20 Days of Gold Making - Day 15 - Professions

Nev asks: Professions - do you have all of them, some or none? Which is your favorite for goldmaking?

I think if you're serious about goldmaking it would be quite important to have all of them. I'm not serious, though, and I and my relatives don't have all of them. I have maxed tailoring and enchanting, a common combination for mages; Fuill has inscription (for making gold) and engineering (for PvP); and I've a few other relatives that  have between them that have blacksmithing, alchemy and jewelcrafting, none of them maxed out (and therefore not very useful).  I did want to get them maxed out, but there always seems to be something better to do. Between us we also have all the gathering professions, and I have cooking and fishing at max level. Fishing seems to be valuable, but cooking is a net drain. the raw materials usually seem to sell for more than the finished dishes.

For goldmaking, Fuill used to make a lot of money with glyphs, but now that's a dead market. Engineering pets were also quite good to her, but that's another dead market now. It seems few people collect pets just to have them, now. It's all about the pet battles.

Tailoring is still fine. Entry-level PvP cloth gear still sells reasonably well, especially the level 90 ilvl 450 stuff (Contender's Silk set and Contender's satin set), as does pretty or unusual stuff, for instance shirts, wedding gowns, tuxedos, stuff like that. I've not really made much money, though, with ilvl 476 gear, though, and I've no ilvl 496 patterns. Frankly, I don't want to spend a lot of money on a pattern that I might not make back on sales of the finished article!

Enchanting isn't too bad, either, though it's not as good as it once was. I think LFR is the reason. Here's my tinfoil hat theory on this: back in the day, a lot of people wanted to raid, but couldn't easily raid because they were not in a raid team. Breaking into a raid team is tough. You need to impress a raid leader that you are capable, at just the point where they were looking for a new member of their team. Fortunately, it was not impossible. The usual way in was to win friends and influence people. You would get yourself invited to a PuG and hope that the alt of a raider was present, and noticed you, and added you to their friends list.Then when their raid was short a body, the raiders would search their friends list to see who was around who could help. Or simply the raid leader might be calling out in trade that their team had a free spot, and was seeking a suitably qualified mage to fill it. Anyway, you had to make sure to impress at least one person that you knew what you were doing, and that included being properly geared (including belt buckle), gemmed and enchanted. You would be inspected. Questions would be asked.

In the new world of raid-finder, though, all that matters is your ilvl and you're in. Doesn't matter if you're a warrior wearing cloth or a mage in spirit gear. Gems? Enchants? Belt buckles? Don't waste my time!

Now a lot of people who wanted to raid were frustrated by the previous scheme, and would be lucky to get into one raid a week pugging. Usually when that PuG finished for the night, there was no further progress that week. So many people who would in the previous scheme have tried to join a PuG to get noticed decided that they'd prefer to use LFR instead, to avoid the hassle and frustration. It isn't the full raid experience, but you can see all the bosses that way. Several times a week, if you like. Such people would not need to buy enchantments. Only the people still trying to impress future raid leaders need those.

So, at the moment tailoring is my favourite profession; and farming and fishing seem to be the most lucrative.

Part of the 20 days of Gold Making series