Philip Hibbs pointed out:
>>I had a GM who used glass coins for mermen, the idea being that
>>glassmaking would be difficult and rare underwater, but its attractive
>>product a stable currency base.
>Wouldn't this leave them at a loss when trading with landlubbers? What's
>to stop someone cruising in and wrecking their entire economy?
Ya got me. I do vaguely recall that the glass coins were "alien" in
appearance (hel-lo, Lovecraft's Deep Ones) and to the touch, so maybe the
Mermen could figure out the difference between "their" coins and "surface"
coins. Might be a sonar thing.
And the one or two times we saw this, we nabbed a couple glass coins as
curiousities and the rest was barter -- the mermen didn't want our coins,
either. More "organized" groups like coastal cities, trading cults, etc.
might be willing to exchange them. <Shrug -- sorry, this was really just
a comment o' "A saw a GM do this, it was sorta neat.">
Still, the idea of dumping millions and millions of glass coins on the
mermen, forcing them to cart their lunchmoney in wheelbarrows appeals,
oddly enough. The sea's import-export market is thrown haywire, and the
economic shock ripples across Glorantha... :)
BTW, thanks to all who commented on bolgs -- plenty of ideas on how to
make them more viable as a currency.