Talent Points

[Sakura Moon]

I did a search about talent points, but didn't find exactly what I was looking for in regards to doing a respec on a character.

I am curious about the cost for each respec point. I understand that it goes up for each one, but what does the cost start at and by how much does it increase with each additional point?

I also read earlier (if I understood it correctly) that when you unlearn a talent point, you have to pay to learn to use it again. Is this referring to paying with gold, or do you get the actual points back when you unlearn them and use those to "pay" for learning them as you do the first time?

An example perhaps would be a character at level 40 or 45 doing a complete respec - about how much would that cost total?

[clevins]

You don't pay by the point... what happens is that you pay to unlearn all of your talents, so you start with a fresh slate and have all of your points to reallocate.

This is done at your class trainer (they all have an "I want to unlearn my talents..." option. Cost starts at 1g and goes to (I think, it's been awhile) 2g, 5g, 10g, 15, 20...

If you don't respec for a bit, the cost goes back down, one increment per month (again IIRC).

Unless you messed something up badly, I'd not respec a bunch at lower levels - maybe try each of the trees (if you're a mage, Fire, Frost and Arcane). Find a good class guide and see what each tree is thought to be best for (PvP, soloing, etc), fit it to your playstyle and have fun.

Oh, and respec costs top out at 50g

[Baboon]

You have also have to relearn spell (all ranks) if they are talented. For example if you spec out of shadow as a priest and back in, you have to learn all ranks of Mind Flay again.

[Gorny]

If I remember right the first respec is 1G, the second 5G, and it increases by 5G each time you respec, not counting the cost of relearning skill ranks of of abilities that are granted through talents. The max cost of respec is 50g.

As of patch 1.1 the cost will decay over time between respecs, to 15G.

Don't panic! Players have the ability to unlearn all their talents and start over. Your Class Trainer, for a modest fee (increases by 5 each use, to a maximum 50 , however the first time you do this you will only be charged 1 , a freebie of sorts), will let you recover all Talent Points spent up to this point. You can then reassign all your points. Keep in mind that all points are removed from ALL trees, and you'll also unlearn higher ranks of the spells achieved through a talent point expenditure. Fortunately, higher ranks of so-called Talent spells are extremely cheap in comparison to normal class spells.

Since patch 1.11 there is a decay in the cost of such talent respecs:

The cost to unlearn talents will now decay over time. This cost will be reduced by a rate of 5 gold per month to a minimum of 15 gold.

[Sakura Moon]

Okay, so when you unlearn talents from the class trainer it also removes all the skills you learned from them as you leveled up? You have also have to relearn spell (all ranks) if they are talented.How can you tell which skills are talented?

[Gorny]

Okay, so when you unlearn talents from the class trainer it also removes all the skills you learned from them as you leveled up? How can you tell which skills are talented?

Not quite.

When you unlearn at a trainer you unlearn all skills granted through talent points and any and all ranks of talent granted skills that have extra ranks granted through a trainer.

For example in the Mage Talent Tree(s) here: http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/info/classes/mage/talents.html?0000000000000000000000000000000000000000000002330320313235013001051

I have sunk random points into the Ice Tree in order to grant the following skills: Ice Block and Ice Barrier and Summon Water Elemental.

Lets say you were using that as part of your talent spec, when you respec, all of your talent points become unspent again and you will lose the skills I mentioned. In ordder to gain the use of them again you need to put points into them again and also rebuy any extra ranks of that skill from a trainer.

You can tell what is granted through training from a vendor versus what you get via talent points easily. Everything that is granted by talents is only gained from spending points in one of your talent trees. You can't by talent abilities (not counting extra ranks) from a trainer.

Everything that is available from a trainer is shown on the list from your trainer, but that list is usually filtered there's a filtering option in the trainer's window to show you all trainable skills - the ones you can't learn yet are tinted red naturally.

Mage skills are listed here, they are available in different ranks from trainers, and are not gained via talent point spending, but talents will enhance them for sure.
http://wow.incgamers.com/wiki/Category:Mage_Skills

[Sakura Moon]

When you unlearn at a trainer you unlearn all skills granted through talent points and any and all ranks of talent granted skills that have extra ranks granted through a trainer.Oh, okay. Then the talent points spent are unlearned along with those ranked skills required to use them and will have to be relearned. Makes more sense now.

[nidanone]

I'm kind of new, but from what I read, at level 10 is when you earn a talent point per level, and these talent points go towards learning new talents.. ok I get that part..

but, I'm level 10 now, I just spend my first talent point, but when I go to a trainer I'm able to "buy" some more training, I'm not in front of the game right now so I don't remember exactly what was there, but I seem to recall it being a 'Combat' category in green.

is that a new feature or am I confused?



Also, at one trainer it shows in green that I can pay to learn the Bow, but it says I need bows... but I don't have one.. it seems I can still learn it though... should I learn it now or wait until I have a bow?

[clevins]

Ah.. skills vs talents...

Skills are something that every toon of a given class can learn. To use your example, classes can learn certain weapon types like daggers, swords, bows, etc. All you need to do is pay the trainer when you're at the appropriate level. Another skill type you'll get are base abilities, e.g. Backstab, Sinister Strike, etc. Skills are common across all toons of a given class - all rogues can learn Backstab for example.

Some abilities have ranks - you get Rank 1 the first time, as you level you might be offered the option to train Rank 2, 3, etc. Higher ranks are more powerful versions of the talent.

In contrast, talents (the items in the 3 trees) are ways to customize your character by emphasizing certain aspects over others. You have a maximum of 61 talent points, but there are far more than 61 points in the 3 talent trees. You can't get every talent in all 3 trees - you don't have enough points. So, what you do is to pick a style that you like and put points in that tree, perhaps with points in one or both of the other trees.
Sometimes the talents improve your skills, e.g. Improved Sinister Strike. Other times the talents aren't related to a skill, but do other things for you... for example, give you a chance to have something happen to the mob or to yourself. If you're unsure of how to spend your talent points, hit the class forums here and see if there's a guide for levelling builds.

An excellent rogue guide was written by Osiris - it's not yet on the forums, but is on Google Docs - http://docs.google.com/View?docid=dt4f32p_4dcj7jt&pli=1.

[nidanone]

Thanks, yes I'm using that guide for my talents, I guess I was confused of the different between skills and talents (thank you for explaining :)

and so I was afraid that selecting a certain skill would affect my talent choices, but I see now that it won't.

So basically anything in GREEN in the skills that are avaialble for me to learn I should just pay and learn it right?

[clevins]

If you won't short yourself for gold, yes. One thing about weapons... your skill starts at 1. So if you learn, say, Bows, buy a bow (or get one from a quest, etc) and buy some arrows and then use it to pull mobs... your skill will rise. If you then get a nice gun as a reward and go train guns... your skill will start at 1 again. In that case, go back to a lower zone where the mobs are easy and shoot a bunch of stuff with the gun to skill up without risk.

But, yes, train everything - all the weapon types etc. That way if you get a good drop or reward, you have the skill already.

[Gorny]

I'm kind of new, but from what I read, at level 10 is when you earn a talent point per level, and these talent points go towards learning new talents.. ok I get that part..

but, I'm level 10 now, I just spend my first talent point, but when I go to a trainer I'm able to "buy" some more training, I'm not in front of the game right now so I don't remember exactly what was there, but I seem to recall it being a 'Combat' category in green.

is that a new feature or am I confused?



Also, at one trainer it shows in green that I can pay to learn the Bow, but it says I need bows... but I don't have one.. it seems I can still learn it though... should I learn it now or wait until I have a bow?

I'm guessing you are a Rogue, they have the Combat Talent Tree.

I'm thinking you might be a bit confused, maybe I can sort you out a bit. Anyways when you go to a trainer, in this case, your Class Trainer, you will be able to learn new skills at every even level. These will be shown in green and be divided in subcatagories between the three talent trees (For Rogues it's Assassination, Combat, and Subtlety). These are the skills you learn and will be using from day to day while you level, but not all of them are for fighting.

When you mentiones seeing bows available in green, I think you were at a weapon trainer or Weapon Master as they are called. I'm not sure if you are Horde or Alliance, but if you saw bows as trainable then you were either in Darnassus and were at Ilyenia Moonfire who is a Weapon Master and trains bows, or you were Horde and in Valley of Honor; Orgrimmar and in front of Hanashi, who is the Horde's bow training Weapon Master. As far as not having a bow, you can still train to use a bow and not have one yet - this is true of any wepon that your class can train for. All you need to do to get a bow is visit a Bowyer or go buy one from the Auction House. Arrows are also sold both from certain vendors and on the AH.

Since you said you remember the combat catagory in green, I'm also thinking that there were (currently) no other skills that you could learn in other catagories (Assassination and Subtlety) at your current level. The Class trainers have an option to show everythigg that you can't currently train in in red - look for a filter in the upper part of the class trainer's windo to toggle this.

The Talent Tree's are used to specialize your characters abilities, for more information on Rogue Talents, visit this thread (http://wow.incgamers.com/forums/showthread.php?t=373315) in the Rogue Forum. It's a good start.

[nidanone]

Thanks, yes that helps.

I honestly haven't come across any bows or arrows yet... and if I have to purchase the arrows I'm wondering how useful that will be... does it make sense not to spend money on a skill if you don't think you'll use it much? (i.e. bows). Although.. I was in a group with someone yesterday, he was also kind of new, but he had a bow and he was able to reach mobs a lot further away than I could throwing my dagger... decisions, decisions...


Yes I'm a rogue, alliance side.


Thanks again
Nidanone

[clevins]

Honestly, I'd only use a ranged weapon for the stats. There's a ranged weapon type called Thrown. No ammo needed, you just need a thrown weapon (throwing knives, shuriken etc). Some ranged weapons have stats (+agi etc) that you get when you equip them... those are nice. In general I'd not spend a lot of effort on ranged - as long as you can pull mobs, you're fine and all ranged can do that.

If the person you were with was a hunter they have a 41 yard range to shoot - just different from us.

[Gorny]

I'm kind of new, but from what I read, at level 10 is when you earn a talent point per level, and these talent points go towards learning new talents.. ok I get that part..

but, I'm level 10 now, I just spend my first talent point, but when I go to a trainer I'm able to "buy" some more training, I'm not in front of the game right now so I don't remember exactly what was there, but I seem to recall it being a 'Combat' category in green.

is that a new feature or am I confused?



Also, at one trainer it shows in green that I can pay to learn the Bow, but it says I need bows... but I don't have one.. it seems I can still learn it though... should I learn it now or wait until I have a bow?

You'll mostly use ranged weapons to pull one monster away from a pack. I should also mention that you will do this more often (if at all) while playing solo, and not so much in a group or in PvP. While in a group, the Hunter or maybe Warrior will pull. You should be able to equip a bow at level 10, and there are bows that you can use at level 6. So check the Auction House or a weapon vendor (Bowyer) to buy one and arrows for it.

You can learn it now, or wait till you buy a bow, it's up to you and doing either will not hurt you in any way.