Whatever You Do. Don’t Tell Anyone.

You don’t have to smoke pot to like Queens of the Stone Age, it certainly doesn’t hurt though. I started listening to these guys long ago when I heard a song of theirs played at a local radio station (probably by accident). But then, that’s the upside of being a weird kid in such a rural disconnect, you find music as weird as you. And it speaks to something in you. It’s safe to say I immediately adored QOTSA, and it wasn’t just the pot talking. Even now I get stuck in these moods where I have to listen to their music. If you like this, definitely check out their other material – and of course don’t neglect their side – project bands such as the The Eagles of Death Metal and Them Crooked Vultures…

Stockpiling for Cataclysm
Yeah, that’s right. I’m betting on some long odds here, but I think there’s some items I’ll definitely be making some gold on. There’s several problems when you get into a serious collection though. First, there’s the cost. Getting the items necessary to cash in on a new environment does not come cheap. Second, there’s the question of storage and management. When you’re talking about a serious collection like mine, you’re talking about literally thousands of stacks of goods. Definitely not the kind of thing you want to be juggling in the mail (even if it is only once every thirty days). Point is, you’re going to have to come up with a storage solution to suite your needs. Finally, there’s the most important consideration of all – what do you stockpile, and how much?

Cost is of course the easiest part of the equation, if you’re the type of person who’s hoarding items in preparation for a big patch or expansion release, then it follows you’ve got some petty cash to blow on the endeavor. A word of warning however, as my uncle Remo used to say “never invest anymore than you’re willin to lose”. In fact, I’d even go as far as to say – assume the worst, assume all of your investment is lost. Knowing that, how much gold are you willing to throw away? Once you’ve figured that out, you’ve set yourself a spending limit or threshold. Maybe you’re not willing to spend more than 20K maybe you’ll spend anything you have over 200K. In the end, the choice is yours. And fairly arbitrary, but what matters is that you’re comfortable with the numbers, otherwise the investment just doesn’t add up.

As for the second issue, storage warrants a bit more consideration. At what point is one mule or ah alt not enough. If you’re going to use a gbank, how many tabs do you need/want? Is the old tried and true mailbox bank feasible for your needs? A lot of this is about preference, myself I currently have six fully stocked guild banks, with about twenty characters (not counting Khaas) holding onto things . I’m in the process of leveling several of those alts so I can utilize them for more cooldowns each day. But the main thing is, they all have a full set of bank slots, and a full set of 16 slot bags. It takes eleven bags to fill both the bank and the character.

■ Fun Fact about Personal Banks: Each bank has seven purchasable bag slots, the cost increases with each extra slot purchased starting at 10s , then increasing to 1g, 10g, 25g, 25g, 25g, 25g for a total of 111g 10s for all slots (not including the bags that go into them).

As a simple run of the numbers, let’s say that each is using 16 slots (the backpack) for other things – consumables, hearthstone, etc. That means that each of those characters has 112 slots of storage, a maximum capacity of 2240 individual items per character (assuming stacks of 20). That’s a whopping 2240 slots and 44,800 stacked items total. Factor in profession specific bags and you could nearly double that figure for things like Bars and Ores, Enchanting Mats, and Leather.

■ Note: My math was originally incorrect on this, I blame the Scotch. Thanks Taugo for catching the error.

But what if you don’t want to load down your alts with extra stuff, what if you actually want to play them a bit (or maybe you’ve run out of room), how does the guild bank stack up?

■ Fun Fact about Guild Banks: Each guild bank contains six purchasable tabs which have 98 item slots each; bags are not required for the slots. The price for the first tab is 100g, and increases for each successive tab, 250g, 500g, 1000g, 2500g, 5000g for a grand total of 9350g.

So, with six guild banks I have 3528 slots available as storage, which is 70,560 individual items (assuming stacks of 20). When you combine the numbers of both the characters available for storage and the gbanks, it comes out to 18608 slots of storage, with a capacity of 115,360 individual items. That’s a LOT of storage, later I’ll be showing you precisely what I’ve been using all that space for…

Finally, the biggest problem is what precisely do you want to hoard for the expansion/patch? Again, this is one of those things that takes some skill to figure out. Safe bets are in the harder to acquire commodities. With Cataclysm coming there’s a fair amount of speculation in favor of things like Ore and Bars, people are already dropping professions like tailoring on their casters in favor of Engineering to eek out that little extra edge in PVE. With the removal of ammo, the skill requires more bars. Similarly, you have all the rerolls for new class/race combinations and the new Goblins/Worgen to consider. They will surely want their professions maxed, especially if it’s someone established on the server already, these people will pay for the bars, ores, or gems necessary to get their skills up.

Enchanting mats are tricky, some old enchants remain viable for specific situations. And there will likely be several trying to get this skill up as well, Dusts and Essences are where you want to focus your attention. The Shards tend to be worth less and less as time goes on, Crystals are similarly lackluster. Ultimately, this type of speculative investing is risky, because you really don’t have much in the way of concrete evidence on how the market will change in the new environment, there are a lot of variables that can effect the outcome. So, a lot of it is about intestinal fortitude. Hence, why I say earlier – only invest what you can afford to lose.

The Bloodscalp Report
Slow and steady, Bloodscalp is staying the course. I’ve moved out of most markets for the time being and am focused mostly on finishing off my stockpile, the hoarding continues and is being funded mostly by my daily xmute/cut routine. Fingers crossed.

That’s all for this week, thanks for reading…