WoW Classic Goldmaking Guide: The Best Ways to Make Gold

Before we get started on goldmaking, we would like to present you our Icy Veins' class-specific guides.

In WoW Classic, professions are an integral part of the game and will be important in every phase. While some professions can help to make items that you will use for raiding and PvP, professions are also an excellent way to make gold. If your primary goal is to make gold, some professions are better than others. Below is a tier list for how the different professions rank strictly in terms of making gold.

• S-Tier: Skinning
• A-Tier: Alchemy, Herbalism, Mining
• B-Tier: Leatherworking
• C-Tier: Enchanting, Engineering
• D-Tier: Tailoring, Blacksmithing

While this tier list should be accurate in general, it is important to note that there are exceptions. Certain Enchanting patterns, Alchemy recipes, and other crafting patterns are very rare and very desirable. If you get lucky and get a rare pattern, such as the pattern for Lionheart Helm from Ragnaros, you can make insane amounts of gold just by nature of being one of the only people able to make that specific item.

Skinning is one of the most competitive professions, but has the highest gold making potential by far in phases 1 and 2. As a skinner, your best way to make gold is through one specific commodity: Devilsaur Leather. Devilsaur Leather drops from Devilsaurs, which are level 54-55 elite beasts found in Un'goro Crater. Devilsaur Leather sells at a premium early on in WoW Classic because it is used by Leatherworkers to craft Devilsaur Gauntlets and Devilsaur Leggings. This 2-piece set is used by all physical damage dealers as a pre-raid BiS set, and is incredibly powerful. The strength of the armor means it will be in demand for quite some time, meaning Devilsaur Leather will continue to be valuable.

While Devilsaur Leather is extremely profitable to farm, it is also well known. There are only 6 Devilsaur spawn points in Un'goro Crater, each of which has a roughly 15 minute re-spawn timer. On more populated servers, you should expect to see people camping these spots at all hours of the day. On PvP servers, you should expect to see groups of people for both factions camping these spots, killing anyone they see of the opposite faction. While it is possible to farm these, know that it can be competitive, and on PvP servers especially can be rough if you are farming these alone.

Alchemy can be expensive to level, but has a high payoff. Unlike Skinning, Alchemy will continue to be profitable throughout all of WoW Classic, and will eventually become S-Tier as more people reach level 60 and start to raid, most likely around phase 2 or 3. The best way to make money as an Alchemist is to craft potions, elixirs, and flasks to sell on the Auction House. The best crafting choices are listed below. The most profitable potions to craft come down to knowing what the most popular consumables are that people use during raids, specifically Molten Core.

For the best possible profit margins, you should pair this with Herbalism. Additionally, timing is also incredibly important. Most guilds raid on Tuesday or Wednesday nights (depending on your reset day), which means most people will be looking to buy these consumables on Tuesday and Wednesday evenings. To make the most gold, you will want to craft and stock up on potions throughout the week, and then list them with an 8 hour duration on Tuesday and Wednesday afternoon at a premium.

• Elixir of the Mongoose: One of the most important buffs for physical damage dealers.
• Greater Arcane Elixir: One of the most important buffs for casters.
• Flask of Supreme Power: The best buff in the game for casters, but much more expensive than most others.
• Flask of Distilled Wisdom: A very expensive, but very strong buff for healers.
• Restorative Potion: Required for two bosses in Molten Core by almost everyone in the raid.
• Free Action Potion: Strong in PvP.
• Living Action Potion: Strong in PvP.
• Limited Invulnerability Potion: Strong in PvP.
• Greater Fire Protection Potion: Heavily used in Molten Core, especially on Ragnaros.

Herbalism offers a way to farm gold without really needing to put much thought into it. If you want the best gold income, pair Herbalism with Alchemy to farm the herbs that you will use to make potions and elixirs. The best herb to farm is Black Lotus, which is extremely valuable, but also quite rare. Black Lotus is needed to make Flasks, which are the most powerful consumables in the game for raids and will be used for all of WoW Classic.

Similar to Herbalism, Mining offers a means of farming gold without needing put a ton of thought into it. You can just go to higher level zones looking for ore deposits to farm. The most profitable thing to look for is Thorium deposits, both because Thorium Ore is the best ore in the game, but more importantly because the nodes can drop Arcane Crystal as well. Arcane Crystals are incredibly valuable right now since they are needed for Warriors to craft Lionheart Helm, which is the best Warrior DPS helm for all of WoW Classic.

Leatherworking can be profitable during the early phases of WoW Classic when Devilsaur Gauntlets and Devilsaur Leggings are highly sought after. For the best profit margins, you should pair Leatherworking with Skinning so you can farm the Devilsaur Leather yourself and then make the pieces. You can still make a decent profit even without skinning, but not nearly as much.

Enchanting can be profitable, but takes a heavy time and gold investment to get there. Enchanting is one of the most expensive professions to level, and to make any meaningful income you will need to get access to rare enchanting recipes, most of which drop from Molten Core. This means you will need to be raiding Molten Core, usually as your guild's designated Enchanter to ensure that you are given the recipe drops. Even then, most of the important recipes are incredibly rare, sometimes taking months to drop.

Even if you successfully get the rare enchanting recipes, Enchanting faces another major issue. You cannot "craft" enchants in WoW Classic. The only way to enchant gear is to trade someone and have them put their piece of gear that they want enchanted into the "will not be traded" slot so you can enchant it. This means you cannot use the Auction House to sell your enchants, which severely limits your income potential compared to other professions. The only way to make money is to advertise your enchanting in chat, and have people pay you to enchant their gear, which can take lots of time for a sometimes small profit margin depending on how desirable and rare your recipes are.

Engineering is not traditionally used as a goldmaking profession, but you do have some income options. Several of the Engineering bombs and trinket are highly sought after, and can be sold on the Auction House for some profit. The issue is that most of them require Engineering for anyone to use them, meaning people are more likely to make their own. Goblin Sapper Charge is one example, where you can freely sell it and potentially make a profit off of people who do not want to spend the time making their own. Engineering is also quite expensive to level, so do not pick up Engineering just to make gold.

Blacksmithing is used to craft powerful gear and weapons that will be used by level 60 players. Some items such as Arcanite Reaper are sought after and will sell well, but require specialization and training to craft. The highest possible gold income will come from getting Plans: Lionheart Helm from Ragnaros, but it is an incredibly rare drop and not something that you should count on. Blacksmithing is generally not a reliable gold making profession, and if you want to earn gold there are better options.

Tailoring is mostly used as a means for casters to eventually craft some specific pieces of BoP gear, and less about making gold. You can make some income by using Mooncloth to create Mooncloth Bag, but it will not be very profitable.

If you are not interesting in using professions to make gold, you can always fall back on farming. Farming refers to killing enemies that drop valuable items, either to vendor or sell on the Auction House. There are many places to farm for profit, but some of the most profitable places are listed below.

Maraudon can be soloed at level 60 by Hunters, Warlocks, and Priests. To do these runs, you will need a Scepter of Celebras from completing the Maraudon dungeon quests. Once you use the item to portal to the final part of Maraudon, you can run through the instance, only killing Tinkerer Gizlock and Princess Theradras. After each run, have an alt in your group, log off your main and onto the alt, wait 1 minute for lead to be automatically passed to your alt, then reset the dungeon. Log back onto your main and you will be at the start of the instance, with it reset. You can do up to 5 of these runs per hour, which should be about 35g/hour in gear that you can sell to a vendor.

This is both an efficient gold making method and results in guaranteed gold. You will never have to compete with other players and you will not have to deal with the Auction House. If you want to increase your gold from this even further, Miners and Herbalists benefit heavily from these runs since there are high level herbs and ore in the dungeon. Additionally, Blackstone Ring drops off of Princess Theradras, which is a highly sought after BiS ring for all physical damage dealers. Lots of players will pay for these runs, tagging along and paying you if the ring drops to guarantee that they get it.

Some classes are better than others at farming, but Eastern Plaguelands offers farming that anyone can do. Most of the enemies are easy enough to kill that every class can farm them relatively efficiently. Almost every enemy in the zone can be farmed for profit, but the bats in the zone offer a good balance of gold, being easy to kill, and vendor-able gray items.

Hearthglen is an encampment in the Western Plaguelands that can be a very profitable farming spot for solo farmers. The Scarlet Spellbinder on the road to Hearthglen have a chance to drop Formula: Enchant Weapon - Crusader, which is the formula for the most sought after weapon enchant that most melee use. The formula itself will sell for lots of gold, or if you are an enchanter, you can learn it to be able to use the enchant. Having the enchant is rare, enabling you to charge people decent amounts of gold to enchant their weapons. Scarlet Spellbinders also drop Runecloth, Major Healing Potion, and other useful items.

The Furblogs in Winterspring are easy to farm and have a chance to drop Winterfall Firewater, which is a desirable melee consumable that sells well on the Auction House.

If you want to make gold without ever leaving the city, you can by buying and selling items on the Auction House. The key to making money off the Auction House is understanding the markets. You want to buy items when they are cheap, and sell them at a higher price to make gold. This is easier said than done though, and can be risky if you predict incorrectly and the price of an item you buy falls. Markets will be different on every server and faction, so you will need to do your own research if you want to make gold off the Auction House this way.

Raid consumables such as potions, weapon stones, elixirs, and buff food all will fluctuate heavily during the week. If you buy them slowly from Thursday to Monday, you can generally sell most raid consumables at a premium on Tuesday or Wednesday when most guilds raid.

Lots of the lower level rare and epic gear does not sell for much at the moment, as the people buying them are still leveling up and do not have much gold. Starting in phase 3 when battlegrounds are released, twinking will become extremely popular and you can expect the prices on low level rare items to skyrocket. If you want to make some long term investments, twinking items are a good way to invest.