Diablo 3 is a dungeon hack and slash game, but it is also a game about trading.  I believe one of the greatest things people loved about D2 was the trading.  It was basically two games in one, a trading game, and then you tested out your items in PvP and PvM.    Well Diablo 3 is still a game of items and trading, but with the introduction of the auction house it has been more difficult the longer the game goes on to sell anything.  It seems as if most items either don’t sell, or sell for a million or more.  Players standards have gone up from release, most people have pretty good gear, so, ‘pretty good gear’  isn’t really in demand anymore.

Here are some tips and what not for learning how to find a niche and just make some bank in the auction house of Diablo 3.

You take your item, and you look at its most desirable stats. Then you search the auction house for items with similar stats.

1. Think like a buyer. No one searches for shoulder with strength, cold resist, pickup radius, and bonus health globe healing- lol. They search for [primary state], vitality, all resists, and sometimes MF.

1. You have to price your items competitively or it won’t sell.

1. The more you know about the game, the better you can play the Auction House. For example, shoulders can have up to 300 strength and up to 200 of any other stat. If you didn’t know that, you might think a pair of shoulders with 150 str / 150 vit was worth about the same as a pair with 150 dex / 150 vit.

1. Off-hand weapons with very high life on hit (LOH), critical hit damage, and a socket are worth a fortune even with 200 DPS. This is because of how whirl wind (ww) barbs work. The items are quite rare, but if you didn’t know that you wouldn’t ever save a 200 dps dagger.

1. Even if you aren’t good at eyeballing price, every item you find can be priced by comparing it to the cheapest comparable alternatives on the AH. There has been so much gear generated that only the top notch gear is valuable.

Also, something else I’ve learned firsthand.  If you are trying to play the auction house, try searching for items for the class you know the best.  This way you know what people are searching for, what would be an upgrade for you, and if you have been trying to upgrade your character much you should already know most of the good deals and steals which you can grab fast and flip for a few gold or a few RMAH dollars.