Warcraft\’s Economy and Gold in Cataclysm. The Changes We Can Expect.

Long term players may well have become aware of changes in the way Warcraft\’s economy is working over the past fifteen months or so. The progression of wealth alongside character progression and profession is now completely out of balance.

The reason as I see it is the economic weight of so many level 80 characters paying the way for their \’toons.

I\’ll explain. I have 16 level 80\’s at present (as I mentioned before I multi box, so 15 of those were levelled in 3 teams of 5, and yes I do now have a Horde team). But I know plenty of guild buddies getting their third or fourth level 80. Level maxxed characters are ten a penny. Servers are full of them.

So what happens when you start a new toon?

Well, if you\’re anything like me, you are trying a new class, race or combination of the two. At some point you give your character a profession, then, using the huge piles of gold from your main characters you level them up to say 225 in about 90 minutes. Buying stacks of low level items in the process.

Then – having done this, I will quite often get bored of the character and have to decide whether to carry on levelling.

I do not progress them past say level 40, never finish levelling the professions, and often end up deleting them to make room on the server for something else. What\’s even more asinine is that I will often then repeat this process with a different race or class (Doh!!)

I know I\’m adding to the imbalance problem. Crafting is a gold sink. Until you get a crafting profession to 450, you are pretty much pouring gold down the drain. Sure the odd item sells, but most are destined to be vendored for a fraction of the production cost – or just thrown away. Apparently it costs over 5000g on most servers just for enchanters to level their rod. Just the rod! Never mind the 450 enchants they have to perform as well.

Expect patch 4.0 and Cataclysm to bring in some big changes. Most of this is informed speculation at the moment buy I predict;

Crafting professions will be overhauled. Items at low level will be tweaked to make them more attractive to buy. They will cost more to make, but the good ones will offer more than one skill point towards the crafters profession.

Huge gold sinks put in game to stop the rampant inflation that is becoming a real issue. Expect to pay huge amounts for the right to fly over Azeroth and even more for speed perks for your mount.

Archaeology will provide crafting materials that can be added at the manufacturing stage to alter the stat bonuses of many items made by the existing professions. These perks will improve the saleability of these items still further, and will provide some real variety and choice for both the crafter and the potential user.

The vendored consumables for levels 81 to 85 will cost a lot more. Not just the sort of jump we had with Wrath of the Lich King – but a huge increase in cost for food and drink, ammo etc.

Blizzard are determined to make each level an \”experience\”. So expect certain conditions on how you can proceed from 81-85. It may be that many areas do not allow groups at all. So those hoping to rush through with guild mates on a race to 85 may find that this tactic does not work (this goes for multi boxers as well of course)

Cataclysm is perhaps the last chance for Blizzard to fix the economy. Sure it works now, and many don\’t see the real world warning signs of hyper inflation and manufacturing redundancy being relevant in a game. But they are. These two economic problems are rife in Warcraft, and they will eventually grind the economy to a halt. The laws of supply and demand need a helping hand in WoW. This is Blizzards last chance.

Luckily it seems they are initially looking to fix the economy. However, if it doesn\’t work, then patch 5.0 may well be the end of it.

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