This is a post I did for the JMTC forums about a new scribe thinking of getting into the trade.
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I've been doing inscription since it was introduced and the biggest reason it is a huge moneymaker is because no one thinks it is a huge moneymaker (at least people that don't read jmtc). If someone is told that inscription is the best way to make money they go through what I call the 7 stages of inscription:
* Excited Scribe - You heard somewhere that that inscription is a huge moneymaker. You quit your old profession and become a new scribe. You invest all your money in herbs and start milling.
* Disappointed Scribe (2 weeks) - You realize that leveling inscription is expensive and have to start farming and doing dailies to get enough gold to continue to level the profession. You've done all the training, created a bank alt, bought all the books and made a few cards to get the profession to max level but sales are slow and creating/posting glyphs is taking quite a bit of time. Where is the money I was promised?!?!?!?!
* Resilient Scribe (1 month) - You notice that you most of your glyphs are selling for less than 2g and the glyphs over that amount are undercut the next time you log in. You notice that the same names are undercutting every time. You do a little research and find the mod Quickauctions. You also start tracking your sales with Beancounter and researching the most popular glyphs on WowPopular. You start a second bank alt because 1 toon isn't enough to post everything. You are going to make inscription work if it bankrupts you. Your raiding buddies begin to wonder where you are....
* Experienced Scribe (2 months) - Money is starting to coming in and your glyphs are starting to sell. You've set up all the mods and are beginning have configured them. You add a third bank toon as you are now making 300 types of glyphs. You have stopped raiding altogether.
* Wizened Scribe ( 3 months) - You know all the patterns. You know what sells. You have all the mods. You know your competition and may have even started getting hate mail from other scribes. The money is coming in fast and furious and you mock people that don't put epic gems in their heroic gear. You buy epic flying for some of your raiding buddies alts just so they remember your name. That doesn't stop them from removing you from active raiding status for inactivity.
* Jaded Scribe (4 months) - You are on top of the inscription world. The money is still coming in but you wonder to yourself... "Didn't I start this to make money to get gear, gems, enchants so I could have more fun playing?" You reduce the number of glyphs to focus on just your best sellers and use just 1 bank alt to post. You start hitting the 10 mans with your guildmates on their offnights to gear your toons.
* Retired Scribe (6 months) - You've passed the the gold cap but the money continues to roll in. You ask yourself, "How much money do I really need?" You've got the raiding bug again and apply for reinstatement as an active raider -- the donation of 1000 flasks helps your cause immensely. You've got more than enough money for the foreseeable future but your are confident in the knowledge that inscription is always there if you need it.
Now here's the thing - 90% of scribes stop trying when they hit the Disappointed Scribe Phase and probably another 9% quit during the Resilient Scribe phase.
People that are scribing today have two other things that are causing them to quit -- 1) Spring Fever and 2) Expansionitis. Spring Fever should be self explanatory as many people don't want to play as much when they could be outside. Expansionitis is what happens 6 months before a WoW expansion as many people stop raiding as the gear they can get will be replaced by greens in a few months. That is a good time to level alts or just find something else to do with their time. Blizzard knows this and usually makes a few token changes in PvP and some lame sidegrade content to try to keep people interested. It works to a degree but what really brings people back is beta testing. This does little to help the "real" WoW world but it does keep people paying their monthly subscriptions. What brings people back to the game is when they release a patch about 2 months before the expansion with all the expansion's new class abilities. It's pretty smart on Blizzard's part as they get to beta test on a large scale and it brings excitement back to the game just before the release of the expansion.
What's this mean for scribes? There will be less players in the coming months but with that comes less competition. The good thing is when people stop raiding some will change focus to creating alts as now is a good time to switch mains. Some may fear that the additional alts will increase competition but the barriers to entry listed above will still occur for alts as most won't have the knowledge or will to make it work. So we are headed into a period with less competition but little drop in glyph demand. The only wildcard is if Blizzard decides to make massive changes to inscription in the expansion which is a huge subject all by itself and you will make tons of money long before anything like this happens.
The bottom line is now is a great time to become a scribe. My tip for beginners is level your toon to 400+ the cheapest way you can find then get Quickauctions and learn it. Create a bank alt and equip him with 4 Bags of Endless Pockets. You should also goto Wowpopular and click on the glyph toggle. Make a list of all the Major Glyphs on the page and also include the top half of the Minor glyphs. This will give you about 50 major and 30 minor glyphs on your list. You will notice that you can only make about a third of the list with only training/glyph books so you should go into glyphs by class and add a 4-5 of each so you have a good list of glyphs to create (Skip this additional step if you are cash poor). Now mill herbs (use a macro), create inks (afk nap time!), and use QA, ATSW, or Skillet to make 20 of each glyph on your list and send it to your bank alt with a focus on streamlining your production time (I make my create list in QA on my bank alt and then create my glyphs in QA with my scribe). Make sure you have Quickauctions configued and install Postal/Mail Opener to streamline getting mail. You can post and cancel all day long if you'd like but the key period is starting around 6pm server to about 11pm. Make sure you cancel and repost during that time at least once. The glyphs you can not make from your Wowpopular list are learned from daily research so make sure you do this every day. There are 64 Minor and 83 Major Glyphs to research so in 2-3 months you will have the full list. Make sure to watch what glyphs are selling and eliminate the slow sellers as you learn new ones through research (I use Beancounter). Also make sure to watch the patch notes for any upcoming changes.
If you follow this and have enough tenacity you will hit the gold cap long before the expansion arrives. I just hope you aren't on my server as that would suck. :P
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I've been doing inscription since it was introduced and the biggest reason it is a huge moneymaker is because no one thinks it is a huge moneymaker (at least people that don't read jmtc). If someone is told that inscription is the best way to make money they go through what I call the 7 stages of inscription:
* Excited Scribe - You heard somewhere that that inscription is a huge moneymaker. You quit your old profession and become a new scribe. You invest all your money in herbs and start milling.
* Disappointed Scribe (2 weeks) - You realize that leveling inscription is expensive and have to start farming and doing dailies to get enough gold to continue to level the profession. You've done all the training, created a bank alt, bought all the books and made a few cards to get the profession to max level but sales are slow and creating/posting glyphs is taking quite a bit of time. Where is the money I was promised?!?!?!?!
* Resilient Scribe (1 month) - You notice that you most of your glyphs are selling for less than 2g and the glyphs over that amount are undercut the next time you log in. You notice that the same names are undercutting every time. You do a little research and find the mod Quickauctions. You also start tracking your sales with Beancounter and researching the most popular glyphs on WowPopular. You start a second bank alt because 1 toon isn't enough to post everything. You are going to make inscription work if it bankrupts you. Your raiding buddies begin to wonder where you are....
* Experienced Scribe (2 months) - Money is starting to coming in and your glyphs are starting to sell. You've set up all the mods and are beginning have configured them. You add a third bank toon as you are now making 300 types of glyphs. You have stopped raiding altogether.
* Wizened Scribe ( 3 months) - You know all the patterns. You know what sells. You have all the mods. You know your competition and may have even started getting hate mail from other scribes. The money is coming in fast and furious and you mock people that don't put epic gems in their heroic gear. You buy epic flying for some of your raiding buddies alts just so they remember your name. That doesn't stop them from removing you from active raiding status for inactivity.
* Jaded Scribe (4 months) - You are on top of the inscription world. The money is still coming in but you wonder to yourself... "Didn't I start this to make money to get gear, gems, enchants so I could have more fun playing?" You reduce the number of glyphs to focus on just your best sellers and use just 1 bank alt to post. You start hitting the 10 mans with your guildmates on their offnights to gear your toons.
* Retired Scribe (6 months) - You've passed the the gold cap but the money continues to roll in. You ask yourself, "How much money do I really need?" You've got the raiding bug again and apply for reinstatement as an active raider -- the donation of 1000 flasks helps your cause immensely. You've got more than enough money for the foreseeable future but your are confident in the knowledge that inscription is always there if you need it.
Now here's the thing - 90% of scribes stop trying when they hit the Disappointed Scribe Phase and probably another 9% quit during the Resilient Scribe phase.
People that are scribing today have two other things that are causing them to quit -- 1) Spring Fever and 2) Expansionitis. Spring Fever should be self explanatory as many people don't want to play as much when they could be outside. Expansionitis is what happens 6 months before a WoW expansion as many people stop raiding as the gear they can get will be replaced by greens in a few months. That is a good time to level alts or just find something else to do with their time. Blizzard knows this and usually makes a few token changes in PvP and some lame sidegrade content to try to keep people interested. It works to a degree but what really brings people back is beta testing. This does little to help the "real" WoW world but it does keep people paying their monthly subscriptions. What brings people back to the game is when they release a patch about 2 months before the expansion with all the expansion's new class abilities. It's pretty smart on Blizzard's part as they get to beta test on a large scale and it brings excitement back to the game just before the release of the expansion.
What's this mean for scribes? There will be less players in the coming months but with that comes less competition. The good thing is when people stop raiding some will change focus to creating alts as now is a good time to switch mains. Some may fear that the additional alts will increase competition but the barriers to entry listed above will still occur for alts as most won't have the knowledge or will to make it work. So we are headed into a period with less competition but little drop in glyph demand. The only wildcard is if Blizzard decides to make massive changes to inscription in the expansion which is a huge subject all by itself and you will make tons of money long before anything like this happens.
The bottom line is now is a great time to become a scribe. My tip for beginners is level your toon to 400+ the cheapest way you can find then get Quickauctions and learn it. Create a bank alt and equip him with 4 Bags of Endless Pockets. You should also goto Wowpopular and click on the glyph toggle. Make a list of all the Major Glyphs on the page and also include the top half of the Minor glyphs. This will give you about 50 major and 30 minor glyphs on your list. You will notice that you can only make about a third of the list with only training/glyph books so you should go into glyphs by class and add a 4-5 of each so you have a good list of glyphs to create (Skip this additional step if you are cash poor). Now mill herbs (use a macro), create inks (afk nap time!), and use QA, ATSW, or Skillet to make 20 of each glyph on your list and send it to your bank alt with a focus on streamlining your production time (I make my create list in QA on my bank alt and then create my glyphs in QA with my scribe). Make sure you have Quickauctions configued and install Postal/Mail Opener to streamline getting mail. You can post and cancel all day long if you'd like but the key period is starting around 6pm server to about 11pm. Make sure you cancel and repost during that time at least once. The glyphs you can not make from your Wowpopular list are learned from daily research so make sure you do this every day. There are 64 Minor and 83 Major Glyphs to research so in 2-3 months you will have the full list. Make sure to watch what glyphs are selling and eliminate the slow sellers as you learn new ones through research (I use Beancounter). Also make sure to watch the patch notes for any upcoming changes.
If you follow this and have enough tenacity you will hit the gold cap long before the expansion arrives. I just hope you aren't on my server as that would suck. :P
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