I am still honestly confused about why CNJ became WHM and THM became BLM.

You all can correct me if I'm wrong because I haven't advanced far enough in either mage class to learn about their lore in any kind of depth. But from the main storyline I got the following gist:

Conjurers atune themselves to the elements (in particular, Gridania's elements of the wood) and through dedication have learned how to summon forth these elementals and wield their destructive power. (Sounds like a black mage to me)

Thaumaturges took a different route, using science and ancient tomes and maybe alchemy? They specialized in more or less 'forbidden' magics (light and dark) with a particular focus on bringing people back to life and sacrifice and all that forbidden stuff. Although this does lend itself to the notion of a "dark mage" it is more or less sacrifice for the benefit of others which at its core sounds more like a healer to me.

How SE flipped it around and made CNJ both 'the' healer and 'the' elemental specialist at the same time still baffles me. All that leaves for THM would be their forbidden magic which could have been elaborated on (much like SCH from XI) focusing on their debuff/manipulation skills (sleep/enfeebles). They could even go as far as giving the THM the ancient magic for the sole reason that its ancient and forbidden, something the holy Conjurers wouldn't dare touch.


As far as PGL/MNK's lore I can see it being easily adaptable. The lore around PGL is merely that they beat people up when those people don't pay their debt to Uldah. Since Uldah is set in the desert (properties including earth fire and wind) it makes sense that they would deviate from GLA (solely metal/muscle) and meditate in the elements to empower themselves.