Picking new cuts

I am fairly new and inexperienced at the JC market. So remember that when you read anything I say about it. These are the things I do with it. They may be a huge mistake or I could be on the right track. One of the first things I had to deal with was picking a new cut.

You first need to know what your goal is. Are these cuts for yourself/friends or to make gold? One does not rule out the other but you usually end up giving on something. If its for you or your friend the choice is easier. Just pick the cuts you use the most and off you go.

If you are looking to make gold, different things need to be looked at. I started by looking at the cut gems that listed for the most. The mark up is higher to the profit is greater. How many sellers are listed? The more sellers, the more competition. So for my first few gems, I also looked at how many sellers and gems each had listed.

Now rule out any that look questionable to you. Is it a gem that someone would want. If you see one Tense Eye of Zul (10 hit/13 spell pen) for 250G its probably not going to sell. Who would buy that? This could turn out to be a very profitable gem. I have no idea. But for my first few gems, I want something that feels a little more useful.

As you start to pick up more and more cuts, try to get a few of the other colors. If you focus in one color of cuts too much its possible you will drive the cost up on them (from buying so many to cut and re-list). You will be set up much better if you give yourself that flexibility. If you end up prospecting later, you will end up with gems of all colors.

Discovering the epic gem market

I have to admit that I was very slow to jump onto epic gems. I had my hands full with inscription. I did level a JC a while back but have not done much with him. I have been slacking on doing my daily JC quests.

I had to take his tux off and get his gear back out of the bank. I just got my 4th token so it was time to pick a pattern. I went to the AH and did a QA summary scan. I saw a smooth kings amber listed at 230G with only 2 up. Raw I see this gem at 150G. So I buy one, go get the pattern, and cut it. Next morning its already sold for 225G.

I guess it has started. I am slowly discovering the epic gem market. I am going to take my profits and put them back into JC and see if I can get a large bankroll going with little investment. I hope I can take what I learned with inscription and apply it to epic gems.

Skilling up JC

I finaly broke down and started skilling up a JC. I have wanted one for a long time but never got started. There are a few cheap things that can be DE'd that had my eye for a long time.

First thing I did was go mine some copper ore. I have a lot of gold, but there was no way I was going to pay 6G a stack for copper ore. This was the only ore that I gathered. I got the rest from the AH for fairly cheap. I took my time looking at the cheapest way to get some thing.

I have a minner, so when it called for bars of something, I was able to look at the price of ore instead. That saved me a good deal in some places. Having the option was the big thing. Some places I picked up half ore and half bars. Whatever was cheapest.

Prospecting ore is key to doing it cheap. There were several things needed by JC that was in limited supply (or over priced) listed in the AH where the ore was cheap enough to prospect to get those items. The one big mistake I made was prospecting fel iron ore for gems to cut. That was fine, but just after that I had to prospect several stacks of adamantite ore for the powder and got a better gem drop rate. I was done with those gems at that point so that turned out to be some expensive powder.

I sent off all the gear to be DE'd to get a little return on my investment. I am now 400 JC and can prospect saronite ore. I need to do the math again, but it looks like the price of saronite is getting so low that I may be able to turn a profit by prospecting it and vendering/DE everything.

It looks like I may be getting into the prospecting business.

My New JC

So I powered up Jc over the weekend. I figured that was one more tool that I should have had a long time ago. I made a lot of gold without it already. But its never to late.

I missed the big gold that JC made with this patch. Or so I thought. I can now prospect saronite ore. That and the cheap DE mats was my goal. So lets see how my first day went.

I paid 15G a stack for 4 stacks of saronite. Total cost was 60G. I got one scarlet that sold for 55G as soon as I posted it (a solid 10G undercut so that was expected). I picked up an eternal earth for 8G and made some rings to DE. 7 infinite dust that sold for 3.4G each. Chalcedony is selling for 9G each at the moment for meta gems. I had 6 of those to list that all sold. After it was all said and done, I had 147G in sales from that 60G investment.

I turned and purchased 160G worth at just under 15G a stack and I am in the process now of posting that. 2 scarlets already sold for 110G total and 4 blue gems for 8.5G each while I was writting this. I have 9 Chalcedony up at 11.8G each.

I messed up and made 11 earth shadow rings (soulbound). Ouch that hurts. I also didn't look close at the mats either. It used a whole eternal earth for each one. After all my other crafted items got DE'd, I ended up with 29 inf dust and 5 essencs.

So it looks like there is a profit in prospecting while scarlets are still up and Chalcedony is over priced. This looks like an easy market to work. I can see why so many people made so much gold from it. I was thinking that saronite was getting so cheap that it was under vender values is why I decided to pick up JC.