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Spirits of Harmony confirmed unbound in 6.0
Over in the land of Blizzard twitter, Senior Game Designer Jonathan LeCraft has confirmed something that should make crafting and various Mists of Pandaria-era projects far easier for players: in patch 6.0, Spirits of Harmony will become unbound. @mfgIcarlos Yes, it will be unbound with the expansion. - Jonathan LeCraft (@TheCrafticus) June 4, 2014 While I personally would loved to have seen this happen in 5.4, late is better than never. This way, folks will be able to buy, sell, trade, and store Spirits on whatever toon they like. Though most of the things we currently use Spirits of Harmony for will almost certainly become obsolete in the new expansion, their being unbound will make collecting legacy recipes or completing old quests (such as the Pandaren Cooking Ways) much simpler for future alts and players.
The need to resuscitate first aid
Having played a paladin for the majority of my WoW career, first aid has never been anything more than a novelty to me, a way to accumulate a few extra achievement points by wasting some cloth that could probably be put to better use making bags or craftable gear. It has been years since I have used a bandage with the express purpose of actually healing myself from a grievous injury, as opposed to either attempting to clear out some bag space or trying to point out just how useless the things are. After archaeology's introduction, the newfound relevance of fishing thanks to good ol' Nat Pagle and the Anglers, and cooking's dramatic makeover, I think it's about time Blizzard breathed some life back into first aid. In order to figure out how the blues can go about resurrecting this flat-lined secondary profession, let's examine how they have done the same with the others.
A beginner's guide to WoW's secondary professions
We've talked about WoW's crafting and gathering professions which only leaves the game's four secondary professions left to discuss. Unlike primary professions, you can take as many secondary professions as you want, so there are no hard choices here: if it's interesting to you, take it, and if not, ignore it. So just what are these secondary professions? Cooking, fishing, first aid, and archaeology. And, we know, these might sound a bit on the dull side -- do you really want to spend your video game time cooking? But whatever you do, don't write secondary professions off as optional or unimportant, because they can definitely come in handy for players of all types. So let's take a look at the secondary professions and just what they can do for you.
Breakfast Topic: How do you pick the perfect professions?
Picking the right professions for a character is always a bit of a puzzle, or at least it is for me. Do I want to make gold in the short term with a pair of gathering professions or do I want to craft gear for myself that will be useful as I level -- and maybe even at end game? If I pick up a profession now, who's to say it will still be what I want after I've leveled up? And do I even want the hassle of leveling up professions? And, even if I do want to go to the trouble for primary professions, what about secondary professions? Do I really want to level up fishing again? Of course, I inevitably come to the conclusion that leveling the professions as I level up is easier than leveling them later, but my profession choice is always pretty haphazard. (Except for fishing. I have leveled fishing enough for a lifetime.) Though there are, surely, better ways to pick professions, my selection inevitably boils down to what sounds good to me at moment I hit level 5, regardless of what may be good further down the line. But surely you, dear readers, have better sense than I. How do you go about picking the right professions for a new character?
A beginner's guide to WoW's gathering professions
As soon as your character hits level 5, it's time to pick up a profession -- or two or three! Each character you have can take two primary professions -- herbalism, mining, skinning, alchemy, blacksmithing, enchanting, engineering, leatherworking, tailoring, jewelcrafting, or inscription -- as well as however many secondary professions -- cooking, fishing, first aid, and archaeology -- they want. Primary professions are typically categorized as "gathering" professions -- herbalism, mining, and skinning -- that allow you to collect materials and "crafting" professions -- alchemy, blacksmithing, enchanting, engineering, leather working, tailoring, jewel crafting, and inscription -- that allow you to create items. When choosing a primary profession, it's good to pick two that work well together: say, a crafting skill that uses the items you collect with a gathering skill. This means herbalism is typically paired with alchemy or inscription; mining is typically paired with blacksmithing, jewelcrafting, or engineering; skinning is usually paired with leatherworking; and enchanting and tailoring can be paired with anything (though often players will pair them together and use goods created by tailoring to level their enchanting). But if you aren't terribly interested in crafting or just want to give your character a leg up with money-making, you could pick up a pair of gathering professions and take whatever you gather while you're leveling to sell to crafters on the auction house. As to secondary professions, since you're not limited on the number you can take, you can really grab as many as interest you. Not sure where to start with all these choices? We'll walk you through it.
Changes coming for fishing and leatherworking ... but not in patch 5.2
When asked on Twitter whether any changes were on the horizon for grind-tastic professions fishing and leatherworking, everyone's favorite crustacean (Ghostcrawler, not Sebastian) replied: @timparrish Odds are high, but not for 5.2. - Greg Street (@Ghostcrawler) February 13, 2013 While we already saw the number of catches required to max out fishing halved in patch 4.3, the profession is still heavy on the tedium. And, as someone currently trying to level leatherworking, it's probably best that I not get started ranting about how much leather farming (or buying) that needs to be done to get to max level. Whether either of these professions will see a quick level up option like cooking has and blacksmithing is getting in patch 5.2, we can definitely hope. Regardless, knowing that revamping these professions is on Blizzard's agenda is heartening.
Seven things every newbie needs to know
While plenty of old hats might say the WoW newbie experience is easy mode now, I'd call it streamlined: rolling a new character or leveling an existing one has never been more straightforward. Gone are the days when you had to pull up Wowhead (or download an addon) to figure out every other quest, the days when you kill dozens of monsters for a single quest drop, the days when you had to run through high level zones to collect flight paths. If you don't remember having to run from across the Wetlands to pick up the Menethil Harbor flight path -- dying more than once along the way -- count yourself lucky, because those corpse runs were decidedly un-fun. However, even in this golden age of newbiedom, there are some aspects of the game that just aren't explained very well. So, whether you're brand new to the game or, like me, returning after an absence, here are a few things every newbie needs to know.
Mists of Pandaria Beta: New archaeology items
Players with the archaeology profession will get to experience some joy come Mists of Pandaria, according to a new post at MMO-Champion. All of the datamined items are directly related to Pandaria itself and allow us to start piecing together the history of the continent. Pandaria currently is such a new land to all of us that Matt Rossi and Anne Stickney have managed to condense all of the lore we currently know about it into a single post, which is truly an epic feat. The new items introduced through archaeology will help us paint more of a picture of what Pandaria's history was and who the major players were. Items such as the Manacles of Rebellion, Cracked Mogu Runestone, and Petrified Bone Whip are relics of the depraved Mogu Empire, focusing on their love of torture and slavery. The Spear of Xuen and the Standard of Nuzao show us that the pandaren aren't the naive, comic race that some people are assuming; they've fought in and won their own wars. And in classic pandaren fashion, the Empty Keg of Bewmaster Xin Wo Yin and the Twin Steins of Brewfather Quan Tou Kuo highlight the race's love of beer. As it's still beta; things are still subject to change. For one, I'm hoping Blizzard adds in more pandaren lore items. Beyond that, I'd like to see some new on-use vanity items like the Last Relic of Argus, as these datamined items all lack any on-use effects. Finally, I think Blizzard may want to revisit the rarity of some items; the Edicts of the Thunder King make very little sense as a common item when you realize they're essentially the same as finding the stone that holds Hammurabi's Code or the tablets of the Ten Commandments. It's open warfare between Alliance and Horde in Mists of Pandaria, World of Warcraft's next expansion. Jump into five new levels with new talents and class mechanics, try the new monk class, and create a pandaren character to ally with either Horde or Alliance. Look for expansion basics in our Mists FAQ, or dig into our spring press event coverage for more details!
5 not-so-simple ways Blizzard can fix the World of Warcraft Auction House
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 firstborn to him. And be sure to catch the return of Basil and Fox's podcast, Call to Auction! Is the World of Warcraft economy broken? Not for everyone. Plenty of people get exactly what they need out of the existing WoW economy. High volumes. Quick sales. Strong profits. For some, though, the economy is terribly broken. Plenty of folks are marooned on low-population servers with economies that crawl (if an economy even exists at all). There are few sellers and even fewer buyers. These players need help, and Blizzard isn't acting. But what exactly can Blizzard do to help? Simple, small solutions won't help -- problems this big call for major action. And that's exactly what today's column is all about: major reforms to the WoW economy, any single one of which could right a ship that, for thousands of players, is sinking. For broken servers, a fix. For servers with humming economies, reforms that actually improve things and make the economy better and more fun. So what are we waiting for? Let's roll up our sleeves and get to work.
Preparing a money making strategy for 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. And be sure to catch the return of Basil and Fox's podcast, Call to Auction! Yes, I know, Mists of Pandaria is a long way off -- too long for most of us WoW addicts. But in terms of making money, no event will mean more to your bottom line than the MoP launch. New patches and expansions are where fortunes are won and lost. If you dream of getting to 1 million gold (or even a more modest figure), the best time to do it are the few days and weeks following the launch of a new expansion. If you're going to take advantage of the Mists of Pandaria gold rush, you're not going to want to wait until the last minute. You're going to want to work out a plan now, so you know exactly what to buy and what to make.
What days should you buy or sell on the Auction House?
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. And be sure to catch the return of Basil and Fox's podcast, Call to Auction! There's no question that time is a very powerful influencer of prices. Most typically, time affects prices via inflation, the natural and inevitable tendency of things today to cost more than things cost yesterday. But that's far from the only way that time affects prices. A Love Is In the Air holiday pet is likely going to be less expensive to buy now than if you wait nine months from now. The cost of i397 BoE gear is going to continue to decay right up to the launch of the next expansion. It's not a phenomenon unique to the game, of course. Those Super Bowl cakes are going to be a lot cheaper at the supermarket today than they were on Saturday. And if you can wait until January to shop for your winter clothes, you're going to get a far better deal than if you do it in October. A lot of prices are cyclical. But how do those cycles work in the game? If you're a buyer of mats, when should you head to the Auction House to grab what you need? If you're a seller of ore, should just skip listing it certain days to maximize your profits? Let's see what the data say.
The curious case of Cataclysm potions
Remember how amazing cogwheels were? The concept was an inherently cool one -- engineers, much like jewelcrafters, could get their hands on something that would enhance their gear purely through their craft. For jewelcrafters, it's the ability to cut amazing gems, limited to the number they can use in their gear. For engineers, cogwheels were purchasable with crafted engineering items and could be used in a helm with cogwheel slots. You may be wondering why I'm using the past tense here. It's for good reason -- cogwheels are, essentially, a dead item. Introduced at the beginning of Cataclysm, they could be used in engineering crafted goggles, but that was it. Once players started raiding, those goggles were quickly replaced ... and we never saw anything with a cogwheel in it again. For something that had me really excited about being an engineer, the cogwheel was a letdown of sorts. But that's not the only thing that's been a little off, professionally speaking, with Cataclysm.
The WoW economy code of ethics
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 or tweeting him at @foxvanallen. There's nothing more American than the idea of making money off the labor of others. Wall Street was built on it. Presidential campaigns are built on it. Even World of Warcraft fortunes are built on it. If you want to be a member of the 1%, you have to do it off the labor of the 99%. The whole process sounds a lot more unethical than it really is. After all, just about any sale of a physical good involves someone else's labor. You may have put a lot of work into building that lemonade stand yourself, but did you work the fields to harvest the sugar cane? And while you may be the one selling that Darkmoon Card: Volcano trinket, were you the one who collected the thousands of herbs and Volatile Lifes? Or did you visit the Auction House and profit off a farmer's efforts? Profiting off of others is simply how money is made. But we have a social responsibility to make money the right way. Without an in-game legislature or an in-game court system, what rules and laws should we operate under? As the engines of the World of Warcraft economy, what are our ethical responsibilities? How do we make money without causing social harm?
Breakfast Topic: What is WoW's most lucrative profession?
I've asked a version of this question previously in a Breakfast Topic when I was curious about which class had the easiest time making gold. There didn't seem to be much of a consensus in the comments, which is a good thing. No one class seemed to have an overwhelming advantage when it came to piling up a boatload of gold. But since Cataclysm launched, it's a question I've occasionally pondered whenever I hear someone grouse about the expense of gemming a tier set or enchanting a new weapon. One of the players in question was a max-level jewelcrafter, which threw me for a moment. "Shouldn't you be making money hand over fist on the Auction House?" I asked. "You can," he said. "But a lot of it just pays back the expense of leveling JC in the first place or recouping the cost of buying ore and gems." I'm curious. For all those of you out there who have two primary professions or just a host of alts with different trade skills, which one has earned you the most? %Poll-72880%
Gold Capped: Tracking the most frequently bought and sold items
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 constructing a multi-million dollar video wall for his benefit. One of my favorite topics here on Gold Capped is World of Warcraft's problem with inflation. If affects just about everyone in a very negative way, regardless of whether they're an Auction House maven or a casual player. Inflation makes any gold your character is holding worth less and less by the second, making work you do now far less valuable than work you do later. It even affects the way developers approach the economy, from the amount of gold you get for finishing a daily to the creation of new gold sinks. By most anecdotal measures, in-game inflation is wildly out of control. And that's one of my problems as WoW Insider's other market follower; the only evidence of inflation we have is ancedotal. There's no real solid way for us to measure inflation in the game and understand what's working to control it and what's not. The question got my mental gears turning. In the real world, inflation is measured using something called the Consumer Price Index. Creating an in-game version of the CPI intrigues me, but to figure out the best way to construct it, we need to first figure out the answer to another difficult question: What do people buy the most of in-game?
The Fastest Way to 10,000 Gold: The Fox Van Allen counterpoint
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. And be sure to catch the return of Basil and Fox's podcast, Call to Auction! Basil, you ignor... Kidding. Last week, I found out that my Auction House teammate Basil Berntsen was writing an article for WoW Insider titled "The fastest way to make 10,000 gold." Before I even read the first word of the column, my first instinct was that it was a great idea for a column. My second instinct: I'll bet my idea of the fastest way to getting 10,000 gold is different than Basil's idea of what's fastest. To be sure, Basil has some good ideas. Ore shuffling. Converting herbs to ink. But I've got my own ideas as to the fastest way to earn money.
Profiting off the Darkmoon Faire
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. Hey everyone, great news! The Darkmoon Faire is back in town! From now until Saturday, Jan. 7, you can play some games, eat some carnival food -- and oh yeah, make a ton of money off it. Usually when new content is released, it's only the level 85 characters who can make money hand over fist. But the coolest thing about the Darkmoon Faire is that you don't need to be a level 85 character to participate or even profit off it. A level 20 character can have just as much fun at, get just as much benefit, and even make as much money as a level 85. It just takes the right amount of knowledge. And, oh yeah, it also takes a Darkmoon Adventurer's Guide. You're carrying one of those on you at all times, right? Right? Well, according to Wowhead, most of you sub-level 85 players aren't. And that's a gigantic missed opportunity for a lot of money -- thousands upon thousands of gold. The kind of money that's just unheard of at lower levels.
Gold Capped: A tailoring leveling guide
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. And be sure to catch the return of Basil and Fox's podcast, Call to Auction! Here at WoW Insider, we've been on a beginners' class guide kick. But after taking the time to put together my shadow priest leveling guide (and after reading the warlock leveling guide written by my less talented coworker), I realized that we didn't have any kind of leveling guides for professions. Time to fix that! After all, you need professions to make money. But first, the most important question: What professions should your character choose? The best answer is always going to be "whatever appeals to you most" -- but if you're a magic-using, cloth-wearing class, I'd recommend you at least take a look at tailoring. By leveling it, you get access to Lightweave Embroidery, one of the best level 85 buffs in the game for casters. Of course, you can level tailoring on any character, and a lot of the craftables you make can be sold at a profit. But if that character can't use the buffs from the profession, you're missing one the key benefits to max leveling a profession.
Gold Capped: Pokemon pandas, the economy, and BlizzCon 2011
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 by participating in your city's Fox Van Allen 5K Walk to Support Leg Tension. Any time a new World of Warcraft expansion is announced, a flurry of information and speculation comes with it. For us auctioneers, the announcement of Mists of Pandaria at BlizzCon 2011 was no different. Pets, professions, and more -- Mists of Pandaria will going to bring plenty of major changes to the game's economy. To be sure, the Auction House wasn't the most talked-about aspect of WoW at this year's BlizzCon, at least directly. But when you consider how major the announcement of non-combat pet combat was and start considering how these pets will be fully tradeable ...
Gold Capped: Cashing in on the Molten Front
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 or tweeting him at @foxvanallen. If you'll allow me a moment to editorialize, I'm pretty damn sick of the Molten Front. This new questing area for level 85s, released with patch 4.2, is the grind-iest damn place I ever had the misfortune to grind lately. Basically, how it works is this: First, you clear a solid chunk of the regular Mount Hyjal quests that have been available since Cataclysm's launch. This opens up a small new quest hub, the Sanctuary of Malorne, with a couple of non-repeatable quests and a few dailies. Grind those dailies long enough, and you'll get access to a new daily quest hub inside the Firelands. Grind those dailies (and the old ones), and in another week or so, you'll gain access to another set of dailies. Keep grinding, and ... yes, you guessed it, another set of dailies becomes available. Eventually, after about 40 consecutive days of grinding dailies in the Molten Front, you'll gain access to your choice of three vendors: one with tailoring and leatherworking patterns, and one with blacksmithing plans and engineering schematics. The stuff you can make from the patterns, plans, and schematic are neat -- 36-slot profession bags and some epic i365 gear. There's an awful lot of grind-y garbage keeping most players from these rewards. But for those of us who play the auction house, that's a good thing -- players are always willing to pay a premium to avoid a long, boring grind.
