Sayin’ goodbye to crafting cooldowns
Apr 23, 2008 Patches, Professions
Before I start this post, I just want to say hello readers. I’m Kevin, the new guy here. I’ve been hiding in a dark corner working hard on getting WoW Economist to it’s own domain and website, so I haven’t been able to contribute much until now. Will and I have some great plans for the upcoming weeks, so keep your eyes peeled and make sure you subscribe!
As you no doubt have noticed, patch 2.4.2 is up on the public test realm and the official patch notes have been released. From an economists point of view (as many readers have already pointed out), the changes to our crafting cooldowns, Void Shatter in particular, is a new opportunity to take advantage of before the economy stabilizes.
The cooldown for Void Shatter will be removed in the next patch, but be wary of stocking up on Void Crystals. While there are a few possibilities for some quick profit, they are unpredictable.
You might think it wise to buy Void Crystals to shatter and sell as soon as the realms are up after patch day. I don’t expect it to take long for the market price of Large Prismatic Shards to drop. Unless you plan on camping the login server and being one of the first to start shattering and spamming the trade channel, I wouldn’t recommend this route. It could be the most lucrative choice, but definitely the most risky.
Another outlook would be buying Void Crystals in hopes they end up in short supply, giving you a chance to sell them at a higher price. With the patch, the demand for Void Crystals will likely increase because it will be more cost effective to shatter them than to buy the shards themselves. This one is a little more predictable than the time it will take for the shard prices to fall, so it isn’t as risky of an investment, but the yield won’t be as high either.
My best recommendation to you is to sell any Large Prismatic Shards you may have laying around and use the gold to buy them back in the form of Void Crystals before patch day. Come Tuesday of 2.4.2, have them shattered (or shatter them yourself) and enjoy the extra pocket change.
On a side note, what’s the point (besides perfectionism) of patching the crafting quest for the Onyxia Scale Cloak? Does anyone even bother with Blackwing Lair any more?
April 23rd, 2008 at 9:35 pm
Yo on a side note concerning 2.4.2 the riding crop and similar items will be changed from trinkets to enchants to be placed on a single mount, hence each mount you have will need a riding crop enchant to get the 10% speed increase…(why o why did i shard my riding crop when i got the skywhip!)
So what does this mean? well basically riding crops are going to be in demand, at the least everyone on the server who is 70 will want at least one more. And riding crops are made from Primal Might. Guess who bought 16 primal mights earlier today….
Anyway just thought I would mention this!
Miyuji.
P.s. I was wondering if you wanted somone to write about using auctioneer and how to maximize its effectiveness?
April 23rd, 2008 at 9:45 pm
We decided against writing about that as there are rumors floating around that the riding speed trinkets change could be reversed. Once we get more information, we will be sure to cover it.
April 23rd, 2008 at 10:47 pm
Miyuji: It appears that although you can use the Riding Crop as an enchantment now, you are equally able to keep it as a trinket; therefore, for many people, it’ll just be business as usual switching it in and out with their various mounts using Itemrack or a similar addon for automation.
April 24th, 2008 at 3:20 am
Hey guys !
Just wanted to say I think this one is a great piece of advice. Hope not too many people read it so I can buy even more Void Crystals !
Keep up the good work !
PS: Where is the risk’o-meter on this one ?
April 24th, 2008 at 6:40 am
It’s worth remembering that the equilibrium point for any widespread transmute is basically zero. In fact, it can frequently go negative, since there’s sometimes a loss of utility.
For example: The 5 primals going into a Primal Might have all sorts of possible uses, including being turned into a Primal Might. Once they’re a Pirmal Might, they therefore have fewer possible uses. This also applies to the herbs in a potion, which his why any potions from non-rare recipes are a loss to make from mats.
So, whatever money is going to be made out of this is going to be made fast, before the market reaches equilibrium. (Which won’t take long with a zero-cooldown spell.) After not-very-long, prices will stabilize with Void Crystals being worth just the faintest bit more than their equivalents in Large Prismatics.
April 24th, 2008 at 10:37 am
After not-very-long, prices will stabilize with Void Crystals being worth just the faintest bit more than their equivalents in Large Prismatics.
Now here is what I’m wondering: does this mean the price of Void Crystals will go up to meet the price of 2xLarge Prismatic… or that the price of Lg Prismatic will fall to 1/2 a Void Crystal? Or will they balance out and meet somewhere in between?
Personally, I can’t see any way the increase in the supply of Large Prismatics would help their price. However… having a way to remove the supply of Void Crystals, I’m thinking, can’t help but drive up their price somehow (on my server, Void Crystals can sometimes be found for less than Large Prismatics, but generally they are around the same cost).
It’s kind of a gamble, but I’ve been buying up Void Crystals. My gut kind of tells me it could work out well. If not, I don’t think I’d loose TOO much gold on it… hopefully.
April 24th, 2008 at 10:42 am
(First I would like to congratulate the WoW Economist Team - I like your blog and wish you all the best)
I agree with the assessment sell LPS and buy VCs, on my realm I was already doing the same as in a 24 hour period I would make around 20g on one shatter.
Current prices for VC is around 25-30g and one LPS goes for 25-30g. I guess after 2.4.2 it will depend on realm economy - on my realm we have tons of new 70s, everyone wants to get enchants and enchants take loads of LPSs. Therefore I feel the demand will be there however VC prices will go up. My bet buy as many VCs at reasonable price as you can and wait.
The inflation is just started and it will be a high inflation - there will be more and more people doing SSO dailies and more and more money in the economy. People will be willing to pay more money for mats. On my realm Primals (W, A, F) used to be around 15-20G now few weeks after SSO they are at 40-50g less people do farming and more do dailies as the income is much more predictable.
April 24th, 2008 at 10:55 am
François: I didn’t add a risk-o-meter to this one because it had three different risk levels for the possible scenarios.
April 24th, 2008 at 11:01 am
JSG: “It’s kind of a gamble, but I’ve been buying up Void Crystals. My gut kind of tells me it could work out well. If not, I don’t think I’d loose TOO much gold on it… hopefully.”
Fully agree - now I have 56 VC more and 1200g less than yesterday, we shall see….
If LPS price drops to 20g I still will be able to sell them for 2240g (1000g profit)
April 24th, 2008 at 11:06 am
I agree with ChesireCat. I think the bigger question is what will be the equilibrium price? Right now, Large Prismatics go for around 22g on my server while Voids go for 30g. So will the equilibrium price become 44g for Voids and remain 22g for Prismatics or will it still be 30g for Voids but 15g for Large Prismatics. My best guess is that we’ll see a bit of both and I predict 18g for Large Prismatics and 36g for Voids – with the Prismatics regularly be sold for 15-16g when the market is flooded. In the short-term (right after the patch) it will be pretty volatile.
April 24th, 2008 at 11:11 am
BTW, regarding “carrot on a stick” items… I’m amazed at how many people think making them a mount enchant is a BAD idea. IMO, it seems like a great idea!
I actually stopped carrying around my Carrot on a Stick- it’s too much trouble to have to swap it on/off everytime I mount/dismount. Why on Azeroth would anyone want to continue dealing with that garbage? A mountspeed enhancement sounds perfect… and it also opens up a new market traded item.
April 24th, 2008 at 11:22 am
zoltannyc Says: “Fully agree - now I have 56 VC more and 1200g less than yesterday, we shall see….
If LPS price drops to 20g I still will be able to sell them for 2240g (1000g profit)”
That’s a good point, which the more savvy traders already understand, but should nonetheless be emphasized for people new to the game: buy low and sell high.
If nothing else, that maxim is what makes a mod like Auctioneer a must-have: it tells you where the current market fluctuation is at. Otherwise you need to rely on spreadsheets or paper (or memory, heaven forbid!).
It will also make the REALLY great deals stand out for you, and when those come along, it’s your ticket to really easy money. For example, last night I saw somebody listing 3 primal nether for 40g each… but the buyout for all the other auctions were 1 for 60g. So I bought it out, relisted them all single, and made a really quick and easy 60g.
But obviously, you can’t think Auctioneer itself will make you money. It gives you more options with data manipulation, but you are still going to have to do the work.
Does anyone else wish the entire mod would display data in the same way the auctioneer window does? I’ve actually been keeping one of the item I want to track in my inventory just so I can easily track those items. Having a window where you can see the info on items you specify would be insanely great.
April 24th, 2008 at 11:29 am
JSG: You mean the tooltip data with the item’s market history? Or a different Auctioneer window?
April 24th, 2008 at 11:33 am
JSG: I use AHsearch from http://wowui.worldofwar.net/?p=mod&m=4023
=====
AHsearch saves Auction House search queries.
AHsearch puts a 24×24 pixel ‘Arrow Down’ button (’AHsearch Button’) on the right side of your searchfield in the Auction House frame (screenshots).
- Right-click ‘AHsearch Button’ for options like create, edit, delete, sort, move categories/search queries.
- Left-click ‘AHsearch Button’ for your saved search queries.
=====
Works with Auctioneer without any problems however some bookmarking (tracking) in Auctioneer would be great)
April 24th, 2008 at 12:51 pm
Thank You will, nice to know about the options regarding the trinket / enchant for riding crop. regardless of whether or not the changes go live i still purchased each primal might at 20g below server selling price since i bought in bulk. I am not sure if I will still have them in stock when 2.4.2 goes live as I want to keep my gold in constant rotation so I have already started to post them. But may decide to purchase another large chunk later on as information gets released.
April 24th, 2008 at 2:42 pm
Kevin Says:
JSG: You mean the tooltip data with the item’s market history? Or a different Auctioneer window?
I mean the window where you check items from your inventory (which are listed on the left side) and can set prices, split stacks, etc. The view I like is how it displays other listings of that item in the AH, you can sort the prices, etc.
It would be great to have the exact data display elsewhere.
zoltannyc: thx for the tip, I’ll check out AHSearch.
April 25th, 2008 at 8:07 am
I’m not sure I completely follow your recommendation. From where I sit right now, I see Void Crystals selling at an average of 40g, where as I pick them up when the price dips to 35g or lower. With Large Prismatic Shards, I see an average climb toward and beyond 30g a piece (we just got the badge vendor last night) while I buy them during short dips of 25g (or similarly priced 65+ blues).
I’m with you so far as selling off your Large Prismatic Shards now and restocking them under the current reduced price of Void Crystals. What trips me up is the recommendation against converting all those voids to sell on patch day, then the followed recommendation to… split those into Large Prismatic Shards and sell them… later? Am I missing something?
Now, obviously the demand for Large Prismatic Shards comes from the high quantities needed for high end enchants, where as Void Crystals are used in smaller quantities. This is coupled with the fact that guilds get far more Void Crystals from Karazhan (for example) than Large Prismatic Shards, and most people have 1-2 pick up members in their instances/heroics (meaning those shards aren’t guaranteed guild property, unlike the voids). The end result is that the majority can currently turn to their guild for most (if not all) of their Void Crystal needs, but they have to pony up most (if not all) of their own Large Prismatic Shards. Thus the market has lower demand for Void Crystals, and high demand for Large Prismatic Shards.
In the future, however, all of those excess voids are going to hit the market as twice as many shards. Won’t the price equalize, or even tip in favor of the Void Crystals since those non-raiders out there still have to enchant their heroic badge loot, but may not have the vault of a raiding guild to turn to?
My thinking is to follow your first suggestion in dumping those shards on the market NOW and resupplying them with voids NOW, but to hold onto them in the form of voids long enough to see which form comes out ahead.
Again, am I missing something?
April 25th, 2008 at 11:58 am
My thoughts on the matter is that on the whole the price of LPS will go down after 2.4.2 and to a small extent the prices of void will go up, but I am not sure that voids will increase in price massively so much as we will see a decrease in the price of shards. Void’s primary use after 2.4.2 will be used for shatters as there so few enchants that actually use them.
I am persoally using my shatter cd’s as they come up as I bought my voids prior to 2.4 at 16g a pop so they are netting me like a 400% return atm, and I plan on trying to lower my stock of both items. to be honest investing is one thing but you have to remember as we dont know the date of 2.4.2 that unless you have absurd amounts of gold lying around it is better to have your gold in circulation within the ah over and over again rather then buying and holding on waiting for some magical patch date that could possibly be 2 months away.
personally the main issues is when will 2.4.2 hit? does anyone have a timeline on when we should be expecting this patch?
April 29th, 2008 at 3:13 am
Hi!
I bought 27 void crystal yesterday, each cost to 31g.
my question is,
how much is the maximum price after patch that i could shell them?
(sry for my bad english)
April 29th, 2008 at 11:58 am
I must say i love the site. But you guys need to have more articles.. 1 a week just isn’t that good..
April 29th, 2008 at 1:12 pm
András: I have no idea what they will do or how high they will go. I did not recommend doing what you did, so I really cannot give you any advice.
Alwyzbkillin: We are doing our best. We are afraid if we post too often, we will run out of ideas and get stuck posting once every two or three weeks.
April 30th, 2008 at 9:45 am
If your server is like my server, then this change is not a secret. Prices on Voids have risen from an average of 28g to an average of about 33g. When the market floods, they still go for as low as 28-30g. My best guess (and we can only guess) is that the equilibrium price on Voids will be about 37g post-patch and 18.5g for Shards.
Here is my logic:
Prior to the patch news, equilibrium price seemed to be about 28g for Voids and 23g for Shards on my server.
Two shards = One Void
One Void = (Two Shards + One Void) / 2
One Void = ((23*2) + 28)/2 = 37
One Shard = (Two Shards + One Void) / 4
One Shard = ((23*2) + 28)/4 = 18.5
One thing to consider is that lots of people will be stockpiling Voids with the intent to sell them post-patch for a quick profit. The initial flood on the market will be greatest right after the patch and I suspect you will see very high prices to start, followed by panic and a serious drop in market price as they don’t sell as quickly as expected. In other words, don’t be surprised if market is like 28-30g on Voids the first week of the patch. Don’t be one of those guys selling. Hold. Or if prices drop low enough – Buy. You waited until the patch, you can wait till the market achieves equilibrium again.
I’m actually planning to work both ends. I’m buying at 28-30g and selling about 50% of what I buy at 35g when the market is peaking. My belief is that’s not much less than what they will sell for post-patch and I’m getting an immediate return of several gold per Void. When the patch DOES hit, I plan to BUY (hopefully around 30g) after the market gets flooded by panicked sellers. A week or two later when equilibrium is reached, I’ll just sell it all off again for a tidy profit at around 37g.
May 1st, 2008 at 10:24 am
Hi
on my realm (one of the oldest EU-PVE) we have the following prices:
1x Void Crystal sells for 19-20g, i even bought some for 18,5g this morning
1x Large Prismatic Shard sells for 22-25g
At the moment i’m buying any Void Crystal under 20g.
I hope it works out as planned.
May 2nd, 2008 at 3:32 am
on my server VC sells for 19-22G and LPS slightly higher.
I’ve been shouting in trade channel to buy VC in big quantity at low prices. The average price i bought are 16G, someone even sold me 60 crystals for 700 Gold.. I was surprised but bought it without hesitation.
Either way I think my avg price of VC will be low enough to make a profit whether the price go up or down in the new patch.
May 15th, 2008 at 12:48 am
I made close to 3k in profit in the last two days just from sharding my VCs and selling the shards. If I’d been able to find more VCs in the last couple of weeks, I could have made more.