Back to Basics : What to Sell

Back to Basics : What to sell

Determining what to sell for someone new to the Auction House can be quite daunting. Crafting something that never gets sold can be demoralizing. I tried my hand in the Mogging market for a while with mixed results, and can vouch for the fact that it’s a feast one week, and a famine the next, not really my preference.

The Consortium Project focuses on items that sell fast and regularly, this blog will primarily be from that perspective. There is nothing better than going to the mail box and finding 50-100 sales. When I had a holiday recently, Humph (one of the partners whose focus is glyphs) took over my part of the business temporarily. He couldn’t believe the amount of money we took from non glyph items. The secret is that we’re diversified, and sell the most profitable items from a range of professions. By combining our professions we get economies of scale which reduce our crafting costs, thus maximising profit.

 I’m going to assume that you have Jewelcrafting (JC) at max level but this process works for most other professions too.

What Gem cuts are popular? There are so many different cuts, what sells, what are lemons?

Even though I play a variety of Toons, I still don’t know the secondary stat preference, for most classes. i.e. Enhanced Shammy they want Agi as their prime stat, but what’s the best secondary stat?, Haste, Mastery or Crit?  In MoP hunters now need Expertise, do Enhanced Shammys need that too?

I gave up trying to memorize all the different combinations and requirements of each class/spec.

There are 2 Methods to determining what to sell.

Method 1

I turn to WoW Popular which is updated after each Patch.

What we want here is to make a list of what’s in vogue for each Class/Spec. Pick Gems from the top menu then select the Class/Spec you want to review. In the below case I’ve selected DK -> Blood

 

Anything with less than a Popularity of 2 stars I would ignore, but make sure you note the Meta Gem just in case it’s got less than 2 stars. Now you can cut n paste this into Excel/Open Office or use a pencil n paper to make a list. We do the same for each Class/Spec. When you have finished this click PVP under Playstyle on the left panel and for each Class/Spec repeat the above process and add their PVP preference to our list.

What you’ll find is that a lot of Gem cuts appear twice or more, sometimes with Popularity of 5 stars other times with 4,3 or 2.

In Excel sort the list by Name then Popularity so you have all the cuts in Alphabetical Order with most popular cuts at the top, then descending in order. Now all you need do is delete the duplicates with less popularity.

If you’re not familiar with Excel then you can look forward to a long process of coming up with a single list via pencil n paper.

One thing to remember is that WoW Popular is a data mining site which means it will take a bit of time to update come MoP, as players level at different speeds. One could surmise that the most hardcode players will be the first to level to 90, and gear their toons, ready for raiding, therefore the data will be accurate from the start, but that is purely speculation.

Method 2

This method focuses on Wowuction

The Gold Queen did a great video guide to this site and I see no reason to reproduce her work.

Suffice to say goto Professions -> Jewelcrafting then sort by Sold per Day and you have a list of popular cuts. Nowhere near as exhaustive as method 1, but an accurate list none the less.

In the next thrilling instalment of Back to basics we’ll go through how to setup TSM.

 

 

 

 

Wow-Pro MoP Ready

Wow-Pro MoP Ready

I’ve had beta access to Mist of Pandaria for some time but have only dabbled in it from time to time. My son has played the beta far more than me and is really looking forward to Poki-wow, but that’s a whole other story, today I want to share my love for a particular addon.

When I first logged into the beta Macros didn’t work, so for me that made the whole experience a bit tedious. Addons at that time weren’t enabled either, so I was reliant on the ingame quest helper, which even with an upgrade, left a bad taste in my mouth.

Since my first dabble in MoP beta, Blizz have enabled the use of addons and macros ingame, thus permitting Authors of Addons to make the necessary changes to make them MoP ready.

 Last week I tried installing wow-pro on the beta with no joy, Sunday 16th I think, they made a version available with MoP quests enabled (v2.3.1A). I installed it and took it for a test drive on the beta last night.

The other addon that’s necessary to make this addon work is TomTom which provides a directional arrow to the relevant quest ingame. I usually drag the arrow to the top of my screen so it’s out of the way but still easily visable.

I completed about 60 quests in the beta with no dramas on my DK. The great thing about this addon is that it auto accepts and hands in quests when you have selected the correct quest giver.

It also gives you a summary box of what you have to do to complete the current quest and tracks how many “Boars hearts” for example, that you have in your inventory towards the total required.

BTW Blizz you really need to do something about the number of heartless boars running around Azeroth! I remember killing 20 Boars to collect 8 Hearts once……

I’m a happy camper now that I know this addon is MoP ready and will use it to great advantage when levelling the “Consortium Project” toons to bring hell and cause disdain in my fellow AH Goblins. Big shoutouts to all the contributors at wow-pro for all your hard work.

Back to basics

Where to begin...

With Mists of Pandaria (MoP) soon to be available, I’m going to start a short series of guides as to how to get from no professions, to choosing the items to sell to maximise profit.

The recommendation below is not from the perspective of a hardcore raider, but more to achieve synergy in gold making.

From the start work towards finding a level 13+ (Preferably 25) guild to join as you level your character. Keep an eye on trade chat for any guild advertising. The idea behind this is you will get a bonus to experience gain as you level (Fast Track rank 2 Guild lvl 5) plus another perk (WorkingOvertime Guild lvl 13) and (Bountiful Bags, Guild lvl 22) which will assist you in your profession levelling.

When levelling a toon I always use the free ingame addon from http://wow-pro.com/. This addon is so good I can’t give the authors enough credit.

What Professions to take?

Some people will tell you to level your professions as you level your character, I’ve found this to be more time consuming then doing it once you hit 85, with the possible exception of Gathering professions (Mining, Herbing, Skinning).

Starting out I would recommend Mining and Jewelcrafting (JC) to any new players.

Ore is required by 4 professions while Herbs are only required by 2, so even if you just farm ore you will find a bigger market in Ore. That’s not to say you’ll make more gold in ore, just that there’s more liquidity. The main reason to take JC is that Gems have a very high turnover and with gear being upgraded regularly, customers keep coming back.  JC is also part of the Shuffle which feeds Enchanting. If you want to know how the Shuffle works then the diagram in the link below, will break it down. Having the professions associated with the shuffle is the foundation to the “Consortium Project”

http://stormspire.net/addons-ui-customization/1563-consortium-cataclysm-shuffling-spreadsheet-v4-5-a.html

These sites are a great resource for anybody wishing to level/change professions. They give you a detailed list of materials required to level any profession and what items to craft to quickly max  it.

http://www.wow-professions.com/ or http://www.warcraftprofessional.com/

Once you hit 85 and have levelled your Mining & JC to 525, then I suggest you either drop mining for enchanting or preferably level it on another toon. The synergy between Mining, JC and Enchanting is “Golden”.

After this, on another toon I would take Blacksmithing.  Alchemy is also a good choice because you can transmute uncommon gems into Rare Gems but it requires herbs which you’d have to purchase off the AH. It’s preferable to make friends with a Guildy who has Alchemy (Transmutation Master) as a profession and see if they’d be willing to craft Rare Gems for you for free/small fee, if not go outside your guild.

So to break it down, 2 toons with the following professions.  

Toon A - Mining & JC

Toon B - Enchanting & Blacksmithting.

Now you are ready to make some serious gold.

384 DK Tank LF Heroic Dragonsoul full clear

Undergeared but experienced

I transferred my DK from Horde to alliance this week, I forgot how undergeared she was. Ilvl 383 but the Tank set was pretty good but for the Trinkets. I purchased a JP cloak (397) and I was good to go. Fortunately my Raid Leader is flexible and didn’t mind me off tanking so in I went to Heroic Dragonsoul having never stepped into anything past LFR on it.

The crazy thing is I didn’t have a problem. I died when Morchok was around 3% Health but by the time his twin made it to the other side, Morchok was a Corpse. Looky Looky  Indomitable Pride drops yay, the other DK tank already had it.

I went DPS for the next 3 fights. This is where I was carried. My DPS gear really sux, but I was able to pull 25k DPS which I thought was ok considering. We 1 shotted all three.

We had a few wipes on Ultraxion, 1 because I didn’t have DBM setup correctly on this toon and was missing the Fading Light taunts…..my bad.

The Loot Ship was a cakewalk, again I off tanked. We had a few wipes on Spine, but eventually got through with me dying to blood damage on the last platform, but in the Corruption phase, so DPS took that out.

Back to DPS for Madness, again a cakewalk, Blizz finally fixed the adds on the last platform so it was sweet. Souldrinker for me, woohoo.

I think a lot of my survival had to do with the excellent healz our group has, but even so as an undergeared Tank, knowing when to blow cooldowns, helps a shitload.

 

Heroic Dragonsoul + Mount

Heroic Dragonsoul + Mount

Last week our 10 man team got Heroic Dragon Soul down and I was the lucky mount recipient.

I have been raiding on my Druid as a Tank this expansion and I have had a blast, until patch 5.04 hit. WTF have Blizz done to Druid Tanks. I’m sorry to say but I won’t be playing my Druid in MoP.  Having to refresh Savage Defence every 6-9 secs is idiotic and a huge backwards step. I easily was able to mitigate the damage from Impale on Madness of DW until this patch, now I have to blow CD’s all over the place, just to survive, it’s total crap. I ended up speccing as Boomkin for the fight as our OT DK single tanked the whole fight, ffs not happy.

So now that I’ve vented I can say that my Horde DK will soon be joining the Alliance as my main for MoP.

At last review I had about 2.4 million gold across my toons so I decided to spend some. I purchased a Spectral Tiger Mount for 350k which was probably Duped, but I bought it from a fellow AH Goblin who I knew pretty well, so I was confident there would be no drama in the transaction.

I normally would not purchase these sorts of items but since they’ve became account bound it’s now something all my toons can enjoy and easier to justify. The only other mount that I really want is Ashes of Alar. Maybe in Mop I’ll be able to solo it or at worst keep an eye on the Blackmarket AH but when that goes up I could see someone bidding 999999.99 gold for it.

How to make 600k gold per month

aka the Consortium Project.

Wow! times flies when you’re on holidays. Lot’s has happened in the last month. Took the family on a Cruise through the South Pacific which was fantastic and I highly recommend them to people with kids….

Back in July I setup a Project to see what a group of like-minded Goblins could accomplish on the AH.

The idea is to have all the major consumables covered on the AH and watched as much as possible during the day and evening. I’m calling this Project “Consortium”. My best friend in game, his wife and myself are the 3 members of the guild and are enjoying rich rewards.

We’re talking Gems, Enchants, Belt Buckles, Leatherworking Leg Enchants, Tailoring Leg Enchants, and Glyphs. Anything that moves fast and is easily sold.

Our first month we made (July) 600,000 gold profit the second month with me away half the month, we made (Aug) 500,000 gold profit. This month (Sept) has slowed down due to MoP’s imminent release I’m guessing, but we’ll still make good gold.

 

The reason I titles this post how I did is becuase Glyph sales have been so pathetic it's hardly worth the effort. The 600k gold was brought in by 1 player. I would estimate that about 20k max could be attributed to Glyphs. Patch 5.0.4 has seen the glyph market become a bit more viable .

 

The Consortium Project ideology

The idea is to have a member post auctions during the day while gathering mats to keep costs down. At night the other 2 members keep their markets topped off and replenish stock levels.

Gathering has not been really necessary other than for Dragonscales as they are pretty expensive. Ore is cheap as to are herbs currently. Ore is shuffled or turned into Stormfoged Shoulders for DE and Belt Buckles. Herbs are milled for glyphs and  used to craft Inferno Rubys.

The great thing is the synergy between us, and I can’t wait till MoP to put this into full swing now that Scribes can make the shoulder enchants. Together we have the following professions covered.

Mining x2

Herbs x2

Scribes x3

Enchanters x3

Alchemists x2

Tailors x2

JC x3

LW x 1

BS x 1