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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;dougsmit, post: 5287733, member: 19463&quot;]Grading is very much a matter of opinion and really does not lend itself well to only five levels for strike and surface.&nbsp; No one cares about my opinion but pay good money for the opinions of the NGC graders.&nbsp; In general, I believe they are overly hard on surface issues including light scratches and patchy porosity which causes 2/5 and 1/5 to contain a wide variation of things that I would prefer to separate from the coins that have extremely poor surfaces.&nbsp; I consider the Constantine reasonable at 2/5 which would suggest the Vespasian should be lower but there are coin so much worse when it comes to surface it hardly seems right to call these coins even 2/5.&nbsp; When we come to opinion, someone has to decide the relative merit of patchy versus overall porosity versus several fine scratches versus a single heavy scratch versus a dozen other things that can happen to a coin in ~2000 years.&nbsp; Certainly owners of coins will tend to think their coin ranks higher than those belonging to people trying to sell them another coin like it.&nbsp; I bought the coin below from a dealer who had removed it from its NGC slab where it was rated 2/5 for surface and he felt that most people would be more bothered by the 2/5 label and note &quot;lt. grafito&quot; than they would by the scratches.&nbsp; [ATTACH=full]1221664[/ATTACH]</p><p><br /></p><p>In the defense of NGC&#039;s standards, light marks can be harder to see on a coin in a plastic slab so it is probably better that they are careful to note marks of this level rather than have them discovered only after someone bought the coin.&nbsp; My theory is that anyone spending money on a coin should ignore what NGC or the seller thought about the coin&nbsp; and decide on their own whether they want a coin with this &#039;situation&#039;.&nbsp; I bought the Otho because the marks made it more affordable and I wanted an Otho.&nbsp; I would not buy a Constantine or Vespasian 2/5 unless the coin had some other redeeming merit (rare type, great eye appeal etc.).&nbsp; </p><p><br /></p><p>For example, the Sikyon stater below (not graded so I do not know what NGC would say) could not be surface graded over 2/5 because of the graffiti on both sides in the form of the Greek letter Phi (Φ).&nbsp; The one on the reverse is not light; the one on the obverse is very light but there (in exergue).&nbsp; If this coin were in a slab, the obverse mark might be hard to see.&nbsp; Does that mean it should be ignored?&nbsp; In this case, I preferred the coin with the Φ which I saw before I bought it and fantasized was the initial of an ancient owner (can not prove that!).&nbsp; I did not see the obverse mark until I got home (show lighting is not always the best) but it does nothing to make me not want the coin.&nbsp; That is, like all grading, just an opinion but it alone should make this coin no better than the 2/5 of the Otho.&nbsp; Would the heavy reverse mark drop this coin to 1/5 along with coins attacked by a chain saw?&nbsp; Opinion&nbsp; --- and nothing more. </p><p><br /></p><p>[ATTACH=full]1221670[/ATTACH][/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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