Here’s this week’s thread for quick Fallen London questions! Also, happy April Fools’ Day, fellow fools. Hope you had some good foolishness!
Update to what happened last week: my TtH came on time and on the right day this week. We’ll see if my Gift has been pushed back (probably has).
I guess we really did need that routine maintenance yesterday didn’t we?
Has anyone ever actually tried to work out the theoretical IRL dollar value of the Kitten-Sized Diamond absent its magical properties?
(Because obviously if it acts as a Fountain of Youth/Holy Grail, it would be priceless by default, so setting that bit aside…)
I assume there’s been at least one geology and/or precious stone-obsessive who’s thought about it.
Starting parameters would probably be the median liquid volume of the average kitten (normalizing for various breeds) and then either assume… perfect/wholly colorless D grade diamond orrr either a fancy yellow or pink diamond colour-wise?
The safe swings open. A flood of gold washes over you, warm as a tropical sea, lively as the sirocco. The stolen light of the Mountain – yours, all yours! Your bruises vanish. Your cuts knit back together. In an instant you feel like you’ve had a hot bath, a cup of coffee, and a good night’s sleep.
I say one of those three because you would assume that the “perfect” diamond would be literally flawless, but the light it produces is described as gold and Stone’s depictions show her as being reddish pink. So I dunno, pick whichever would theoretically be most valuable I suppose?
EDIT: Extra credit if someone figures out the exchange rates/inflation for surface currency then works out whether the Diamond is worth more than the Network of Connections (whose stated value is 1 million echoes).
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Ah…I frankly think that’s worthy of it’s own thread, since this one is about relatively short questions if I understand correctly. Interesting question tho.
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I mean the seed question is short, I just believe in elaborating on a point. lol
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Nah it’s fascinating and deserves a thread imo.
It absolutely could spark some intense conversation!
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Actually, no, I don’t think we should set that aside: can you imagine how much one if the parasites(Elon musk, bezos, that level of way too rich)would pay for a foundation of youth, even if it wasn’t a diamond? Enough money to buy both heaven and hell probably-and making it a diamond, too? When they’re that vain? Can’t imagine imagining that kind of money!
Did the math.
The diamond should be 5,500 carats, and the cost in Victorian pounds would be £497,518,866. Converting that to echoes? 35,537,061. So yes. It’s worth significantly more than the connections.
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Hear that Vake Hunters? I’m 35 times richer than you are.
Betcha wish you gave the Steed/Priests/Society a fairer shake now, huh? 
(Also I’d be curious to know the specifics behind those numbers. Color/kitten volume/etc.)
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Kittens weigh about 1100 grams, which can be converted easily to carat. For pricing, the Hope Diamond is the closest analogue to quality and color, so I divided the carat number by Hope Diamon’s carat and them multiplied that by the price of the diamond.
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What age kitten is that, out of curiosity?
(It occurred to me much later than it should have that a newborn kitten is palm sized, while 3 months is probably what most people picture in their heads size-wise. Meaning: about the size of an American football, give or take.)
Many thanks for the math, but I’m curious about where you got the Pounds to Echos transfer ratio. Are you using one fistful of surface currency as one 1899 pound?
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I used a 6 week old for reference because that’s the archetypal kitten image most people think of, and we know the diamond takes two hands to hold!
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I am not! Someone did the math conversion on the wines with the prices of a bottle of wine from 1899 in real life England at that time! So I used that to get to the conversion of approximately 14 pounds per echo!
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I think the only time surface currency is explicitly denoted as a particular currency is when smuggling crates from the Khanate, where it’s referred to as at least partially Kroner? So using it in conversion rates would be….complex
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Actually, in the very description of Surface Currency, it is noted to include “pounds, francs, dollars, and piastres” so using it would be almost absurdly challenging. The wine method is much better.
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haha whoops yes that is a much more obvious source
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According to Wikipedia, a fistful of surface currency is worth either $200 thousand or $20 million, depending on whether we’re going by production budget or box office.
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