How I Dealt With a Bait and Switch

Two days ago in trade, someone posted they wanted to sell Hurricane Deck for 11k. Spotting a good deal, I immediately took action, only to discover I was involved in a bait and switch.

No sooner had I agreed to his deal than he bumped it to 12k. Here is where I made my first and only mistake, as seen in the picture above. Knowing 12k is still a great deal, I said sure. And I would just need to transfer gold.

He did not immediately respond, so I continued on my way to grab some parchments when he came back with this.

At this point I was pissed, he was looking to increase his sale by 2k over what he posted in trade. Immediately I put in a ticket. In a whisper back I informed him.

"no, you originally posted 11k in trade, that is what you have to sell at, this is called baiting and switching and is against ToS. I'm reporting you as we speak"

A minute later I received his response.

"Okay, I'll sell it to you for the 12k"

Still fuming I politely responded "No, I'll keep my ticket in."


Clearly at this point he was scared. He offered to sell it to me for the original 11k and asked if he did would I take out the ticket. I agreed only to have this happen.

As you can see I stood firm at 11k. He took off, and I reported again that I had screenshot the entire event and my ticket was still in. Reluctantly he returned and finally made the trade, for 11k. I gave him a stern lecture about Baiting and Switching and kept the ticket in after modifying it to tell the whole story.

So there you have it, that was how I dealt with a bait and switch situation. What would you have done differently?

Cheers - Brouck

Making Gold With Limited Time

This post is written for the Blogging Carnival over at JustMyTwoCopper.org

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These are three of the simplest tips I can give for someone with limited time.

For Alchemists:

Simply set Hearthstone to your preferred banking location. Then take a portal to your desired zone of transmutation for living elements.

Hyjal - Fire
Deepholm - Earth
Vash'ir - Water
Uldum - Air

Make your transmute, come back, post on AH and profit.

For Miners:

Check prices of pyrite ore and pyrium bars. 2 ore = 1 bar. If ore is selling @ 10g per ore (typical on my server) and bars are selling for 30g per (again typical on my server) simply buy out all the ore and smelt. Take Cold's advice and smelt and afk log for the night, that way, when you log the following day, you have nice stacks of pyrium bars ready. Post the bars in stacks of 4 and buy up more pyrite ore, repeat process! I made 10k alone on this, in the past 4 days!

For Scribes:

Check the prices of Inferno Ink. See if it is remotely close (or higher than) the price of a stack of the following:
Twilight Jasmine
Whiptail (your best bet)

Again, I'll use my server's prices as an example. 1 Inferno Ink goes for 150g. Whiptail stacks sell at 180g (roughly). I buy all stacks Whiptail within 50g of my target price for Infernos (150g). Mill all the herbs (takes a minute max with a macro). Convert pigments to Inferno Inks and Blackfallow Inks. You should get at least 1 Inferno Ink per stack of Whiptail and 4-7 Blackfallow Inks. Post all inks on AH, and repeat the process the following day.


There you have it, three simple tips for making a quick buck.

Cheers - Brouck

What I Do While Shuffling

As I stated yesterday, the obsidium/elementium shuffle requires copious amounts of time. Typically I spend an hour or two working on the simply spamming my macros. When doing it, I suggest listening to Auction House Junkies Podcast.

For those who do not know, auction house junkies is run by Wes from Capped By Cata and Cold, Colds gold Factory from So far they have had two podcasts, which I listened to this afternoon while doing all my shuffling activities.

So far they covered Mysterious Fortune Cards, and the Obsidium Shuffle in depth. Both podcasts are roughly 45 minutes and provide an easy listen with a good amount of humor, mixed with specifics on different markets. It's nice to hear voices of the people behind the blogs.

Go over there and give them a listen, especially if you involved in something as mind-numbing as the obsidium shuffle.

Cheers- Brouck

Frodo Potter and The Macro of Shuffle

By now I think most people are familiar with the Obsidium or Elementium Shuffle. For those who aren't, the simple steps are

1. Buy cheap Obsidium and Elementium (my thresholds are 60g/stack for Obsidium and 70g/stack for Elementium)
2. Usually* prospect ores into gems
3. With the gems do the following:
Jasper - cut into Jasper rings/ sell raw gems on daily day.
Hesonite - sell on AH (if prices are low, convert to hesonite bands)
Alicite - convert into Alicite Pendants
Carnellian - make Carnellian Spikes
Nightstone - wait until daily, and sell in groups of 3 at gouging prices
Zephyrite - wait until daily and sell in groups of 3 at gouging prices

4. DE rings and necks and sell raw enchanting mats.

Now there are obviously places to deviate from this plan and continue to make coin. I know I do my fair share. But primarily, I stick to this scheme.

Which leads me to: Macros

The biggest problem with the shuffle is the time invested to prospect and de the mats. Here are a few suggestions to make life easier.

1. For Prospecting, keybind the following macro:
/cast prospect
/use obsidium ore
/use elementium ore
/use pyrite ore

Just hit this repeatedly until all ore is processed. Make sure to have full stacks or multiples of five.

2. Have enough settings for what you want to craft first.
3. With the exception to Carnelian Spikes, craft next to a mailbox, that way you can mail out to your DE'er
4. Use the following macro for DE'ing the rings, necks and/or spikes

/cast Disenchant
/use item:52306
/use item:52307
/use item:52308
/use item:52309
/use carnelian spikes

Step five is to simply profit. Remember, not to undercut too sharply.

Abyssal Shatter is Back!

So prices today on my server went as followed:

Greater Cosmic Essences: 7g each
Infinite Dust: 3g each
Abyss Crystal 6g each

Can you guess what I did?

Yep, I bought a stack of crystals for 120g, and shattered them into 95 dusts and 34 essences.

They yield a total value of 285g for the dusts and 232g for the essences. Once they sell, it represents a total of 517g in a matter of mere seconds. With a profit of close to 400g.

What are you waiting for? Go see how the market is on your server.

Cheers - Brouck

Nerf to Enchant Off-Hand Intellect in 4.0.6

One of my nice little niche items has been scrolls of Enchant Off-Hand Superior Intellect, which has raised the intellect on off-hand items (including shields) 100 intellect. It has been announced that they will be nerfed in 4.0.6 to only +40 intellect. While it will still be the best choice enchant for shields and off-hands for casters, I expect a drop in sales to occur. Here are my recommendations:

Sell off your existing scrolls now before they drop.

Expect Staves to raise in demand: I'm looking at you, Chelley's Staff of Dark Mending. If you see one for cheap enough on your AH it may be worth investing in.

Cheers - Brouck

Monday Hangover

Does your realm do the same thing my realm does? Everyone knows that Saturday and Sundays are great "buy" days in World Of Warcraft as weekend warriors are practically falling over themselves to sell all of their wares to the masses. It makes for good buying, but terrible selling, as everything has been undercut "to the ground" as Ghostcrawler would say.

But Mondays, well Mondays are the worst. It is impossible to make sales on my realm for any real profit as there are still many people posting at high undercut levels, but none of the quality goods you want are available for purchasing.

For example, I try to find one or two BOE epics every weekend cheap and flip them later in the week. But my main gold making commodity is via the shuffle, and today gems and enchant mats are still being posted at insanely low prices. For me, Monday is a throw-away day.

Things I do instead on Monday's include:
Level new toons
Focus on gearing current toons
Preparing wares for Tuesday's raiding rush.


So.... What do you do on your Mondays?