Greedy Goblin

Monday, November 1, 2010

Cataclysm preparation #1

Note: I promised a philosophy post for today, but then I realized that it's the Day of the Dead, holiday in many countries. People mostly read my blog in work, so I always have low visits on holidays. I post a less important (for me) post today, the promised one will come tomorrow.


Cataclysm is coming, making lot of old world stuff obsolete. A wise goblin focuses his efforts to be prepared, to do tasks now that can be done now instead of doing it when he could be leveling instead. Of course Cataclysm leveling is not a race. However there will be a huge wave of players playing again. Do you want to camp quest monsters on PvE servers and fight deadly battles for them on PvP ones? Do you want to LFD the new, much harder dungeons with Arthasdklol? There are two solutions for that: staying ahead of the wave and falling way behind it.

A tip if you choose the second: level Archeology in your free time in the first week and start leveling more intensively 2 weeks after the start when the wave is in the 83+ zones.

I choose the first way though, getting ahead of the wave. I took a week off and plan to be in the yet unpopulated 81+ zones when the wave is lolling in the starter zones. I pre-ordered a digital copy of Cataclysm (just visit battle.net, you can't miss the huge Deathwing). The pre-order allows me to download content now and practically play at 00:01, which I will definitely won't do. I'll be sleeping and start playing around 6 AM when the servers are least loaded.

However there is much to do in the game too. At first the dreaded banks. Do you have a mess in your bank? Do you have 100+ boxes in your mailbox? You are doing it wrong. The mess will take lot of your time in Cata. Make order now! Look at my bank and inventory:
Noticed the "45" number on my backpack? The empty bag slot in the bank? Also my mailbox is empty. The bank bags from left to right:
  1. Consumables for leveling
  2. Tailoring stuff
  3. Old stuff (even I have some "fun" items. No shame in that. But I fit them into one bag)
  4. Herbs that I mill (I buy all kind of herbs, the bag contain 1-4 of each type)
  5. Inscription stuff
  6. Inscription stuff
  7. Empty slot, I put my inventory bag here when I do inscription or tailoring, and place the empty bag to my inventory
Of course I have more tradeskill materials, but they are with an alt's mailbox, sorted and named (the box "Ink of the Sea" has 12 stacks of ink and not various nonsense).

I know that many of you fear his bank like the bubonic plague, but now you have time. Soon, you'll be busy with much better things than throwing out crap that's been collecting dust since Karazhan.

19 comments:

Squishalot said...

Good advice, generally, not just for pre-Cataclysm.

Thalis said...

What about going instances with people from your guild? That way you can avoid M&S in LFD.
Or, starting a new worgen/goblin alt.

Anonymous said...

i've been having space issues in my 5 tab guild vault.

i know....but i'm a packrat.

anything with an average-high deposit cost i dont both wasting time trying to AH. i just throw it in the guild vault for the day i might need it.

i recently moved all vanilla material to one bank alt. when the goblins all start i'll dump it all on the AH for them to get started on leveling tradeskills.

i might get a higher price for it now(or later), i guess, but there will be so much liquidity in the market at the time i hopefully will be able to dump it all with 1 or 2 listings instead of having to list it many times.

Visalyar said...

Get rid of the old stuff, yes. That´ll be hard, to tell what to keep and what to throw away.
I´m just happy I rerolled in BC so I don´t have my full s3-set on an active charakter.

My plan for Cataclysm?
sleeping from 18:00 til 00:00 and start the rampage then. I just hope my favorite arenamate will be with me.
At 3:00 I hope to sell my first obsidian ore stack for some excessive gold. (have to get the handy AH-pony for my little squire).

Anonymous said...

I believe you don't need to leave the bank slot free, you can just drag over the bag you want to swap.

Ulsaki said...

In Wrath, I was amongst the fastest players to hit 80 on the server. I attribute most of this to the hour head start I had over most players whilst others were at stores purchasing or picking up their copy of the game. (I got my copy a day early because I pre-ordered online, and had to laugh at the news story about some idiot who had fainted after waiting in line for 12 hours before the launch!)

1 hour is not a big advantage in terms of time, but it allowed me to complete the initial quests with little competition.

That hour saved me either weeks of waiting until the zones were less crowded, or hours of battling with other players for quest mobs.

I also gained a lot of gold because for a time I had a complete monopoly on the high level herbs (Icethorn and Lichbloom). Massive demand and no competition meant I could quickly sell them for something like 200-250 gold per stack of 20.

Treeston said...

@Thalis: There are no alts in the PuG.

jane said...

Ah this has inspired me to get into my personal bank and inventory as it is SUCH A MESS! The last thing I want to do is worry about where I'm going to put all my exciting new Cata stuff when my personal bank is filled with 10 different helms/20 different dresses etc Time for a purge I think :)

Wilson said...

Yeah, I agree. Now's a good time to clean out the bank.

Completely off-topic, but I noticed that it has been a month now since you logged on to Koltas, which I'd say is a fairly strong sign that the guild is dead. Given that people with open minds often learn more from failure than success, do you have any thoughts on why you didn't kill Arthas? Yes, I know, because people didn't come to raids, but that only shifts the question over a step. Could be an interesting discussion.

BigFire said...

Kind of hard to keep my old stuff in 1 bag. Lets see, I have tier 1, 2. Legendary, Tier 6 with weapon. I'll probably get rid of Tier 7 & 9, but keep Tier 8 with shield and sword. I'm wearing Tier 10 right now, and I'll probably keep the tanking set.

One thing I can get rid of is all of my holiday garbs. I just need more rooms.

Xinge said...

My main's bank is full to the brim most of the time because he is also a primary crafter. I keep my bags empty however except for good, hearth, gnomish army knife, and a stack of healing pots/bandages. I mail everything I loot to a dedicated bank alt on a 2nd account and go through my inventory during prolonged flight times.

Energybomb said...

I would also suggest farming/ buying wrath ores and herbs now.
While the price will be stable for some time, soon (around 2 weeks after cata), the demand from the rerollers will surpase the migre demand and the random supplies will be exhausted.

As all the cool kids will be on the new zones, the ores will reach very high prices.

Guy said...

I like to hold on to my old gear for the memories. It's completely retarded, so I guess I'll just take screenshots and then ditch it. I wish I didn't have to play the "bank space management" game though.

I'm also having problems choosing which of my 80s I want to make as my new main. Anyone else having this problem?

Anonymous said...

Now with all this bank space I had a thought. Do you think you would be able to turn a profit with trade skill leveling. All of these new characters are going to want to level and most would not waste time gathering as they level. If I was able to stockpile what was needed to level a skill such as alchemy to the current LK max from 0 would I be able to find a buyer? Now I would assume I could fit all of the herbs in this case in one of those herb bags and vials just off to the side or not provided.

I guess the only question is would my time spent produce enough of a profit to make it worth it but low enough people would buy them?

Either way I was thinking after the cleaning should you stock up on things you would expect the new wave of low lv chars will want and pay for with their lv 80 sugar daddies.

chewy said...

I'm looking forward to about June next year when the high traffic will have slowed down, the bugs will be fixed, the raid content delivered and the theory crafting established.

Like a good book, the words don't change in the paperback edition.

Squishalot said...

@ Wilson: "Completely off-topic, but I noticed that it has been a month now since you logged on to Koltas, which I'd say is a fairly strong sign that the guild is dead. Given that people with open minds often learn more from failure than success, do you have any thoughts on why you didn't kill Arthas? Yes, I know, because people didn't come to raids, but that only shifts the question over a step. Could be an interesting discussion."

I actually brought this up in an unposted comment to Gevlon. Post 4.0.1 and pre-Cataclysm, I believe that this is the prime time to bring down the Lich King. 30% buffs are still there, and so many classes have had their DPS boosted. Koltas's own DPS should have at least doubled. Healing has become a lot stronger. If it's going to happen, it's now.

Anonymous said...

I thought the download key was going to be made available at midnight PDT.

For those of us in earlier timezones (most of the world) that would mean buying the box copy at midnight local time (or even 9.00am as I plan to in Australia) will give access to the servers many hours before the digital keys are released.

Or do I have my facts wrong?

Gevlon said...

@Anonymous: you can download Cataclysm data as soon as it's available. On Nov 7 0:00 all you have to do is download a minor patch and you are good to go.

Anonymous said...

Check out the addon Bankstack if your bank is in disarray.

The addon will automatically sort your bags/bank, making the moving of items, culling of trash, and general inventory upkeep much less headache.