Part I- Cataclysm Rare Spawn List - Locations/Loot

Now some of you folks out there are big into farming (I know, you don't have to hide). One of my favorite past-times is running around and farming these mobs. Now of course they are on a "Blizzard Timer" (4 to 8 hours- but once again, RNG), but odds are if you do a route to the different areas, you can hit up at least one. Due to most of the drops being Rare "BoE's", they are a very farmable mob if you are in the area.

*Edit- I have added Part II and Part III- The Addon 

The pics are the "spawn locations" according to wowhead, and the links on their names provide you with the "dropped loot" of these spawns (mouse over their name below to see the loot). Due to their being a handful more, I didn't want to mash them into one post, so expect Part II to hit the "shelves" tomorree. Without further ado, here's you go:


Blazewing Hyjal

  

Thartuk the Exile Hyjal

















Shok'sharak Vashir

















Poseidus Vashir

Burgy Blackheart Vashir
















Lady La-La Vashir

Hope this helps you find not only the rares, but some great loot as well! Some of the drops will actually sell very well on the AH, so keep that in mind when listing them. See ya'll tomorrow!

Epic Gems From Transmutes: But Not How You Think....

Hey Folks! I have done the improbable. I have let a guest post in.....

Bones, better known from IRC and JMTC's Friday night gold meetings has came up with yet another way to get epic gems. Well, kinda. He has a new spin on the Transmutes, and once again, it's a very interesting "view" on the possible stockpile. Will it work? Who knows. Will I stockpile up a bit of herbs? You bet. Will it be a bank tab full? Nah, but I am gonna set aside a few stacks after hearing his "insight".  How about you just read and see for yourself, as he hits some great points within.

Will Epic Gems Transmutes really use Volatiles?

Bones here again, Hijacking another blog to bring out an important service announcement.

Our good friends at JMTC recently posted an article called The Top 5 Items To Stock Up For 4.1/4.2.  The information contained therein is valuable, but I figured I needed to speak up as I believe that they may be leading you down the wrong path on 1 of the 5 topics covered.

In JMTC's words:

·      Volatiles - Why? Again, if you're even going to transmute any of the epic gems you're going to need some cheap volatiles. They're currently low-medium on my server, this will most likely change come 4.1/4.2.

Everyone is so focused on what Blizzard has done in the past, that they often forget to look at the subtle and not so subtle hints that Blizzard puts in our faces.

Case in point, Epic Gems from Transmutes.  In the past, you would take some gems, some volatiles and mix it up together and get an Epic gem out of the deal, 2 if you were an xmute master.

In Cata however, Blizzard, up to this point, has gone down a different path.  The screenshots below show what is likely the real path that blizzard will take for xmuting gems this expansion, and it won't be Volatiles, it will be HERBS! 

See the following screenshots as Exhibit A and I will elaborate in the rest of the article.

 

 

 

To my knowledge, and please leave a comment if I am wrong, never before Cata did blizzard use herbs in the transmutes of gems.  It has always been elementals (Volatiles, motes etc..).

But, in Cata Blizzard decided to buck the trend and use herbs for transmuting un-common (Green quality) gems into rare (Blue quality) gems.  I don't know about the rest of you, but this gets me thinking:

Is Blizzard going to use Volatiles to Xmute Epic Gems?

Maybe.  But I wouldn't bank ALL my gold on it.  To me, there is a 50/50 chance.  It's either going to be Volatiles or its going to be Herbs.   I do not see any other options.

What does this mean to you?

If you're a veteran goblin able to fill Azeroth's wells and fountains with your gold, then I would save up all the cheap Volatiles and Herbs that I can find.  You know its going to be one or the other, and you know you will be able to liquidate the unused choice profitably if you purchase at the proper price point.

What do I believe?

Personally, I believe the xmutes will use Herbs.  I rather believe the simple clues in front of our faces, rather then what Blizzard did in a previous expansion.   Blizzard likes to change things around and keep us on our goblin toes.  I believe this is where 1 such change is here to stay, for this expansion at least.

What will I do with all those unused mats?

As always, in my articles, Bones is here to give you a way out of your stockpiling mess should these investments fail to produce.

Volatiles

Volatiles are used in a lot of recipes.  From Blacksmithing to Tailoring and almost crafting profession in between uses em.  Blizzard has said that they were commited to having ever evolving professions this expansion,  I expect more patterns will be added to the game to continue to stabilize the volatile market.  I still believe Volatiles will have a strong demand, but not because of transmuting Epic gems.

Herbs

Simply put, with the Herbs, I currently make:

Flasks/Potions

Mysterious Fortune Cards / Darkmoon Faire Cards / Glyphs

Flasks have not reached their peak volume yet.  There are not enuf raiders to sustain a high demand on flasks, on most servers.  As people get better geared, they start doing more Raids, the more people that do raids, the more Flasks are going to go off the shelf and this is what I intend on doing with the herbs should they not be needed in transmuting Epic gems.

Conclusion:

Am I right? Am I wrong?  I don't think anyone knows for sure, and I dont think anyone will say that their way is set in stone.  I know mine sure isnt, but I am planning for either eventually.

If you've enjoyed the article, I have another one posted at Xander's Goldmine, called The Real Reason To StockPile Pyrite Ore .

Thanks for reading and don't hesitate to leave your comments. I'll do my best to respond and reply.

Bones

Did you Forget Something? Dust off those Unused Professions!

JMTC has their carnival tomorrow, and here is my "entry" post.  If you haven't already, I want you go over and check it out, as there are quite a few bloggers now with a ton of information. Now for my post, here is how you should start taking on specializing and diversifying the AH on your server. Ready? Set? Go!



Pic from Jack Nadels:
Use What You Have
To Get What You Want



How good are you on the AH? Have you hit 10K, 50K, 500K, a Million? Whichever spot you are at, you mos def need to use what you have to get there. Think about that a second.....

Use what you have. Now this is gonna be completely common sense, but hear me out, as this basic necessity may have passed you by. Use what you have.....

If you are stuck at X amount of gold and wondering why, I can give you one answer (but do you really want to hear it again?) "USE WHAT YOU HAVE". I mean really use it. If you have a toon, and your have Jewelcrafting and Leatherworking (just a for instance here, it can be anything, keep reading...), and you only cut gems and post, what is happening with your other craft? Nothing? Collecting dust? Get the Pledge out and dust that off!

You have professions for a reason, be it to craft goods for yourself or your guild, add to your "buffs" from the profs, but most of you reading this will have a profession for making gold. So why aren't you using it to post your AH? Because you don't want to hit your next 100K mark. That is the only answer you can give. I won't believe anything else.

"Well Alto, it's only 420"

So go burn one. Wait, what? Really, you need to utilize that prof to make you gold. There is probably a reason you stopped leveling. Raiding, got bored, ran outta cash, etc. Whatever excuse you had, you stopped. Pick it back up. If you stopped leveling it, my guess is you also have random mats in your bank near that level too. Use them. Check TuJ or wowhead to see what is available at that level. In leatherworking, there are quite a few niche markets, not all sell daily, but often enough to make a profit. See where I am going with this? Good. Now get it done.

"Alto, I stopped at 515 because I ran out of materials, and the cost was too high"

I am gonna guess that was a few months ago now. The mats have dropped considerably since then, and you need to recheck the AH again. Get up to "cap", and then get some epix recipies (I am still using the leatherworking as an example, but this works with most "crafting" profs other than scribes- as Cata added very little to that prof glyph wise). You spent time leveling that to get to the 515, go that little bit further, because now is the time to make your $$, before 4.1 and a bit after that they will still be selling too (for the ilvl requirements for the heroic 5 mans).

"Bah. There's too much competition"

I have to call bullshit on that one. I really, really, hate that. Too much competition to me means "I am too lazy to look at the different areas". I can personally guarantee there is a niche market somewhere in each profession. Glyphs? "I get undercut". Ok, I believe you. But I bet there are glyphs that aren't even up in the AH right now. It might be a level 25 glyph that sold for 12g last post, but if there isn't one there, it won't sell, amirite? I am. Check. Spend your time, and it will payoff. Guaranteed. Oh, you are a Jewelcrafter? "The gems are worthless, all of them". I call bullshit again...Ok, so you must have every single cut available, along with every "crafted" necklace, ring, etc. And you have checked each one of them at the AH. I bet there are at least 5 "cut" gems that aren't even on your AH. And the crafteds? Yeah, probably half of them aren't on their either....

"Well, to tell you the truth, I was looking at changing profs to XXXXX, because I am bored of it, and haven't used tailoring in a while"

Look above at that answer. Have you checked EVERY possible craft? Are you posting EVERY possible craft? Once again, I see so many folks that don't utilize what they can, or should be, posting daily. You aren't on everyday? Post 24 or 48 hours.....

"God Alto, you know how much AH fees I will lose on 48 hour posts?"

Yeah, I do. But you know how much profit you are losing? You are gonna risk a 10g AH fee if it doesn't sell against a 2-4K profit? Once again, that is one of the worst excuses I have heard. You know Johnny, if you keep saying this stuff, I am gonna have to kick you outta class, I don't think you are even reading what I am talking about....


So in order to specialize and diversify, you need to first see what you can do, what markets (or niches) you have available in your AH, and what time you are willing to spend to find what you are looking for. If you have more money than time, or are just stuck, you can always go to my coaching program and I can assist you in finding what you have been searching for.....gold.

Now log into your toon and start crafting and posting. Then after you sell some, come back and holler. Chanks!

PTR 4.1.0 Zul' Gurub 5 Man Heroic Snapshots- Part I

Just a quick update, in between the constant issues with D/C'ing, the horrible pugs (I dont think they even have level 60 toons, not sure why they are allowed to "roll" a test 85 if you have never even done an instance before) and the bad lag times, I was able to get a few pics of ZG for ya'll to drool over (blizz actually did a good job changing the scematics of the instance, even though the baseline graphics are there, I like the additions so far!)

For those that don't want to see, spoiler alert inc!

 

 

Starting off, the instance is great. I D/C'd three times at the first boss, so there was a total wipe each time (not that a piddly rogue's DPS would have helped- a dead deeps is worse than a bad deeps), but I can tell you to use the cauldrons, as they have a buff (Toxic Torment) that absorbs 90% of nature damage (and it's unlimited, so mid fight you can run back to debuff, I recommended to the tank to "pull" next to it, common sense huh? lol.).

There are achievements that are related to the "dungeon" as well, a "PTR Guildie" just got one before I disconnected for the last time, and wasn't able to get back on again, so I was not able to get a pic for you.

Is this patch going to get me back into enjoying the game again? I am thinking so....

A "How To" on Selling Goods - 4.0.6 Enchants Example

This post is once again directed from a reader email that I received yesterday. Mila asked about the new Enchant formulas and how to price the scrolls. Even though this post is geared toward them, the information contained here will work with any "rare or epix" item (you just might have to use your imagination a little).

Whether you are a blacksmith, tailor, leatherworker, or what-have-you, take the info below, and just "tailor" it to you and your prof. While reading, you will see how I set market prices for "new" items (after patches, after new BoE's come out into the AH). I will cover a few things here: pricing, AH comparison, estimating worth/value, and dealing with buyers in /tells. Without further ado, here's you's go!

So with the drop of 4.0.6 recently, we came across a few new enchants:

Enchant Bracer- Agility    +50 Agility
12 Hypnotic Dust
2 Maelstrom Crystal
15 Volatile Air

Enchant Bracer- Major Strength    +50 Strength
6 Hypnotic Dust
2 Maelstrom Crystal
25 Volatile Earth

Enchant Bracer- Mighty Intellect  +50 Intellect
4 Hypnotic Dust
4 Greater Celestial Essence
2 Maelstrom Crystal
15 Volatile Water

Now if you were one of the first to pick up these enchants, you are probably freaking out wondering if you are ever gonna get your "investment" back. Whether you paid 10K, 15K, or 25K for the "drop", the market is still pretty slim right now. When you factor in each one is 2 Malestroms, and those are probably sitting around 2-3K right now (on the low end), you are looking at a 6500g enchant. Crafter cost....

So now we have to decide a few things. One, what profit margin you are looking to get. First, you will need to check to see if anyone is selling the enchants in your AH. If you are on a US server, check The Undermine Journal to see what the traffic is on the 'chant.

"Alto, there are a few I see, and they are going for 7K"

Keep one constant at that price. A 500g profit (or 499g99s99c) is better than zero. In this case, I do not want you to buy out the 7K and list for 10K. Go all the way down to 200g profit. I would not recommend to go lower than that. Peace of mind.

"Alto, I haven't seen any yet. None. What prices do I sell them for?"

One and a half to twice the mats cost (remember, that's YOUR mats cost). So if you pay out of pocket 4.6K, then you should cut that in half (2.3) and add that to your inital investment, so you end up selling on the low end for 6.9K.  See where I am going with this? Pretty simple. If one sells quickly, then what we will do next is add 1K. If it sells, then add another. If it doesn't, drop it back down. Okie Dokie?

"Alto, after listing, I am getting tells with folks having mats, and will tip for it"

This is a great thing. I normally charge half my markup in the AH. So using the numbers above, you can safely charge 1K. Now here is the kicker. If you keep an eye out on your "popular" guilds, and see that they are one of them, do this....."I have been charging 1K to enchant this, but I will cut it in half if you holler at your buds. Anyone in your guild can get one for 500g if they supply the mats". Now "big money" might not tell his/her guild, but you put a bug in their ear, and it's still freebie profit. Feel me there?

"Here we go, I got another one for you....Someone isn't wanting the chant, they are wanting it on a scroll. They said that they are putting it on their "main", and offered a 500g tip.....they also mention that the one you have listed in the AH is too high, the mats only cost 4.6K."

Ugh. Bad situation. Before saying "yes" right away (I just told you to take 500g for a tip...didn't I?), you can assume that this guy is going to try to flip it (remember you have one in the AH for 2.3K more than the mats, right? If not, he just reminded you...). So you get 500g, he gets 1800g, and you lose a sale because he just undercut your auction.

In this scenario, I would tell him "I am sorry, but I am the only one with this chant that is selling the scrolls, and I hate doing this, but I can go 1K to put it on a scroll for you (that way if he does sell, at least you got 1K, and you can undercut the shit outta him for lying to you...), or if you log on your main, I can chant your bracers for 500g."

"Alright, you are doing good covering scenarios Alto. Now I got one for you.....You get a tell saying "why would I pay 6.9K for that when i can get XXX for a couple hundred gold? You aren't gonna sell that, how low can you go on it?"

This is probably the worst situation for a sale. How good of a salesman/woman are you? I would have to respond with "The reason the lesser chant is XXX is due to that's an old enchant. If you want me to sell you that one, I have one I can sell you for XXX (cheaper than AH). The reason that scroll is so expensive is that it's the best. Have you seen the materials to make it? I am barely making profit. So if you want to heal/dps/tank/ at Wrath level, by all means, it's up to you. But you have to pay for the best, and these are the best. Welcome to Cata bud!"

Now thats a long tell, but you get my point. You want to let them know that if that is too rich for their blood, you can sell them the "lesser" scroll (more sales). Then you want to tell them mats cost (they might not know). Then you want to tell them that there is little profit (you aren't lying. you are still at a loss from the 15K you paid for it....).

Now I want to reiterate a few things here:

One, you NEED to have one of all your major "crafts" in the AH at ALL times (as you can afford). You should know your market to see what is selling, if not, you can check around (The Undermine- even if you are on a EU server, just to check the "going rates" and the average sales per day).

Two, DO NOT sell for a loss, unless in dire need. I would hope that you have listened to me about investing in anything, no matter what it is, that you should NOT put more than a third of your bankroll into a "quick flip" (herbs, ores, volatiles- at a "farmer rate" or CHEAP...), and if there is a chance that it won't sell fast (epix crafted, the rare scrolls above, etc), don't invest more than 10%. This way, if it doesn't sell right away, or the price fluctuates, you aren't freaking out. You still have your "stockpile" of gold to invest in other areas. Feel me?

I hope this helps clear up a few things about newer items and how to go about selling them. Pricing, AH comparison, estimating worth/value, and dealing with buyers in /tells.

For my seasoned (no, not with salt or pepper, the "pro") readers, do you see anything I left out here? Did you actually get through the whole post? If you did (haha), I bet you are thinking about something right now. How about tossing a comment for the folks out there? Thanks ahead of time for the support!

Goldmaking After Darkmoon Faire- Alto's "How To"

First off, I want to thank everyone that commented on yesterday's post. It was a very tough decision, and the winner is......Well, I can't tell you yet, I said Wednesday! I also wanted to thank Brouck for his post dedicated to me, "The Best Blog (post) Ever!". It means alot that someone cares that much to post something like that. Alright, with that outta the way, Let's rock on!

With the end of Darkmoon, we have a bit of time before the next one. What does this mean for us AH PvP'ers? Alot. See alot of people are gonna burn up their stock of their singles, because they want their gold back in their pockets. I can't blame em, and we are here to make some profits.

"Duh Alto, we know that already. How do I make gold? Get to the point already!". Ok. First off, you are going to want to hit the AH and open up your BUY tab. Now make yourself a nice and pretty Shopping List:

*Edit- Thanks to Syn in comments for this addition- To make it a more specific List with Auctionator you can also type: Quest/of embers,Quest/of the winds. it will come up with only the cards because it searches the quest category of the "of whatever" name.

of the winds
of stones
of embers
of waves
Earthquake
Hurricane
Tsunami
Volcano

Now I hope you added these to your new shopping list. If you didn't, go back and do it again, because to do this right, you cannot miss any of them. Got it? Good.

Now in this example, you can see that every single card is up for grabs. Nice. A full deck. Let's add em up quick and compare to the screenshot above.






Lets just round up a few gold and say 15K instead of 14923g (i didnt add silvers...). And how much is the full deck going for? 29K. The card? 10K cheaper at 19K. Now you do the math....see all them zero's? 15K investment, maybe a week on the AH, and you are looking at an easy 10,000g profit. "Ok Alto, your math is jacked again, that's a 14K profit". Gimme a minute to explain...

Now don't get me wrong, you might sit on this for a few weeks, or it might sell in a day. You might /2 it up and sell it in trade with something like "WTS Hurricane Deck- 5K cheaper than AH- my loss, your gain". Or not. Completely up to you.

Now all you have to do is keep posted on the different decks, and go from there. Before you say "This don't work on my server". Tell me which server you on, because I will check. It does. Now you might not have all the cards for one deck available right at this moment, but you can always snatch up a few now and change your list to "Needed Darkmoon Cards" (yes, I have one like that in case you were wondering). Obviously, there are some decks that are not worth the "flip" here, they might be lopsided, but I hope you got my point here. Now I have done this before and hit on it in a post, but this tosses a bit of more detail for ya'll.

By the way, this is great to do for the "old school" decks as well, and save them for the week before the faire to sell off (even the day of) for the folks that pay to turn in decks or that are buying the cheaper darkmoon decks to turn in for rep.

Now I gotta ask, how did your server look after checking? Some great deals out there, huh? If you don't see anything, either you need a new script on your glasses, you need glasses, or someone beat you to the punch...But I have a feeling that quite a few of you will see some great profits out there. Lemme know!

Altos "How To" Guide- Manipulate the AH to get Epic Results

I have hit on this before, but not in complete detail. Well, here you go folks. This style of AH PvP is hated by some, as I am sure to get some blast on my comments for covering this....

This is in fact a two part post combined into one. Since Cata, I have seen this example happen on almost every "farmable" mat that is used in crafting, and have used this style of PvP with almost every one of them. Mysterious Fortune Cards is a biggie. Volatiles, Gems, Leather, and Ore/Herbs are heavy hitters too. Enough chit-chat, lets get this goin, right?

First off, check your AH. You can do it many ways, but the best is using the Auctionator Buy tab. Go to my "Recent" searches (like my jacked MFC twice in a row? lol) and in this example, I am using Volatile Life. Be prepared in some markets to do a hefty investment (in this case around 3300g). The reason I focus on Volatiles for this is they are a quick sale, everyone and their grandma are snatching these up all times of the day. So I am warning you to be weary of what markets you do this with, as I prefer the ones with the quick flip like I mentioned above. Next.

See the 7.99g posts?

There are 8 stacks of 1, 2 stacks of 200, then it goes to 10g with two stacks of 1. Total around 3300g investment. Buy em all up. Got me? You are looking for the "big break". 8g to 13g is a 5g profit per sale, correct? And how many did I just buy? 400ish? So really, I am looking at a near 2K profit on this "flip". But I bring it a bit farther. Why do you ask? Read on, young grasshopper....

Click on the SS above, and study it, then come back. "What are you doing Alto?", "You are already undercutting yourself!". Yeah, you are right. But no, not in all senses of the term. You see, Volatile Life is used by a few different profs. And really, you need multiples. Not just one. When crafters purchase these from the AH, they buy bulk. I would go into why, but it would take too long. Trust me. You have already and made a ton of gold from my advice, why stop now?

Now I know your next question. "Why are you only listing half of what you bought, and why in 50 stacks?" The 50 stack reason is due to my answer above. If someone needs 36 to craft XX item, they will buy 50 and have extra. Why? Because to buy 36 in the example above, they would have to click 12 times to buy the stacks of three below me. We all know we make more gold from the lazy people. One click versus twelve clicks? We win. =) The second part of your question is....wait. I answered the second part first. Thanks for correcting me. The "first" part of your question was why am I listing half right now....that is twofold. One, you create a false sense of "rarity" of the item. Two, well, in this case, I was planning on being on for a few to prospect and mill, so I would have easy access to the AH when they sell. And if I saw no movement in 20 min or so, I would double back, check to see undercut, and change my gameplan.

So, I post my 4 stacks of 50, tap the button for a fresh AH scan, go downstairs to put a load in the wash, go out back, smoke a stogie (thanks to a twitter post by CbC earlier, I broke out a Cohiba, went on the porch, and watched the snow melt for a few minutes). I come back to see that my four sold. So I repost the other four stacks of 50, do my Auctionator scan now, and go to finish my stogie. I come back, and this is what I see:

Ok. Add that up quick. 3737.5g is on it's way to my mailbox. 250 outta the 400 sold, and I have already made a 400 gold profit. Now I am writing this post around midnight, and havent logged back in yet to check, but I can guarantee they sold, for another 2200g in sales. So if you wanna see it as a 2600g profit for a few minutes work, then I am gonna have to agree with you. Not too shabby, huh?

Now this is not server dependent. You can run multiple markets with this idea, and even go further and "bully" with this style of AH PvP. So when your niche market is slowing, search around and do a test run. Remember, I know my markets, along with the ebb and flow. You might not want to risk this, as certain markets will seriously stress you out if you toss some gold at it and see no returns right away.
I can guarantee if you see the same screen above on your server, follow my steps, you will succeed. Well, unless you are on my server, you won't see this too often, unless I miss it.... =(

Now I need something from you. Tweet me, Follow me, Digg me, whatever all those little circles are up there. If you have one of those accounts, get my blog out there. I am not asking you to buy anything, just shout out to your WoW friends. It took me about about an hour and a half to write this post and make it all pretty for you to read, I imagine you can take 10 seconds to do this for me. See how easy that was?

And to all those that are filling up my inbox the last few days, know that the emails do not go unnoticed, and I enjoy reading what you have to say! Thanks again, and always feel free to contact me or ask questions in comments below.

4.0.6 Update: Tiny Treasure Chest Droprate

I have some new droprate information for you all since the patch and recent hotfixes, as I am sure that you have been wondering if it's worth spending 250g on a Potion of Treasure Finding or not. I went to my time honored mob spot (Hyjal) and I timed an hour (ok, 1 sec short on my last loot) and here are the results:

122g 54s 29c: Gold Looted
52g 78s 40c : Random Greys, vendored
85g 38s 83c : (10) Random Greens, vendored
356g : Kilt of Elemental Mending (only blue looted- AH price)
396g : 18 Volatile Fire
96g : 32 Embersilk Cloth
77 Lovely Charms

12 Tiny Treasure Chests:
225g : (75) Embersilk Cloth
24g : (2) Pyrite Ore
28g : (7) Elementium Ore
72g : (3) Volatile Water
198g : (9) Volatile Fire
44g : (4) Volatile Life
90g : (6) Volatile Earth
27g : (1) Volatile Air


Total Gold= 1816'ish
Minus 150g for Potion= 1666g

The 12 Tiny Treasure Chests more than covered the "average" cost of the Potion on the AH, so I believe that it is still viable to use for solo mob farming. Obviously, you can factor in the numbers to make them better or worse by crafting items, fluctuating AH prices, AH fees, etc. It does seem that the "patch change" to the chests have no significant difference from before.

And as an update, I received some in game mail, I seemed to have sold a 5K card to one happy customer! Have you sold one? Have you got one? Are the cards even selling anymore on your server?