Since the talent trees for the current version of the Cataclysm beta are available on wowtal.com, I have decided to have a closer look at the talents, and comment a little on what I’d potentially pick and choose.
As a small disclaimer, since I do not have Beta access currently, the comments are based on the information available to me. If some of my assumptions are wrong, I humbly apologise and will correct any errors I’m made aware of.
1. Balance
With things as they are right now, a 32/0/5 (+4) build seems like the logical choice. The remaining 5 points will be distributed according to preference, with some strong contenders being:
- Owlkin Frenzy:attacks done to you while in Moonkin form have a 5/10/15% chance to cause you to go into a Frenzy, increasing your damage by 10%, cause you to be immune to pushback while casting Balance spells. Lasts 10 seconds.
During WOTLK, this talent has been affected by inconsistency. Initially, it would proc from any attack that hit the druid – including environmental damage, aoe, and hits by adds. In following patches, it was changed to not do so on a per fight basis – thus being reduced to a mostly pvp talent. The potential is immense – if, in Cataclysm, it is returned to its initial state, and procs from any successful attacks, it would make for a significant dps boost for a raiding Balance druid. However, having to test whether the aoe during every single boss fight would proc Owlkin Frenzy does strike me as a waste of time. - Solar Beam: you summon a beam of solar light over the enemy target’s location, interrupting the enemy target and silencing all enemy targets under the beam within 10 yards while it is active. Lasts for 10 seconds.
In its current incarnation, this is purely a pvp talent(and a mediocre one at that). While a targeted aoe silence does sound useful at first glance, the long cooldown and the fact that it does not lock the school of the spell being cast make it situational at best. I would personally love to see a damage component added, the cooldown lowered or a spell lock added(or, alternatively, the range being made wider than 10 yards, so the time the target spends running is equal to the time they’d be silenced from a counterspell, from example).
Of course, I would be happy to see a boss fight with multiple adds that need to be silenced at once, where this particular spell would be extremely useful. Time will tell. - Natural Shapeshifter: reduces the cost of all shapeshifting by 30%
Again, this is a very situational(and, I assume, not used enough to reap any significant rewards) talent. I can’t think of any case in which we would need to change forms during a fight. Unless, of course, Blizzard decides to make me eat my words by introducing a fight with lots of frost novas, roots and any other snares.
2. Restoration
The build I came up with is a 8/0/32(+1) build. That one point baffles me at the moment, simply because none of the talents it would go into would potentially bring any benefit during raids.
As a very cursory first impression, I have to say that, even though the trees have been pruned, they still look very fleshed out. There are talents that buff important spells and give us new mechanics to work with. They bring a palpable benefit to the player, regardless of play style or experience. As I’ve said before, whether these (so far) exciting changes will be received positively or not will depend mostly on how well Blizzard implements the core mechanics of the specs – Eclipse and Tree of Life.
