Before I properly geared my thm, Thundara on Ifrit did about 500, now I am a fair way into my gear and double melds and supplement a more damage orientated build with food to keep the macc right, it consistently does ~700.

A 40% increase in damage from gear clearly shows stats in this game are not broken.

As for con, simply buying 3 MND rings and a cheap ass healing pot/mnd+ cowl will raise your curas from 900 to about 1100

If they were, surely people wouldn't need to gear the hell out of their ARCs to get the 10 min moogle achievement.

Also, whilst the reindeer suit tank on Ifrit is a bit stupid, its more down to the setup people use than stats being broken. Anyone that has healed on Ifrit will know how excessively the healers tend to cure bomb the tank - if their HP dips below 75% both healers start using cura, because its definitely better than neither, but thats ~2.4K of curing to about 1k HP, meaning there is a LOT of leeway in how the tank is geared. A skilled and optimally geared healer and tank combo makes a single healer setup possible, but I doubt a tank in a reindeer suit would manage. The fact is people chose not to do that, because it's safer the other way.

Top tier gear is a luxury and not a necessity, the Ifrit fight is a prime example of that - it is keeping hate and keeping Ifrit positioned so plumes are predictable that makes or breaks the run for the tank, and it is managing WS/Spells between WS windows to avoid eruptions that makes or breaks it for everyone else, and this is down to player skill.

Top gear being a luxury, and player skill being a necessity is the way this game should be.

I am just hoping the skill level required rises in future patches.