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With the release of the Heirloom chestpiece and changes to mount level requirements, I have since a huge increase of people leveling alts. With this increase has come a very profitable market for lower level enchants. Heirloom items are considered item lvl 1, which means that the only enchants available are the vanilla wow, no requirement enchants.
Currently there are two pieces that can be enchanted. Chest, Weapon. I have made a lot of money off of enchanting the obvious. This week I am going to see if i can expand further into this market by picking up some of the lucrative enchants that I have overlooked.
The enchants that have been selling for me like candy are: Crusader, Fiery Weapon and Major Health. The mats for these are quite easy to pick up, and the formulas are often available in the auction house.
There are some obvious enchants that I could pick up that should also be in high demand. In this section, we will be looking at the possible enchants, their material costs and potential profit, and where to get the formulas.
Starting with the chest enchants, there are really only 3 possibilities. They Are:
Major Mana (+100 mana), Major Health(+100 hp) and Greater Stats (+4 stats). As you can see, each of the material costs for these enchants are low.
The materials for the items below require the following:
Illusion Dust: On spinebreaker you can frequently buy illusion dust from 1-2g. Once I write down my disenchanting guide, you will probably have plenty from disenchanting item level 51-55 (2g) and 56-60 greens (5g). I typical classify the value of an item in two categories. The market price and my sale price. In this case, i put illusion dust up on the AH for 2.99g each, when the market runs dry, they always sell at this price. The market value, i use for when disenchanting or buying, is 1.5g. In the case, i value item level 51-55 armor greens at 2g because they disenchant into and average of 1.5 illusion dust. When i create enchanting scrolls, i use my market value to determine how much it will cost me to make a particular scroll. After i determine the cost, i then tack on what i feel would be a good profit margin. The reason i don't use my sale price to determine the cost of the scroll, is I try not to "double-dip" or tack on profit from dust and then profit from scroll. This usually inflates the price too high for buyers, so i have too options; 1) Use my sale price of 2.99g per dust and charge the total materials (my price) cost for the scroll, or 2) use the Market Price for the materials used in the scroll and then tack on a profit, either will work just fine as both will gain significant profit from what you paid for the original mats.
Small Brilliant Shard: Recently with the patch 3.1 enchanting changes, these have sky-rocketed. I used to buy these for as low as 10-25 silver. Now, i frequently buy them all up at 2-3g each. These are used in the very popular heirloom enchant: Major Health. The market value i use for these is 2.5g , my sales price is 5-6g.
Large Brilliant Shard: These have also sky-rocketed post 3.1. The market value i use for these is 3 gold. A lot of the time, i can find these as little as 1g each do to the excessive number of stratthome farmers. I sell these for 5-6g. You will need a lot of these for weapon enchants as well.
Armor Vellum: These are very easy to come by. Many scribes who are powerleveling inscription make loads of these. Try to buy these up whenever they are cheap on the AH. I have found these for as little as 1g per stack of 20. This is such an insignificant cost, that i don't even add it into the cost to produce the chest enchants.
Now lets look at the chests enchants we will be enchanting.
Major Mana requires 8 illusion dust. I "could" make 8*2.99g= 24g, from selling the dust by itself on the ah. My market value puts this enchant at 8*1.5= 12g. It is probably not worth your listing time to sell this at anything lower than 30g. 29.99g is what i sell this enchant for. Although the least popular of the chest enchants, i have still managed to sell a dozen or so at this price. If you are low on funds, start out making 5 of these, they have no deposit fee, so there is very little risk. Eventually they will sell. The formula is found in Eastern PL from scarlet enchanters.
Major Health (Note: This enchant requires lvl 30 to function but can still be used on heirloom items.) requires 2 Small Brilliant Shards. I could make 2*6=12g from selling the shards. Market price of 2.5*2=5g makes this a very cheap enchant. Using my no listing under 30g rule, 30g is a significant profit. This is a very popular heirloom enchant. If no one else in your market is creating these, you could easily sell these for 40-50g. Major Health can be purchased by Qia in winterspring. I have sold around 50 of these since i started making these.
Superior Health Could be a great alternative to the lvl 30 requirement of Major health. Sup Health costs 6 vision dust and is trainable by the enchanting trainers.
Greater Stats: Requires 6 illusion dust and 2 Large Brilliant Shards = 15g market value or 30g sales price. Currently I do not have the formula to make these, due to the fact that it is a world drop and extremely rare. Sealed Scroll Case from ZA can contain this, although getting the correct vendor to spawn can be difficult. Your best bet is to continuously search the AH for it and hope it appears. This is a very popular enchant. Due to its rarity, i would sell the scrolls for 99g.
As you can see, Heirloom enchants can be a considerable boost to your daily AH income. Tomorrow we will analyze the weapon enchants available for heirloom items.
Click Here to Read More..
Wednesday, August 19, 2009
Friday, August 14, 2009
Tip of the Day: Primal Might
At the end of The Burning Crusade we saw players dump their current stockpiles of BC mats in a frantic effort to sell before prices bottomed out. Primal_Mights were one of these. I didn't think much about stockpiling Primal Mights, in fact, i think i was actually part of this group that dumped them, thinking that these would become substantially less after the release of WotLK. I did, however, end up stockpiling tons of Primals which ended up making me a bit of a fortune months later after WotlK when the market had run out of many of these due to players powering their engineering. My mistake of dumping my primal mights probably cost me a good chunk of change. Valued at 100g during much of BC, i think i ended up dumping them for 35-45g. Now in WotLK they are back up to their 100g mark due to supply meets demand. This is a great example of how to shrug losses and go back to making profit. I lost a lot of money on primal mights, yet here I am investing in them again.
A lot of people cannot stomach losses. You saw that during the 2007-2009 stock market crash. Many dumped their stocks at the worst possible time, the bottom. I am not suggesting to sit on stocks that are falling in price. A loss is a loss. A potential reinvesting into a stock that would either maintain value or gain value would be a better choice, not just giving up and say "to hell with stocks."
What i am saying, is that many of these people who dumped their stocks after the latest resession, chose not to re-invest a few months later at one of best times in our stock market history. Some stocks like Palm Inc (the gadget company) have risen 10x their bottom price of 6-10 months ago. The inability of investors to stomach losses separates the average from the pro. This is an essential attribute you will need to posses to be an AH guru. If you cannot stomache massive losses, (I bet horribly wrong on void crystals post BC for example) then the AH is not for you. However, this is another post for another day.
Focusing back on Primal_Mights, on my server there aren't many suppliers of these. Even though the demand may not be very high (they are only used in one critical recipe), the demand is currently greater than the supply. I started making these again a few months ago when my girlfriend was powering her enchanting on her shaman. She noticed their were none in the AH (there were also no adamantite rods either, both used in making the runed adamantite rod). Fortunate for me, I already had two maxed alchemists. One was elixir specialist and the other was potion spec. Since i rarely use my elixir spec, (my server the flasks sell for less then the mats required to make them.... again the mentality of the average player confuses me, another post for another day) I decided to drop elixir and switch to transmute. I believe the proc rate for transmute is around 10%, so it was a substantial profit to switch. I began making these using the following prices for each material used to create the Primal Mights.
Primal Air 20g , Primal Fire 15g, Primal Water 10g, Primal Mana 10g, Primal Earth 2g = 57g
I decided at aiming for a 20g profit per item and settling at 79g 99s ( you should always put 9.99 instead of 10, look at the price of gas next time you are at the pump.
Within a week, my initial stock of 10 had sold at my first price. Since then i have toyed with increasing prices each time a lot of 5 or so sell to eventually come to the price where the consumer does not become unwilling to pay. I am currently selling them at 129.99g, which would have been a 70g profit if prices of the primals would have stayed the same. Currently each primal has gone up roughly 25-50%, airs being the most expensive at 30g. I still pull in 40-50g per Primal Might and sell 5-10 per week, which makes them a great addition to my WoW income.
Now, as with all my posts, I will attempt to analyze why these items perform well. As i mentioned before, the old suppliers of primal mights quit making them. They moved on to more popular transmutes that are used more frequently. The problem with this mentality is they aren't putting into consideration the supply vs demand. 1000 alchemists making skyflare diamonds might have a supply/demand curve at a less value than 3 alchemists making primal mights. The natural competetion in selling skyflare diamonds might bring down their profit margine extremely low, like 5%. Even if you were to sell 100 diamonds at 5g profit each that would = 500g - AH fees. Whereas the primal might supplier could sell 10 primal mights at a 50g profit and make the same profit as the diamond provider.
Secondly, the demand for primal mights is actually quit high. This is because every enchanter who wants to max enchanting must at least use 1 primal might in doing so by creating a Runed Adamantite Rod. Enchanting, being one of the most popular professions, will be pursued by a vast amount of players, making the demand for primal mights disproportionately high compared to the amount of alchemists supplying them. These are the exact deals you will need to find to be an Auction House Guru.
Adamantite Rod could be another potential money maker, unfortunately through my experience I have found the mats and ability to have this crafted much easier than Primal Might. This probably explains why my Primal Mights sell on much higher volumes than my rods do. It would be interesting to know where my primal mights were used. I wonder how many of them were actually used to make the lvl 70 gear for novelty players or those who are trying to level their 70 alts a little faster. Click Here to Read More..
A lot of people cannot stomach losses. You saw that during the 2007-2009 stock market crash. Many dumped their stocks at the worst possible time, the bottom. I am not suggesting to sit on stocks that are falling in price. A loss is a loss. A potential reinvesting into a stock that would either maintain value or gain value would be a better choice, not just giving up and say "to hell with stocks."
What i am saying, is that many of these people who dumped their stocks after the latest resession, chose not to re-invest a few months later at one of best times in our stock market history. Some stocks like Palm Inc (the gadget company) have risen 10x their bottom price of 6-10 months ago. The inability of investors to stomach losses separates the average from the pro. This is an essential attribute you will need to posses to be an AH guru. If you cannot stomache massive losses, (I bet horribly wrong on void crystals post BC for example) then the AH is not for you. However, this is another post for another day.
Focusing back on Primal_Mights, on my server there aren't many suppliers of these. Even though the demand may not be very high (they are only used in one critical recipe), the demand is currently greater than the supply. I started making these again a few months ago when my girlfriend was powering her enchanting on her shaman. She noticed their were none in the AH (there were also no adamantite rods either, both used in making the runed adamantite rod). Fortunate for me, I already had two maxed alchemists. One was elixir specialist and the other was potion spec. Since i rarely use my elixir spec, (my server the flasks sell for less then the mats required to make them.... again the mentality of the average player confuses me, another post for another day) I decided to drop elixir and switch to transmute. I believe the proc rate for transmute is around 10%, so it was a substantial profit to switch. I began making these using the following prices for each material used to create the Primal Mights.
Primal Air 20g , Primal Fire 15g, Primal Water 10g, Primal Mana 10g, Primal Earth 2g = 57g
I decided at aiming for a 20g profit per item and settling at 79g 99s ( you should always put 9.99 instead of 10, look at the price of gas next time you are at the pump.
Within a week, my initial stock of 10 had sold at my first price. Since then i have toyed with increasing prices each time a lot of 5 or so sell to eventually come to the price where the consumer does not become unwilling to pay. I am currently selling them at 129.99g, which would have been a 70g profit if prices of the primals would have stayed the same. Currently each primal has gone up roughly 25-50%, airs being the most expensive at 30g. I still pull in 40-50g per Primal Might and sell 5-10 per week, which makes them a great addition to my WoW income.
Now, as with all my posts, I will attempt to analyze why these items perform well. As i mentioned before, the old suppliers of primal mights quit making them. They moved on to more popular transmutes that are used more frequently. The problem with this mentality is they aren't putting into consideration the supply vs demand. 1000 alchemists making skyflare diamonds might have a supply/demand curve at a less value than 3 alchemists making primal mights. The natural competetion in selling skyflare diamonds might bring down their profit margine extremely low, like 5%. Even if you were to sell 100 diamonds at 5g profit each that would = 500g - AH fees. Whereas the primal might supplier could sell 10 primal mights at a 50g profit and make the same profit as the diamond provider.
Secondly, the demand for primal mights is actually quit high. This is because every enchanter who wants to max enchanting must at least use 1 primal might in doing so by creating a Runed Adamantite Rod. Enchanting, being one of the most popular professions, will be pursued by a vast amount of players, making the demand for primal mights disproportionately high compared to the amount of alchemists supplying them. These are the exact deals you will need to find to be an Auction House Guru.
Adamantite Rod could be another potential money maker, unfortunately through my experience I have found the mats and ability to have this crafted much easier than Primal Might. This probably explains why my Primal Mights sell on much higher volumes than my rods do. It would be interesting to know where my primal mights were used. I wonder how many of them were actually used to make the lvl 70 gear for novelty players or those who are trying to level their 70 alts a little faster. Click Here to Read More..
Introduction:
I recently decided to start a blog about my success in making vast ammounts of World of Warcraft gold on the US server Spinebreaker Alliance side. There are countless blogs and websites that share numerous info on making gold in WoW. What i hope to achieve is a unique approach to determining new strategies and analysis of how to optimize my readers' and my own gold making experience. Spinebreaker Alliance is a tough market. To consistantly make any decent amount of gold in a low pop / dying market, you have to know how to adapt. In a way, I am glad that I am stuck on such a market. True, i will never see those massive volumes of auction sales others have blogged and bragged about, but i will never experience a more challenging and thought provoking experience then trying to make 1 million gold on a weak market.
Out of everything WoW has to offer, i find making gold the most challenging and rewarding activity. When arena season 2 came out in Burning Crusades, I had banked the max amount of arena points and honor allowed and immediately purchased my new Season 2 gear. At the time, my focus was completely on PvP and Arena. I loved it, and spent nearly all my WoW play time perfecting it. As always with new content, the prices of gems and enchants skyrocketed that week. I could not afford the appropriate gems and enchants. After struggling for a week or so using farming strategies I found on the web that were now much too popular to make any decent amount of gold (remember skaald for primal fires?), I decided I would try my hand at the auction house. I had always used the auction house and would say that I was already well ahead of the average player as far as knowing the laws of supply meets demand and how to effectively work with them, but I knew that i wasn't nearly as skilled as I needed to be to maximize my auction house revenue. After tinkering with the auction house those few weeks, i became enchanted by the idea of becomming an Auction House Guru. That very month, the first player from Europe achieved the gold cap. After reading about his success my focus began to change from PvP/Arena to strictly the auction house.
In this blog I will tell my story of how I have altered my Auction House strategies from novice to pro through the course of BC and WotLK. Through trial and error I have seen both massive gains and losses. Be assured, I will blog about both. From learning and reflecting on both losses and gains, it has helped me refine my skills to making mass amounts of gold. In this guide I will show you the necessary skills and tools you will need to becoming an Auction House Guru. You will also be able to follow me and my quest for 1 million gold before the next expac.
On the toolbar to the left, i will categorize all of my blogs to the appopriate function. In Wow, there are four main ways to make gold. They are:
Questing: the ammount of gold earned from completing NPC quests.
Farming:Killing mass amounts of mobs for their loot, or mining/herbing/skinning/fishing.
Crafting: Using the available professions to create items used by players.
Reselling: Buying items from players through the auction house or other methods to be sold later at a profit.
Personally, I prefer to use a combination of Crafting and Reselling to make my gold. Although farming and questing can be VERY lucritive (i know of places that can easily make 300-500g per hour), you can never reach the necessary volume of gold (100k+)by strictly farming or questing. The Auction House connects you with thousands of potential buyers. These buyers are often impulsive, impatient, or just lazy and naive, creating a very rewarding atmosphere to making mass ammounts of gold.
Although Crafting and Reselling are my personal favorites, I will not completely ignore farming and Questing, as they can become important parts of your WoW income.
To navigate this page, please first read the Getting Started posts. There are essentials that will need to be completed before you can start dreaming of rolling in thousands upon thousands of gold. These essentials include: Necessary user interface, How to start and effective banking system, Crafting Essentials and Understanding how to make the most using the Auction House.
Lastly, I will be posting a lot of my opinions and views concerning philosophy, politics, culture and random thoughts and rants. Often these will have direct relation to WoW in general and the mindset of the average WoW player. To make the most gold, you have to get into the mind of your potential buyer. A lot of which makes no sense (like why some gems that are totally useless or subpar sell like candy, and others that are much better don't) . A huge part of making money in WoW is understanding the behavior of the typical WoW player. Much of this blog will be about Behavioral Science and Theory, as which am pursuing as a real life career. Wow is the perfect simulation for real world themes, this is a big part of why i enjoy toying with the WoW economy.
I hope you enjoy my blog. Feel free to comment, critisize, or ask me questions! Your input is greatly appreciated and encouraged.
Click Here to Read More..
Out of everything WoW has to offer, i find making gold the most challenging and rewarding activity. When arena season 2 came out in Burning Crusades, I had banked the max amount of arena points and honor allowed and immediately purchased my new Season 2 gear. At the time, my focus was completely on PvP and Arena. I loved it, and spent nearly all my WoW play time perfecting it. As always with new content, the prices of gems and enchants skyrocketed that week. I could not afford the appropriate gems and enchants. After struggling for a week or so using farming strategies I found on the web that were now much too popular to make any decent amount of gold (remember skaald for primal fires?), I decided I would try my hand at the auction house. I had always used the auction house and would say that I was already well ahead of the average player as far as knowing the laws of supply meets demand and how to effectively work with them, but I knew that i wasn't nearly as skilled as I needed to be to maximize my auction house revenue. After tinkering with the auction house those few weeks, i became enchanted by the idea of becomming an Auction House Guru. That very month, the first player from Europe achieved the gold cap. After reading about his success my focus began to change from PvP/Arena to strictly the auction house.
In this blog I will tell my story of how I have altered my Auction House strategies from novice to pro through the course of BC and WotLK. Through trial and error I have seen both massive gains and losses. Be assured, I will blog about both. From learning and reflecting on both losses and gains, it has helped me refine my skills to making mass amounts of gold. In this guide I will show you the necessary skills and tools you will need to becoming an Auction House Guru. You will also be able to follow me and my quest for 1 million gold before the next expac.
On the toolbar to the left, i will categorize all of my blogs to the appopriate function. In Wow, there are four main ways to make gold. They are:
Questing: the ammount of gold earned from completing NPC quests.
Farming:Killing mass amounts of mobs for their loot, or mining/herbing/skinning/fishing.
Crafting: Using the available professions to create items used by players.
Reselling: Buying items from players through the auction house or other methods to be sold later at a profit.
Personally, I prefer to use a combination of Crafting and Reselling to make my gold. Although farming and questing can be VERY lucritive (i know of places that can easily make 300-500g per hour), you can never reach the necessary volume of gold (100k+)by strictly farming or questing. The Auction House connects you with thousands of potential buyers. These buyers are often impulsive, impatient, or just lazy and naive, creating a very rewarding atmosphere to making mass ammounts of gold.
Although Crafting and Reselling are my personal favorites, I will not completely ignore farming and Questing, as they can become important parts of your WoW income.
To navigate this page, please first read the Getting Started posts. There are essentials that will need to be completed before you can start dreaming of rolling in thousands upon thousands of gold. These essentials include: Necessary user interface, How to start and effective banking system, Crafting Essentials and Understanding how to make the most using the Auction House.
Lastly, I will be posting a lot of my opinions and views concerning philosophy, politics, culture and random thoughts and rants. Often these will have direct relation to WoW in general and the mindset of the average WoW player. To make the most gold, you have to get into the mind of your potential buyer. A lot of which makes no sense (like why some gems that are totally useless or subpar sell like candy, and others that are much better don't) . A huge part of making money in WoW is understanding the behavior of the typical WoW player. Much of this blog will be about Behavioral Science and Theory, as which am pursuing as a real life career. Wow is the perfect simulation for real world themes, this is a big part of why i enjoy toying with the WoW economy.
I hope you enjoy my blog. Feel free to comment, critisize, or ask me questions! Your input is greatly appreciated and encouraged.
Click Here to Read More..
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