The Master Looter

Crafting professions require a lot of materials to level. While there’s not much you can do to reduce the amount of materials necessary, there are certainly a few things you can do to lower the cost of acquiring those materials, and recoup those costs using the Auction House.

Farm your own mats. This one’s a no-brainer. If you’re an Engineer, Blacksmith, or Jewelcrafter, pick up mining as your second profession. If you’re a Scribe or Alchemist, become an herbalist. Skinning goes with Leatherworking. Enchanting is a bit trickier; if you have tailoring you can disenchant the items you make, otherwise it’s often worth finding cheap greens on the AH that you can disenchant. With mining and herbalism, always keep your node tracking active while questing and gather those nodes.

Level your tradeskill while leveling your toon. Don’t wait until level 80 to pick up a profession – especially a gathering profession. It’s a lot less stressful, and often less costly, to level professions slowly. One big benefit of doing this is that you can actually use many of the items that you craft while leveling. If you wait until reaching the level cap, you will miss out on one of the biggest benefits of being able to craft your own gear.

Craft items with the highest demand and resale value. A lot of crafted items are just plain useless. Unless it’s an incredibly cheap way to gain a skill point, avoid them at all costs. Check the AH to see what your crafted items go for, compared to the cost of the mats needed to make them. Knowledge is power!

Don’t unload all your items onto the Auction House at one time. If you list five of one item that’s not of especially high demand, you risk having someone list a single item and undercut you, and having all your items expire without a purchase. This will cost you a lot of AH listing fees in the long run (unless you’re selling enchanting mats, scrolls, or glyphs – of course!) List one of each item at a time, and once it sells you can list another. Keep doing this until all of your items have been sold.

Don’t waste too much time in the trade channel. Depending on your server and what you’re selling, chances are that folks in the trade channel will not be willing to pay anywhere near AH prices. Trying to hawk your wares in Trade is time consuming, and you will have to deal with your fair share of irritating folk. Unless you have something incredibly rare and valuable that you absolutely need to get rid of quickly, it’s probably best to stick to the AH and let the open market work its magic.

Gold Making Strategies, Newbie Guides

It’s frustrating going into a raid where the tanks can’t hold aggro, the healers don’t know how to heal, the DPS stand in fire or just don’t bring down the boss fast enough to beat an enrage timer. Usually there’s one common factor though – lack of experience. Here’s a few simple ways to overcome this obstacle if you find yourself in one of those situations.

Learn as you level. It’s incredibly easy to solo your way up to level 80. You could get all the way there without grouping up with anyone, in theory. Many people actually do this. The problem with doing this is that level 80 dungeons are a lot tricker than their lower level counterparts. The skills you hone from doing 5-man instances while leveling will prove invaluable when you hit 80 and join your first raid or heroic. If you’re a tank, there’s a lot more room for error if you’re in the Deadmines than in the Halls of Lightning. If you lose aggro on a few mobs in the Deadmines, it may not cause a wipe. But in the Halls, those mobs are going to hit a lot harder and it’s going to be a lot more frustrating for the entire group. Practicing holding threat as you level through 5-mans will pay off when you’re tanking heroics at 80. The same goes for healing, or watching your threat as DPS. If you’re still leveling in Azeroth, you probably don’t need to worry about being specced as a tank or healer to fulfill that role in a dungeon. At level 40, you have the option of dual speccing, which may help out substantially as you reach the higher levels. 1,000 gold isn’t nearly as hard to come by as it used to be, so gold should not an issue.

Use a DPS meter. Recount is one of the most widely used DPS meters, and I can’t recommend it enough. If you’re a DPS class, it’s important to be able to gauge your DPS. While DPS is not the only important factor in a raid, it’s still necessary to monitor. If you’re only doing 1,000 DPS at level 80, that’s a big cause for concern. It’s far less embarassing to find out on your own that you need to pick up your DPS, instead of heading into a raid and finding out the hard way from the rest of the raid! Even if you’re not in a DPS role, it’s a good idea to make sure the rest of the group is performing well. If you are wiping to an enrage timer because of a couple of low DPS, it will help to find out who needs some coaching, and get them some assistance.

Seek out a mentor. If you’re new to healing, find a dedicated healer from your guild and learn from them. Find out which spells you should be using in which situations if you’re not sure. If you can’t find a good mentor in your guild, you can always look outside your guild. Perhaps there was a really good healer in your last PUG that might be able to help answer a few of your questions? The same goes for any class/role.

Stay informed. Whatever your class or role, there are many blogs that can keep you up to speed with all kinds of useful information. Taking the time to read what others have to say about your role, or a specific boss encounter, will better prepare you for your raid. Taking a few minutes a day to read blogs is a great idea for raiders of all skill levels.

Watch the boss fights. You can look up any boss fight on YouTube and watch the video. This is incredibly simple to do and does not need much of an explanation!

Dungeons, Newbie Guides, Raiding

DPS is Damage Per Second. It’s the most common unit for measuring how much damage you output. While other factors are often just as important, such as situational awareness and threat management, there are a few simple things you can do to make sure those mobs are going down as fast as they should be!

Get a DPS Meter: Using a DPS meter such as Recount is how you’ll be able to gauge your performance. If you don’t know how much DPS you are doing how will you know if you’re improving?

Find a Talent Spec: Some talent specializations are better for leveling or soloing, some are for PVP, and some are built for raids. If you are going to be running heroics or raids, you can benefit greatly from having a talent build that will support maximizing your DPS in those situations.

Get Hit Capped: If you’re going to raid, know what your hit cap is and get as close as you can to it. Hit rating is the single best stat you can have until you reach the cap. It doesn’t matter how much spell power or attack power you’ve got when the boss you are fighting dodges your attack!

Learn Your Rotations: Once you find a good spec, spend some time learning what all of your talents do, so you can see which abilities work together the best. The order in which you use your abilities will make a great difference in your DPS output. For instance, if you are a balance druid, a good rotation might be Moonfire, Insect Swarm, Faerie Fire, then a few Starfalls.

Enchants and Glyphs: Get the best glyphs for your class/spec. If you’re not sure which ones they are, do a little research and find out what your options are. Make sure all of your gear has appropriate enchants, leg armor, belt buckle, and gems. Even cheap ones are much better than none, and will help your DPS out significantly.

Get Buffed Up: Elixirs, food buffs, and scrolls can add some extra oomph to your damage output. You don’t need the most expensive ones, anything is better than nothing.

Practice, Practice, Practice: Practicing on a test dummy in a capital city is a great way to tweak your DPS rotation until it’s at peak performance. Once you’ve got your moves down, you’ll be on your way to getting some epic gear!

The most important think you should take away from this article is that it’s a good idea to take some time outside WoW to improve your gameplay if you’re going to raid. The internet is home to an incredible amount of useful information. Searching on Google is still the tried and true method to find out anything you need to know!

Dungeons, Newbie Guides, Raiding

One of the best ways to earn the respect of your guildmates is to be self-sufficient. World of Warcraft is a dynamic game that allows you to participate in all kinds of activities: questing, dungeons, raids, professions, and PVP to name a few. Your goals might include leveling to 80, improving your gear, and maxing out a profession. If you’re in a guild, you’re part of a group of people who also have their own goals. We all have only a limited amount of time to work with, and while it’s nice to help others out when able, it simply isn’t feasible to do every single time.

If you are in a leveling guild, or any guild with alts, you know what I’m talking about. Yes, it’s hard to get a group together for Gnomeregan or Sunken Temple, but that does not give you an excuse to beg in guild chat asking for run-throughs. Is there only one tank online in your guild? That does not automatically mean they want to tank the daily heroic for you, or any other instance.

Mount training is expensive, but asking for a handout is not the way to get there. Need 1,000 gold for your flying training? Go out and earn it. It’s a lot more rewarding that way! Grab a mining pick, skinning knife, or whatever implement you need and get to work. They aren’t called professions for nothing!

Being self-sufficient means meeting your goals while helping other people meet their goals. It’s not hard to get to level 80 without taking your guildies away from what they want to be doing. Instead of asking for someone to run you through the Deadmines, it’s a better idea to use the Looking For Group system, or ask if anyone in your guild has an alt that would like to run with you. If you are lucky, someone might offer to run you through anyway. When I see someone constantly asking to be run through dungeons, I am very unlikely to help them.

Another benefit of being self-sufficient is learning how to play your class. When you ask someone run you through a dungeon, not only are you asking them to take time away from what they were doing, but you’re looking to get XP and loot without any effort. This does not give you a chance to improve your gameplay. Yes, it will take longer to complete a dungeon with people your own level, but the experience you will gain playing your class will pay off later on. It’s not hard to tell who has never done a dungeon the “regular way” when you are in a raid like Naxxramas. It’s the DPS who is constantly pulling aggro, the healer who doesn’t dispel, or the tank who can’t find the taunt button. Take the time to learn how to play your class without begging for help, and you will become an experienced player who has earned the respect of your guildies.

Dungeons, Newbie Guides

Rerolling? Bored with your main and working on leveling a new toon? Here are a few ways to speed up the leveling process.

Heirloom Shoulders: These are bound to account, meaning you can share them with any of your same-faction alts.  For 40 Emblems of Heroism you can ship one of these to your brand spankin’ new alt to increase XP gained from killing mobs by 10%. For example, you can pick up a Tattered Dreadmist Mantle and use it for leveling a warlock, a priest, a mage, and even a druid or shaman. When combined with the next tip, this will speed up your leveling a substantial amount!

Rested XP Gains: For every 8 hours spent logged out or in an inn or capital city, you will gain one bubble of rested XP. When logged out at any other location, you will gain one bubble of rested XP every 32 hours. Up to one and a half levels of rested XP can be accumulated this way. Any XP you gain from killing mobs is doubled while you are rested. While taking breaks from leveling won’t level you faster in real time, it will certainly cut down the amount of /played time that you need to endure in order to make the grind to 80. If you are leveling multiple toons, switching between them after your XP bar turns purple can shave off a lot of leveling time.

Refer-A-Friend: Whether you are bringing someone new to the game, or simply using a second account that you are paying for, this is another way to level an alt faster. When you are questing together with your recruited toon, you will both gain triple XP up until level 60. You also get bonus levels you can grant for every two levels the recruited toon gains. You can also summon each other once per hour. For a list of program details and restrictions, visit Blizzard’s website.

Newbie Guides, Questing & Leveling

Wrath of the Lich King has been out for about six months now, and I still have no DPS toons at level 80. With two level 80 healer toons, and a smattering of 70ish DPS toons, I just didn’t feel like leveling any of them. So instead, I started leveling a warlock. Revisiting old areas can be fun. But I am definitely not looking forward to doing the Hellfire Peninsula quests yet again!

Here are some fun ways to break up your leveling grind:

Questing vs. Grinding. Some people swear by questing, and some attest that grinding is superior. I tend to do a balance of each. Find an area where you can do a number of quests, and kill all the mobs in the area several times. This way you can get XP and quest rewards from quests, while minimizing your need to travel. This is especially useful at the low levels before you get a mount.

Grouping. Be outgoing and offer those a hand who are questing where you are. You’ll all benefit from faster kills, fewer deaths and less downtime. It’s a great way to make friends, too.

Dungeons. If you can put together a good group, dungeons are a great way to break up the grind while gaining valuable experience playing your class. Depending on your server’s population, it might be difficult to get a group for a low level dungeon, but if you can it’s worth it.

Crafting. Crafting while leveling is a lot easier, and less expensive than power-leveling a crafting profession after you are at max level. Plus it’s a fun and profitable diversion once your XP bar turns purple.

Turn your computer off. This is the best advice of them all!

Newbie Guides, Questing & Leveling

My favorite part of leveling is doing dungeon runs, hands down. You get XP, some shiny blue items, and best of all – you get to develop your class/role expertise as part of a group. Whether you are a tank, healer, or DPS, dungeons are the best way to hone your skills; especially if you want to raid when you get to level 80! Here are a few tips to help you on your first dungeon run.

Pick a dungeon that’s suitable for your level. A quick way to find out which dungeons are available at your level is to use the Looking For Group tool. In the drop down box you will be able to see which dungeons are well suited to your level range.

Preparations. Repair. Clear out your bags. Stock up on food, water, potions, and elixirs if needed. Get any or all of the available quests for the dungeon where you are headed.

Bring a tank. The tank’s job is to keep all the mobs from going after everyone else. Protection-specced warriors and paladins, feral druids, or tanking-spec death knights are your friends here.

Bring a healer. Someone has to keep everyone alive, and that’s where the healer comes in. Restoration druids and shamans; holy paladins and priests.

Try to have a good variety of classes. Each class offers its own way to buff the group. Druids can buff Mark of the Wild, paladins have Blessings, mages have Arcane Intellect, priests have Prayer of Fortitude, shamans have Heroism, warlocks can Soulstone, death knights have Horn of Winter, and so on.

Don’t pull aggro off the tank. If you are a damage dealing class, give the tank some time to get aggro on the mobs before you pew pew. If you have any abilities which reduce your threat, such as Feign Death or Feint, use them regularly.

Ask before rolling on gear. A good way to prevent loot arguments is to ask before rolling on an item drop. If nothing else, it shows the rest of the group that you have good manners!

Ask lots of questions. If you are just starting out, dungeons are a great way to learn more about your class from other seasoned players. Ask and ye shall find!

Give constructive advice. If someone else in the party is doing something incorrectly, be tactful and let them know nicely.

Learn from mistakes. We all make them, the best you can do is learn from them!

Have fun!

Dungeons, Newbie Guides

What makes World of Warcraft en epic MMO isn’t just the awesome content. It’s the way it brings together many people from around the globe to work together in achieving common goals. World of Warcraft has all kinds of different guilds, organized by the players themselves, to enhance your gaming experience.

Roleplaying Guilds

If you’re into the roleplaying aspect of WoW, RP guilds (and servers) are the place to look. While RP realms are often lacking, there are still guilds out there that offer their members an opportunity to participate in RP.

Casual & Leveling Guilds

These guilds offer a more relaxed, laid-back atmosphere. These are a great way to find people to quest and level with, and run dungeons. Some casual guilds offer a limited amount of focus to raiding as well.

Raiding Guilds

The focus of a raiding guild is end-game content. Whether you’re a tank, healer, or DPS, raiding guilds demand a high level of experience with your role. If you’re looking to take on the biggest challenges available, finding a raiding guild is the way to go. Raiding guilds are often a lot more demanding, though some casual raiding guilds do exist.

Newbie Guides

Training fees getting you down? Repair bills forcing you to mortgage your mount? Here’s some common-sense tips that may seem simple enough, but all too often go overlooked.

Always loot your mobs. Too many times, I see a field of dead mobs that haven’t been looted. Gray items may not be useful at all, but the vendor value sure does add up. In Northrend, gray weapons and armor can vendor for several gold, and other worthless gray items can vendor for 20 silver or more. Everything adds up, even in small quantities.

I can only think of two reasons why people don’t loot their mobs:

Not enough bag space: This is a problem easily fixed by keeping your bank and bags organized, and by carrying 18 slot or larger bags. If you can get 20 slot or larger bags, by all means use them. Don’t waste stacks upon stacks of Frostweave cloth, or buy Haris Pilton’s Gigantique Sack! Make your way to some raids, new and old, and pick up some free 18 to 22 slot bags. Alternatively, you can pick up or craft some Imbued Netherweave Bags if raids aren’t your thing.

Not enough time: Oh, give me a break. It takes half a second to loot a corpse! You’ll be glad when it comes time to train Cold Weather Flying.

Don’t rush to max out your profession skills. Level them gradually, making sure to keep the costs involved minimal, if any. Make items with other peoples’ mats to gain skill points. Level up making items that people will buy on the AH for a decent amount. Don’t make an item just because it is orange if you are going to take a huge loss to do this, if at all possible. Often it’s more profitable just to sell your raw materials than to craft items to sell; don’t be afraid to do this to keep your cash from running dry.

Drop your crafting profession if you don’t need it. Know a lot of other leatherworkers? You’ll get by just fine dropping Leatherworking and picking up Mining. Know a few alchemists? Drop alchemy and pick up skinning. Having two gathering professions is the best way possible to keep a lot of gold coming in.

Know the market, and don’t always undercut. Visit the AH regularly to get a feel for the prices of the items you regularly gather. If the market is flooded and prices are low, wait to sell. If the supply is low and prices are higher, that’s when you want to be listing your items. If you see items listed at way below the normal cost, buy them up and resell at a profit. By having patience, and knowing the value of your items, you can earn several times more gold for your efforts. Timing is everything.

Utilize helpful add-ons. Auctioneer will help you list items on the Auction House and keep track of their value. There are many add-ons that show the vendor value of items, and allow you to vendor all gray items with one click, that will also save you time and provide valuable information. The more time you save, the more time you can be leveling or farming!

Gold Making Strategies, Newbie Guides

Through your questing and leveling journey you will encounter a number of quests that require the aid of others to complete. Icecrown and Shadowmoon Valley are notorious for the large number of group quests they offer. Here are a few options for approaching these quests, in order of best to worst:

Try soloing the quest. This is possible for some quests and classes, but doesn’t work out too great for others. Sometimes waiting a level or two can make this possible. It’s usually worth a shot trying to solo a 2 or 3 man quest, depending on your level and class. The better your gear, the fewer people are required to do a group quest. As a general rule, most Northrend 2 man quests can be soloed, most 3 man quests can be duoed, and most 5 man quests can done with 3-4 people. Some higher level group quests demand a tank and a healer, while the lower level ones usually do not. Having a healer always helps though.

Asking in General Chat or Looking For Group. This is by far the best way to get these quests done. Especially if you are on during peak hours, there is often someone else also looking to do the same quest you’re on. Asking in the General chat of the area you’re in should always be the first step you take when trying to find someone to help you with a group quest. Looking For Group can sometimes work too. Your best bet is to ask in General upon entering the area, and then ask again every 10 minutes or so. Don’t spam, though; this won’t get you anywhere.

Ask in Guild Chat. While guildies can be a great source of assistance, this should be done sparingly. Don’t be that guy who asks for help with quests 5-10 times every day. First try and solo it, and ask in General or Looking For Group if soloing isn’t possible. Remember, your guildies have things they’d like to get done, too.

Ask in Trade Chat. Don’t ever do this. There’s enough spam in trade chat!

Newbie Guides, Questing & Leveling