Truely separating class from job - an overhaul (again).

[Xeia]

Personally, I would prefer the class specialization you've talked about to instead be a different job (eg from THM, both BLM and NEC), but that whole job progression thing is a discussion for elsewhere. I can see your point for wanting the base class to fulfil the role rather than adding more jobs, I just prefer the thought of more jobs.

I'm always surprised how many people I see advocating this idea. While it looks nice on the surface, I can't see it working fairly without a complete overhaul of the way classes and jobs are currently set up. To follow your example, let's say I'm a level 50 BLM but have never touched NEC. Now I go and unlock it and all of a sudden I'm a top level Necromancer. Why is that a problem? Other than the fact that the two jobs would be strikingly similar, balancing issues between classes.

Continuing with the example, we now have two full-fledged jobs stemming from Thaumaturge and tied in levels. That means that leveling THM is more worthwhile than leveling, say... ARC. How do we fix that? Well, now let's make ARC split into two paths too. BRD and... I dunno, RNG. Now we're in a situation where in order to make each class tree equally useful they need to think up two jobs for each class they add. People are already worried that the armory system limits the introduction of new jobs because they have to think up a new class for each one... and while the suggestion you gave is often cited as a fix, I think it compounds the problem. Think of SMN. What on earth could be its partner job? Arcanist really can't go into anything other than Summoner because it uses Carbuncle.

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Bah, I guess that wasn't really the point of OP's thread, so I'll try to be brief in getting back to what I wanted to say:
I like the current system. I think it works BECAUSE classes are comparatively weak. And while I agree there needs to be more distinction between jobs and classes, anything added to the class will also be added to the job, so it wouldn't accomplish that. I'm against the class having abilities the job won't inherit (other than cross-class). I like to think of classes as the level of expertise any normal person can achieve through hardwork (NPCs in the guilds), while jobs are only the few special, "gifted" elite (us players). Of course jobs are stronger.

That being said, I'm categorically in favor of added abilities, especially spells for mages. The number of different spells we have access to at the moment is depressing.

On a side note, I -NEVER- equipped my soul crystal while soloing as a Gladiator.