I think each job should have it's roll as defined by the "Holy Circle" or the other abilities that give people a "resistance" to a certain creature. Paladins get Holy Circle which increases their resistance to undead, DRK's get resistance to Arcana and so on. Those should be the backbone of each job.

DRKs = Pure DPS but lack an "awesome" weapon skill. I think they should be able to tank somewhat(not for this thread) and this job has been neglected through some of the updates. I do like the mp based weapon skill idea because that would force BRD and RDM to refresh them more often.

DRG = spam Drakesbane and can just solo on it's own(thus why we never see it in parties). I would like to see the wyvern grow in size as you level up to a full wyvern(not the size of Shinryu) and do other attacks than breathe and normal round robin.

SAM = pwnage as far as Great Katanas, decent at polearm and also decent at ranged so why can they ONLY use Namas Arrow(if you have relic bow upgraded) without Ranger sub? They can also solo light and darkness skill chains so they're a little OP right now. I'm sorry but when you can use 2 different abilities, not including 2 hr, and do 2 light or darkness sc's...that's kinda OP and no other job can do it(2 light or dark back-to-back...DNC can only self sc once).

THF = having TH as a trigger ability kinda messed up a lot of things. I'm not even sure if TH works with THF as a sub. I remember doing SAM/THF and doing 1k dmg with Tachi: Gekko at lvl 66. Steal and Mug on 5 minute CDs seems kinda high to me and maybe should be at 3 minutes(or less if they're 3 minute CDs now). THF should still be the "maintainer" of enmity.

DNC = Not much in terms of dps. Can self skillchain but I would like to see something new here but i can't put my finger on it. I'm doubting that the steps even do anything to the mob that's being attacked or i just don't notice much in terms of damage or magical damage increase.

PUP = DRG + MNK put together. I've never partied with a good PUP before or they just didn't do much in terms of party balance so i can't say much.

SCH and BLM = I don't play SCH but my BLM can pull enmity with just 1 spell even at the end of the fight so enmity dynamics would definitely need an overhaul.

SMN = depends on how you play. Normaly, i look for a smn/whm to help with healing if i can't find a whm, rdm or sch to heal the party. Most of the time, the SMN doesn't want to party because then they can't use their Avatars. There's still some Avatars that need to be added in order for me to actively play my SMN. I'm talking Phoenix(spelling?) and Bahamut and get rid of the "must use 2hr" for Alex and Odin. If i have a pact with these Avatars, i want to be able to whip them out whenever i want. Make their abilities cost a lot of MP and deal a lot of enmity to the SMN and not Avatar(enmity + for Avatar would then be a lot more helpful to the SMN). Each Avatar needs to be special and i don't mean in terms of Shiva = Ice and Titan = Earth. I mean like Titan = Tank, Carby = heals(i.e. smn casts cure 2 on someone, thus Carby uses Healing Ruby on them without smn going into BPs). Levy = regen/refresh...see where i'm going with this? I don't just mean whatever the Avatar's pressence thing is...make the Avatar much more Special than they really are.

MNK = Accuracy isn't the greatest at lower lvls so might need a boost in that catagory. I'm a firm believer that MNKs should be able to use 2 different fist/claw(h2h) weapons. Think of it from FF4 when you had an Ice Fist on your R-hand and a Flame Fist on your L-hand. This would open up the way for some pretty awesome debuffs from added effects on h2h weapons.(nin's can equip 2 different katanas so think of it like that). Some h2h weapons can have a small "shield" on them that would allow MNKs to tank and/or guard more often(my mnk is 95 and my guard skill is still below 100 so i rarely guard).

NIN = DPS nin would use Innin. I don't know about others but my nin gets enmity really quick standing behind a mob and doing a critical hit every hit add into that doing a ws about ever 10 seconds and now the DPS nin is actually Tanking. Defeats the purpose of using Innin at this point. Innin should have an enmity - effect on it so the nin can focus on elemental spells(if it already does and/or has this, then it needs boosted). San spells don't do any where near the same dmg as Tier 3 BLM spells so they need a slight boost. NIN also has the most Catagory 2 merits to pick from. Sange, Nin Tool Expert, and 6 elemental San spells....need to balance the # of "abilities" in Cat. 2 and/or make the 6 San spells learnable from ra/ex scrolls that need to be quested and add 2-4 more abilities to get from the gap the san spells would make. I wouldn't mind seeing an actual Throwing weaponskill(or a couple) that can be learned via merits....would actually make Sange useful since it would use up the shadows you have left to throw something(up to 5x dmg on ws if you have +2 boots).

Overall Balancing...

I thought some new weapon types would be kinda nice as well. I haven't seen a Flail or a 2h mace yet.

Gear - I really can't say much as far as JSE goes. I think haste+ on most of the AF3 pieces was a little bit overboard.

Server Balancing - Bare with me...

Relic, Mythic, Empy Weapons = As far as the couple of servers i've played on, none of the players(i'm generalizing here) do not help each other out with these unless you're in a Dynamis shell(but chances are, you're helping the LS Leader upgrade his/her weapon). Countless times i've been shouting for help for farming Briareus helms and NO ONE answers me. The sense of helping each other just isn't there anymore and it's turning me away from this game...also why i'm farming ancient currency as bst for relic weapons. That reminds me. The cost of ancient currency has remained the same even though the drop rate has been increased. So, if you're that DPS(or anyone for that matter), I think the amount of currency you need to upgrade Relic, Mythic or Empy should be at least halved, i.e. relic katana requires 400 Byne Bills, 1600 Whiteshells, 6100 Bronzepieces and 10,000 Byne Bills but with them being in half, people may start farming Dynamis again because they can upgrade faster and not spending countless months trying to get to the next stage. Empy weapons are the same way...50 Briareus helms would be 25, then 25 Sobek skins, then say 40 horns(would be 37.5 but good luck getting that half a horn to drop...). I know these special weapons shouldn't be here as far as DD balancing but think of it if you could lock in your weapon....what else would you need to change to increase your DD capabilities?

The book burns and Abyssea Alliance XP parties need to go away, FOR EVER. Yeah, it's a fast way to lvl up but NO ONE is learning what they're supposed to do or how that job is played. Instead of earning your levels, your levels are just being handed to you for being in a party. I could be lvl 30 and be lvl 95 in probably a day if i had the time(or i could be like 60% of everyone that plays and just AFK it). I've been in Abyssea parties and people were like "what's a magic burst? I just did one with Bio2." The game dynamics were bypassed with Abyssea and now it's time to go back to the roots of FFXI. /insert_Player_memory_wipe_here/ and make everyone start over at lvl 1 again without the alliance book burns and what not.

Sorry to put a lot into 1 post but these are things i've been thinking about for a while that i strongly believe(or wished for the relic weapons to cost less to upgrade) would make the game more enjoyable for me. Some people my agree with me, and well, most probably won't(especially the people that have upgrade relics already).