Reader Submission: Relics of Ulduar & Reputation In Cataclysm

Reader Submission from Lasse aka Dahmek of Turalyon-EU



Hello your hallowed Coldness. Off to a good start with a wordplay :D


My question is this: Do you see any profit in stocking up on Relic of Ulduar now?

What I am considering is the following:
1: The prices of Relic of Ulduar have dropped a lot since the introduction of shoulderarmors as BoA items.
2: Come Cataclysm, a lot of new Worgen/Goblin will be created. Some of these as new mains.
3: A small part of this "new" playerbase will be interested in achievements and reputation.
4: Buy Relic of Ulduar at insanely low prices now and cash in in Cataclysm.
5a: You could merely use AH as normal
5b: Do "/2 WTS complete Sons of Hodir rep package to exalted. Get your achievement now"

This was a short overview of what I've been thinking about. Relics of Ulduar is atm at 13.07 servertime ~25s a piece at my server, Turalyon-EU, and I see them lower sometimes. I figure you should be able to at least get 1g return a piece, possibly more with Cataclysm inflation.
Thank you for an excellent blog. I follow you daily, and you have quickly become my favorite blogger.
Kind regards from a fellow AH camper and golddigger.

Lasse aka Dahmek of Turalyon-EU

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Thanks Dahmek for the sumbission.  I highly welcome guest posters and reader submissions or questions.  Thanks again!

The real questions here are:

1. Will there be enough demand to flip the Relics for a profit?
2. Will people be continuing to collect these themselves?
3. Will they continue to be available on the auction house once Cataclysm releases?
4. Are there any recipes or items from the quartermaster that new players or alts will continue to want from the Son's of Hodir quartermaster?

These Relics drop off of mobs all over the Storm Peaks, but they also drop off mobs in The Halls of Stone and The Halls of Lightning so people will be receiving a small amount of them through the dungeon finder.  As far as people leveling in Stormpeaks, I would tend to think most players will skip The Storm Peaks and finish their leveling in Icecrown, due to the sheer number of dailies for various quest hubs and argent tournament quests.  So I would think that these may tend more towards drying up than be in constant supply.

There are a few reasons to continue with gaining reputation with The Son's of Hodir.  New characters will probably be wanting to grab the shoulder enchants, if they have no main to send them a BoA shoulder enchant.  Alts may skip the enchant altogether as it can't be used on BoA shoulder gear anyways.  Mount collectors will surely want to be able to purchase the 2 mounts that are available from the quartermaster.  Recipe collectors, may be after the patterns for +16 crit gem, Pattern: Glacial Bag, or Pattern: Mammoth Mining Bag.  Nothing really groundbreaking here.  So your main market you would be selling to includes Achievement Seekers, Mount Collectors, and Recipe Collectors.  Good news is, these kind of players tend to have money to blow on items.

Selling these in Cata may be a strategy for profit, but probably not much as your buying audience is pretty slim.  Although it probably is a low risk investment, if you can find the Relics cheaply, but you will have to continue to buy out them while you are selling these kits, in order to keep the value higher.  At least storage space wouldn't be an issue since you can stack 200 at a time. 

In my opinion, this could work, but I tend to like to focus on things that have a better return on investment to make it more worth my time.  Plus you can get to exhaulted fairly easily without even using these rep turn ins, since the dailies reward a nice chunk of rep each and you get more dailies opened the farther your progress with their reputation.

Thanks again and let me know what you decide to do.

Anyone else have any thoughts on the Relics of Ulduar strategy?