[busyrobot]

dead stuff is still organic matter.

and you don't know that the tooth is from something dead, could just be from some guy that forgot to eat.

I have to say, plain tooth or plain diamond, unless the tooth is from a unicorn or some wee magical creature, niether are magical and well thus it's an issue of 'receptiveness' of the material, and then I'd vote for the diamond as being the most 'clean' vessel.

Unless the tooth has magical origin, any residual organic energy left in the thing would be counter productive. At this point, the diamond is better precisely because it doesn't have imparted organic energy.

It's a silly argument, like debating warpdrives in star-trek, so unless anyone has real world experience with a talisman it can be however the designers want it.

P.S: I think 350 plat for a tooth and string could be fair, if the string is worth 340 out of the deal. Heck, it's still twice as cheap as a pen.