100 Million Gold

For those of you who have been following my blog, you'll notice that I have never had a huge amount of gold to play around with.  All of the markets that I have been playing are very low end, which can result in some insanely high profit margins but the overall net gain of a transaction is mere pennies compared to what some Diablo 3 RMAH traders are doing.

Last week, I hit a milestone that I was pretty proud of...100,000,000 gold!  If you think about it, 100 million gold is only worth $25 in real money at the current rate of $0.25 / 1,000,000.  It's not a lot, but considering that using that 100 million gold I have cashed out around $75 dollars in a week and still have a running balance of between 80 million and 100 million gold every time I log in to the game, that 100 million gold is valuable capital for my Diablo 3 business.

It's also nice to know that I've never invested any cash into Diablo 3, other than the initial purchase of the game and purchasing guides from Diablo 3 Gold Secrets and Gimmic Gaming, and built up my bankroll from scratch.

When you have a "bankroll" to work with on the gold auction house in Diablo 3, there is really no reason to leave a balance sitting in your account.  Make your money work for you by investing it each time you log in.  I make most of my money by bidding on items and then listing them for a higher buy out.  Each time I log in, I find items to bid on with whatever gold balance that I have on my account.  Because I log in before work and before going to bed, while I'm not logged in to the game my auctions are selling and my bids are buying the items that I will re-list later.

It's a bit depressing seeing a balance of just over 1,000 gold after having 3 more digits just a few minutes prior, but I know that all of the gold that I used to bid on items is worth more than the 100,000,000 that I had before I bid on those items.

Keep grinding away while we wait for patch 1.0.7!  If you would like to receive an e-mail update about my upcoming dueling leagues/tournaments, sign up for my e-mail list under the big red arrow.

Cheers,

PBody

Selling Weapons on the RMAH in Diablo 3

In the last couple weeks I've been playing Diablo nearly every day and learning as much as I can about the current markets and how to make money playing Diablo 3.  While I am still focusing on growing my account and its value by investing into my Barbarian, I am starting to take some of the profits that I am making from the auction houses and cashing out to my Paypal balance.  If things keep going the way they have been, I should clear about $200 in January while continuing to grow my gold balance.

I am going to share with you a few of the markets where I have found the most success in the last few weeks.  There are so many markets on both the GAH and RMAH in Diablo 3 that it is very simple to play around and find something that works for you.  Since I know the Barbarian class very well, I focus mainly on gear that I would buy for my character.  This strategy allows me to quickly evaluate an item and determine if I think it will turn over quickly and takes out a lot of guess work if I was playing markets for Witch Doctors or Wizards.

Most of the RMAH sales that I have had in the last few weeks have been weapons for Barbarians.  Here are a few screen shots of my transactions (note that I will sometimes send the funds to my Battle.net account and sometimes to Paypal - I learned a lot about cashing out in Markco's Gold Guide and highly recommend buying it and joining the forums, which have a good group of active members that are making hundreds of dollars playing Diablo 3)

Markco has a great video on his Gold Guide about buying and selling Skorn and I took those strategies and applied them to other weapons that Barbarians use in Diablo 3.  The more that I play around on the RMAH and the GAH, the more markets that I'm finding.  Keep an eye out for posts in the next few weeks with other potential markets out there!

First Hellfire Ring

I FINALLY crafted my first Hellfire Ring.  I can't believe that it's taken me this long, but normally I only have time to sit down and do one key run at a time when I play.  A normal key run for me takes about 15-25 minutes, depending on how quickly I find the key warden.  I'm keeping my Diablo 3 time down to about 45 minutes a day if I'm going to do any farming and I only spend about 15 or so on the auction houses when I don't farm.

With the help of my friends at Gimmic Gaming, I've jumped from struggling with mp3 to killing it at mp5 and mp6.  I quickly saw more key drops and had better luck on my UBERs drops, which resulting in...

*cue epic entrance music*

It's not the best one I've ever seen, but it's a start and I'm enjoying the 35% increased experience bonus.  I'm paragon level 12 now (a bit short of my goal for December, but I'm ok with that) and the 200+ strength is nice for my build.  I'm on my way to another one, so hopefully I'll get a better roll next time.

I've invested quite a bit of gold (and some real money that I spent on Gimmic's Barbarian guide) into my character in the last couple weeks, not to mention the time I've spent playing him.  I think that to truly know what's going on in the game and in the markets that I'm trying to make consistent money from, I believe that I have to be up on what other players are doing, what is working, what's trending, etc.  The only real way to do this is to actually hop on my Barb and get into groups with other players and mow down some hellspawn.

...At least, that's my excuse :).

In truth, if I spend 45 minutes every day playing the auction house, researching, reading Markco's Gold Forum, instead of spending a portion of my "play time" whirling around with my Barbarian, I would be making more money.  The real money in this game is in the auction houses.  There is plenty of good information out there, especially in guide's like Markco's, that can help you make consistent money from playing Diablo 3.  Unless you put a ton of time and/or money into one of your characters, there isn't much money in farming and frankly, it doesn't make financial sense.

But who can resist hacking away at demons for a few minutes every now and again?