In the World of Warcraft grinding elementals is a tried and true method of earning gold. They are all over the game world and come in a variety of types: fire, earth, air, etc. All Elementals will drop parts that are in demand by the various crafting professions, such as air elementals dropping “Breath of Air” or “Crystallized Air.”
The Market
All of these bits can be used by players in a number of crafting recipes, so there’s always a market for them. Motes and crystallized stuff can also be combined, 10 at a time, into primals/eternals. High level recipes use a lot of these primals/eternals to keep an eye on that market. Check the Action House to see what’s keeping the high prices, then go farm that item.
Find Them and Farm Them
The same will likely be with the new Cataclysm areas. Collect the bits from the various elementals and then sell them “as is” or combine them and then sell. (Keep in mind that if you’re in a PvP area, such as Wintergrasp, your farming might be more entertaining than otherwise. )
How do you find the Elementals that you’re looking for? People who’ve leveled a few characters probably have some areas memorized, otherwise go to Thottbot.com, search for Elementals, then click “creatures.” There will be a list of Elementals that you can sort various ways. Elementals from Cataclysm will eventually show up in the Thottbot database.
As with any gathering run, take large bags, stock up on sodas, rations, and tunes, and go farm some elementals . Here are some ways to make it a bit more interesting: time yourself, see how fast you can kill them. See how many you can take at one time. Take a buddy and make it a contest to see who gets the most, the fastest. Or just destroy everything and then watch a video or hunt other players while waiting for the respawn.
Next, send everything to your auction house alt and come up with a plan to sell your loot.
Some tips on posting stuff to the Auction House
Ok, you have your elemental bits, or whatever you’ve collected , here’s how to get rid of your stuff.
Think of their being only two types of items for sale on the Auction House (AH.) Glyphs, enchant scrolls, weapons, etc. make up the first group, the items that people only buy one of. Unless someone is buying for resale, or supplying his buddies, only one of these items will be bought at a time. The next group is made up of items that people will buy a lot of and may well buy repeatedly. A Scribe will buy tons of herbs for her glyph making, a leatherworker will buy tons of skins, and so on.
All of those elemental parts are in the second group. While people usually won’t buy tons of primals/eternals at the same time, chances are they will be repeat buyers. Not only do the crafters want them, but also the people who want those crafters to make something for them. These people buy your bits and hand them to the crafter to make whatever.
How you set your prices is based on understanding these two groups. If you’re selling one-off items, such as glyphs, those green/blue weapons you found, etc., you want to have the lowest price. The lowest price will sell first, though you don’t have to undercut by much.
With the other group you don’t have to be the lowest price. You do not need to undercut everyone else. If my scribe is buying a ton of herbs for Inscription then she’ll buy the lowest price stuff first, then the next higher, then the next… and so on until she has enough. The same is true with skins, ores, and your elemental bits.
Pricing, Grabbing, Posting
Ok, now it’s time to sell stuff. Check the prices on motes/crystals and do the same with primals/eternals. Post yours in the form that will get you the best prices. For example – motes of life are selling for 1g each, but the same primals are selling for 15g each (and the price rapidly climbs to 23.) Sell the primals and post them above the lowest price. But if the low price is 375g per bit, then I’d suggest undercutting. By a lot.
If some seller of cheap goods (call him “Igntaz, the farmer”) has posted a pile of bits at well under everyone else’s prices, feel free to buy all of his underpriced stuff and sell it at an appropriate markup. You know they’ll sell well at 15, he’s priced them at 3, you know what to do. Post them over time, not all at once, you don’t want to flood the market.
In summary, all the elemental bits sell well and you don’t need to sell them at the lowest price. If you do sell them way under market that’s fine, someone will by them, and chances are it will be me, or someone of a similarly greedy mind. You sell yours for 3g each, while doing all the work, and I’ll buy you out and sell yours for 15g each. That’s fair, right?
You could also just hand the lot to your guild crafter, but that’s hardly the point of this article.
Now get to work!