Merchant's Favor

The crate loop

wow-professions.com lays out the loop. You right-click a Waylaid Crate and fill it with one of the bundles it lists, for example 40 Linen Cloth or 20 Light Leather. It becomes a Sealed crate that binds to you. You hand that to Marcy Baker at the Alliance camp or Dokimi at the Horde camp for Favor and some silver. Textiles, Ore, Herbs and Curiosities crates take raw materials; Fabrics, Ingots and Parts crates take crafted ones and pay double.

Wowhead lists the same amounts by crate quality: white crates pay 5 or 10, green crates 10 or 20. Blue Sealed crates and a Sealed Elite Crate also exist, but what they pay isn't known. Your first filled crate or writ also gives a Shipping Label, which starts a quest to your camp worth 2,000 reputation and 50 Favor (wow-professions.com); Wowhead adds that the label quests give experience too.

Crate drop rates aren't published. Beta testers on Blizzard's forums complained that crates dropped too rarely to rely on. Blizzard's beta known issues listed two crate bugs in September (crates that asked for more than an item's stack size, and a Curiosities crate accepting the wrong essence), both fixed in the next build.

Reputation

Handing in crates gives no reputation. That comes from Craftsman's Writs: sealed envelopes that drop in the world or sell on the Auction House, each holding a crafting order. You make or buy the item (you don't need the profession), deliver it to the customer marked on your map, and get reputation and a pouch of silver, but no Favor. A Journeyman writ gives 75 reputation, an Expert one 125 and an Artisan one 200. Each distinct writ can be done once a day; different writs can be completed the same day (wow-professions.com).

At Friendly, an Uncertified Scribe opens in your camp. Their Forged Delivery Receipt (15 Favor) turns an empty Waylaid Crate into 50 reputation; the Forger's Quill (15 Favor, Honored) swaps a writ for another of the same rank. Each faction starts at Neutral for its own side and Hated for the other (ForeverDB). The Legacy perk Diplomat raises all reputation gains by up to 10%.

What Favor buys

Recipes. Each camp has a vendor for every crafting profession and Cooking. In the beta they sold 28 Alchemy, 61 Blacksmithing, 6 Cooking, 39 Enchanting, 26 Engineering, 81 Leatherworking and 67 Tailoring recipes, at 30 to 240 Favor each, with the better ones locked behind Friendly or Honored (wow-professions.com). Highlights:

• Blacksmithing: five role-themed mail and plate sets (tank, melee, healer, Protection and Retribution Paladin) from level 12, plus weapons such as the Thorium Greatmace.
• Leatherworking and Tailoring: sets for every role and spell school, armour kits and reagent bags.
• Enchanting: necklace, weapon and bracer enchants, relics (idols, totems and librams) and caster weapons.
• Alchemy: potions and elixirs such as Elixir of the Owl and Major Frenzy Potion.
• Engineering: bombs, thrown weapons, goggles, belts and trinkets.
• Cooking: six Spirit smoothies.

Armour and weapons made from these recipes bind on pickup, so you can only craft them for yourself.

Other rewards:

A Certification unlocks a title such as "the Alchemist" for every character on your account; a character needs 300 in the profession to display it. Tamelyn Aldridge (Alliance) and Gishah (Horde) sell the pet, toy quest and tabard; Huey Sunnydale and Okamache sell the kodo. Wowhead also notes an auctioneer, linked to the faction Auction House, at the Alliance camp. See Collections for the mount, pet and titles in context, and Waylaid Crates for crate prices on the Auction House.

The Legacy perk

Performance Bonus sits in the Professions tree of the Legacy system. Each of its three ranks adds a 5% chance of 100% extra Favor when you hand in a crate, so 15% at full rank. It needs five points in the tree and Bountiful Harvest at 5/5 first (ForeverDB). Blizzard's Legacy article calls the two factions "a major source of new tradeskill activities". Wowhead lists the perk with five ranks; ForeverDB, Icy Veins and Warcraft Tavern list three.