How Profitable Is "The Shuffle"?

[MyLifeIsRandom]

I'm speaking of the jewelcrafting, alchemy(transmutation master) and enchanting "shuffle" that involves using the three professions to maximize profit off of ore. You prospect on the Jewelcrafter, cut gems when profitable, make accessories when profitable and if not, things go to the other two professions. The Alchemist transmutes gems into blues and metas, and the Enchanter disenchants accessories that are worth more as enchanting materials. There's also the benefit of the Alchemist being able to transmute Trillium and Living Steel if you've taken mining.

The problem is, this takes preferably three characters and quite a bit of ore farming. It's not as straight and simple as say, mining and blacksmithing. There you just gather the materials for blacksmithing via mining, and provided there's a market for your craft, you make gold. Though, the "shuffle" seems to hold the benefit of also allowing you to be able to have your own gems, potions, elixirs, flasks and enchants ready to go whenever you need them. There's more value in those three professions, in my opinion, because everyone can benefit the same from them as opposed to, say, a Warrior with tailoring.

Has anyone had the "shuffle" going for Mists of Pandaria? Has it been profitable? Is it worth the time and effort, sans obvious market differences?

[Villafranca]

I would buy ghost iron ore off the AH or in trade for 35g or less a stack prospect it, craft the accessories and AH blues/DE greens. When I started I had 1000g, I finished with 100,000g about 3 weeks later, did it about 3 times a week and spent all I had on ore. The hardest part was prospecting all of it, it took a while.

ps, my alt was a enchanter, so I did it with just JC/Chanting....some times I had a guild mate transmute gems into primal diamonds.

[tidus4eva]

I use the shuffle to make my money and I did 100 stacks of Ghost Iron Ore every day for a month. I bought the ore for between 30-50g per stack (sometimes as low as 15g) and my final profits per day came to around 10-15k on average. After I finished the month I had made nearly 400k, spending only around 50k only on ore. I am on a low population server, and there aren't many auctions per day there, I nearly had 10% of the AH was my postings.

On my realm, it was definitely profitable, I looked on the AH of my old realm at the same time and ores on that server were selling for double what I was paying, and gems and enchanting materials were almost half what I was selling for, I would have made a loss on that realm, which was a high population server (it might be different now, I did this back in Nov/Dec)

I still do the shuffle today, but I have everything I need to buy with gold, so I do it once or twice weekly now

EDIT: I did it on my JC/Ench alt, I only used 1 character, and *Occasionally* sent mats over to make Primal Diamonds on my other alt with Alch, but I only did this about 3 times (I could have made more, but I was already rolling in cash so I was lazy)

My starting budget was 5k

[Lanthanum]

I do it but not frequently. I have all of the professions covered across my characters, some in duplicate, so it is not difficult to move things around between them.

I am on a high population realm so in general most things are on the cheaper side. I am having a problem shifting gems at the moment. I think it is due to the pre-patch lull. Everything enchanting related though is doing a lot better. All of the rings and necks that I DE get converted to dusts and essences and then I either sell the mats or the enchants depending on the prices on the AH.

I turn a profit but it is nothing to write home about. The greater the effort, the bigger the reward.