For those interested, here is PLL XXXVII, where they clearly stated moving away from balance based around difficulty, and wanted instead to balance around uniqueness. I am slightly amused that they clearly have backpedaled from this on a 180°.

Quote Originally Posted by Reldhir View Post

A fairer comparison in DPS might be between a phys ranged and a melee dps that has to do all the phys ranged mechanics. It is still possible! but you will very quickly see how much the melee takes a nose dive in DPS. between similarly skilled players phys ranged will come out on top every time.

They are not the same role.
You're actually comparing ranged and melee, not rphys and melee dps. There is virtually no difference between caster dps and rphys mechanics in modern raids and this has been ongoing since forever (shadowbringers and the great demolition of all other metrics beyond damage and uptime). And there is actually almost no difference between all melees (dps and tanks) and all ranged (rphys, casters and healers) either beyond that some raid mechanics are role based, but the mechanical execution and solutions on their own aren't specific to support or dps beyond an arbitrary filter.

The reality is that in modern encounter design in XIV, the only difference is between a melee mechanic and a ranged mechanic. The former allows room for any job to perform it, while the latter doesn't work well with melees and requires range. This is the root of the problem and why melee DPS are constantly kept ahead of everything else by the devs, else they'd be obsolete, even if performing, because all the ranged jobs would be able to take their slots as well. And then, we have BLM and PCT... which have the luxury of ignoring that model and fill for every spot. This isn't a rphys specific issue.