A Freelancing gold seller journal.

[Savanebunu]

Eya ownedcore community, I just finished my bachelor's degree project which is based on virtual economies and how it all works.

After reading it over, I noticed my journal could actually help a few people see how the market works in WoW (same concepts still apply to other games as well)

It's more or less a detailed guide on how the process of obtaining materials goes and how they are processed to raise value. I also have a few trades with the gold firms included, but i'll keep them out for now, If people would like me to add more from the Journal, let me know and i'll organize some more to be added.

Enjoy


Inc wall o text!



Date: 22/11/2011, Tuesday
Time: 3:30 P.M.
I start off by checking a few regular sites that post any upcoming changes to the game, checking for price changes on crafts and demanded items. I also read thoroughly any dungeon changes that might come in the future patch. Nothing relevant today from MMO-Champion - World of Warcraft News and Raiding Strategies. I also occasionally check forums for any new ideas from other people, glitches etc. I then go to OwnedCore - World of Warcraft Exploits, Hacks, Bots and Guides - OwnedCore News forums for any new firms or standalone gold buyers to add to my list of potential buyers.
As a freelancer, having a wide selection of buyers is good as to maximize profit on the gold you have to sell.
I start off by loading PingFuUDP, a tunneling program, so i can launch WoW and log on one of my 2 available accounts. One of them is for leisure activities with my mate, we sometimes hook up in the weekend and play to relax, he’s still new at the game. This account is good to split up my gold on for future trades with the gold firms. Otherwise Mr.GM from blizzard gets wise to my attempts and i get a ban. I only log it myself for when a trade is going to happen, otherwise i stay out of it.
I log my account and select one of the 3 realms i play on a daily basis. I start off with Outland realm, alliance side, an 85 Human Rogue. This is the main character i chose to make gold on constantly and have set him up properly with Jewelcrafting/Enchanting.
As soon as i log on, i keep my eyes on trade channel for any offers that seem valuable to make profit off of. Meanwhile i check my mailbox and empty it of unsold auctions and sold ones since last night. I check the time of each auction sold for when it happened to get a good perception of when the market is no longer active.
I keep that in mind and notice my percentage of items posted last night sold in a proportion of 35%, which is a pretty good number considering Undercutters and the lack of an active mass of players. Around 6k gold made from that sale. I pick up items left in mailbox, check for the active ones still on the Auction House(AH). Using Auctionator addon i see if any of my items are not on “pole position”. Most if not all of them were after the lowest priced items so i cancel them from the AH, take them from the mailbox and repost them as the lowest priced item of their kind on AH.
I, of course, check if any of the items that i am about to repost are not going be severely dropped in value and get suckered into dropping by more than 10-15% of the majority of other auctions of the same item. I cut off price on every and any item i repost by 1 Silver. It assures me pole position in front of the lowest priced item and will be 1st picked by any potential buyers.
After reposting everything i have for sale, i check for the regular items i buy in bulk to further manipulate and process them into items of higher value and thus gathering a noticeable amount of profit. Even though i have acquired a good amount of materials a few days ago, i’ll still keep looking to invest for more and more if the price is right. I see that there are quite a few hundred stacks of Elementium Ore at a low price varying from 25g to 28g per stack. Standard price for them would be around 30g-35g. I consider it a good deal and decide to buy around 300 stacks to process. This way i raise my gains AND i close out any potential competition from further increasing their profits and posing a problem for me in the future.
After that i check for Maelstrom Crystals which would need to be around 75-80g for a nice haul in profit. They are currently over 100g and i refrain from buying any, for now. They are essential for the scrolls I create with Enchanting for tomorrow’s reset and need a good amount of them. After that i check for Volatile elements to create the scrolls. Too pricey for the moment, i stand aside for now.
No friends of mine are online so i could do fast dungeons with them so i resign from playing.
Taking a break at 4:50 P.M.
I resume play at 7:28 P.M.
Before I log WoW again I get an update on the price of gold from the firm representatives on an instant messenger program.
Gonna post a really short log, as i inquired them only a realm.
Me: hey, price on Outland EU alliance?
Forgame Ideas is typing...
Forgame Ideas: Outland EU alliance 0.42$ per k now
Me: I see, thanks.
Here’s another price from another firm
Me: hello, price on Outland EU alliance?
******* ******* is typing...
******* *******: 0.35$/k
Me: i see, thanks
In China or wherever their HQ may be situated is probably really late at night because not many firm dealers are online. I then carry on into WoW, logging my Rogue on Outland realm.
I find my only apprentice online and persuade him to run quite a few dungeons to gather some essential materials. I call for his aid to speed up queue times and the actual dungeon since he knows his class and plays a tank quite well.
1st Dungeon finished in approx 25 minutes, queuing next. Quite lucky on drops/rolls.
We do this thing called “offspecc roll”. We roll “need” on items we don’t need, but the others in group can’t know that. We get the items and then i Disenchant them.
Kinda sneaky and unethical, but hey, wanna gain economical edge, you gotta play dirty in every situation.
2nd Dungeon finished in 30 minutes. Gathered 4 Maelstrom Crystals, not to mention the Justice and Valor points.
3rd Dungeon took a bit longer with deaths and all, 37 mins.
We take a break while Bogdan, my apprentice, eats. I start Prospecting all the elementium ores from earlier today using a macro to help me do it in one push of a button, one stack at a time. A tedious task it is...
When we resume, i start Tanking on my 85 Paladin on a few dungeons, trying to get the Chaos orb at the end of the instance to craft a very expensive weapon, usually selling up to 10k gold.
No luck on the Chaos orb.
I log off at 12:47.



Date: 23.11.2011, Wednesday
Time: 3.37 P.M.
I start off by checking forums again, not much news.
Today is Wednesday, it is the day that demands go sky-high and prices on level 85 related gear improvements will be in higher in value and for the following days due to bosses reappearing in Raid instances. Also players that had reached their weekly limit on Valor points will have the possibility to once again gain another weekly cap’s worth, element which also adds to the enchants/gems demand overall.
I get to work on prospecting the stacks of elementium ore on my rogue on Outland realm.
During which I create scrolls of the most sought after enchants. 1 per enchant on Auction House.
After i’ve posted them i wait to see if the “fish” are biting also i look after other fishermen that put their bait in front of mine.
I notice none of the hardcore competitors are online so I’m pretty relaxed knowing that i only have to repost when a few random players post their scrolls now and then. The prospecting yields a lot of uncut gems which i then process with Jewelcrafting, making a lot of rings/necks. After which I disenchant each and every one of them into Enchanting dusts/essence and then i finally make scrolls out of them.
Prices on each scroll vary from 350g to – 1500 on the most expensive ones.
Whenever one scroll of a certain type of enchant sells, i quickly create another scroll and repost.
I sell/repost/resupply on materials until a few mates log on at 7.35 P.M.
I then join them on a few heroic dungeon farming until 10.45 P.M.
Today’s progress had shown a profit of approximately 15k gold, yet i felt today the market had been sluggish due to the patch that will probably go live next reset. I assume people won’t be buying that much if their gear will soon be replaced.
On a sidenote, i have bought 100 truegold bars for 20k from what it would seem a hacked account, the chinese usually sell in mass what they find on the account at 50% rate of AH prices. Also noticed their lack of English skills, further proving the fact that they were skimming anything of profit from the account. The investment i just made will yield around 60k gold for me next week, assuming Truegold will be in higher demand for new craftables and such.
i log off for today at 11.00 P.M.


Date:26.11.2011, Saturday
Time: 8:30 P.M.
It’s my relax day and as every Saturday (whenever possible) i log on my horde Shaman on Kul Tiras realm to raid. Raiding is scheduled and led by the best players in top guilds that want to gear up their alternate characters, luckily they had room for me for 6 weeks now. Always a pleasure playing with so many coordinated players. Raid lasted from 20:30 to 23:50. It was a good run, won a few items.
On a sidenote, what i wish to achieve through this character is to gear him up properly and hopefully my Character buying agent will be interested later on and buy him off of me.



Date: 28.11.2011, Monday.
Time: 12:37 A.M.
Confirmed new content patch the following week.
Damn! Wanted to wake up in the morning to get ahead of the “pre-planning” players. The Auction House has been cleaned out and heavy price listings start to appear. This is not good news as i have not nearly enough stock materials to make the desired amount of gold from the upcoming rises in price and demands. Can never predict when the assault on materials begin before a patch, so it’s always wise to stock up constantly on cheap items as they get refreshed in value every patch.
Luckily i still have those 100 Truegold bars which will net me in a good amount of gold.
I lay low, scouting the trade channel and AH for an hour or so for some valid offers. Nothing.
Logging off at 2:12 P.M.
I Log on at 8:45 to check up on any changes, it’s getting worse, materials are scarce and the ones on sale are expensive beyond profitability for me.
Logging off and ending play for the day at 11:00 P.M.

Date: 29.11.2011, Tuesday
Time: 08:12 A.M.
No luck in the morning, most materials have doubled and in some cases have tripled.
Logging off at 10:36 A.M.
I log back on at 10:22 P.M. and no changes have occurred.
Calling it a day at 11:05 P.M.

Date: 30.11.201, Wednesday
Time: 1:23 P.M.
Patch day. New raid, new gear, new features, new things for players to do in-game.
Patch day literally refreshes the incentive for players to buy more materials/gear.
As soon as i logged on i got to my post in a more obscure place to play the Auction House.
Dalaran is more vacant and usually the smarter players come here to avoid the lag.
And it’s just so damn peaceful, helps the transition.
Another key feature would be the multitude of mailboxes at practically every building corner. The faster I pick up the mail, the faster i can run back to the AH and undercut competition.
With just a small stock of supplies i start loading up the scrolls and thus the real “business” begins.
I notice online a few of my competitors, ready to snag pole position on the market.
Wednesday and Thursdays are essential as at least 50% of raids manage to kill off most bosses and wish to enchant their looted gear. Those 2 days must bring profit as the rest of the days become casual and demands are dispersed throughout the passing day and too much work would be involved to keep scrolls up for a lot longer. I avoid the rest of the days playing the AH. I normally just predict i’ll be upgrading my characters’ gear and get to know the new dungeons and raids.
An amazing Feature had been added this patch. The Looking for Raid option.
In short, it meant casuals (the majority of players) were given a simple fast way to group up and raid the current tier bosses. And manage to kill them in an awfully easy manner. Which meant more demand for enchants as many more people get loot.
I somehow overlooked this dreadful event as it meant the essential need of Maelstrom Crystals would skyrocket. Outland realm is among the most heavily populated servers in the European region. The demands can get out of hand and i was hoping not by far.
And so the struggle for pole position had started. I constantly refreshed my “to buy” list to make sure i’ll knick a few items for cheaper prices. Prices on scrolls have almost doubled, tripled in some cases.
I guess it’s true what they say, everything is relative. Gains are the same. The only difference here now is that estimation of value becomes an issue for sellers, as some get confused and don’t get the sweet spot on scroll prices. Some underestimate them and some overprice them. Problem is with the ones that post for a lower value than actually is possible to post. They have the potential to screw the entire line of value for that certain scroll. If they have 5 scrolls and see the price range of 1600 or so, they assume their scrolls will sell faster if they are way ahead of the competition on price and post at let’s say 999g.
I, for one, would not risk buying all those scrolls so i can repost at a comfy 1600g each. If i do it, the seller then probably is gonna make a sale today and so he creates more scrolls at the same price and then I’m literally going down the drain on the profit gains as i will not get the chance to maintain monopoly on that particular scroll. Control i cannot gain and so i can only watch as the train-wreck occur as many other start undercutting the seller that had posted the 5 scrolls for 999g to 998g. And so many follow and presto in less than possibly 10 minutes the value had stumped from 1600 to less than 1000. And who knows when demands manage to buy them off and stabilize price to normal again.
This was just an example, a “happy” example. Prices can vary so much, it just takes an uneducated seller playing pin the price on the price tag blindfolded to screw things over so easily.
Competition was on the move and were undercutting appropriately by 1 to 50 silver. I can at least rest assured they will keep value as high as possible so we don’t start cutting profit. It wouldn’t benefit any of us as we would be selling the scrolls in tens if not hundreds in terms of numbers.
We duked it out for quite a few hours. My uptime was about 60 to 70% against them considering i’ve been making quite alot of sales. They weren’t so responsive as i were. They would take a refresh at about every 45 to 1.5 minutes to cancel auctions and undercut. My top priority is making sure is i’m constantly in pole position, nothing else mattered to me at that moment. And so scrolls were selling, i quickly buy more Maelstrom off AH as they sold to replace the sold item and be present on the most demanded of scrolls. The idea here is not to sell really high each time, but to keep the line rolling, the more i sell, the more profit i gain. The strategy to wait out on an expensive item to sell is overrun by the idea of just selling for little gain, but selling fast.


I think this will do for now, i'm open to opinions ^.^

[Owning]

That took a while to read lol

[oprime]

One word: TradeSkillMaster

[Savanebunu]

Sorry, can't sum it that way to a committee of doctors, they need 30 pages or so! ^.^

[oprime]

Yes, absolutely true good job!