A lot of what would make their utility stronger is knowing when to be in either stance, highly optimizing for each fight.
Fair enough. The cast times in spell mode make this much more interesting unlike some jobs *cough*smn*cough*.

One concern I have is with the short range of spells. No other job in the game (to my knowledge) has a short range like this and boss mechanics that force you out of melee are probably going to be balanced with the standard range in mind. What do you think about adding a way to temporarily increase range?

As for Battlemage and Spellblade stances, they're mostly a way to change the overall feel of the class. The idea is for them to use at least one GCD to incentivize remaining in one stance. Might be worth giving it a longer cast time. The damage buff is secondary
Hm. So is the intention more about letting players do what they want than being part of the rotation?

For visuals, here's their damaging abilities in sorted by the general flow.
Thank you. Y'know what, I rather like this. It looks like there's a good amount to keep track of between both stances with the long duration buffs and debuffs. Yeah, I think I'd enjoy this job.

Whats next? Yellow Mage? Pink Mage? (all jokes aside lmao) GO GO POWER MAGES! XD
Green Mages have been in previous FF games so it's not as silly as it seems.

But now I'm wondering what those would be like lol.