New pets are not a threat to gold sellers

Tobold, among others, are talking about how Blizzard is introducing gold purchasing with real money.  Me?  I'm not worried about the gold seller's business model just yet - or at least not more than I already was. 

How does Blizzard's model work?

• You buy a pet with US$
• The pet is BOE, redeemable on one toon.
• You can post it on the AH.
• Someone (presumably a collector) buys the pet, and ding, cash into gold, legitimately.

Now, I am not too worried about this.  I don't see anyone hitting gold cap with these pets.  I have an engineer, and I have tried selling unusual pets before.  They just don't sell that well.  That is not to say that they don't sell at all; they do.  But it is slow.

Now, if you have the ability to prepare ahead of time, you can make gold in WoW very easily.  Most players quest; some players gather; and even fewer play the Auction house.  If you are reading this blog, you are more likely to play the AH than most, and not even all of my readers play it.

The distracted, the broke in WoW are not going to sell a pet on the AH.  They also can't afford one with their gold, but might be able to pay cash using parent's credit cards.

If you are not a pet collector, you won't buy it.

The rich collectors will pay gold.  There really are not many in this category. 

Lets say you can sell one of these pets for 7000 gold.  On day one.  Regular players know what happens when there is an oversupply of an item; the price tanks.  By day 14, I would be surprised if you got 1000 gold for a pet.

This is an additional wedge into the real money WoW, but not a big one.

By making the pet BOE, Blizzard are bound to sell a few more of them.  The sellers will be clueless at making gold, and rich in real life.  The buyers will be rich collectors. 

The total impact? One gold in a gold cap.