Brawling Time - BMAH

I want to start out this post by appologizing a bit for the lack of content in the past few weeks.  I was busy for a while IRL and when Sandy came (I live in NJ)  things got hectic for a while, but now things have settled down and I finally have some time to write and play WoW.

First Rule of Brawler's Guild
Well I'm breaking the first rule by writing this post, but when reading an article on Wowhead about Brawler's Guild on the PTR, I was surprised to see that you can access this content by invite only.  And where does one obtain such an invite?  The Black Market Auction House, or as Cold pointed out to me, through member invite.  Invites take Rank 7 in the guild which this post (read it for more info) says currently requires ~75k dps on the PTR.  Needless to say these non-BMAH invites won't be spreading around for a while.

BMAH on the PTR courtesy Wowhead.com

Now, the number of invites  you see in this picture will most likely be more than that on the live servers when 5.1 comes out (maybe not though), but these are going to be a pricey commodity when 5.1 first comes out and the weeks to follow.

What does this mean?
Well, you have two options.  Maybe you're one of the elite gold makers on your server and you want to try out this Brawler's Guild before everyone else, perhaps because you're after the Realm First Achievement associated with it.  If your pockets are deep and you can outbid your competitors, and babysit the auctions, you can be the first to try this, and possibly get the Realm First.  On the other hand you can just wait.  If you're not interested in the Realm First I HIGHLY suggest this route.  Sure go back and check daily what they're going for, or check trade for people selling cheap invites, but wait it out at least 1-2 weeks.  Maybe even get an invite from a friend if they have one.  Prices will drop exponentially by then and you can get your invitation for a great deal.

General BMAH Tactics
In general when using the BMAH you have to take 2 things into consideration.  What you're willing to pay, and where you're going to be when the auction expires.  If you're not going to be on when the auction expires you may very well lose the item to someone who is willing to just pay 1k more than you at the last second.  You may have to pay a premium if you really want an item on the BMAH but just can't be in game when the auction expires.

Always set a price threshold.  If there's an item you're interested in, decide what the maximum price you'd be willing to pay BEFORE you start a bidding war.  This way you don't get caught up in a silly bidding war and end up in a situation like this:

Click to Enlarge.  Image courtesy reddit user jlwg.

Finally, if you're able to be in game near when the auction is expiring, don't start bidding until then.  This one is pretty simple, if you start bidding before then you're only raising the price for yourself, and why do that?  If you're going to start a bidding war, do it as late as possible.

So, if the system goes as planned, when are you going to try to get your invite to the Brawler's Guild after 5.1 is released?

Cheers,

Phat Lewts

If you like my blog follow me on twitter, @PhatLewtsGold!!

First Look: 5.1 PTR

World PvP
If you haven't read it already, check out the current 5.1 PTR Patch notes.  Blizzard is doing a lot of great things with 5.1, including heating up the Horde vs. Alliance conflict the way they have been saying they would.  For gold making I think this will be a great boost.  They're adding 2 outposts, one for each faction that reward rep and have objects to capture.  They are also awarding "commendations" for slaying the opposite faction on the shores.

This is really going to boost PvP in Pandaria, and I think it's going to be absolutely amazing for the crafted PvP gear market, because people who normally wouldn't care about PvP Resil/Power as stats will suddenly be very interested in it.  This will also provide a boost for the enchant/JC enhancements for PvP as well.

Battle Pets
There were also some changes to battle pets that tweaked my interest, the first being that there will now be tokens that drop from wild pet battles that can be used to upgrade pets from grey/common -> uncommon, or uncommon -> rare.  Better yet, they're not BoP, so they can be sold on the Auction House.  This is going to be a very interesting thing to see progress.  Basically it makes any uncommon pet you could sell into a rare, and will allow Pet Battlers to capture uncommon pets instead of hunting for rares, and upgrade them for a price.  This is interesting to me at least, because I've been dabbling in the pet battle system.  They're also adding a 3,000g reward for going through the entire quest chain and defeating the "Grand Master" NPC Pet Battler of Pandaria.  At the very least it will get more people interested in these things!

On my server, I've just seen the first level 25 battle pet posted in the auction house, a Winterspring Cub (of all things).  The seller is selling it for 15k with a 10k bid, which I think will be interesting to see if it pans out.  That's all from me for now, just wanted to get a quick post out about the gold making changes in 5.1, there are other cool features though, check out the Blizzard post I linked at the top! How do you think 5.1 will impact your gold making strategy?

Cheers,

Phat Lewts

If you like my blog follow me on twitter, @PhatLewtsGold!!