Cataclysm Comes Tomorrow for JMTC

Posted by Markco at 8:00 AM

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What is a Content Manager?

A content manager collects, edits and publishes all content on the site. Initially, the content manager will only be handling posts and comment moderation, but eventually if all goes well he will also be handling emails and additional social aspects of the site.

Why Get One?

The #1 reason for getting a new content manager is to provide better content for you, the reader. At the moment, I need time to work on my cataclysm gold guide and to get up to speed with the world of cataclysm. For instance, yesterday I spent three hours going through nine of the new leveling zones in Kalimdor, documenting limited sale items as well as valuable farming spots and sharing gold making tips. When I started this blog I was entirely sure in my abilities and knowledge of world of warcraft, but with the new expansion I'm going to have to hit the ground running while looking for lots of new ways to make gold. I know my limits (yes I actually have some) and I will not be able to provide you with the best content, write my gold guide and play the game at the same time. You may remember that I tried hiring some 20 authors to make my life easier on this site but it only turned into an article reviewing nightmare. So after giving this conundrum much thought I came up with the idea of hiring a content manager as the solution to my time constraints.

I'm also putting effort into a brand new site called Traffic Blogger, which is a blog focused on helping authors attract a community of readers to their own sites. I'll be taking the lessons I learned from two years blogging at JMTC and sharing them in great detail with the audience at Traffic Blogger. Without the new content manager here at JMTC I would be unable to create this additional resource, which will indirectly create better content for you by helping out any gold bloggers who take the time to learn from it.

What Do YOU Get Out of This?

I'm grooming the new content manager to be just like me, only with more time on his hands to write great posts about world of warcraft. You're going to get lots of helpful pointers with tips that make you want to run to the auction house as well as the occasional high level, bird's eye view post on economics from myself. What's more, this guy is very active in PVE and can bring a new perspective to the blog which I cannot provide. So yes, you will now have two writers instead of one here at JMTC. If this works as well as I hope you may be getting more over time.

So Who Is the New Content Manager?

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Sell 400,000 Wow Gold for $1,000 in Cataclysm

Posted by Markco at 8:00 AM

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Perhaps you were considering 'cashing out' and calling it quits with the end of the wotlk expansion? Maybe you thought you could sell all your gold and get some money back for all the hours you spent playing world of warcraft? You might want to read this article...

"Hey markco, its [...name removed to protect the not so innocent...] – hope things are going well.

Thought of a good post for you, but I don’t want my name mentioned at all. Something stupid I did that I don’t want anyone else to have to deal with.

I recently saw a website that buys gold, normally I would just pass by knowing its against the TOS however in this case I did the math and realized my 400,000g was worth almost $1000. Instantly dollar signs flashed in my eyes.

Long story short, the company took the gold and never gave me payment. I’m out 400,000g but thankfully blizzard is restoring it because the gold company used a hacked account.

I learned the hard way, breaking the TOS never works – even if blizzard doesn’t find out."

Learn from this guy or girl's mistake and don't sell or buy wow gold in cataclysm. You're going to get burned and besides, it's just so easy to make it if you know what this site can tell you. Have you ever bought gold? Use anonymous as your name if you would like to comment but not give away your blogging identity.

Looking for Items to Sell in Cataclysm

Posted by Markco at 8:00 AM

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Picking the correct markets and then actually selling the associated items are two invaluable abilities on the auction house. However, if you don't master the art of picking out the right markets then the latter skill is useless and you'll be left spinning aimlessly in circles.

The world of cataclysm will be a rather diverse one and it will behoove you to read markco-vian economics before jumping into the art of picking your markets. Now, once you've become aclamated with my philosphies on long tail markets vs hits in cataclysm then it's time to narrow down your options into three possibilities:

• Niche Markets
• Frequent Sellers
• Epics

Each of these categories has their own advantages and disadvantages, so allow me to analyze them for you.

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Cataclysm Engineering Gathering Volatile Air

Posted by Markco at 8:00 AM

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Email sent in by Necka from http://www.neckarunrivaled.com/. Give him some credit, he plays the auction house on the same server as I do!

"Hey Markco,

I know you talk about how much gold someone can make with Engineering on Call to Auction. With the changes to the game, such as arrows/bullets, we have very little in terms of making gold. Well come Cataclysm we're going to be able to gather Volatile Air, which is  needed to level using Cataclysm patterns.

Electrostatic Condenser
Binds when picked up
Unique
Requires Engineering (440)
Item Level 85
Allows a skilled engineer to occasionally collect Volatile Air while mining, skinning, or Herbalism.

This basically means that unless your Engineering toon has either Mining/Skinning/Herbalism the only way to get Volatile Air to level, you'll have to buy them off the Auction House. This is going to be a massive gold mine for anyone who was lucky to have a gathering profession with Engineering. Now this could change, but with Cataclysm release less then a month away its very unlikely.

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New Secret Cataclysm 4.0.3a Trade Skill Addon

Posted by Markco at 10:32 PM

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There is a new addon called "Trade Skill Master" which has invited me to become a member of their alpha testers.

These are the same guys and girls who brought you quick auctions 3 and its replacement: auction profit master.

Let me just say... this addon is HOT. It automatically ques up items which can make me money based on auction house pricing. SWEET. AWESOME.

No longer do I need to sift through all my items and pricing on auctioneer to determine what low level and/or high level items I can craft to turn a profit.

As alpha testing continues and we move into beta I will keep you informed about this addon and any additions that are made. So far it is a little bit buggy but very promising!

If you are interested in alpha testing then please contact this address.

♫

Here is the official feature list that is currently working well:

• _Crafting : _Crafting automatically queues crafts that make solid profit. With plenty of options and customization, players can craft as little or as much as they want. Works with all tradeskills! Conceived from the work of Sapu's excellent and popular addon ScrollMaster!
• _Auctioning: Mostly-intact design from Auction Profit Master (Formally Quick Auctions 3). This module quickly posts auctions based on rules set up manually or automatically (through other modules).
• _Mailing: Automatically mail items to other characters (ideal for sending large amounts of items to a banker or other crafter). Formally the auto-mailer feature in Auction Profit Master, this module was separated to allow users freedom to chose other mailing addons as needed.
• _AuctionDB: Database module designed to keep memory usage to a minimum. Just like auctioneer, it picks up pricing information from the auction house to use in calculations of profits.

Here are the plans for the future versions:

• _Shopping: This module automatically buys materials a user needs, using lists generated from _crafting, or other lists the user creates (such as with Auctioneer's "snatch list". Interfaces with AuctionDB for pricing information!
• _Networking: This client/server based module will allow users that strongly dislike the auction house or using addons to farm materials for the AH goblin and send them through the mail at pre-approved prices. This allows the goblin to develop a "supply network" of users who will keep supplying him with materials he needs to survive.
• _Gathering: Automatically retrieve needed items from enabled gbanks, personal banks, and alts. Manages inventory as needed.

I Bought A Cataclysm Gold Guide

Posted by Markco at 8:00 AM

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So today I decided to buy a gold guide I'd heard about for quite some time. It's an extremely popular guide and was perhaps the finest piece of marketing I have ever seen for the wow niche. The pitch page was sound, the copy itself made me just drool at the idea of learning just a few lessons to hit the gold cap. Oh look, apparently these lessons are updated for 4.0! I decided I would buy it and see if perhaps the mighty Markco needed to learn from these lessons.

What I found was atrocious. Simply ATROCIOUS! Just like the vast majority of gold guides I have purchased (I tend to buy them about once every four to six months) I was appalled at the complete and utter lack of valuable information. This stuff was good for an absolute dunce, maybe even someone who didn't have two silvers to rub together, but for anyone beyond amateur level it was an utter waste of time. The south park images which took up huge chunks of page space within the 'guide' just added insult to injury.
The idea that anyone had ever taken these strategies and hit gold cap was ridiculous and you know what, after reading the 'testimonials' I realized that they had to be fake. One way to see if testimonials are written by the guide writer is to look for where the emphasis is in the writing. Is the spotlight on thanking the guide provider or on promoting a piece of the guide? Does the testimonial say "thanks for the awesome guide, it has helped me so much!" or "Strategy XYZ made me 500 gold per hour!"? The first one looks genuine, the second looks like a marketing ploy.

You're probably wondering to yourself, well wait Markco, why do you bother to buy guides when yours are so good?! I'm a marketer, and a damned good one at that. I like to see what the competition is doing and every time I've done it mine was vastly superior.The guides that I have enjoyed are ones that I also recommended to you, but 90% of the ones I have looked at were total bs. These guys writing guides are just looking for a quick buck off the vast majority of noob players who need to be pointed at a few addons and given a general strat to follow. My guide is far too adventurous for that, I not only show noobs how to become better players but I then show them how to go all the way to gold guru status. I give them the tools and the road map and then they choose how far down the path they want to go. Some are happy with an epic mount while leveling, others with a mammoth, others with 100k and still others are only satisfied with a million gold. This makes my guide capable of helping even some of the most advanced auctioneers. If you don't have a system for getting gold cap, I will show you how to make your own personal one. While other guides may be able to provide a leg up for noobs and newbs, mine will take them the distance.

I think that it would be a disservice to totally disregard all other gold guides out there as there are a handful of honest players who, like myself, have poured their hearts and souls into developing reputable guides. For instance, I thoroughly enjoyed the personal walk through style developed at Cataclysm Mastery, so if you'd like to check out their membership blog you could go there with a very strong recommendation from myself. They are looking into personalized guides for gathering in the first few weeks of cataclysm, along with profession guides for crafters who want to get an early lead on the competition with guidelines showcasing what mats and crafted items will be popular.

Let me reveal to you a little known secret, 20kleveling is not the first guide I've written and it wasn't the last either. I've written two others so far and several other guide marketers have stolen my content for their own use. Here are three catch phrases which you'll find in other guides that came from my writings, see how many you recognize:

Click to Continue Reading...

Cataclysm Gold Sink

Posted by Markco at 8:00 AM

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It's not old world/new world flying, although that's a hefty amount of gold in and of itself. It's not 310% speed either eventhough you know everyone with the gold to burn will be buying that.

It's not reagents or respecs.

It's Reforging. Yep, everyone's favorite way to enhance their gear is the main way you're going to drop gold throughout cataclysm. There's no limit to the number of times you can test out reforging that favorite pair of gloves for the ninth time. Most players are not going to want to spend the time doing the math behing changing gear so they'll just do it and play with it until they get it right. After all it's only 15 gold here, 10 gold there, not much right? I managed to drop 80 gold reforging my gear from haste to hit and that was only eight peices! Imagine how much gold you'll spend tweaking your character as your gear changes... you'll get a new peice and suddenly have not enough hit or too much hit and once again you'll be standing in front of the reforge dude with his sweet outfit. If blizzard had allowed for the reforging of primary stats (strength, agility, intellect) I would have gone bonkers reforging all my gear but thankfully they didn't do that.

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The Power of Buy in Cataclysm

Posted by Markco at 8:00 AM

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"Hey Markco/Call to Auction.
There is something that has been bothering me when I read a lot of forums posts.  There is a concept that I believe you may not have addressed yet in your blog/podcast and it is really fundamental piece of information that all Auctioneers need to understand. Money is made on the BUY not the SELL.  The best way to beat undercutters is by buying.

"It is at the time of buying when you set yourself up for future profits. But the profit potential that you control is 100% related to your buying decision."

This concept is often misunderstood when someone is complaining undercutters posting below cost.  In all likelihood they are not.  Unless they are trying specifically to drive competition out nobody will ever post below cost without it being a major mistake.  Most of the time when people are complaining about posting below cost they fail to realize that the other person is posting below "your" cost, but probably not theirs.

This loops back to the aforementioned concept.  You make your money when you buy, whether that be for flipping or raw materials for crafting.  We're dealing in goods where everything is equal and there are very few factors aside from price that influence a buyer's decision.  Now that we've acknowledged that we can assume that it only takes one person to set a price ceiling.  As long as they keep one auction up all the time at a certain price they have set that limit.  Sure you can post above it all you like but you will never sell your auction unless there is a demand spike or someone mistakenly pays more to you.

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Low Risk Investing for Cataclysm

Posted by Markco at 8:00 AM

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Image taken from http://www.risingnova.org

*Guest Post Written By: Just Another Goblin*

Several things are changing in Cataclysm and no matter what you plan to do - reroll alts, change guilds
or just continue as normal. One thing will remain constant, you need gold, everything costs money and
Cataclysm isn’t going to change that so don’t you want as much gold as possible? Of course you do!

Investing Before Cataclysm Hits

At this time of the current expansion, there are two kinds of people - People who have a plan and
continue to list sensibly and people who panic. You’re going to want to exploit the latter as much as
possible. Here are some items you should be looking at in regards to Cataclysm.

Saronite Ore - Everyone’s favourite ore and that’s not going to change until at least a few
months into Cataclysm and even then, at the prices it’s being sold now (around and less than
12g 50s per stack, where it can be smelted and vendored at no loss) it’s so low risk it’s perfect.
So why invest in this you ask? Well tradeskills, Engineers, Blacksmiths and even Alchemists will
be using this as cheap (Well cheap in comparison to the potential costs of the new materials)
way to get quick levels as the profession caps increase.

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Sale Tracking Addon for Wow

Posted by Markco at 8:00 AM

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*This post is brought to you by Moravec of Follow the Gold Road.*

Today, we’ll be taking a look at MySales which is a lightweight, yet extremely useful addon for
monitoring your sales. It is a little less robust in features than BeanCounter, yet will probably suit
most people’s needs – especially those Auctioneer-o-phobes among us.



Figure 1: MySales Config Screen

Click to Continue Reading...

Cataclysm Gold Without Addons

Posted by Markco at 8:00 AM

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Before I show you this email I received recently, I'd first like to talk to you about the whole concept of playing without addons. Some players actually enjoy it! I know that I am constantly recommending the use of about a half dozen powerful addons to help you manipulate the auction house successfully, but it is entirely possible to do well without them. I would go so far as to say it's close to self mutilation but who am I to rain on someone else's parade? Who's to say that combing the auction house by hand isn't a great way to learn the auction house so that when you do end up using addons you'll be a pro at it? Keep this in mind when you read the following email and please try to avoid the 'l2addons noob!' comments. Not that you leave those kinds of things, just trying to make sure that you get the point of the post instead of focusing on how addons would make this player's life easier.

"Thanks! Your blog is one of three real pretty regularly. I came into the making srs gold just a month ago. I have been able to make over 6k gold since I started in earnest. I am proof that you don't need to be hardcore to make gold. I am stitting today a month later at 12k. See I don't make gold full time, I raid 3 tiimes a week so, I have to be able to fit it into my schedule and not overrun my rl.

What it takes is Omg Brainssss!

I am on a rp horde leaning server and here is how I've done it, so the next time someone calls you and ass you can't point to me as an example.even my husband is amazed at how well I have been doing with little work involved!

1. No Auctioneer

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Cataclysm Gold Guide: Feast of Winter Veil

Posted by Markco at 8:00 AM

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With cataclysm coming out on December 7th many players may be wondering how they can prepare to make gold in the expansion. This speculation is probably overshadowing the easiest ways to make gold during december and january in wow: the Feast of Winter Veil. I intend this post to be THE ULTIMATE guide to the feast of winter veil and I will go into exactly how you can make gold along with some new strategies you probably have never heard of for christmas.

Before I get started, let me explain why you should prepare now and not after cataclysm's release date. Besides the fact that you will have more time if you start now (duh), there's also the simple fact that the world is being torn asunder. Who's to say that those dragon hatchlings outside of silvermoon will even exist after the cataclsym, or that they will drop eggs like they do now?

Materials

Here is a master list of what materials you can collect now to make gold. Add them to your snatch list!

• Copper Bar
• Wool Cloth
• Runecloth
• Deeprock Salt
• Rugged Leather
• Small Egg

Click to Continue Reading...

Euripides: Gold Capped and Insider Trader

Posted by Markco at 8:00 AM

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Before I get into the review of my friend, Euripides, I'd like to go over some news bits for the community.

• The Carnival, "Cataclysm Gold Strategies", is scheduled for December 2nd, so get your posts published onto your blogs and then send me your links asap. The posts are featured in the order that they are received.
• A cataclysmic change is coming to JMTC in the form of a new community manager! This already famous blogger is being trained to fullfill your gold making needs and prepared to start on December 1st. As we get closer to that date I will be giving you more information, so stay tuned!
• Friday posts are "Markco's Corner", where I talk about anything I'd like to talk about related to wow instead of just wow gold tips.
• Cataclysm Gold Guide efforts continue and I am working towards developing strategies for Cataclysm's professions and cross professions. I expect that these will be released on and around December 7th, with updates coming fast and furious throughout the expansion.

Now for the review...

There are two names everyone in the gold making business of world of warcraft know who are serious about being informed: Euripides and Markco. You know who I am, but perhaps you don't know who Euripides is? Even if you do, this review of Euripides and his efforts in the gold making community will be well worth the read.

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How to Deal with Constant Undercutting

Posted by Markco at 8:00 AM

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Here is an email exchange between myself and Extensity, Frostmourne US. He asked a great question a few weeks ago on undercutting and hopefully my answer will help everyone who has a similar quandry.

"Hi there Marcko,

Firstly I'd like to thank you for your massive contribution to the WoW community and for the information you hand out so freely. All the little tips and suggestions have made a big difference on how I play this game.

On that note I'd like to ask the questions 'How can I keep competitive on an overcrowded market?', 'Are there certain days you don't bother with certain markets?'

On my server it was particularly difficult to catch up and match the prices of glyphs. The only way I can stay competitive with the multitudes who are listing them is to cancel all my uncut auctions every 5 minutes. Unfortunately this just kills a lot of profit for all of us. So back to the question, is there any other way to keep competitive without sitting here all day cancelling and relisting auctions.

I know a simple answer to this: Diversify. But I'd like to know how you deal with constant undercutters.

Thanks,

Extensity - Frostmourne US."

Markco: Are you selling all your items the same way or do you sell certain glyphs differently? Are you focusing on anything in particular?

Click to Continue Reading...

Happy B-Day JMTC, Cataclysm Gold Awaits!

Posted by Markco at 8:00 AM

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Retweet, tell your friends on facebook, mention JMTC in a youtube video, post on the wow forums, or race out your front door and shout at the top of your lungs: "HAPPY BIRTHDAY JMTC!" Well that last one is probably the least effective, but to each his own!

Jhaman did this for JMTC's birthday, very funny commercial for 20kleveling.



I'd like to thank YOU, the community, for making this site such a worthwhile and enjoyable place to visit. The recent explosion of readership over the course of the past 6 months and heavy linking from major websites have helped to cement JMTC, the collective entity you all represent that is, as the #1 gold guide out there.

It's not about Markco and his ideas, it's about this community and YOUR ideas. Thank you for your collective efforts in building and maintaining the superb information on this site and the forum, as well as your well mannered nature while conducting discussions here. I have only sent a handful of comments in the past six months to spam, most of them being bots, gold sellers and hack supporters. That speaks VOLUMES to the way you all behave on this site. It's not elitist jerks, it's not hate mongering with nonsensical philosophies, it's good old JMTC with information anyone can use to go from a gold making noob in cataclysm to a pro auctioneer who practices markco-vian economics.

If you think I'm done praising you guys and girls, well too bad, because I'm not. I don't care if you blush or feel embarrassed, you're getting thanked today.

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Wow Marathon Charity Event

Posted by Markco at 6:00 AM

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*Press Release Written By: Wow Marathon*

Giving the gift of mobility, one level at a time.

On December 6th, the first annual wowmarathon.com video game marathon will set out to become the world’s first level 85 character.  We will be playing for 48 hours straight, hosting various contests, and information on our journey.  We will be helping raise money for Free Wheelchair Mission.

Visitors are encouraged to come watch a team of dedicated gamers race through the new expansion for World of Warcraft:Cataclysm. Visitors will also be encouraged to donate money through the site to Free Wheelchair Mission, a charity that helps disabled people all around the world have the gift of mobility.

We have set up various levels of donations, to help entertain and  encourage donations for our viewers. We will have various contests throughout the marathon, and plenty of free gifts for our viewers, that will be sent out to the winners at the conclusion of the marathon at no charge to them.  We will be streaming live, and interacting with the community via facebook, twitter, e-mail and our online live stream chat.

For more information, go to http://www.wowmarathon.com

December 6^th, 2010 @ 9 AM PST

In service since 2001, Free Wheelchair Mission has sent over 500,000 specially-designed wheelchairs
around the world, providing the gift of mobility free of charge to people with disabilities in 77 developing
countries. For just $59.20, a wheelchair can be manufactured, shipped and distributed…changing a life,
forever. To learn more, please go to www.freewheelchairmission.org.

Pre Cataclysm Gold Guide - Elemental Invasion

Posted by Markco at 8:00 AM

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Elemental Invasion Part 4: Twilight Bosses Loot Table

251	Shield	Melee	Off Hand	Barrier of the Earth Princess
251	Plate	Heal	Waist	Girdle of Oblation
251	Plate	Melee	Chest	Tectonic Plate
251	Plate	Melee	Chest	Salamander Skin
251	Plate	Melee	Wrist	Twilight Offering Bands
251	Mail	Physical DPS	Legs	Sacrificial Mail
251	Leather	Heal	Feet	Flamewaker's Treads
251	Leather	Physical DPS	Chest	Pulmonary Casing
251	Cloth	Heal	Chest	Earth Bride's Gown
251	Cloth	Physical DPS	Back	Cloak of Mocking Winds
251	Cloth	Spell DPS	Back	Zaetar's Deathshroud
251	Cloth	Spell DPS	Feet	Sandfury Sandals
251	Finger	Melee	Finger	Old Gods' Blessing
251	Finger	Physical DPS	Finger	Sulfuron's Favor
251	Finger	Spell DPS	Finger	Ring of the Three-Headed Beast
251	Neck	Heal	Neck	Pendant of Burning Spirits
251	Neck	Melee	Neck	Flamelash Amulet
251	Neck	Physical DPS	Neck	Amulet of the Centauri
251	Neck	Spell DPS	Neck	Amulet of Evil Winds

Great Markco you pasted some info from MMO-Champion. What are we supposed to do with it?

Make GOLD of course!

Now, the first thing you're going to want to do is focus on the items which you can actually provide upgrades for:

Click to Continue Reading...

Your First 100 Gold in Wow

Posted by Markco at 8:01 AM

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Written by Kammler of Kammler's Corner:

Since I needed to roll a Horde toon to begin working the neutral AH, I decided to
put to the test some of the tips I have seen (and used on occasion). My goal was
to see if I could generate 100g on a brand new toon in my first day playing that
character. The surprising results below.


Background

New players often lament not having enough gold to buy what they need. They
sometimes beg in trade chat. We all know how obnoxious that can be. I strongly
suspect that pressures for gold lead some players to resort to ninja tactics to get
upgrades or to "help themselves" to items in the guild bank.

My theory is that if a new player can earn 100g in the first day playing, he will be
more able to enjoy the game without the hindrance of always being broke. Teach
a man to fish.....

Here is my very recent experience with detailed steps to follow if you wan to
replicate my strategy.

Level 1-10 (first 3 hours): Gold in hand--0g to 10s

Click to Continue Reading...

Prepare for Cataclysm

Posted by Markco at 8:00 AM

I sent the following email to my subscribers almost two weeks ago but you can still act now and take advantage of knowing what items will sell the first month of cataclysm as well as what items will become utterly worthless. You do not HAVE to get this guide to do well when cataclysm launches, as I have given out enough information on this blog to make you quite a bit of gold. But if you want to take it to the next level and get a beta insider's view on what's going on in cataclysm (I only have access to live currently) then this article is definiately worth a thorough read. I feel that it can fill in the blanks for those of you completionist auctioneers out there who want everything there is to know about cataclysm for making a killing off the expansion's release. Even if you only have 1,000 gold to invest you should still learn the best ways to spend that hard earned gold and which items you should liquidate to then turn around and reinvest for even more profits.

Did you get through patch 4.0.1 and think to yourself... man if only I had prepared better, I could have made a killing! That was a minor patch in comparison to what awaits you when cataclysm launches on December 7^th. There will be so many more opportunities to make a fortune if you start preparing now and the trick is to focus on the right items in order to not waste any of your valuable time or gold.

Do you have an idea of the changes coming in cataclysm and how they will affect the auction house? Do you know what to buy now and sell after cataclysm is released? Wouldn't it be great to know exactly what's going to happen when deathwing arrives and how the prices of popular items will change?

Your answers are closer than you think, keep reading...

Click to Continue Reading...

Jewelcrafting Before Cataclysm

Posted by Markco at 8:00 AM

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The following tip is an excellent example of diversifying and spreading out into various markets within your professions. I like how even if you cannot sell the suggested item you can still vendor it and make some money back. This makes the following strategy perfect for last minute sales because if they all fail you still won't lose gold when cataclysm is released.

"Hey Markco,

First off, I just wanted to say thanks for your reply a couple weeks ago about the Dalaran JC tokens. 

I wanted to write you with a neat little Jewelcrafting tip that may be useful to you or some of your small-time auctioneer readers, or maybe just some Jewelcrafters that are looking to expand their options as far as sales go as Cata draws closer and the market for cut gems slows.

I didn't max Jewelcrafting until just a few weeks ago, but I've been able to make a nice chunk of change selling uncommon (green) cut gems.  While I've had a lot of luck with red & yellow gems, I've been having a lot of trouble selling the orange ones, and have about 3-4 full stacks sitting in my bank.  I was about to list them on the AH just last night when an idea struck me.

Click to Continue Reading...

MMO Leader

Posted by Markco at 8:00 AM

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Hi Markco,

I wanted to tell you and your readers about a project I've become involved with, it's a site called MMO Leader. The project started months ago when several prolific wow bloggers took a look at the community and saw a problem, everyone seemed to be focused on individual performance rather than the raid as a whole. There are plenty of sites that inform players about their rotations and other theorycrafting topics. But there's little in the community to aid people in managing and leading raids. It's with that thought that the site was created, our goal is to make leadership easier, and to make good leaders better. Since the launch of the site a multitude of discussions have been started on topics such as team building, leadership styles, voice chat solutions and of course asset management.

The Team
■ Blacksen of Blacksen’s End
■ Brangwen of Non Elitist Raiding Diary
■ Gravity of Pwnwear and Hammer’s Eve
■ Karatheya of Cold Comfort
■ Kasgrin of Pwnwear
■ Khaas of SRS Business and Pwnwear

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World of Cataclysm - Unique Gold Ideas

Posted by Markco at 8:00 AM

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What continued to set JMTC apart from so many blogs and what made it grow throughout the past two years was its uniqueness.

I'm going to show you how JMTC is unique and then every person in this audience who is a blogger can go off and try to find their own unique take on this niche. For the standard reader I will leave links to the more unique ideas which can be found on this site for making gold. Some of these ideas have become so mainstream that you wouldn't know they came from this site originally. Some ideas just didn't have a name so I named them, packaged them and dissected them for your reading pleasure.

Some Examples of Unique Ideas

Bid Low Sell Normal
The crowning jewel of my earliest ideas on making gold. This strategy revolved around bidding on mid level items with random demand and selling them for 5000% profit. A peacebloom stack with a 1 copper bid might not look like much but it's nice when you win it and resell for 8 gold.

Bidding Times
Ever wonder when the best times to bid were? Ever hear of bidding on server restarts? JMTC was the first site to really talk about and analyze this information. I even put it into a pretty little chart.

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Auctioneer: Vendoring for Gold

Posted by Markco at 8:00 AM

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Here goes one of those emails that is so good I let it stand on its own two feet. Please see 22 steps to auctioneer for information on vendor scans, or perhaps view the fully documented and detail oriented walkthrough in my cataclysm gold guide for searches with addons.
 
"Greetings,

I have been reading your blog for a few weeks, and I would like to congratulate you for the great work.

You will probably know about this, but since I haven't seen it on your blog (I might have well missed it), I thought it would be worth sharing.

There are some goods whose offer is (almost) always far above the demand. As sellers keep blindly undercutting each other (probably via miss-managed addon automation), the price of the auctions quickly falls below the vendor price. At this point, smart players may have two options:

1) Try to flip these goods: risk is low-medium, because of the low prices, but profit margin is also low, due to the continuous market flood.
2) Buy out and vendor the goods. Profit will normally be low, but the good thing is that risk isn't simply "low", but actually zero.

I have been doing (2) for a while and, although it didn't made me rich in two days, it's become a slightly noticeable bonus to my regular gold input. For example, last night there where several Super Healing Potion auctions going on, with the following pricings:

 

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Profession Powerleveling: Cataclysm Gold Guide

Posted by Markco at 8:00 AM

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Why do items found in the mid level of profession skill ups sell so well?
It's not because they sell quickly.

It's not because they sell often.

It's because they don't sell often and don't sell quickly.

WHAT?! Markco are you smoking groms blood again? (maybe you bought it off that imp from winterspring again for cheap but instead of reselling it for 3000% profit you decided to smoke it)

Nope, I'm not... well maybe I am but don't judge me! Let's look at another confusing reason why mid level profession skill ups will do well in cataclysm. It's a simple matter of supply and demand.

The supply for mid level profession skill up items is irrelevant. The demand is what makes it so valuable and it's not because the demand is consistent, it's because it's not consistent that working this market is so profitable.

Confused yet? Don't worry, when I developed the strategy of bidding low and selling normal, most people looked at me like you are now. Like I had two heads and was dual weilding shields. Speaking of "dual," it's dual spec not duel spec. Duel spec is what I use to kill you, dual spec is what I buy to get duel spec. That's neither here nor there though, let's get back on track and avoid more instances of markco a.d.h.d.

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Cobalt Ore: Cataclysm Preparation

Posted by Markco at 8:00 AM

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I've been telling everyone to stockpile saronite ore for the purpose of selling bars to alchemist levelers for months now. What about it's lesser cousin, the cobalt ore? Is there a reason for stockpiling cobalt ore in cataclysm?

Yes, actually there's more than one reason... there's three reasons. Unless my math is off and I'm missing a reason, in which case I'm sure you'll enlighten me in the comments section.

1. Selling Cobalt Bars

Bars sell to those players leveling engineering or blacksmithing. Those 30 or so skill up levels requiring cobalt bars will make them sell throughout cataclysm. It may be worth your while to make cobalt war axes out of the bars and disenchant them but I doubt it.

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Cataclysm Need 85 for 525 Skill Level?

Posted by Markco at 7:59 AM

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This is a news post on the possibility of needing level 84 for access to phased recipes in cataclysm that can get you past 500 skill level in several professions. This post does not count as the daily gold tip.

Anyone else read on the JMTC forums that 75 may not cut it for skill level 525 for professions in cataclysm?

"I know a lot of people who have more than two professions will be currently in the process of levelling them to 75, that being the new minimum to get to 525. However on the beta right now its looking like even though u need a minimum level of 75 to continue levelling a proffession that is not a gathering proffession, you will only be able to get the gathering proffessions to max until you reach 84 as currently the 500+ recipes are all on vendors only reachable at minimum level 84. This is the Beta and as Kaliope has said it seems like blizzard is keeping it to the last minute, however it's possible that this will end up being the case and people might want to think about getting these extra toons to 79.9 (so that they will have rested). 

Thanks, Alkurian"

Here's a link which features both of my cohosts from call to auction and what they had to say on the issue.

What do I think about this? Well, glad you asked. I think it's going to be removed and when cataclysm launches 75 will be the requirement to get recipes beyond 500 skill level. I'm thinking back to past beta features that never went live like 3 gold battered hilts and cooldown removal of transmute epic gems.

Herb Shortage - Enchanting Vellum

Posted by Markco at 8:00 AM

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Have you happened to look at Earthroot, Peacebloom, Silverleaf or Mageroyal lately?You probably will notice that there aren't many of them and that they are very expensive (this blog did too!). Besides the discussion I'd like to have about moonglow ink and enchanting vellums, this rise in price for low level herbs makes for an awesome opportunity for low level characters to make gold. Any low level herbalist can go farm for an hour and come back with over a 100 gold worth of herbs easy. A higher level character could probably break 200 gold worth of these herbs.

When I looked at my own server tuesday afternoon to see how prices were doing this is what I saw on average:

Earthroot : NONE.
Mageroyal : 5.5 gold each.
Peacebloom: 1.5 gold each.
Silverleaf : 15 silver each.

Of these only silverleaf had a decent amount on the ah (about 120). Mageroyal had 1 stack and peacebloom had about 50 of assorted stack sizes.

So why the sudden drop in supply and increase in demand for these herbs? Keep reading to find out silly...

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Where can you train glyph of Mage Armor?

Posted by Markco at 7:59 AM

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"Yeah, next patch has it fixed but no date is set for that yet, sorry."

This post is simply an update on glyph of mage armor, it will not count as the daily gold tip.

"Hey Marco,

Here is a brief update on the Glyph of Mage Armor. I was speaking to a GM about an unrelated issue when I thought I would bring the question up.

Anyway thanks for the great blog/podcasts.

Lannie - Argent Dawn EU"

So where can you get Glyph of Mage Armor? For those of you who have been living under a rock, the glyph of mage armor was one of four glyphs not included in patch 4.0.1 that should have been. Only difference between Mage Armor and the other three was that Mage Armor was in the game before the patch. Therefore it was possible to have some Glyphs of Mage Armor in stock while no one else could craft them. Over time these glyphs have gone up to astronomical prices as frustrated players shell out the cash for this crucial pve glyph.

From this screen shot we must assume that it is possible that glyph of mage armor will be crafted again either after this tuesday's patch or another soon to come. There's only so many weeks left until cataclysm, so get your flips in now on Mage Armor while you still can.

If you think this kind of gouging is unethical, perhaps you'd like to call me an ass?

Mercurial Adamantite: Gold in Cataclysm

Posted by Markco at 8:00 AM

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"Dear Markco,

Your gold advice has helped me greatly over the past year I have been part of your community. I have found a small niche market which I would like to share. Many jewelcrafters know this, but you need Mercurial Adamantite to level up ten points in jewelcrafting in the late Burning Crusade cuts. I've seen these sell for 100 gold on my server, and when cataclysm comes out I believe these might be good sellers. Its a slightly hard grind but if you have the patience to farm (I don't) then these will be a great source of income.

PS: Post more Castaclysm videos! I miss you guys!

-Goore, The War Chef of Farstriders
The Farnsworth Paradox"

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Vanishing Dust and +22 Intellect

Posted by Markco at 8:00 AM

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"Hi Markco,
I read your blog for a few months now and find it rather helpful at times, so i feel obligated to write you about vanishing powders. I would suggest to include them into one of your starter threads as you can buy them in every major city and turn them into gold in no time. At least on my realm it goes for 2.5-4g a piece (following the usual raid-sells curve), compared to 6.4s as a purchase value (no rep). It sells like mad... I bought 40 just to try how fast i can turn them into gold few days ago, within two hours all of it was sold and it wasn't what one would call prime time. I'm keeping the market supplied, but not flooded. Most people don't really know you can buy it from vendor and so the price derives from price of herbs for crafting it, but i expect some kid will flood the market within a month and lower the price to 0.5-1g. Nonetheless, people are lazy so it will always be more expensive then buying it from vendor, thus making it good enough for starters no matter when they join the game.

Some others might have already reported it to you, but just in case no one did...

Tazanturn - Drak'thul EU"

"Hey Markco,

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I Challenge Cataclysm Gold Blogs

Posted by Markco at 8:00 AM

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Markco's Corner

Before I get into the challenge I'd like to propose for my fellow wow gold bloggers, I'd like to remind all of the new readers here that there is a powerful tutorials section on the site which you should all make use of. You should also try out the brand new search feature on the site, which will allow you to search what's currently on the blog, outgoing links and even the content on the blogs within my blog roll!

For those who don't know, friday posts are "Markco's Corner" and they tend to be articles geared towards the blogosphere, what's going on for this blog or my prot pvp/pve antics.

A Challenge

I've got a challenge for you all, yeah you gold blogs and guide sites, I'm talking about you! It will take you some time to write this post but it will probably be both the most commented and visited post by far on your site once you're finished.

Follow this outline and write your post answering each question:

(Feel free to link to your article in the comments section here or you can ask me to tweet about it.)

1. What was your first post ever? Why did you write it? (don't use an intro post)
2. What was your favorite post and why?
3. What was your least favorite post and why?
4. Find a reader comment you like and respond to it regarding one of your posts. Call them out and thank them for the comment.
5. Ask your readers to pick a post they found useful on your site.

Ok I asked you to do it, now I'm going to follow the outline:

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Turn Your Honor Into Gold

Posted by Markco at 8:00 AM

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Currently you can buy the paladin pvp shield for 70 honor, disenchant it and sell the resulting abyss crystals on the auction house for 35-70 gold depending on server prices. You could also take the abyss crystals and create popular armor enchanting scrolls like +10 stats to chest (enchant chest - powerful stats) or weapon enchants like spellpower or berzerking which are selling rather well at the moment.

Shatter is actually a perfectly good way to convert those abyss crystals into valuable items for cataclysm (dust and lesser cosmic essences). When everyone is dumping abyss crystals on the auction house as cataclysm launches you will want to be the one who buys them out for cheap and shatters them. I know that shatter becomes greater cosmic essences by the way, but the leveling enchants use lesser cosmic essences and you can mark up the price on the lessers so that 3 lesser cosmics are more valuable than their bigger versions.

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What to Sell Before Cataclysm Guide

Posted by Markco at 8:00 AM

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Everyone has been speculating on what items to buy and stockpile for cataclysm, but what about all the stuff you should get rid of? Also, how should you get rid of these soon to be valueless items?

Let's go through the various professions and address specific items which you should sell or use to craft items and then sell before cataclysm's release.

Alchemy
Flasks, elixirs and potions may sell to levelers but they will quickly drop to worthless within a week or two of the expansion's release. I would advise getting into some undercutting wars on raid nights and really pushing your items. Remember the previous posts I've done on flask selling? Try to post an hour before the prime raid times with a handful of each flask/elixir/potion. After waiting an hour then you undercut everyone who has undercut you and take the prime selling slot with the bulk of your items. Obviously you should be doing your daily transmute epic gem cooldown even if you don't have a jewelcrafter to cut and double the value of the gem(s) you get.

Leatherworking
Arctic fur will probably sell well the first few weeks when people need skill ups. However, since borean leather will retain quite a bit of value it would be worth your while to wait and not convert all your leather into furs until you know for sure what is used to level leatherworking. I've had great luck selling frosthide leg armor as well as the good old fashioned uncommon quality borean leather armor.

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Cataclysm Preparation - "Lessons Learned"

Posted by Markco at 8:00 AM

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You have one month to brush up on your Auction House skills in preparation for the cataclysm expansion, so I thought that a carnival about learning from past mistakes would be beneficial to you and help you prepare. Let's see how the following collection of 18 blog writers answered the question for November's carnival: "What lessons have you learned from while playing the auction house?"

I would like to remind you that all comments written on the blogs of those who submitted articles for today are greatly appreciated by both myself and the authors themselves. Articles are listed in the order that they were submitted. Have fun!

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Insane in the Membrane - Feat of Strength in Cataclysm

Posted by Markco at 8:00 AM

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If you're looking for help completing the insane in the membrane achievement before it is removed with cataclysm's release, head on over to the JMTC forums "Insane in the Membrane Support Group."

Items to flip on the auction house for insane in the membrane achievement seekers:

• Heavy Junk Boxes
• Darkmoon Cards but mostly Decks
• List of Darkmoon Faire Items Note: Site inactive.
• Librams of Focus, Protection and Rapidity.

Since this is becoming a feat of strength you can expect a similar upward trend in the value of these items as we saw for ZG reputation bijous and coins. Don't underestimate the value of some of the lesser darkmoon faire turn ins either.

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