Swords Decks as a Source of Leather Shoulders for Xmogging

  Those of you who follow me on Twitter (@EpicPennyPouch) know that I'm still around. I got bored of gold making routine quickly when I hit the gold cap and was just playing the game for a while. Then the patch 4.3 brought us the transmogrification feature and the whole new market of BoE xmogging gear evolved. Keelhaul aka Mogfather (@DEazeroth) showed us its possibilities and right now I'm full into it, xmogging my toons and selling gear to other players.

  Today I will do just a short post to share with you what I found out while making my own xmogging outfit. My rogue wears full Defias Leather set (on the second picture) but you can't get the chest anymore so I will be talking mostly about another set with a similar look.

Scouting Garb

Defias Leather set

  Scouting Garb is one of the most popular choices among rogues, and I even met a resto druid who wanted to look like a ninja (on the first picture). There is one problem with this set though - Scouting Spaulders are of common (white) quality and cannot be used for xmogging. But I have an answer for you - Cloaked Shoulderpads!

  These shoulders come from one of the inscription decks - a Swords Deck. They look exactly like those from the Scouting set but are of rare (blue) quality. With the revamp of the Darkmoon Faire low level inscription decks are no longer used for getting the DF reputation and can be bought from the AH quite cheap as well as single cards "of Swords". You need 4 cards, the Ace through 4, to complete the deck.

  Current prices for US realms:
  Swords Deck - 104g

    2 of Swords - 11g
    3 of Swords - 22g
    4 of Swords - 14g
    Ace of Swords - 14g
  Total for a deck: 61g

  If you have a scribe with a skill level 125, you can make Swords cards using 2 x Dawnstar Ink. Spell is called Strange Tarot. It may be a nice way to use those extra inks that are usually just gathering dust or are getting vendored. Of course, there will be RNG involved in this case.

  This is what I sell these shoulders for:

  Probably, you can try to get more for them, if there are none on the AH.

  The other two choices you get from the deck are cloth Darkcloth Shoulders and mail Azure Shoulderguards. The first share the model and colors with two low level dungeon drops (Batwing Mantle and Flameseer Mantle) and the second are unique but I don't sell those as there are lots of better looking mail shoulders out there.

  In conclusion I would like to make a quick overview of the other 3 low level decks and what gear you can get from them.

  Rogues Deck: Darkmoon Robe, Darkmoon Vest, Darkmoon Chain Shirt
  All of these are too common and as such are not good for flipping.

  Mages Deck: Darkmoon Necklace, Darkmoon Pendant

  These are of rare (blue) quality and in absence of heirloom necklaces they may be actually useful for leveling toons. I was selling them on my scribe for 70-100g a piece.

  Demons Deck: Darkmoon Dirk, Darkmoon Executioner, Darkmoon Magestaff

  These are of rare (blue) quality, but they don't look good enough for xmogging and most leveling toons use heirloom weapons or dungeon drops.

  And don't forget that to complete the quests, started by these low level decks, you don't have to go to the Darkmoon Faire and it doesn't have to be running, just click the deck to summon a Darkmoon Fortune Teller and turn in your quest.

  Have a nice day!

Biweekly Sales Report 06-19.06

  It has been almost two weeks since my last post. I slowed down on gold making. I am not a very disciplined person so with a lack of the next big gold-making goal I got easily distracted by other things in game. The result you can see from the numbers below. Also I was actively stockpiling materials for the coming patch and that made a significant dent in the profit too.

  Previous gold total: 1,020k

  Total sales: 262k

  Profit for 2 weeks: 93k 

  Current gold total: 1,113k

  

  You will find a few details under the cut.

One Million Gold: My Road To and From

  Last week I hit that magic number - one million gold. Am I excited? A little, but not very. There is a start to the journey but there is no finish line. The current gold cap is just a built-in limit for one character, so you can accumulate 10 mil on one realm and up to 50 mil on one WoW account plus some more in guild banks. I can't imagine anyone would ever want so much gold, even 1 million is an insane amount. And here I am, staring at the screen, at that number in the Auditor add-on window.

  My Road To

  Was it my goal to get 1 million? Yes. Why? Because it is often mentioned as a goal of other gold bloggers, though not every one of them is going in that direction.

  Now it is difficult to remember how and when I started making gold in WoW. I told my story in the very first post. You can see that my journey began already in Cataclysm. I missed all the gold making opportunities of the beginning of the expansion, such as "glyphmas". My way was steady, without big spikes in sales and income, and that is the way I prefer.

  If you look through all the posts in the blog, you will see a few weekly reports with pretty big numbers of sales and profit and a few small gold making tips. There is not much there, I agree (the only post I am proud of is the one about flipping single Darkmoon cards). A logical question to ask is: where all that numbers come from?

  What professions do I use?
  Jewelcrafting, enchanting, inscription, tailoring, alchemy. I also have herbalism and mining, but I don't farm, only pick something on my way.

  What gold making methods do I use?
  All that are available to me with the given set of professions. They are described very well in all the major gold blogs. Here is the list:

  - Jewelcrafting: cut rare gems and metagems, obsidium shuffle, elementium shuffle, high level jewelry, WotLK rare and epic gems
  - Enchanting: disenchanting for materials, 10-15 enchants that are the most profitable, enchanting pets
  - Inscription: all glyphs on one side and some on the other (my second scribe is still doing research to discover more), relics, Dust of disappearance, inks
  - Tailoring: cloth pvp gear, bags, low level vanity gear
  - Alchemy: Truegold, rare gems transmute, Primal might, Arcanite bar, some potions
  - flipping and cross-faction trade: single Darkmoon cards, pets, cloth pvp gear, relics
  - Cooking: Cata buff food

  I guess you did not see anything new in my list as these are all well-known methods. You can find many more gold tips, tricks and strategies. The most important thing I understood was that you can not cover each and every profitable market on your server. Any gold making method takes time and time is limited.

  How long did it take to reach the gold cap?
  Milestones:
    beginning of April - 400k
    beginning of May - 500k (after spending 170k on mounts)
    beginning of June - 1 mil (after spending 60k on a mount)
  It is nice to know that I can make 500k a month. Weekly reports are very useful for getting a big-picture view of all your gold-making activities and organizing them more efficiently.

  Why I had so much time to devote to gold making?
  The answer is very simple - my guild is small and is not raiding. Often there are not enough guildies online to run a heroic. I was looking for something to do alone.

  What do I do in game besides making gold?
  I do not raid. I rarely run dungeons. The last time I pvped was when Blizzard was giving 1800 honor points for a win in Tol Barad. Is there anything left? Yes, there is. Achievements. I mean those other kinds of achievements, like reputations, quests, professions and general. The most valuable to me is Mountain o'Mounts (got it on May, 27th), not to mention that I bought three TGC mounts that cost me 200k total and delayed my reaching the gold cap by two weeks. A valuable achievement, indeed.

  My Road From

  How did I reward myself for reaching 1 mil gold mark?
  Probably, you will laugh at me. I bought 310% flying for my main. I can spend huge amounts of gold on rare mounts or stockpiling materials, but tend to delay the purchase of those things that I can buy in game at any time.

  Where am I going to do now, when the goal is reached?
  I have not decided yet. This week I continued my daily routine and made more gold. I am doing it "on autopilot", but I plan to change the way I spend time in game. Here is the list of options that I am considering:
  - to post auctions less frequently (once a day or every other day)
  - to drop some markets completely
  - to make a list of 50/100 best-selling items across all the professions and sell only those

  What do I plan to do with the time that will be freed?
  Anything that I don't do now: heroics, battlegrounds, twinking, dual boxing and, of course, all kinds of experiments in gold making.

  Have a nice day!

  P.S. My post looks much like a Warcraft Econ interview, but I did not do it on purpose. I am still thinking if I should submit my interview there. 

Weekly Sales Report 30.05-05.06

  I will make just a quick overview of what has sold last week.


  Previous gold total: 886k

  Total sales: 209k

  Weekly profit: 134k 

  Current gold total: 1,020k

  For details go under the cut.

Selling Low Level Crafted Items: Tailoring

  Tailoring is not the best profession for gold making. It is a fact. Spellthreads, high level gear and all kinds of bags are the major markets where competition is strong on most servers. Trying to get their share of the big pie, many tailors forget about the low level items they can craft. It seems strange to me, as tailoring offers some of the most popular vanity gear. One of the reasons for this may be that many of those patterns can not be learned from the trainer but are sold in limited supply all over Azeroth. 

  This is the list of what I craft and sell (numbers in brackets mean the level of tailoring skill needed to make the item, then comes the information about where you can find the pattern):

  1. Vanity gear often is bought for bank alts:

    Black swashbuckler's shirt (200) - Narkk, Booty Bay, limited supply

    Haliscan pantaloons (245) - Haughty Modiste, Gatgetzan, Tanaris, unlimited supply

    Haliscan jacket (250) - same as above

    Tuxedo pants (245) - Oufitter Eric (A), Ironforge or Millie Gregorian (H), Undercity, limited supply

    Tuxedo jacket (250) - same as above

    

  2. Low level gear:

    Spidersilk boots (125) - trainer

    Spidersilk drape (125) - trainer; this does not sell often since the introduction of heirloom cloaks

    Icy cloak (200) - Ghok'kah (H), Dustwallow Marsh.*

    White bandit mask (215) - random drop from the Old world mobs.

    I used to sell Dreamweave gloves, circlet and vest, but all these patterns require Wildvine, which is now rare and expensive.

* Note: It seems after the Shattering the Pattern: Icy Cloak can be bought only by Horde players, as the Alliance vendor was located in Southshore that is now... Ruins of Southshore. I should check the rest of his patterns too and try selling them cross-faction.  

  This list is not exhaustive. It includes only items that are selling well for me. While writing the post I found a few more things (Dress shoes and all kinds of shirts, for example) to try crafting and listing on the AH. I will tell you about it in my next weekly report and update the list if necessary.

  Have a nice day!