Here’s the usual gold drill: Grind a few primals (or other items,) sell them off, and make upwards of a couple hundred gold an hour if you’re really good at it and there’s no competition. It’s about the same for the daily quests, plus you get the rep items. If you’re good at playing Auction House games you can double that.

Now consider for a moment what it takes to hit the gold cap: that limit being currently set at 214,748 gold, 36 silver, 48 copper, and once reached will prevent you from receiving any more cash. At 300 gold an hour that’s a measly 716 hours of pure gold making activity.

Brad, of Warcraft Millionaire, has hit that cap on four separate characters.

How was it that this guy had managed to do what is seemingly impossible when millions of other players have been at it for just as long and are nowhere close? You can see the video proof on his home page, which really drives the point home.

When you watch it you will see Brad clicking between several characters he has on the same server, each of which had reached that gold cap of 214,748 gold, 36 silver, 48 copper. It’s rare enough to see one character at the cap, much less several characters.

So how did he do it? What has Brad done that very few, if any, have done before? What did see in the game that others had missed? His strategy must surely be superior, right?

It seems that Brad’s friends and fellow players have been asking the same question of him for some time and so, instead of constantly answering questions, he has put together a collection of resources at his website that promises to guide the casual or even hardcore player through the same process he used to reach the upper echelons of gaming.

The truth of the matter is that it’s not some special secret, as you might think. The difference is entirely in his understanding of how the WoW market works. His secret? It’s all in the Auction House (AH.) We all know that; we’ve been to the Auction House and we’ve seen what kind of gold it can provide, but none of us would have guessed that there was quite that much gold in it.

Suffice it to say, that Brad provides concise, well written advice on how to use the Auction House to make a lot of gold. I think that hitting the gold cap, four times, provides some serious credibility, don’t you?

While I won’t reach a million gold anytime soon, I definitely feel much more confident in my ability to make hundreds of gold on demand and pretty much all of it it with my low level bank alts.

Not Just the AH

Now, while the real gold is made at the auction house, and Brad emphasizes learning to use the AH, there are people who would, for whatever reason, rather do something else to earn their WoW cash. So, I’ll open up my copy of Warcraft Millionaire and note that, in addition to the Auction House domination guide, Brad includes the following:

• All of the Daily Quests - listed, rated (1 to 5 stars,) with notes on the gold and the rep that you will earn, and linked to WoWdb.com for more info. Of course, you do need to be level 70 to do these.

• The Grinding Guide - Want to just mindlessly kill hordes of mobs and fill your bags with goodies? This is the guide for you. It includes where to find certain special items, grinding instances, various locations, and recommended addons to make you grinding easier (besides plugging a case of Mountain Dew into your brain.) Brad hates the grind, I hate grinding, but if you’re Ok with it then this guide is for you.

• A limited items listing - This is a big list of vendors who sell all sorts of limited items. General locations of the vendors are provided, but it would have been nice to see exact locations.For items found in Azeroth the list is sorted by specific item, who sells it, and how much you’ll pay. How much you can sell it for will depend on the economy of your particular server. The Outlands listing lists vendors by zone, plus the items thy sell and the cost. Make a loop of these vendors, grab the items that are available as you hit them, ship them to your banker, and sell for a very nice profit.

• 1-60 and 60-70 gold guides - As you level you should keep an eye peeled for certain items and these two guides cover those items. You can make a lot of gold in the leveling process (beyond taking Herbalism and/or Mining) and these guides will show you what to look for. Naturally the best stuff requires higher level characters.

• A special bonus, is the Warcraft Basics Guide, which covers the basics of the WoW economy, principles, gold making, questing, professions, etc. New players will find this guide to be very useful, experienced players can skim much of it, but will find some useful tips as well.

Since Millionaire is one of the newest gold guides it neatly cuts out one of the problems of the older guides, none of the info is out of date. You won’t find references to the level 60 cap or to items and mobs that are no longer in game or of value.

You don’t have to have level 70 characters. In the video on the home page Brad notes that his level 1 bank alt does most of his trading, buying, and selling. Yes, it’s at the gold cap. You will also get an idea of what he buys and sells.

You won’t just be given a set of grinding locations either, though you do get those in addition to everything else. What you will get and learn is a set of techniques that will massively boost your gold stash.

Even better is that Brad has a Wrath of the Lich King update in the works and that update should be live very soon now. It will be free to members of Warcraft Millionaire.

Just One Thing…

There is one section lacking: With the addition of Inscription into the game, and what it’s doing to herb prices, I expect there will be an update soon that will cover Inscription and that will do more with making gold from Herbalism. The guide was released before much was known about Wrath or anything was known about Inscription.

I’ll bug him until I get the exact word on the Inscription/WotLK/3.0+ update. If you’re not interested in those two professions then the rest of the guide is golden (pun intended.)

You can snag your copy of Warcraft Millionaire here.

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Parry! Dodge! Spin! has a post on what’s happening with the Rogue talents.

New Rogue Changes Coming

Parry! Dodge! Spin! has a post covering the various Glyphs that the new Inscriptions will add to the Rogue talents and abilities:

First of all, I think every other class needs to send Blizzard a thank you card for the following change to Mace Specialization. As a Combat Swords Rogue (and as a Resto Druid), I’m pretty excited to see it myself. This should make Mace Specialization a bit more attractive for raiding as well.

Mace Specialization (Combat) no longer stuns enemies, and instead increases critical damage bonus by 2/4/6/8/10%.

Here’s the rest: WotLK Beta 8820 Rogue News

You’ll want to look at the comments, too. As usual with something like this there’s a wide differing of opinion.

One of the comments points out that resilience pretty much negates the crit bonus. Still, not everyone in PvP is running around with 400+ resilience or s4 gear. For leveling the damage bonus might be better than the rare stun proc.

Keep in mind that this is still in beta test and the final numbers may well be somewhat different. I’m sure that no matter what change Bliz make there will be whoops of praise and howls of outrage.

I think a lot of the Glyphs look pretty nice. What do you think?

Edit: Azande, in the comment, has some interesting stuff for the rading Rogue and more remarks on the raiding potential of Glyphs.

Twinking is the fine art of taking your character to levels far beyond what he/she should be able to do at any given level. For example, a Rogue twink, at 19, with 2,000 HP? It’s been done.

The Warsong Gulch Battleground (Capture the Flag) has a level 10-19 bracket. Naturally one wants to be level 19, otherwise rapid doom will happen. Then one needs that little edge over the other 19s…

AzerothNow.com has a killer twinking guide for those level 19 Rogues bent on mayhem and slaughter in Warrsong Gulch (and maybe a duel or three.)

So you’ve done your dailies - everyday, you’ve cleared Heroics and Karazhan for Badges until your eyes bleed, maybe you’re even utterly tired of farming Illidan every week or wiping on Kil’Jaeden. But what now? Level another character? Cancel your subscription until Wrath?

Well, I have your solution: why not create a lvl 19 Twink Rogue? But what is a lvl 19 twink Rogue, you may ask. The simple explanation is that they are characters with the best possible gear for their level (including enchants), whose purpose is PvP, and their playground is the 10-19 bracket of Warsong Gulch Battlegrounds.

Here’s the rest: The Ultimate Guide to Lvl 19 Rogue Twinking

edit: A commenter points us to his twinking guides and I may just make use of his level 39 Warlock guide. Very cool. WoW Twink Guide: 39 Affliction Warlock

Tags: rogue twinking guide, battlegrounds, PvP, twink, Rogue

Actually, it’s a Cunning Blade and I’ll skip further Black Adder references.

Rogues at level 10 can do a quest chain to get this Cunning Blade as a quest reward. This quest chain is entirely optional and if you browse the Auction House regularly you’re likely to find better weapons for not much gold. (And you twinks can stop laughing now.)

Still, it’s a fun little quest chain and it can be quite challenging for your average level 10 Rogue. Each race has a different quest, in its own area, but the quest rewards are the same.

Gwynne’s done a complete walk-thorugh of all of these level 10 quest chains. So if you have an up and coming Rogue, here you go:

1. Level 10 Rogue Quests for Horde
2. Level 10 Rogue Quests for Alliance

I’ve been fussing around with macros for my Rogues and have come up with a couple of useful ones. Now, I’m more the “copy and paste” type than any kind of macro programmer, but the macro system is worth learning and will save you a lot of clicks and keymashes.

Basically a good macro set will make you a leaner meaner killing machine.

By the way, this naturally applies to classes other than Rogues, it’s just that I’m working with Rogue macros at the moment. There are a variety of other sources for WoW Rogue Macros and I list a couple at the end.

So here are the macro basics to start:

1. Type /macro to open the macro interface
2. Hit “new”
3. Pick an icon
4. And then you’ll enter your code.

For my Shadowstep (Swords) Rogue I use this:

/cast Premeditation
/cast Cheap Shot

Replace Cheap Shot with the opener of your choice, eg: Ambush. Premeditation adds 2 combo points right before the attack (with a 2 min cooldown.) So with this build I Cheap Shot and can frequently add an immediate 5 pt combo finisher. If the cooldown hasn’t finished then just the Cheap Shot will fire.

This one makes sure you bandage yourself and not the other guy. Replace the bandage with whatever bandage you’re using at the moment.
/use [target=player] Heavy Netherweave Bandage

This next one allows me to strike with Ambush and immediately switch to swords or maces or whatever. Probably not the most efficient thing to do, but it’s fun. Slot 16 is your main hand, 17 is your off hand. Just swap in whatever weapons you’re using.

If Ambush doesn’t fire for whatever reason then the weapons still swap. If you’re one of those people who likes to spam the Ambush key as you approach then this won’t work so well, because the weapons will swap before you get the ambush off.

/cast Ambush(Rank 2)
/equipslot 16 Diamond Hammer
/equipslot 17 Ironpatch Blade

Here’s a quick swap macro. Make a couple of these and switch back and forth as the situation dictates.
/equipslot 16 Mainhand weapon
/equipslot 17 Off hand weapon

Macros can get far more advanced than these, allowing you to simplify many different actions.

Killer Guides’ Rogue Guide has a bunch of other macros and a ton of great Rogue info. Get your’s here.

Arena Junkies has a page with macros for all classes that’s worth checking out, especially if you do PvP.

In order to apply poisons to their weapons Rogues have to undergo a little test. Alliance Rogues have to sneak into a tower, open a lock, steal something, and get back. Horde Rogues have to kill a few things.

Here are all the details, whether you’re Alliance or Horde.

1. Rogue Poison Quest Walkthrough

Edit: Added pics to the guide.

I’ve posted a lockpicking guide for the complete Rogue. I’ll take you from skill 1 to 350 (assuming you’re 70.) Here it is: Rogue Lockpicking Guide

edit: added pics to the guide