It was nice in v.early wow, but then they 'fixed' things and made it shitty while making other things good.
As to Balance's purpose; timesink of making players spend ages getting the best non-set gear available and trying to prove its not worthless, kinda worked I guess.
Beast Mastery is almost as bad for PvE, however atleast they made it PvP friendly, Moonkins are just there to take the initial nuke instead of a healer or something in PvP but I spose when they die atleast the team doesn't loose much.
Oh and instead of idling in Shattrath I decided to do something just as pointless, I redesigned the Resto Tree:
http://talents.unleashedgaming.net/?p=vt&i=12126
The [+] icon means I changed it, and the 'normal' icons were annoying to put in and are ment to be the real ones.
Basicly has some talents buff Tree Form, makes PvP more viable and attempts to make Regrowth more worthwhile.
Probly really overpowered and yada yada
Didn't have the will to touch the Balance tree without the support of Alcohol and a Barge Pole.