This week we take another look at the Work Order system and how customer interactions are starting to feel like working in Retail IRL! We go through some of the pros and cons of the system and I talk about why I’m returning to the AH in both Retail & Classic. Plus, we have a great breakdown of making the most out of Tailoring Cooldowns by Penguin2gt.
My name is Samadan and I’ll be your guide through the World of Gold Making!
When Retail Feels Like Retail
This was an interesting discussion that came up this week with u/RuneSaber’s Rant about social interactions with this crafting system
The buyers will complain to the crafter because its the only one they can complain to. They have spend 15-30k in a stupid armor patch but expect the crafter to craft it for cheap. Some will beg that they have no money and some will demand it.
Case B:
The buyers feel entitled to ask for a cheap price because “it’s just a recraft”. And these recrafts are from the last season, some badly done, + you were not the original crafter.
Case C:
They would claim “why do you charge so much. You just have to press a button.”
Case D:
They feel entitled for a cheap price because “it’s just a change of stats” on their 421 or 447 weapons (with embellishment on top).
Case E:
The buyer is a dumb person and a total ignorant about the crafting system and expects you to hold their hand and explain them how to upgrade things, how to put orders, how to get souls, about embellishments, wasting your time to no end.
Has this happened to you? How do you deal with it? What if you get insulted for no reason, would you insult them back?
It sounds a familiar tale and is one of the things that puts many off the system of Work Orders and Trade Chat
Welcome to working in retail.
No joke the crafting orders chats I manage feel like customer service chats, with pre written greetings and explanations since at the start a lot of ppl needed handholding just to end up making a public order.
I didnt sink any gold into crafting when I realised I will not have the time to yell in trade chat and public orders will be not enough to recover gold, and listening to the “working in retail” experiences my guildies have, I am glad I skipped out on that. Dealing with people is draining enough in my acutal job, I am not signing up for that during my free time 😀
I think this post is a great example of why this new crafting system isn’t good for the game overall. It caters to the people who have the time and resources to understand the system while being confusing and too easy to not understand and make mistakes for the casual or uninitiated player – this just causes additional opportunity for tension in a game that is already overflowing with elitist attitudes, inflated egos and impatience for misunderstandings. This new crafting system just isn’t “fun”, like a lot of other additions they’ve added over the past few xpacs.
The main issue here is one of knowledge. The buyer is expected to know how the whole system works and the effort required to get there. The buyer is the one with the purchasing power and it’s up to them to decide the price.
Don’t ascribe to malice what could be explained by ignorance. Crafting is complicated this expansion, and these could very well be people who know nothing at all about crafting. Just ignore them.
It’s the order system that ruins it. These person to person interactions are only happening because the work order system is unusable for certain things.
I also sort of think that expecting people trying to craft Mythic level gear to do a bit of their own research isn’t too out of pocket, since they would have to be doing that research for any other content that would reward similar level gear.
This then leads onto the discussion of what the commission should be?
This looks like a reasonable Public Order, the mats are provided and the tip is at least worth the effort of the click. At the time of writing the recipe on my server was , so the crafter would need at least 50 of these orders to make the cost back. At an individual level though, the commission seems perfectly fine for mats provided.
If you’re going to tip more than 1000g find someone to send a personal order to, and make sure you’re getting at least a R4 item back.
The only reason to tip more than 1000g on a public order is if it’s a profession tool and you want the crafter to supply mettle, or if you’re submitting an order with no materials on it.
Which items are you getting crafted? Some tools are really easy to hit R5, some are not.
Some tools crafted by BS craft at R5 by default with a higher skill crafter. Tools crafted by LWs only have like 35% inspiration. Tools crafted by scribes have high inspiration .
Some profession tools require having 19 renown with a particular faction, not a lot of crafters will be around with that item, and the crafter you’re talking to knows it.
Are you providing all the materials including mettle?
Are you demanding a R5 back first order?
Are you expecting crafter to insight? Is insight being used by the crafter?
I’m asking because the crafters have asked me for prices ranging from 500 to 15k gold.
Everyone is different.
Not all crafters are the same skill level.
Not all crafters are using the same crafting methods.
Not all crafters craft at the inspiration they advertised.
Some crafters are greedy, some are not.
What are you actually paying for? Just because something is more expensive doesn’t mean it’s better. Cheap crafters aren’t always fine either even if they appear to be on par with a more expensive crafter.
There’s really not enough info here for me to say based on info in OP.
If the people charging 10-15k are offering you R5 on first order, I feel that’s a fair price. That’s usually what I pay for guarantees since I don’t like the recrafting process.
It’s impossible to know which crafting tool the crafter is using unless they stream video to me, and a lot of crafters don’t care if your item hits R5.
I’d rather pay more gold to avoid having to send 5-9 recrafts, or having to find a new crafter after I get the feeling the current crafter doesn’t care to proc R5.
There’s also the fact that some crafters will just disappear on you before your item procs R5 (assuming you’re crafting stuff that needs a proc for R5).
The system overall has many positive aspects to it and there are some great examples of people making lots of gold. However, for those who don’t want that level of interaction with customers, there is not much available for alternative choices.
What’s Wrong with Dragonflight?
To echo a lot of what’s been said above, I went through my own thoughts about it in this video here …
So far, I’m having a lot of fun with older gold making methods using the regular AH in Classic and the Retail AH is ticking along slowly with small AH sales without using the Work Order system
There is certainly gold to be made flipping, sniping, disenchanting, pretty stacking in Classic. If you want to learn more about making gold in Classic, TheLazyGoldmaker has a great video here.
Retail has a few niches that are profitable on my server. One thing that’s been really nice to see is the Tailoring cooldowns and Penguin explains below..
Tailoring Cooldowns are Back!
Penguin2gt has a great video going into depth about Tailoring cooldowns that have been fixed to be working properly and are therefore now profitable even in a Region wide market..
This is fantastic news for those wanting some gold making methods without the use of Work Orders and can be leveraged further with alts at lvl 60.
Further Reading
Most of this information was discussed and originally posted on the /r/woweconomy subreddit or in the accompanying Discord Server.
I hope you found this useful and If you have any suggestions or feedback, please do say so in the comments below..
Until next time, Happy Goldmaking!
Samadan
