Buying Greens while leveling

Depends on the class really, as a warrior I would probably always look for upgrades. And as a paladin and warlock I would not need the gold for my 40 mount, so could spend there… But as a hunter I would never buy anything other than a bow upgrade :mrgreen:

As a Priest you need Wands...so you should always check the AH after a new Wand as an Upgrade...

I only like to buy greens from the hidden vendors around the world: I like to explore to find more of them so if they have something useful I usually buy it. It's like a self-reward for going out of my way :-)

I think that people often overestimate the amount of budgeting that is required to obtain a mount at 40. I think if you aren't spending unnecessarily on useless skills and using constant mage ports and flight paths due to poor planning, you can cut a lot of excess waste. I think that investing in gear and cheap consumes is VERY realistic if you have a gameplan laid out and are leveling with skinning. Depending on your class needs you may want to invest more or less into your gear. If I'm leveling a warlock or paladin I obviously invest aggressively into gear because I have no mount cost. Each class has its own needs but generally speaking everyone should have some room in the budget for the odd gear upgrade unless they are terrible at managing their gold.

Depends on the class really, as a warrior I would probably always look for upgrades. And as a paladin and warlock I would not need the gold for my 40 mount, so could spend there… But as a hunter I would never buy anything other than a bow upgrade :mrgreen:

I should've probably been more clear, i meant ranged weapon for hunters :)
Good point on the lock and paladin!

I should've probably been more clear, i meant ranged weapon for hunters :)
Good point on the lock and paladin!

Yes, as a hunter with skinning you will have a lot of excess gold at 40 on a fresh launch.

For hunters, there's decent lists for leveling weapons for Horde and Alliance in this guide here. It only shows bows since the guide is for speedrunning and you don't want to spend the time skilling up a different weapon. It shows a mix of vendor weapons, quest rewards, and boss drops. For the first 20+ levels, it's best to upgrade asap when a white upgrade is available at a vendor.

I think that people often overestimate the amount of budgeting that is required to obtain a mount at 40. I think if you aren't spending unnecessarily on useless skills and using constant mage ports and flight paths due to poor planning, you can cut a lot of excess waste. I think that investing in gear and cheap consumes is VERY realistic if you have a gameplan laid out and are leveling with skinning. Depending on your class needs you may want to invest more or less into your gear. If I'm leveling a warlock or paladin I obviously invest aggressively into gear because I have no mount cost. Each class has its own needs but generally speaking everyone should have some room in the budget for the odd gear upgrade unless they are terrible at managing their gold.

Good point,

are there any specific items people should look for on the auctionhouse? are there any levels where say warriors are struggling and should buy a weapon?

Good point,

are there any specific items people should look for on the auctionhouse? are there any levels where say warriors are struggling and should buy a weapon?

It depends on your class. For a warrior you can pickup really cheap scrolls and trolls blood consumes that will be worth their weight in gold. This is especially true for a fresh launch when the AH is WAY oversupplied with sellers with very few buyers. A specific example would be trolls blood potions for warriors. Everyone is holding onto their 5 silver and you can grab STACKS of consumes for dirt cheap and use that to propel yourself ahead. Warriors will want a weapon plan laid out for their entire process with various options just like a priest would want with wands. There are tons of guides for which weapons to go for at certain breakpoints but that will also depend on your leveling strategy. Are you doing dungeons? Are you leveling as a duo? Are you leveling as 2handed fury? Tons of considerations. Usually as a warrior I would opt to focus on getting a decent 2hander and then invest primarily into spirit gear. Between pulls I would hot swap into my full set of spirit for max regen to decrease my downtime. You can net more efficiency early on by getting cheap spirit gear than spending more for strength gear and then sitting around eating. Decreasing your time between pulls is JUST as valuable as increasing your kill speed.

Generally speaking, you will always have some gold to reinvest in gear without sacrificing your mount, if you are managing your gold efficiently.

never, ever. leveling gear is fleeting. thats just how it goes. get something new and itll be extra-powerful. keep leveling for a bit, it'll feel standard. keep leveling, and it will begin to lag behind, so you start looking for something new. thats the cycle. the cycle doesnt stop until 60...then a different cycle starts. you should never find yourself in a place of "i have bad gear" unless youve somehow decided to equip something you shouldnt have. if you really have to replace something, focus on quests or dungeons. certain class quests will even give you good gear. so save your money, and not just for your mount and abilities. even if you can afford your mount, you dont want to be destitute the moment you hit 40.

depending on your professions, they might be earning you extra money or even COSTING you money. also, certain classes/specs will pay more or less for repair costs (a warrior tanking dungeons is going to shill out a ton to repair heavily damaged mail/plate, while the priest that never draws aggro will pay barely anything to repair his cheap cloth). meanwhile, a hunter (as it looks like you'll be playing) has the game on easy mode. grinding for money won't be hard. pet takes all the damage. feign death to get out of dying. however, take a priest for example. grinding is going to be exponentially harder for them. will you need to be as frugal as one of them? doubtful. but as a general rule, "save your money."

Stfuppercut i can agree with some of that, and getting a spirit set is excellent advice. but the question posed seemed more along the lines of constantly buying upgrades. i can get onboard with investments, but repeatedly sinking good money into leveling gear isnt something i'd advocate.

never, ever. leveling gear is fleeting. thats just how it goes. get something new and itll be extra-powerful. keep leveling for a bit, it'll feel standard. keep leveling, and it will begin to lag behind, so you start looking for something new. thats the cycle. the cycle doesnt stop until 60...then a different cycle starts. you should never find yourself in a place of "i have bad gear" unless youve somehow decided to equip something you shouldnt have.

While I admire playing frugally, this is simply untrue for players looking to maximize their efficiency. Gold is a resource. No different than HP or Mana. A warlock wandering around with full mana or HP at ANY time is not being fully efficient. You always want to be maximizing your output. If you are hitting breakpoints with excess gold, you could have invested that gold into gear and increase your throughput, thus increasing your efficiency. Look at it this way, if you can cut 5-10 hours off of your leveling process by investing your chump change into gear, that 5-10 hours can then be spent at 60 farming 50-100g per hour, netting you MORE gold in the long run. I'm not saying you should be blowing all of your gold... But if you're hitting level 40 with an extra 15-30g, you're doing it wrong. Dont worry about pinching pennies early on as the cumulative gold you will save does NOT outweigh the cost of opportunity of being a level 60.

The key here is the cost of opportunity. What is it worth? Hitting level 40 with 20g short for a mount is JUST as poor efficiency as hitting 40 with 20g extra.

I won't be doing much buying from the auction house. I will always take a look to see if I can get a big upgrade for cheap, but I will mostly try and save money for my mount.

Same with spells. I will only take spells I need and get the other's when I am level 60.

I will learn all my professions and train all my weapon skills as soon as I can buy them though.

I won't be doing much buying from the auction house. I will always take a look to see if I can get a big upgrade for cheap, but I will mostly try and save money for my mount.

Same with spells. I will only take spells I need and get the other's when I am level 60.

I will learn all my professions and train all my weapon skills as soon as I can buy them though.

Generally speaking, dont be afraid to buy things off of the AH. Your gold will immediately start to devalue as soon as the server launches and inflation slowly starts to creep on the server. Invest your gold in gear and invest your gold into items that will gain value in later phases of the game. You know the phases, you know what items will be valuable over time by looking at patches, so dont hold onto gold that will slowly devalue.

Example: Investing in arcane crystals or arcanite bars early can be cheap BEFORE guilds begin to build their thunderfuries. These items can then be sold later for gold. Nature resist potions are dirt cheap before the AQ patch. Etc etc etc... Gold sitting on your toon is wasted gold and is constantly losing value. Reinvest in yourself and invest in physical assets that will increase in value throughout the phases.