Blizzard's Cory Stockton and Scott Mercer have concluded a World of Warcraft: Cataclysm Dungeons & Raids panel at BlizzCon this morning.

Here's a summary of what we can expect from the expansion in the near future;

• In patch 4.1 The Deadmines and Shadowfang Keep will be level 85 heroics. These dungeons will feature new quests and new encounters.
• Dungeon quests will be attainable right outside the entrance, including all classic dungeons.
• The bosses for new dungeons will be tied to the zones they're in. You'll interact with those bosses in the zone's main quest line, and Heroic versions will have different bosses.
• Vanessa Van Cleef is the new heroic boss of the Deadmines.

The team also wanted to review all classic dungeons. Some are too long or confusing. Maraudon and Uldaman are examples of this.

• Uldaman is now broken into two instances. The dungeon is split at Ironaya, the titan boss. Maraudon is now broken into "Living" and "Princess".
• Sunken Temple has been trimmed.
• The Wailing Caverns have been clipped too. The "maze" towards the end has been removed.
• Bosses in those areas have been moved.

On raid philosophy in Cataclysm;

• The first goal was more raid zones for ship.
• Blizzard want to create the "coolest encounters yet." There are players fighting on platforms, or in the air. Another fight requires raiders to be quest to creep past a blind dragon.
• They also want bite-sized chunks, smaller raiding, rather than three night epics.
Content for everyone." Normal and Heroic modes.
• Raid progress is saved to your character, rather than to a Raid ID.
• You can join multiple normal raids of either 10/25 size, but you can only defeat each boss once a week.
• Heroic raiding will work the same way as it has in Lich King.
• A new UI addition: A list that shows all bosses defeated in the raid, and all bosses you've defeated.

We've also learned more about the new raid environments themselves;

• Firelands Raids: In the raid you enter the elemental plane of fire. This is the home of Ragnaros and you'll fight his true form.
• The raid will feature seven bosses. This smaller number is aligned with the "bite-size raiding" philosophy.
• You'll fight Ragnaros in Sulfuron Keep. Like the level 70 Hyjal raid, it'll be both indoors and outdoors.
• When Firelands drops, so will Abyssal Maw, a five player dungeon.
• Abyssal Maw is "nothing like Occulus". It's set in the elemental plane of water and the entire dungeon is set underwater.

On Enhanced Maps;

• All dungeons in the game now have a 2D map. These maps will have detailed boss information, including loot, lore and abilities.
• These are designed to give you an idea of what you're getting into before the boss is pulled, says Blizzard.
• 3D portraits of each boss will also be included.
• These modifications will work in both dungeons and raids.

A Q&A session at the end of the panel revealed;

• Blizzard expect the difficulty between 10 and 25 raids should be pretty similar as they drop the same loot.
• PuG will "be rough" when Cataclysm drops, but eventually changes made will improve things.
• On Blackrock Depths: There are no places to make clean breaks as they are in Ulduar. Instead, they're introducing teleporters.
• Teleporters have also been added to Shadowfang Keep and the Deadmines. Graveyards are also within 30 seconds of the instance.
• Visual meters are being included on the interface, instead of stacking debuffs, for example.
• Binding legendary weapons to the guild is something that's been considered, but it's difficult. There are no plans at this time.