Weird Exploits (Long) (Patreon)

Here is a list of exploits that are interesting, and some are quite powerful in the hands of an expert, but niche, this article is mainly for more sophisticated exploiters and those who are keen on finding their own plays. For more casual players, don't worry I am working hard to find things for you. 

Area Of Effect Quest Item, Increased Gold From Skinning, Infinite Re-Spawns Which Award Experience

In the south-east corner of Ardenweald during Threads Of Fate leveling I encountered a bonus objective "Dreamshrine Basin Hibernal Hollow Defended". This gives you an item called "Anima Explosion" which allowed me to do significant aoe damage. In addition to the quest mobs you are meant to kill this can also be used on the wildlife in the area which is plentiful and can be skinned.

The exploit here is simply to join any kind of group (you can group with a starter edition character on your battle.net account) and convert the group to a raid, this prevents you from completing the objective and allows you access to the quest item indefinitely.

Any kind of dps increase equates to more gold per hour from skinning, exactly how much will depend greatly on your gear and class abilities.

Additionally the portals that appear in the bonus objective area spawn mobs which yield experience (but no loot). Provided convert to raid is active they will spawn mobs endlessly. 

Snapshotting Shields

In MMORPG'S the word "snapshotting" refers to some effect whose power is determined by the statistics of a player at a given moment time. So a damage over time spell where player A has 1200 Intellect at the moment it is cast will do an amount of damage determined by that 1200 intellect, even if the player's intellect subsequently falls or rises.

The opposite of snapshotting is dynamic updating which is how most spells and abilities are determined now in modern wow. With dynamic updates the power of the above damage over time spell in our example would increase with a rise in caster intellect after the moment it has been cast but is still active, and fall with a drop in caster intellect.

The one area where snapshotting remains in wow is with most forms of shielding. This is especially the case with the Necrolord ability "Fleshcraft", (from the tooltip)

Form a shield of flesh and bone over 3 sec that absorbs damage equal to 40% of your maximum health for 2 min.

Any increase to your maximum HP from player buffs to trinkets etc also increases your fleshcraft shield. 

The very simplest way to exploit fleshcraft is by changing spec. If your class has a tank spec then cast fleshcraft while in tank spec then switch to dps. The shield will persist through a spec change and retain its power. On my death knight for example, switching from blood to frost spec after casting fleshcraft gives me a 23K shield-8k more than the 15K shield I get from casting the spell in frost only, a noticeable increase. 

Taken to its extreme this can produce virtual invincibility for the spell duration. For example the firelands raid boss casts a stacking debuff which increases the HP of the player. It is possible to stack this debuff so that you have 800% of your normal HP, allowing you to gain a fleshcraft shield 8 times larger than normal. Crucially this will persist outside of the instance. 

It is easy to illustrate the potential here with fleshcraft but other forms of shielding can be manipulated the same way. For example the mage barrier spells are similarly based on the maximum health of the player. In some cases, such as with blazing barrier or the paladin's shield of vengeance associated dps effects can be manipulated also. 

Control Undead-Overpowered NPC

While spells such as enslave demon and control undead are intended game functions, in practice Blizzard generally nerf any mob of disproportionate power. This Maldraxxus mob:

https://www.wowhead.com/npc=160479/steelskin-linebreaker

seems to be an exception, with a health pool of 84K (twice that of most players) and strong dps for a mob. 

On-Demand Damage Debuff

Monks have often asked me for a debuff which they can use to add dps to "Touch Of Karma". This is actually a lot harder than it seems as most debuffs are of limited duration, do too much or too little damage, or simply don't zone. 

This buff works pretty well as it lasts indefinitely (until the player jumps), survives a port, and does a decent and adjustable amount of damage (it stacks). 

https://www.wowhead.com/spell=335882/clinging-infestation

(From "Fen Hatchlings" near the start of the Plaguefall dungeon). 

Aside from Monks a number of class abilities and items can benefit from on-demand player damage on a situational basis. 

Blood DK Ability "Debilitating Malady" Works At Very Long Range

If you cast blood boil with the conduit "debilitating malady"

https://www.wowhead.com/spell=338516/debilitating-malady

while targetting any mob within 100 yards, you will aggro the mob. 

This turns the death knight from one of the worst classes for soloing legacy dungeons to one of the best, as mobs can be chain pulled from range-potentially in some instances you can easily pull every single npc in the dungeon. 

Firelands Skip To Ragnaros

Shiekrunner the legendary speedrunner has produced this video for Method on speedrunning which goes into more detail about his techniques than usual. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WlRkwxdOK2Y&ab_channel=Method

This is essential viewing for exploiters as there is a massive crossover between speedrunning and exploitation, in particular Shiek's methods allow you to skip through dungeons and farm things more efficiently. 

There is too much to go through in one article but the one thing that stuck out on first viewing was Shiek's revelation that Ragnaros now spawns when you enter the instance. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WlRkwxdOK2Y&t=6412s

Shiek's method works fine but requires a demon hunter and some preparation, there is an easier method which everyone can use which is only slightly slower. Simply run to the boss Alysrazor and go through the initial roleplay. Do not attack Alysrazor, wait for her to drop feathers on the ground. Click on three of these and you can now fly straight over to the final boss Ragnaros. 

The main reason you would want to do this is to get a  much sought after mount,

https://www.wowhead.com/spell=97493/pureblood-fire-hawk

which has a low drop chance from the final boss.

Convert to Raid Endless Re-spawn Farm, Low Gold Returns

A patreon contributed this:

Good day sir.  It appears the quest Ritual of Purification in the Night Fae campaign 5/9 you summons purged manifestations four at a time during the quest.If you use your standard convert to raid, it appears this can be done endlessly.   all that is dropping is emphemeral Digist worth about 1g, and Tendrils of Ectoplasm worth about 50 silver each.  Doesn't seem like it would be worth much to make a farm out of it, but I figured I would send it your way.

I recall doing this quest and I believe it can also generate endless npc's by simply repeatedly abandoning the quest. I agree with the contributor that a standard gold farming approach is not likely to be worthwhile given the uninteresting drops without a spectacular amount of multi-boxing..

However this quest is potentially interesting as a way to generate mob kills for any type of "kill n mobs for rewards" quests or items which yield additional rewards.