For something like 5g? If it speeds up my questing, it’s worth more than that. 
…That sounds confusing since the Herb/Alc would work better on one character while the other could also do Enchanting. O.o
I already mentioned that; some people don’t have the time or the energy to actually do all of that farming, instead just being able to log in for a dungeon or two before what they still had in the tank fizzles out. I’m actually an example of that, really; doing one or two dungeons after work gets me closer to the goals I have, but because I don’t have the ability to focus long enough to do much more than that unless it’s a day off, the only thing keeping me from being gatekept out of raiding in general, much less GDKPs where tens of thousands can get thrown around, is my unwillingness to engage with a system I see as inherently flawed from the start.
To offer an example, take FFXIV; with the way the Job System is set up, the highest tiers of armor currently in the game (weapons aren’t relevant since changing that changes your Class/Job) are usable by multiple classes depending on the type of armor it is, so the relevance sticks around longer; even if a tier gets added that’s Job-specific, those are still useful anyway since another Job can use them to get to THEIR next item, unlike WoW where the second something better comes along, the old piece is either disenchanted, sold, or just tossed entirely. The thing no one seems to really think about too much that I’ve been mentioning is that the enchants/gems only apply to a single item that gets removed once it’s replaced, making any resources put into them wasted.
I’ll spend some money to get crafting mats off of the AH or something (that Belt of Blasting lasted until not just 80, but raising my Tailoring high enough to make 187 armor) if it’s going to make something worthwhile or furthering some goal I have, but slightly improving a single item I have in order to do something where a major goal is replacing that item, losing whatever I just spent or made in the process, is anathema to me…so the only recourse is to give the entire system the finger and do my own thing.
That and the Vortexes, really. I was a Tailor already so the Netherweave was already sitting around, this character itself was either still in Azeroth or unmade at the time so the Fire was something I had to essentially buy all of since farming went nowhere fast (I was also in some terrible mental health at the time thanks to a third-shift job that I can’t describe here, so focus was out the window even more than it currently is), I didn’t have a Mining character at a high enough level to matter, and I think I’d just put together the money for Epic Flying not long before that, so I had maybe a few hundred bucks in my wallet.
I also didn’t figure out that a good source of Motes of Fire was the Nethercite Ore in Shadowmoon Valley (found that out in Retail very recently, actually) so there’s that too.
…Also, WoW’s far from the only game I spend time playing, especially since the ingame playerbase is well…mostly #$%#heads, so not something someone with an already-low social battery is going to be able to interact with for long.
