I decided to level up herbalism from zero this past weekend, and one thing that surprised me was how well all of the herbs from the older zones still sell for. In many cases, the herbs from Stranglethorn Vale and Western Plaguelands were selling better than the higher level herbs from Northrend.

This got more interesting when I got to Outland because I got to start using my flying mount again for farming purposes, which helps speed things up. In Netherstorm, I picked up quite a bit of Netherplague in a few minutes which sells for close to 4g each. I also picked up a Khorium Power Core from the engineering vender in Area 52 for 4g, which I resold on the AH for 50g!

I didn’t time anything, so I can’t say for certain how well some of these areas compete with Northrend farming, but it was definitely fun to go back to some of these areas and mess around. I got a certain amount of pleasure from one shotting elites that I know sent me on trips to the graveyard several times back in the day.

In Dalaran there’s an NPC named Frozo the Renowned who will trade you valuable items for Frozen Orbs.

Sometimes Frozen Orbs will be worth more than the other items (I wouldn’t trade them for the Eternals, for example), but at other times, the orbs will be worth less.

Right now on my server, frozen orbs are worth 20g on the auction house, and Frost Lotus are worth 30g. It would be profitable them to exchange them.

To get the best deal, look up what Frozen Orbs are selling for and what the item you want to exchange is selling for. If it makes sense, make the exchange and post the more valuable item on the auction house.

Undercutting is a good way to make sure your item sells on the AH, but you don’t always have to undercut the lowest bid to guarantee a sell.

Take a look here…

You can see that I didn’t undercut the lowest bid of 9g15s. Instead, I undercut the next lowest price.

Why? For two reasons.

First, I know that first auction of 9g15s will be bought by someone else quickly, which will leave mine as the next lowest bid. (actually, if I was smart, I would buy that lowest auction myself and repost it for twice the amount immediately)

Second, the cheapest auction is for a stack of 20 eternals. What if players only need one or two? They are going to go to the next lowest auction, which is mine!

Here’s another example selling a different kind of eternal:

Again, I didn’t need to be the lowest bid to undercut my competition. I only needed to be the lowest auction selling a stack of 1.

This is a good way to squeeze every possible gold out of an auction you post.

The Midsummer Fire Festival lasts from June 21 to July 4th. The biggest part of this event is a fight with the Frost Lord Ahume.

This is a single boss event that you can join by opening your dungeon finder and choosing “The Frost Lord Ahume”

It’s a fairly easy fight. The Frost Lord spawns elementals adds, and periodically  turns in a crystal while his shield  goes down. He can be dps’ed the whole time, or just while his shield is down for the most impact.

He drops a epic cloak which is worth getting if you don’t already have that slot filled, but it won’t be an upgrade for most raiders or pvpers.

More importantly, he drops a bag that has either 1 or 2 frost emblems. You can get this once per day, making it a quick and easy way to add another frost emblem to your daily routine, which you should be saving for end game epic gear from emblem venders.

The new expansion, Cataclysm, will bring change. Change brings price fluctuations. And that means you have an opportunity to make heaps of gold if you can anticipate what people will be looking to buy.

There are two new races being introduced in Cataclysm, goblins and worgens. I have a feeling worgens will be popular, and A LOT of players will level new characters.

What happens when they level new professions? Most new characters are being power leveled by higher level characters, and they aren’t going to stop and do a lot of material farming. So, why not sell them those trouble materials that take forever to level through – like thorium.

And guess what, thorium is cheap right now at around 15g per stack. Prices could easily double or triple when Cataclysm comes out.

Think about other professions and what they might need as well.

Don’t go and blow all of your gold now though buying materials. Cataclysm isn’t supposed to be out for several months. Just be on the look out for good deals if you see them.

Blizzard has announced that the next expansion, Cataclysm, will come with more than 3000 new quests. That’s a lot of questing!

The previous expansion, Wrath of the Lich King, came with a not-too-shabby 1000 quests.

A large portion of these quests will be revamped level 0-60 quests as those areas are transformed. Anyone leveling a new character should expect an entirely new experience.

The new secondary profession, archeology, will also encourage players to go back to the lower level areas

If you haven’t already purchased your copy of Cataclysm, you can get it HERE. The game ships out a few days before, so players that buy online typically get their copies before everyone else.

Just a reminder, if you plan to farm elementals in Wintergrasp for eternals, you need to wait until your faction controls the area.

If your faction does not control the area, then you can only see half of the elementals that drop eternals, and not ones that drop them often. So, it’s a huge handicap if you try farming without control over Wintergrasp.

I came here to farm Lashers today, and spent a few minutes killing the Living Lashers, but couldn’t find the Mature ones. Alliance had just lost Wintergrasp, so duh! I’ll have to wait until we get it back.

What’s even better? I was trying to making a video for youtube and didn’t realize my failure until the video was over.

There are a few reasons I think Lashers are a top area to farm for gold in Wintergrasp

• On my server, Eternal Lifes are more valuable than any other Eternal, the drop rate for Lashers is high
• There are lots of them, which means less time waiting around for spawns
• You can Herb these guys after they are dead if you have Herbalism

I actually ran into this area when I was looking for a place to level a new weapon skill. I don’t have herbalism, so I didn’t test to see how much gold I could make an hour, but I’m pretty sure it would beat out the other elementals I’ve tried farming in Wintergrasp.

If you have herbalism, let me know if this place is as good as it looks!

After I tried farming mammoths I noticed that Rhino Meat was worth a lot more on the auction house, so back I went to do another timed test.

The first thing I noticed was that the drop rate for meat was a lot lower than the mammoths. The good news though is that Rhinos have a good chance of dropping rare recipes and I got on that sold overnight for 250g.

Besides the recipe, in 40 minutes I farmed 30 chilled meat, 36 rhino meat, 105 borean leather, 24g in trash, and 2 green items. Not including the recipe, that came to 180g, or 270g per hour.

With the recipe, I earned 650g/hr! So far, that’s my best timed trial to date.