How do I get Recipe: Vial of the Sands? The alchemy drake mount!

After much research I think I may have found out the topic I have been looking for. (PLEASE NOTE: the drake and recipe or BoP as of the recent hotfix on Dec.17, 2010. It is no longer BoE.)

How do I get the drake mont from alchemy?

Well couple of things you need to know. First, it is VERY exspensive and rightfully so. Its a mount that can carry a friend. And second, you need to find the recipe.

Well, you ask, how much is it? Where is the recipe?

Price

Pyrium-Laced Crystalline Vial (1x5000g)
Vendor Item - "Sold only by Yasmin in Uldum"
Sands of Time (8x2700g)
Vendor Item
Truegold (12)

• Pyrium Bar (3)
  

  • Pyrite Ore (2) OR {Elementium Bar (4) + Volitile Earth (4) }
• Volitile Fire (10)
• Volitile Air (10)
• Volitile Water (10)

Flask of the Winds (8)

• Volatile Life (6)
• Azshara's Veil (12)
• Whiptail (12)
• Crystal Vial

Flask of Titanic Strength (8)

• Volatile Life (6)
• Cinder Bloom (12)
• Whiptail (12)
• Crystal Vial

Deepstone Oil (8)

• Albino Cavefish

~~~ TOTALS ~~~
Pyrium-Laced Crystalline Vial x1
Sands of Time x8
Albino Cavefish x6
Crystal Vial x16
Whiptail x192
Cinder Bloom x96
Azshara's Veil x96
Volatile Life x96
Volitile Fire x120
Volitile Air x120
Volitile Water x120
Pyrite Ore x72 OR {Elementium Bar x144 + Volitile Earth x144}

Time costs:

• 35+ hours leveling/searching archy in order to hit max and find the pattern in uldum.
• 10+ hours herbing to level alch/produce the flasks and violatiles involved.
• 2 hours fishing to get the fish for the deepstone pots

Gold costs/opportunity costs:

• 29k vendor mats
• 16k+ in Truegold (Just post launch prices)
• 2k in flasks
• 160g in oil
• 10 blown transmute cooldowns (around 5.5k gold on my server at the bare minimum)
• unable to sell truegolds for 5k+ first day of expansion.

so just taking these base costs I put my grand total at:

• 52,660 Gold
• if I add Gold per hour opportunity cost from my farmer ( around 500g/hour on average) in order to accuire the pattern/craft it.
• 76,160 Gold!  (taken from WarcraftEcon)

So as you can see, this is very exspensive. Now one thing to note. If you are a goblin, vendor items will less exspensive due to the goblin racial. Also, once your guild reaches level 24, you will then rescieve an additional 10% discount. (It wont be for a while till your guild reaches that level due to the blizzard guild level mechanics.)


Recipe Discovery

The Recipe: Vial of the Sands is found through "discovery". Now what does that exactly mean? Well if you played BC or WotLK like I did, it typically mean some sort of research you level throgh leveling alchemy. There is always a random chance to learn a random recipe. The cool down on the research is usually long so it could take days or weeks before you discover the recipe since its random. In catayclsm though, THIS IS NOT THE CASE!!! You will not find out Recipe: Vial of the Sands through Alchemy.

Recipe: Vial of the Sands is found through ARCHAEOLOGY!!

(PLEASE NOTE: It says it in the Quick Facts. "Smart loot: Only available to players that have the profession and don't already have the recipe." You have to be an alchemist to discover this recipe.)

You need to be at least 450 archaeology and in Uldum/Tol'vir.
(see the short guide below)

A Handy Guide for those who haven't started Archaeology:

• Training Arch allows you to see Dig Sites on the two old world continents.
• There will always be 4 Dig Sites on a continent at any given time
• Once you mine out a dig site it respawns at a randomly selected location on that continent
• The Canopic Jar that drops this recipe is completed from Tol'vir Digsites
• Tol'vir dig sites are only in Uldum, and require a skill of 450 to spawn
• There are 4 Tol'vir dig sites and 52 across all of Kalimdor, meaning when you mine out a Kalimdor dig site it has a 1/13 chance of spawning a Tol'vir dig site which contain 9 or 12 fragments
• There are 6 common Tol'vir artifacts requiring 45 fragments each to complete, you will not be able to get repeats until you've completed them all once
• The Canopic Jar has a, currently unknown, % chance to drop the recipe. Most reports are of people not getting it on the first or second try, so likely less than 50%

So, what does this mean? Well, pick you Archaeology and start saving money. My plan is to start creating my mats and saving money. Find the recipe and create the mount when my guild reachs level 24. It will cost less and I am not in need of the mount right away.

Good luck to all! Hope this helps. As always, if I am off on any of my reseach please inform me.