Greed vs. Disenchant...

So Patch 3.3 dropped this week and I got my first chance to run the "random daily heroic" cross-realm instance the other day.  First impression was that the interface was pretty smooth, and pretty quick.  For those of us that can do multiple roles, I'm not sure about the fact that it dumps you straight into the instance - I carry my healing gear with me so that I can change on a moment's notice, but does everybody?  I know you're supposed to be able to port back into the instance if you have to leave but I haven't had a chance to really use that yet.  Other than that (maybe), I like it.

My run went REALLY well.  We pulled HoL, and ran it quickly and efficiently.  No deaths, knowledgeable and highly-geared crew.  Loken fell like a chump.  AoE damage to the party seemed a little rougher and harder to handle, but that could just be coincidence, I'll need some more play to tell if that's really the case.

I also got to use the new option to disenchant loot as it dropped for the first time.

My first impression was that this was awesome - no more spending ridiculous amounts of money every time I need to enchant something, as I should have quite a bit of the mats available already instead of having to purchase all of them.

When I had a chance to think about this a bit, I was more subdued and a little nervous.

This has a huge impact on the in-game economy.  Players will be making less money on average, I think - everybody will now have to deal with the enchanter's eternal issue, do I greed and sell this item, or do I disenchant it, get mats, but no money?  Unless enchanters can no longer disenchant items, enchanters now have a small advantage - they can greed every item and decide LATER if they want the money or the mats.  Maybe that's not really an advantage, but it looks like one to me. 

At the same time, the auction capability of enchanting mats just disappeared almost entirely.  Enchanters can no longer rely on that as a source of income.

How does this affect the rest of the auction house?  DOES this affect the rest of the auction house?  Will there be inflation or deflation due to this?  Am I overestimating the impact?  Am I an idiot?

Don't answer that last one! :)

As far as myself personally, I will be disenchanting everything until I have a decent stock of needed mats, and then going back to greeding until I need more mats.  I suspect that a lot of players will take this track, and it will mean a decrease in gold in-game for awhile, followed by a big upward spike as more and more players stop disenchanting because they don't need the mats anymore.

As far as tanking or healing and mechanics go, I didn't notice a huge change, but I haven't had a lot of opportunity to dig into it.  I'm hoping I'll get more chance over the next week.  Most of my playing time this week and late last week just about got eaten with several different issues, but I should have some more time in the coming week.

I haven't had a chance to try the new 5-man dungeons or either of the raids yet.  I think we'll be going into the 10-man next Tuesday and I hope to have a better report for you then.

Happy patch week everyone!