Bard does not make sense as a job

[Shirobi]

Unlike dragoons, bards have a much broader definition and a number of interpretations, and those with the frame of reference saw the approach taken in this game made sense. Not to mention that this is one of a handful of RPG series that have a jump-oriented lance wielder, so the number of analogues of what we know as dragoon is obviously going to be limited.

Bard in a fantasy situation has a pretty set in stone, genre wide reputation as a song singing, dagger using rogue type. As far as "dragoon" goes, the only place it really exists as some sort of lancer is the FF series. So no. Flawed analogy. While you can no doubt find some other type of dragoon out there somewhere bearing resemblance to the FF one, its quite likely inspired by it.

I can gurantee you with 110% certainty there are many, many MANY more instance of dagger singy guy bards than jumpy lancer dragoons in games and fantasy.

As far as FFXI's summoner goes, I see you either did not play the game much past CoP or you have a very flawed view of what smn was truly capable of, especially multiple summoners. There was nothing wrong with FFXI's summoner in the least. It merely needed proper gearing, like every job.