The 15 Minute Rush - Making Profits From Server Shutdown

The Intro

Just tonight, the servers went down which gave me a good idea for a quick write up, which was the 15 min bid war every time servers go down. It gives me a great feeling/rush to know that i got the last bid on something and can/will make profit on it when i log in.

For me servers go down Tuesday night, come up Wednesday morning, so its a good time to start bidding.

The method

The basics of this is, the moment the 15 min warning comes up(or maybe at the 10 min warning for less wasted time), you run the AH and look out for items that could be bid on that will make profit from either reselling ,vendor or if you are good enough you can calculate profits of what you can make with the item I.e vendor a crafted item for more profit or crafting an item to sell you could in theory also DE the items for dust.

The Addons

This can be done quicker with addons, but most addons don't have an up to date scan of the AH at the time that it goes down. So i prefer to do this manually also, it gives me a better feeling of winning an item.

There are some addons that are a must have when doing this, well more like. Any addon that can provide a vendor amount on the tool tip will suffice, I.E Auctionator and TradeSkillMaster.

The execution

1. Rarity settings: This setting helps alot when deciding between junk or treasure, most grey items are worthless so you don't wanna be buying those unless for vendor, but if you have low gold supplies bidding on low profit items isn't recommended if your money can be tied up somewhere else. A general good idea is to just search for white items(common) or higher.
2. Specific areas: These are specific areas that you are looking for, Normally i would search into these and check the items in there before doing a full view of the AH. But generally i just search the whole AH and go through one by one.
3. Click search: Pretty self explanatory.
4. Sort by: Generally if you are bidding on items, you want the lowest bid to be displayed first, so clicking on this little, thing? not sure what to call it, Header bar or what ever. until the items on the AH are going from lowest bid to highest bid.

Generally i will search through the ah for 15 mins. Get outbid switch over the bids page and rebid if worth it(This is where it gets exciting). While searching through the AH i will generally mouse over items on the right so i get there tool tip and scroll mouse wheel while looking at both bid price and vendor price and thinking in my head what i can resell it for or do with it.

Look out for the tricky items that have a low bid, but normal Buy price, those are good items to buy for resale.

And hopefully by the end of the 15 mins, you have had a mad rush of bidding/getting outbid and your bids page will look like this

And in the morning your mailbox will look like this:

Not as many was won as i would like, alot of outbids and some still ending.

The Conclusion

In the end, the profits were good, but i could have done better and looked for items only ending soon(inb4 i write an addon to do this). that way the profit right now would be bigger

The abyss crystal i shattered into 9 infinite dust,Which gave a good profit.

I DE'd the vest, and marked everything at there min buyout right now if its lower then market.


Cheers Sw

Modifying Auctionator for stack switching(Addon Code diving required)

Heya!

Due to how many people have wanted a modified Auctionator code and i'm not sure on the ability for me to release the addon with the modification without being in trouble from Zirco the original author of the Auctionator.(I have messaged them asking them but yet no reply)

What are we doing?

Hopefully learning something atleast. But at the most you will be adding a button to Auctionators sell interface which in turn will swap Stack size with Amount of auctions. So if you had 20 stacks of 1 hitting the button will make it say 1 stack of 20 instead and then clicking Create auction will proceed to post that 1 stack.

Requirements

• Auctionator - Well this one is obvious
• ScitE or Notepadd++ - Although you could use any text editor, i prefer these 2 due to the line numbers which will be needed.
• Me - Could be replaced by someone else with knowledge.

DISCLAIMER:BACK UP YOUR WTF AND ADDONS FOLDER BEFORE ATTEMPTING INCASE YOU ACCIDENTALLY MAKE WOW CRY WITH YOUR BAD EDITTING I TAKE NO RESPONSIBILITY FOR ANYTHING YOU DO INSIDE OF YOUR WOW FOLDER

Let's do it?

Ok, to start you will need to open your choice of editing program i will be using ScitE for this but you can follow along with anything(including notepad but enjoy counting lines).

First thing is to go to your addon folder mine is located at "C:\Program Files (x86)\World of Warcraft\Interface\AddOns" Then go to Auctionator folder and you want to open Auctionator.XML and Auctionator.LUA file.

What are these files?

The LUA (Pronounced Loo Ah)file is the main code for an addon, this is where most of the magic happens for addons  Lua is a pretty simple programming language that can be used for multiple things, WoW uses it as a language to interpret into WoW.

The XML(Extensible Markup Language) file contains the UI elements for Auctionator. Simple to use, complex to write.

We will add the button into the XML file and the commands the button does in LUA.

The Code

Open up the XML file and scroll down to line 697(this is where having line numbers comes into play) and add the code: http://pastebin.com/LAgszsaJ

Let's break it down.

<Button name="Atr_SwitchSizeButton" inherits="UIPanelButtonTemplate" text="Switch Sizes" disabled="false">

This line Creates a button called "Atr_SwitchSizeButton" which can be referenced inside of the LUA file at a later date.

Inherits tells the button to get the same layout data from blizzard own "UIPanelButtonTemplate" which is a basic button that has the red background.

Text is the text to display on the button.

Disabled=true will mean the button is able to be clicked, Disabled = false will make the button grayed out.

<Size><AbsDimension x="150" y="20"/> </Size>

<Size> refrences the size of the button object it can be changed directly by <size x="150" y="20"/> but most developers tend to use absDimension which if i remember right stand's for Absolute Dimension.
<AbsDimension> refrencs the absolute dimension of the object, x being width and y being height of the button.
</Size> just closes the object reference. When programming its easy to forget to close a function or object

<Anchors><Anchor point="TOPLEFT"><Offset><AbsDimension x="25" y="-240"/></Offset></Anchor></Anchors>

ahh anchors, Anchors define the core placement of objects on the screen in wow the place they reference is inside of its parent frame. Setting an anchor point to "TOPLEFT" means that by default without positioning the button will sit in the "TOPLEFT" of the Auction house frame.

<Offset> is how much to offset from the Anchor point that was previously stated. x="25" means it moves 25 pixels across and y="-240" will move the button down from the anchor point the reason we use -240 is due to that if we did a straight 240 it will move up instead of down, also if we did -25 it would move in the opposite direction.

<Scripts>

<OnClick>

Atr_SwitchSizeButton_OnClick();

</OnClick>

</Scripts>

<Scripts></Scripts> inside of these lines is where we reference what each command the object can recieve will do. The basic button command <OnClick> is what will happen when someone clicks the button. In our tutorial here we see it references a Function Atr_SwitchSizeButton_OnClick(); which we will talk about when we get into LUA, but for now anything between <OnClick> and </OnClick> can be LUA or should be. For our tutorial you could test this out by replacing the function with "print("Hello, i am running")".

The other parts of the XML section only close objects/frames, typically anything with a preceding "/" will be a closing argument. </End of xml section> :P

Lua time!

Ok, now comes the coding of what the button does.

Open up your Auctionator.lua file and scroll down the very bottom and add this code: http://pastebin.com/EJH8uA9D

You may notice my screen shot has 1 extra line then your code will that is because the "--print(NumOf,StackSize)" was just there to test out if the code was working =]

Breaking it down!

function Atr_SwitchSizeButton_OnClick()

This is a function in lua, basically a function is a block of code that can be run my referencing its name anywhere in the existing addon. You may remember this function from the previous XML section on the <OnClick> command of the button. here is where will be issuing what pressing the button should do.
Basically a function will have 3 constant things, the command "function" which tells that the following is a function. "Name" which is the name we give to the function which in our case is "Atr_SwitchSizeButton_OnClick()" having a good name that describes what the function does is normally good to do. and finally "End" which tells when the function should end, as you can see in our code that is after we switch the numbers.

local NumOf = Atr_Batch_NumAuctions:GetNumber()

local StackSize = Atr_Batch_Stacksize:GetNumber()

These 2 lines are variables. Variables hold different type of data that can be used just by referencing the variable name. These variables reference "Atr_Batch_NumAuctions:GetNumber()" and "Atr_Batch_Stacksize:GetNumber()" which basically references different text boxes inside of our XML we edited. "Atr_Batch_Stacksize" is the frame to reference and ":GetNumber()" is the command to run on the frame. GetNumber() will literally do as it say's, get the number for the frame.

Atr_Batch_NumAuctions:SetNumber(StackSize)

Atr_Batch_Stacksize:SetNumber(NumOf)

As we just previously saw Atr_Batch_NumAuctions and Atr_Batch_Stacksize are frame name's and what follows is the command to run on that frame which we currently are doing is ":SetNumber(StackSize)" which i am sure if you have gotten this far you know what it does.
Inside the brackets are what we are going to set the Frame to which is our variables previously created.

As you can see what we basically did was add each frames contents into a variable then added the opposite frames variable into each other which in turn switches the stack sizes and amount.

end

This just tells us that we want to end the function here. if we don't end a function WoW will throw a <EOF> error, which stands for End Of File which typically happens when WoW cant find the end of a file.

</End>

Now all you have to do is Save both those files and /reload in game or log on and make sure you have no errors!

I hope this was helpful and in the future if you wish to see more tutorials for addons like this please leave a comment!

If you need any further help please feel free to drop me a message on twitter @shiftywarloc.

For now...

Cheers Sw

Adventures as a lowbie gold maker Day 6(boring post, don't read)

Heya!

Day 6 of writing this and to keep people that interested, well.. interested i thought id post my results over the last few day's since we last talked.

I'm going to break down how much i made into the method of what i used to make those as mentioned from a previous post.

Low level gem prospecting: 
Bought a bunch of tin ore and prospected about half of it and came out with around 2500g across 2 days
Cooking Savory deviate delights:
It's hard to find these at a low price, most people seem to be farming them to make it so they think they can push prices down. so only around 100g in sales
Xmog flipping
Only deal in plate so i have not had much sales with these only around 1000g
Mop Green flipping
Selling my green's for about 500g each they are very random on when they sell,  but they do sell. past 2 days about 4000g
Mop Blue Flipping
only 2 ghost shard weapons for about 800g each, so 1600g there
General Item Flipping
0g, havnt had much luck selling anything like this lately
Buying MoP epics and getting them DE'd and then re-selling the material
900g, they sell fast but the supply isnt that fast/cheap so it's a bit of work to find the right ones.

Roughly 10k give or take a few thousand from memory loss

While i write this im actually prospecting more gem's, im currently at the rate where i buy any tin ore below 1g and i have TSM dealfinding lists set up along with the TSM app to help along the way. If you don't know how to set up the TSM app, just go to my previous post and read!

It's good to be constantly buying item's you use, Ever hit that dry spot where everything is too expensive to craft? if you constantly buy at your set prices then your stock should never dip too low. it's a balance between price and quantity.

For now...

Cheers Sw

Your guide to the TSM APP

(This was also posted on elvinelol.com by me)

Hey guys!

A few people have been having trouble with the TradeSkillmaster APP, it auto updates your auction prices out of game and generally is a must have item when using TSM these day's.

You can download the APP from tradeskillmasters website.

Just follow instructions, sign up, and set it up. then come back here.

1. Setup

After first opening the TSM APP this is the first page you should be looking at.

• You will first want to choose your WoW directory by clicking on change and navigating to your WoW folder.
• If you want it to run at startup when you first boot the computer click, run at startup.
• Start minimized will make the APP load up minimized.
• With minimize to system tray selected it will make your app go down to your system tray(Next to where the time is located on your computer)

Lets set it up.

1. Select your server from the drop down box(you can have 5 active servers max? i think)
2. Select faction, the options are both, alliance, horde.
3. Add your realm!. it will apply your current selection.
4. If you screw up something, select this.
5. Do not click, unless you want to go through the website set up process again.

2. AuctionDB Updater

This is the key part of the APP, it allows you to update your TSM auction data every hour by itself, out of game. all you have to do is /reload to get the data

This area is pretty self explanatory, but ill try my best.

1.  Check the server/server's which you want the app to update, as you can see there is a maximum of 5
2. How long you want to keep the data for. This setting depends on how often you log into the game, if you log into all your servers at least once a day, you can set it to one day. after one day it will delete old data even if you haven't imported it into game.
3.  Force an update, if you have already scanned within the last hour it will only download the data for that last hour, because blizzard dumps its AH data every hour.

3. Deal notifications

This section is a gold mine when it comes to finding deals. it allows you to check your dealfinding lists that are set up in game, every hour there is a update.

1.  These are the main tabs of this section. the first tab, set up is what is being shown and is where you set up all the details to get this working. The second tab, the Deals, is where once every hour and when the data is updated it will show anything in your dealfinding lists that are below your deal price.
2.  This is where you select the account your toons with the dealfinding lists are located.
3.  The TSM profile with the dealfinding lists you want to check.
4.  Sync the shopping lists in game out of game(will need to /reload after changing a setting in game)
5.  The server in which you want to check deals for.
6.  Your current dealfinding lists on selected profile. enable/disable the ones you want.
7.  Sapu has kindly included a free email service to email you your current deals to the email address of your choice that is set up on the TSM website. Also here is a button to enable/disable all the dealfinding lists below it.

This is a view of what your deals that are found will look like on the Deals page.

4. Wowuction Updater

Wowuction provides you with another set of data for your realm or even region!

To get Wowuction to work with TSM you will need the tradeskillmaster_Wowuction addon I have it for the sake of it, and it can be useful to see some extra data on an item you are trying to flip

1. Same setup as AuctionDB Updater except there is a section down bottom for region data, which will give you all of US data, average market value across all servers etc.
2. Your wowuction api key, which if you need you should follow the instructions above this box to get started.
3. Same as the auctionDB force update.

5. Backup/restore

Back up and restore is an area that allows you to back up your Saved variables and settings for TSM automatically!

USE IT! i can not stress how useful this setting is.

1.  Choose your directory you want your back ups to go to.
2.  How often do you want to back up? i choose everyday because i change alot of settings day in day out so i need constant back up
3. Select this if you want it to automatically back it up for you.
4. Force a back up right now.
5. Purge will delete backups older then the specified day.
6. Enabled purging.
7.  If you screwed up and lost your settings, select this to select a back up.

6. report Bug/Error

Currently this isn't working, for more information go Here

7. Useful Links

List of TSM Related Links. Main Forum/help forum. Sapu's Twitter.

8. IRC Chat

This is your go to source for help with TSM it's a direct connection to the IRC chat room for TSM. You can get help from Dev's or TSM Users. I am constantly on there as long as I'm at the computer under the name j311yf1sh.

Adventures as a lowbie gold maker day ??(i lost count)

Heya,

Another post about my current progress at low level gold making. Currently over the past few day's I've just been follow my current methods of:

Low level gem prospecting
Cooking Savory deviate delights
A little Xmog flipping
Mop Green flipping
Mop Blue Flipping
General Item Flipping
Buying MoP epics and getting them DE'd and then re-selling the material(or if i get enough i get enchants crafted)

I may not have talked about some of these method's and if i haven't... please feel free to ask me about them.

All these are great way's to make profit at a low level some of them don't even need a profession. As with one of my previous posts i mentioned i had Mining along with JC, but i don't remember going into how i made gold with mining.

Most people will see mining as a farming/gathering profession and that's the only way to make profit from it.But I've got news for you(if you are one of those people) it's also a crafting profession and sometimes a highly profitable one at that.

Currently my Mining trade skill window looks like this:

As you can see not many crafts possible, but some still profitable!
(For anyone wondering... The addon showing the pricing there is Lil' Sparkys Workshop with TSM data, How ever in TSM2.0 it will have the prices by default... One less addon to run!)

As you can see i've got silver highlighted, the day when i bought the current silver ore the price was alot cheaper then it currently is and the sale price was alot higher, but thing's change so owell.

As you can see by this i bought 61 pieces of ore, and with that ore i turned it into bars at a 1:1 ratio and the Auction house did some magic and my mailbox ended up like:

As you can see by this i didn't sell all 61 bars so there's still some on the AH and i will keep re-posting at my price even if there are some cheaper until i sell them all... i have all the time in the world to post them up.

As i level mining higher i should be able to find more and more crafts to do in order to make more profit at a low level.

I'm constantly on the look out for great deal's and so should you, there is multiple website's and tool's available to the community to use to find those deal's but i'm sure they have been discussed in countless other places.


Currently as it stand's i am at 13k liquid gold and over 19k invested in some item's.
And my TSM accounting look's like...

For now...

Cheer's Sw

That was quick....

Well, i wrote a post earlier this morning about my current state of this blog and also wrote a little hint about prospecting low level ore for low level gems, well... i haven't even been to sleep yet and they all sold!

It's not quite the 1.3k i estimated but its pretty darn close (which means i can mostly trust wowhead Prospecting results).

it's not a bad haul for 5 mins of work prospecting.

So, try it on your server, tell me your results!

So for those that didn't read the earlier post: Long overdue

How ever for now...

Cheers Sw

Long Overdue...

For anyone that has read or even looked at my blog, you will know it isn't much, due to pure laziness and no motivation to write anything and i didn't want to write anything that was just picked off the shelf, blended up and re-packaged as my own, as i see many blogs do.

But i feel seeing as a few weeks? maybe more ago, i wrote saying that i got my gold back and will be continuing my adventures as a lowbie gold maker yet didn't post anything toward's it after that, i let some people down.(if people actually read this thing)

So, i thought i'd write this post and update on what's been happening.
Last time we spoke i invested all 10k of the gold i received back and put invested it right back into markets and bought over 400 different mop Green's to re-sell(also invested into some Deviate fish) and have since sold 40% of what i bought.

Since 5.2 i haven't really logged onto the toon much to do anything lowbie like, but over the past week i have been logging on once a day to repost anything that ended up in the mailbox with out thinking too much forward of what i wanted to do.

As im writing this it is 4:17 am and i can't sleep so i decided to log on and look around my toons and see what needed improvement, then i landed on this toon... Re posted as i normally would... logged out... then thought to myself.. its 4am nothing to do why not just improve this toon so i did.

Improving this toon left me deciding between dropping herbalism or mining to pick up a crafting profession, as it currently stands low level Ore is worth more plus mining acts as a crafting profession if used right(pity TSM doesn't it see it like that)

With that i then went and asked myself what matched with mining? Blacksmithing? Jewelcrafting? Engineering? Which was the most profitable at the current level? Calculating it in my head i determined Jewelcrafting to be the most profitable due to the gem's you can receive from prospecting and the main leveling gem's seem to come out around lvl 50 from tin ore(the lowest level to really profit from) which only requires lvl 10 to learn.

I leveled my JC following wowprofessions guide which was simply:
50 copper bars
25 of either malachite or tigerseye ( i used a mixture of both)

1-25: Delicate copper wire
25-50: Tigerseye band/malachite necklace

Which costed me a total of about 380g give or take a few gold.

The basics of propsecting simple gems for profit is posted in countless places including http://www.elvinelol.com/forums/showthread.php?239-Prospecting-Simple-Gems


How ever i went one step further for tin ore and created a little spreadsheet you can download from google docs.
The Spreadsheet

Basically go through your AH, input your prices / your ore amount and bang, done!

I must warn you that these prospecting values are taken from Wowhead's own data so it may not be 100% accurate!

After all that i went and invested some gold into tin ore and started prospecting!

As you can see i spent a total of 258g on ore... not too bad, i didn't buy any ore above 1g per piece

with my spreadsheet i calculated the total cost as the highest price i paid for the items. and it comes up with some interesting numbers, 1.3k profit is apparently possible, well see how that works out.

Results

Other then that and the typical stuff i have posted about, nothing else in the routine has changed drastically.

So after all this absent time my current summary results are as follows:

Maybe expect some future posts if anything interesting comes up.


Cheer's Sw