Cataclysm - items and stats

Hi all,
Sorry for the delay between posts but its been, as usual, a heck of a week. Work, the guild and life in general, always seem to find a way to change my plans.
This installment is from the Blizzcon Class Items & Professions Panel discussion. The biggest piece of news to come from this panel was the change in item statistics. In game items will no longer have the following stats on them:
MP5
Spell Power (SP)
Attack Power (AP)
Defense
Armor Penetration in the same form
Block in the same form
It looks like we are harkening back to the days when items (gear and weapons) contained the core stats such as Intel, Spirit, Stam etc and those stats modified the secondary stats listed above. Here's the lowdown.
MP5 (mana per 5 seconds) will be controlled through Spirit. Spell Power as well as mana regen will be modified by Intel. Attack Power will be based on Agility. Defense and Armor Pen will come thru the talent tree and the new mastery system. Block, while I dont claim to understand it, will become a mitigation for incoming damage, and was described as being similar to Dodge. In the same vein, Stamina will no longer have anything to do with Spell Power, Attack Power or Defense. In essence Stam = health and its possible for plate wearers and clothies alike to have similar it not the same HP.
Haste, which essentially caused casters to push buttons faster, will work the same for melee. It was also stated that it may possibly increase regen of rage, energy, focus and/or runic power. It very much sounded like it was still up for discussion as to how exactly it will work.

Very short and to the point which was nice. This panel was very quick, leaving a lot of time for Q & A.

I think this is awesome. I always wondered what prompted the Blizz think-tank to come up with more math for one stat than the average CalSci classroom. It has always seemed like an annoyance. Hit, Crit, AP, Def all seem this convoluted mess that only a dedicated math wiz would tackle. In the end, for me the average Joe, I just stacked whatever seemed best or whatever the latest trends told me was the right way to go. I did do some research on my own, but I was rarely ever able to scratch the surface. I don't know if converting back to the "old days" will make any difference to me as far as the math goes. I can say with certainty though, I seemed to be able to understand it better when 1 stat like Spirit, modified 1 or 2 other stats like health or mana regen. I could measure those effects myself by simply taking off and putting on gear and looking at the numbers. After some simple calculations, if I recall correctly, 1 Stam = 20 hp, or something along those lines. I could look at it and understand what the gear was modifying. I may not have understood all the mathematical ramifications but I could get from A to B and look at C and say, "Oh ok I can see how it works", even if abstractly. Now it seems like every time I change a piece of gear it becomes an equation and balancing act if I want to maintain the stats I think "might" be the right ones for me. I have regemmed more gear just from changing one piece of armor than ever before. I am hoping this will make my personal math hell a little easier. So all I can say at this point is /cross fingers. ;)