by Basil Berntsen

Today we’ll be talking about something that many experienced auctioneers have discovered on their own– the stack size you list on the auction house has an effect on your profits and sales volumes. There are many types of things that you’ll find yourself selling as you get more involved in making gold on the AH, and most of them are being bought by people who need more than one, but less than a stack.

The buyers for whatever product you’re marketing are motivated mostly by price, however also by convenience. If a buyer needs a stack of 3, say, Infinite Dusts, unless you provide them with the choice of buying a stack of three, they need to choose between 3 singles or a stack that would leave them with leftovers. If the prices are the same, they’ll typically go for avoiding leftovers. Many will even pay more for singles to they can avoid leftovers. You also have to factor in that many of them use the default AH interface, complete with its horrible sorting, so they may just buy the singles to avoid having to page through to the stack size they want.
How should you use this to make more gold? You can provide the service of pre-packaging your wares in a variety of stack sizes. The skill comes in when you’re trying to decide what sizes to offer, how much of each size you should list, and what prices you should use. Here are some rules of thumb:
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by Amanda Miller

If you’re like me, you have a lot of excess emblems sitting around. Maybe you never got around to spending them before the next tier came out, or maybe the badge gear just never quite compared to your raid drops. Whatever the case, there is no sense letting them go to waste when you could put them to work and earn some gold!

First, here is a quick breakdown of the current badge system, from most recent and difficult to acquire on down:

1. Emblem of Frost: These can be acquired primarily by raiding Icecrown, completing the Raid Boss Per Week “weekly,” or by completing one WotLK heroic dungeon per day using the Random tool.
2. Emblem of Triumph: Most raids now drop these badges, as well as heroics. You will also be awarded these for doing any number of WotLK heroic dungeons past your first one per day using the Random tool. You will also get some by completing your first normal WotLK dungeon per day using the Random tool, as well as completing the Raid Boss Per Week “weekly.” Also of note: If you get Heroic Oculus using the random tool, don’t drop group! Not only has it been nerfed like crazy, but when you defeat the end boss, every player will receive a loot bag that will contain these badges and more, plus a chance at getting the super rare Reigns of the Blue Drake, which used to be available only by killing Malygos, who now drops his 25-man version (Azure) in both 10 and 25-man.
3. Emblem of Conquest: Originally, these were acquired by running 10-man Coliseum, or 25-man Ulduar.
4. Emblem of Valor: Originally these dropped from Ulduar 10-man and Naxxramas 25-man.
5. Emblem of Heroism: These were among the first WotLK badges, and dropped from Naxxramas 10-man and heroic dungeons.

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by Amanda Miller

The new Dungeon Finder that was added in Patch 3.3 has been garnering a lot of attention lately – and for good reason! But did you know that you could use it to make money?

Step One: Maximizing your speed.
If you spend too much time in each instance, or waiting in the queues, the amount of gold that you make per hour will decline significantly. Fortunately, there are a few things that you can do to to help ensure that your dungeon runs go as smoothly as possible.

• You can queue from anywhere, so choose a location that will allow you to do some farming on the side should you need to wait in a queue. Why not try a favorite fishing locale? Don’t wander too far away from a vendor, though, unless you have peculiarly empty bags.
• Don’t be choosy. Sign up for a random dungeon, because you are more likely to find a match more quickly.
• To avoid queues almost entirely, sign up as a healer or tank if you can. Don’t do this to trick your group mates, however. Many people are selecting tank or healer and then showing up in green sets expecting someone else to agree to switch specs. This is not only idiotic, it will take more time in the end.
• Queue prepared. This means snacks, drinks, in-game buff food and water, glyphs, enchants, scrolls, flasks, reagents, and whatever else you might spontaneously want.
• Use the teleport feature! On the way into or out of each dungeon, simply click on the little green eye around your mini-map and select teleport. This is also handy if you do have to go back to town in the middle of the dungeon.
• Sell and restock! Between groups, hit up a vendor.
• Keep a good group member! Once you meet up with a good group member, remember that you can keep them! Ask them if they would like to continue playing with you, and make sure that no one degroups between queues. Polite, competent, geared group members will not only make the experience more enjoyable, it will also speed it up significantly, and minimize dying.That last part is important because, aside from the lost time, repairs will cut into your profits.

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by Amanda Miller

Angelfish, that is. Not only are they scrumptious, they’re extremely profitable. How does 80 gold (give or take, depending on your realm) per stack of 20 sound to you?

Time Invested

Set aside 10-30 minutes a day to farm up a stack or two. If no one else is farming Dragonfin Angelfish in the area at the same time, you should be able to knock it off pretty quickly.

But Where?

Borean Tundra and Dragonblight are the two zones that you should search. In both zones, you will want an effective Fishing skill of 475 to avoid catching junk. Trust me, time really is money. If your Fishing skill is not maxed, invest in a good fishing rod, whip up some Captain Rumsey’s Lager, and throw on a lure. You will catch significantly more fish in a shorter period of time.

For even more money for your time, make this a part of your Daily Quest circuit. Even if you don’t normally do dailies in these areas, there are a couple quick ones that will grant you some extra gold and reputation.

• Borean Tundra: Head on over to Unu’pe and grab the quest from Utaik called Preparing for the Worst. It will only net you 5g, but it takes under one minute to do. The reputation will also inch you closer to getting your very own Mastercraft Kalu’ak Fishing Pole.
• Dragonblight: Stop by Moa’ki Harbor and pick up Planning for the Future. Again, it is only 5g, but I know you want that fishing pole. This will probably take you five minutes or less.

You could also stop by Coldarra in the Borean Tundra and Wyrmrest Temple in Dragonblight for dailies that pay a higher wage and grant Wyrmrest Accord reputation. If you cannot stand dragon/vehicle combat, you may want to skip them and save yourself the frustration and time.

If you are still leveling to 80, the above dailies will also grant you quite a bit of experience.

Why is Dragonfin Angelfish so Profitable?

This fish is the main ingredient for two of the most popular raiding foods out there; Blackened Dragonfin is arguably the best tanking food available, and Dragonfin Filet is the best option for strength-based melee classes.

While several of the upper end buff foods have two recipe versions, one using fish and another with dropped meats, these two have only the fish version.

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by Amanda Miller

How would you like to make 45g in less than 20 minutes per day? Act quickly, and they’ll throw in 850 Argent Crusade reputation and a shot at your very own Deputy Pa’trolla Badge!

Individual results may vary. If you are not level 80 yet, you won’t make as much gold, but you will gain a whopping amount of experience!

So how can you take advantage of this once-a-day offer? By going on a Troll Patrol of course! You need to finish in 20 minutes or less to get the full benefits, but lucky for you, I have all the tips to get you movin’.

Overview
After accepting Troll Patrol, you will have to visit four different quest givers. Alchemist Finklestein is perhaps the main reason why this quest chain can be so frustrating; but more on him later.

The other three, Captains Rupert, Grondel and Brandon, will not give you the same set of tasks every day. Fortunately, there are not so many that this should pose a problem.

When you have done them all, if you have completed the entire chain within the 20 minute time limit, you will get an additional quest called Congratulations! that you must accept and then hand in at the Argent Stand.

This chain will eat up 6 of your 25 allotted daily quests. The average amount of gold per daily is very low, while the amount of gold for the time invested is quite high. If you never approach the 25 quest maximum, then this chain is ideal for you. If, however, you have a lot of time to play and you generally do a whack of dailies, then you’ll want to give this a pass.

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by Amanda Miller

Nerubian Chitins are gathered by Skinners and used by Leatherworkers, and although they show up on a number of mobs, there are only a handful of areas that are actually worth farming.

They sell for around 5g a piece, and Leatherworkers consume them in bunches from one up to 40! In fact, for several levels, the chitins provide some of the best and cheapest leveling options. On the low end, they are used for leg armor enhancement kits, and on the high end, epic gear.

Azjol-Nerub
If you can get a group to run Azjol-Nerub with you a few times, with you as the only Skinner, you’ll make quite the profit. The skinnable mobs there have an average drop rate of about 25%.

In Icecrown, before you start questing…
Upon entering Icecrown, your first stop will likely be the Argent Vanguard, a mid-size outpost with several quests available to you. Before you begin these quests, or at least, before you hand in A Cold Front Approaches, start farming the mobs around the camp. Once you hand in that quest, you phase out permanently, and all of those spiders will be gone.
You will also notice that you can kite groups of mobs to the town guards for quicker killing. Just make sure to use some AoE to tag each one, or you won’t be able to loot and then skin them!

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http://sacredduty.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/04/icecrown.jpg

This is the path I use in Icecrown to farm mining nodes.  On Sunday, I spent an hour flying around this racetrack picking up whatever I could and here is what I got:

• 288 Saronite Ore
• 18 Titanium Ore
• 12 Eternal Earth
• 8 Eternal Shadow
• 3 Eternal Fire
• 1 Eternal Air
• 2 Eternal Water
• 15 various green quality gems
• 5 various blue quality gems

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Today we’ll be discussing some of the choice farming locations in the province of Storm Peaks. There are three areas in particular that I will point out, as well as some good gathering tips and information on where you can locate rare mobs.

Mission One: Valkyrion
Targets: Nascent Val’kyr and Valkyrion Aspirants.

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