I agree, the changes are a bit weird. Rather than limiting who can take the talents, I think they should just be a little less powerful (or other talents buffs, preferably). Although I don't even think The Pawn was too big of a deal, and Warlord was mostly fine unless you paired it with rage, grouped up a bunch of enemies, and wailed on them with whirlwind + cripping blow + regular attacks to completely wipe whole groups.
The Pawn feels so nice to play with I just wish every character had 1-2m of free movement, kind of like how you get 1m of free movement for attacks, but you could just nudge your characters out of the tiny puddle of ooze or get a slightly better position to attack a character from without costing an AP.
