Just My Two Copper - WoW Gold Guide

Blizzard has announced the different events they are planning during Gamescon 2012, including the world first playing of the intro to Mists of Pandaria.

With each tidbit of information that is offered, the opening to the gates to Pandaria comes closer and closer. And so closing of sales routes and limiting inventory will become much more important.

I've been talking more and more about how collecting inventory to resell at the beginning of the new expansion will be more important. But just as important will be the limiting of production of items that will not sell between now and the beginning of MOP.

Two options are presented the closer that we get to the panda invasion. You can begin to look to turn around inventory at reduced rates. It is important to make sure that you are keeping a close eye on what is and isn't selling.

Take the Extreme Impact Hole Puncher that I have sold consistently since it's introduction.

Production costs have always hovered around the 3-4k (less if I produce the items on alts) and sold at the start easily for 11k+. The closer that MOP comes, the lower I will drop the prices to make sure that I do not get caught up with extra inventory.

Jewelcrafting will find this is very important. The lower blue gems (Nightstones etc). will still be important for players rolling new jewelcrafters. Other items such as Inferno Rubies will continue to lose value due to lack of demand. Inventory control will give you both added space for your investment items, and generate quick sales without the fear of losses in the future.

Closing all sales and liquidating inventory is possible at this point. This would guarantee no losses but also could limit the continual gold stream that is still available. Knowing your markets and selling to them is going to be the driving force of your continued gold goblin empire.

Will you wait til the announcement of the introduction date for MOP? Or start to close your sales route now to play it safe?

Good Luck and Good Hunting

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MOP Prep: Stuff to Gold, Gold to Stuff

MOP Prep: Setting the Lineup

MOP Prep: Seting up the Cartel

Burn Them Fires

Selling for Dummies

MOP Prep: Setting up the Cartel

Posted by J.E. Douglas at 12:14 PM

Cartel

3. A group of parties, factions, or nations united in a common cause; a bloc.
(courtesy of the free dictionary)

In Wow terms a cartel is a powerful weapon to gaining more gold. This is especially important to know if you do not have all of the professions covered. On your toon you may have your Jewelcrafting and tailoring professions maxxed out. But at times you see something that you want crafted to sell. Or someone your selling asks if you have a [Sword Of Awesome]. You might not have the pattern but you have the information that one of your cartel members has the pattern.

This is where the power of a cartel setup comes into play. You may not get the sale yourself, but your helping a friend or colleague get a sale. And vice versa your team members will pass on sales to you. The cartel setup gains it's strength from keeping the gold in house. Also included in this grouping are your hired farmers for raw materials.

Another lost benefit of a cartel is information. Most players will not spend all day sitting and sorting through the AH. New Mists of Pandaria quests scream to be completed. Leveling of toons and new raids. So time ends up being limited on scanning for items to flip. The latest trends in sales go by the wayside, unless you have a cartel to inform you. A strong cartel of 3-5 members gives the advantage of having someone on the AH multiple times during the day. So if Heavy Savage Leather is going at a premium, cartel member b can inform the group through the secret cartel channel (you did remember you can create your own limited access channels right?) the group can quickly jump on the trend, and score extra profits. This is especially useful for arbitrage (Horde to Alliance/Alliance to Horde) sales. Using information to strategize what gets passed across the joint auction house for sales later on in the day.

In my current setup I have 4 members of my cartel. 2 farmers (one handling my leather goods and one handling minerals). Cartel members are also are performing auction house chores will tell the group if there is a trend in our super secret channel of mystery.

The key to the cartel is information. Where we are in competition on some items, and have set out or specialties, our power and strength comes from knowledge and teamwork. One person can have a competitive business in warcraft. Conglomerates can conquer entire economies.

Have you set up your cartel yet? Even if it's an information one through your guild. The power is at your fingertips to obtain larger amounts of gold. All just for a little social interaction.

Good Luck and Good Hunting

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MOP Prep: Stuff to Gold, Gold to Stuff

Posted by J.E. Douglas at 12:44 PM

Pricing a Guild: Pawn Star Style

I have preached from my gold goblin pulpit that need for space. The more markets you are involved in, the more space that becomes necessary. Space becomes a premium if you are a collector. The same occurs if you are an investor. MOP approaching the more storage area that you have now, the more markets you can be involved with flipping mass amounts of items/materials.

If you missed my entry earlier about Guild Bank Buying/Selling here is a link to it

So for our prep work we should be looking for at least one guild bank (if not more depending on how much gold you have to spend). Depending on how many slots are available, you are looking at an investment between 500-750g. This might seem like a lot (many people who message me are sitting at the 10k to 20k range for investments) but just Investing in Netherweave by itself will recoup that loss and more.

Lets assume that you purchased a 3 tab guild bank. That will give us 291 slots to play with (3 x 98). Thats a good healthy amount of slots to store items for quick flipping and production. If your working with one guild bank (which I suggest placing at least two of your crafting toons in). Organize your tabs with one tab covering one profession. Tab 2 can cover the other profession with tab 3 being organized over miscellaneous items to sell. If you have purchased more than one guild bank then repeat the process with two more toons (if you have them) or seperate your toons so that each bank is covered by one of your production toons.

This setup will allow you to go directly to the guild bank to pick up items instead of needing to log out on one toon to ship items to the other crafter. To set this up will require a trustworthy friend/player who you can set as the Guild Master and invite the other one of your toons into the Guild. After the invite and acceptance then your friend can return the mantle of Guild Master to one of your toons.

Organization is going to be a key ingredient to being successful. Those first few days will go quickly with people looking to invest gold into items. They will want to buy more and more items and it's a guarantee someone will be there to purchase them. The important part is to make sure that the seller is you at the highest cost possible.

Good Luck and Good Hunting

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Selling for Dummies

MOP Prep: Setting the Lineup

Posted by J.E. Douglas at 12:01 PM

I grew up loving baseball. Having been a lifelong Cubs fan (you can insert your pity here now) I have watched the same foibles played out time after time.

One thing that any monday morning manager will tell you, the manager needs to change the lineup for success. The guy that fumbled the night before needs to do down to AAA and be replaced by the up and coming player to be named later.

Warcraft is a little different in the idea that you are always in control of what sells and what is produced. But your lineup is just as important as any baseball manager. Which toons will you be leveling first? What crafts will you be leveling first? Should you double up on certain professions.

A gold goblin has to answer these questions. With MOP almost upon us it's more important than anything to have your profession lineup starting to come together.

I will give you the lineup I'm using for my prepping for MOP.

(I've left out some of my players names because I might be the one that's undercutting you that day).

Druid X - Alchemist/Herbalist - (has fast flight form)
MorphineDrip - Jewelcrafter/Alchemist
ShamanX - Jewelcrafter/Engineer
Mommar- Blacksmith/Leatherworker
Moliono - Inscriptionist/Herbalist
Mosiac - Tailoring/Enchanter
CurdledMilk - Banking toon (parked in Thunder Bluff)
Moonpye - Banking toon (Parked in Tanaris)
Deathknightx - Engineer/jewelcrafter
Move - Miner/Skinner

I decided that my leveling will be switched between my Hunter (Move) and my Blacksmith Leatherworker (Mommar). This is how I leveled when cataclysm first was introduced. All my production items were sent to the appropriate craftsman to allow them to level quickly. Remember that with Catalcysm it was needed to have at least one 83 to access some of the materials necessary to level the Inscription Profession. It's possible the Blizzard producers will do the same for Mists of Pandaria.

Recently I did some changing to my lineup by dropping Mining from MorphineDrip and leveling another Jewelcrafter. This is simply to double my ability to obtain Gem patterns and tokens faster. Also I added MorphineDrip as an Alchemist to double my opportunity at daily transmutes. Both of them will be transmute specialist.

In my lineup my workhorses are the Druid for the Herbalism and Move for the mining and skinning. My lineup also has in it my two bank toons (one for the regular AH in Thunder bluff and the joint AH in tanaris. This gives me access to both quickly for Arbitrage between the two factions.

These changes to my lineup ended up in investments of around 20k, which may seem a lot but I will recoup my losses quickly by having the access to the double transmutes and the quicker jewelcrafting turn around.

So why did I choose to present this part of the plan first? To build a goblin gold fortification you need your base. And your placement of characters and professions are your base.

One thing, this tip might seem to be placed towards those that have lots of gold to play with. But it's just as important from the start of your gold empire to have your lineup planned out from the start. You should play a toon that you will enjoy playing, and professions that you can see will become valuable both to your personal usage as well as gold making skill. Having one toon be the workhorse for your farming will add flexibility to your other toons and their ability to craft valuable items. It's possible to make large amounts of gold without any type of farmer, but it becomes more difficult if stocks begin to dwindle.

What other combinations would be useful to have for MOP?

Good Luck and Good Hunting

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Its Dead Jim

Selling for Dummies

burn them fires.

Posted by J.E. Douglas at 12:58 PM

So it's mid summer (at least according to Blizzards calender of events). So this brings to us the Mid-Summer Fire Festival.

Wow insider has a great write up on the festival. Including where to find all of the bonfires and the achievements you will want to get your Violet Proto Drake for the It's Been a Long Strange Trip achievement.

So if they have already written up an awesome guide, why should you read the rest of this?

Cause you love me? Okay, I'm not that deluded. But a couple of things to remember gold speaking for the pets you can get. And a few gold making opportunities. These events tend to be my number one answer when someone asks me "how can I make x amount of gold quickly".

- The Ice Chip (teaches you the Frigid Frostling pet) that drops from the Satchel of Chilled Goods on your first ahune kill is unique. But if you notice it isn't listed as being BOP. Since the notes for Mists of Pandaria has stated that many of the BOP pets will become BOE. A wise gold goblin will continue to run ahune to gain the Burning Blossoms from the satchel. Also finishing up the full complement of Bonfires during the holiday event can be used to purchase Captured Flame. If you have multiple toons running the events once on each toon, then purchasing one pet for your collection, and saving the rest til MOP could put you well ahead of the game. Many players are taking their wowcations right now so they won't be back for the festival. These pets if they do become BOE will become valuable rare pets for training during the first wave of MOP pet buying.

The other money making possibility is to grab your two seater (you do have a two seater vehicle right?) and transport low players to the different locations they can't reach by themselves. Name your price in trade and for maybe 30 minutes work pull in an easy 2k or more.

Most of the items that Ahune drops end up being small or non upgrades to many current items. But don't ignore even the 10g vendor gold. It may seem like chump change, but small gold increases are always enjoyed.

Enjoy the blizzard holiday.

Good Luck and Good Hunting.

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Selling for Dummies

It's Dead Jim

Posted by J.E. Douglas at 10:54 AM

Many times I hear readers say that their servers are dead. That their raiding community is in the pits and that x profitable item sits on the AH for days not selling.

Don't take this as an argument against someone who believes this with their server. Servers and server population flux between activity and inactivity. Depending on population there may be a strong questing community and a weak raiding community. The reverse may be correct as well. A rush of players to get working on raiding content and not as much repeat leveling of multiple toons. Or the server may be truly "dead" with neither a raiding community or repeat questing. This is seen by large amounts of players sitting on trade chat with the call of "I'm bored" being typed repeatedly.

But how can a gold goblin combat this? If a server is truly dead, is gaining piles of gold impossible for them? The quick answer is yes, it's possible for them to make gold even in a weak market. The driving force is to figure out exactly what people are wanting, and looking to convert that knowledge into sales. Whether it's vanity items to parade the main cities in, or pets. It's very rare that something is not being sold on the AH, and someone is raking in those profits. It's this time that the creative goblin has to look at their tools to find some answers. Using their tools such as the Undermine Journal as well as forums for the server, a web of sales can be developed along with a plan of action.

If the server does become difficult or even impossible to sell, preparation for a server transfer might be in order. Blizzard announces from time to time free transfers to a new or low population server, many times within the first 4 months of a new expansion release This makes transferring a prime opportunity to take your sales conglomerate into more fertile soils. Even the idea of paying for a guild transfer with all of your toons attached might also be useful. I'm very rarely a proponent of paying real world money for world of warcraft projects. But 20 dollars a month is a lot to be spending sitting around Orgrimmar retelling the latest in fart jokes.

The choice is always yours on how you proceed with reviving a "dead" server sales opportunities. You may be suprised at just how alive your server is after you've done your research.

Good Luck and Good Hunting

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Selling for Dummies

Can I make Money digging old things?

Posted by J.E. Douglas at 12:46 PM

Archaeology, next to the first aid profession is considered a busted profession by many. It's tiring, tedious and has very little sales value. At least for the normal player who just looks at the items they "craft" from the pieces and fossils and vendor them.

But a Gold Goblin can see a sale in just about anything of value. In this case we are looking specifically at the buying and selling of race keystones.

On a weak server, these keystones (one for all of the major playable races) ended up lingering on the AH. Sales were weak on many servers (which is an understatement) while on other servers they were brisk and continual.

The major difference between the weak sales on some servers and the positive sales on others was the idea of downtime. What were people looking for?. Almost all of the items obtained from archaeology were Bind on pickup or Bind on Account items. They could only be vendored for little or no gold (even the 100g vendored items were not worth the time taken up to collect.)

One bright spot was that players who had maxxed out both their archealogy and alchemist on the same toon were able to collect pieces and craft the recipe for Vial of the Sands.

The Vial of the Sands was the workhorse for many Archaeology/Alchemist combinations when it came to gold making. Many servers had this mount/transformation item going for 50k per. This is what is going to add a lot of money in your coffers in the next one to two years (this is the expected lifetime of the Mists of Pandaria Expansion according to Blizzard/Activision)

I've been a proponent of having big ticket craftable items in your gold making arsenal. I'm sure many people think my preaching about the Mechano-hog/Mekgineers chopper has become tedious til they start selling two or three a month and add an extra 10,000 gold into their goblin pockets. Both of these mounts will be important since many players won't grind out the recipes but will want the mount for themselves. Rarity always means a premium in a seller run market.

So to answer my original question. Yes, you can make money with Archaeology. With the right information and market place it can become a nice stepping stone to increase your profits.

Here is a link to a quick guide to Archaeology and how to level it quickly.

Archaeology Guide
Vial of the Sands Guide (courtesy of How-To-Warcraft.com)

Good Luck and Good Hunting

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Selling for Dummies

The Pyrite Experiment

Posted by J.E. Douglas at 1:30 PM

As players start to progress towards the ending of an expansion. The normal routes towards gold making start to slow down or dry up. Inferno Rubies selling at 80g per, Armor patches selling for 300g. Epic items dropping to half the price they were since their original patch introduction.

Some gold goblins at this point are rolling up their tents and taking their wowcations. This isn't a bad idea for some because it's becoming more and more difficult to keep the expected market incomes grinding into our coffers.

Other goblins are looking to squeak out as much profit as they can from revisited markets. One of them came to mind was the pyrite ore market.

If you remember at the beginning, lots of speculation was given to the idea that epic gems would become available through the prospecting of pyrite ore. When patch 4.3 PTR patches were introduced a collective 'ugh' was heard through all the prospectors. Many were caught with their pants down and overstocked with pyrite ore in their guild banks. But the cost of ore didn't stumble as fast as it probably should have. There were still demand for the ore and for products that it was used for (Ebonsteel belt buckles and Truegold especially). The market seemed to hover between 5 to 8 gold per ore (100g to 160g per stack).

The pyrite market seems to be coming down now to where it becomes more interesting on using it for production of income. With some servers having their pyrite ore at 2.5g to 4g per (50g to 80g per stack) this makes it much more interesting to add more income to your coffers.

Pyrite ore is very useful for not just the previous production of Ebonsteel belt buckles and Truegold but also the return of the Obsidium/Elementium Shuffle. With storing up enchanting materials such as Heavenly Shards and Greater Celestial Essence for MOP, selling to enchanters both generating scrolls and leveling their professions to a maximum level is a reopening market to take advantage of.

Prospecting of pyrite ore creates Volatile Earth. The Volatile Earth market has taken a nosedive in the markets along with many of the other volatiles. The question to consider is that will these recover when MOP is released and there is less production through transmutes by alchemist and prospecting. Volatile Earth is going to be one of the cheapest volatiles used to level professions come MOP. And with the large amount of new MOP players wanting to level their crafters, just about everything will be in demand.

What other markets should be looked at to rediscover lost profits?

Good Luck and Good Hunting

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Selling for Dummies

Go and Kill the King

Posted by J.E. Douglas at 1:12 PM

Sometimes I like to take a step away from giving gold tips and add some other tips in the mix. It may not put gold in your pocket, but it will make your game life slightly easier.

With Mists of Pandaria the Have Gift Will Travel guild perk will be changing to Ride Like the Wind. The new guild perk will increse speed on the flight paths (right now it's listed at 0% so it's undetermined exactly how fast it will be).

So why is this important to us? Because everyone wants the For the Alliance/For the Horde achievmeents and the Reins of the Black War Bear for their collection. And the changing of this Guild perk will remove a very useful tactic for raiding a major city.

Currently the best strategy I've seen for killing all for faction leaders is to sneak rogues into all four major cities. Have them sit there and then summon the raid to the Faction leaders area. Kill the leader then escape from the city. By the time the group is reformed outside then the next rogue can summon to the next kill spot. If done quickly enough the achievement is yours, and your on your way to your mailbox to collect your mount.

I have been very suprised that Blizzard didn't gimp this perk more during the cataclysm expansion. But now that they have changed it, it is a perfect time to take advantage of the amount of wowcations that players are taking before the MOP expansion.

Good Luck and Good Hunting

Past Entries

Selling for Dummies

Come Back Players... Come Back

Measuring the AH of a "Wow Killer"

Gold: It makes a player better

Get thee to an Engineer

Darkmoon Faire Returns.... Much rejoicing

Prepping for MOP: Dinner Improbable

Are the days of Warcraft Millionaires Over?

Posted by J.E. Douglas at 11:27 AM

No realm first achievement for you

My brain was chugging along this week as i was working security for an outdoor concert coming up with ideas and plans for the next few weeks. Waiting for the opening of Mists of Pandaria and starting to lower down my posting on some items has given me some free time. One of the questions I asked myself is whether "gold millionaire" status will be as elite as it is now.

There are many journals, blogs, podcasts and strategy guides on how to make millions playing warcraft. From working the auction house, to crafting items. The terminology is endless and the expectation to those that want to put the extra time in is even more expansive. Those that take a few moments to ask questions and read whatever flavor of information they can obtain, find that being a warcraft millionaire is a thrill in the game all to itself.

With the introduction of the "black market" auction house, Blizzard is attempting to throw another gold sink into our gold goblin lives. A gold sink for those that aren't familiar is an attempt to take money out of the pockets of those with large amounts, usually to balance out the players so that they work on a level playing field. The Tundra Mount from Wrath was a prime example during that expansion. 20k gold was a lot of time and effort put into the game for most players. Those that had caught onto the gold goblin making game had 20k gold in no time. But others struggled to get what became a very very useful mount for raiding and questing.

As we progress farther into Mists, there will be other mounts, items and "gold sink" items thrown as the casual buyer in the quest to have a player spend their fortunes. The question is always, is it worth how much you put into your fortune to buy the item.

Good Luck and Good Hunting

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Selling for Dummies