I've rarely encountered "average" ACNs in DF.

Most often, I've played with:

- Competent ACNs that are compensating well for other team members' shortcomings (often ended up 3-man -team-ing a dungeon with ACN filling up for the useless/gone tank or sometimes healer/DPS, even 2-man team'd once), making the most of their versatility (strongest point of this class imho).

- Lazy/ignorant ACNs, who had no idea how their pet worked (or couldn't be bothered), playing as if they were solo and their pet was an independent addition the game made to themselves (just attacking the targets as if they where THM, letting the IA take care of their pet on it's own).
You know, the same that goes off looting that chest or opening this door while you're all busy fighting (if it's not the ACN, look for the ARC); the one that doesn't seem to notice his caruncle is making the team's job more difficult by stealing aggro, pushing the mob away, or just running after the target when they shouldn't (second boss in Halatali comes to mind as a mostly harmless example, final boss in Haukke as a funny one).

The guy you're talking about probably was in the second category.


NB: I'm in neither, I play SCH