3 things that will become more expensive in Mists of Pandaria
by Basil Berntsen 
Mar 30th 2012 at 3:00PM
If you save every gold you have right now until the next expansion, you won't actually be any poorer than you currently are, but you sure will feel like you are. Assuming there are no new gold sinks, the amount of gold entering your characters' pockets is going to skyrocket, and they will all buy stuff you want, raising prices across the board. Farmers will make more from crafters, who will charge more for crafted goods.
World of Inflationcraft
Inflation is one of those universal truths like taxes and hunter envy. Unlike hunter envy, though, it can't be avoided by simply upgrading your main from a support class to a hunter. The best way to deal with it is to plan ahead and tie up as much of your money on things that will go up in price. You want to aim for things that will rise at least as much as inflation will erode the value of your savings.
If instead of worrying about the value of the gold under your mattress, you're living paycheck to paycheck, you're in fine shape. Inflation will increase your income and costs at about the same rate. It only starts to hurt if you have a nest egg you want to spend on pandaren content. When everything is more expensive, your hard-earned pile of gold will be able to buy you less BoE gear, item upgrades, repairs, and pets than it will now.
Pets
Pets will be trainable and tradable in Mists of Pandaria. Particularly rare ones will likely see high increases in demand and price, even untrained. There's no way to know how much of a return you'll get from time spent training one of these things, but since there's no penalty for losing a match, I predict it won't be much per hour.
Your best bet is to pick a few rare drop mini-pets and watch the Auction House for them until launch, buying them if they're ever reasonably priced. You can research their average price on the Undermine Journal. The day the Pet Battle feature goes live, list everything you have, and don't lower your price for months. The fact that there are truly unfarmable drop rate pets combined with the generally higher level of gold most people will have will mean that you'll get your profit.
Materials
A few months into Cataclysm, the average price for some Wrath of the Lich King mats spiked, and they haven't come down yet. Enchanting mats, ore, herbs, and leather all went up. Much of the demand for these was linked to people leveling professions on new characters, but there are still some best-in-slot raiding enchants and very attractive bags made from Wrath mats.
Assuming that there are a few things like that in Mists, you'd be well served to keep at least some mats around in case they ever seriously spike. The main difficulty with stocking mats is that they take up a lot of room. Some of them, like Maelstrom Crystals, are quite dense, but the dust is very voluminous. In fact, if you're going to stockpile dust, ore, or herbs, you're best off dedicating a mail-bounce alt. Simply mail 12 stacks at a time to this alt, and 30 days later, they'll be returned unopened. It's a labor-intensive way to store things, but it's free and unlimited.
Speaking of maelstroms, remember that there's a price cap on them. As long as you have an enchanter with the ability to DE epics, you can get them for 146g from the Firelands reputation vendor. Of course, this is only going to work as long as Blizzard doesn't make a change like making all vendor-bought epics resistant to disenchanting.
You'll notice I left gems off this list as well; this is because of the new design for ilevel minimums. While Wrath gems are usable for any gear with a socket, Cataclysm gems are only good for 300+ ilevel gear. There may be a way to make a profit selling them in Mists, but I won't risk it.
Think big
As mentioned above, one issue with mats is that they generally take up a lot of room. Even assuming you're spending time every 59 days to re-mail your entire inventory, you still have to work pretty hard to store a small amount of gold (relative to even a modest auctioneer's average gold pile). The solution? Denser investments.
Rare mounts, vanity items, and TCG loot can often cost hundreds of thousands of gold. A few of these could easily reduce the amount of mailing you have to do. The key is to pick something that won't see a massive increase in availability next expansion -- rare raid rewards, for example. A Shadowmourne tchotchke costs more now than it did last expansion and should be even more in Mists. Everyone will have tons more money, and even fewer people will be building Shadowmournes. There is a very expensive and rare sea mount that will see less supply next expansion, and of course, Trading Card Game loot.
The main thing about high-ticket items is that they take much longer to sell. I wouldn't keep too much gold tied up in them, or else you run the risk of having to sell for a lower amount that you otherwise would have if you need your money quickly.
Also, TCG loot is not like in-game rare items in that the number available depends on the number of codes bought from the company that makes the cards. The supply tends to increase over time, and while you may get lucky and pick something that retains (or gains) value, you may get something that loses money.
Maximize your profits with advice from Gold Capped. Want to know the very best ways to earn 10,000 gold? Top gold making strategies for auctioneers? How about how to reach 1 million gold -- or how one player got there and then gave it all away? Fox and Basil are taking your questions at fox@wowinsider.com and basil@wowinsider.com.
Filed under: Economy
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
Mackenzie Mar 30th 2012 3:05PM
AHSpy.com is dead.
Long live AHSpy.com.
Charlie Mar 30th 2012 3:09PM
I wanted to ask you guys about Area of effect looting and its effect on the economy.
It seems to me that AOE looting works for games like SWTOR because out of all the enemies you kill, only a small number have loot.
My concern with wow AOE looting is that people will be able to loot old dungeon and raid content much more quickly and essentially make the economy very cash heavy.
Do you think this is a possibility?
Boobah Mar 30th 2012 3:48PM
I doubt it'll make an appreciable difference. The stuff that people are soloing won't drop more loot; they'll just be picking it up a little faster. Most of the time involved, in my experience, if running from one group of mobs to the next, not so much the killing and looting.
Although that could just be subjective thing, since the running bit is what I find the most boring.
On the other hand, it probably does make it more likely people will actually loot the piles of dead things they leave behind them.
Kar On E Mar 30th 2012 6:43PM
I'd argue it will take up the bag economy. I know I'm already shopping for the largest ones I can find as it may make skipping loot slightly less favorable.
Gen Man Mar 30th 2012 6:49PM
no more than it is now because the 5 dungeons per hour limit will still be in place.
chris crouse Mar 30th 2012 3:13PM
hunters are horrible.
evoxpisces Mar 30th 2012 4:39PM
Not as bad as mages :)
RedMosquito Mar 30th 2012 6:56PM
You both suck.
murmaiderxx Mar 31st 2012 3:15PM
Coming from a blood sucker? Mind = Blown.
Ron Mar 30th 2012 3:14PM
Not sure if you are aware but I clicked on the auction spy link and that site is no longer active : | seems they gave up on the project.
littlelingos Mar 30th 2012 3:13PM
Gonna make a buncha' mechanical squirrels, hopefully they sell and my engineer will finally make some money
vocenoctum Mar 30th 2012 8:49PM
I was one of the few who sold Lifelike Mechanical Toads on my server. The cost of mats was usually 20-30ish, but they sold for 300+ at times. Main thing of course being that even though the mats are easy enough, if you put too many up, it'll kill the market, so not a "huge money maker" at the time.
Same with the mechanical chicken that you can from those escort quests while leveling. It's BoE and the two I sold (two different characters obviously) were 3k each.
Revynn Mar 30th 2012 3:19PM
Bags and heirloom enchants. Anything that will cater to the sea of new Pandarens and monks.
xiani Mar 30th 2012 10:29PM
Yes. Pretty much this.
For the flood of panda monks the best sellers will be agility & int enchants that work on heirloom weapons.
Glyphs too - they are all getting changed up again, so lots of opportunity there, and everyone needs them, not just the new characters.
Also, farming. Probably the only time it's the best tactic, but the first few weeks of a new expansion is pretty mad - metals, herbs, skins; all of it goes for crazy prices.
The trick is to go to higher level areas than everyone else is in to avoid the competition. This may not be so easy with the new flying restrictions, but I'm sure there will be a way;)
I made over 300k gold just from mining and engineering (http://www.wowhead.com/item=67494) in the first couple of days after Cata launched, and I guess inflation will only make that higher come Mists....
Shrikesnest Mar 30th 2012 3:22PM
My queue question yesterday had this in mind; up until now, flight speed has been the mid-range gold sink of choice. It's desirable enough that everyone will want it, but not a prerequisite for any real content (pretty much just competitive farming) so as not to leave poorer players out in the cold. Many an amateur AH player has sunk tens of thousands of gold into maxing flight speed on their stable of alts. Without an increase in flight or riding speed, Blizzard is forced to come up with another universal gold sink in that money range. Hell of it is, I can't imagine what it would be! Vanity pets and cool mounts are nice, but tons of players don't care about them, and in terms of useful game utility you can't really beat faster outdoor movement (without making your new gold sink mandatory, anyway - bad idea.)
If Blizzard can't come up with something, the result could be pretty bad. Monster gold sinks like your Sandstone Drake and Motorcycle help curb the rich and determined, but what if every casual player just had 15k extra gold laying around for various purposes? Not a rhetorical question - hyperinflation.
DavidsnikreP Mar 30th 2012 3:42PM
Misty flying! Just like... Every expansion after flying came out.
Shrikesnest Mar 30th 2012 3:59PM
It.s
Boobah Mar 30th 2012 4:00PM
Post-BC, the cost of flight hasn't been much of a gold sink. Before the end of Wrath prices were adjusted that the average player would have the cost for flight training more-or-less just lying around by the time their level was high enough for them to buy it. Yes, fast and slightly faster than that flight speed is still a gold-sink... but it's still only a one-time purchase. You don't have to buy Swift Cold-Weather Flying, for example.
I don't, however, put much stock in Shrike's 'OMG! Everybody already bought fast flying! Worse inflation than evar!" either. The inflation is going to come; some because the rewards keep going up in value, and some because just playing the PvE game is a gold-positive endeavor at any level. I just don't see the presence or lack of an optional (if functional) gold sink making the difference.
Pyromelter Mar 30th 2012 5:21PM
Black Market Auction House will be one of the new gold sinks in Mists.
Noyou Mar 30th 2012 3:35PM
"Simply mail 12 stacks at a time to this alt, and 30 days later, they'll be returned unopened. It's a labor-intensive way to store things, but it's free and unlimited."
I lost 48 khorium ore doing that. So, I would be careful. Sometimes mail gets eaten.