Group Therapy: Reinvesting

Whenever we have profit, a piece of it gets reinvested back in to the AH. But what if you'd have 10K+ , 100K+ or 200K+ (!)? Is it possible to keep reinvesting? If so, how much, in what, and even why?
Personally, i invest 50% of my profit. with other words, if i earn 5G profit, i would use 2.5G for the AH and keep 2.5G. Yes, this makes progress slower, but then atleast I still have some back up money if something goes wrong. Ofcourse no two minds are alike and some would even shoot me for doing it this way. I know i'm not the all powerfull Guru, there are others out there.... well, for once they are here. And they are sharing their thoughts....

Zekta:I keep a comfortable level of cash (currently 4k).
my balance will be always on 5-6k level. So whenever opportunity hits, or I need for spending, there will be 2k cash for me. (if I need more, e.g. for a given gear, I'll save them up up front)
I normally invested in Ore, Ethereal, Pets, Leather, Gem. Whenever they're cheap or will raise for patch later. Sweet Deals are much harder to find lately, so I called for COD for Nether Cloth, Books, Herbs (For ink, I had 1-2 month ink supply now :( ). Am looking into noble card for that, but seems not so profitable in my server. I am still looking for other business to do (or to burn those extras ) peeking on JMTC's forum now.

Grodus: I play on a heavily populated horde server. Many of the markets are difficult to break into because of this, as there are some players who post auctions almost constantly, but I've learned to reinvest very strategically. In a given week, I tend to spend 2-3k gold to make back around 5-6k gold. It's not a huge amount of my overall gold as I'm usually sitting at around 20k, but it's a good number for anyone who wants results with less risk.
It's very important when reinvesting to know when to buy and know what to sell. I've found that the two best times for stocking up (and this will vary from server to server,) are Monday night before server maintainence, and Friday night. A lot of farmers will post their items Friday night to get ready for the Saturday rush. There's gold to be made there.
As for what to reinvest in, do some research on the items people need to have for raiding. Flasks and gems are great to buy on slower days and post them again on heavy raiding days. Even better if you have an alchemist. If you know of items that are useful for raiding, do some research. Even if someone has cornered one of these markets you can still make a profit by supplying the supplier.

Three seperate views gives a nice depth to the post don't you think?
Thank you Grodus and Zekta for doing this with me!

And remember A fortune starts with one copper!

Monday Morning Hangover: Politics

oooh Boy it was a weekend.
Saturday most of my day was Wife, WoW and mates. Doing VoA 10 and 25 and clearing 2 wings of naxx i severly lost track of time, and just forgot about the video. (im still searching on a subject for that one too!)
Sunday it was aaaalll Politics. It was the day of the European election but also for our Flemish Goverment, so most of my day was spend in front of the tube. Crying and swearing that the guys where i vote on (and am a member of) we're losing severly.

This got me thinking about WoW though...(hopefully that ain't an addiction warning)
In RL if someone makes a mistake in politics they ussually pay for it. And Pay bigtime sometimes. (10% loss in the election)
Well the same happens in WoW actually though slightly diffrent. On my Naxrun of Saturday, it was my first time with Elloën as a RL and my first time ever to lead a PuG, my main was a RL untill the guild quited raiding and i transferred here to Ravenholdt, but i never ever leaded a pug before. Well i got everything together, took some extra flasks with me (bought them cheap) and sold them at pug members for 2G profit, (always take flasks to a pug raid, most of them forget to buy them)
Well i've had a great run the first two quarters. then things got hot and heavy.
Construct quarter: Patchwerk. First mistake of a member: didnt repair and died. so He needed to fly back to repair come back again, and died 2 more times because of the slimes taking half the raid (about 11) along to his death! Flaming started and i really needed to spam Raid to keep everyone in it. (god i hate not having ventrillo)
We died 3 times at patchwerk, as the RL this is my fault, someone not dps'ing enough? undergeared? i'm responsible for the deaths and trouble. So ofc my head rolled after the 3th time and we broke apart. This small ex. to just show you that even in WoW you take your respnsibilities, sometimes without even choosing it. If you pût something in AH and it sells for 25s instead of 25G = you lose money! if you like it or not you will lose money. trouble in the guild? officers are responisble and the guild can turn against them.

Oh well posts to read up:
Greedy goblin asks you an Easy Question.
WoW enomics is being funny on monday.
And Zekta gives his Weekly report.

Enjoy your first workday of this new week!

Grtz
Seth

1G plz!: Watch your step: Armor ahead!

For all the new players starting their that don't want to beg for their first gold, here's another edition of 1G plz!

One of the biggest money sinks at lowerlevels, and through out the game is gear.
People and certainly new players think that they need the latest and greatest... you couldnt be farther from the truth...
If we just level, with some instances you'll probably be wearing gear that lies in the range of up to date and outdated 10lvls ago.. well i'm here to say: this aint a big deal! One of the prime examples is: Delzoun (Ravenholdt EU) he's a lvl 45 prot tank, who dungeons a bit while lvling. if you'll look at his armory page you can see he's not wearing the latest and greatest gear, hell my chest is a quest item from lvl30 (okaj, a blue Q item, with awesome stats but still).
I tank throughout dungeons with "outdated" gear, and still i have to see my first wipe with him. Granted i have died a few times in instances, but always managed to save the group. This is just to say: You dont need Expensive gear! quest for it, then dungeon for the rest, and you'll be geared in no time.

A few very important tips:
- Don't be sad if your still have a white or grey item the first 15-20 lvls, just look at the following tip.
- really really need gear? => dungeons!
- remember: you don't need that extra +1 intellect, its only 0.03% crit and 15mana! take a look at your spells... what costs less then 100mana at lvl40? nothing! So that 1% intellect increase won't matter!
- Sell your green gear that you find and don't use at the AH! remember others are still dumb enough to buy it. (only list it once though! and don't overcharge it)
- don't buy new armor when you can wear mail/plate at lvl40!
- Sell all your mail/plate items from lvl40-46!!! (great, great cash!)
-if a blue or purple item drops and its BoE don't you dare to equip it! it'll be outdated in 5lvls instead of 3 so just sell it on the AH and youll have enough gold (or more) for your mount! (believe me i once did this with: bow of searing arrows)

Yes, i know this post doesn't "teach" you how to make money, but it will save you about 100G+ through out the first lvls, so i made you money anyway HAH! Seriously, these tips will make you money, though you won't "see" it, youll be a gold richer for every equipment slot every level.

That's it for today, stay tuned!

PS: An "AH-config" movie will hopefully be made this weekend.

And remember
A fortune starts with one copper!

Crafters Gold: Low-level Inscription... andi mean low

So Remember my warlock? he's lvl idunno 16? right now. I didnt have much time to play him, or even log him on the last 2 days, what i do know though is that my prejudice of Inscription was wrong... so terribly awfully wrong.

Damiän's (the warlock) inscription is up and about 90skillpoints, which ain't worth nothing for most proffesions. well, i'm 90 and have done 3 orso daily minor researches. with that i got ofc 3 minor glyphs.
2 out of 3 sell well: Glyph of charge (?) and glyph of bloodrage. Both are for a warrior and both can be sold at my ah for about 10G. while the mats to make them cost about 1G. I sold 3 of each, every day for 3 days. which gave me a 54G profit, just to log-in on an alt (!) now ofc 54G isnt much but its something, certainly if it's your first char, and you farm the mats... do you hear the money rolling?
Ofcourse this can expand... if i'm getting 10glyphs to sell at 10G ... just do the math.

If you just started playing, or want a good way to start making your money, this is really it.
farming herbs and leather can be nice profit, same for ore and leather. But inscription, really takes it to a next level. Though i still believe with some effort i could do the same with low-lvl Jc, i'll need more mat's to buy (less profit) or more time to do it (less profit).

quick recap:
1) low-lvl Inscription = Amazing
2) probably the top gold maker for characters between lvl5-20!

Grtz
Sethc

Deep thoughts: being active is expensive

My newly dinged hunter (80) is getting a bit expensive... and by a bit i mean holy hell(!)
After raiding with other mains for the last 4y (and taking a break from it since january) I decided, with my current time schedule, i could do it again. So i said to myself... let's get this guy geared up...
What do i spend my money on then?

Heroics... yes heroics... sunday and monday where The Ocolus dailys... we wiped 9 and 6 times at the last boss... which means 50G repair a piece = 100G.
Leatherworking, i needed to get my lw up from 43? to 440... which cost me about 350G
gearing up... good cloacks almost never drop at heroics so i made my own... 250G
Flasks... My guild is going slow these days with my raidleaders being off on vacation and the GL being online about 15mins a day. so i had to buy them. (ofc i checked mats to flasks) so thats 22G a flask x 10 = 220G
Cooking... and this is the worst... already at 100G and only skill200... why didnt ever bothered? i mean its a hunter for godssake... ooh well.
4000 arrows a day. (minimum) = 100G

So yesterday i spent 1020G on my hunter...(!)
I mean i love making money and i love getting it in my mailbox, but i forgot how expensive endgame is. on Ravenholdt i now have a total of 10K in my pockets. and still some stuff thats worth 2K (avools sword of jin) but jeeez(!) i also decided not to get the fast flyer (i dont need it anyway, everythings explored and i dont herb/mine)

On the Raiders side:
I've done 2 pugs this weekend OS25 and Naxx25, both times i came in 10th of dps, which is considering my lowlvl rings/trinkets pretty ok. I've got one good item out of it so i'm happy. The guild is starting to raid again in 2 weeks (Raid Leaders will be back) and I need to get geared up... and deep down inside i hope that i' can get my own raiding guild together by the end of this month (thats going to cost me!) , probz not happening.
So if anyone of Ravenholdt reads this... if you want me to raid with ya, just ask! Elloën is at your service.

On a Brighter note:
My best mate decided to join me on my new server (Raven...) and he brought me 10 arctic furs, for 50G a piece, which is awesome since they cost 110G here.. can you hear Ka-ching, Ka-ching!

My tip for keeping your money up: work your proffesion(!) cooking,fishing, leatherworking, what ever, all of them have something that lets you sell for profit so USE it! I'm selling a lot of icescale legguards right now for a 50G profit a piece.

So what do you all think? is Endgame too expensive? did you saw your money drop a bit when you started raiding again? And any tips to the blogreaders to keep your money up?

Group Therapy: Family and WoW

Hello all,
A lot of people say that "Videogames are anti-social", "Videogamers are nerds" or "he's a loner, he plays videogames". Well 90% of the Time they are probably right. But WoW is so diffrent. Myself and my wife as example.
When i met her, she already played WoW. Granted her highest character was lvl26 orso. But still... she played(!) Weirdest thing about it is beautifull, yes yes i know a lot of people say that his/her mate are pretty. But i'm not saying pretty here. She is gorgeous weird but true. So "Videogamers are nerds" isn't always true. I'm work in the IT and do know too much stuff for my own good, but still i don't look like one. Why is it that people are so hung-on on clichés?

Well my wife and I, we still play WoW and a bit more than we used too, with a bit more time on our hands and that we can see each other a lot more then we used too, helps with that. We have nights (certainly in the weekend) that we can put up our lap-tops next to each other and just game a few hours. Some of the nights, my best mate (who i made a WoWer) comes over, and we play with 3 in the living room. Even my lill sister joins in from time to time. So are we loners? I think not, Granted we don't "party" as much as we used too, but i'm feeling too "old" (read: mature) for that stuff.

Normally this should have been an interview with my wife. But due lack of time and memory (we kept forgetting to do the interview) we kinda forgot. So this is my way of saying thank you.
For all you have done for me, for all you mean to me, for letting me do the things i do and believe the things i believe, for loving me, but most importantly: Just for being who you are. Sweetheart, I love you.

Note that from next week, other bloggers will join this Thuesday post. I'm not telling who yet, just to keep you reading this blog.... (as we say in wow: ^^)


Grtz
Seth

Monday morning hangover: eating money

pffff weekends eat my money away, friday night i was up to 6K in money and 10K worth, today i can say without blushing im at 5K and 7K worth (!!!) my "main" on Ravenholdt dinged 80 and needed some stuff....
1) powerlvling cooking
2) buying flasks for raiding
3) heavy repair bills (about 100G a day (!))
so money is a aspect of the game which i need to pay more attention on these days, but ofcourse the small AH isnt in my favor, a lot of niche markets have dissapeared, (arrows and bullets are now selling cheaper then the boxes) markets are overflowing, and others are dry and too hard to farm (arctic furs, which i need myself)

So trading wasnt that good this weekend, i also didnt have time for a vid (i'm sorry!)
But this gives you the chance to give a comment on what you want to see in the video... (hint hint)


for (more) reading material you can always visit the folowing blogs:
Greedy goblin is talking about uproar and trust.
Wowenomics is being funny again.
And ofcourse don't foget one of my personal favorits: Zekta's sunday report.

Grtz
and take care