Two weeks later

... 17 days, rather. And the gold pool has risen from 10,000 on the dot to 17,000. Not great; this represents a profit of just over 400 gold per day ... surely we can (and must!) do better than this. If we take my original starting date and 10,000 gold and assume I'll make 400 gold per day, it will take me until mid-November of 2010 to reach the cap. That's unacceptable. I want my stockpile complete in 2009!



So, why the slow progress? Well, it hasn't all been a matter of my incompetence; I'm also leveling professions to increase that amount of money I can make. As everyone knows, this takes money! Especially if it's done via powerleveling. So now I have:

• An alchemist almost to 300. This is my death knight who I started leveling just for this purpose. I got him safely to Stormwind to pledge his fealty to King Varian Wrynn and immediately sent him to the alchemy trainer. I've hit a bottleneck, though; there doesn't seem to be any Arthas' Tears on the auction house on my server, like, EVER, and when the rare one does turn up, it winds up having a ridiculous buyout (think 10g+ per herb). One of these days I'll run through the Eastern Plaguelands and pick a stack of these for my poor DK. And then I'll have to level him to 65 so I can max out alchemy!
• An enchanter almost to 225. This is my little guy who just dinged 21. For all intents and purposes, he's maxed out. At least I will be able to insta-DE any unneeded quest items and old gear. With heirlooms and rested XP, 35 doesn't seem to far away. 65, on the other hand ...
• A JC up to 100. Same deal, this is my 21 alt. It's not so much that I'm stuck at 100 as it is that I was focusing on enchanting first, and with the amount of time that Inscription is taking up, I just don't have the hours to move forward. Which is fine; I figure that if this guy doesn't move much before 3.2 drops, I can get him the heirloom chest piece once I get my Crusader title and accelerate his leveling with the regular mount at level 20 and the epic at 40. So as you can see I'm in no rush with this.

I've been making most of my money with Inscription, although Blacksmithing continues to be profitable as well. Inscription, to be perfectly honest, is no fun to make money with. It consists of the following:

1. Checking the AH for herbs of all sorts multiple times a day on the first bank alt. Then buying every single stack of Icethorn under 20g and Adder's Tongue under 19g. If I have more time I check Outland herbs and a few select types of old-world herbs too.
2. Checking the price of Eternal Life on the AH. If it's under 15, it's usually a buy, depending on my stock.
3. Mailing everything I just bought to my scribe.
4. Logging over to the second bank alt and doing the Terrible Auction House Sequence: checking for undercuts, canceling undercut auctions, running to the mailbox and picking up the canceled glyphs (fifty at a time; usually there are between 150 and 250 glyphs that get undercut, so I have to wait for the mailbox to refill 5 times).
5. Running back to the AH and batch posting those glyphs. Again, 200 or so glyphs takes time.
6. Logging over to the third bank alt and doing the same thing. See, for simplicity I have the glyphs split into two groups, with a different alt handling each group: Banker A gets DK, Druid, Hunter, Mage, and Paladin glyphs, and Banker B gets the other five classes. So he does the Terrible Auction House Sequence, and then:
7. Logging over to the scribe, if applicable, and doing any of the following: milling (and milling, and milling, and milling, and milling), making ink, trading ink, buying parchment, making glyphs, and mailing glyphs. Occasionally, if the number of Snowfall Inks exceeds 80 or so and I have enough Eternal Lifes on hand there is also Darkmoon Card making to be done here, which thankfully doesn't add much time to the whole routine and can be deliciously profitable. (Yes, selling Snowfalls makes the most sense, but the thought of making all the gold you've invested back when that Five of Nobles procs is too tempting sometimes.)

So, why only 7000 gold up in over two weeks? I'm also investing in Titanium ore in advance of Patch 3.2, of course. I now have 60 stacks of the stuff that I've bought for 160 gold or less per stack. Conservatively, I think I have 10,000 gold tied up in titanium, and that's if I sell it without turning any sort of a profit. I'm simply hoping to double my money with that; I don't think 300-350g per stack is unrealistic. I'm also sitting on 30 Abyss Crystals that someone batch posted to the AH for 60g apiece; I'm selling them when I can list them for 95g or so. All told I paid about 2000 for those and should have 3000 when I clear them all out, so assuming I liquidate those for my desired price and I break even on titanium, my actual bankroll is on the order of about 30,000 gold currently. Add to that the fact that I'm sitting on almost complete Chaos, Undeath, and Prisms decks from clearing my bags of Snowfall inks as well as a full Prisms Deck and five Nobles cards (including three Eights ... how does that happen? sigh.) then the picture starts to look a bit brighter.

UPDATE: and as I write this some clown posts a bunch of Titanium ore stacks on the AH for 140g per, and then I find 15 stacks of Adder's Tongue at 16g apiece. So instead of 17,000 gold let's call it 15,000. Easy come, easy go :)