Another first for the CCF, the 1989 3.3 oz silver god of war and wealth coins have been discovered by relatively new CCF member "reiboy" to be made up of two varieties: a "clouded claw" and a "clear claw", which is the claw located above the dragon's head, on the upper right of the dragon and phoenix side of the coin.
This coin already has a very low planned mintage of 2000 or 2500 (sources vary, one source says actual mintage is 2430 - certainly many were melted or damaged). Now that we know it is made up of two varieties, each one is going to necessarily be just a fraction of the total mintage.
I have been researching these coins lately, and so far in my opinion, it seems the clouded claw variety is the rarer variety. My very preliminary information on die states for the clouded claw variety seems to support the idea that fewer of them were made with the clouded claw die. But, once again, this is all very preliminary. We may learn more things as this develops, since this discovery is literally just a few minutes old.
I do believe the clouded claw to be a variety, and not an error. It seems from the photos that the clouds are features of the die, and not accidental excess frosting. I have seen both of these coins in person, but I don't have them in front of me now to say this for 100% certainty yet.
Good job reiboy!
Here's the discovery:
One of these Taels is not like the others