World of Warcraft – Auction House Walkthrough

This article will explain the World of Warcraft auction house and how to use this system to make a profit. Following the tips presented here will give you a starting point for making money in Warcraft. It’s important to note that no system is foolproof, and due to the dynamic nature of an MMORPG like Warcraft, things can change very quickly. As such, this article is not intended to outline specific details. Instead, it is designed to lay the foundation for using the Auction House effectively and turning it into a profit center, regardless of fluctuations in the game.

The following material is organized into three sections:

I. Putting the right tools in your Warcraft II auction house utility belt. Guidelines for being a successful Warcraft III auctioneer. Buy and sell on the Warcraft auction house

Section I Putting the Right Tools in Your Auction House of Warcraft Tool Belt

To be truly effective on the Auction House you need several tools. These are plugins that are easy to install and will greatly simplify the process.

essential accessories

1. Auctioneer Suite – This plugin will modify the user interface of your auction house and provide you with a variety of features and a wealth of information. It is simply the most powerful Auction House plugin available. Its scanning feature will collect data on auction prices and provide recommendations for appropriate bids and buys. The Appraiser feature (accessed via a tab at the bottom of your auction house UI) will make posting auctions a breeze.
2. Telo’s LootLink – This is a frontend plugin that stores all the items you come in contact with in a database of links that you can then explore. It’s useful for linking items you don’t have and looking up item stats.
3. CT_MailMod – This is a simple plugin that will make managing your mailbox much easier. Expands your multiple mailing capabilities and offers “open selected” and “open all” options so you don’t have to handle each Auction House message one at a time. A decent alternative to this is MailGet. This one doesn’t have the expansion of multi-mail capability, but it does offer a “Take All” feature to quickly snag your unopened messages. NOTE: In both cases, the complementary buttons that appear in your mailbox user interface will interfere with the red system message that appears when you have more mail items than your mailbox currently has.

As stated, these plugins are essential. Without them, you’ll lose information critical to maximizing your bids and/or waste time on mundane tasks. Make sure you get them before launching your auction house strategy!

Section II. Guidelines for Being a Successful Warcraft Auctioneer

Rules of the game
1. use an alternative: Don’t bother running the auction house with your principal(s). The characters you’ve leveled up are better served on the field, whether it’s running dungeons/raids, completing quests, or farming materials/loot.
2. Be discreet: It’s better to choose a name that blends in with the crowd than to have something like “Phatlewtz” or “Auctionking” as a seller. The proliferation of alternative “Bank” names can also cause some to take their eyes off those auctions, so keep that in mind if you’re running the Auction House for your guild.
3. Be Prepared: Place your alternate near one of your faction’s auction houses and keep it handy to accept all of your main character’s mailed stuff on the field. If you can afford it early on, outfit that alt with a full complement of bags. The bigger the better, as it will reduce transportation time.
4. Scan often: You’ll want to do two different types of scans: auction house scans and macro scans. To perform HA scans, just use the “Scan” button that Auctioneer places on their HA UI. Please be patient as this scan can take 10-20 minutes depending on how many auctions are currently running. Macro scans will require you to create macros using the following syntax:
   

   /auction broker [xxx]

   In this example [xxx] represents a projected profit margin in silver. So,

   /auction broker 2000

   would give you a list of currently posted auctions with a bid to buy at a profit of 20g if you were to buy and resell them.

5. Take notes: Auctioneer can only do so much, and since it’s a piece of software, it’s not perfect. Be sure to take notes as you see major changes in the market.
6. Shop!: If you find deals and have been paying attention to market fluctuations, pull the trigger. Collect the good deals and relist them.
7. Be Thorough: You may find that you can buy low and sell high in one area of ​​the auction house (ie guns) and make a profit. Don’t act like the uninitiated. Look through all areas and capitalize!

Please pay attention and follow these general rules for running the Warcraft auction house. They will be important as you get into some of the buying and selling tips outlined below.

Section III. Buy and sell on the Warcraft auction house

Armed with the above rules of thumb, you now have a solid framework for buying and selling on the AH. It is crucial that you understand the market and know when, how and why you are buying items. Here are some helpful tips for buying items on the Warcraft auction house:

1. Always set a purchase price. Never, ever hold an auction without a purchase price. Even if for no other reason than the simple psychology of buying, it is imperative that you set a purchase price. If you don’t, you may end up needlessly burning your earning potential in re-enrollment fees. People want to know that they can have something immediately. Don’t let them down. If you’re totally convinced that the item will incite a bidding war (this rarely happens), then make sure you set your buy appropriately high. But for God’s sake, put one on!
2. 24 hours, no more, no less. Less than 24 hours won’t give you a big enough window to capture all potential buyers. Get your auction the exposure it needs to sell. More than 24 is just throwing money down the drain. If it’s not going to sell in 24 hours at the price you set, it’s not going to sell.
3. Look for Inexpensive Items – Be sure to manually search for inexpensive armor, weapons, and other items. You can often find steals on items below level 49 (that’s the usage level, not the item level). A corollary to this tactic is to purchase transitional armor in the level 39-40 range. Shaman/Hunters that change to Mail and Warriors/Paladins that change to Plates are great targets for lucrative sales. Explore these armor items for those classes and buy them low to sell them high. It’s a good idea to check with the class community on the forums to see what the prevailing gear specs are. This will help guide your purchases.
4. Minimum Bid Reduction – Since the Warcraft Auction House ranks its bids based on “bid price” (before users rank) and not “buy”, you can achieve greater visibility by outbid anyone competition with a lower bid price. BAIL: Be cautious when using this technique, as being too aggressive can leave you with bid prices that deeply reduce your profits if converted to ask prices.
5. Stacking for easy math: People are inherently lazy and that’s the operating factor with this technique. It is prudent to unstack stackable items before renumbering them. When you do, be sure to put them back into numbers that make the math easier. Buyers will try to calculate the price per item in the stacks, and if they don’t have a plugin to do it for them, they will often ignore auctions that they can’t quickly figure out in their heads. An exception to this is stacking items that are used in quests. In this case, it’s okay to create odd stacks.
6. Bid Before Downtime – Patches and scheduled maintenance disrupt the normal flow of things, including normal people bidding on the auction house. If there’s any new content to explore when the game comes back up, AH will likely be a ghost town except to your fellow auctioneers. If you place bids right before the servers go down, you have a good chance of winning once they come back up. This will obviously work much better for those auctions that are nearing the end of their listing time.
7. Sunday Late/Monday Early Sale: Most players do their hard work over the weekend. So from Friday night to Sunday night, they’re searching, raiding, and doing whatever else they do. Once all the action dies down, many players are looking to make some money on the auction house. This usually means that the supply exceeds the demand and since most of these auction advertisers just want to sell fast and make some money, they will often undercut to the point where you can get great deals.
8. Use Trade Chat for Great Deals – There are many players who would rather advertise their products in Trade Chat than post auctions on the AH. If you’re paying attention, you can identify items worth buying and listing. Using your stats, bid in the 65-75% range of what you know you can sell. If they bite, great. If not, don’t worry and don’t make a fool of yourself. It’s not worth the time. In many cases, you will find that they come back to accept your offer because they were unable to find a buyer through trade chat.
9. Cater to Youngsters – Even with the changes to Warcraft’s battlegrounds system, youngsters remain as popular as ever. Players still want to dominate even if they can’t hang out indefinitely as a level 19 in Warsong Gulch. So take advantage of this. You usually want to search for items that are level 60 and below. For the blues, take anything that can make a profit. For greens, look for items in the x6 – x9 range (ie 26-29 or 46-49).
10. Don’t Buy on LOW Bids – Keep in mind that when you’re scanning the auction house and snagging low-priced resale fodder, don’t overlook the sale price of items. Many sellers will pay no attention to this number and leave it ridiculously low, giving you a great opportunity to score a solid deal. If the offer is 60% of the total purchase or less, don’t be afraid to bid. If you lose an auction or three, no problem. There will always be plenty of opportunities.

There you have it. A good base from which to launch your Warcraft auction house domain. This isn’t as easy as flipping a switch, but it’s definitely not as hard as some people think. Get the right tools, follow the general rules, and use the techniques presented above and you’ll be well on your way to generating respectable wealth in Warcraft. You will have enough to comfortably pay for the things that will help you enjoy the game. Mounts, equipment, toiletries and more.

And, if you’re interested in boosting your AH domination and learning other useful strategies, there are several respected experts in the field who can reveal the really juicy secrets to you.

I hope this information has been helpful and I wish you the best of luck!