Hall of Fame: Hulan of Moonglade-EU
The Warcraft Econ Hall of Fame is a column featuring the few elite players that have hit the World of Warcraft gold cap of 214,748 gold 36 silver 46 copper. We have with us, Seata of Hulan of Moonglade-EU, who will be sharing their stories with us today.
Please tell us a little about yourself and your gaming experience.
My main is Hulan on Moonglade-EU. I started playing WoW back in April 2005. I initially rolled a hunter on a PvE server and then once whe was 60 I levelled a mage. In 2006, looking for something a bit different I rolled the 1st Hulan on an RP server. Orginally she was a hunter too but I re-rolled her after the release of The Burning Crusade as I didn’t want to take 2 hunters to level 70. She was re-incarnated as a priest and I moved my PvE characters to Moonglade as well. I have a severe case of altitis and now have a hunter, a mage, a priest, a druid, a death knight and a paladin at level 80 and a warrior who is curently sitting at level 73.
Do you raid or PvP most? Both? How do you enjoy the game?
My early experieces of raiding weren’t positive and put me off for a long time. As I work shifts it’s difficult to raid regularly but the guild I’m in tries to raid at least once a week. We are a small casual guild, mostly older people and several of us work odd hours so regular raiding is almost impossible to organise. When we do raid though we usually have a fun night and even on wipe nights the mood is good-humoured. I’ve done a little PvP but got bored with it quite quickly. The lack of raiding is probably why I’ve levelled so many alts. I’m almost out of character slots now (I’m saving one for when Cataclysm hits!)
Why did you choose to collect this amount of gold?
The simple answer is that I didn’t. I started out in October 2009 with 7,000 gold seed money and the gold cap seemed completely unattainable but I needed a new challenge and making money on the Auction House was something I’d never done seriously. Having so many alts I was pretty self-sufficient and rarely used the AH apart from mad farming stints occasionally when I needed yet another epic flyer. When patch 3.3 hit I had been selling for around 2 months and had 40,000 in my guild bank. In the space of a week I had tripled that and all of a sudden hitting the cap was a possibility. In the few weeks following the patch the price of raw materials was fairly prohibitive but I continued to watch the markets and in the last month or so things have got back to normal and hitting the gold cap just seems to have happened on its own with no extra effort on my part.
How did you go about getting to the 214k? Did you use professions? Auction House arbitrage? Any creative ideas?
I have used professions. I started with selling glyphs then added in eternal belt buckles, flasks and leg armours/armour kits. I also have 2 alchemists, 2 miners and 2 tailors and use their cooldowns every time they are available so also sell epic gems, titansteel bars and specialist cloth regularly.
How did you learn to do it?
There is a lot of information out there if you are prepared to look for it. Gold-making blogs are a good source of practical tips on how to cost things, when to buy and sell, which addons to use etc. I also spent a lot of time at the Just My Two Copper forum and did research on Elitist Jerks when trying to decide which glyphs to sell. Some of it was trial and error, thankfully with not many errors. Markets can vary a lot from server to server but the principles are the same, pick a market and research it thoroughly; test the waters and either expand or withdraw depending on your results.
What addons, if any, do you use to help you make gold?
For the Auction House I use Auctionator and QA2. I also use Postal to make sending and receiving mail easier and faster. For crafting I use ATSW and have also found Altaholic to be a big help.
Are you still going for more gold, like 1 million? If so, do you have a new goal? Are you close?
I will continue to sell glyphs but will probably wind down my other markets. I still have one alt to get to level 80 and several level 80 alts who haven’t touched any of the higher level zones yet. I will still be making money but not on the same scale and have no other financial goals…at the moment. At the start my aim was mainly to see if I could do it and to have a bit of a financial cushion going into the new expansion.
Do many people know you have this amount of gold?
Most of my friends and guild mates know. My children, who also play WoW, know too. My son keeps asking if he can join my guild!
Did you spend your gold on fun things? What have you bought? What things would you like to buy?
I spent a fair bit of it on vanity pets for my paladin so that she could get the 75-pet achievement. My biggest spend was a Hyacinth Macaw that was being sold in the trade channel for 11,000 gold. I also splashed out a fair bit on gear for her when she spec’d Holy. I’ve thought about getting the big mammoth but can’t decide which of my characters to give it too and am too mean to buy them all one each so they will probably spend the rest of their WoW careers trudging to the nearest vendor while I dither!
Do you have any special tips that you would like to share?
Don’t be afraid to snap up good deals when you see them, even if it takes your working capital quite low. Prices of raw materials can fluctuate quite a lot so if you see something you know you will use grab it while you can. It’s frustrating to see the price of crafted goods rocket when raw materials become pricey and be unable to take advantage of it because you can’t afford the mats. I usually aim to keep 10,000 gold on my banker and bank the surplus. When I’ve spotted a good deal on Frost Lotus my banker has occasionally been down to a couple of hunderd gold.
Do you have any fun stories from when you were grinding?
I’m sure I shall think of several once I hit send but nothing springs to mind right now.
What was the best deal you ever came across?
Several stacks of Flask of Endless Rage posted on the Auction House at 3.5 gold per flask. I snapped them up and reposted them at 30 gold and they all sold the same day. I can only imagine the vendor intended to post them at 35 gold each.
Do you remember any of your worst deals?
I managed to post 2 cut epic gems at 17 gold each the other evening and only realised once they had both sold. A timely reminder to take more care when I’m posting after a 12-hour shift and am tired. If there’s any justice the guy who posted the flasks bought them.
What are your future plans with WoW?
As mentioned above I want to complete Northrend on all my alts. I’m intending to roll a Dwarf Shaman in the expansion; I’m going for a full set of healers! I’d also like to take a much more active part in the Auction House when Cataclysm is released. Although I’m planning to wind down my AH activities I’m also trying to plan ahead ready for the expansion.
Thank you for taking the time to do this interview for Warcraft Econ. Do you have any last words?
I know from my own experience that the Auction House can seem a mysterious and daunting place but if I can do it, anyone can. Do your research and start small expanding as your confidence and expertise grows. Most of all, have fun doing it or it isn’t worth doing at all.
Thanks,
- Hulan
Hall of Fame: Seata of Dragonmaw-US
The Warcraft Econ Hall of Fame is a column featuring the few elite players that have hit the World of Warcraft gold cap of 214,748 gold 36 silver 46 copper. We have with us, Seata of Dragonmaw-US, who will be sharing their stories with us today.
Please tell us a little about yourself and your gaming experience.
My character name is Seata form Dragonmaw-US server. I started playing WoW when it first came out as a paladin but switch over to shaman when TBC came out. Since then I been playing the shaman exclusively.
Do you raid or PvP most? Both? How do you enjoy the game?
I do a little bit of both PVP and raid. At the moment the only enjoyment I get out of the game is doing achievement and making gold via Auction House.
Why did you choose to collect this amount of gold?
I started collecting gold after we clear ToC (tournament of Crusade) back in September. Before then I have already gotten enough gold to buy my motorcycle, traveling tundra mount, etc… Since my guild was pretty casual we didn’t do much heroic mode, so to keep myself occupied I started collecting gold. It was 10 time easier then back in pre-BC.
How did you go about getting to the 214k? Did you use professions? Auction House arbitrage? Any creative ideas?
I been JC since TBC but I never really play around the AH. At the beginning of the expansion I started to use my JC to buy uncut gem and selling it as cut gem to cover the cost of my motorcycle and travelling tundra. I started getting more aggressive when the epic gem came out.
I also got an alt paladin who is an enchanter. I use him exclusively for making crusader and spellpower enchants for alt leveling BoA gears. He usually bring in about 1k to 2k a week just from selling those 2 enchants. There a reason why the price of Righteous Orb and Golden Pearl spike up.
How did you learn to do it?
I learn that weekend is a good time to buy uncut gems and weekday is the best time to sell them. Tuesday night is the biggest money making night. I usually put all my auction 8am on a 12hr timer just right before going to work. When I get home at 7pm, I collect all the gold and relist them again. After raid, usually around 11pm, I relist some gems to cover the overnighter and people who uncut me earlier.
What addons, if any, do you use to help you make gold.
I use only Quick Auction and Postal only.
Are you still going for more gold, like 1 million? If so, do you have a new goal? Are you close?
I’m not sure at the moment. If Blizzard announce more gold sinker items, I might aim for more gold.
Do many people know you have this amount of gold?
A couple of people in the guild knows about it and Yasume my auction partner in crime.
Did you spend your gold on fun things? What have you bought? What things would you like to buy?
So far I think I gotten everything Blizzard has out there as gold sinker. I spent 10k gold on the epic parrot pet. I also bought 2 motorcycles for my brother and my cousin as Christmas gift. I also traded 10k gold with a guild mate to for the panda and Lil KT pet. I wish Blizzard would put in a 2 passengers flying mount for 100k gold.
Do you have any special tips that you would like to share?
Not much, making gold in WoW is 10x easier than before because the amount of money coming from dailies. Casual player are usually your best money maker in the gem market.
Do you have any fun stories from when you were grinding?
Not much.
What was the best deal you ever came across?
I came across another player and bought all his stock of uncut gems, dusts, essences, etc…at about 50% below AH price. I think I spent close to 10k buying all his things but in the end it pay off.
Do you remember any of your worst deals?
None that jump at me.
What are your future plans with WoW?
Killing Arthas the Lich King would be the first goal but aside from that, waiting on the next expansion like everyone else. Let hope Blizzard has something good for all of us gold capper.
Thank you for taking the time to do this interview for Warcraft Econ. Do you have any last words?
Making gold is easy, just have some patient and be a Jewelcrafter.
Hall of Fame: Kyrin of Stormscale-EU
The Warcraft Econ Hall of Fame is a column featuring the few elite players that have hit the World of Warcraft gold cap of 214,748 gold 36 silver 46 copper. We have with us, Kyrin of Stormscale-EU, who will be sharing their stories with us today.
Please tell us a little about yourself and your gaming experience.
Hi, my name is Kyrin, I play a Blood Elf mage on the Stormscale EU realm. I started playing WoW in late 2008 and got hooked pretty fast. I started on the Blade’s Edge realm and later switched to Stormscale because my friend was playing there. In general I’ve been playing games as long as I remember; my first console was a hardware clone of the Nintendo Entertainment System.
Do you raid or PvP most? Both? How do you enjoy the game?
Mostly raids or occasional BGs, sometimes I level my alts so I can get access to more professions.
Why did you choose to collect this amount of gold?
At first I just needed gold to buy my epic flying skill and mount, but it was so exciting that I decided to keep going and see how far I can get.
How did you go about getting to the 214k? Did you use professions? Auction House arbitrage? Any creative ideas?
I started out by buying low and selling normal, it was just after I somehow stumbled upon the Just My Two Copper Blog, shortly after my RSS reader was filled with similar blogs and I started learning. At that time I only had one profession – Alchemy.
I got my starter gold from arbitrage (around 3k)and started making meta gems, this was just before 3.1 was released. On patch day I made about 8k gold only by selling the two metas, so at this point my gold making addiction started.
At the moment I make all my gold from professions, I have two level 80s with Alchemy/Inscription and Tailoring/Enchanting, also have a lvl 65 DK with Blacksmithing.
How did you learn to do it?
Mostly by reading blogs like JMTC, Warcraft Econ and many others. Trial and error also works.
What addons, if any, do you use to help you make gold.
Auctioneer, Quick Auctions, Market Watcher, Altoholic, KTQ, Postal, LSW, Skillet and Auditor.
Are you still going for more gold, like 1 million? If so, do you have a new goal? Are you close?
Definately, my next goal is level the remaining professions and hopefully reach 2x goldcap.
Do many people know you have this amount of gold?
A few people know, that’s it.
Did you spend your gold on fun things? What have you bought? What things would you like to buy?
I bought battered Hilt for 8k and some ToC recipes and maybe few minor items, but that is it. I plan to buy the mammoth mount, chopper and the Kirin Tor ring just to get the achievements.
Do you have any special tips that you would like to share?
Try to optimize your gold making so it doesn’t take too much of your WoW playtime, I spent way too much time at the AH when i started. Use the Snatch feature of auctioneer, it is a huge time saver when buying mats. When a certain strategy works for someone on one realm doesn’t necessarily mean it will work on your own. Try to find a farmer who will regularly supply you with needed goods.
Do you have any fun stories from when you were grinding?
I don’t grind at all, it takes too much time and the g/hour is low.
What was the best deal you ever came across?
Nothing specific comes to mind, but I’ve made over 28k gold the day patch 3.3 hit. Best day in gold making I ever had.
Do you remember any of your worst deals?
Back when I was doing arbitrage I tried flipping some epics, it didn’t end very well.
What are your future plans with WoW?
Kill Arthas. Kill him again in hard mode. Try to max out my achievements. Always wanted to get into arenas, maybe try that.
Thank you for taking the time to do this interview for Warcraft Econ. Do you have any last words?
Don’t rush for the gold cap, be patient. Good things come to those who wait.
Patch 3.3.3 PTR Runed/Crusader Orb Crafting Reagents Reduced
Source: MMO-Champion.com
Blacksmithing
•Battlelord’s Plate Boots – Titansteel Bar x 5, Runed Orb x 6.
•Belt of the Titans – Titansteel Bar x 5, Runed Orb x 6.
•Indestructible Plate Girdle – Titansteel Bar x 5, Runed Orb x 6
•Plate Girdle of Righteousness – Titansteel Bar x 5, Runed Orb x 6
•Spiked Deathdealers – Titansteel Bar x 5, Runed Orb x 6
•Treads of Destiny – Titansteel Bar x 5, Runed Orb x 6
Leatherworking
•Belt of Arctic Life – Heavy Borean Leather x 4, Arctic Fur x 3, Runed Orb x 6
•Belt of Dragons – Arctic Fur x 3, Icy Dragonscale x 20, Runed Orb x 6
•Blue Belt of Chaos – Arctic Fur x 3, Nerubian Chitin x 20, Runed Orb x 6
•Boots of Living Scale – Arctic Fur x 3, Jormungar Scale x 20, Runed Orb x 6
•Boots of Wintry Endurance – Arctic Fur x 3, Icy Dragonscale x 20, Runed Orb x 6
•Death-warmed Belt – Arctic Fur x 3, Eternal Shadow x 4, Runed Orb x 6
•Footpads of Silence – Arctic Fur x 3, Eternal Shadow x 2, Runed Orb x 6
•Lightning Grounded Boots – Arctic Fur x 3, Icy Dragonscale x 20, Runed Orb x 6
Tailoring
•Cord of the White Dawn – Moonshroud x 8, Runed Orb x 6
•Sash of Ancient Power – Spellweave x 4, Ebonweave x 4, Runed Orb x 6
•Savior’s Slippers – Moonshroud x 8, Runed Orb x 6
•Spellslinger’s Slippers – Spellweave x 4, Ebonweave x 4, Runed Orb x 6
Continue the discussion at the “Insider Trader” section of our forums!
Just in case you missed it:
Patch 3.3.3 PTR Economy and Auction House Patch Notes
World of Warcraft PTR Patch 3.3.3 (Source)
The latest test realm patch notes can always be found at http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/patchnotes/test-realm-patchnotes.html
Auction House
- If the Auction House on a realm is unavailable for any reason, an alert will pop up informing players who attempt to access it.
- Players can now Right-Click to place an item in the Auction frame.
- Entire stacks of a specific item type can be placed in the Auction frame and several options have been added for choosing how to list auctions. (Picture)
- Stack Size: If a stack of items has been added to the Auction frame, players can select the size of the stack they wish to sell. If an invalid stack size is entered (i.e. a stack of 21 Saronite Ore), the Create Auction button will be grayed out.
- Number of Stacks: In addition to selecting the size of a stack, players can select how many stacks of an item they wish to sell (i.e. if a player has a total of 43 Saronite Ore in the Auction frame, they can choose to list 2 stacks of 20, 4 stacks of 10, 8 stacks of 5, 43 stacks of 1, etc. If the number and amount of stacks listed results in a remainder, the left-over items will be placed back in the player’s bags automatically).
- Stack Size and Number of Stacks are linked mathematically so that altering the variables of one may automatically calculate the amount of the other (i.e. if a player puts 20 in the Stack Size field and 43 Saronite Ore are in the Auction frame, the Number of Stacks field will change to 2 by default. If a player only wishes to sell one stack of 20 Saronite Ore, the Number of Stacks field can be manually changed to 1).
- Price: Players can now choose to input the price of an item Per Stack or Per Item by selecting either option from a pull-down. If Per Item is selected and a player is selling a stack of that item, the Auction House will multiply the selected Per Item price by the amount of that item in the stack. If Per Stack is selected, the player can enter the total price he or she wishes to charge for each stack of that item being listed.
- Auction Post Completion Bar: If multiple items or stacks of items are being listed at once by a player, a Posting completion bar will appear showing the total progress of each individual auction being listed once the Create Auction button is selected. The greater the number of individual listings being made in a single press of the Create Auction button, the longer this process will take. Players can still browse the Auction House while the Posting completion bar is in progress, but moving around will interrupt the progress, similar to moving while attempting to create multiple bandages with First Aid. Just as with creating bandages, auctions that were completed prior to the character moving or otherwise canceling the actions will successfully be listed.
Items
- Items which previously required Marks of Honor will have their costs adjusted to remove these requirements.
- Frozo the Renowned has moved into the Dalaran Magus Commerce Exchange and will be trading your Frozen Orbs for various other trade goods.
- For those curious, here are the items for which you can trade your Frozen Orbs to Frozo. These each cost 1 Frozen Orb unless noted otherwise in parentheses:
- Crusader Orb (6)
- Runed Orb (4)
- Eternal Fire
- Eternal Earth
- Eternal Water
- Eternal Air
- Eternal Life
- Eternal Shadow
- Frost Lotus
- Pattern: Frosty Flying Carpet [Tailors Only] (6)
Professions
- Runed Orbs: Recipes which require this item have had their material requirements significantly reduced.There are lots of Auction House and economy changes. Prices of Frozen Orb’s have already gone up after a few hours of the news.
Inscription
- Most recipes that required 2 inks now only require 1.
Mining
- Titansteel Bar: Creating this item no longer results in a cooldown.
Tailoring
- Glacial Bag: Creating this item now invokes a 7-day cooldown.
- The cooldown and location requirements have been removed from creating Moonshroud, Spellweave and Ebonweave.
Fishing
- The “Monsterbelly Appetite” daily fishing quest has changed so it now takes place outside the Violet Hold in Dalaran. The quest still requires a Severed Arm and has been renamed to “Disarmed!”
Continue the discussion at the “Insider Trader” section of our forums!
Just in case you missed it:
Patch 3.3.x – The content patch between now and Cataclysm
With that being said, we do have some additional PvE and PvP content and changes we plan to implement prior to the release of the big Cataclysm patch and subsequent retail release of that third expansion. We’ll be discussing these new features in more detail in the coming weeks.
As we stated before releasing Wrath of the Lich King, we still intend for Icecrown Citadel to be the final raid of the expansion in terms of tiered progression. (Source)
This looks like a patch similar to the Isle of Quel’Danas one, except no new raid. Possible new 5-man instances, quests, dailies, Argent Crusade content, maybe even new items and armor sets. After this patch hits and we come closer to Cataclysm, players are going to start to liquidate their banks and prices will start to fall. There will be some die-hard speculators that will hang on to certain old world and even Wotlk materials in hope for a profit in the next expansion. These items may include key materials to leveling the different professions and class specific quests.
Continue the discussion at the “Insider Trader” section of our forums!
Hall of Fame: Tatzu & Decha of Doomhammer-US (Valentine’s Day Edition)
The Warcraft Econ Hall of Fame is a column featuring the few elite players that have hit the World of Warcraft gold cap of 214,748 gold 36 silver 46 copper. We have with us, Tatzu & Decha of Doomhammer-US, who will be sharing their stories with us today. This couple have each hit the gold cap for a total of almost half a million gold.
The two of them contacted us a few months ago about hitting the gold cap, however it was between the both of them. We felt that if they were working together, that each of them would have to reach the gold limit to preserve the Hall of Fame requirements. This interview couldn’t have come at a better time… on Valentine’s day.
Please tell us a little about yourself and your gaming experience.
My girlfriend and I made the gold together. Our characters are Tatzu and Decha on US-Doomhammer. We both started playing WoW the day of retail release on Doomhammer, but we weren’t dating then. We met in game about a year later and have now been dating over 3 years. Before WoW I came from FFXI. That was my first MMO and I played it for about a year before WoWs release. I have always been into RPGs. I played Diablo and Diablo 2 extensively and before that was mostly into console RPG games. (Final Fantasy series, Chrono Trigger, etc) Before WoW, Decha played City of Heroes as her first MMO. Decha previously was more into RTS games, such as Warcraft, Starcraft, Age of Mythology and Populous.
Do you raid or PvP most? Both? How do you enjoy the game?
We raid. The small amount of PvP we do is only for achievements. We really enjoy the game. We feel the game has just got better and better. The current raid content is fun and interesting. Hard enough to be a challenge, but not so hard that you have to get overly stressed out about the game. We play in a guild that wants progression, but never at the cost of fun and the ability to joke around. We are also very excited for Cataclysm and think that the game will just continue to get better.
Why did you choose to collect this amount of gold?
It has always been good to have a lot of gold in game. What counts as a lot changes, but our philosophy is if you have the spare gold you can always throw it at problems. Quickly make all the crafted items for a new patch. Always be able to buy consumables you might need for raid content. After that it is just about how to make the most money with the least effort. Once we found an easy way to make lots of gold, we just let it keep flowing in.
How did you go about getting to the 214k? Did you use professions? Auction House arbitrage? Any creative ideas?
The first key is our history: we enjoy playing alts. Then Decha found Alchemy transmutes to be a good, easy way to make money. By the end of Burning Crusade we had 21 characters 19 of which are transmute specialized alchemists. We made good money transmuting eternals, but when they added the ability to transmute epic gems our income skyrocketed. We make most of the money selling those epic gems. Tatzu is a jewelcrafter and we utilize his epic cuts to keep profit margin high, selling only cut gems.
We also occasionally use other professions: crafting leg enhancements from both leather and cloth, cloth transmutes and enchanting materials. We also do some dailies, but only as they gain us something else, reputation, tokens of some sort, etc. But the bulk of our jump from having 50k gold to over 500k gold is from epic gems.
How did you learn to do it?
Decha was the one who saw the value of using transmutes even back in vanilla with level 35 characters and Arcanite. Over time our amount of characters to do this with grew. Then the patch notes for 3.2 told me that we were about to make considerably more money.
What addons, if any, do you use to help you make gold.
We utilize Auctioneer, Quick Auctions 2, and Postal for mail management.
Are you still going for more gold, like 1 million? If so, do you have a new goal? Are you close?
I wouldn’t say we have a specific goal, we just plan to keep making as much money as we can. We have slowed down a little. We don’t watch the Auction House as closely as before, but I feel that this high profit margin method we currently have may not happen again in Cataclysm, so I would love to have as much as possible before people stop getting new gear that they want to put epic gems into. Hitting 1 million does sound like a great number though.
Do many people know you have this amount of gold?
We don’t discuss the specifics much, but everyone in our guild knows that we have a lot of money. A few good friends outside the guild and some real life friends who play on other servers also know. Past that we try not to publicize it much.
Did you spend your gold on fun things? What have you bought? What things would you like to buy?
We buy some things for fun, but mostly we spend the gold to improve our characters or to provide convenience. For example all of our characters have epic flying and cold weather flying, even though mostly just transmute. We both have the Traveler’s Tundra Mammoth. I think our biggest purchase was to buy enough Primordial Saronite so we could both get the crafted legs and boots quickly and so I could begin on the Shadowmourne quest line.
Do you have any special tips that you would like to share?
Loot everything. And get a sense of the market value of things. Just because you can’t think of why anyone would buy something, doesn’t mean it’s not worth 10g on the AH. And just because you farmed something, doesn’t mean it was free. I’ve seen people sell something they transmuted for less than or barely more than the raw materials are worth. And people say, “But I farmed those mats, they didn’t cost me anything.” But it did. It cost them time. And if they can sell the raw mats for almost as much, they are selling the effort and transmute for nothing.
Dailies and grinding can be a good way to start your bankroll. But I think the goal is to let your money start working for you. I joke that I only farm the AH now.
But my main tip for people is that making money is easy in WoW. There are lots of ways to make it you just have to decide what works for you. Just remember it does take some kind of effort on your part. It isn’t going to make itself.
Do you have any fun stories from when you were grinding?
No grinding, well not for gold. I have grinded out a lot of reputations over time. Plus “fun story” and “grinding” don’t belong in the same sentence in our opinion.
What was the best deal you ever came across?
In general the epic gem transmutes are the best deal I would ever need. Getting a 5x crit is a giant profit. Generally mats of 20-50 gold and sold back for about 1000 gold.
Do you remember any of your worst deals?
What stands out generally is when doing transmutes quickly you mess up and end up transmuting an eternal, instead of the epic gem you meant to make.
What are your future plans with WoW?
We plan to continue raiding hopefully getting as far into hard mode content in ICC as possible. Same focus into Cataclysm, and hopefully keeping our bank roll as large as possible.
Thank you for taking the time to do this interview for Warcraft Econ. Do you have any last words?
We would like to thank Blizzard for making epic gems a transmute. We hope they create similar cash cows for us in the future (no offense to Taurens).
Auction House iPhone Application
Auction House iPhone Application
We’ll let everyone know if and when we get to the point of adding this application to more devices. We’re currently focused on getting the functionality working properly for this device at this time. (Source)
Auction House and Armory Integration
Since the launch of the World of Warcraft Armory, we’ve been regularly releasing updates and new features designed to help players stay connected to the game even when they’re not logged in. Today, we wanted to give you a heads-up about a new service now in development that will let players access the Auction House directly through the Armory website or Armory App for iPhone or iPod touch.
While there are still plenty of details to be worked out, we’re designing the service to offer auction functionality similar to what’s available in-game. Players have been requesting — and we’ve been hoping to implement — a feature like this for a long time, and we’re excited that the Armory and the game have evolved to a point that makes it possible.
This is a fairly complex service to develop, due in large part to its unprecedented integration with the game, so we don’t have an exact release date yet. It’s important to note here that certain elements of the service will be premium-based, which we’ll go into more detail on once the service functionality is finalized. As with all of the services we offer, we plan to integrate the Auction House and Armory in a way that won’t disrupt the gameplay experience, and we won’t release it until it meets the quality standards that we’ve set for our other features and services. You may be seeing bits and pieces of the Auction House service pop up in the test builds we use for the public test realms as we go through the process of internal testing. We’ll have more info to share with you here and at http://www.WorldofWarcraft.com as we get closer to release. (Source)
We are sure some people are very excited about this new addition, especially those who like to check their auctions before leaving for work or even those who constantly watch the economy like a hawk. There are various benefits to having the auction house available at your fingertips. So far Blizzard have announced this feature for the iPhone as well as through the Warcraft Armory website. Those currently who would like to play the auction house at work or school but can’t, now have a way to. Time will tell what sort of features as well as limitations will be integrated into this new feature.
Do our readers agree or disagree with this new auction house feature?
Market Watch – 02/01/2010
Our new column Market Watch focuses on the latest and most informational news from our forums. So lets dive in and see what current gold making tactics our tycoons are engaged in…
- Best selling gems and highest profit gems by: Kumíko – Our gold capped and millionaire player lists his best selling gems on the market today, it is definitely worth a look if you are a Jewelcrafter with access to some of these recipes.
- Prospecting/Jewelcrafting/Disenchanting spreadsheet by: Delcitina – Our resident spreadsheet creator has updated the prospecting spreadsheet for 3.3. Get your copy now by visiting our forums.
- 3.3 Epic ammo by: Killgore9998 – Finally some more profits to be made as an Engineer with the help of the new epic quality ammo from Icecrown Citadel recipes.
- Heavy Borean Leather / Arctic Fur by: LargeRichard – One of the easiest Leatherworking tricks you can do for a quick profit.
- Crafted Runed Orb Epics by: Warcraft Econ – Runed Orb crafted epics are still selling well?
Hall of Fame: Kumiko of Malygos-EU (1 Million Gold Achieved)
The Warcraft Econ Hall of Fame is a column featuring the few elite players that have hit the World of Warcraft gold cap of 214,748 gold 36 silver 46 copper. We have with us, Kumiko of Malygos-EU, who will be sharing their stories with us today. He has reached 1,000,000 gold, well above the gold cap.
Please tell us a little about yourself and your gaming experience.
Hello. My name is Boris. I play my feral kitty Kumíko in the raiding guild on the german EU server Malygos. I started WoW right at release day and experienced vanilla wow with my human priestress Nem, who is still well known on Antonidas EU. With her I managed to save 48k gold till the end of vanilla just with buying and selling epics and rare twink items. In fact I made much more, but I blew out the money for any upgrade I could find for my rogue toon. I didn’t use any profession so far for making gold. When BC came out, I rerolled and played my actual main char Kumíko (healer at first, when black temple started I switched to feral). I bought every level 70 beginners epic I could find to stuff her out and joined my raid guild. After that all my gold was gone and I had to kill mobs and farm greens and greys to get the daily money for raiding (repairs, flasks and food). It was a pain in the arse, because I hate farming gold by killing mobs. Then I saw a guildmate making enormous amounts of gold with his jewelry profession. So I learned JC and from that day on I invested all farmed gold for rare JC recipes and soon was the first and only player on Malygos, who could cut every gem ingame. At the end of BC I had nearly 500k cash and, believe it or not, I guzzled all for my brother’s toons, guildmates, friends and every luxury available. I thought I would quit WoW, but that didn’t happen, because I’m addicted to it. When wotlk started, I bought every damaged necklace I could find. Only few people read patch notes and look for quest items i.e. on wowhead.com. So I already knew, what to look for, weeks before the latest expansion came out. The first 100 necklaces I got for a median price of 50G. Later i payed up to 100G. And when the prices finally reached 200G+, I already had every rare gem cut in my book. Even the useless ones.
Do you raid or PvP most? Both? How do you enjoy the game?
I don’t like PvP. Neither arena nor battlegrounds. I only like raiding PvE bosses. Ok, i do my daily dungeon quest for the two frost emblems until i have my T10 set and the emblems cloak, but that’s it.
Why did you choose to collect this amount of gold?
My worst nightmare, my greatest fear is, that i have to kill mobs for cash to continue raiding. Thank all gods of Azeroth, this won’t ever happen again. And that’s the only reason why i play the AH.
How did you go about getting to the 214k? Did you use professions? Auction House arbitrage? Any creative ideas?
I used my JC profession. Once I had all recipes in BC, it was very easy to get the gold cap. It’s much easier, when you can spread your auctions and offer five gems of every kind instead of auctioning hundreds of runed rubies. Scan the AH every time you can. Look for cheap offers. Buy low and sell higher, but not too high. Let’s take eternals for example. Just buy all cheap eternal airs you see in the morning. Then send 20 to 40 of them to an anonymous toon and offer them way overpriced in the AH. The other sellers enter the market right below your prices, they just undercut but are still way too high. The other 80%, the main charge of your eternals, put into the AH some hours later or when you get home from work. best time is half an hour before the competitors (and you) start raiding. Undercut them by far, but still stay high enough for a good profit. Your offer looks cheap in comparison and you’ll see, you get bought out.
How did you learn to do it?
Before I played WoW, I already had played Everquest for five years. In fact, there I really learned to play the AH, buy cheap, sell high. Everquest had a lot of “twink items”. Items with many and good stats on them. Hitpoints regeneration, haste, large amounts of stamina and so on. Some of them were as good as endgame gear. And they all were and remained tradable, even after equipping. And even a level one char could equip them. So i.e. a fresh created level one toon with cloak of flames (haste), fungi tunic (hp regen) and two scepters of destruction (imba dps and insane procs) could kill a group of level 10 mobs, level very fast, own every place and flex its epeen to the max. That were the days, when trading was much more fun and time killing than the rest of the game was.
What addons, if any, do you use to help you make gold?
I only use Auctioneer for mass acutioning and Postal to empty my mail box. Time is money. I don’t care about suggestions and data from auctioneer. All prices and clues have been storaged in my brains.
Are you still going for more gold? If so, do you have a new goal? Are you close?
Of course I do. It’s my way to play the game. The last 1000 gold isn’t worth less than the first. It’s funny, when you realize, how many hours you spent to make one million gold, you don’t ever want to break it again. So I only use my surplus for new stuff. Bought four portable holes to self reward me for the effort. There is no new goal. The second million doesn’t look very appealing to me. If it comes, I’ll take it. If not, I don’t care.
Do many people know you have this amount of gold?
Yes, my server knows. And there are players from other servers, who log on to malygos with a level one to get some hints from me.
Did you spend your gold on fun things? What have you bought? What things would you like to buy?
Got the first chopper on my server. And I bought the new totc craftings right after 3.2. The knightbane carapace was 40k and the bracers of swift death were 20k. I am not Scrooge-like. I hope, Blizzard is bringing out some really nice gold sinks with cataclysm. I mean, very pricey and very exclusive things. An exclusive flying mount for 250k gold would be nice. Not stuff for 20k everybody will be able to afford. It must feel epic to buy it.
Do you have any special tips that you would like to share?
In fact, no. There is no master plan. No secret. Just use common sense and read patch notes carefully. A good profession can help. JC is very good, as long as you are one of the first to get all recipes. The joke is, you can get much more gold with farming than with playing the AH. But you have to like farming several hours every day.
Do you have any fun stories from when you were grinding?
Nope. I hate grinding. That’s why I always make one of the first three max level chars on my server after each expansion. I want to get through it asap. Once in BC, I grinded through the mana ghosts for primal manas at Kirinvar Village in Netherstorm. The ground is an inclined plane, which made me feel so giddy, that I puked. Is that a fun story?
What was the best deal you ever came across?
Twelve “damaged necklaces” in the auction house, in a row. Three days after wotlk came out. For 10G buy price each one. Took me the longest eight seconds in my life to buy them. But the best deal were the 1700 stacks titanium ore I bought pre patch for 100G-120G each. Invested 180k for all. On Patch day, titanium stacks rised up to 300G per stack. Nevertheless I started prospecting them at 3.00pm in the afternoon just when I logged in and finished the last stack at 2.15am in the night. Ported to Dalaran and got every epic JC recipe in the game, sold the rest of the powder for a good price and had enough raw gems to dominate the market for weeks. After all I had approx. 80k profit in cash + whatever you would say, all epic gem recipes are worth.
Do you remember any of your worst deals?
I remember them all. But they didn’t matter. Every new patch I have some very big deals with very good profit. Then some, which just repay and some, which are a loss. As long as the big deals have the majority, everything is fine. The losses merge into the crowd, because I do wide spread mixed calculations.
What are your future plans with WoW?
To stay the strongest kitty on my server like I have always been. In 2010 I want to get out of home more often and do things that really matter *laugh*
Thank you for taking the time to do this interview for Warcraft Econ. Do you have any last words?
Get an authenticator ASAP!
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