WoW Tokens
The WoW token has changed how I view and play the game. When I first heard of the WoW token, I thought I’d be a gold buyer. I’ve never been particularly good at making WoW gold and the idea of spending $20 to get 100k gold (the number being speculated at the time) sounded really good. There were so many things I would buy myself from pets to mounts to heirlooms.
Then the reality hit. The token started at 30k gold and now hovers around 23-24k. I would never have 100k gold to buy one, but 24k gold? That seemed so much more doable, in fact, it almost seemed reasonable to think I could make that much gold in one month. The JC daily alone gives me about 200g per day (6000g per month or about ¼ of what I’d need). I’m somewhat frugal in the real world, and the idea of letting others pay for my game time really appealed to me. I went from prospective gold buyer to hard working gold seller.
I starting looking at spending gold differently. My brain instantly translated the gold to real world dollars (using approximately 1000g = $1). That 20k gold repair mount? That’s going to cost me $20. It didn’t seem quite so appealing anymore. 30k gold for a Mythic BoE. Yeah, no thank you, I’ll just wait for a drop. Very little in game is more appealing to me than saving up for Tokens. The only exception would be gems and enchants for my gear, but Honors is a JC which helps on the gems part. The only thing I really spend gold on is enchants and I'm not getting new gear all that often.
I've gotten to the point where I actually started a spreadsheet where I track the amount of gold I have at the start of my play session and what I have at the end. I realize there is probably some addon that would do that for me, but I like doing it myself in Excel. My goal is to try to make about 1000 gold per day. If I do that, I can easily purchase a token each month and I won't need to spend cash on my subscription. April was a successful month and I bought a token last night which pushes my sub out to August.
The Mage
I realized pretty quick that having only 1 level 100 was a major hindrance to the gold making. I still had the Level 90 boost from buying Warlords. But what to use it on? I really enjoyed playing the Mage for the Dirty Casuals twink group. I also considered boosting a Monk but I felt like it would be a very similar experience to my Paladin (Tank/Melee/Healer). Thus, my level 90 mage was born. He’s now around 98 and I’ve got him learning Engineering and Inscription. Granted Engineering has never been a cash cow, but I just like it, and you know, I should still do some things in the game for the pure enjoyment of them. I've built him an Inn and he's recruiting nothing but Treasure Hunters.
The Next Toon?
Once the Mage is 100, I'd like to start working on some additional toons to get into their Garrison and also to prepare for the next expansion since 6.2 is supposed to be the final Raid teir. I thinking about taking a break from tanking for the next expansion, but I'm not sure which class I'll play. I've enjoyed leveling the Mage, but oh man, is he squishy. I've never felt so vulnerable out questing. It is to the point that I upgraded the Barracks to get him a Bodyguard. I really like toons that more solo capable and unfortunately a couple of the best classes (Warlock, Death Knight) really freak me out. I don't think I'll ever have one as my main.I have several toons of various classes and levels scattered across different servers. I have an 85 Warrior, an 80 Druid, a 60 Shaman and a 51 Hunter. The problem is that it costs $25 to transfer a toon so I'd have to be confident any toon I transferred to Hyjal could make me at least 40k gold. A Otherwise, its not worth it. A Level 90 boost will set me back $60 (or about 4 months of subscription).
My other option would be to level up a toon from scratch on Hyjal. I could have him learn skinning and either Herbalism or Mining. Of course, trying to avoid transfer fees is how I've managed to have multiple alts of various levels scattered across the different servers I've called home. If I was going to level a new alt, I'd really prefer to have the Level 1 Mount and I'm about 7 Heirloom short and getting them is going to cost me gold.
Comments
There is no other game that has a class that plays like the enhancement shaman (that's one of the reasons I play one). The majority of shaman players are resto or elemental (easier to gear those two specs together due to the intellect deal).
Survivability is not an issue. You can use your maelstrom weapon procs on instant cast heals, you have a healing totem, you can use shamanistic rage every min (reduces damage by 30%) and when you pop your wolves they heal you for the damage they do.
This expansion they are one of the top AOE damage specs in game. Thogar is a fight that was made for Enhancement.
The Cons? Blizzard seems to like nerfing enhancement. This is probably so that you Thrall will always be the most powerful shaman. Also, you have to roll against hunters (the most played class in the game) for gear, rogues/monks for weapons.
Hit me up if you have any questions. Secondary stats are haste then mastery. We expect enhancement shaman to be a whirling tizzy of swings. The absolute fastest swinging melee class (rogues are only faster because of their quick speed daggers).