Updated for Warlords of Draenor 6.2
Table of Contents
- Introduction to Inscription
- Draenor Inscription (600+ to 700)
- Step by Step Guide to Leveling Inscription to 600.
- The inks that you will need, including which herbs you will need to make them.
- Where are the Trainers and Supplies
- Materials Guide
- Really Short Inscription Guide
- Milling Macro – Save some work with this macro
- Click here for an in-game Professions Guide
Introduction to Inscription
Inscription is the process of taking various herbs, milling them down to pigments, creating inks from those pigments, and then creating glyphs, cards, scrolls of stat buffing, and various other items. It’s a great way to add several small, permanent, buffs to your character.
What the glyphs do is enhance one of your character’s abilities in some way. For example, Glyph of Recovery adds 20% to all healing received. Other glyphs change cooldown times, cut mana costs, increase ranges, and so on. See below for other items that can be created.
If you would rather have an in-game Inscription guide, along with one for all the other professions, helping you every step of the way and showing you where to go and what to do whether you’re farming (or buying) your own materials, then here’s the place to go.
Warlords of Draenor Changes
Warlords is not bringing any major changes to Inscription, but there is one interesting change. Characters of all classes will now automatically learn certain glyphs at levels 25, 50, and 75, exactly as they learn new abilities. Also…
- 700 Skill cap.
- Various glyphs were removed completely, others changes, and still others are now automatic, which means that you automatically learn them as you level. Just like your abilities. Each class gets about 5 or 6 of these automatic glyphs. They’re all major, no minors involved.
- Exclusive categories have been added for some glyphs. Other glyphs from the same category cannot be applied at the same time. For example, if you have three glyphs than affect one ability then those three are likely exclusive with one another.
- Some glyphs are now exclusive to a specialization.
- Herbs will stack to 200 instead of 20.
- Light Parchment replaced all other parchments in Mists of Pandaria. In Draenor it also stacks to 200 (which is a nice change.)
- There are a number of glyphs that are Pandaria world drops and some that are Timeless Isle drops. You should be able to buy a number of these off the Auction House. Getting the drop or buying them is the only way to get them. On the AH they are referred to as Techniques.
- There are no rare Draenor inks, just Warbinder’s ink.
- If you’re in Draenor and have or get the profession, any profession, then you’ll quickly find a scroll that’ll teach you the Draenor recipes. You can use these even at level 1, which is a pretty big change from before.
- Zygor’s Gold Guide is updated for Warlords and will help you with gathering, crafting, auctioning and more. Basically it’ll help you to make a lot more gold. Check out the videos on this page and find out how.
- Patch 6.2: Endless milling is dead!!! There are 6 new recipes from the Herb Trader. Each of this will mass mill all of your herbs of one type. Get the recipe and mill those 5,000 Gorgrund Flytraps in your bags with one click. The recipes are all named Mass Mill (herb type), so Mass Mill Gorgrund Flytrap, for example. One you get the recipes they will appear in your Inscription tradeskill window, not in your professions window (where you find the milling widget.) Open up your tradeskill window, click the mass recipe you want, click “munch ’em all!” ad go get a cup of coffee.
Draenor Inscription
Level 90 and skill 1? No problem, you can do it all in Draenor. The “Step by Step,” below, is if you’re not yet in Draenor (under 90) and want to level Inscription.
Learning Draenor Inscription
You’ll need a scroll to learn Draenor Inscription. You can either buy this from the Inscription Supplies guy in Ashran (100g, modified by rep) or you can do a quest. If the latter then once you enter Draenor you you will find a “take this quest” item, which will start you on an easy series of quests to get that scroll.
- Alliance will quickly find Mysterious Satchel to start that quest series.
- Horde will quickly find Illegible Sootstained Notes to start that quest series.
Once you have it you just read the thing and you’ll learn several new recipes.
- War Paints – for making the good stuff (staves, item boosts, etc.)
- Secrets of Draenor Inscription – for more recipes, such as those staves and item boosts.
- Research: Warbinder’s Ink – to research those glyphs
- Ocean Tarot makes a 540 trinket. These trinkets cannot be upgraded.
- Laughing Tarot makes a 565 trinket.
- Savage Tarot makes a 580 trinket.
- Card of Omens predicts your fate (such as being ganked by the other faction.)
- Warbinder’s Ink – Your Warlords ink.
If you’re 90+ you can make these recipes at skill level 1 and get skill-ups. They start at orange and will stay there until at least 600. Yes, this means you can skip all the other Inscription leveling bits. Just hit Draenor, grab the skills, buy a ton of materials, and level it up int he comfort of your garrison. Inscription was always easier than the other professions to level (being the newest) and now it’s even easier.
If you’re not yet in Draenor you have to do it the old fashioned way, which might be reason enough to wait on it till 90+.
Acquiring Glyph Recipes
One of the new recipes you’ll get is a research recipe. There’s no cooldown (yeah,) so you can make ’em all in one sitting, given enough ink. When you run out of Draenor recipes you’ll start researching older recipes until you have them all. The research goes gray at 605, so you’ll gt all your glyphs but you wont level much from it.
When you do the research you’ll get research notes. Click those and you’ll learn the new glyph. research -> notes -> glyphs
- Research: Warbinder’s Ink – 3 ink and 3 parchment per discovery. This creates Scribe’s Research Notes. Clicking that is what actually gives you the new (random) glyph discovery.
- Secrets of Draenor Inscription buys other recipes from your garrison vendor or the guy in Ashran.
Your Garrison
You do want to make an Inscription shack in your garrison and you do want a follower working there.
- The garrison lets you do work orders for more War Paints and some Sorcerous fire/earth/air/water.
- The minion will increase the War Paint production from your work orders and will let you create (once a day) a Draenor Merchant Order. Combine two of the same type and you can sell it to the vendor form some gold and maybe food.
Everyday you’ll want to keep your work orders running and do your own War Paints cooldown.
Step by Step to 700
See the next section down if you’re under level 90 (not in Draenor.) Getting to 600 can be quite fast, getting to 700 is a bit slower.
- At 90+ and any skill level below 700…
- Get your scroll (see above) for the recipes. Start making your War Paints and start grinding up that Cerulean Pigment > Warbinder’s ink.
- Do your Warbinder’s Ink research for +5 per research, until 600. If you run out of glyphs before 600 you’ll have to make a pile of glyphs to hit 600.
- Get at least one of the new glyphs. Make that from skill level 1 to 450 (it goes green after than, gray at 600.)
- Making War Paints (once a day) is worth +10 to 600, +1 to 800.
- Each Shadowtome you make is worth +10, but costs 50 War Paints each. All of the weapons/trinkets give +10, but this is is the easiest on your mats.
- A milling macro (down here) will make the grinding easier.
Inscription, Step by Step to >600<
Save all surplus inks. Unlike other professions, high level characters do have use for low level Glyphs, such as Pyroblast. If you’re leveling this skill to make gold then you will have need of all of the common inks. The rares are optional, though you will need them to level past 500+ (at least until Mists glyphs go live.)
When you hit max level you will be able to stick to the highest level inks and trade them for other inks at the Ink Trader, such as Ms. Sellers, in Dalaran. Regular inks are a 1 to 1 trade, rare inks are a 10 to 1 trade.
The Rare inks are needed for making items other than glyphs, such as “off hand” items, staves, shoulder inscriptions, etc. Some of those sell very well and for a pretty penny (er… gold piece) and so are worth your while.
In Warlords those other items are created with your Cerulean Pigments or War Paints.
Skip to the => Start — 75+ — 150+ — 225+ — 300+ — 375+ — 450 to 600
| Skill | Creates this | Materials needed per item |
1-75, Apprentice Inscription, Requires level 5, Train up at 50+ |
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1-75 requires:
|
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| 1-15 | Ivory Ink (make 45 inks) | Alabaster pigment |
| 16-35 | Scrolls of Agility or Strength | 2x Alabaster pigment Light parchment |
| 35-75 | Moonglow Ink (save all of this for your Minor Inscription Research skill) |
2x Alabaster pigment |
76-150, Journeyman Inscription, Requires level 10, Train up at 125+ |
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76-150 requires:
|
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| 75-80 | Midnight Ink | 2x Dusky Pigment |
| 80-90 | Vanishing Powder | Midnight Ink |
| 90-96 | Make any two: Hammer of Justice or Maul or Pyroblast or Serpent Sting | 3x Midnight Ink Light Parchment |
| 96-102 | Make any two: Evasion, Healthstone, Heroic throw, Lightning Shield, Psychic Scream | 3x Midnight Ink Light Parchment |
| 103-105 | Lion’s Ink | 2x Golden Pigment |
| 105-111 | Make any two: Divine Favor, Eviscerate, Fade | 3x Lion’s Ink Light Parchment |
| 111-117 | Make any two: Slam, Fire Nova, Health Funnel | 3x Lion’s Ink Light Parchment |
| 117-120 | Make one: Arcane Missiles, Healing Touch, Mending | 3x Lion’s Ink Light Parchment |
| 120-126 | Pick one of the level 120 glyphs and make two | 3x Lion’s Ink Light Parchment |
| 126-130 | Dawnstar Ink Train up to the next level |
Burnt pigment |
| 130-136 | Any of the skill level 130 Glyphs, make two. | 3x Lion’s Ink Light Parchment |
| 136-142 | Any of the skill level 135 Glyphs, make two. | 3x Lion’s Ink Light Parchment |
| 142-145 | Any of the skill level 140 Glyphs, make one. | 3x Lion’s Ink Light Parchment |
151-225, Expert Inscription, Requires level 20, Train up at 200+ |
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150-225 requires:
|
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| 150-155 | Jadefire Ink | Emerald Pigment |
| 155-161 | Glyph of Evocation, make two | 3x Jadefire Ink Light Parchment |
| 161-167 | Glyph of Gouge or Renew, make two | 3x Jadefire Ink Light Parchment |
| 167-170 | Glyph of Shadowbolt or Lava Lash, make one. | 3x Jadefire Ink Light Parchment |
| 170-176 | Glyph of Overpower or Rebirth, make two | 3x Jadefire Ink Light Parchment |
| 176-180 | Royal Ink | Indigo Pigment |
| 180-186 | Make any two of the skill 180 glyphs | 3x Jadefire Ink Light Parchment |
| 186-192 | Make any two of the skill 185 glyphs | 3x Jadefire Ink Light Parchment |
| 192-200 | Make Glyph of Revenge or Voidwalker until you hit 200. Then train up. | 3x Jadefire Ink Light Parchment |
| 200-205 | Celestial Ink | 2x Violet pigment |
| 205-211 | Glyph of Consecration x2 | 3x Celestial Ink Light Parchment |
| 211-217 | Glyph of Sinister Strike or Smite, x2 | 3x Celestial Ink Light Parchment |
| 217-220 | One of the skill 215 glyphs | 3x Celestial Ink Light Parchment |
| 220-226 | Two Glyphs of Starfire | 3x Celestial Ink Light Parchment |
226-300, Artisan Inscription, Requires level 35, Train up at 275+ |
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226-300 requires:
|
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| 226-232 | 2 of either Disengage or Ice Block | 3x Celestial Ink Light Parchment |
| 232-235 | Either Crusader Strike or Dispel Magic | 3x Celestial Ink Light Parchment |
| 235-241 | 2 of either Slice and Dice or Totemic Recall | 3x Celestial Ink Light Parchment |
| 241-250 | Create either Glyph of Cleaving or Soulstone until 250 | 3x Celestial Ink Light Parchment |
| 250-255 | Shimmering Ink | 2x Silvery Pigment |
| 255-261 | 2 of Desperation, Mutilate, or Shamanistic Rage | 3x Shimmering Ink Light Parchment |
| 261-267 | 2 of either Bloodletting or Freezing Trap | 3x Shimmering Ink Light Parchment |
| 267-270 | Glyph of Exorcism or Bone Shield | 3x Shimmering Ink Light Parchment |
| 270-276 | 2 of either Fear Ward or Frost Strike Train up to Master at 275+ |
3x Shimmering Ink Light Parchment |
| 275-290 | Ink of the Sky (pigments permitting) | Sapphire pigment |
| 290-295 | Ethereal Ink | 2x Nether Pigment |
| 295-305 | Scroll of Spirit VI |
Shimmering Ink 2x Light Parchment |
301-375, Master Inscription, Requires level 50, Train up at 350+ |
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Materials required:
|
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| 305-311 | 2 of Glyph of Pillar of Frost or Feint | 3x Ethereal Ink Light Parchment |
| 311-317 | 2 of Pounce or Rune Tap | 3x Ethereal Ink Light Parchment |
| 317-320 | 1 of Arcane Blast, Holy Nova, or Rapid Fire | 3x Ethereal Ink Light Parchment |
| 320-326 | 2 of Blood Boil or Sweeping Strikes | 3x Ethereal Ink Light Parchment |
| 326-330 | Darkflame Ink | Ebon pigment |
| 330-336 | 2 of Lacerate, Scourge Strike, or Windfury Weapon | 3x Ethereal Ink Light Parchment |
| 336-342 | 2 of Arcane Power or Rebuke | 3x Ethereal Ink Light Parchment |
| 342-345 | Either Ambush or Death Strike | 3x Ethereal Ink Light Parchment |
| 345-351 | 2 of either Raging Blow or Vampiric Blood Train up to Grandmaster at 350+ |
3x Ethereal Ink Light Parchment |
| 351-355 | Ink of the Sea | 2x Azure pigment |
| 355-360 | Scroll of Spirit VII | Ink of the Sea 2x Light Parchment |
| 360-365 | Scroll of Intellect VII | Ink of the Sea 2x Light Parchment |
| 365-370 | Scroll of Strength VII | Ink of the Sea 2x Light Parchment |
| 370-375 | Scroll of Agility VII | Ink of the Sea 2x Light Parchment |
376-450, Grandmaster Inscription, Requires level 65, Train up at 425+ |
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You will need:
|
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| 375-380 | Snowfall Ink | 2x Icy Pigment |
| 380-385 | Any two of the skill 375 glyphs | 3x Ink of the Sea Light Parchment |
| 385-386 | Northrend Inscription Research (1/day) | 3x Ink of the Sea Snowfall Ink 5x Light Parchment |
| 386-402 | Two of any skill 385 glyphs, discovered through Northrend Research | 3x Ink of the Sea Light Parchment |
| 400-405 | Scroll of Stamina VIII | Ink of the Sea 2x Light Parchment |
| 405-410 | Scroll of Spirit VIII | Ink of the Sea 2x Light Parchment |
| 410-415 | Scroll of Intellect VIII | Ink of the Sea 2x Light Parchment |
| 415-420 | Scroll of Strength VIII | Ink of the Sea 2x Light Parchment |
| 420-425 | Scroll of Agility VIII train up to Illustrious Grand Master |
Ink of the Sea 2x Light Parchment |
| 425-445 | Blackfallow Ink | 2x Ashen pigment |
| 445-450 | Scroll of Intellect IX | Ink of the Sea 2x Light Parchment |
451-525, Illustrious Grandmaster Inscription, Requires level 75, Train up at 425+ |
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You will need:
|
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| 450-460 | Mysterious Fortune Card | Blackfallow Ink Light Parchment |
| 460-465 | Scroll of Stamina IX |
Blackfallow Ink 2x Light Parchment |
| 465-470 | Scroll of Strength IX | Blackfallow Ink 2x Light Parchment |
| 470-475 | Scroll of Agility IX | Blackfallow Ink 2x Light Parchment |
| 475-480 | Inferno Ink | 2x Burning Embers |
| 480-490 | Etched Horn (+5 skill per item) or Origami Slime (+1 skill) | Slime: 3x Light Parchment Horn: 4x Inferno Ink Scavenged Dragon Horn* |
| 490-500 | Origami Rock (+1 skill) or Manual of the Planes (+5 skill per item) | Rock: 3x Light Parchment Manual: 10x Light Parchment 2x Inferno Ink 2x Each Volatile Air, Earth, Fire, Water. |
| 500-540500-600 | Tome of the Clear Mind (which you’ll want at 90 anyway for glyph and talent switching) or any one of the glyphs that require 500+ skill. for example: Glyph of Shifted Appearances. Unlike earlier glyphs these stay orange until 595, then yellow to 600. | Tome: 1 Ink of Dreams 1 Light parchmoentGlyphs: 3 Ink of Dreams 3 Light parchment |
| You do not need any of the following items to level to 600, but if you’re interested in making items that sell fairly well then go ahead and make a few and try them out. The bracelets, eyes, etc. are available from a vendor in the Twilight Highlands, once you unlock your faction base there. They’re also, sometimes, on the Auction House at inflated prices. | ||
| 510-520 | Make five of any of the following (each awards 2 skill points: ) | |
| Vicious Charm of Triumph | 5x Inferno Ink Silver Charm Bracelet* 6x Volatile Life 6x Volatile Water |
|
| Vicious Eyeball of Dominance | 5x Inferno Ink Preserved Ogre Eye 12x Volatile Water |
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| Vicious Jawbone of Conquest | 5x Inferno Ink Bleached Jawbone* 12x Volatile Life |
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| 520-525 | Make one of any of the following (each awards 5 skill points: ) | |
| Notched Jawbone | 12x Inferno Ink Bleached Jawbone* 36x Volatile Life 12x Volatile Earth |
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| Silver Inlaid Leaf | 12x Inferno Ink Silver Charm Bracelet* 36x Volatile Life 12x Volatile Air |
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| Tattooed Eyeball | 12x Inferno Ink Preserved Ogre Eye 36x Volatile Life 12x Volatile Water |
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* From the vendor in Twilight Highlands or from the Auction House.
Do it all in-game, and make a whole lot more gold than ever before.
Go here for more.
Go to => Top of page – Inks – Steps – In-game guide
Inks That You Will Need
If you’re under 90 and are interested in making the various inscription items, then keep all of the Moonglow Ink and the Snowfall Ink that you make. You will need them for your Minor and Northrend Inscription Research.
Inferno Ink is used with some of the Cataclysm items (Relics, books, but not the glyphs.)
Starfall Ink is used for the Pandaria items, such as the shoulder enchants.
Cerulean Pigment is used for all Draenor inks and many other items. You’ll use this to create your War Paints (daily “quest” and also from garrison work orders) to make the nice stuff, as well as the items to boost the item levels of the nice stuff.
The other rares can be kept or sold, depending on what you want to make.
As mentioned above: Any of the herbs in any group will do, you do not need to have a few of one and a few of another. Just gather whichever is easiest and/or buy the cheapest off the Auction House. You’re garrison herb farm will make some herbs for you, but it won’t be enough if you’re making any quantity of items. If you just want enough for your daily War Paints then you’ll be good. Free herbs, what’s not to like?
You can use something like Auctionator (see image) to make shopping lists which will make buying easier, whether you’re buying herbs or inks.
| Tier | Inks |
Min. Skill
|
from pigments | from these herbs | Skill to Mill |
| Tier 1 | Ivory Ink Moonglow Ink |
1
35 |
both from: Alabaster pigment |
|
Skill 1 each |
| Tier 2 | Midnight Ink Hunters Ink (rare) |
75
85 |
Dusky pigment Verdant pigment |
|
skill 25 |
| Tier 3 | Lions Ink Dawnstar ink (rare) |
100
125 |
Golden pigment Burnt pigment |
|
skill 75 |
| Tier 4 | Jadefire Ink Royal Ink (rare) |
150
175 |
Emerald pigment Indigo pigment |
|
125 each |
| Tier 5 | Celestial Ink Fiery Ink (rare) |
200
225 |
Violet pigment Ruby pigment |
|
175 each |
| Tier 6 | Shimmering Ink Ink of the Sky (rare) |
250
275 |
Silvery pigment Sapphire pigment |
|
225 eachicecap 200 |
| Tier 7 | Ethereal Ink Darkflame Ink (rare) |
290
325 |
Nether pigment Ebon pigment |
|
275 each |
| Tier 8 | Ink of the Sea Snowfall Ink (rare) |
350
375 |
Azure pigment |
|
325 each |
| Tier 9 | Blackfallow Ink Inferno Ink (rare) |
425
475 |
Ashen pigment Burning Embers |
|
425 425 450 450 475 475 |
| Tier 10 Mists of Pandaria |
Ink of Dreams Starlight Ink (rare) |
500
600 |
Shadow Pigment Misty Pigment |
all: 500 | |
| Tier 11 Warlords of Dreanor |
Warbinder’s Ink | 600 – 700 | Cerulean Pigment | all: 600 |
Go to => Top of page – Inks – Steps – In-game guide
How Inscription Works
Glyphs come in two flavors: Major, and Minor. In addition to glyphs you can make books (off-hand items,) a few relics, stat scrolls, self-only shoulder enchants, enchanting velums, origami objects, and a few other items.
Making Glyphs
The basic process to make a glyph, or any other inscription item, is this:
- Buy a Virtuoso Inking Set from the Inscription supplier.
- Buy a stack of the appropriate herb (see below for the herb lists.) You might also be able to buy the inks or pigments directly off the Auction House and skip the milling step.
- Mill the herbs into pigments.
- Process the pigments into inks.
- Grab a stack of the appropriate parchment from the Inscription Supplies Vendor or Trade Goods vendor.
- Make your items. Every glyphs costs three inks and one piece of parchment to make.
- Other items, such as Relics and Darkmoon Cards, will require additional mats, such as Eternal Life or Frozen Orbs or Volatile Whatever.
Getting the Recipes
Most of the glyphs and such are learned from the trainers, but a number of other glyphs are learned via:
- Warlords: Research: Warbinder’s Ink – discovers all of the glyphs that use Warbinder’s Ink and then researches lesser inks. You need to have Draenor Inscription to have access to this. There’s no cooldown, either. With enough Warbinder’s Ink you could research all of the glyph recipes in one sitting.
- Minor Inscription Research – Dead in Warlords
- Northrend Inscription Research – Dead in Warlords
- Book of Glyph Mastery– These books are rarely dropped from Northrend mobs. They’re green and BoE and can be traded or sold.There was a rumor that the need for these books would go away in patch 4.2, but that was changed by Blizzard. You will still need to buy or find these books to get the Glyphs that are unique to them. Spend a ton of gold (figure a couple hundred per book) and learn a bunch of glyphs quickly, w/o the research cooldown. As of 4.3 there are 54 Glyphs that these books will teach. The books will not teach you any other glyphs. I suspect your Draenor research will cover all of these glyphs.
- Scroll of Wisdom: Creating the scroll also provides you with a random Mists of Pandaria glyph recipe. The scrolls themselves are used to create a few items.
- Drops – In the Mists of Pandaria many glyphs are world drops in the Pandaren lands and the Timeless Isles. They can be traded so you might also be able to buy them (referred to as “techniques”) on the Auction House.
Go to => Top of page – Inks – Steps – In-game guide
Installing your glyphs
The old way: To install a glyph you needed to buy, beg, borrow, steal, or create an appropriate glyph and then find a Lexicon of Power. Generally these are (still) located next to the Inscription trainers.
The new way: Just like an item enchant, you buy the glyph and “right click” it. You will permanently “learn” it by doing so. All glyphs learned will be listed on the “glyphs tab” of your talents window. Right click a glyph in your list and drop it on the appropriate slot.
Below is your Glyph page as it will appear in Mists of Pandaria
To install a glyph just drag it from the right area to the appropriate slot in the left area.
Note the Dust of Disappearance at the bottom. This is required to change any installed glyphs. This means that you can reset your glyphs for any particular situation.
- If you’re level 80 or lower you can use Vanishing powder instead, also found at the same vendor.
- 81 to 85 requires Dust of Disappearance
- Level 86 to 100 requires a Tome of the Clear Mind
Keep a stack in your bags at all times. Need a couple of glyphs for one boss, but others for a different boss? No problem, just swap them.
This also means that once they are learned you will not need to ever again buy those glyphs. Buy them all, learn them, and then swap back and forth as necessary.
Go to => Top of page – Inks – Steps – In-game guide
What Else You Can Inscribe
Like any other WoW profession there is more to Inscription than just glyphs. You can hop over to WoWhead for a complete list of glyphs and other inscribed items for your particular class, but here’s the short list:
- Glyphs, of course.
- Scrolls of <stat.> Scribes can create all those Agility/Int/etc. scrolls. Want a bunch of +100 Agility (or Int or Str or Spirit) buffing scrolls? Make them.
- Shoulder Inscriptions, like this one (self only)
- Hunters, change your pet’s name with a Certificate of Ownership
- Tomes, held in the “off hand,” such as Faces of Doom
- Vellums, which allow Enchanters to place enchants on scrolls, and then pass them around or sell them like any other scroll.
- Cards – Darkmoon cards of various levels can be made by Scribes.
- Relics – Just the thing for Paladins, Death Knights, and Druids. You will be able to make item level 377 PvP relics and i359 PvE relics.
- Fortune cards – Get a chance to win!!
- Forged documents – Forge some incriminating papers then hand them to someone in exchange for a sack of gold.
Why Inscription is Cool
Why is Inscription cool? Let’s see…
- Relatively cheap to level – You won’t need exotic items, such as TrueGold, and you can level the entire way from 1 to 600 for much less than the materials cost of some Engineering items. Pretty much the only thing you’ll need is herbs and supplies from the Vendors, but see #2.
- Cataclysm relics and items will require some Volatile items (Earth, Water, etc.) and some require other items which can be found on a vendor in Twilight Highlands. Alliance vendor, Horde Vendor. Access to the vendor will require you to do enough of the Twilight Highlands quests to get portal access to Storm or Org. Alternatively, you can often buy them off the Auction House, usually at a small premium.
- Mists of Pandaria items generally only require the usual inks, but a few require Spirits of Harmony and/or Scrolls of Wisdom. You don’t need these to level the profession.
- Glyphs are cheap enough to make that you can make and learn all the glyphs for your class, probably for less than 500 gold.
- Tomes, cards, shoulder inscriptions. and more.
- It can be a decent money making profession (see the Auctionator image, above.)
Where is Everything Located?
To train up to max skil see the Inscription Trainer in any of the Azerothian capital cities. You don’t need to do any special recipe quests, just buy the recipes and skill promotions from the trainers. Ask one of the city guards for exact directions.
As for the inks, you can actually trade for the necessary inks. In Mists of Pandaria you can trade your Ink of Dreams for any of the other inks you might need, including rare inks. The ink trader will be close to the trainer.
Materials Needed for Inscription
To make any of the ink needed for Inscription yu will need to have some herbs, which is why Herbalism is the perfect companion skill for Inscription.
- The herbs are milled into pigments, and each milling requires five herbs. Each time you mill a 5 stack you will receive 1 to 4 (usually 2 or 3) common pigments and you might receive a rare pigment. The latter is used for the special inscriptions, such as cards. Generally any stack of 20 herbs will yield 10 pigments (5 inks) and one or two rares. Note that higher level herbs will give a slightly higher quantity of pigments than lower level herbs. For example, Cinderbloom gives 1-3 Ashen Pigments and Whiptail gives 1 to 4. You will also need a higher level of skill to mill the higher level herbs.
- You then process the pigments into inks (you will pick up the ink creating skills from the trainers, there is a different one for every ink.) It takes two pigments to create one common ink, and usually one pigment to create one rare ink (some rares will require two pigments.)
- Once you have your inks you will need parchment to create your glyphs and other items. All parchment papers can be bought from the Inscription Supply vendor next to the trainer.
The cool thing about the herbs required is that you can use any of the herbs from a set of herbs, rather than just one herb. To create Midnight Ink, for example, you can use any of these herbs, five at a time: Briarthorn, Bruiseweed, Mageroyal, Stranglekelp, or Swiftthistle. Use whichever is cheapest or easiest to buy/gather, the drop rate of the pigments is exactly the same for each of the herbs in a set.
Note: You don’t need all of the herbs from a group, any of the herbs from a group will do. So use whichever is cheapest. Also notice that you don’t need exotic herbs, such as Fel Lotus or Frost Lotus. See the next section for the herb lists.
Each glyph will require three inks to create and will award three skill points (if it’s orange to you.)
All glyphs only require one piece of parchment. Items such as Tomes will require more materials, and a few items require mats that aren’t inks or parchments, such as the Frozen Orb, required by Faces of Doom.
The new relics, such as Tatooed Eyeball, will require items that are either dropped by various mobs or which can be bought from a vendor in Twilight Highlands (you have to do some of the TH quests to get access to these vendors.) In addition, you will need some of the Volatile Air etc.
These mats also appear on the Auction House at, usually, higher prices.
Still, making these relics will cost you a tiny fraction of what it costs to make high end Blacksmithing or Engineering stuff.
Keep an eye on pigment and ink prices, too. Sometimes they’re cheap enough to be worth your while. My personal targets for buying are:
- herbs – 1g each, 20g per stack (yields about 5 inks)
- inks – 4g each, 80g per stack
- pigments, 2g each.
This works out to a cost of about 12g per glyph. Whether or not you’re gathering your own herbs, buying the pigments and inks can save a lot of clicking.
Go to => Top of page – Inks – Steps – In-game guide
Leveling Inscription
Leveling Inscription is just about the same as leveling any other crafting skill. Buy a bunch of mats, camp the trainer, buy whichever skills are available, train the skill while it’s orange (if possible,) and so on. Same here, with a couple of differences.
(Dugi’s Professions Guide will make all of this, and leveling any other profession, easier. )
The step by step guide is here. (or scroll down.)
- Inscription skills go from orange to yellow to green to gray very quickly. So the typical routine will be to buy a skill, level your skill by five points, then buy a new skill and level the new one for five points, and so on. Note:Since Cataclysm all the crafting skills have various items that will award different amounts of skill points per creation. For Inscription:
- All Glyphs award three skill points each, while orange, so you will usually be making two at a time for your 6 points.
- Scrolls, inks, misc items, shoulder enchants, cards, etc. award one point each.
- The skill level 475+ books and relics award 2 points each.
- The skill 500+ books and items reward 5-10 or more points each, but some require rare items (eg: Spirits of Harmony) to make.
- The Mists of Pandaria glyphs break this pattern. They will stay orange from 500 to 595. You can level from 500 to 600 by making 35 or so copies of any one of these glyphs.
- The general routine is this:
- Grab your new skills
- Grind up your herbs and make the appropriate inks. (Keep an eye on the Auction House, you might be able to find pigments and inks for cheap with any luck.)
- Pick a glyph to make and make two
- Keep an eye on your skill level
- Every five points, usually, you will get your new skills.
- repeat until 500, after that the rules change a bit (see above.)
- Which glyphs to pick as you level? It doesn’t matter. They all cost the same and give the same number of points. Pick the ones that you or your friends can use or that you can sell. You can use your own Auction House research for the selling part, or use an addon like the tycoon gold addon. Remember that they gray out very quickly.
- If you’re bored of crafting you can make money by selling the inks.
While it sounds expensive to buy a ton of herbs, keep in mind that you can probably level Inscription from 0 to 600 for less then the cost of a few advanced points of something like Enchanting or Blacksmithing and for much ess than the cost of one MechanoHog.
Go to => Top of page – Inks – Steps – In-game guide
Milling Macro
This macro is obsolete IF you have access to the new patch 6.2 Mass Milling recipes (see the WOD changes at the top of the page. If you don’t well, this macro will still save you a lot of clicks:
/cast Milling
/use Name of Herb
Just add in the names of the herbs you’re using. There is a limit to how many lines you can have in one macro, so if you end up milling lots of different herbs you will want two or more macros.
You could call this macro, “tier1:”
/cast Milling
/use peacebloom
/use silverleaf
/use earthroot
If you’re using Cataclysm herbs then you would use something like this:
/cast Milling
/use Cinderbloom
/use Twilight Jasmine
/use Azshara’s Veil
/use Whiptail
/use Stormvine
Note: All stacks of herbs in your bags have to be in multiples of 5: 5, 10, 15, 20. If they’re not then the macro will be unable to continue. For example, if you have two Cinderbloom herbs left over then you will get an error message that says something like, “not enough herbs…” regardless of how many stacks of any other herb you might have.
Also, If that stack of 2 Cinderbloom comes first in your bags, before larger stacks, then it will stop the macro. So either put those 2 herbs in the bottom of your bag or send them elsewhere. All your herbs should be in stacks of multiples of 5.
Warlords of Draenor looks like it will be increasing the herb stack size to 200. A nice change.
In-game Professions Guide
I’ve made a ton of gold (see pic) with inscription since it went live, one month before Wrath was released. (Since the 3.1 patch that number is much higher, I bounced off the old gold cap.) As far as I’m concerned it’s a pretty killer money maker, though it takes a bit of work. Even in Warlords it’s pretty good.
There are a ton of interesting ways to make gold in WoW, this is just one of them. While I did most of that with glyphs you can make the other Inscription items and, of course, the are all the other crafts.
What’s really handy is knowing what’s selling and how nice the current prices are (nice for selling, that is.) One thing that will be a big help in determining that is Zygor’s gold guide. It’ll help you with your crafting and even your gathering, farming, and Auction House playing (buy low, sell high.) It’ll even show you how to farm transmog gear, which often sells for some pretty nice prices.
There’s a number of videos on the page which will explain how it all works. Check it out, here.