Cataclysm - So where does money come from?

In part two of my thinking on Cataclysm I finish up my 'bigger picture' stuff, so I can get into more details over the next few weeks.

Last time I looked at what makes people spend gold, and today I want to look at what we, as goblins, have to do to ensure we can meet the demands of these motivations.
The premise is simple. If I have something you want then, depending on a number of factors, you will give me something (usually gold) in exchange.
The factors that affect this transactions include:

• How badly you want/need the item
• Who else, if anyone, is able to supply the item
• How big a supply is available to you and others

Each of these either strength or weaken you position when setting a price for the item.

But first you need to get the item to be able to supply the purchaser. Getting items in Wow is restricted to a very limited number of ways:

You looted the item

Whether from a chest or dead mob (and very rarely from a quest reward), you can acquire tradeable items which you can sell for gold. Practically any resource is available by this method, from elemental items (X earth/air/fire/water etc) through to ores, herbs etc.. Cloth and green gear are the most 'farmable' of these. Trying to acquire items via this method can be hit and miss, even if you evaluate the best NPCs to kill. This includes frozen orbs as well.

You purchased the item from a NPC

A limited resource, mostly for scalping the entirely stupid (thinking simple flour during the Christmas event.). However runed orbs/crusader orbs/primordial saronite are in this category - as are a limited range of items that can be purchased with frozen orbs

You purchased or were given the item from another player

Although true, they must have got it from somewhere in the first place, which just puts us back in this short list.

You obtained the item via one of your professions

And finally, the main way that anything resource is created - professions. Now we are not just talking gathering professions here i.e skinning, mining, herbalism and fishing. True, these four are the main farming professions but there are other professions that can be considered farming professions such as engineering (mote extractor/mechanical corpse dismantling) and tailoring (increased drop rate of cloth).

Then there are the professions that produce secondary raw materials (ie. a raw material produced from another item) - inscription (pigments/inks from herbs), jewellery crafting (gems from ore) and enchanting (enchanting mats from armour/weapons)

But of course we arent just talking about 'raw materials' but also produced materials - bringing in the rest of the professions - cooking, blacksmithing, leatherworking, alchemy, plus all the other ones mentioned before - which make something with the raw materials that someone else wants.

Its obvious that professions are vitally important to ensure you have a chance of tapping into the needs of others. If you aren't committed to ensuring that your professions are maxed then you will struggle.

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I've only experienced one expansion previously - WotLK. I wasn't around then BC was launched and therefore can only make my observations based on events that occurred with Northrend was delivered. I was a poor lvl 40 priest at the time with no ability to flex my 'professions' muscle to great affect. I was an AH farmer (which any level one toon with gold can do). When the expansion hit, and in the patches that followed, there were crazy prices to be seen across the board.

I personally remember buying purple items for 200g, paying a maxed enchanter 20g a DE for abyss crystals, which I sold for 400g each. I remember titanium ore at 2000g a stack. I remember arctic fur at 800g each. I remember frost lotus at  200g each.

The reason people were able to sell at these ridiculous prices were to meet the 'motivations' of WoW community.

In today's market, there are no longer these inflated prices - in fact prices slide quickly and reach a plateau relatively quickly. The big winners in these boom and bust markets are those who get in and then get out quickly. And to be in at the beginning you need to be able to be there at the start with stock.

Now a patch change is generally something you can make an educated guess with. Take patch 3.2. In this patch JCers could suddenly prospect titanium ore for Epic Gems (result titanium ore went up in price) and potions could stack in 20s (goodbye healing/mana injector market). Some people made a killing by planning weeks out - purchasing ore to on-sell and dumping injectors.

The problem with Cataclysm is that we won't have access to the new materials to stock up. We will have to join the throngs as we push to level 85, fighting for mobs, and quest givers and resources. But as time goes on the market will change, will evolve. And a good goblin will be able to ride the Great River* as it changes, being able to make gold at each stage in the cycle.

Next time I'll step through where I feel the best opportunities are and what changes I plan to make to my own toons to accommodate this.

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* The Ferengi concept of conducting trade and business can be best described in the episode "Treachery, Faith, and the Great River". It introduces the Great Material Continuum, a metaphor in Ferengi culture that describes trade as the binding force of all life in the universe, where there are "millions of worlds, all with too much of one thing and not enough of the other." The Continuum is a river whose current flows from those who have to those who want. According to this concept, there is a finite amount of wealth and goods in the universe, and any goods taken from one part of the "river" must be appropriately replaced or paid for by other methods. Thus, one must be sufficiently knowledgeable of the wants and needs of others to properly conduct business. A Ferengi sufficiently skilled at navigating this continuum will certainly prosper and amass great wealth and power.

If a Ferengi navigates the river properly, he can accumulate wealth and distribute it throughout society, at various points along the river. This may demonstrate an important distinction, even in Ferengi culture, between selfishness and greed. Ferengi believe that greed, while essential to their concept of economics, is not inherently selfish, because the pursuit of greed serves a greater good.