maelstrom-crystal
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3 items to unload and 3 to stock up on before Mists of Pandaria
Every week, WoW Insider brings you Gold Capped, in which Fox Van Allen and Basil "Euripides" Berntsen aim to show you how to make money on the Auction House. Feed Fox's ego by emailing him, tweeting him at @foxvanallen, or sacrificing your first-born to him. As we approach the end of the Cataclysm expansion -- there are maybe four months left -- playing the Auction House gets a bit trickier. There's less enthusiasm on the part of buyers. More scary, though, is that the launch of Mists of Pandaria is about to render a lot of markets obsolete. It happened in Wrath and in The Burning Crusade too -- those potions and flasks that were top of the line suddenly became worthless. Gear that once cost thousands of gold could be had for hundreds. It's the nature of our in-game hobby. If you sit on stock, you're going to lose a fortune. (Shamefully, it happened to me out of laziness.) But not everything is set to crash. A few select items are going to increase in value, if not in the days leading up to MoP, then shortly after launch. These are the items you need to fill your bank tabs with. But which ones are they? What should you sell ASAP, and what should you buy?
How to make 146g in Maelstrom Crystals in 5 minutes
Every week, WoW Insider brings you Gold Capped, in which Basil "Euripides" Berntsen and Fox Van Allen aim to show you how to make money on the Auction House. Check out Fox and Basil's reboot of Call To Auction, and email Basil with your questions, comments, or hate mail! All enchanters know that Maelstrom Crystals can be expensive, especially now that more players than ever have access to pretty good epic gear through the Raid Finder. This increase in demand has touched all professions that make things that improve gear, including enchanting. I know I went from paying under 90g for a Maelstrom Crystal to paying over 250g at one point soon after the launch of patch 4.3 and the Raid Finder, and that was after stockpiling (and subsequently blowing through) more than 75 stacks. If I knew then that I could have been making them in unlimited supply at 146g each, I'd have made a lot more.
Gold Capped: Shattering Maelstrom Crystals
Every week, WoW Insider brings you Gold Capped, in which Basil "Euripides" Berntsen and Fox Van Allen aim to show you how to make money on the Auction House. Email Basil with your questions, comments, or hate mail! Patch 4.3 will bring with it the ability to shatter Maelstrom Crystals into Heavenly Shards. This is unsurprising, as we have been able to shatter or transform the epic enchanting mats from other expansions. At this time, it looks like it will produce two Heavenly Shards per Maelstrom Crystal, and since it's not disenchanting, it's unlikely to be affected by the guild perk. This is going to be an opportunity for people to make some money, as well as provide a much needed sink for these Maelstrom Crystals, which have been piling up of late. The market for Heavenly Shards is a little odd. In case you've forgotten, you can make one from 16 Elementium Ore and 8 Obsidium Ore. Despite this being "common" knowledge, the price for these enchanting mats has a consistently high profit margin. Maybe it's because of how long and annoying it is to turn ore into shards, or maybe it's because of the large volume taken by the popular enchants this expansion.
Gold Capped: Patch 4.1 and Maelstrom Crystals
Every week, WoW Insider brings you Gold Capped, in which Basil "Euripides" Berntsen aims to show you how to make money on the auction house. Email Basil with your questions, comments, or hate mail! Is the sky falling? Will patch 4.1 herald the end of the high price for Maelstrom Crystals? The informal communication channels between auctioneers (sharing market analyses with each other in IRC and custom channels or tells in game and on gold blogs) have been abuzz with the frantic analysis that patch 4.1 will drive the price of Maelstroms down to ridiculously low amounts. Personally, I'm not sure I'd blindly buy that.
Gold Capped: How to farm Maelstrom Crystals
Every week, WoW Insider brings you Gold Capped, in which Basil "Euripides" Berntsen aims to show you how to make money on the auction house, and Insider Trader, which is all about professions. Email Basil (new address is basil@wowinsider.com; old one no longer works) with your comments, questions or hate mail! The Maelstrom Crystal used to be disenchantable from an easily crafted epic. This was hotfixed, and the prices have unsurprisingly shot through the roof. People still want their gear enchanted, however, and for some reason these things keep appearing on the auction house. Where are they coming from? How can you get them? This article will discuss the current cheapest methods for getting them.
Insider Trader: The trick to farmable Maelstrom Crystals
Insider Trader is a column about professions by Basil "Euripides" Berntsen, who also writes Gold Capped about how to make money using the auction house. Email Basil your questions at his new email address, basil@wowinsider.com. All the coolest enchants take Maelstrom Crystals. Why do most guilds not send raiders back home with a note to their parents when they show up with the second-best enchants on their gear? Because these crystals can be pretty darned hard to get. Even when they are available, they are very pricey. You can't even buy the recipes for some of the cooler weapon enchants until you can get your hands on five of these. So what's the best way to get them? If your answer is to wait until your guild starts getting raid drops it doesn't need, then click through for a pleasant surprise.
