My state of the union: The Mogfather, The WoW Factor, PC Gamer and Blizzard

So why the downtrend of the Mogfather and the absence from the gold-making community over the last month? Haha, sure enough here's the scoop!

This is largely due to two factors, though gold-making via transmogrification is still a topic in which I can quickly find myself diving too deeply down the rabbit hole! It's just that fascinating.

First, I'm trying hard with the time that I have to focus on what got me into the transmog market in the first place and that's simply transmogrification as a subject. It's lit a fire underneath me since I first heard rumors of it on The Instance Podcast prior to 4.3 even being announced. So I've been working hard to convert my transmog fashion shows into the The WoW Factor, with lots of help from Noelani and Ironyca of WoW Roleplay Gear. As well as cranking out videos of these events and spreading the word from one Battle.net forum to another. In addition, I've been trying desperately to get another weapons article out here on DA which will be polearms. If you saw the latest livestream, you can see the silent film (weird, I know, still working on audio) where I was putting the finishing touches on the Visual Positioning matrix for the article. I'm hoping to publish it tonight. So it's been busy, and with a wife and two kids I've got to be selective with my mindshare!

The second reason I've been focusing less on the gold-making transmog story is because I feel there is more value in blending it in with the bigger story of transmogrification and these shows I'm doing which have effectivley become community in-game events. In fact I was contacted by community managers Lylirra and Zarhym at Blizzard, who were inquiring about details of the shows and where they could point players to learn about these events should they desire to hold one on their realm. Their question was the same as PC Gamer Magazine's, though: who was I, Keelhaul or the Mogfather? Was it Disenchanting Azeroth or was it Mogfather Main? Was it about gold-making or about transmogrification? I mean pick an angle already!



And they were right, so I made the choice to consolidate into a single hub here on Disenchanting Azeroth. It's always been about personalization, customization and the player experience. The gold-making was just icing on the cake I was trying to bake. So with that, I consolidated the sites and put forth DA as the primary identity and hub for these storylines of the Mogfather, the WoW Factor, the transmogrification analysis, etc. And it's here on the forums where I'm hoping for each of these communities to coexist because there is a lot of knowledge that can be shared.

So that aside, where am I at with my transmog flipping? Well, right now my focus has been on logging in and posting probably every four days and only on realms where I have shows coming up. That way it helps me make a bit more coin that I can turn into prizes for participants. So currently my focus is on Arthas and Lightbringer with a bit of Proudmoore sprinkled in. Arthas is the next show on the schedule, coming up this Friday 16th. It was going to be a 50,000g show, but in focusing on that market every few days I've been able to boost it to 75,000g and that number continues to climb. Lightbringer will follow the week after and I'm already at over 120,000g there so the prize package is very stable.

Since I'm doing so much, my glory days of pushing for 10,000g and 5,000g items is about two weeks behind me now as two things happened. The first was I grew a conscience. So many players come out at these shows and really put in genuine efforts with their looks to do so. A number of them do it with BoEs purchased from me off the auction house, and I've seen enough commentary from many of these players with the pulse of "Wow ,these prices are painful, but we know Keel gives it all back during his shows so I guess it's ok and we'll pay those prices" that it's prompted me to cool it a bit and slash everything in my pricing structure by 50%. So yes, Glorious breastplates (sold one yesterday actually) are down to 5k, Tyrant legplates are down to 2k, etc. So there is still a massive markup, but it's no longer astronomical. It's also made a number of highly desirable sets more accessible, with Blood Knight, Overlord, Darkcrest, etc. all going for less than 450g for the chest and legs.

So the income is much slower, I've not seen much of an increase in rate of purchase, but to be honest I'm too busy whack-a-moling other things to be able to worry much about it!

I've also reduced my inventory to Mail and Plate only, with a few weapons I'm confident will sell. That's probably the one thing I haven't reduced is weapons. For example, I sold an Ethereum Nexus Reaver for 10k a day or so ago. No markdown, still sold.

There is still much more to learn about this market, and I'm convinced items will continue to appear on the radar and prove valuable (see Chan's Imperial Robes). And pioneer players like @Farli_wow @EpicPennyPouch and @Elvinelol are continuing to blaze the trail further into unchartered territories that I never went into. So if you want the old tales with lots of dramatic storytelling about the market and the foundation behind it, then I'm your guy! But if you want up-to-date pricing information and analysis, stick to the aforementioned experts. I follow them, so should you.

-Keel

PS. I'll have to check my numbers, but I believe by the time the Proudmoore WoW Factor show hits in the first week of April I will have earned and given away over 2,000,000g across multiple realms just by flipping transmog items.

I figured as such...

There is a reason why I called you "Anna Wintour", and not someone who has a designer brand. I figured you were the taste-maker, much more than the entrepreneur.

And as a long-time MMO person, I absolutely love the community-spearheaded events. Including the troll-PvPers who wants to crash into the party, and fashion-show security guard! X-D

I think you are heading in the right direction.

-K