Was World of Warcraft gold drops nerfed while I wasn't looking?

It has been a long, long time since I last played World of Warcraft. Back when fast land mounts were 1000 gold training and You had to "run the gauntlet" as we called it in my former guild to get between Night Elf starting lands and the rest of the alliance starting lands...

Basically, back before Burning Crusade had even been released. But that's enough reminiscing for now.

My question is this: Was the money drop rate nerfed since then? I realize things change over time. Especially over the course of nearly 3 expansions now... But I seem to recall being able to go down to Silithis, running just west of town, and killing the humanoid enemies there for anywhere from 1 to 5 gold each. I just went back there to build up a bit of money (I gave all my gold away before I quit last time), and was quite disappointed by the results.

So, was it nerfed since then, or is my memory just being wishful?

Solution 1:

I don't think money rates have been nerfed in general. Although, I think some mobs in various places (including Silithus) have been made non-elite, when they were formally elite, and as such, their drop values have probably been lowered. It does depend on which mobs you're referring to, and I think that, for the most part, things are the same.

Solution 2:

Small correction: while the other answers are right that money rates have not changed generally, there have been various cases where specific mobs had their monetary drops nerfed after changes to the level cap spoiled the balance between risk and reward.

For example, the original level 60 version of Onyxia originally dropped around 180 gold, but this was changed to 50 much later when she had become soloable. Similarly, the the Ghostly Philanthropists in Karazhan dropped ~12 gold when the content was current, but now drop no gold at all. This tends to happen any time outdated content becomes a target for high level players because the rewards outshine the difficulty, so the same thing could certainly have happened to the mobs the questioner is asking about.