Fishing for Gold - Laid Back Mode

Gone Fishing  - Laid Back Style

I've spent most of the last week doing my Order of the Cloud Serpent dailies & Onyx Egg hunting - I really wanted those Cloud Serpents so my gold making activities have once again taken a back seat. One of the quests over there though, requires Golden Carp & another requires Sugar Minnows - both from Fishing. As I hadn't leveled my Fishing to 600 yet, I decided to bite the bullet & get it over with! As I wasn't too worried about gold & fishing in Pools for the 'right' fish, I just plonked myself down at the edge of the circular stream right there in the Arboretum & proceeded to spend an hour or so, just fishing & listening to some music.

Fishing Area at The Arboretum, Jade Forest

Imagine my delight when I started fishing up Jade Lungfish & Redbelly Mandarins as well as the Golden Carp I needed! Both fish are required for the Way of the Grill cooking recipes & Jade Lungfish are also required for the Way of the Pot too so their prices have remained fairly good on the Auction House. Now I was only here for an hour or so but in that time I managed to pick up 48 Jade Lungfish, 54 Redbelly Mandarin & 168 Golden Carp. I sold most of them within 24 hours on the Auction House although I kept most of the Golden Carp for the Cloud Serpent daily & for converting to an Ironpaw Token for cooking materials later.

Golden Carp - Easy Fishing Gold 

Jade Lungfish - Easy Fishing Gold 

Redbelly Mandarin - Easy Fishing Gold

Overall, I made just over 700 gold in that hour - not a huge amount but still a nice little chunk for something I would have to have done anyway. Best of all though, it got all of my professions to 600 so I gained the 'Serious Skills to Pay the Bills' achievement too - always a good side effect of making gold!

Now don't get me wrong - I'm not suggesting this as a great way to make lots of gold - there are much better ways of course but if you find yourself over at the Arboretum doing your dailies & a friend or guildie wants to chat - you'll probably end up just standing around whilst you have your conversation. That's when I do most of my fishing to be honest! Or perhaps you like to PvP and have 5 minutes between battlegrounds where you normally just hang around - plonk yourself down & do a little fishing. Now that you don't have to equip a fishing rod, there's no risk of forgetting to swap back your weapons when the BG queue pops!

There are no hostile mobs to worry about here either & there's a mailbox over near the dailies quest hub so if you get carried away & fill your bags, you can easily send all your slinkies off to your bank alt.

Do you have a favourite fishing spot? Whether for a bit of quiet time or for gold fishing, I find it quite relaxing sometimes & the gold is always a nice bonus especially now that Mists of Pandaria has brought Cooking & Fishing into the limelight.


Image © Helen Shorey (me) available as a print in my Society6 shop

Buy Low, Sell At Market Price

Buy Low, Sell Higher

I think most goldmakers know the principle of Buy Low, Sell High and possibly even newbie goldmakers too but there has often been some discussion about the 'sell high' bit. Buy low, sell normal or sell at market price is often used too but again, what is normal or market price is also subject to variations per server & even by day of the week! Buying low is always the best, no matter what stage of gold making you are at but with experience & knowledge of your own Auction House, it does become a little easier to find those low priced items.

I tend not to 'sell high' as my server has a few fairly high profile goldmakers who usually beat me to the best markets. I'm very casual in my gold making, especially now with all the distractions provided by Mists of Pandaria! Selling high is also a subjective thing - what is a high price to you may be an okay price for others or it may be seen as an extortionate price and gain you some troll mails.

I prefer to 'close the gap' in some markets, especially Trade Goods like herbs, ores & enchanting materials. I look for an item that has a fair few auctions listed at a spread of prices & look for the big gap in the item price. It's often possible to buy out the lower priced items & just relist them immediately at the price at the top of the gap. I guess you could say I 'buy low, sell higher' - it may only be a few gold here & there but it's a great way to build a little starter cash with pretty low risk.

Buy Low, Sell Higher

I use the Auctionator search function (circled in screenshot) to search all the herbs at once. It gives me a nice list of all the herbs available in a summary format & I then start at the cheapest herb & click through to the individual herb screen as shown above. I didn't bother to buy these 5 cheap Peacebloom today but if I was starting fresh on a new server, I would have. Turning 1g 50s (cost for the 5 cheap herbs) into almost 10 gold just by relisting them at 1g 95s each is good practice for larger buys later on in your goldmaking career :)

Using the back button to get back to the summary list, I can quickly run through all the herbs in the list to see if there are any 'gaps' similar to that shown above (32s -> 1g 95s) & snatch any cheapies up too.

Now you do need to use your brain a bit here too - sometimes that top price is just stupid high & the apparent low priced items are actually at the correct price. By regularly scanning the Auction House with your Auction House addon, you will build a picture of average prices so hopefully you won't get caught out by those stupid high price items. If you're not sure of something, especially if it's a more expensive item than just a few herbs, don't forget you can check The Undermine Journal for your server. It will show you an average price & a graph of most recent prices - both of which will help you judge the local market price for your item(s).

The most important part of playing the Auction House is to use your own brain - it's great to read tips from blogs like this one but I can only speak for my own server, you have to apply the tips & tricks to your server & decide for yourself if you want to follow my methods or develop your own. The other part of playing the Auction House is time - it takes time to learn the trends & prices & peculiarities of your server but it also takes a whole chunk of time to reach the big numbers of gold. Be patient & don't forget that even a few extra gold here & there (as shown above) all adds up eventually.

Farming Meats in Mists of Pandaria - All You Needed To Know!

Farming Various Meats in Mists of Pandaria

As I leveled some of my cooking skills in Mists of Pandaria, I found that apart from fish & vegetables, I needed various meats too. So I set off to investigate and found some of the best places to go & farm those meats for yourself. You could buy them off the Auction House of course but with prices still quite high, I decided to farm instead especially as my only level 90 is also my Skinner and I can always use more leather!

Over the past week or so, I have covered where to farm these meats & provided little maps to show you exactly where the areas are.

• Raw Tiger Steak
• Raw Crab Meat
• Raw Crocolisk Belly
• Raw Turtle Meat
• Mushan Ribs
• Wildfowl Breast

I received a couple of comments on those posts with helpful extra information & I've since found some other useful bits to add so I thought I'd put them all here for you in one easy reference post.

Wildfowl Breast - Tailswish pointed out that the Glade Singers have a 'sleep' spell which some farmers might find irritating - I know I did, especially as I pulled about 3 at once! Felt like Sleeping Beauty there for most of the fight! lol

Raw Crocolisk Belly - Tailswish let me know that the Crocs in Vale of Eternal Blossom aren't always the daily so it may be best to stick to the area in Krasarang Wilds for these. I farmed some last night on my very slow paladin - 35 in 35 minutes (plus all the leather of course) not too bad but would have been better on a quicker alt. I didn't have to wait for any respawn at all, especially once I realised there were some crocs in the mid part of the island too!

Mogram was kind enough to tell me about the rare spawn Blackhoof in Valley of the Four Winds - he drops an amazing Battle Horn which allows you to pull enemies from 40 yards away - great for mass AoE farming (if you can handle the mobs of course!).

I focused my posts on farming to level the various new Ways within the cooking profession but these are not the only uses for some of these meats.

• Raw Tiger Steak - used for the Pandaren Banquet (10 per) & the Great Pandaren Banquet (20 per) which are the 10-man & 25-man raid feasts. However there is a small benefit to individuals to use their own specialised food rather than a Banquet in a raid situation so it may be that your raid team will ask you to bring your own food buff.(thank you to ScottieGazelle for the banquet info).
• Raw Tiger Steak - also used for Chun Tian Spring Rolls which is the level 90 buff food for tanks (+450stamina)
• Raw Crab Meat - used in Steamed Crab Surprise, the level 90 buff food for healers (+300 spirit)
• Raw Crocolisk Belly - used in the Mogu Fish Stew, the level 90 buff food for intellect users (+300 intellect)
• Raw Turtle Meat - the basis for the Sea Mist Rice Noodles, the level 90 buff food for agility users (+300 agility)
• Mushan Ribs - used for Black Pepper Ribs & Shrimp (damn that sounds good!), this is the level 90 buff food for strength users (+300 strength)
• Wildfowl Breast - used in Wildfowl Ginseng Soup which is a level 87 buff food for hit (+275 hit).

I do hope you found this series of farming posts useful - sometimes knowing where to farm is all you need to get some gold flowing. As the newness of Mists of Pandaria wears off, many players who are currently farming to level their professions will move on to raiding, challenge modes, pet battles & all the other new stuff Blizzard has provided for us. If you have the patience & time to do some farming yourself, I expect these meats will hold fairly good prices at the Auction House - perhaps a little farming in between battlegrounds would be good for PvP'ers gold making too.

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New Series - Quick Gold Making Tips for PvP'ers

Several times over the last few months, I've got chatting to various PvP'ing guild mates of mine. Initially, I kept quiet in guild about my gold making but as guildies became friends, I opened up a bit so I often advise them in small ways on the AH and various other bits & pieces. The one thing my PvP friends all seem to have in common, besides an unending thirst for killing Horde is that they are all virtually broke most of the time.

They can make gold if they have to, especially if saving up for a new bit of gear but to do so, they stop their PvP activities & do some daily grinding or farming until they have enough gold. I've tried many times to explain some basic gold making but almost with out exception, their answer has been 'that sounds complicated' or 'that's gonna takes forever'.

So I was sitting here quietly today & it hit me - I should do a small series of 5-10 minute gold making tips - little bits that over time will add up but most importantly, can fit in those 5 minute gaps between battlegrounds! I've added a tab at the top of the page so over time, it will provide quick access to any tips I think fit in this category as well as the new posts I'm planning for you.

Today's quick tip then is to install Auctionator if you don't already have it. I'll show you how to set up a basic shopping list of some nice bits to snatch for reselling in my next post. You could use Auctioneer or TSM of course but I haven't used Auctioneer for a while now & TSM can get a bit complicated if you're not really into Auction House stuffs!

If you are a PvP'er & want to know anything in particular, just leave a comment or you can email me on auctionhouseaddict@gmail.com or tweet me on @nevahaddict if you prefer. Or of course, if you want to share your own 5 minute tip - I'd love to hear those as well.