Passive/boring vs. fun/interesting talents

#0 - Jan. 29, 2010, 12:39 p.m.

So we all (or most of us) know that Blizzard wants to remove the boring/passive talents and replace them with fun/interessting talents in Cataclysm. Examples Blizzard used: Warrior's Warbringer and Priest's Body and Soul.

After looking over the talents of my mainchar (a hunter) I realized: Thats a f***ing big load of work.

For example the Beast Mastery-Tree: (Please remember: I don't judge the talents about usefulnes in the current patch-state/game but only on my opinion if they are fun/interesting or passive/boring)
[If you are from the TL;DR-faction you can skip to "a little recap"]

Tier 1:
Imp. Aspect of the Hawk - Somewhat interessting because it is a proc. But technically a flat, boring, passive dmg increase.
Endurance Training - Passive and Boring
Tier 2:
All 4 talents are passive and boring
Tier 3:
Again all 3 talents are passive and boring.
Tier 4:
Imp. Mend Pet - Adds a new functionality to Mend Pet so it is somewhat interessting.
Ferocity - Passive and boring
Tier 5:
Intimidation - Yay! A new ability! It also lets you do something you couldn't before (stun someone). Fun and interessting!
Spirit Bond + Bestial Discipline - Boring and Passive
Tier 6:
Animal Handler - Somewhat interesting I think, I doesn't add additional functionality to an ability but at least it makes Master's Call a lot more useful. The second part of the talent is passive and boring, again.
Frenzy - Passive and boring
Tier 7:
Bestial Wrath - Fun! But not that interesting. Technically it is mostly, only a temporary dmg buff for your pet
Fericious Inspiration - Somewhat interesting because it lets you provide a raidbuff, but this raidbuff is only a flat dmg increase.
Catlike Reflexes - Mixed Bag. On the one side we have a cooldown shortening part, which at least lets you press more buttons. And again a passive and boring part
Tier 8:
2 passive and boring talents
Tier 9:
The beast within - Fun and interesting, because it changes the way an ability works and provides you with new combat options.
Longevity and Cobra Strikes - Passive and boring
Tier 10:
Kindred Spirits - Passive and boring
Tier 11:
Beast Mastery - Interesting because it provides you with new Pet options and new possibilties with your pet spec. For me it is at least temporary fun because going all pokemon on exotics is a nice chance of flow. But in the end it is somewhat boring.

A little recap:
We have 9 talents that are at least a little interessting and 17 talents that are passive and boring.
And thats only 1 talent-tree of 30.
If the ratio passive/boring to fun/interesting is similar in the other trees then omfg (and it is). I really don't think that Blizzard will nearly accomplish their goal to remove (the most) passive/boring talents.

Now for the discussion part of this topic:
Do you think Blizzard will accomplish the goal of removing the passive/boring talents?
Look over a talent-tree of your favorite class and try to find examples of fun/interesting talents and passive/boring ones. And if you want to be creative: recreate an existing passive/boring talent into a fun/interesting talent.
(A fun and interesting talent would for example change the way an existing ability/spell works. Again some Blizzard examples: Body and Soul adds a movement-buff to PW:S, Warbringer lets you charge in Combat, Lock and Load makes your rotation more interesting by temporary removing the cooldown of an ability).

Oh, and sorry for my bad english :-/

#3 - Feb. 1, 2010, 4 p.m.

I think this thread is a good place to highlight a few things in regards to our plans on changing the talent trees in Cataclysm.

All talent trees will be changed in Cataclysm so that there will be less emphasis on valuable but boring talents that only provides passive increases to damage or healing. Basically we want to make the fun niche and utility talents more available and attractive by making them feel less expensive. We will most surely still see "cookie cutter" builds in cataclysm, but there should be fewer "mandatory" talents in those builds, which will allow you to spend more points elsewhere.

Some talent trees will see considerable changes, whereas others will see fewer changes, but it is not our intent to remove old favourites or completely change the focus of the trees. You will have to rethink your builds for sure, but you should still be able to easily identify the purpose of the different trees just like you can today.

We will also be looking into streamlining the trees a little more in order to avoid things like for an example Warlocks having two conflicting range increasing talents, and some trees will as a result of this get completely new abilities. These new abilities are of course in addition to the new level 81+ abilities.

We have no plans to deepen the talent trees though, so the 5 additional talent points you will get for the new levels will instead provide some interesting opportunities for previously unseen builds, such as being able to place 51 points in one talent tree and 21 points in another.