Just to clarify how much of a difference it is form current talent trees, all tree will be reduced in half by size, to allow for 31 point talent max.
I made a summery of the most important points of the change below, you can read the complete official announcement on the Cataclysm official blizzard official announcement page.
WHY?
The main idea of the changes is to be able to cut off and throw away all the mandatory boring talents (such as increased X% for damage done) .
The changes will also be less confusing for new players, and will be more "leveling friendly"
Blizz made a nice compared the new thinned down talent trees to a menu of a good restaurant:
The best restaurants are not necessarily those with a lot of entrees on the menu. The best restaurants probably have very few choices, but you know that anything you order will be great. They don't bother cooking it if they know it will suck. That's a real choice as opposed to the diner with fish on the menu that everyone, ever the waitress, whispers under their breath that you should never, ever order.HOW?
- Talent trees are cut down in half. The deepest talent will be 31 point talent available at level 70.
- Players will receive a new talent point to allocate every 2 levels or so, instead of the current talent per level system
- When reaching level 10 players will need to chose a talent tree role and stick with it, prior to allocating their first point on the tree.
- This will lock down the other two tree for points allocation until level 70, and will instantly grant the players passive bonuses that will grow with level according to their chosen role (like the mastery system that is being changed as well).
- Because the other 2 trees will be locked, a lot of a current deep tree talents will be available the players either in the mowers talent levels, or as part of the level 10 bonuses they passively chose when choosing role.
- For example: dual wielding for enhancement shamans.
- Dual speccing will remain the same
- None of the current "Cool" talents is going away in Cataclysm.
- For more example and info check out the blizzard official announcement page
