How the Blizz Ruined Glyphmas

You heard it here first folks: you can still trade Blackfallow inks at the Ink Traders, at least that is what the Known In-Game Issues site says right now. Okay, you probably heard it elsewhere, but here I am writing about it now. What does this mean? Essentially, that the whole stocking up game that some of us have been doing for the pre-Mists patch has basically been for naught.

Well, not so quick. As it is, sure, there won't be the crazy low supply of herbs that makes glyphmas great, but there will at least be a lot of demand, which will still mean more glyphs sold, and higher prices most likely. That stock of glyphs/ink that you have? Well, it will almost certainly come in handy whenever they fix the issue(it is listed as a bug, although it may be intended. Who knows?), or in the first few weeks or so after Mists launches. All is not lost, but I can definitely understand the frustration that some of you must feel.

Myself, I am just glad that I didn't go all out and get like 20k ink stocked up. Only about 10k-ish on me :P I will be just going about business as usual, and keeping the inks stocked up for when Mists launches.

EDIT: I forgot to credit my source, @msherretz on twitter, aka Michael Sherretz, probably best known from the amazing Auction House Junkies Podcast. Sorry about that :P

Glyphs and Transmog, My Submission for the August 2012 Blogging Carnival!

To begin, this post is for "Cold's Gold Blogging Carnival". The topic this time is,

As WoW gold makers, we must be flexible and adapt our posting, pricing, and relisting strategies based on the individual markets.  Every server is different, yet within the same server, each market can be completely different as well.  For the August Gold Blogging Carnival Topic, let's illustrate some of the ways we post differently based on the different profession markets.  
Compare & Contrast 2 Different AH Markets and How Your Gold Making Strategy Varies In Each Market

My post will be about how I handle glyph selling, and transmog. Now, to be honest, I have taken a bit of time off of glyph selling, since I have been engrossed with the beta lately, but I still find time to sell some transmog items. So, this post will mostly be reflecting on how I was selling things a couple months ago.

First off, how I sold glyphs can be summarized pretty simply:

• I took the shotgun approach. Just posted 2 of EVERY glyph that was even marginally profitable(as in, at least 5 gold above crafting price, and due to the super low cost of Whiptail, the crafting cost was super low, about 15g a glyph max).
• I posted for 24 hours
• I checked in with them every couple hours, or after a major competitor logged on. I had all of them(if they post more than 5 glyphs) on my friend list on every toon I play. I also know the posting cycles of the major ones, through the amazing TUJ.
• I aggressively undercut and try to shut out certain people, namely my chief competitors. I used to be kinda nice to them, but they weren't to me, so it's WAR. Got one to leave the market for like a week, then I left for a couple days to see if he was watching, and lo and behold, he was, and came back immediately. So, I came back too, and demoralized him further, made sure to log on IMMEDIATELY after he logged off, no matter what I was doing(except raiding, of course!). Got my bank toon to be on my other account, and literally camped the AH all day some days, just to demoralize him further. It worked, and he stopped competing, or did so not as aggressively. 
• I did minimal flipping, although I did reset some markets which were prices very low but had very little stock, especially if they were Northrend glyphs.

How I sold transmog is way different:

• I carefully examined and priced all of the pieces I was selling, or buying to flip
• I posted for 48 hours
• I never checked in. Frankly, I had no competition, and I don't price based on it anyway. Fixed prices all the way
• I did an auctionator search almost every day for items to flip, plus farmed for them in Blasted Lands all the time

As you can see, the way I approached the two markets were very different. With glyphs, I was very competitive, paid a lot of attention to my competition, but I was not very particular about the, um, particulars. With transmog, I was very careful about the pricing, but cared little about competition. 

I would say that for the effort spent, transmog did give me more gold, but glyphs gave me more gold overall. In other words, I spent little effort or stress in selling/flipping transmog items, but didn't make a lot either, and couldn't really push it too hard to make more. I had to just be patient. But with glyphs I could and did push things hard, and it paid off almost immediately. So, they both had their benefits I suppose. 

Overall, which did I like more? Probably glyphs. Between the highly competitive atmosphere, and high payout, it was exciting and fun. The downsides, of course, were added stress and attention, but that's all part of the game of glyph selling. If you prefer a more relaxed, patient approach, then transmog would be the way to go most likely, or another similar market, like the 77-80 green market.

I hope you enjoyed! Let me know what you think in the comments below!

Why I Like Gated Markets

So, today I got a comment on my post about Spirit of Harmony, but I wanted to take the time to reply to it in its own post, partially because I want everyone to see it, and partially because I cannot think of anything else to write about right now. Either way, here is the comment first:

Spoken like a true raider but hey each to their own, I have never been a fan of gating content as in my view it just tends to bore players to death and two months into an expansion you wonder why there are so few players left already. To be honest so many of Blizzard's decisions affecting gold making issues vex me these day I don't know what to do but as I'm not quitting I'll just have to grin and bear it.

Now, although the commenter is clearly conflating two separate things, the gating of content, and that of markets, I do want to tackle the latter. I am a big fan of gated markets, being, those markets which one has to spend time to get into. I am a fan of them for two big reasons:

1. It makes that market more valuable, by making it more scarce. It's simple economics: the less there is of something on the market, and granting that there is enough demand for the item, the more valuable the item will be. Valuable, in this sense, meaning that you can demand a higher price for the item, because people will pay a higher price. The value of something is simply how much you can sell it for, not the material cost+time, or whatever other metric. Gating a market naturally limits the amount of competitors you will have in that market, and thus, the value will go up, and stay up longer. The perfect example of that, at least on my server, is Pack of Endless Pockets. I still see them up for anywhere between 500-1000g a piece, long after they were introduced. This is because the gate for that market is really good at discouraging people from passing it.
2. It makes the market somewhat more fair. To use an analogy, Free-to-play(FTP) games. I am really really against some FTP games, because they clearly give an advantage to people who can throw enough money at the game. To contrast, in WoW, there is no amount of money you can throw at the game to get an advantage, or at least, one that actually gives you an edge against other players in PVP, or in clearing PVE faster. Now, I understand that you can pay more money in WoW to level faster(scroll, or RAF), but that does nothing to affect the endgame, only gets you there faster, which I could care less about. The same goes for gated markets. No matter how much gold you have to throw at the problem, unless you spend however long it takes to get the pattern for the Pack of Endless Pockets, you will not get it. There is no amount of gold you can spend to pass that gate. This makes it more fair for those who don't have millions of gold, but who have time to play. This also helps spread more gold to more people(people who aren't big gold makers, but love grinding faction rep), which is a good thing, because more gold for everyone means more people who can afford what you are selling, which means faster selling, which means more demand for goods, which means higher value of them.

Anyway, that is why I am a fan of gated markets. What do you think? Think I'm a loony, or dead on, or somewhere in-between? Let me know in the comments!

Why I am Happy About Spirit of Harmony

The following may put me in the minority opinion among gold-makers, but that's fine. I am not your average gold-maker, if there is even an "average" to speak of. In other words, I am not the type of gold-maker that does it for the sake of it. I make gold in order to spend it on the things I need in order to progress in other areas of the game, namely raiding. Let's just say that I have seriously seen some people who are into gold-making who barely know how to spec, or what abilities to use on their toons, or how to play in general. This kinda saddens me, as I think if you are going to be making fictional currency in a game, you should at least be interested in playing it. Oh well, that is neither here nor there, and I have no reason why I am bringing it up right now, other than I just feel like venting.

Anyway, why am I happy about Spirit of Harmony? A few reasons, which I will put in a tidy bullet list:

• First, it will make certain items more scarce, namely Darkmoon Cards, Crafted Gear, things like that. Yes, I know that Darkmoon cards will also be able to be made with the Scroll of Wisdom, but that is limited to one scroll per day(which are also used for other things). Point is, because of the fact that Spirits will not be tradeable, and many people will not be paying other people for their spirits(if they even have the recipe needed in the first place, which will come into play with the recipes given by factions), there will almost definitely be less of these items flooding the AH, which of course means higher values for the ones YOU craft.
• Because the Spirits will no longer be tradeable, the prospect of just sitting in a city and camping the AH will no longer be really that viable, at least for certain markets. Of course it will still work for others, but that is beside the point. If you want Spirits, you will have to go out and get them in the world, or in dungeons. This makes me happy, because certain lazy, trade-spamming gold makers on my server will be at a clear disadvantage, because I will have more Spirits, more rep with the factions, etc. In other words, there will be a better gating system to certain markets: time and effort, not just how much gold you can throw at it. High gating is a good thing for those who put in the effort to get past them(like me).
• The design of spirits will help spread the wealth around somewhat. It will probably become somewhat common for people to ask to use the Spirits that other people have. Depending on the ease of getting Spirits, this may mean that they will have a high value. So, for people who are not that into the gold-making game but who love to grind rep with factions and get lots of Spirits, this can be a boon, and create a sort of symbiotic relationship between the strict gold-makers(who don't really play the game) and the people who DO play the game. More gold all-around is actually a good thing. It means more people to buy the other things you are selling.

In summary, I am happy about Spirit of Harmony because it will make certain things more scarce(and thus, more valuable), will spread gold around, and set gates to certain markets(or at least to how much can be produced in that market), which if you take the time to pass them, will reward you immensely.