Gold Capped News: Critical AH addons broken by patch 4.0.1
by Basil Berntsen 
Oct 8th 2010 at 7:00PM
If you were to install the PTR right now and try to post a batch of auctions for sale with your favorite addon, there's a good chance it wouldn't work. Blizzard has changed the way that addons can interact with the auction house so that it's no longer possible to queue up a large volume of auctions and let them post while you read my columns.
Both Auctioneer and Quickauctions 3 have been hit hard, obviously. These are the most commonly used addons for queuing up a bunch of auctions. The rule previously seemed to be that we're not allowed to buy in batches, but we are allowed to sell in batches. Well, it looks like Blizzard has decided that we can no longer sell in batches, either. In addition, QA3 has lost its ability to automatically cancel auctions that have been undercut. The new patch requires a hardware event per action, and this has not (at the time of publishing) been written into these addons.
So what is a batch? Since you can queue up multiple stacks of the same item using the default UI, that seems to be allowed still. What is no longer allowed is putting together a list of different types of items that you want to sell at the same time. Take heart, dear reader: There is a workaround!
First, the workaround is fortunately not to simply manually post all your auctions. When you have 300+ glyphs (for example) and dozens of types of cut gems that you probably want to be listing for all the new demand that 4.0.1 will generate, sitting there with the default posting interface does not cut it. It doesn't show you the similar auctions you will be competing with in the same frame, and it doesn't suggest a remotely intelligent default price.
That said, to fix QA3 (only, for now), simply download and install this addon. [edit: credit where credit's due. This was written by the awesome folks who spend their days at the JMTC forums, specifically Zerotorescue, the author of the QA-poster addon]. Without it, QA3 will just hang. With it, you're presented with a handy-dandy little box saying, "Do you want to post this auction?" It doesn't seem to work with Auctioneer (currently, the box comes up but doesn't seem to work when you click it), but I have faith in the Auctioneer dev team's ability to get a new build out fairly soon when its product stops working. Still, gems and glyphs are expected to be the big sellers come patch day, and those are both markets that QA3 does very well.
Apparently, addons are still allowed to automatically price for you, and that's one of the two biggest advantages that QA3 gives us, in addition to automated batch selling and canceling. The only change is that you need to click once for every group of auctions. Luckily, you can still keybind the action of clicking the Yes button: Simply create a macro with this line in it.
/click StaticPopup1Button1It will work for canceling as well as posting. Drag the macro to a button, keybind that button, and you're set. This type of automation was covered in another article: same principle, different application. It's not perfect, but at least it's better than using the default UI to post several hundred types of products by hand.
Why now?
I am not going to hazard a guess about what drove the fine folks at the Blizzard UI dev team to make this undocumented change to the functions used by these addons specifically to service the glyph and gem markets, but it's a little rough that it's happening simultaneously with a patch that's expected to drive more demand for them than any other patch in the history of the game. Patch 4.0.1 is drastically changing the desirability of stats to many classes in the game, and a huge number of people will be regemming from armor penetration to something other than crit (which is what ArP gems will give you after the patch). Also, now that we can learn every glyph in the game, there's going be a huge surge in demand for glyphs as people scramble to get one of each.
Maximize your profits with more advice from Gold Capped, plus the author's Call to Auction podcast. Do you have questions about selling, reselling and building your financial empire on the auction house? Basil is now taking questions for a special series, "Ask an auctioneer," at basil@wow.com.Filed under: Economy, Add-Ons, Cataclysm, Gold Capped
Reader Comments (Page 2 of 7)
Skrotus Oct 8th 2010 7:18PM
I'll hazard a guess at their motivations for this change:
http://wow.joystiq.com/2010/09/22/gold-capped-quick-auctions-poster-does-the-undercutting-for-you/
Zyla Oct 8th 2010 9:13PM
Exactly. The minute I read that article I knew it was going to be handled by Blizzard. Blizz has been very consistent to remove anything that let's you perform actions while you aren't at the computer. The add-on that let's you automatically undercut someone while you are logged in but not actively playing was going too far. Now you will need to press a button for each set of auctions of the same item.
Jabbaprime Oct 9th 2010 12:00PM
Another reason might be the introduction of the remote AH. I am not sure of its features but I don't think you can sell in batches, and by removing it from in game it will level the field for those who are paying for the service.
Maybe blizz received a lot of complaints or maybe they want to enable batch selling only in remote AH later. Who knows.
Darkdust Oct 8th 2010 7:23PM
So let me get this straight.
The "problem" here is that Blizzard wants you to actually click ("hardware event") for every auction, so that you can't just post 300 auctions with only one or two clicks.
And people begin to worry that they will need to put effort into their auction PVP.
Yes, this sounds like it's already starting to have the desired effect. Thumbs up to Blizzard.
Erin Oct 8th 2010 7:44PM
I completely agree with you
Noyou Oct 8th 2010 8:01PM
I love this. Very tired of seeing XX undercuts mere seconds after I post an item that had no prior market. Sure it's nice to buy certain things at fractions of the price (often times lower than the cost of reagents) but as someone who has all the professions covered through my alts I don't mind prices being more worth while to actually farm and craft things. Kudos to you blizzard!
totenkopf1001 Oct 8th 2010 9:36PM
"And people begin to worry that they will need to put effort into their auction PVP."
That is a ridiculous statement, although it seems to express a naive belief shared by many here.
Blizzard created a profession like no other: 300+ different types of glyphs, many of which were in regular demand. The process for making the each of those glyphs was multi-staged: 1. farm/buy Northrend herbs 2. mill 3. convert to Ink of the Sea 4. trade Ink of the Sea for all of the various inks needed to make all of the various glyphs 5. purchase all of the variouss parchments needed to make all of the various glyphs 6. make the glyphs. That's above and beyond the time and effort it takes to know which of the hundreds of Glyphs you actually need to make to stay in stock. Scribes that played the AH heavily devoted TONS of time to the profession before ever posting their Glyphs. The advantages of auto-posting reduced the posting-time, but posting is just the end of an already long and terrifically boring process.
I find it particularly interesting that people are complaining about undercutting. Certainly it is not rational for an average Glyph consumer to complain about the cost benefit to them of constant undercuts. I presume that many of the complaints are from folks like "Noyou" just above: people that DIDN'T want to devote the time and effort into a massive Glyph operation, and are really just happy that their auctions won't be undercut as often, with the obvious affect upon Glyph cost. In other words, plenty of folks praising this change either misunderstand the advantages of the auto-post feature from a consumer standpoint, or are just glad that their amateur auction efforts won't be undercut, and they won't be forced to reduce their Glyph prices.
From my point of view the change is not all that bad, although I feel it is a form of betrayal on Blizzard's part: many folks spent a lot of time working on Inscription because of the tools that were available to make some aspects of the glyph business more time-efficient. Now Blizz has pulled the rug out, and hasn't even bothered to tell folks about it. No surprise, Blizzard pulls that kind of stunt fairly regularly. One mitigating factor: the Glyph business as we knew it will die soon after 4.0.1, and along with it will die the fierce competition that accompanied it. I sure as hell won't bother anymore.
Despite all of that, as far as I'm concerned, it's basically a good move: I spent incredible amounts of time supporting my Glyph business, and this will help me to walk away from it for good, and spend more time playing my main, instead of my auction mules.
Sinthar Oct 12th 2010 4:42AM
@totenkopf1001
"posting is just the end of an already long and terrifically boring process"
Then maybe actually,,,,you know, PLAY the game in a way that you actually enjoy? If i have to do "long and terrifically boring" processes, then I am at WORK, if i am doing something I choose to do as a hobby/pasttime, then I enjoy it. I cannot understand someone who chooses to be 'Terrifically' bored
Eirik Oct 11th 2010 2:45PM
I must just be slow. (As in "short bus" slow...) I use Auctioneer, post a fair number of glyphs. But I've been using the "Post" auction tab, which pretty much only adds a) display of most recently scanned auctions of that type, and b) automatic/remembered pricing for that item.
1) The vanilla auction interface allows the "post N stacks of Y of this item" already (yay!). So the "100 stacks of 1 arcane dust" aren't going to go away regardless.
2) Where on auctioneer does it (did it) let you post batches of auctions? I must have missed it.
Pyromelter Oct 8th 2010 7:32PM
"In addition, QA3 has lost its ability to automatically cancel auctions that have been undercut."
Good change, since this was a pretty blatant violation of the "one event" part of the ToS.
Boobah Oct 9th 2010 4:09AM
This. So much this.
It was very obviously beyond what an addon should be able to do; after reading what the addon did, I was quite frankly amazed that Basil was promoting its use when it's even more clearly over the line than that paint-on-screen addon was.
Nipah Oct 8th 2010 7:32PM
Thank goodness... Maybe now I won't have to flip past 4-5 pages of 1xFrostweave to find out how much to charge for a stack of 20.
Nipah Oct 8th 2010 7:34PM
Bollocks. I just remembered they can still do this with the default UI... *hangs head*
Pfooti Oct 8th 2010 7:51PM
Yes, and they've broken the function that Auctionator and SimpleAuctions use to mass-buy multiple listings as well. So now, you can't even shift-click and buy 20 individual listings of one cloth. Hooray for progress.
Bronwyn Oct 8th 2010 10:07PM
Yeah. -_-
Also, are you the Nipah from Ghostlands?
Arcticcore Oct 8th 2010 7:41PM
What does this mean for the lazy bastard who only likes to press one button?
JC_Icefox Oct 8th 2010 8:14PM
There's a game called "Pong" you might want to look into.
Greg Oct 9th 2010 12:02AM
What buttons are you pressing in Pong!?
Boobah Oct 9th 2010 4:10AM
Start?
bluerobin427 Oct 8th 2010 7:44PM
Didn't they ADD the ability to post in batches to the default UI a while ago? And can't these addons just tap into that functionality? Or did this get removed in 4.0.1? Sorry if this is a dumb question, but I just check on the auction house and was able to post multiple stacks with a single click with no addons, so I'm a little confused.