So this is just some daydreaming I had while bored at work, considering the role skills system the game currently has. What if they gave each class an alternate spec/role, utilizing the role skills more heavily? (keeping in mind that it would have to make sense with the job as a whole if it were to cross a role barrier)

For instance, I think tank role skills are already halfway there....just consolidate the rest of the defensive cooldowns into there, add a heavy threat weaponskill + aoe, along with a stance/trait to take reduced damage. Then most of the melee classes could tank as well.

Similarly, for a DPS kit, put in a trait/stance to do increased damage and whatever support skills would be needed for balance. Then the current tanks can go as full-fledged DPS - who wouldn't want those greatswords and giant axes to do bigger numbers

Black Mage, Bard, and Machinist would probably need something to switch within different DPS specs (maybe something similar to Noct/Diurn sects for AST?). The healers could all draw upon a DPS kit pretty effectively, given just a few tweaks to numbers and an added skill or 2.

Could open up some interesting combinations and party setups if they changed things up like this. I imagine it'd be a complete nightmare for the balance team, though hehe

Anyways, this was just a muse/ramble, though I'd be curious what other people would think of this.