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Top Three Essentials in WoD
I’m gonna need all you people to take a breath and for sure relax a little. Okay, we all know that Legion will have plenty of cool stuff (except Demon Hunters – let’s not forget who the original Hero class is, bubba). But before everyone starts planning their moves for the next expansion, let’s make sure we have all that we need from the current steaming wad of WoD.
Looking back at Mists of Pandaria, I have zero regrets when it comes to grinding the rep dailies for The Anglers. Sure it was a pain at the time, but the reward was ultimately quite worth it – the Azure Water Strider. That mount was on the toolbar of every character that I leveled through Draenor. We may not have flight (Yet? Ever? Come on WTF Blizz!) but the Water Strider helped get me through zones quicker by tearing over the water, rather than forcing me to go around it.
Does WoD have its own Azure Water Strider? Are there “quality of life” items in this expansion that would be worth having in the next?
You daaaamn right there are.
- Garrison – You had to know I was going to get this in the list somewhere. Normally I sing the praises of garrisons because they’re stupid easy to use to make gold. But that’s not why I included it in my list. Blizzard has said that we will be keeping our garrisons going forward. In fact, they want us to be able to go back to visit them. Now, everyone has a garrison hearthstone. So why not make it worth using? Get your bank, transmog, supplies, whatever. Make your garrison your one-stop shop. You have a hearthstone for the place, so you might as well make sure you have reasons to go back there. Make it worth keeping the hearthstone.
- Professions – For the most part, professions in WoD have been somewhat lackluster. No love there, that’s for sure. But from all the talk around the water cooler, Blizzard is planning on giving them value again in Legion. Don’t wait until then and end up playing catch-up. It’s never been easier to level professions, so get everything capped at 700. Except Archaeology, because screw that noise.
- Aviana’s Feather – As we patiently(?) wait for Draenor flying, Blizzard hinted that there would be similar hoops to jump through in Legion when it comes to flying in that content. Aviana’s Feather already works in Azeroth, so there’s no reason to suspect it won’t work in Legion. It might not be flight, but it’ll speed things along until flying goes live in Legion.
Are there any more items to snag before Legion? Tell me about it in the comments below.
Rokk Talk – Busy Weekend
The Main Monk was busy on Halloween weekend.
Holy Cornball, Batman!
Needless to say, Rokk made this look his own.
Rokk the Robin, Tweet Tweet Tweet!
With Blizzcon 2014 coming this week, and Warlords of Draenor coming next week, it’s going to be a very interesting time in the near future.
Profession Headaches
There were two specific perks to boosting Rokk, my Windwaker Monk, to 90. One was to fast-track through the leveling process so he’d be ready to go for Warlords of Draenor. The other was to max out his professions. At the time, Rokk had Skinning. But he dropped that and picked up Tailoring and Engineering once he’d cleared the level 60 profession hump. Both professions provided combat perks, and the Tailoring was nice for farming extra cloth mats (as well as making bags).
That’s one jacked seamstress.
Patch 6.0 kicked all that in the manbasket. There were no more combat perks to be gained through professions. Sweet bags aside, were my selection of professions providing any real benefit? I had other characters with Engineering, and gathering extra cloth wasn’t really that much of a reason to keep Tailoring.
In various profession interviews I’d listened to, it was suggested that in WoD it would be helpful to have a crafting profession that would let you craft your own gear. Between that, and that fact that the transmog set for Rokk involved a chest piece that was a bind on pickup item from Leatherworking, I decided to make the switch. I dropped both Engineering and Tailoring, and picked up Leatherworking and Skinning.
Leveling the new professions hasn’t been that bad. Rokk is farming his own mats, but even if he wasn’t he could still level his Skinning right there in Pandaria, since a recent patch allowed characters to level their gathering professions in MoP right from skill level 1. You’d simply pick up fragments and scraps rather than whole items.
Leatherworking hasn’t been too painful either. It helps to have a goal (like a sweet transmog piece) to work towards. Once he reaches that skill level, he could complete Leatherworking in WoD since they plan on allowing skillups for professions through the garrisons. Patch 6.0.3 also fixed a bug that specifically affected Rokk. The bug would not allow a Windwalker Monk to craft more than one item, even when hitting the Create All button.
Even with WoD only being two weeks away, it isn’t too late to start working on building professions for the next expansion. It’s not like there’s anything else going on between now and then.
Oh. Right.
The Great Gold Making Hoax
Two of the most annoying questions I see in WoW are:
1) How do I make gold?
2) Can I have some gold?
My answers to this are:
1) Sell some shit that people want to buy.
2) Sure. See Answer 1.
Everybody likes having cash in their pocket. For some, it’s a rainy day fund for buying potions and repairing their gear. Others like being able to hit the AH and upgrade their gear to the best money can buy. Oh, and buy sexy mounts and stuff. Gotta have the sexy mounts, right? Otherwise how would scrubs know you’re ballin’, playa.
It’s like riding a Porsche with gold spinner rims.
Whether you’re searching on blogs, forums, or even Youtube, you’ve seen the title: “Earn X Thousand Gold in [Insert Absurdly Short Time Here]”.
It’s bullshit. Complete and utter bullshit.
People who make those claims are often using “projected wealth.” They’ve picked up a rare drop, usually a transmog item, that according to some spreadsheet should sell for a small fortune. Post it up on the Auction House and wait for the cash to roll in.
Youtube is guilty of this, and the comments below the video reflect that. People will outright call bullshit on the video (like I am doing on the whole concept) because they’ve done the same thing, maybe even farmed the same gear, and after months of posting it they made a few hundred gold.
People lie on the Internet?
But there are still those sellers who swear up and down that they’re making hundreds of thousands of gold per month with various techniques. Huge transmog sellers, flipping, sniping the AH, they make it sound easy. It can be, if you have the server economy. Generally speaking, you’re looking at a long term time-investment if you want to make any kind of serious gold.
There is no magic formula to make a mountain of gold.
There is no single zone that unlocks your fortune.
There is no one profession that crafts cash.
Don’t get me wrong. Professions can definitely net you gold. Double gathering professions are nice to use while leveling, and if you keep them up as you level you can earn some decent gold. A gathering profession with a complimentary crafting profession (mining & blacksmithing) can beef your cashflow since you can gather your own crafting mats. More time consuming, but you save money while you make money.
Once you learn your market, you can start flipping items. You know what the regular going rate is on an item, so buy it out when it’s selling low and post it for the regular market price. People will dump things on the AH when they’re hoping for a quick resale, so if you’re patient you can swing some swag of your own.
If you’re the patient type, then and only then should you dip your toe into the transmog pool. A fortune can be made here, but it’s going to take some time. Plus, you need to know what to buy. Phat Lewts is a transmog wizard, who often posts market information that can give you an idea as far as where to start. Tailor prices as the market allows.
Making gold isn’t about earning X gold in Y minutes. It’s about research. It’s about knowing what sells, and for how much. It’s about knowing when to sell, and when to snipe from the AH. I’ve posted numerous “The Gold I Find” segments here to help people find various methods to earn gold. Playing the gold making game is the same as playing any other aspect of World of Warcraft – there are various ways to reach your goal. Find one that works for your playstyle and ride that puppy until the wheels fall off.
World of Windwalker
The experiment continues.
I remember when I first started leveling my Windwalker monk. I figured I’d play around until level twenty or so, pick up the daily quest (which gave a 60m xp buff), and probably lose interest. Playing him in PVP seemed amazing, but that had more to do with what I expect was the Call to Arms for PVP being Warsong Gulch, given the amount of xp and honor I was getting per match. Once the sweet perks dried up, and I kept dealing with Alliance groups who seemed to forget which way to go to find the Horde flag, I began to feel like the Windwalker experience was starting to sour.
Then I remembered that PVE is also a viable way to level. Better, some might say. Especially with a 50% xp buff through heirlooms, and 50% through a daily quest. So I booted up my Zygor Leveling Guide and decided to try my luck with AI mobs.
Merculees is now level 34. Zoom.
I enjoy playing the Windwalker monk but I can’t pin down exactly what the draw is. I’m still using the killswitch macro (which you can read about HERE) but even if I wasn’t, there isn’t any complex patterns when it comes to killing with the Windwalker. Healing, rez, debuff, silence, all things the Death Knight can do. Maybe it’s the rolling, or the flying dragon kick that I like so much. Maybe it’s just something different than the plate-wearing killers I’m used to playing. Judging by the Crash Course video, things don’t change all that much at endgame either.
The drawback to leveling so quickly is that my professions are falling behind. I only have one – Mining – but I’m now in zones I can’t mine in because my skill level is too low. My playtime is still limited, so I can either continue leveling my monk, or go back and level my professions. I had considered getting skinning as well, given the amount of animals I was killing. I’d get xp leveling both professions (not so much with the skinning until the animals turned at least green), but I’d make more by completing a single quest at level.
I also started running dungeons. The xp is nice, the other players are hit and miss. No comments about anything I’ve done, good or bad (but how often do random players in a group make positive comments about anyone other than themselves anyway). No news is good news I guess.
The PVP is something I still want to do. But I admit, it’s frustrating. It’s tough running to a flag, or a node, and being the only one nearby. You look at the map and see your teammates either clustered together somewhere way off from where they should be, or so spread across the map it looks like the zone has measles.
Serenity now, serenity now.
Rokk Talk 