Why so few spells

[Finchley]

This isn't XI.

DoT and Debuffs are an Arcanist's specialist, so it's likely a lot of spells will be given to them (e.g. Bio, Poison, Blind).

Since all classes gain abilities at the same rate it would be a waste for THM/BLM to have such a diverse range and end up having abilities/spells with similar effects.
Fire = Damage
Blizzard = "Refresh" and additional effects
Thunder = DoT

The system, in my eyes, is perfectly good and optimised for damage output; i.e. once you run out of MP you can still switch to the weaker blizzard spells to have semi-decent damage output instead of sitting and waiting for it to recover by itself. As for the AoE spells, Fire II and Blizzard II are both AoE in their respective "damage" and "refresh" categories.

Multi-elemental spells when mobs don't have elemental resistance is pointless.

So spam, FIRE FIRE FIRE FIRE FIRE FIRE (oH OUt of mp) spam ice ice ice ice ice ice.

Seems very exciting.