First of all, I want to thank all the Goblins on this subreddit. Some of the information here was instrumental in my planning and organization to be successful in this endeavor.
IntroductionPrevious to this expansion I tried to get Long Boi through just reputation satchels across a few toons, and after crunching some numbers, I realized even if I did them nonstop for the next year I would never get enough money for Long Boi. I built up over 1 million gold, which was great, but nowhere near my goal. I decided for the next expansion I had a goal. 10 million gold. I WOULD achieve it.
I find gold making has two currencies in WoW. For example starcraft, you have several currancies: Minerals, gas, and supply. In Wow, those two currencies are gold and time. Sometimes the currency I choose to invest is gold. Sometimes the currency I choose to invest is time (which usually means farming). Early on I would farm to mitigate gold risk. I was worried that a good would drop in value greatly and I would invest a large amount of gold and lose the gold. So the currency I chose to spend was time instead of gold. But this had a side effect. Farming has value too! I quickly learned what the 'difficult' materials were to farm and that gave me insight into what would be higher price on the AH.
ResearchI did a lot of research in the few months leading up to the expansion. In some cases/areas I did enough. In others I was severely lacking. The one thing I read over and over and over was; get lots of alts. I went overboard on this as I transferred or leveled 9 toons on a single server (to 50) in preparation for the expansion. Partly this was to consolidate my gold, as I had 500k on some servers that I never intended to play on again. For MY playstyle and available time, I have found that I only NEED 6 toons on a server to maximize my productivity. Of those toons only 5 are level 60. (also I highly suggest not having your bank toon at max level, as you don't accidentally use flasks/potions etc).
If I wanted to make more money, I definitely could level a few more alts for transmutes, etc. But my personal time is a resource. And that resource is scarce! I've found that @ 6 toons total, I am able to utilize my spare time effectively to make money. I have a house/job/life so my time in wow is limited. Even in covid times. If I had had more time, I would have leveled alts sooner and ground out more reputation for gold in things like blacksmithing (the 168 gear for example was a huge missed opportunity).
At the end of the day, I went too light on research on legendries before the expansion released. I didn't understand it totally, so I didn't understand the potential. I made it to gold cap fairly quick all things considered. But if I had understood the potential, I could have made a LOT more money.
Understanding how to use TSM and the Undermine Journal was critical in this process. Research via watching videos of goblin masters gave me some critical basic tools to make my gold. I wish I had spent some time in BFA learning to watch the AH to understand ups and downs of the market. Samadan's basic videos on TSM are fantastic. One of these days I'll watch the rest.
Finally, research indicated that a farming druid toon was critical to making gold in a new expansion. I found this to be very very very true. I went mining/herb.
The ProcessI went through several phases in my gold making. I'll break it down like this:
Pre expansion. Selling leveling mats. See row 4 in the picture below.- Expansion launch. Selling raw herbs/mining. In retrospect, I wish I had saved more of these for myself, but the capital was very helpful regardless.
- Leveled my first alt. Blacksmithing unlocked.
- Ran another toon through Maw and got enchanting/tailoring going. This was VERY expensive at the time to invest in this. Looking back though, it wasn't bad at all cost wise. Row 10 in the excel picture.
- Leveled third alt. Alchemy & Herbalism. Stocked up for M+ and raid release.
- Entered the legendary market in Blacksmithing (just one lego. In case you didn't know, lego is short for legendary)
- Leveled another alt. Entered the LW legendary market (just one lego there).
- BOE flips and Alch/Enchanting sales. Unlocked shadestone transmutes.
- Shuffling and Alch/Enchanting sales. TSM's crafting tool is GREAT for enchanting.
- BOE flips and Texas storms. Also entered the ring legendary market. This was done AFTER I hit my goal.
I can go into a lot more more detail, but instead I'll just post my day by day which I documented every day or so. Here's the day by day.
Here's the graph of my progress.
On average, my gold increased about 100k per day.
Final ThoughtsI'd say the majority of my profits were from Legendary sales. I mitigated the 'risk' of the price of the legos dropping out on me by farming all of the elethium ore, and half of the heavy callous hide. When I hit the legendary ring legos, I just bought all the ore and prospected it. My time had hit a point that it was more valuable than the time required to farm that ore up.
Alchemy is second on my gold making. And then followed up by BOE flips. Overall it's a multitude of things and not just this or that. Every gold earned adds up.
All in all I'd say the most important things to make gold are:
- Watching the AH prices. Buy low, craft, sell high. Be willing to reset a market here or there if you see a cheap opportunity.
- Be willing to farm occasionally. But be aware, time spent farming is time lost elsewhere.
- Cancel scanning. It sucks, but a necessary evil.
One last thing to say, making friends with your fellow goblins is MASSIVELY helpful. I had one person sell me back a lego I accidentally posted at the wrong price. (I now use TSM instead of manually posting so this doesn't happen). Also occasionally they will let me know when they are about to reset a price, so I can buy some mats. Be kind, don't hold grudges, even though they **** you off with their cancel scanning, and be aware you're ****ing someone else off with it too. It's just a game at the end of the day.
Shoutouts
Special thanks to Vynoir, Telleria, and Jonnytrump (even though he can be a pain to fight on cancel scanning) for being helpful and friendly in this process!
The excel rows:
https://imgur.com/a/ywprOc5The graph:
https://i.imgur.com/WngDp8Q.pngThe end result:
https://i.imgur.com/mf3FBj3.pngFor those who may have missed the news on
Wowhead, the Cataclysm JC crafted Rhinestone Sunglasses can be transmorg come Patch 9.0.5. You need a JC with Cataclysm JC maxed at 75 to learn the recipe. That's the easy part...trying to obtain
Design: Rhinestone Sunglasses I have read is not so easy. However, if you don't already have the recipe and don't want to be grinding hours, days, weeks, months or years(?) to get it you could make lots and lots of extra gold by selling/flipping the reagents needed to craft the Sunglasses:
- Truegold transmute (no cooldown) requires:
x3 Pyrium Bar created by either:
Smelting x2 Pyrite Ore - Transmute: Pyrium Bar (nets 3 bars): x1 Elementium Bar (Smelting x2 Elementium Ore) and 1x Volatile Earth *Daily Cooldown - Shared with Living Steel*
x10 each: Volatile Air, Volatile Fire and Volatile Water
Hypnotic Dust
- Can be disenchanted from Deathsilk Belt or Deathsilk Bracers. Either are made from 2 Bolt of Embersilk Cloth (x10 Embersilk Cloth) and 2 Eternium Thread. Note: DE yields 1-3 Hypnotic Dust OR Lesser Celestial Essence.
Dream Emerald
- Can be prospected from Pyrite Ore, Elementium Ore or Obsidium Ore.
As an FYI there is no mass prospect in Cataclysm, but it is going to be the cheapest way to get the gems you need to level Cataclysm JC.