It seems like forever ago that we originally posted this series.   We did a whole big thing about the artisan fishing and cooking quests along with where to get the books you need for training – and with 3.1 it all went poof.  So we thought that an update was in order.

It also turns out that leveling fishing just got a WHOLE lot easier now that fishermen (and women) of any skill level can fish in any body of water.  You’re only going to catch vendor trash if your skill isn’t high enough, but that’s better than nothing.  Besides that, with the fishing timer getting cut in half, the whole process just got a big time reduction.  Now you’ve got next to no excuse for leveling fishing, especially if you have plans to level cooking.

And we’ve always recommended exactly that.  Some of the best raid buffs come from cooked foods, and even more specifically, cooked fish.  We don’t want you to have to always buy everything from the AH, so here’s how to put those two secondary profession skills together to make leveling cooking a breeze.

And just like fishing got a lot easier in 3.1, cooking also no longer has an artisan quest or any book learnin’ involved, so you can do it all at the trainers.  You’ll still have to buy most of the fish recipes, but we’ve got that covered for you as well.

To make this as easy as possible, we’ve include links to each recipe you will need as well as the page showing the very best fishing locations for each fish type.  So here is the complete guide to leveling both at the same time.  It’s short, sweet, to the point and very Dominating!

1 – 50: Brilliant Smallfish = 80. Mats (1 Raw Brilliant Smallfish)

• 80 Raw Brilliant Smallfish
• Fishing Holes
  

51 – 100: Longjaw Mudsnapper = 80. Mats (1 Raw Longjaw Mudsnapper)

• 80 Raw Longjaw Mudsnapper
• Fishing Holes
  

101 – 175: Bristle Whisker Catfish = 120. Mats (1 Raw Bristle Whisker Catfish)

• 120 Raw Bristle Whisker Catfish
• Fishing Holes
  

175 – 225: Rockscale Cod = 80. Mats (1 Raw Rockscale Cod)

• 80 Raw Rockscale Cod
• Fishing Holes
  

226 – 275: Spotted Yellowtail = 80. Mats (1 Raw Spotted Yellowtail)

• 80 Raw Spotted Yellowtail
• Fishing Holes
  

276 – 325: Your Choice – or combination of the following = 80.

• Mightfish Steak. Mats (1 Large Raw Mightfish, 1 Hot Spices, 1 Soothing Spices)
• Mightfish Fishing Holes
  
• Baked Salmon. Mats (1 Raw Whitescale Salmon, 1 Soothing Spices)
• Salmon Fishing Holes
  

326 – 350: Golden Fish Sticks = 40. Mats (1 Golden Darter)

• 40 Golden Darter
• Fishing Holes

At this point the recipes come from the trainer directly or from purchases with Dalaran Cooking Awards from doing the cooking dailies.  As with any profession, it is much easier to do all of this at level 80.  You’ll have to do the cooking dailies regularly to complete the rest of this guide, but that’s not the fault of the guide, the game just requires it.

351 – 375: Baked Manta Ray = 60. Mats (1 Imperial Manta Ray)

• 60 Imperial Manta Ray
• Fishing Holes

Here’s where you’ll actually have to use some beast meat for a little while.  The mats are normally to be had on the AH, so you don’t have to go farm all of it yourself, but if you’re cheap you can look each one up and go get them yourself.

376 – 400: Great Feast = 40. Mats (1 Chunk o’ Mammoth, 1 Shoveltusk Flank, 1 Worm Meat, 2 Chilled Meat)

• 20 Chunk o’ Mammoth
• 20 Shoveltusk Flank
• 20 Worm Meat
• 40 Chilled Meat

401 – 420: Anything else, although Spicy Blue Nettlefish sells fairly well.

421 – 450: At level 420 you can cook all of the other recipes in the game except for fish feast.  We recommend Dragonfin Filet using Dragonfin Angelfish as we cover in this post: Fishing For Gold.  Dragonfin Filet and any of the other recipes you buy with the cooking awards will take you all the way to 450, where you can make the premier buff food in the game – Fish Feast.

It’s then that all your Dominating work will make you the most popular cook around.  Everyone loves a fish feast, and you can make serious coin cooking up any of the foods you grab the recipes for.  We highly recommend doing the cooking daily every day.  It will maximize your buffs, and your gold earnings – especially if you can dominate it with more than one toon.

Now, even though leveling fishing doesn’t require running all over the place any more, it’s still a pain in the tookus.  It might actually take longer.  It’s easier, but a larger time sink.  After about level 225 it’s 10 casts per skill-up and that means it will take you around 4-6 hours if you did nothing but fish.

We’ve also got a great little tip for how to get those last few skill points in cooking in the Leveling Cooking Tip post, as well as a nifty mod that makes getting all your recipes for cooking or any other skill a whole lot easier in the post Finding Recipes Made Easy.

This little guide should make the prospect of getting to those dailies on alts a bit less daunting.  So grab a pole and a pan and get to work!  Soon you’ll be cashing in, just like we do.

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Paladin Tanking Part 1 – The Basics

This has been a long time coming and I wish it was there when I started – but due to popular demand, Here it is.

It’s not that complicated really … but it can be tricky if you’re new to tanking or to the paladin class in general.

Things you should know about the Paladin Tank:

This time it’s all basics, boring but fundamental; and fundamentals are rather important. If you have never played a paladin, or if you just got to 80, just know that tanking as a paladin is like discovering a whole new character, it’s unlike anything you have ever done before. While leveling your goal was to kill things as fast as possible. Now your sole mission in life is to put yourself in harm’s way and hope your healers are on the ball and the DPS is high enough. (Although any well played tank can make a healer’s job a lot easier).

This series of articles is intended for the Protection Paladin who tanks in PvE content, and wants to clear 5-Man dungeons and/or 10-25 man Raids. Also note that the writer is of the opinion that Tanking is more of an art form rather than hard science and common sense and personal opinion weigh in as much as mathematical calculations.

Much of the content that will follow here and over the next few articles in the series,  is drawn in part from the following sources:
ElitistJerks.com for the most explicit and detailed WoW theory-crafting available on the net
TankSpot.com for the guides, videos and examples.
Aemaeth/Zmack for screaming at me until I got it right.
All the healers in the guild for bearing with me until I got the fights down.
The rest of the guild for suffering through my learning curve and still accepting to raid with me in the process…

Let’s get down to brass tacks: the approach to playing a level 80 Protection Paladin is a complete 180 from the Retribution spec that you used to get there. Here are some “No D’uh” basics that may seem obvious but still worth mentioning.  As a matter of fact, these basic rules apply to every tank, not just the paladin. Since I came from the ranged DPS world (lock if you must know), I won’t take it for granted that you know any more than I did when I started to tank.

Also, since there are so many people who just know this stuff already (and who like to scream NOOOOB) we figured it would be the best place to start for anyone who hasn’t tanked at all.  If you’ve never tanked, do a few runs in some regular Northrend dungeons with these things in mind.  And it sure wouldn’t hurt to take along someone who is an experienced tank to give you even more pointers (Zmack for instance).

• The Paladin is the Master of AoE Tanking since most of your abilities hit multiple targets.

• As a rule, you (The Tank) control the positioning of the mobs/bosses: always face mobs away from the raid – DPS goes UP when attacks come from behind mobs.  Don’t make the whole raid run around the mob, YOU turn the mob so that the raid is always behind what you’re tanking.  DPS will rise dramatically the less time they have to spend getting into position.  The joust move is the best way to get to the right spot.  Strafe through the mob(s) and then spin to face the raid.  You will be in front of the mob and the raid will be behind them – with as little wasted time as possible.  This is tanking 101.  Good tanks always turn mobs, stupid tanks don’t.  Don’t be a doofus.

• Since you control the positioning of the boss (and mobs): Move as little as possible unless the situation demands it.  You’ll get more out of the entire raid’s DPS if they can just sit there and face roll their rotation, (especially true for melee … think Patchwerk).  Again, don’t move if you do not absolutely have to.  It can make the melee DPS guys absolutely hate your guts if they are constantly having to get behind/closer/overthere/overhere/closer/behind – statue tanking is best, make the mobs come to you (There is an ability commonly referred to as “Taunt” for such situations).

• Try to keep your back to a wall and avoid knock-backs if necessary. Strafe through mob groups and then back up to a wall.  Mobs are programmed to try to get behind you.  Standing against a wall cuts that sort of nonsense out.

• When positioning, NEVER turn your back to mobs, you cannot Dodge, Parry or Block from behind. Instead Strafe, so that the boss or mob is never “behind” you.  If you need to move, always move backwards or strafe.  This is one of the most subtle differences between a good tank and a crummy one.  Once you learn to do this properly you will be able to tell who is a good tank in one or two pulls.

• It may look like I’ve already said this, but Strafe, Strafe, Strafe.  Once you engage mobs keep your face (or cheek ; ) to them, and if you must move, do NOT turn and run, learn to strafe in flat arcs (see figures below).  Good tanks will actually look a little drunk most of the time.  Running sideways and banging into walls all the time.  But what  a luscious sight for the rest of the raid – especially the healers.

• This may seem silly but Oh so important: Don’t get out of range of your healers … or Line of Sight for that matter.  This is easier for a paladin than a warrior.  Warriors like to charge and it can be a real pain for a healer to have to run to get in range.  Try to pull mobs so that you pull them into range instead of running headlong away from healers.

• Don’t engage the Boss until your healers have full Mana … you’ll live longer   A tank’s first priority is to make sure that he is behaving responsibly toward those responsible for him.  Annoy healers at your own risk.  It’s common courtesy to take a glance at your healer’s mana pool before you make some gigantic pull.

• It’s best if everyone is ALIVE when you start a pull, wait for the healers to rez your dead friends (who probably dies because you missed a mob on that last trash pull). Pulling early is the cause of more wipes on trash than any other single thing.  Overly aggressive chain pulls put too much pressure on healers trying to rez AND catch back up to the heals they could have been making if you weren’t being a knucklehead.

• Once you choose your talents in the Protection tree for the first time, remember to train them up … level 1 spells/abilities aren’t all that useful in Heroics, or anywhere else for that matter.  This seems stupid, but a brand new spec often can include a touch of forgetfulness when it comes to skills you’ve never trained before.

All kidding aside, Tanking is a High Stress job, if you wipe or people die, it’s usually your fault (usually).

Here’s a little graphical depiction of what we’ve been talking about:

This is a pretty typical pull in most 5 man dungeons.  This is a 5 man group with a Paladin (P/T), Rogue (R), Warrior (W), Warlock (L), and Healer (H).  We have a pull of 3 mobs coming up where the (P) is a patrol and there is also a Caster (C) and Mele (M).

At the pull the rogue is stealthed out in front near the patrol.  Wait until the patrol is moving away from the group.  As the patrol crosses the face of the caster, that paladin tank runs right up to the group and begins to generate aggro (more on this in another article).  The warrior follows along with the rogue – but since our tank knows exactly where to put the group of mobs, the healer and lock can just stand still and begin to DPS the caster (or heal, of course).

As soon as the tank pulls (where the straight line becomes a curve), he turns to his left and strafes left up against the wall and drops his Consecration.  This will pin the mobs to his face with their backs to the group in perfect position.  His back is to a wall so that the mobs cannot get behind him, and his melee buddies can stand in one place and hit all three mobs from behind without moving an inch.  Plus, the Lock and healer haven’t moved an inch since the pull began.  They can just noggin roll their keyboards or even AOE with no worries.

If something does go wrong and it becomes necessary to move, the tank can just make the flat strafe arc to the far wall.  (Let’s say the mobs drop a void zone or some other nasty thing).  Strafe left while turning right a bit will actually keep the rogue and warrior from having to move more than a few steps – keep the tank’s face to the mobs, and the ranged won’t have to move at all.  You run the long way around so that everyone else moves as little as possible and are always attacking from behind.  Plus, you get your back against another wall and keep the mobs in a nice tight little cluster.  Just remember to strafe in circles around mobs.

Now that you have the bare essentials in mind let’s move on to: Tanking Mechanics, Basic Stats, Combat Ratings, Gearing choices (Mitigation vs. Avoidance), Threat Generation, Professions, Enchantments and Gems, but I have a feeling that most of you want to see the Talent Build first.

So we’ll start with that and build the rest of these articles around this since it’s the core of the character.

My preferred Tanking Build as of patch 3.1.3

I’ll highlight the important ones and give a brief reasoning behind my choice, let you mull it over for a while and answer questions next time when we cover the next topic:

Divinity – Rank 5/5
Increases all healing done by you and all healing effects on you by 5%. (Makes you easier to heal.)

Improved Righteous Fury – Rank 3/3
While Righteous Fury is active, all damage taken is reduced by 6%. (Single largest threat generation tool available, you WILL lose aggro without it.)

Blessing of Sanctuary – Rank 1/1
Places a Blessing on the friendly target, reducing damage taken from all sources by 3% for 10 min. In addition, when the target blocks, parries, or dodges a melee attack the target will gain 2% of maximum displayed mana. Players may only have one Blessing on them per Paladin at any one time. (Big mana boost and damage reduction.)

Spiritual Attunement – Rank 2/2
A passive ability that gives the Paladin mana when healed by other friendly targets’ spells. The amount of mana gained is equal to 10% of the amount healed. (OOM tank usually = wipe … )

Ardent Defender – Rank 3/3
When you have less than 35% health, all damage taken is reduced by 30%. (Gives your healers a chance to catch up, it has saved our raids more times then I can count.)

Redoubt – Rank 3/3
Increases your block value by 30% and damaging melee and ranged attacks against you have a 10% chance to increase your chance to block by 30%. Lasts 10 sec or 5 blocks. (Block Value = DPS=  Threat=  Good!)

Guarded by the Light – Rank 2/2
Reduces spell damage taken by 6% and gives a 100% chance to refresh the duration of your Divine Plea when you hit an enemy. In addition, your Divine Plea spell is 100% less likely to be dispelled. (Divine Plea should be up on every fight that will last longer then 30 seconds, this makes it almost permanent and is more then 50% of your Mana regen)

Pursuit of Justice – Rank 2/2
Reduces the duration of all Disarm effects by 50% and increases movement and mounted movement speed by 15%. This does not stack with other movement speed increasing effects. (This ability is Crucial for movement intensive fights, Heigan the unclean, Anub’Rekhan, Malygos, Ignis, Razorscale etc.

These are the more important talents and/or the ones that need an explanation.

Next time: Combat Ratings (Hit, Defense, Block value, Dodge, Parry etc). Start with the basic build and the fundamental tanking tactics covered above and before we’re through you might be able to say you DOMINATE!

Articles in this thread:

Part 1 – The Basics (You are here)

Part 2 – Combat Ratings

Part 3 – Armor: Mitigation vs. Avoidance

Part 4 – Hit Table and Threat Generation

Part 5  – Abilities and Rotation

Part 6 – Professions and Upgrades

Part 7 – Buffs and Starter Gear

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Finally; A Way To Make Arbitrage A Little … No … A LOT Easier:

A few days back I wrote an article about Getting a Low Level character to Booty Bay.  Well the endeavor in question was Arbitrage.   I have been using almost every other trick in the AH Mastery Guide, so I figured why not maximize my efforts?

I work ~60 hrs/week; and when I get home the last thing I want to do is work some more. I would much rather get to PLAY WoW instead of “working” (Farming and such non-sense) again. If I can buy something for 100g and turn around and sell it for 200, that’s 100g PROFIT in 5 minutes, that’s 1 whole night of raid repair bills (Ok, not quite … but you get the picture).

Arbitrage is Buying something from one faction and selling it for a profit to the other faction on the same server. To do that you need to use the Neutral Auction houses (Booty Bay: StrangleThorn Vale; Everlook: WinterSpring; Gadgetzan: Tanaris).  Booty Bay in Stranglethorn Vale is the quickest, hands down.  Especially since we’ve already covered how to get a level 1 Alliance toon down there with no sweat.

The most important thing to know about Neutral Auction House: They will take a 20% cut on your sale. So … you’ll want to list the item for 1 silver (or less) and buy it right away.

On Fenris, there are far more Alliance players then Horde, and that is the case with most servers.  One faction will almost always have a much larger auction house than the other. Plus, prices for most items will vary between factions which means lots of opportunities for killer profits (you’ll have to use Auctioneer to get your server’s prices for both sides).

For Instance: Book of Glyph Mastery sells for 50-100g on Horde but on the Alliance side they list for 150-200g each.  When I see things like this here’s what I do:

• Buy the Item with your Horde Bank toon and send it to your Horde Mule, sitting at the auction house in BB.
• Have the Mule List the item for 1 silver.
• Buy out that auction with your Alliance Mule in BB. Once the Alliance character has picked up the item out of the mailbox he can then …
• Send it to your Alliance Banker (sitting in Exodar of course) post that sucker for sale at the AH and voila … instant profit!

The way we set up Auctioneer you can find out what items are profitable for Arbitrage with one click of a button.  That’s the true power of Gavin’s system.  You can also turn right around and repeat the process with the Alliance toon selling things on the Horde side.  In a matter of a few weeks you can have an enormous bankroll on both factions.

Now that you know – get out there and DOMINATE both sides of your server.

P.S. if you haven’t purchased the AH Mastery Guide for whatever reason, this is just one of many neat little tricks that it explains in far greater detail. Learn to EARN your money the smart way.  Farming is for Farmers … I’d rather  be a PLAYER not a Farmer.

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The Domination Podcast Episode 15

This week it’s the Midsummer Festival edition of the Domination podcast.  The guys cover everything you need to know about completing the meta achievement for the flame keeper title.  As always, we had a little trouble getting them calmed down, but it’s great information and maybe a little fun.  Download the full transcript below and see if you can unravel Bonehammer’s rant.

Episode 15 The Domination Podcast

 

 The Domination Podcast Episode 15 [12:42m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

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How To Level Up Faster And Easier Using Inscription And Herbalism

When it comes to leveling fast there is no doubt that Gavin Garrett is the undisputed king of the solo speed run.  And even though his methods are no secret, they can be hard to duplicate if you don’t know exactly where to go and what to do, and what NOT to do.

The methods are no secret since anyone can duplicate them, and thousands have done just that using the Horde Leveling Guide.  Gavin’s in-game mod guides you every step of the way from 1 all the way to 80 using exactly the same formula I’ve developed to break world records.  We’ve also given out dozens of my very best leveling tips here at Dominate Your Server over the last three years.

The real key to leveling fast: waste less time and you’ll hit 80 faster than you can imagine.

Before you all start yelling we need to cover a couple of things.  There is NO substitute for the Refer a Friend program if you need a level 80 right now, today.  RaF and a decent level 80 toon can have your alt to 60 in just a few hours, but since not every single person (and that’s 12 million+ folks) can, or will, do an RaF uber powerleveling run, that means there are millions of you stuck doing it the old fashioned way, and that’s where this tip comes in.

The comment above may not sound earth shattering in any way.  But it really is the key to my world record for solo leveling.  Think about it; if you spend an extra 5 minutes running the wrong direction just once during each level, you’ll add an extra 6 hours to your time from 1-80.  Just a few extra seconds at the vendor a couple of times each level and there’s another 4 or 5 hours.  Every single second you waste messing around can end up adding up to an entire day to your time.

I don’t know about you, but cutting out 10-20 hours of the time it takes to get to 80 is time I can spend doing other thing that are a lot more fun.  So here is one thing I always do to make sure I never waste a single minute on travel time, getting my mounts, or finding certain quest items on every single run I ever do.  It’s also the very best way for a pure melee toon to ensure you don’t ever have to make a time killing corpse run.

Two Ways To Cut More Than 10 Hours Off Your Leveling Time From 1-80

• Herbalism

Herbalism does several things for you while you level.  First, it makes it incredibly easy to find certain quest items on your mini map.  It seems that there are dozens of quests where someone is asking you to get 10 Tiger Lilies or something of the sort.  Herbalism makes these quest items far easier to grab.  Time saved: 1 hour.

Herbalism is also a nifty way to make some extra cash while you level.  I only pick the herbs that are close to my mob kills, but they can add up really fast.  Just mail them to a banker and sell them at the AH and your mount costs should easily be in the bank before you ever need them.  Running around when you could be on an epic mount is a killer.  Time Saved: push.

But the best part of using herbalism to level is the herbalism only skill Lifeblood.  Lifeblood gives any class or race a heal that can keep you alive when things go wonky.  As a general rule, Lifeblood will heal you for about 25% of your health bar, and that’s probably as good as whatever bandages you could be using, but requires no mats.  Lifeblood and a bandage and you can reduce the time you spend eating to regain health by a ton.  Do your pulls right and you can cut out the number of times you stop to eat.  Time Saved: 4 hours.

• Inscription

Inscription is a beast.  It takes a load of mats and is very tough to get a decent return at level 80 using it as a gold making profession. (Remember, I never spend gold on a profession, or anything else for that matter, where I don’t get a decent dividend on the investment, and I wrote the Guide to making gold with Inscription).  But the return for Inscription when leveling can mean the difference between a world record and a very pedestrian time.

The key here is in the Scroll of Recall.  Ever since Blizz lowered the time on the hearthstone cooldown to 30 minutes, my leveling times have been better.  But when you use your regular hearthstone AND the scrolls of recall, you can get back to your primary quest hub 6 times every hour!

Since my leveling method is to take maximum advantage of multiple quest turn-ins, it means Inscription is a serious time saver.  Since I am always using Herbalism anyway, I also have the mats for the scrolls, so the synergy is there.  I can just go pick up a round of quests, head out and complete them all and then hearth or recall right back to the quest hub no matter how far the quests took me.  By not having to run back to the quest hub you can save gargantuan amounts of time on your way to 80.  Time saved: 6+ hours.

So What Are You Waiting For?

For a warrior, rogue or mage with no self healing capacity, the herbalism is a huge benefit in the form of Lifeblood.  And every class can see their very best leveling times drop by a huge amount using the scrolls of recall any time they are up and you’ve got quests to turn in.

I don’t normally keep Inscription beyond level 80, but it is undoubtedly the single greatest tool you can have when it comes to leveling faster than you ever have before.  So the next time you decide to run a toon, make sure you have the tools the masters use to really Dominate!

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How To Get A Level 1 Alliance Toon To Booty Bay In 15 Minutes Or Less

So there I was 53 minutes and 17 corpse runs into my attempts to get an Alliance character to Booty Bay, just about to give up the whole idea when a guildie heard my plea on Vent and mentioned this tiny tidbit … It was so good that I can’t help but share it with you folks.  Ok, I exaggerate a bit.  But if you’ve ever tried to get all the way to Booty Bay before level 20 you know it can be a bear – or at least a monkey.

There is a really good reason why I wanted a low level toon in Booty Bay, but you’re going to have to wait for that part.  But this tip is so good it couldn’t wait at all and I didn’t want it getting buried in the reason I was trying to get to Stranglethorn in the first place.

You can use this technique to get just about anywhere between Kalimdor and Eastern Kingdoms at even level 1 with absolutely no worries whatsoever, and you’ll be moving faster to boot – so here is the killer low level travel tip from the folks in the Dominate guild.

(This is certified to be working as of Patch 3.1.3)

As a side note – it’s not that we forgot about the horde (they can use this too)it’s just that when it comes to getting to Booty Bay, the Horde have it easy: Orgrimmar to Ratchet and on to Booty Bay.  But for the Alliance … Good Grief! … until now. . .

So here’s how this goes:

• Create a Human (shortest distance to run from start zone)

• Die (Yes …  get killed, anywhere will do)

• In spirit form (50% speed increase)  Walk/Run south, out of Elwynn Forest, across Duskwood (you can even run on the river between Westfall and Duskwood if you want) and down to Stranglethorn Vale.

• Stand next to the Spirit Healer outside of Booty Bay (if you follow the road you can’t miss her)

• Log out and exit the game while still dead

• Log back in and accept the rez (No sickness because you’re level 1  ) It seems that exiting the game resets the location of your body to the closest Spirit Healer

Now you can get your new level 1 character almost anywhere in Azeroth in record time. This is just as valid for the Horde as it is for Alliance. You can get your level 1 Tauren to Orgrimmar if you like, or your Night Elf to Ironforge faster then you ever could before. No more begging for a portal, or trying to buy an escort.

Here is why this particular trick comes in handy in one word: Arbitrage

Now that you know, Get out there and DOMINATE.

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Over the next 12 days you have a unique opportunity. If you’ve been thinking about starting a new toon or cruising one of your current alts up to level 80 don’t waste another minute!

The midsummer festival is in full swing right now all over the WoW landscape. While there are events associated with the festival that we covered yesterday (such as some serious gold to be made) today we wanted to let you in on how the festival can really buff your leveling runs.

In each zone there are bonfires burning. The bonfires are lit every midsummer to symbolize the hottest part of the year with flames. This all seems a little silly to me, but hey, people do silly stuff all the time when they are making up excuses to have a party! Wouldn’t ice cream be better for this time of year? Oh well, I guess fires when it’s already hot outside is fine.

When you visit a bonfire controlled by your faction (Alliance or Horde) there are several things you can do that will give you rewards or buffs. You can also earn some nice change by visiting bonfires controlled by the other faction and snuffing them out! Here’s how this festival is a once a year opportunity to level those alts.

When you complete midsummer festival quests you will receive an item called Burning Blossoms. These blossoms can be used at the bonfires to light them or you can collect a lot of them and turn them in for some fairly decent rewards. The quests are easy and mostly involve running to talk to various NPC’s so it’s pretty easy to collect the blossoms.

As you are out questing be sure to keep a few blossoms in your bag and be aware of the locations for all the bonfires in the zone as well as nearby zones. Whenever someone lights the bonfire (of your faction) for the zone you are in you will get a buff that adds a 30% chance to add fire damage to each attack you make. The amount of fire damage is pretty big and scales with the level of your character. At lower levels it normally results in a one-shot kill when it procs. At level 70 this buff adds a chance to do 700 fire dmg. But the fire damage buff is only the beginning!

You’ll want to stock up on burning blossoms for this next buff. If you use a burning blossom near a bonfire that is already lit you will also gain +3% to your critical hit rating. This buff also adds fire damage to each attack! You can actually gain this buff as well as the bonfire buff every time you light the fire yourself using a Burning Blossom. With both of the fire damage buffs and increased crit chance you will be blowing mobs up like an elite.

At each bonfire there is also a pole. Dancing around the pole gives you an experience per kill reward of +10%! To dance all you have to do is toggle the gear cursor when standing near the pole. Your toon will go into a frenzied spinning dance and you can watch the experience buff increase as you spin.

Be sure to dance for about 60 seconds every time you visit the pole. This buff has a sort of “slow fill” on the countdown timer. The longer you dance, the longer the buff lasts – up to 60 minutes.

You can see how stacking these three buffs can really speed up your leveling times. Don’t waste this chance to scoot through about 50 levels over the next 11 days. You won’t get an opportunity like this for another year. Get out there now and Dominate with those alts!

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The first Midsummer Fire Festival was great fun, and this year is going to be no different. We’ll resurrect a couple of posts about the festival, but we certainly needed to cover first things first, since you might be tempted to skip honoring or desecrating flames, but that wouldn’t be very smart.

Outside most settlements in Azeroth and Outland have been placed festival bonfires. They look a lot like the ones in the major cities that I’m sure you’ve seen. Alliance and Horde both have their own fires burning. At both factions bonfires you will find a quest.

At every friendly fire you will find an NPC with a quest called “Honor the Flame.” At any level, this will grant you 5 Burning Blossom. Even better, if you’re level 80, you will also receive 6g63s. At every hostile fire you will find that the fire itself gives a quest called “Desecrate this Fire!”

At any level this will give you 10 Burning Blossom. At level 80 you will also receive 13g23s. That’s the same as many dailies! For both these quests all you have to do is talk to the NPC or fire and you complete the quest automatically. A very easy way to make gold.

Now, last but not least, the four hostile cities. Within these are the big fires. These will be harder to put out, due to having to sneak past the guards as well as avoid combat with the opposing faction. However they are well worth it. For each one you will get a selection of some basic holiday items, 25 Burning Blossom and 9g93s. On top of all that if you turn in all of the opposing city flames, you will have received 49g65s and the item Crown of the Festive Fire.

Now you may think that’s all well and good, but you might think that if the gold is similar to what you get from dallies, surely it’s quicker just to complete all the quests in Ice Crown for the same amount of gold – wrong. Last year it took about 3 hours to hit every single fire in the game, and that includes the major cities. Add about 20 minutes for Northrend this time around and another 130+ gold and it’s not a bad way to get a meta achievement nearly done for a title and pick up over 900 gold.

As a Horde player at level 80, if you visit every bonfire you will gain a total of 910 gold 23 silver total. As an Alliance player at level 80, if you visit every bonfire you will gain a total of 897 gold 3 silver total).

Eastern Kingdoms

• Arathi Highlands: Refuge Pointe [50,44] (A) / Hammerfall [74,41] (H)
• Badlands: Kargath [4,49] (H)
• Blasted Lands: Nethergarde Keep [58,17] (A)
• Burning Steppes: Morgan’s Vigil [80,62] (A) / Flame Crest [62,29] (H)
• Dun Morogh: Kharanos [46,46] (A)
• Duskwood: Darkshire [74,51] (A)
• Elwynn Forest: Goldshire [43,65] (A)
• Eversong Woods: North Sanctum [46,50] (H)
• Ghostlands: Tranquillien [46,26] (H)
• Hillsbrad Foothills: Southshore [50,46] (A) / Tarren Mill [58,25] (H)
• Loch Modan: Thelsamar [32,40] (A)
• Redridge Mountains: Lakeshire [24,59] (A)
• Silverpine Forest: The Sepulcher [49,38] (H)
• Stranglethorn Vale: Booty Bay [34,73] (A) / Booty Bay [33,75] (H)
• Swamp of Sorrows: Stonard [47,47] (H)
• The Hinterlands: Aerie Peak [14,50] (A) / Revantusk Village [76,74] (H)
• Tirisfal Glades: Brill [57,52] (H)
• Western Plaguelands: Chillwind Camp [43,82] (A)
• Westfall: Sentinel Hill [56,64] (A)
• Wetlands: Menethil Harbor [13,47] (A)

Kalimdor

• Ashenvale: Astranaar [37,54] (A) / Splintertree Post [70,69] (H)
• Azuremyst Isle: Azure Watch [44,53] (A)
• Bloodmyst Isle: Blood Watch [55,69] (A)
• Darkshore: Auberdine [37,46] (A)
• Desolace: Nijel’s Point [65,17] (A) / Shadowprey Village [26,76] (H)
• Durotar: Razor Hill [52,47] (H)
• Dustwallow Marsh: Theramore Isle [62,40] (A) / Brackenwall Village [33,30] (H)
• Feralas: Feathermoon Stronghold [28,43] (A) / Camp Mojache [72,47] (H)
• Mulgore: Bloodhoof Village [51,60] (H)
• Silithus: Cenarion Hold [57,34] (A) / Cenarion Hold [46,44] (H)
• Stonetalon Mountains: Sun Rock Retreat [50,60] (H)
• Tanaris: Gadgetzan [52,29] (A) / Gadgetzan [49,27] (H)
• Teldrassil: Dolanaar [55,60] (A)
• The Barrens: Crossroads [52,28] (H)
• Thousand Needles: Freewind Post [42,53] (H)
• Winterspring: Everlook [62,35] (A) / Everlook [59,35] (H)

Outland

• Blade’s Edge Mountains: Sylvanaar [42,66] (A) / Thunderlord Stronghold [50,59] (H)
• Hellfire Peninsula: Honor Hold [62,58] (A) / Thrallmar [55,40] (H)
• Nagrand: Telaar [50,70] (A) / Garadar [51,34] (H)
• Netherstorm: Area 52 [31,63] (A) / Area 52 [32,68] (H)
• Shadowmoon Valley: Wildhammer Stronghold [40,55] (A) / Shadowmoon Village [33,30] (H)
• Terokkar Forest: Allerian Stronghold [55,55] (A) / Stonebreaker Hold [52,43] (H)
• Zangarmarsh: Telredor [69,52] (A) / Zabra’Jin [36,52] (H)

Northrend

• Borean Tundra: Fizzcrank Airstrip [55.2,20.3] (A) / Bor’Gorock Outpost [51.1,11.8] (H)
• Sholazar Basin: [47,66] (A) / [47,61] (H) (Fires are around River’s Heart Basin)
• Storm Peaks: [41.4,86.9] (A) / [40.3,85.6] (H) (Both Fires near K3)
• Dragonblight: Winter’sguard Keep [75,43] (A) / Agmar’s Hammer [43.6,57.6] (H)
• Crystalsong Forest: Windrunner’s Outlook [55.7,46.1] (A) / Sunreaver’s Command [56.1,42.] (H)
• Grizzly Hills: Amberpine Lodge [Conquest Hold [68.3,60.8] (A) / [63.8,61.1] (H)
• Howling Fjord: [79.5,68.6] (A) / Camp Winterhoof [76.3,67.7] (H)
• Zul Drak: [66.7,41.9] (A) / [67.5,44.8] (H) (Both Fires near Argent Stand)

Major Towns

Alliance:

• Darnassus (57, 93)
• Ironforge (64, 25)
• Stormwind (41, 61)
• The Exodar (41, 26)

Horde:

• Orgrimmar (47, 38)
• Silvermoon City (70, 43)
• Thunder Bluff (21, 26)
• Undercity (68, 9 [upstairs])

So get out there and start hunting down all the flames. Honoring your own flames will grant you rewards, but remember that desecrating your enemies bonfires will not only get you more gold and blossoms, but will also grant your faction the zone buff, and remove it from your enemies – just be prepared to fight your way in, and out again.

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Knowing The Ins And Out Of Supply And Demand

This is another tip from the archives, but it also shows that some principles never EVER change no matter how much the game changes.  If you really want to be a gold guru, you’re going to have to learn how to look at the market and get out in front of it.  So these oldies are still goodies, as a matter of fact they just keep getting better.

Now I have long since put so many of these types of things on auto pilot that I actually have a little bit of a hard time remembering all of them to re-post them as tips.  Once you identify a market segment that works, just work the crud out of it forever.  It’s really not that hard – and we can teach you exactly how to do things just like this for hundreds of items in a way you’ll never have to think about again either.

The Sheep Are Getting Away

(Originally published April 27th 2007)

One of the biggest secret money-makers in WoW is wool. It’s weird that everyone seems to know that wool always costs about as much or more than silk, everyone needs it to level up first aid, but no one seems to know why. Well you’re about to find out, and how to cash in as a low level toon or even farm a bit from time to time on your main.

Wool is expensive because it’s one of the harder cloths to get in the whole game. It’s actually surprising it doesn’t sell for more than Frostweave, since it actually drops a lot less often. To explain why, let’s look at the levels cloth drops from mobs.

Analyzing the chart shows us why wool is so hard to get. Although all cloths drop for about 20 levels, take a look at the 30% drop rates. When we look at the levels of mobs that drop the individual cloth at a 30% chance, we can see that you only have at least a 30% chance to get wool for a mere 5 levels. Another interesting fact is that for Frostweave every single one of the mobs that drop it do so at a 30% or higher rate. This means it’s much easier to collect Frostweave than it is to get wool.

Wool is even more difficult to farm for Horde characters than Alliance since the best drop rates are in the Deadmines and the Stockades. Since you would have a really hard time getting into the stockades instance in the middle of Stormwind, this leaves Horde toons with only one really good farming run and that in contested territory.

You may get your hands on a ton of silk, and it sells well, but it is just as profitable to run for wool. The best spot is definitely the Deadmines. But you can also grind through the Foulweald Furbolgs in Ashenvale forest. The Furbolgs are easy to get to for both Horde and Alliance and drop enough wool to get about 5 stacks an hour if you can kill them fast enough.

Also watch the wool prices on the AH. If someone is selling too low, be sure to scoop it up and re-list it for sale at high market value.

Fast Forward to WotLK

Since this original post we’ve refined our techniques to the point where I always have tons of mats of all kinds to sell without tracking a single thing or killing a single Furbie.  The Auction House Mastery Guide will show you how to use the Snatch module in AADV to build massive lists of: auto-pilot, market-controlling, sheer AH Dominance.

We know that Frostweave may still have a higher price than wool – but in reality it shouldn’t.  On several servers I peg wool at the Frostweave price and make people pay for it.  Yes, I know that there is actually more demand for Frostweave since more people use it, but you can’t skip wool altogether.  So you’re either going to pay my price (which I set by the time required to farm the stuff) or go farm it yourself.  And welcome to my world.

Now, you can choose to be not quite so . . .pirate-like . . .in your pricing strategies, but a good solid control of the wool market should be a standard part of every wow auctioneer that has any degree of skill or desire to Dominate.  Our students will tell you it’s so easy that once you do it for a month you’ll be rolling in dough and not thinking about it a lick.

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One of the problems with a blog is that it can be a little tough to put all the information we’ve archived right at your fingerips.  As you can see in the instances by level post, Word Press even has issues with tables.

The biggest problem this raises is that over the last few years we’ve given out some really cool tips; but unless you’re looking for them specifically they get lost at the bottom of the pile. 

This isn’t always a bad thing.  Many of the topics we’ve covered have to do with issues and topics that simply no longer exist, while a whole pile of things need major updates.  And that’s exactly what we’re going to do in the coming weeks and months.

In addition to our regularly scheduled content, we’re also going to rework and republish all the very best tips from the past so that even the newest reader of DYS can get a feel for how we’ve helped thousands of folks Dominate the game in even the smallest of ways.  We hate to leave good information sitting in the archives closet when it might really help you out – especially if all we have to do is update a number or two.

This means you’ll be getting even more from DYS than ever before – and you won’t even have to work for it.  We’ll stir through the vault (in no particular order)and bring back all those killer tips and tricks you might have missed.

Today we’re going to go WAY back, almost to the very beginning of DYS.  Back before Lawbringer or any other guest writer or even the web site – all the way to the raw beginnings when it was just Gavin in a few folks’ email boxes every now and again.

The original tip was called “Alt Buff Exploit.”  Sent out to charter DYS members in October 2006.  That’s almost three years ago, but it’s still a nifty little tool you can use to get a little added advantage when leveling your alts.

Did you know you can buff your alts with your main character?

Say you’ve got a mid-level priest, or druid, or mage… something that can cast buffs (the “buffer”). And let’s say you’ve got a low level rogue or hunter alt that you want to give a little help to (the “buffee”)…

Run your buffer and your buffee to the exact same location. Then log into your buffee, and exit the game with alt-F4. This Windows command will terminate your World of Warcraft client without sending a “logging out” message to the server, so your buffee character will remain logged in for another 30 seconds or so.

Then, log in with your buffer character – behold, your alt is right there! Now buff away, and log out.

Log back into your alt (buffee), and you’ve got your buffs…

Is this an exploit? Will it get you banned? Highly doubtful. If anything, you may just get a warning. But I’ve been doing this for a *long* time now, and no one has ever had a problem with it…

Gavin Garrett

They still haven’t closed this loophole, and what’s more, computers have advanced to the point where almost any machine can handle running the login screen twice.  So to make this one easy on yourself it helps to fire up two wow logins when you do this. 

Minimize one, and then log in that alt on the other.  Alt-F4 out of that screen and then use the other one that’s already loaded to log in your main.  Hit that buff (or buffs) and you can log out the main without closing the second screen at all.  Your alt is just a few seconds away - fully buffed and ready to rock.

Sure, you would have to refresh the buff from time to time, but we still do this all the time.  If you have multiple accounts it’s even easier.  You don’t actually have to dual box the toons together, just let your more powerful characters buff your alts from time to time if you ‘must’ level solo.

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