Molsan Method

Yesterday, I wrote an introduction on how to use The Undermine Journal‘s IQY data source for your gold-making strategies in World of Warcraft. Today, I’ll walk you through a scenario where I calculate the price point for Mists of Pandaria Darkmoon Faire cards.

Previously, I worked through the various calculations to determine a conservative herb milling-to-Darkmoon Faire card crafting rate. I figured that it takes about 212 MoP-level herbs to craft a single card. If you are buying herbs at or under market prices, you can then set your price for a potential, substantial profit when you list your card.

Create a Master Market Pricing File

To get started, generate an IQY file from the Undermine Journal and open it using Microsoft Excel. You will be prompted with a security notice, and it is your responsibility to understand what this means and allow/enable the security exception if you wish to proceed.

You should now have a new Excel workbook with a single worksheet that is populated with WoW auction house market price data. This will be your master market price data for all of your other workbooks. Now, save this workbook to your computer.

You will need to update this file manually in order to retrieve current market pricing, but if you link to it properly (as you’ll see below), then all of your other spreadsheet calculations will use current market prices instead of you having to search for them one at a time and enter them as static values.

How to Use the Master Market Pricing File in Your Formulas

Next, create a new Excel workbook, and type in an item name into a cell. The name must match the actual item name found in the game, or the search will fail. In another cell within the same row of the item name, type the following formula:

=VLOOKUP(<item name cell>, ‘[<pricing workbook file name>]<pricing workbook file name’s worksheet name>’!$F:$G, 2, FALSE)/10000

In my DMF Card calculator, my formula looks like this:

=VLOOKUP(A2, ‘[The Undermine Journal - H-Earthen Ring.xlsx]H-Earthen Ring’!$F:$G, 2, FALSE)/10000

For me, this returns a match for the item name in cell A2 when searching my pricing workbook, “The Undermine Journal – H-Earthen Ring.xlsx,” where my worksheet name is “H-Earthen Ring.” Columns F and G should represent the item names and market prices as returned by the IQY.

Sample Use to Determine Cost of Creating a Darkmoon Card of Mists

I multiply the market price value of each herb by 212 (135 for Fool’s cap) to determine the minimum price I should sell a card for given the current market price. Theoretically, I’m buying herbs below market price, so this value should already indicate a small profit.

Here’s an example of what my table looks like given the current market prices of herbs:

The “MILL VAL” column is used to determine the milling value of Fool’s Cap when comparing the ink yield rate against the other herbs.

As you can see, it takes a decent investment just to make a single card. You also have to factor in the Scribe’s time to mill the herb, craft the inks, and diligence to make their Scroll of Wisdom each day.

You can use this method for just about every profession that makes use of raw materials to help you determine what you should sell your crafted item for at minimum. If you’re not someone that is interested in crafting, this can still be useful to you to determine whether or not an item is above or below cost.