More Gold Tips For Alchemy And Herbalism

Mortigan — Sun, 16 Aug 2009 11:12:06 +0000

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I promised more Alchemy and Herbalism tips after last week so let’s jump right into it with five more pieces of advice.

You’ll find that certain areas and herbs are consistently good for Alchemy and Herbalism. The Swamp of Sorrows is particularly good for collecting herbs – it’s a relatively small zone, with a large quantity of herb spawn-points, and generally has a very low population. Ghost Mushrooms from the caves in the Hinterlands also offer a great opportunity to earn gold. Pick those whenever possible.
Watch for non-alchemy herbs like Deadnettle which are found along with other herbs. You won’t be able to use these yourself, but they sell really well on AH for inscriptions, rogue-poisons, etc. Most herbs seem to have a use for some type of profession. When you come across a new one, check it out on the Auction House.
Once you’re maxed out on Alchemy and Herbalism, you have some great opportunities to start making serious gold. Transmuting Skyflare Diamonds and Earthsiege Diamonds are a great way to double your investment (material costs), provided you’re paying attention to the market: buying mats when they’re cheap, and selling Diamonds when they’re high. Example: If Eternal Fire (the main material for Earthsiege) is selling for 30g, but Earthsiege Diamonds are selling for 25g, it’s a bad time to be in the Earthsiege Diamond business. If you can buy Eternal Fire at 20g, and sell Earthsiege at 40 – 45g, you’re making bank.
Watch for sellers who post their Earthsiege Diamonds (or any other item) significantly below the going prices. You might find that someone posts 5 Earthsiege Diamonds for 19g each. Next after him though, the price is 45g each. (I see this more than I’d ever imagine.) Although a bit of a gamble, it’s a sound strategy to purchase all 5 of the cheap diamonds (costing you 95g total) and immediately repost them for 44g 99s. If they sell, you’ll have 224g 95s – a profit of 129g 95s. If you end up having to sell them cheaply, you should at worst get your money back – and you’re still better off than buying the Eternal Fire when it costs more than the Diamond you’re wanting to make.
Frost Lotus is a much-coveted herb and generally sells for around 20 – 25 gold in the AH. But instead of posting the Frost Lotus that you find, I recommend checking the AH cost on Flask of the Frost Wyrm first. A single Flask often sells for about the same – 20 to 25 gold. Frost Lotus is the “main” material for it (being the most expensive), and one batch of materials is good for 2 Flasks. Since you’ll benefit directly from using that potion (assuming you’re an awesome warlock like me), you may decide to either keep the Flasks or go with a “keep 1, sell 1″ strategy. If I don’t have much gold to spare but need the Flasks, I’ll buy several Frost Lotus, along with whatever other mats I need, and brew up the Flasks. Then I’ll keep half of the Flasks and put the rest on AH… generally making enough gold to come close to covering my material costs. Free flasks, basically!

Wrapping Things Up

A last bit of advice: never undersell your items. If an item is selling for 20 gold, and you want to sell your item fast, do NOT price it at 15 gold. Price it at 19g 99s. You’ll still sell your item first. In fact, you don’t even have to be cheaper on the buyout price – you can match the current buyout price, but be cheaper on the bid price and still be ranked “cheapest”. So if at item has a bid price of 19g and a buyout of 20g, if you price yours at 18g 99s bid, and 20g buyout, you’re listed as cheapest, and you will sell your item first, and enjoy the added flavor of feeling like an auction ninja.

Ultimately, the bottom line is buy low and sell high. Pretty obvious, I know. But with AH prices swinging wildly from one day to the next, it’s worth restating. I’ve sold Earthsiege Diamonds for 45g one day, and the next day the price was down to 18g. So pay attention to your costs.

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5 Gold Tips For Alchemy And Herblism

Mortigan — Sun, 09 Aug 2009 12:11:01 +0000

This post originally appeared in my newsletter. Subscribe now to get these Auction House tips before they are published on the blog.

It’s time to turn those Alchemy and Herbalism professions to the task of earning some WoW Gold. This is some straight-up, useable advice on how to keep some decent gold coming in consistently without stopping your normal game-play to farm materials for endless hours. You should be able to quest or group as you normally do and always have some auctions running that bring you decent gold, no matter what level you are.

At the lowest levels, farming is the obvious start to obtaining gold. Getting stacks of 20 can start earning you decent cash in AH, but since the promise here is to earn gold without endless, mind-numbing farming, let’s look at some other ways:

Develop a strong case of A.D.D.: While questing, stop to pick any plant that can be harvested. “Hey, there’s that boss I need to kill! Oooo wait, pretty flowers!” You’ll find that you acquire a good amount of herbs quickly this way, and it’s not so painful as running around solely looking for herbs.
Fairly quickly, you’ll be able to pick Bruiseweed and Briarthorn, as with those materials you can make Strong Troll’s Blood Elixir. The Strong Troll’s Blood Elixir is pretty much worthless to you as a potion, but fortunately, it is a quest item. And there are plenty of low-level alts with gold to spend, so this is one of your first real opportunities to start earning gold. You can make Strong Troll’s Blood Elixir and sell them in single units for 2 – 4 gold each, depending on the market in your Auction House.
These sell fairly quickly and consistently. Just keep an eye on the market, and do NOT sell them in stacks. People only need 1 for their quest. If they decide they actually want to drink the things, well, they can buy multiple auctions.
Pay attention to the cost of materials vs. created items. Strong Troll’s Blood Elixir is fairly hard on materials, requiring 2 of each herb to create (4 total herbs + bottle). You may periodically find that the materials themselves can bring you more gold than the Elixirs will give you. If so, sell the materials directly (obviously) – and skip on creating Elixirs. By keeping an eye on cost materials vs. the created items, you’ll be maximizing your gold-earning potential. Keep this in mind always, as we’ll see in a minute when discussing transmuting diamonds for fun and profit.
As you begin to advance in levels, you should be able to keep your Strong Troll’s Blood Elixir business going without having to farm materials. You’ll reach a point where it’s cost-efficient to just buy the mats and make your Elixirs. I used to always keep 4 or 5 Elixirs on AH at any given time, provided the market price was holding up.
As you gain the ability to harvest new herbs, always do 3 things: 1) Check the going AH rate for stacks of those new herbs. 2) learn what potions can be made, and check the going AH rate for those potions. 3) find out what those mysterious additional herbs are used for, and what they’re worth. This keeps you in the know on where you can make the most gold.

More Tips Next Week

Next week I will have five more great tips for earning gold with Alchemy and Herbalism.