How to Make Money Fishing on "WoW"

The massively multiplayer online role-playing game, or MMORPG, "World of Warcraft" offers a number of ways to earn in-game currency, most of which require a certain character class or primary profession. However, characters may only possess two, such as such as mining, skinning or herbalism. Secondary professions are obtainable by any character and they require nothing more than time and patience. Fishing is one way anyone playing any character can generate some extra income for special in-game purchases.

Prepare and Train
1
Go to Stormwind City (Alliance characters) or Orgrimmar (Horde characters).

2
Talk to a city guard by right-clicking on him to open a dialogue box with choices.

3
Select "Professions Trainers" and "Fishing." box. A flag -- or an arrow if the flag is outside the frame -- appears on your map, directing you to a fishing trainer.

4
Follow the arrow or flag to the fishing trainer and the fishing pole vendor standing next to him. Interact with either the trainer or the vendor by right-clicking one.

5
Purchase training from the trainer and a fishing pole from the vendor. The vendor also sells items called shiny baubles that you can attach to the fishing pole, increasing your fishing skill -- which affects the quality of fish you can catch -- for a short period. Buy 20 shiny baubles.

6
Open your spell book and click the "Professions" tab. Drag the fishing icon, which looks like a hook, to your action bar.

Go Fishing
1
 
fish on image by Mitchell Knapton from Fotolia.com
Time and patience pay off.
Go to any body of water. The fishing trainers are located near water that you can easily fish at low skill levels, but you can fish in almost any body of water.

2
Place your fishing pole in your main-hand weapon slot.

3
Right-click the "shiny baubles" you bought from the vendor, and a green light will appear around your mouse pointer. While the light is active, click the actual fishing pole in your weapon slot -- not the pole displayed by your character.

4
Click the fishing icon you dragged to your action bar. A appears in the water in front of you, and it will dip and make a splashing sound when you catch a fish.

5
Right-click on the bobber immediately after it dips, and catch your fish. Reacting too slowly will cause you to lose your catch.

Earn Profit
1
 
gold image by Raimundas from Fotolia.com
Time to reap the rewards.
Return to the fishing trainer. Each day, the trainer will have a quest requiring level-one fishing skills. The quest awards a skill point in fishing for completion.

2
Find a city guard again, right click, and select "Auction House" from the dialogue menu.

3
Right-click one of the auctioneers at the Auction House, opening a pop-up interface.

4
Click "Trade Goods" and then "Meat." Click "Search" in the top-right corner. To organize the results by price, click "Current Bid" just below the "Search" button.

5
Look through the list for the most consistently high-priced fish. If you are not certain whether the item is a fish, search for it on Wowhead. Look for consistency of price, as sometimes people will post things in error for ridiculously high prices due to a lack of understanding of the current market value.

6
Go to Wowhead, and type the name of the fish you chose into the search bar. Scroll down the page that results, and look for a tab labeled "Fished In." These are the world zones where you can find the fish.

7
Click the "Comments" tab to the right of "Fished In," and look for comments mentioning whether the fish spawn in schools. Schools appear as circular ripples near shorelines and any fishing skill level can catch them successfully. If the fish does not appear in schools, such as the Lavascale catfish, you need a skill level appropriate to the zone to catch it.

8
Fish in the appropriate zone. If you are catching junk items such as cloth scraps and driftwood and little or no fish, your skill is low for the zone. To get a general idea of skill levels needed in different zones, check out the El's Anglin' website.

9
Return to the Auction House with your catch. How soon you go back will mostly depend on your patience, but once you have a 20 to 40 fish, you will likely be ready for a break.

10
Right-click an auctioneer and type the name of the fish you caught to double-check the going price of the fish. Run your mouse over the search results, and take note of the "Buyout Price per Unit" that pops up.

11
Click the tab labeled "Auctions." Open your bags and right-click any of the stacks of the fish you caught.

12
Make the stack size "5," and under "Number of Stacks," click "Maximum."

13
Look to the right of the box labeled "Price" for a pull-down menu, and change it from "per stack" to "per unit."

14
Enter an amount in "Buyout Price" equal to or slightly lower than the price you noted in step 10. Enter a "Starting Price" just slightly lower than what you entered as the "Buyout Price."

15
Fish some more, or search the Auction House to see if there have been changes in prices for other fish; check back regularly to stay on top of changes in the server's economy.