Tracking the BoE market in Wrath
by Mike Schramm 
Nov 10th 2008 at 3:00PM
The folks over at WoW Economist have started up a blog on one of the most popular problems in World of Warcraft: making money, and lots of it. The truth is that it's not hard to do, whether you're working with professions, trying to hang in the AH, PvPing, or just starting out, but everyone's got a tip to share, it seems, and WoW Economist is no exception.This time around, they've got a good short analysis up of what might happen to green BoEs in Wrath of the Lich King. Once upon a time, there was actually a good market for BoEs on the AH -- some of them even challenged Karazhan gear in the early days of level 70, so anyone new to 70 could just spend some time in the Auction House and pick up some nice gear for running the basic instances and starting to build up blues and epics. But in my experience the market has thinned out lately -- while there's always a market for enchanging materials you can get from BoEs, people aren't that interested in buying green gear with epics so easy to get elsewhere. Most of the time, I get more from vendors for greens than I can actually sell them for on the AH.
But WoW Econ says there's a bump on the way -- Death Knights are going to be shooting through 60-70 directly after Wrath, and they're going to want the level 66-70 greens floating around (plate gear with Strength and Stam on it), so that will probably sell well. But everything else is pretty much dried up -- DE it if you can, or just vendor it away and move on. The gold will come quicker in Northrend anyway.
Filed under: Items, Analysis / Opinion, Odds and ends, Economy, Making money
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
alwaypwns Nov 10th 2008 3:13PM
I either DE or vendor all BoEs besides blues and epics... Not worth the hassle to try and sell the litterally hundreds you get while leveling. Blues go to my alts or AH, epics go to AH.
sephirah Nov 10th 2008 3:37PM
I try to sell them at AH at auctioneer price.
If they don't sell... DE!
steve Nov 10th 2008 4:01PM
I used to sell about half of the greens I picked up via the AH (anything I wouldn't buy myself, like "of the whale", was an automatic DE). Going into the wrath season, I found that people were buying less and less and that I had completely filled up one bank alt and half of another with green gear. I decided to DE all of it to free up some space and figured that enchanting mats stack well and never go out of style. The plate gear angle for DKs didn't occur to me, I don't know how much plate I ended up DEing! I'm sure there will be plenty more plate in my future, I'll hang on to it now to see if I can tap into the DK phenomenon.
Amaxe Nov 10th 2008 3:18PM
Right now the market can be good for the drops for level 40s and up, and of course crafting components did very well for the last minute power levelling.
While we have the DKs starting at level 1 in their professions, there will probably be a good market for ore, herbs and the like
oldwisemonk Nov 10th 2008 3:29PM
The green BoE's from Outlands had awful list prices. If you had to list anything more than once or twice, your profit was lost. Unless something was good enough to get purchased on the Trade Chan ... it went into my DE pile.
Beldoro Nov 10th 2008 3:32PM
Someone mentioned the other night to hold on to high end (67+) greens until after Wrath release and then DE them for a chance (however remote) for Wrath enchanting mats.
Not sure if this is true or not.
Smurk Nov 10th 2008 3:34PM
I think it may have been someone in this blog's comments who tipped me off to it, but the Blade of Misfortune is by far the best BoE rare weapon for a level 60 DK, and they were selling for 100-150 gold all summer. I bought scads of them and am now selling for 400-500 each. So if that tipster is still out there, thanks!
neoimmortal Nov 10th 2008 3:58PM
Since the slew of dailies was introduced in 2.4, I haven't tried to sell anything green except an occasional decent piece of armor or one that has a level requirement ending in 9 (for those twinks). Almost all greens go to the vendor now, I may send some to alts for when they get high enough level, but even then I tend to vendor them too.
Jack Spicer Nov 10th 2008 4:02PM
I wouldn't go too crazy on the green BoE gear. Don't the DKs get a really nice set of blue gear from their starting zone quests. I hear that gear can take them nicely into the level 65 territory, and if they're lazy they can probably just head straight into Northrend with it on.
Cyanea Nov 10th 2008 4:07PM
I never really had much of a problem selling random greens I find while levelling in Outland. The "of the Whale" ones and their ilk usually make it right to my DE pile, but someone always buys my "of the Monkey" or "of Power", etc ones and usually for at least 10g.
Dedbitt Nov 10th 2008 4:21PM
The gear death knights start with honestly can get them through Outland leveling. The speed levelers aren't going to stop to shop the AH for greens. Once in Northrend the death knights are no more a target market than warriors and paladins are in the same level ranges.
Evi Nov 10th 2008 4:45PM
I've had the worst luck selling green armor for quite some time now. I finally gave up on the hassle and starting sending them directly to my enchanter friend. I'm not sure I can be bothered to care again, even with the slew of DKs on the way. But thanks for the tip. I'll keep my eyes on the AH to see if it's worth it after WotLK is released...
Zamboni Nov 10th 2008 8:12PM
All of my greens get sent to the disenchanter at the AH. About 1 in 10 will vendor more than the enchant mats, while the rest get ground up int dust and shards (aside from the very rare twink items). The listing fees are too high to risk having stuff come back unsold.
Schadenfreude Nov 10th 2008 9:08PM
I only ever sold greens from outland in the 57-60 range that newcomers to outland would want for the +stam boost. Oh, and occasionally resistance or stamina greens for specialty boss fights. Other than that, I always DE'd or vendored everything. The AH deposit is wayyy too high.
Michael Nov 11th 2008 3:59AM
This will be so nice. I am buying all the cheap mats atm. GPE, Arcane Dust, LPS, Arcane Tomes, Fel Armaments.
Even DK's will need to level their Enchanting and there will be a dire need to get Mats for Mongoose,etc before the new good enchants are available everywhere and affordable.
They will also nee dshoulder enchants before they hit exalted with Sons of Haldir.
In addition there is no ah fee for these Mats so you can leave them on AH forever ;-)
I am already making tons of profits atm, 47k since Patch 3.0, because people emptied their stocks too soon. And on release It will be even more.