Hello everyone!
The Auction House is a feature used by practically everyone at some point in world of Warcraft.
Whether you’re stocking up on flasks and food or you’re looking for a sweet new battle
pet to crush your opponents, the auction house has most of what you’re looking for.
There are some items however that the auction house can’t give you.
Those rare mounts that aren’t in the game anymore, or even those that are but you haven’t
gotten after running their instance every week for the past couple of years.
Maybe there’s a specific transmog set that you’ve been dreaming of, or a tabard from
the Trading Card Game that you can’t get off your mind… sometimes the Auction house
can’t make our dreams come true.
With so many people wanting things they can’t seem to get their hands on, there was certainly
a market for an enterprising entrepreneur to capitalize on, and that is where Madam
Goya comes in.
“These are the finest goods in the land.”
It can give you things you can’t get anywhere else, like the Reins of the Plagued Proto-Drake,
items that were tied to the trading card game, such as the Tabard of the Defender, and even
a chance of finding a still-droppable but incredibly rare mount like Invincible and
the Clutch of Ji’Kun.
We first get access to the Black Market when we come across Madam Goya near the Tavern
of the Mists in Pandaria.
We don’t know much about her, we don’t even know her name or how she came to run
the Black Market.
The only information we have is the information she gives us, which is...well, nothing, and
that seems to be the way she likes it.
She wears a well tailored dress suit and her constant companion is perhaps the only inclination
that there is more to this pandaren than meets the eye.
Mister Chu, a hulking pandaren, stands silently by her side wearing a slightly worn suit and
a scar between his watchful eyes.
Goya seems to us to be a woman of few words, nobody seeks her out for pleasant conversation
after all, but when you loot a copy of “A Steamy Romance Novel: Hot and Misty” we
learn that might not be true.
The Tavern in the Mists was unusually crowded, and he pushed his way through the crowd until
he stood in the shadows of a dark corner.
An exotic voice purred his name, "Marcus, it is good to see you again."
Marcus smiled and squinted as his eyes adjusted to the absence of light.
"Madam Goya, the pleasure is all mine."
She dipped in a polite bow; Marcus felt a sudden warmth as he was reminded why the term
bouncy was often used to describe the Pandaren.
He bowed in kind, catching Madam Goya's hand and kissing it gently, never shifting his
gaze from the hulking bodyguard standing behind her, a single scar between his watchful eyes.
"So, Marcus, can I interest you in something... special?
I'm afraid the usual cannot be offered today."
Marcus did not miss her emphasis on 'the usual', nor the deep regret that laced her words.
Their eyes met once again and she squeezed his hand before letting go.
"If that is your will, may I see what you have to offer?"
Marcus asked.
"There are several magnificent pieces of armor, a tiny companion, and even an exotic mount,"
Madam Goya answered, her typical playfulness quickly returning.
She paused and held a hand to her chin, feigning thoughtfulness.
"But my most valuable treasures are located upstairs."
Marcus's eyebrows lifted comically and his eyes widened before his expression settled
into gleeful acceptance.
"Until we meet again, then."
One can only wonder what the usual is that goes on between Marcus and Madam Goya and
why she regretted not being able to give it to him.
Upstairs Marcus finds out that her most valuable treasures are 2 gorgeous blood elf females,
but if you want to know more about marcus’ adventures...there’s a video up on the channel!
The Black Market itself works a little differently from the normal auction house.
Due to its rather elusive nature it isn’t other players you buy items from here, but
rather NPC’s you may recognize from your travels around Azeroth.
Turns out a few familiar faces have things they want to get off their hands, and they
list their items on the market.
Sig Nicious of the Tauren Chieftains uses the market to auction off his guitar, the
Sun-Lute of the Phoenix King and his bandmate Bergrisst offers his Arcanite Ripper up for
grabs.
Madam Goya herself occasionally lists an Unclaimed Black Market Container that can contain anything
which appears on the Black Market, you could get lucky bagging yourself a rare mount, or
you could get an item you already have.
Tellingly, Madam Goya appeared in a vision in the Smokeywood Pastures Winter-veil carol,
a wow retelling of ‘ A Christmas Carol’ where an undead banker, Scrounge, is being
pestered by several spirits.
The third spirit, the spirit of winter-veils to come, brings him to a future vision of
the Black Market where Goya is seen putting scrounge’s hat inside one of the containers
and his old keys, spoiled bed clothes and a mount in others.
Even these questionable items can bring in the gold if you put them in the popular Unclaimed
Black Market Container, and it isn’t like Scrounge will be needing them any time soon.
Each Auction can last for up to 24 hours and there is no buyout option.
To win an auction you have to have the highest bid when the auction ends.
Bids made within the last 30 minutes of the auction can increase its duration but the
listing can only be up for 24 hours maximum.
Most types of item have a set starting bid ranging from 1,000 gold for fairly common
pets up to 20,000 for rare pets and mounts, but with a chance for players to get their
hands on some pretty sought after goodies the bids can get pretty high pretty quickly,
with the max bid set at 9,999,999 gold.
So if you’re worried about not being able to instantly buy out the item, you could just
drop the max amount of gold or take a risk and play the auction game...
With auctions bringing in such huge amounts of gold it is no surprise that Madam Goya
will offer her services to players regardless of faction, although it is worth keeping in
mind that the listings on the Black Market change per realm.
When the deep pockets of the new adventurers left for Draenor, Madam Goya and the Black
Market moved with them.
In this alternate reality, we can find the Black Market in the Ring of Blood in Nagrand.
Madam Goya has been joined by the ever present Mister Chu, and she has taken on some new
security by hiring an ogre named Mister Knuckles.
The Draenor expansion also gave us a little more insight into the way Madam Goya works,
when we complete the rare naval mission called the Black Market Journal.
A crate had washed up on the shore and we fight our way through the Iron Horde to pick
up a Waterlogged Manifest.
The manifest is largely intelligible to us, except for a small note addressed to Mister
Knuckles.
Apparently a shipment he was expecting is on a sinking ship, and knowing the Black Market
Bodyguard is somebody we would prefer to owe us a favour rather than the other way round,
we find his lost shipment and deliver it to him.
Mister Knuckles is glad to receive his shipment and finds it very interesting that we have
our own dock.
He tells us we should become good friends and lets it slip that our fort is too hard
to sneak a spy into.
It appears any suspicions that Madam Goya tried to sneak a spy inside our fort are practically
confirmed when Mister Knuckles tells us she has sent Zhang Yeoh, a Black Market liaison,
to our garrison.
Originally he tells us it is because we are big stuff in these parts and that Goya wants
to keep an eye on us, before he backtracks and tells us we’ve been sent the liaison
in appreciation.
Talking to Zhang will give you a real-time view of the Black Market auction house, but
all bids must be made to Madam Goya personally.
We haven’t quite earnt her trust yet.
“I am too old for this.”
It isn’t just us who the leader of the Black Market has been keeping a close eye on.
She had her sights on Admiral Taylor almost as soon as he arrived, as we discover when
we read Taylor’s Log.
On day 4 ‘the friendly pandaren’ Madam Goya offered him cartloads of food for a reasonable
price and on Day 21 he was invited to participate in the arena in the Ring of Blood.
It is a chance to show what the Alliance is capable of and he can use the prize money
to pay Madam Goya for the promised supplies.
On Day 25 we learn that one of Taylor’s troops called Edward had been victorious,
and on Day 27 upon arriving back at the garrison Taylor finds out Goya’s supplies had never
arrived.
This was to prove the least of the poor Admiral’s problems however, as upon returning from Nagrand
his garrison had been commandeered by his necromantic subordinate Ephial.
This ley-line obsessed betrayer then killed everyone in the garrison and turned them into
ghosts, including Admiral Taylor himself.
This raises some questions about Madam Goya’s part to play in all this.
Was it coincidence that the Admiral she had been watching just happened to be invited
to the Ring of Blood, an action that would take Taylor away from his garrison for a couple
of days, and give Ephial his chance?
Was it just an error on the usually meticulous Madam Goya’s end that the supplies had never
been sent?
Could it have been something more sinister? that her watchful eyes had told her of the
chaos Taylor would return to and she decided they wouldn’t be needing those supplies?
We don’t know, the story of Taylor’s garrison wasn’t explored further, but it certainly
gives us something to consider the next time we have dealings with the Black Market.
Whatever part to play the Madam Goya had in the events that unfolded in the Spires of
Arak, The supplies aren’t likely to arrive any time soon.
Just like before, when the lucrative adventurers moved on, so too does the Black Market, and
in Legion Goya and her faithful bodyguard move to The Underbelly in newly located Dalaran.
She has hired a new associate Ms Xiulan, and left Mister Knuckles to look after the premises
at the Ring of Blood.
Madam Goya and her Black Market haven’t gone unnoticed in Dalaran, and alchemists
will be asked by their legion trainer, Deucus Valdera, to obtain some hard to acquire burettes
from the Black Market.
Knowing the Black Market is their only choice, Ms Xiulan proves as business-savvy as her
boss and has the budding young alchemists plucking hair from Khadgar, finding some blood
of Sargeras, and buying her some cheese and wine in payment.
You can only sit around eating cheese and drinking wine for as long as there are people
around to bribe for it, and at the end of legion we had all moved on to the latest expansion.
Time may have granted Madam Goya some trust in us, because when she follows us into BFA
she sets up shop in Dazar’alor, and has a liaison, Madam Gosu, acting as the Black
Market Auction House in Boralus.
She can’t be in two places at once after all, and both factions would be confined to
their own newly discovered,and in some cases re-discovered, zones until some time into
their travels.
Placing a liaison in one faction’s zone and having herself situated in the other made
her Black Market accessible to all players, providing you have the gold of course.
She continues to show her trust in us a little more as we progress through BFA and we can
sometimes find an operative of hers, Steelsage Gao on Mechagon Island.
He informs us that Madam Goya has an interest in some unusual items from Nazjatar.
It turns out she wants an item that one of the deep sea murlocs in Nazjatar sells and
the quest can ask for 5 Particularly Dense rock or 5 disintegrating sand sculptures which
can be bought from Mrrglrlr, 5 Unidentified Mass which can be bought from Flrgrrl, or
5 curious Murloc horn which can be bought from Grrmrlg.
The Murlocs are way fussier about who they sell to compared to Madam Goya, and if you
want them to sell the supplies you’re going to need to play their mini game.
Only the Unidentified Mass can be bought in the usual way, the rest of the time we’re
going to need to do some trading, because each of the Murlocs has a common item which
can be bought and used to buy items from the other Murlocs.
If we bring our hard-gotten goodies back to Steelsage Gao he thanks us on behalf of Madam
Goya and tells us we will speak again.
You might have to do this quest a few times,.
Eventually all this work will convince Gao to give us the blueprints to the Encrypted
Black Market Radio, which we load up and build in Pascal-K1N6 in a stack of 5.
The radio is a consumable not a permanent item, and there is 5 minute cooldown between
uses.
Once you’ve used the radio it summons a very flamboyant looking blingtron named Sylvester
for 5 minutes who can be interacted with to allow us to view and place bids on the market
remotely.
World of Warcraft isn’t the only place where people have deep pockets, and Madam Goya took
her ventures to Hearthstone with the Mean Streets of Gadgetzan expansion.
She set up the Black Market in Gadgetzan for the sole purpose of making a killing....
She has a cost of 6, an attack of 4, and health of 3.
Her battlecry makes you choose one of your friendly minions to shuffle back into your
deck which is then replaced with another random minion from your deck that she puts straight
into the battlefield.
This, just like the black market auction house, is a bit of a gamble.
It could pay off by pulling a high cost card out of the deck or you could end up pulling
a low cost minion which won’t have much impact.
Much like her Unclaimed Black Market Containers, only Goya really seems to know the outcome.
In Hearthstone, just like in Warcraft, Madam Goya has plenty of things going on behind
the scenes.
She is mentioned as being the curator for the new Gadgetzan museum of Artifacts and
if you donate any artifacts you may have hanging about she says she will put your name on a
nifty plaque.
Things are never quite what they seem however, and as excited as the Gadgetzan Gazette reporter
Dora is about the new philanthropic heart of Gadgetzan, we soon find out that the shiny
plaque is just a ruse to cover up whats really going on: Aya Blackpaw, leader of the Jade
Lotus, one of three gangs vying for power in Gadgetzan, uses the museum for her headquarters.
The museum opened up, perhaps to keep up appearances so hapless citizens would keep donating their
artifacts and getting their names put on non-existant plaques, with Madam Goya making a speech.
She welcomed everyone to what is surely the greatest museum on earth, and promises that
we’ll find the future exhibits thrilling.
From a crime syndicate with a knack for creating Jade Golems, that promise doesn’t put us
at ease.
It turns out we are right to be wary of the not so cuddly Madam Goya, because she appears
as one of the bosses we face up against in Chapter 4 of the Dalaran Heist, where we venture
into The Underbelly.
The Black Market must be a pretty cut-throat industry because after years of dedicated
service Mr. Chu turned his back on Goya and is now the new muscle for the league of E.V.I.L.
Goya doesn’t look like she needs too much protection though and she can be a tricky
boss to handle.
Blastmaster Boom tells us she is a criminal mastermind who is big on graft, grand larceny
and bamboo.
Apparently she’s too evil even for the league of E.V.I.L, and you can decide to really annoy
her by playing with Mr. Chu as our warrior hero, where she will tell him rather ominously
that he knows the price for betrayal.
We quickly come to realize Blastmaster Boom was right in calling her a criminal mastermind
when we see what Madam Goya is capable of.
She has 80 health and starts with 4 mana, giving her some pretty beefy minions to pull
from her Jade deck.
Her hero ability is Blackmail, where she will replace a random card in your hand with an
extortion card.
Extortion, or as Goya prefers to call it ‘licencing fees’, is a card that, when played for 2
mana, will return the minion it replaced back to your hand.
If you get a hand full of Extortion cards it can get very costly, very quickly.
Another card to watch out for with Goya is her Lotus Bruiser, coming in with 3 health
and 2 attack.
This guy gains 2 to his attack and his health every time an extortion card is played.
Although she can be tricky she is certainly not unbeatable, and she’ll find her defeat
very disappointing.
Whilst Mr Chu went on to become a boss in the Tombs of Terror, his former boss didn’t
appear and we can only assume Madam Goya is running the Black Market Auction House and
waiting for an opportunity she thinks is worth her personal attention.
It’s interesting to think whether Goya is so entranced by the gold of the player base
that she’ll follow us into the Shadowlands, but only time will tell.
Future expansion talk so for now thank you very much for watching everyone!
Subscribe if you like my videos, leave a like if you enjoyed this one aaand until next time...see
ya!