Friday, July 27, 2012

85 to N Madness in 5 days???

So, I leveled the farmer toon to level 85, the herber miner guy and got some HOT gear and couple Valor pieces and crafted items to help on the way... it was I think 5days later that I crushed normal madness... Is it the nerfs? or the content? or the current gearing capacity... of the instances?  It just really seams odd that the shift from BC attunements and raid tiers to and months to actually get to a progression level is now where it is... It took me 5 days I think and it took a guidee and fellow raider 3 days to go from ding 85 to a full normal clear in DS? 

So does this have anything to do with making gold... YES!!! I said purchased gear, I said valor gear and such.. these things are still in high demand... People are clearing DS in one night... instead of 3 nights of progression, there is a lot more time for alts, and then gearing them up and such and the crafted gear, gems and enchants, well that all points to markets you may be able to get into. 

I can only guess however that on smaller realms, this may not be the case at all as its guild raid or no raid.  I can pug 5 toons a week into DS and HM DS runs all week long.  From Tues to Monday... I am good to go,   Some times some toons are going to be harder than other to get a run for, however, others are not a problem at all.  If you have DPS OS on a tank or healer, your in with only short waits in trade chat. Again this can echo of my last post that, consistently doing what you have been doing is likely to continue to realize profits.  Looking for the next best thing is fun and exciting in the AH game, I love doing it, but it was the slow and steady that made the lions share of my gold stocks..

Playing the game in a new way will teach you as much as reading any blog.  Dont PVP? Go PVP and find a new crowd to cater to.  Never twinked a toon? Go twink a toon and find more markets.  Never power leveled a toon with the best gear and chants and gems gold can buy?  Go power level a toon and see just what is potentially in that market? the same could be said for pet collections, mount collections, raiding, casuals, dungeon players that dont raid and many many more examples could be found.  These are the things that taught me the most about markets... Cause when I go pissed about prices for gems and chants and figured out the cost of ORE was X, and the cost of gems was X to the factor of 75% valuation of gems and a profit margin, then to the cut gems and the crafted jewelry and finally enchant mats and more... 1000 gold in in ore, could be processed into 3,000-5,000 gold in finished mats... and that 1800gold scroll of enchant awesomeness was really only about 600 or so in mats and some time to process the goods and make it up... :-0  thats prety good, 1,000 gold profit for one scroll of enchant awesomeness.. its not always tha big of a gold value or even percentage value, but it is the norm...

Good luck and dont jump the ship you are sailing if its making you gold and go on the party cruise, untill you have tested the water and proven that it will be a profitable business model.

Thursday, July 26, 2012

ITS COMMING, ITS COMMING!!! CHANGE EVERYTHING!!! or don't.

Long title but ehh.. I was thinking of something along the lines of American History and Paul Revere.  "THE REDCOATS ARE COMMING!!! THE RED COATS ARE COMMING!!!"  It probalby sounded better in my head.

Lots of good advice out there in the blogosphere... don't think I am not reading other blogs and getting many great ideas, deep insight and thoughts to consider in my plans...  But its still speculation largely...
Ex:  Pets battles and pet sales: "BUY PETS" was a recomendation  based on speculation, now its changed and current status on the beta has caused some apparent panic and "SELL PETS" recomendations are floating around... Again this is also based again more speculation... IMO...  A lot of people spend a lot of time trying to catch the next big wave, instead of just catching and riding a little one for a lot long.  Short burst markets and profits, or long lasting steady markets that will net you a lot more in the long run.

I will be playing in some pet markets.. for fun and profit, but, it will not be any major focus of my efforts...

If you are newer to markets and looking for a bit of starter cash... I think this could be a great and fun way to invest some time and make some gold... I think it will be popular as a gold making method, since pet battles are going to be a LOT more fun than millin herbs or prospecting ore, there in is the problem... how much is your time worth and what are your goal.

MOP IS COMMIN... MOP IS COMMING.. really we already knew that, now we know when, exactly, big deal...
however some posts have suggested in some ways and at various levels, "CHANGE EVERYTHING, THE WORLD IS BEING REBORN".  Okay, a little bit of writers liberty and maybe a bit of a large statement.. However, the point is that really, NOTHING IS CHANGING... just keep doing what you do..

Slow and steady has been the way everyone with a million gold got it... Even my 100K/day for 14 days... avg... 1.4 Million in 14 days run was not an overnight thing.. that was the end of MONTHS of planning and stocking up, and about a year of experience in markets, with back up spreadsheets with good info that still worked when the addons broke...

So, if you think that that the current buzz about the release date and all the changes and blue posts about pet battles is where you should focus... go for it.  IMO if thats where the buzz is though, thats where the market will be a bit rougher... just by overpopulation and the excitement of "NEW" these markets are going IMO to be marginal at best for most players in them...

My plan, change and tweak a little here and a little there, but otherwise do the same thing I always did... Look for markets to turn time into money.  Make patience pay dividends.  Gather, Mill, Prospect, Process, Craft... all of these things take time.   Which one will make you the most money for the time invested or be the most tollerable activity to do... and often a combination is the biggest win.  If you are willing to gather Prospect the ore to gems, and craft the gems to cut gems or jewlery, then disenchant or sell the rings, and then craft scrolls with the mats... Well that game might change a little, but I really think it will be the same too.

Basically, if you are Freaking out now... well, you need to relax and realize its happened before

If your looking for the next quick million, well that is not likely to come from the hype either...

Pick a market, or group of markets.  Pick your priorities and stick with it... I did not say pick a profit margin, because that will fluctuate.  As your market gets more profitable, it will get more attractive, and then there will be more competition, and then there will be less or little profit, but then people will look for the next best thing and move on.. and then the prices rebound and your back in the money.  The trick is IMO to keep your prices from being to unreasonable for your time.  higher prices will attract more people... For instance I never looked for more than about 250gold profit on any one enchant scroll... That is profit margin in my fall back price and my buy thresholds.   I made more often since I often got mats at lower than calculated costs...  Example market for maelstrom crystals is 150 gold... I buy at below 150 only.  but use 150 gold in my minimum sell price.  However on busy nights for Heroics or raids w/ lots of gear being DE'd... The marke would get flooded and drive prices to 100, 110, 120... and I would buy them all often times.  The other thing this does is figure in the cost of AH fees and deposits... also the reason I love Enchanting... VERY VERY low AH deposit costs...  I would have to repost something 100 times to lose one single gold in AH deposit costs... :-)

What will be your strategy in this poker game... the table is being set and the chips and cards are being passed around...

Thursday, July 19, 2012

Goals and progress update

Starting with just a run down on what I remember my goals to be and how I am doing on them before I review my own old post and see how my memory serves compared to what I set as goals previously.

Goals, status, progress
- Level a warlock tailor/engineer --- pretty good to go, level 84 and maxed out tailoring and engineering...
- Level a farmer toon tauren druid miner/herber --- Pretty good here too, at level 76 I completely quit questing (almost, just enough to open FPs and portals to hyjal/vaj'ir)  I am now 83 and it has all been gathering rocks and flowers... well, not quite all XP, discovery in zones and a random convenience quest here and there too...
- Load up and learn TSM --- so far a complete bust, however, my motivation is growing considerably, I am investing a lot of gold into stocks for mists... much of my leveling goals are nearing an end and my interest in gold making is returning...
- Make some bankers, done, I have 7 more bank alts now.. though some still need their guilds created...
- Merge battle net acounts for security and authenticator on second account etc...  - Done...
- Continue Raiding --- still raiding
- Get in the beta and goof around --- Been there, done that, ran a monk up to 90 and ran around a bit... I may switch my main from drood to monk, I like em...
some of it is likely rather foolishly invested, but it amuses me to do it and then wait and see... Its not like having a few thousand pyrite bars bought cheap is a bad investmetn, its just not likely that it will make me 500% profits either... however, its not likely it will completely LOSE value either, so I may make some gold, or at least recoup it as long as I have the patience to offload it slowly.

All in all, Some big tickets that I was working toward are nearing completion,  leveling a couple toons and professions and stocking up and raiding and catching the wind when it blows in an interesting direction...  

Recent lessons relearned.  Really I got to be a pretty big slacker for a while, lots of habits started to fall to the wayside, and are now coming back... and the importance is coming back too... Here are some lessons I have relearned.

- I love LSW (Lil' Sparkys Workshop)  Especially when leveling professions... It may cost you 2 times as much to get a point, but you can sell the end product for profit or DE it to a smaller loss than other options... and you can find new nich markets to play at.  Example: Getting every single point you can out of crafting bags while leveling a tailor could take more materials to get the points when it is green, like 5 gold in mats 4 times over to create 4 bags that sell for about 4-6 gold, the bags sell on the AH at cost or very close to cost... you get your money back VS. 10 gold in mats invested for one pair of bracers that give one point, those bracers can realistically only be DE'd for 2.5 gold (AH market is flooded and selling for 2.5 gold)
the first example you lose 4 gold if you are impatient and dump you goods in the AH, and possibly make a few gold if you are patient to catch the market.  In the second example you lose 7.5 gold... Lil Sparky's Workshop.. can cut the cost of leveling a profession... I would go so far as to say cut the cost in HALF or more and if you find and work those nich markets... it will even pay for itself.. LSW... Love that addon

- LSW is only as good as the data it uses.... SCAN YOUR AH DAILY at least once a day if you log on.  if you data is junk, LSW is too..

- Manually posting Auctions is going take a lot of time, and I always am forgeting the prices of what it cost me to craft something.. this couple tailored item in my nich markets and those couple LW items crafted on another toon for a couple more nich markets and then a couple more engi items a  couple BS items and eventually you are easily going to be listing 20-30? 50? or more items in nich markets... fun items that sell slowly, but regularly with high profit margins, and worth keeping one on the AH all the time.. Well when you forget what it costs to make em, and some one else is offloading some goods for cheap??? well TSM is in my horizon... I need to get the auto posting just for speed and price accuracy... even with only 10-20 nich market items.. I still do not want to sell at a loss and its starting to take a lot of time to do it manually.  Part of my problem is using a posting toon.  I make 12 items at a time on the tailor/engi/bs or such... 12 per mailing and then use the mailbox on the poster to store them... :-)  it cuts down my crafting times... Make 10-20 at once one every 2-4 weeks, or log on and make 2-3 every couple days... I prefer mass production and advance stocks.

-Management ---You have to manage stock, inventory, crafting ques, costs, profit margins, time invested, mats finished goods, intermediate secondary market goods, store all that and keep it posted on the AH at profitable prices... This is where people fail,  That is a lot to do and its a job to do it... Really it is... I think most dont enjoy that job and are not interested and consistent enough to realize the results of slow and steady production result in bigger and bigger mounds of cash, the problem for some is... what to spend a million gold on? YAKS AND PATHERS AND BOEs!!! OH MY!!!

Looking forward to Mists, Lots of changes, but overall it looks good... I have not spent