The Golden Path

MMO Champion tells YOU how to be Rich.

Seriously, if you've ever wondered how to make money in game, without the need for Guides, then here it is. This is pretty much what I've been doing for the past six months and it has netted me sufficient cash to buy Cold Weather Flying for all my sub-80's plus Epic Flight (so far) for one. I go the Leather items DE route, but having been pointed in the direction of the Cobalt items I'll be doing those as well. I don't buy the raw materials on the AH, I use what I grind in the normal run of life. I pick enchants that aren't currently on sale on the AH, and using the Auctioneer data I have I'll fill in gaps for prices. In a lot of cases, if I announce the enchant on sale into Trade it's sold before I make it out of the Auction House.

Most importantly I'm not greedy. I think that's worth saying.

More importantly, however:

YOGG SARON DEAD!

HUGE grats to all involved, I look forward to getting my achievement in the near future.

WTB Icecrown, 0g, PST.

Not Tonight

I will not be picking myself for Yogg Saron tonight. I can't do it when there are FAR better dps-ers signed, however much I might actually want to go, because I understand in the end it's not about doing This One First, it's just about getting it done. Once Yoggy dies (and I have no doubt he will tonight) that's it, the Guild has cleared all the available 10 man content in game. That's a pretty significant achievement. Go us.

Earlier today, not long after logging, I was whispered by someone involved with the Joker Affair. As a result of this I was offered a spot in a 25 man PuG. I have now done ToTC in Large Mode:

I didn't win anything, but I gained a ton of very valuable experience, and 21 Triumph emblems for what was basically two hours work.The fact this can be done in a PuG was something of a revelation, but it does prove that if you can find 25 people who know what to do (and what not to do) with brains and a competant Leader, anything is possible.

Needless to say, I'm sure I can find something productive to do.

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

Hunter Dun. However...

It was an Epic fight. Even a Druid with THAT Legendary weapon could not save the first wipe. Second time in we were fighting whelps at 15%. It was one of those victories you felt you deserved. Lock and Rogue hats dropped, the Lock was celebrating... as the RL looted everything else, and promptly logged out.

STUNNED Silence, and then a lone voice.

'Did... did he just ninja everything?'

Yes, he did. He's been reported by nine people and as I logged out he was the main topic of discussion in Trade. I can but hope with nine tickets open the GM's will do something.

Ah well.

Wonders!

Yogg Saron, we can see you!

Vezax died last night, and I have Piller of Fortitude from the trash to show for it. It was a fairly significant upgrade for me as well, and the extra int on it was VERY useful. I'd still like a main hand and offhand though, maybe I can get into the Crusader 5 Man Heroic at some point. Needless to say, as we were able to grasp and down Vezax in one 2.5 hour raid window, I'd expect to see Yoggy buying it VERY soon. Ulduar 10 completion beckons!

After the Raid last night I do as I normally do, cycle the alts, faff about with bags and clearing items. I logged the Hunter just before bedtime... to find a message in my inbox from Joker ^^

Well then.

I have to say I was momentarily stunned. Even if he was made to write it, and even if he didn't mean it, this does go to prove that if you take the time to make people aware, stuff will get done. I have to applaud the Officers of the Guild in question for enforcing this 'punishment', and I have to say that even if Joker learns nothing from the experience, his Guild have maintained a very decent level of honor as a result.

So, next time someone is mean to you, don't just pretend it didn't happen...

Money Shots

For the first time since it's introduction, we extended a Raid ID yesterday. Mostly it's because of this guy. Vezax is now all that stands between us and Yogg Saron on 10 man.

I completely understand why the Hardcore Guilds don't consider 10 man as 'proper' raiding. In ALL respects getting 25 people in one place and getting them to work as a team is more complex, more time consuming and ultimately should give better rewards. The fact remains however if you don't have 25 people around, 10 man gives you what you'd expect, and probably demand from this kind of experience. There is a lot to consider: there's the question of making sure you are operating at maximum capacity, of functioning well in a unit, whilst ensuring you're doing what you're bought to the raid to do. Currently the loot is pretty much an aside (as we have TotC virtually on farm, PvP bosses depending) and it's all about completing the instance. Without 10 man modes our Guild would probably still be in Naxx, or at least as part of an Alliance... which is nearly not as good as doing it for yourself.

I don't doubt for one second, with the people we have currently running the instance, that we won't finish Ulduar very soon. Actually, I'd say we'll be ready for Icecrown as soon as it appears (which I'll predict will be around the Christmas holidays) with decent gears and people hungry to face off against Arthas. In that respect the game is keeping pace with us for the first time, I suspect with a lot of the more casual guilds overall. I think it's a testament to the changes Blizzard has made that we have a game that now remains current for longer and offers greater overall challenges to it's participants. Props to Blizzard as a result.

Of course, as soon as the servers stabilise all thoughts of Ulduar and the Crusade are out of the window. All roads will inevitably lead to the Wyrmbog... :D

Game Over!

The Druid's seen all the content (in 10 man) that the Crusade has to offer. The last boss fight is suitably taxing, but if I'm honest it's the PvP fight that makes the encounter overall. It all comes down to the RNG and which six jump down from the Arena. Last night was a big step forward from Wednesday's first try and it does reinforce the point that tired eyes and brains are no substitute for coming to an encounter fresh. Last night was two tries and done. I hope the same can be said for Mimiron on Sunday, who we had to 20% on Phase Four last night before we went to bed. I can see Yogg-Saron in my future...

I'm very happy with my Druid at the moment, not simply because I'm doing really challenging stuff currently which I'm finding extremely enjoyable. I'm finally able to do the damage I think I should be capable of. Observe this Recount log from a 25 man VoA in the week:

There were glorious moments when I broke the 4000 dps mark. I've NEVER done that amount of damage on anyone, anywhere, and it brings home to me that there are some REALLY large numbers to be had from the combination of decent gear, good enchants and the right rotations. I have a Starfire/Wrath combo that really works for me and I'm not far now from the haste cap for my Boomer. Haste makes a LOT of difference I now realise: casting spells faster means more spells more often which of course equals more damage. Duh. If you want to beat these more complicated fight, the big numbers, like it or not, really do matter.

The rest of this week has mostly been about PvP, for which I will make a separate post. Needless to say, I think people need to re-evaluate the merits of PvP in the light of XP from BG's. The 80's may hate it but BOY is it great times for everyone else.

You're Not Relevant, Nublet

Shamelessly grabbed from www.break.com

I have, for many years, had a big issue with people who's job it is in life to dismiss you for not being in their clique. Whether it's Spandau Ballet is better than Duran Duran (so bogus) Trek spin-offs being better than Babylon 5 (may you be sent directly to Z'ha'dum for even saying that) or any of the numerous arguments I've had the misfortune to have to be caught up in, I do not advocate EVER choosing a side, unless absolutely necessary. Every position has it's merits, after all. Yes, I have what I like and what I don't but bitter experience has taught me what happens when you place yourself too far into any one camp and refuse to move. With age has come first relaxation and then flexibility. Just don't get me started on stupid and selfish people, ok?

Perusing wow.com as I like to do of a morning, I happened upon an article that says at the Leipzig Games Convention at the end of this month, Ensidia and Method are competing against each other in a timed Ulduar run.

Eliah Hecht writes the following:

It's going to be on 10-man, which is kind of strange, given that most people (and especially hardcore raiders) seem to think of the 25-man version as the "real" version of the raid. Maybe they wanted it to be easier for spectators to follow the action.

Hmmm. So most people seem to think 25 man is the only true instancing. I mention this now because yesterday I had a 'you're not relevant' moment over the exact same issue. A LFG for Ulduar 10 made me ask in Trade who (on a Tuesday) would actually have a free ID to raid, to which I got the response 'Everybody nublet, no proper guild raids 10 man anyway.' But they were *about* to, so one only assumes 25 man raiding with DKP and all the trimmings must leave something missing in the hardcore diet. No hang on, I know, they were only doing it for the Achievements...

So I find myself wondering why this labelling of instances is taking place. I understand totally why 25 man would be given increased relevance, of course I do. What I'm having some problems with is that people consider 10 man to not have a place if you have enough people to do the harder content. I would suspect primarily it's timing: if you're raiding three times a week and you have enough for 25 then there's no point in splitting that down to 2x10 with five standbys. However on non-raid days these people can find nine friends to raid with, they'll go and quite possibly forgo DKP and raid in a more relaxed environment. That's what my Guild does every time we do Ulduar ^^. So in reality this split would seem to be caused by a combination of timing and expectation. If you raided 25 man Naxx the next logical step is to go straight to 25 man Ulduar and to leave everything else outside the schedule. If you don't have the numbers or you wanna be more casual, 10 man.

Except I have a bigger problem with this than I first thought.

We work REALLY hard in 10 man. We're on limited time and with reduced numbers, especially with it being the Summer. It's no less easy to work out, just because there's less of us to do it. Of course it's relevant because it's us doing it, and what anyone else thinks is completely irrelevant anyway. That's not what's bothering me. What's bothering me is that we are FORCED to approach the content in this order as we have no real choice in the matter, because of the way we are structured and with the restraints we have on time and breaks (AFK Child has woken up and needs a cuddle not heard that often in hardcore guilds, I would wager). That really shouldn't as a result be considered as rendering us in some way inferior. Blizzard have provided two versions of essentially the same place, after all. Let's be honest, it's the first time it's happened as well in this order. Naxx began as 40, got pared down to 25 and then 10. That's an obvious reduction in difficulty. As I have no idea of how it was planned, I cannot say whether Blizz started with 10 and went up to 25 man Ulduar in difficulty, or if it was conceived the other way around. It seems logical to assume they started with more and made it less (take stuff away is easier than adding) but does that really mean that the 25 man mode holds more gravitas?

Of course it doesn't, but on some days I think the Community needs to feel it's running a two-tier system.

It's ironic that as Blizzard try and make more and more content available to increasing numbers of people, parts of that player base seem to deliberately want to maintain the segregation. It's the 'them and us' situation: the hardcore raiders who boast of better gears and more epic kills when in reality those running 10 mans are often doing so when they could just as easily be doing 25 but either choose not to or aren't in a position to do so. Back in the days of 40 man raiding there was no halfway house: you found a large guild or a coalition group or you simply didn't raid full stop. TBC gave you a 10 man with no link at all to the 25 man content so there was still a clear distinction between the big boys and the rest. Now Blizz provide two versions of the same thing, and it is the larger group that becomes more important. One assumes that keeping more people happy counts for something, but you know I'm betting the people in the smaller groups are far happier and for longer. Or maybe I'm just being size-ist :P

What remains however is the distinct impression that because I don't have the choices some people do, I am somehow not as relevant. This bothers me. This is therefore the moment when I remind myself this is a game, and it's all moot anyway.

Progress Report

So then, where are we?

We've effectively had a week in Ulduar 10. Last Thursday we did the four external bosses and Kologarn. On Saturday we were able to dispatch Auriaya and then had our first ever Assembly of Iron kill, and last night we finally downed Hodir. This is the biggest single period of progress we've had since Ulduar opened.

Ulduar is clearly NOT!Naxx in every single way possible. It's designed to make you move about, to discourage blanket AoE, to make people focus not simply on standing and nuking but also on maximising limited and highly mobile buffs, on positioning and on timing. For anyone who cut their teeth on MC or BWL that's nothing new, what makes the huge difference with 10 people is the margin of error. One death and fights like Holdir can become virtually impossible. We knew we could do him (and I had my doubts up until this point) when we hit his enrage at 5% with 9 of us alive. SO much to focus on in one fight: falling snow, beneficial buffs to maximise, places not to stand and then to stand, massive debuff damage... but when all 10 of us cracked it, it seemed all very simple. Grats to the Priest who grabbed the tier trousers. Never was one piece of tier so well deserved. There is a good chance we'll see Freya tonight. That fight I'm really not looking forward to at all.


This trinket dropped from Kologarn Thursday night. It's possibly the most useful piece of loot I have ever had. Equipped with my DPS set last night it made the vital difference (with an MP5 flask) between me having extra mana on Holdir and me having to use my innervate mid fight. In my tree set (and combined with the lovely green trinket there, the Majestic Dragon Figurine) it's a fantastic way to maximise my MP5 and keep healing for longer. Last night really did show the value of MP5 gear to any caster, but especially to those healing.

I'll do a round-up of the rest of the alt news later, but for now I'm really feeling rather happy with progress.

Bah!

Yesterday evening, Malygos to 8%. One night of continuous wiping. Do. NOT. Want.

:(

And now, it's time for Mount News:

In the next major content patch, we intend to adjust mount requirements to further improve the leveling experience in World of Warcraft. In addition, cast times for summoning all mounts will be reduced to 1.5 seconds, down from 3 seconds. The following is a breakdown of the upcoming cost and level requirement changes we are making for each riding skill.

Apprentice Riding (Skill 75)

• 60% land mount speed
• Requires level 20
• Cost: 4 gold
• Mount cost: 1 gold
• Mail will be sent to players at level 20 guiding them to the riding trainer

Journeyman Riding (Skill 150)

• 100% land mount speed
• Requires level 40
• Cost: 50 gold
• Mount cost: 10 gold
• Mail will be sent to players at level 40 guiding them back to the riding trainer

Expert Riding (Skill 225)

• 150% flying mount speed; 60% land mount speed
• Requires level 60
• Cost: 600 gold (faction discounts now apply)
• Mount Cost: 50 gold
• Can now be learned in Honor Hold (Alliance) or Thrallmar (Horde)

Artisan Riding (Skill 300)

• 280% flying mount speed; 100% land mount speed
• Requires level 70
• Cost: 5,000 gold (faction discounts now apply)
• Mount Cost: 100 gold

I'd heard rumours they were going to drop the basic skill to L10, this is a great deal more palatable. However, what is more significant is the drop for flying skill to 60 and the increase in mount speed. This makes Outland even quicker to clear, and will make the lack of flying mount in Northrend to 77 a lot more palatable.

So if you'll excuse me, I'm off for more Ogre-ing...

The Main Man

This post is today dedicated to the awsomeness that IS Mr Godfather. Yes, my husband is going to get another shout out here, and for a better reason than helping me out when I couldn't complete quests:


That's him in CoT Strat helping two Guildies get the 'Champion of the Frozen Wastes' title after the Guild pretty much one-shotted Malygos 10. We didn't bother doing it until now for various reasons, but last night a strong group went and had a go (with a very nice strafe technique in P3) and he was toast. Congratulations to everyone who was involved, but special snacks to out MT who has THAT shield and a sense of achievement!

\o/

He Told Me So

So, my husband was spot on. He said the first week we entered Ulduar they'd nerf it, and I laughed at him. How foolish I am.

We're currently in the process of making further difficulty adjustments via hotfix to the following encounters:

• Ignis the Furnace Master
• Razorscale
• XT-002 Deconstructor
• The Assembly of Iron
• Kologarn
• Auriaya

The difficulty of these encounters is being lowered in multiple ways. Some of the adjustments are live already, others will be live soon. Note that some of the spell tooltips for the encounter will not reflect the hotfixes being deployed until the next patch. As the hotfixes are deployed, the Service Status board will be updated. You can check the current hotfix thread here:
http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.html?topicId=16474158165&sid=1

Further adjustments are highly likely to some of the other encounters in Ulduar, but these were the highest priority encounters for us. We want to allow additional players to experience more of the cool Ulduar content.

I'm going to say I'm disappointed, because I really am.

Of course it's great news for many people who I KNOW would never have gotten past the XT-002 in it's pre-nerf state. However, it does (for a brief moment) make me wonder why Blizzard bothered with the testing at all. It also throws up an issue I was going to post on at the time I was on the PTR and I think is worth revisiting now: who actually tests on the PTR in the first place.

Casual raiders don't test content on the PTR. Hardcore guilds do. Casual raiders, by their very definition, have better things to do (like get ready for the patch in Heroics or by grinding mats to make items they'll need to be able to do the new content in the first place) If you want them to test stuff then the current PTR system is a complete and utter waste of time, because by the time they've gotten around to downloading the PTR patch or queued their characters for transfer... well, they're going to not want to waste any more of their time on something that won't give them any satisfaction. Really, if you want more people to get to see the content Blizz, you just need to give it to them. I assume it's easier to make hard encounters less taxing than make easier things more complex, hence the hotfix celebration of the last week. I have to think however there's an easier way. Not sure what it is, and if I think of it I'll be sure to let you know...

Anyway, it's great news for my Guild. Thursday is now our scheduled Jour du Biffage. Reports will of course be forthcoming...

And He's DOWN!

Raidgroup: 3 - Ulduar: 0.

I would post you the Achievement for the Deconstructinator, but the server was just reset.

More tomorrow!

Not Quite Enough

So, here is my damage from last night's foray into Ulduar. The 4% is how far we got the X002 Deconstructinator to before he enraged and owned our asses.

I died fifteen times. It was hugely frustrating but at the same time immensely satisfying to be making up our own strategy again for the first time. I have absolutely NO idea how you would be able to do this in 10 man Naxx gear (as has been said is possible by Mr G. Crawler this weekend) unless those people are infinitely better players than I am, because I was at my limit. The entire two and a bit hours, and it STILL wasn't enough :(

Looking at my numbers, and considering what everyone else was outputting, I surmise I'm about 500dps short. So, last night I made some changes:

I have repecced to 57/0/14, which gives me the Master Shapeshifter buff (+4% damage) and Omen of Clarity (chance of free cast) I've put three points in Celestial Focus (+3% spell haste) and removed Dreamstate, instead throwing a point into Intensity (17% of mana regen continues while casting) I have found a combination of gear that lifts me above 1850 damage, but (sadly) is gonna need Snapper Extreme (+30 hit) to push me to cap, so I lose the extra spell damage but gain 400 health.

Will it be enough? I'll let you know on Tuesday when we go back to try and make it 2/14 in Ulduar.

In other news...

Yes, that's W's Lock spells there. The new dailies at the Tournament (plus the Sons quests) were enough to get her almost to 80, the last couple of bars happened in a Halls of Lightning. She's still wearing the vast majority of her 70 gear but can still pull enough dps for Heroics. Next step is to actually get her into some :p

So, that's three of the family levelled. I have NO idea who I'm going to do next...

...and I feel Fine!

So, there are those who have decided, because the professionals went in and cleared out Ulduar in a night and a bit, that it's all a bit too easy. They've decided that the entire raiding experience has been cheapened or debased. They've decided it's the End of Warcraft as we know it.

What a load of utter bollocks.

We went in last night for the first time. Our team could have been better (for a start they could have found a competant Boomkin) but we weren't there to try and clear half the instance, we were there to have a look and judge what we need to be aiming for. We started with 10 man because we thought it was going to be easier. How wrong we were.

Ulduar ISN'T easy. It's not got the advantage of having existed pre-expansion and it doesn't have the advantage of lots of Guild having been there. PTR training aside *before you even get inside* there are FOUR VERY COMPLEX AND CHALLENGING 10 man encounters. See, I did that bit in capital letters. There are ton of new skills to learn for the Flame Leviathan encounter but this does at least allow you a measure of leeway (if you die you can come back in, wait for a new vehicle type to respawn and return to the fray) We downed him on the second try of asking once we worked out you need someone on top of the vehicle and you HAVE to take out the turrets:


As an aside I clearly didn't get Epic Flight Form on Wednesday, and neither did I join the Brew of the Month Club. Blizzard Changes FTL :(

We then spent an hour on Razorscale and concluded that we needed a better strategy than the guides we could find would give us, so we avoided Ignis the Furnace Master and headed straight for the XT-002 Deconstructor.

When we left we'd pulled him down to 34%. It's an incredibly complex fight by my standards, there is a LOT going on and you need to be totally aware of your own health and what is occuring around you. The damaging debuffs come thick and fast and you are required not simply to just stand and dps (which is so often the case in Naxx) but to watch your range to everyone else, to watch your health and to watch the spawning of robots which, if you let them get too close to the boss will bugger up all of your good work. Plus, he's on a six minute enrage timer. Yes, SIX minutes. So it means (if like us you bought two tanks, and two and a bit healers) the dps have to be VERY good.

I suspect we will be spending some time in the Ulduar Car Park. I suspect it is going to take us quite some time to make it to Yogg Saron. If we are as typical of casual raiding as I believe we are, this is going to be a long road before we've cleared the content. In this respect I think Ulduar is a total and complete success. If you think it's too easy you're either spoilt rotten or talking pants, or you've simply not had the chance to be here.

When we finally kill Yogg Saron on 10 man, and we will, it will be one of the hardest fought victories I've ever achieved in game. And we will have earnt it, good and proper.

Calm Before the Storm

It is palpable, right across the Server. People are waiting.

Whether it's the fact I can get a PuG for my Lock in 5 minutes of joining LFG (L78 and a bit now) and it's not full of people on Easter Holidays (though I did have an 11 year old tank earlier in the week ^^) or it's the fact that even the Azerothian crafting mats sell within one 48 hour window, the signs are there. The IMBA 25 Man Guilds are dressed in their PvP gears at the Mailbox. WG has 5-6 groups per evening assault. There's more than 49 people in Molten Core.

People are waiting for 3.1.

There was an amended set of patch notes yesterday, which normally means we're less than a week away. I'm still sticking to my assertion it's gonna drop 21/22nd but part of me is gearing for this Wednesday because... well, I'm wrong more times than I'm right, let's be honest. While I wait, first up, more from Ghostcrawler on 10 man raiding.

There are groups of players who just prefer to run smaller raids. I don't know off the top of my head how many, if any, exist on your server. They do exist. You can't always assume they are small guilds. Sometimes they are large guilds of more casual players with only a few raiders. It varies. What happened in LK is a lot of these players (who remember prefered to do 10-player content) just gave up and joined 25-player pugs because those were easier and provided better loot. For Ulduar, we predict they will have more motivation to do the 10-player version because the 25-player version is going to be more challenging. They might join a pug, wipe a lot, and remember why they prefer to run smaller raids with friends.

I know a LOT of Guilds like this. I would suspect it counts as a lot of the populations on a lot of servers as well, the 25 man people just don't notice because... well, they're running 25 man ^^ We do 1 x 25 man a week and 1 x 10 man a week and this fits most people into a raid schedule without any issues at all. As it happens this week we had trouble getting 10 people together. Normally we have 30 online on a Saturday evening, last night it was 13. Suspect that won't last long after 3.1 hits, I'd be expecting login queues and lag and...

W should be Locking at 80 in the next few days. She has rested up to 79, and is well into the Sons of Oh Dear dailies. I am grinding Emblems as well in various places across the Storm Peaks, and as soon as someone else turns up to quest I move on. Honored at 78 is not beyond the realms of possibility as a result, so at least I don't have to worry about getting Scryer marks for shoulder enchants any more. Shatt is even more of a Ghost Town than it normally is right now. I was the only Alliance person there for at least an hour earlier this week :(

M the Shaman is 61, and accumulating Rested. I suspect if 3.1 does hit she's gonna be there for a bit, if not we will probably badger Mr Godfather for some boostage. I've decided once I hit 70 she's gonna run through as many PuG's as I can find, partly as an exercise to see just how good/bad the PuGging experience has become. I know at least one priest in the Guild who learnt their trade this way, and now instances are by design shorter and MEANT to be easier it shouldn't be too much of a stretch. I am going to pick up some really cheap 70 epics for a bit of a healing boost. The results will, of course, be reported here.

Two Days in the Citadel

Let's start on Saturday, shall we?:


Yes, be impressed I've done all the Cookery Dailies :p I however will be more pleased at the fact I've completed three rather decent Naxx 10 Achievements. We did 4 wings in two and a half hours, which is a significant improvement on our previous best time. However, KT remains unsquished, something I would hope is corrected before the Wednesday reset. The Safety Dance however has to be the one I got most excited about. There may actually have been whooping.

Sunday Night was Progress Night (Again!) with Instructor Razuvious and then Gothik ticked off the 'To Do List'. This does mean, on this reset at least, only one boss stands between the Raid and Sapph/KT. I confidently predict a Tuesday run to at least get us to watch the Lego Construction animation in Sapph's chamber. The possibility of a 25 man instance complete is now considerably more than a possibility. Yay Guild!

Oh, and Idol of the Shooting Star. 8% drop. HO YUS!

mmmmmmmmmmmsparklymobsmmmmmmmmmmmmm

In Reputation News: Faction #31 will be Netherwing. I went to Felwood but it was like London in the Rush Hour, so I decided on somewhere quieter and with decent cash-earning ability. Thick Knothide Leather is still a decent seller on the AH, and I get tons from the skinning daily, so this was pretty much a no-brainer. With egg drops already I'm already halfway towards Honored, so with some careful planning I should get Exalted in no time. Plus, I have to say, there is a lot of pleasure to be had in huge piles of sparkling mobs.

Talking of cash, the AH on my Server has gone a bit mental. Needless to say this is a great time to be speculating, and if you have your Cookery skill at 450 it's also time to make a few pennies. People are selling raw food items at rock-bottom prices. If you have all your recipes it's still worth doing the Daily so you can pick up 10 Northern Spices with your Award and use them to make those cheap raw materials into more profitable food buffs. As we are pretty sure there are no more Dalaran Daily Cookery quests any time soon, this is a good way of bringing in the extra golds to help pay for your Dual Spec.