Molten Core - In With The Old

This is an old post that I dug up from when the blog first started out, I'm bringing it back because when the blog first started not many people read/saw this, So I thought doing a repost about it will inform those who don't or haven't looked through the archive.

Today I'd like to focus on the beloved Molten Core. I've ran this place now 7 weeks, With only 3 of those being full clears. I love running this place. I don't care if it's solo of it it's with a couple buddies. There is HUGE profit to be made here.

Alright let's get started. The main reason I started solo'ing Molten Core was because I wanted the enchanting formulas ( Formula: Enchant Weapon - Spellpower & Formula: Enchant Weapon - Healing Power ). I farmed this place for 4 weeks without seeing a drop, on the 5th week, it dropped and I was in a bit of a dilemma. Should I try to sell it for 5k, Or should I learn the Formula and mass craft and sell these babies? I decided to try to sell it, I started spamming trade like a mad man, I got a couple low ball offers then I got a 4750 offer. CHA-CHING! I sold it instantly.

On top of having those enchanting formula's drop you can also rack up a TON of Nexus Crystals which can be transformed into make small prismatic shards, which can be turned into Large Prismatic Shards, this can make you net a couple mongoose scrolls for VERY cheap. On top of that you have the Fiery cores, Lava Cores, essence of fires, BOE's and on top of that you have a chance of getting a Sulfuron Ingot! I've gotten 4, and sold them all for ~1250 average!

I make roughly 2000g a run with no formula and that's roughly 2 hours worth of solo'ing/clearing the place. It's a great place to spend a couple hours if your bored and are looking for a new place to make a couple thousand gold.

There are other awesome BOP recipes, for example tonight I got Schematic: Force Reactive Disk, A level 60 BOP engineering Recipe that crafts an epic BOE shield. Now My Paladin is no engineer, Sadly ;(, but I'm sure people would be willing to pay a nice chunk of change for this awesome shield! Other Recipes Include, Biznicks 247x128 Accurascope, Core Marksman Rifle, Elemental Sharpening Stone, Core Armor Kit, Bottomless Bag, Core Felcloth Bag, Major Rejuvenation Potion.

Flipping Magnus Frostwake's Plans - Guest Post

A Guest Post by Cold of Cold's Gold Factory

 
Ghostly Vendor
You may not recognise the npc vendor Magnus Frostwake. He is an npc located outside of the instance Scholomance. He is not able to be seen unless you complete a series of quests within Scholomance. The quest chain starts from Eva Sarkhoff just outside the entrance. After completing 3 parts of the quest chain, you will rewarded with a trinket, Spectral Essence. Once you obtain this trinket and equip it, the ghostly denizens outside of Scholomance can be seen and interacted with. Magnus Frostwake can be found Southwest of the entrance in Caer Darrow.

What He Sells
Magnus Frostwake sells various Alchemy recipes and Blacksmithing patterns. For Alchemists he sells the recipes for Major Mana Potion and Transmute: Water to Air, both of which Bind on Pick-up. For Blacksmiths he sells plans for Ebon Shiv, Huge Thorium Battleaxe, and Ornate Thorium Handaxe. These too are Bind on Pick-Up. The last Blacksmithing pattern that he sells is not soulbound when picked up, so it is a great item to sell on the auction house. Many people have no idea where to get this pattern, since it does take a quest chain reward just to see the vendor. These plans for Plans: Storm Gauntlets will cost you 4g, but can easily be flipped for 25-50g with little to no competition. Best thing is the actual plans are rare and are blue colored, unlike most vendor purchased plans.

Pattern: Rich Purple Silk Shirt - An Easy Flip!

I picked up this pattern about a month ago on the alliance side Auction House for 49g. Since then It's been posted up countless times at 2500g, for about 3 straight weeks, and then today I suddenly dropped the price down to 1500g, to my surprise it sold within a few minutes. This is as far as I know one of the rarest tailoring patterns in the game ( don't quote me on this! ), that is why it sells for so much. It's a world drop from vanilla, therefore it's pretty difficult to farm this.

This pattern is a world drop from vanilla and below, if you were trying to farm this your best bet would to kill the world dragons. Even then the dragon is a pain to catch as they have long respawn timers. This is an item to add to your snatch list and keep checking on every day just to see if it's there. I would be willing to pay up to 1,000g for this recipe, just so I can flip it at almost double that price.

One of the strategies I used to sell this was I first posted the item at a high price for about 3 weeks, this gave people who regularly scan the Auction House a starter price. After about 3 weeks I would lower the price by almost 40-50%, that way the people who have seen it in the past 3 weeks see that, the item is going for well below it's regular price and they proceed to buy it out. This can be done with almost any high value item if it's rare and it isn't commonly seen at the Auction House. It might seem a little evil, but hey it's just smart thinking!

Mechano Hogs - Craft Them Before It's Too Late!

 Lately I've been wanting to focus on things that will have their value increased come cataclysm. Mechanohogs came up to mind as, not only are they semi low risk, but their prices could shoot up in the middle of Cataclysm. I have 2 sitting in my bank that are just itching to be sold, but they won't until 6 months into Cataclysm, where the materials required to craft them will have risen considerably.

But they have a fixed price!
This is very true and untrue. To make one hog, it requires at bare minimum 12.5k, then it also requires 12 titansteel bars, 2 artic furs and 40 cobalt bolts. I can make a chopper for around 13.8k on my server, that is with buying everything from the auction house.

What's the reasoning behind this!?!?!
Materials are currently in large stock, people are trying to dump as much stuff as possible before Cataclysm hits, so now is the right time to buy these cheap materials from the Auction House. Once Cataclysm hits, I expect the prices for everything that is related to Wrath Of The Lich King, to sky rocket. Why? People are going to be busy playing Cataclysm and therefore, Northrend will be close to empty, materials will not be as heavily available as they currently are.

This means you can craft a chopper for 13.5k-14k, hold onto it for several months and then later sell the chopper for who knows how much! I've got 2 choppers premade already, each crafted at 13.6k each, I expect to sell them at bare minimum price of 17-18k.

But people can farm the materials!

While this is true, not many people are willing to farm all that saronite ore just for a mount. Even then they would have to have several people to rely on ( Miners, Alchemists, Engineers ) to help them craft the final product to be used in making a single choppers.

Epic Gem Transmute Cooldown Removed - Easy Gold?

I just read on Mmo champion that epic gem transmutes cooldown will be gone once 4.0 hits the live servers. I know I will stockpile at least enough to craft up an easy 50-100 or so gems, seeing at I don't see gems dropping below 50g per ( the main cuts ), at least until cataclysm hits.

This gives people about a two week window where gems will drop in prices but if you manage to liquidate all of your stock before other people do there is little to no risk involved here. I will be crafting up at bare minimum 50 gems when 4.0.1 hits.

What are you guys thinking? Any thoughts or comments? Will you stockpile materials before 4.0?

Parrot Cage (Hyacinth Macaw) - An Item To Flip

Yesterday I saw a guy spamming in trade selling this pet, I instantly thought wow! that's the first time I've ACTUALLY seen this pet on my server! This pet normally goes for about 10-11k, so I asked if he would sell me the pet for 5k. He instantly said he'd gotten offers for 7k. So I thought that was that until about 30 minutes later he whispers me if I still wanted it for 5k. I instantly said yes, he COD'ed me the pet, an hour later I had it.

It was late at night so I decided not to start spamming trade, and just post on the auction house for 10,750g. I logged in this morning only to find the pet still on the auction house. I decided to go do my daily brewfest kill. I then decided to do my PVP daily, a few seconds after I queued I see, a buyer has been found for your Parrot Cage (Hyacinth Macaw). I was ecstatic, I instantly ran to AH and double checked!

Just comes to show, low balling people can sometimes turn out to become a huge profit. I made about 5k profit from this single flip, I was going to save this pet for cataclysm, but I decided to post it for 11k just for giggles and to my surprise it sold!

Primal Air Farming - Easy Gold For Engineers

I don't know how many people noticed that I transferred my Mage to horde side about a week or two ago, since then I've been trying to find ways to make money with engineering. I've found that farming Primal Air in Nagrand by using the Zapthrottle Mote Extractor is an excellent way to make gold! The place to farm them is in Nagrand, there are roughly 10-12 "clouds" that can be farmed.

What is this Zapthrottle Mote Extractor? Where do I get it?
The Mote extractor is a engineering device that "extracts" motes from Mini clouds that are all over Outlands and Northrend. To obtain the schematic, you have to go pick up a quest in Zangarmarsh. The quest can be started at Mack Diver, for the horde, and K. Lee Smallfry. The quest is fairly easy to do, it can be done in under 5 or even 10 minutes.

I have the schematic where do I go??
You are going to be flying around Nagrand. There are 10-12 clouds around that can be farmed continuously, especially since not many people know about the mote extractor. Click this map to view where the motes "spawn"

So why does primal air STILL sell? This stuff is from BC!

The main reason this stuff still sells is because people are doing the transmutation master quest, to either keep it and then drop it and changing it to elixir or potion spec, but either way, they need 5 of almost every primal that is available in Burning Crusade.

Another great reason this stuff still sells is because of the twink enchant, 15 agility to gloves. I must admit, not many people have this enchant but the few that do have it, are most definitely buying primal airs, rather than going out and farming them.

Argent Tournament Pets - What Will Become Of Them?

 I've been thinking.... man Wrath Of The Lich King was awesome... but it's coming to an end very quickly. I thought... what item is going to have a huge increase in price because it's farmed for in Wrath Of The Lich King and won't be farmed as heavily in Cataclysm? I instantly thought, the Argent Tournament Pets! These things will rise so much in value, because quite frankly, no one is going to farm these puppies come cataclysm!


So What's The Deal?
The Deal is that these things take ages to farm, even with doing everything, they are such a pain in the butt, I'm not even sure why they go for so low. Anyways, like I said  right now they are a pain to farm, so I suggest stocking up on these pets before cataclysm hits as you won't see many around. Their prices are going to rice, regardless, Not many people are going to go out of their way to farm these pets, so it's best to pick them up before hand.

How much do I buy then for?
I've started buying them for as low as 350g per pet. You might think WOW that's extremely low! They currently AH for about 600-700g, but people are so desperate to get rid of these pets, you'd be amazed how many bites you'd get if you spammed trade for 30 minutes.

I've also started trading the pets cross faction as they have a even higher markup value. I can easily push for 1500g per pet if they are of the opposite faction.

Hakkari Bijou Farming - Do It NOW!

People don't realise how close cataclysm is. Mmo Champion said the predicting November 2nd to be the release date. if that's the case, ZG's days are numbered ( well they have been for a bit now ). People are going NUTS for farming the Zanzalar tribe reputation before ZG departs, therefore the reputation items from the tribe are sky rocketing in prices. The time to get these items is NOW! They are seling for ridiculous high prices, and I can't imagine what they'll go for come Cataclysm.

So What's the Deal?

The main reputation item(s) are the Hakkari Bijou's. They gives 75 reputation per turn in, plus another 50 from the token you get for turning it in. That's 125 rep per Bijou. These things drop so much in ZG that if you were to go to Zg and farm the trash mobs you could easily walk out with several thousand gold, even more if the Tome of Polymorph: Turtle drops.

What About The Gold?

The gold here is AMAZING! The Bijou's drop so often that you could walk in here dirt poor and walk out filthy rich! The Bijou's currently AH for 35g on my server, and people are buying them in trade chat for 15-20g per. I farmed this place for about 35 minutes, and walked out with about 25 Bijou's, a bunch of coins, essences, dusts and greys.

So do I save them or sell them?

 It's personal opinion on this one. You could sell them now while people are freaking out about ZG being gone, or you could save them until a couple months after Cataclysms release and sell for even more gold than normal. That is if blizzard doesn't leave these puppies behind in the "new ZG questing zone"

Farming While An Engineer - You Read Right!

Alright, since I just faction changed my Mage I've found myself using cobalt frag bombs like crazy in battlegrounds. Cobalt bars have been going for crazy high prices that I'm not willing to spend money on. So I thought, hmmm I remember back when I got Jeeves there were these little gnomes in storm peaks that I could "skin" for engineer materials. I quickly flew over there and started mass pulling them ( 10-15 at a time ).


I was amazed at what materials they dropped, it was the exact mats needed to make the cobalt frag bombs, since then I was hooked. They have a change to drop 1-3 Volatile Blasting Triggers ( Each worth roughly 4-5g ) or 1-4 Hand Full Of Cobalt Bolts ( Each worth roughly 2-3g ).

I farmed these for about 25 minutes, and man I must say their respawn timer is short! I walked out of here with 4 greens, about 120g in pure vendor greys, 60 Volatile Blasting Triggers, and 42 Hand Full Of Cobalt Bolts. The greens got DE'ed and turned out to be an extra 56g, once the materials sold. I managed to sell the some Volatile Blasting Triggers at 4g per and the Hand Full Of Cobalt Bolts at 3.5g per. They also have a chance to drop relics of Ulduar, I walked out with about 50 of them, the markup on them isn't as big as they used to be, but they should still net some decent gold.

All in all, once these materials sell, I should make about 560g, for 25 minutes worth of work. Not bad considering that turns out to be about 1120g per hour. Please do keep in mind, you are only targeting a specific type of market ( engineers ) so the how fast you sell the materials is going to vary from server to server. I imagine it would be better for PVP servers as the cobalt frag bombs are amazing to use while BG'ing.

Enchant Weapon - Blood Draining - Huge Profits!

I ran an Ulduar 25 pug a couple weeks ago and was lucky enough to have this formula drop of heroic XT. Man am I glad I did! These things sell like hot cakes and the profit margins on it are HUGE!

[Formula: Enchant Weapon - Blood Draining] requires 4 abbyss crystals, one scarlet ruby and 40 infinite dust. I buy all the materials off the auction house and it costs me roughly 185-200g. I then put the enchant on a scroll and list them on the auction house for about 800-900g per scroll! Yeah that's right 700g PROFIT from 1 scroll!

The best thing about this enchant is that many tanks use this, therefore it sells pretty fast. Also since the formula is so rare, you'll rarely have competition. The profit margins are so high that even if you do have competition, and you undercut each other down to 500g, you're still making 300g from it!

Update about Me

I've managed to transfer my mage to horde side. Right now I only have Engineering and Enchanting to work with, but I do plan on leveling a DK along with my mage. Real life has taken up most of my time, so WoW and the blog have been pushed back.

I'm really liking horde side right now, I played a couple BG's and they all went smoothly, no bitching or complaining from anyone. Our alliance side of our server didnt even run GDKP, horde side has 1 guild that does. I instantly signed myself up. GDKP is a great way to earn gold, I don't need any gear besides a token, but with cataclysm nearing I'm not going to waste  my gold on something that will for sure get replaced in Cataclysm.

As for the blog, I need you help. Anything you wish to e-mail me about making gold would be great. Right now the way the blog work is I write up the next day's blog post the day before, and I do have some back up topics that I can post about, but the list is getting slimer and slimer. Any help with gold making tips would be appreciated!

Do your Dalaran Fishing Daily! - 20-150g in 5 minutes!

I'm not sure how many people realize how much gold you can net form this daily. The past 2 days I've done this daily, I've gotten 2 grey items, one which vendored at 25g and the other at 100g, all for under 5-10 minutes worth of work. It's an extremely easy daily to do, I even do my daily while watching a movie, yes, it's THAT simple. Trust me you won't regret it! You can even snag yourself 2 different pets!

How Much Time Are We Talking Here?

There are 5 different Dalaran Fishing Dailies. Only 2 of them require for you to travel 5 minutes. 2 of the dailies can be fished up in Dalaran, and the last one is a minute away from Dalaran ( Wintergrasp ).

Let's Talk Gold!

You're guaranteed at bare minimum 13g for completing the quest. On top of the 13g you get a bag that can contain tons of goodies, ranging from 25-150g. Some of the greys that you can grab vendor for 100g, others can go for 25g, or sometimes as little as a couple silver. You can also get lucky and get either a Waterlogged Recipe or Sealed Vial Of Poison. The Waterlogged Recipe fetches roughly 100g on my server, while the Sealed Vial Of Poison goes for about 45g. Sometimes you can net yourself an epic gem that's well worth 75g+, I must admit it's rare and I've only seen one.

If that's not enough, you can also snag yourself a some nice pets! The first one can be fished up in the Dalaran sewers while trying to complete the daily named Jewel Of The Sewers. The Second pet can be obtained from the bag received once you turn in the daily. I have both pets, and both of them required minimal effort, I'd say maybe a couple days of casual fishing is all that is required.

The past two days I've made roughly 160g from two dailies. I got one of the greys that vendors for 100g and another for 25g.

Profit From Cooks - Selling Materials For Cooking Daily.

There's good gold to be made here. The first thing I do once I get up is to the Dalaran Cooking Daily/Fishing Daily. The Second thing I do is run to the Auction House and buy the required meat for the Dalaran Cooking Daily. There's great gold to be made here, and no doubt it's extremely easy.

4 out of the 5 Dalaran Cooking Dailies require meat. 3 of those require 2-4 chilled meat, and the last one requires 4 Rhino meat. Both meats can be farmed with ease but they require flying for 2-8 minutes. 

Where To Farm

 

A great place to farm Rhino Meat is in Storm Peaks. Right around the Engine of Makers there are several Rhino Packs that are easy to chain pull and loot & then skin. I can generally pull a stack of meat in about 5 minutes. On top of the meat you also get leather! A great plus, If I must say.

As for farming chilled meat. I reccomend flying over to Scholozar Basin and farming Hardnuckle Foragers. They have roughly a 61% drop rate on the meat. They are easily chain pullable, and on top of this they are also great for skinners. This is by far one of the best spots to farm Chilled Meat & Borean Leather.

How much gold we talking here?

If you sell the meats in stacks of 2 & 4 ( Chilled Meat ) Or A stack of 4 ( Rhino Meat ), you're going to be making more gold than selling them in bulk. There is a stack of 4 chilled meat on the Auction House right now going for 6g. A stack of 4 Rhino Meat goes for 10g on my server. 

Both of the meats are great money makers. Especially the Rhino Meat. If you're a cook you can also sell the finished product required for the cooking daily, it might fetch for more than the raw meat.

Gold at Level 30 - 200-500g for Logging in!

 There is an easy way to make easy gold at level 30, and all you have to do is log into to your toon.

What you are doing is farming the Razzormaw Hatchling nest, which spawns roughly every 6-8 hours. What I have done is I grabbed an alt that currently isn't being leveled and parked him exactly where the next spawned. I then log in after ever server reset ( or try to ) and whenever I can to check if the nest is there.

I myself have snagged me about 3 of the pets. I've sold them as much as 560g each, and as low as 200g each. Either way it's pure profit for minutes worth of work.

If you also have mining ( as I do ), there are several Silver & Iron Nodes that I pick up. It's extra gold even if you don't get the pet. On top of all this, this is a great place to grind out a level or two, once at thirty. The Mobs drop tons of green which can be AH'ed, and there is also a rare spawn that has a chance to drop [Plans: Iron Counterweight]. These plans are worth quite a bit as they are an awesome BOA enchant for low levels.

My Level 15 Project - Gold At Low Levels.

Me on my level 15 priest showing off my bags :)

I recently started a little project of my own. I decided to level a priest from 1-15 and see how much gold I could acquire. I only payed for 2 Deadmines runs, which costed me 20g total, and everything else was quested. Most, if not all of the questing was done in Westfall, as this is an awesome place to earn gold & level at the same time By level 15 I had 187g in my bags, more than enough to suffice. Do keep in mind I did not use any professions while leveling, if I would of had , I would of made double the gold.

  

What Items Sold Best & Why

• Wool Cloth & Linen Cloth, both of these cloths were one of my biggest source of income. Wool cloth goes for 6-7g per stack, I usually grabbed about 5-6 stacks per paid deadmines run.

• "Of The Monkey" Gear, another great seller. Twinks are always looking for this type of gear, and they always have a high mark up.

• Low Level Potions, I sold several for a couple gold pieces, almost everyone wants the low level health potions as they are always handy.

• Boar Snouts, Flask of Oil, Okra, & Stringy Vulture Meat. These Items are used for a quest in Westfall. Not everyone has the patience to do quests that require things to drop, so they run to the auction house to see if there are any available.

•  Moss Agates, these are used for Jewelcrafting, they have a  high mark up value due to how rare they can be.

• Small Eggs, & Clam Meat. Both of these are low level cooking materials, they have a high mark up value. Easily farmed in Westfall.

Why these specific items sold

The reason most of the items sold is because they are either needed for quests, or are used for leveling professions at low levels. Either way level 80's are willing to pay top dollar for these low level materials, because they don't want to go out and waste their time farming these items. To most 80's, 5 gold is nothing, so they would rather buy something that's "cheap" instead of going out and spending their valuable time farming.

New Blog Layout - Lost Blog Roll

I've edited the site a little more. I will most likely be keeping this layout & color scheme.
I've lost my blog roll, so please if you would like for me to add you to my blog roll, then please just leave a comment and I will do so.

Borean Leather Scraps - Making Gold At Low Levels

Borean Leather Scraps are a great way for anyone to make some easy gold. I've picked up a stack for under 1g 50s, 1 stack makes 4 Borean leather, so 5 stacks of Borean Leather Scraps, makes 1 stack of regular Borean leather. You do not have to an leatherworker to convert them, you simply right click them, and they will convert.

By using this method you can buy Borean Leather at 7.5g per stack. You can then turn around and sell that stack of Borean leather at 15-20g. It's easy & reliable profit, especially for those low leveled people. You can nearly triple your 7-8g if that's all the starter gold you have.

Field Repair Bots 74A - Making Gold With Engineering

The Bot Itself :)

A lot of people don't realize that bots can be sold for huge amounts of profit. I love making these repair bots for about 15-20g ea and selling them for almost quadruple it's price.

Making one repair bot requires 16 thorium bars, and 2 fused wiring. Both of these items are easy to obtain, and they're also very very cheap. The reason I sell this repair bot is because it is a required material to craft, Jeeves. I can push for 180 each on these things, even on bad days I can sell them for ~80-90g each. It's crazy and easy profit.


The Schematic is picked up from some plans inside BRD. Look at the map to the right. If you do not have the key, then I suggest you obtain it. It's really easy and takes no time. If you are too lazy and you are also a blacksmith, bring some Large Seaforium Charges, which will do the trick. A rogue can also Lock Pick the doors.

The downside to selling these is that you're targeting only a specific group of people, which makes this market very limited. Even if limited, trust me they sell, and often. I craft roughly 20 a week, and by the end of the week they're usually all gone. Like I said before, not many people know that you can actually post these bots up on the auction house, therefore the market is rather easy to control and you shouldn't have problems with flooding the market.

Quiff - The Magical Goblin

Quiff Needs to Eat Sometimes!

I Love Quiff. He's the best goblin I've ever met. I sit down and have lunch with him sometimes. We had a lovely picnic last night!

Quiff is an engineer vendor in Netherstorm. I love coming to him. He has a VERY value thing in his possesion that I'm ALWAYS in need of. Khorium Power Core. This thing can be bought for 4g 80s and resold for roughly 250g+

Be warned the core is a rare spawn item so you might not catch it on your first or second try. If you're an goblin engineer, then build the dimensional ripper to Area 52, and use it EVERY cooldown. Why? Because those 10 seconds of teleporting there and having lunch with Quiff, might net you an easy 250g.

While I'm here I also pick up the pets that are unlimited in supply. His name is Dealer Rashaad and sells 8 pets. I buy them and mail them off to my bank alt where they're posted at pretty good amounts of profit. Just be careful to not flood the market with them, as if you do, you might end up selling them for less than what you bought the pet for.

Quick Update About Myself & ZG

A giant rooster! <3

Man this week has been crazy! I made 300k dealing with TCG mounts. I dropped my raiding guild and joined a different one. I've been farming ZG to hell ( or have been trying to ). Crazy crazy week!

I've been farming ZG until everything is cleared. Currently I am just trying to get exalted with the Zandalar Tribe, but after that I plan on just grabbing everything I possibly can... you never know what it might be worth later down the road.  Sadly I do not have either of the mounts as of yet... :(

I got my magical rooster egg! It only costed me the low low... extra super duper special price of 100k.... :D I don't really mind spending so much on a mount... I've wanted it ever since it came out. I only know of 2 people on my server who has this mount, so I like to show it off :)

I finally decided to stop raiding. It's just not worth it anymore. The gear you get from Icecrown Citadel is pointless. It's going to be replaced within a week of cataclysms release. I've joined a guild that does guild events & achievements. To be honest ICC is just old content and the guild I was in refused to even step into Ruby Sanctum.

Tome Of Polymorph Turtle - Profit Down The Road

I read about how ZG isnt going to be there come cataclysm so I instantly said to myself, what can I snatch out of these before cataclysm? I instantly thought about the mounts... how they are going to become so rare... and then it hit me. [Tome of Polymorph: Turtle]. !

Now a days this tome can go for 1-2k, which I think is extremely cheap investment for something that can go for 10-20k come Cataclysm.
 The Tome itself is dropped from a boss inside of ZG, Gahz'ranka. I myself have never tried to kill him but I assume he's soloable by most classes, and it will be very easy with two or more people there.

I picked up a tome for 1,000 gold today, I sent it to my bank alt and just put it into my guild bank. I expect the prices to sky rocket once ZG is officially gone and those who kept the tomes will have made several thousand gold. I know I will be keeping at bare minimum one tome for at least a year or two before i try to sell it off, only because as time goes by they'll become scarce.