Making money

First off is a reply to a question asked by Honorshammer and Galo concerning how I actually got up the 5,000 gold necessary for my epic flight skill. First thing I cannot emphasize enough is to be very very careful with your expenditures. Simply put, if you don't need it, don't buy it. When you boil it down, the only things we need to spend money on are elixirs/flasks/foods for raids (even in 5-mans you can get by without food), repair bills, gems/enchants, and flying places. Everything else is extraneous. Giving some money to your alt to help him along? Nope. Buying that recipe that's up on the AH? Nope. About the only exception towards this line of thought is if you know the purchase will have direct and fairly immediate monetary returns. For example, purchasing a rare recipe that you know you can make and will sell well. This is obviously a good investment and even if it takes Primal Nethers will pay off in the long run (my guild leader can make Felsteel Longblades and does this).

Now as for what I specifically did, I will admit that I kinda cheated. As a Jewelcrafter I'm sitting on a goldmine. I refer not to prospecting ore for jewels. While I found in general I could make some decent money with that at first, as the value of certain jewels dropped and the price of ore generally remained the same, the average value of prospecting went down. Too much of a gamble hoping for a high value gem like a Living Ruby or a Star of Elune instead of a low value gem like a Talasite. I found it better to go with the sure profit of 25g per stack of Adamantite Ore. No, what I refer to for JC being a goldmine is cutting of gems. Easiest way I've found to do this is to get Auctioneer, do a quick scan of the AH, and then go though your gem list looking for gems that have "No competition". Make sure not to pick gems with Spell Penetration, Resilience, or any blue colored gems with anything other than STA. After that buy some uncut gems of the type that have "No competition" and cut them and sell them back at 5-10g more than you bought the uncut version for. If you're cutting a Meta Gem, go for 10-20g more. The obvious downsides are that it requires you to have JC and do some prior investments both in money and reputation grinding (if you can access the Consortium Vendor in Kara and are Revered with them you can get the Design: Bracing Earthstorm Diamond, which sells very well due to it's relative rarity), but after you get enough designs for gems you can basically make almost endless money with no effort on your part.

The other big thing a Protection Paladin can do is AOE grinding. If you haven't already go grind your rep with Sporeggar up to Honored for the shield (also a good way to make money for Herbalists if you kill Fungal Giants) then go to one of the many places mentioned over at Maintankadin forums for AOE grinding (I find I like the Demon Hunter Supplicants for the Scryer tokens). What I've found best is using Retribution Aura, Blessing of Sanctuary, Judgement of Light, and Seal of Wisdom. Those, combined with the shield brings down even the largest crowds quickly. A fast attack weapon is also advisable. If you happen to have a high level tailor and enchanter, send any Netherweave to them and have them make Netherweave Bracers to make and disenchant. You can sell the mats for way more than you would sell the straight Netherweave.

Even then, it's a slow process. I've been working on getting the 5,000g for around 8 months or so. Unless you get super lucky with a epic quality BoE drop or recipe to sell on the AH for a grand or more it's just a matter of plugging away at it a little bit at a time.