coin, it's just inferior material.

Take care,

Jason

[richter]

People have used teeth, sex, seashells, pretty rocks, SALT, and god knows what else as currency IRL.

In some of those cases, the object in question wasn't used as currency so much as an investment.  Currency denotes a medium of exchange, not necessarily a valuable object unto itself (ie, a ruby).

But in each of those examples, you're also talking about something rather durable (excepting salt of course, but even then it can be rather sturdy).

What is wrong with them using a fragile rock as currency INSRL? (in not so real life)

Again, note the word fragile.  Currency is something handled quite a bit.  It has to be rather durable lest your fortune literally crumble to dust.

Take care,

Jason

[Bestatte]

Help_Bestatte's_Pretend_Official_Docs wrote:

Game currency: The obsidian coin.
Obsidian by itself is fragile in real life. However in Zalanthas, obsidian is not the same rock as it is near your average Earth volcano - since, in case you haven't noticed, there aren't all that many volcanos on Zalanthas.

No, Zalanthan obsidian is a different animal altogether. Made in part from the core substance of the hot earth, zalanthan obsidian is melded by time with silica and silt, baked to a density not known or understood by any except the Nenyukis and the dreaded Black Robes of Allanak. The coins themselves have even different properties; rumor has it fashioned of powdered obsidian, mixed with silk and made solid with a glue of silt-horror spit and the sperm of the legendary giants of the silt sea itself.

There. Happy now?

[Maybe42or54]

Seriously. Everyone knows Tektolness has Ruk himself enslaved and works only to print the image onto the coins.