I have a friend that was intersted in playing SMN end game. He achieved Lv15 and was looking forward to topaz carbuncle as tank. but we discovered that all the pets are now just DPS.

So, you have a physically weak class, unable to put out the damage the other starters can but without any way to mitigate the mob aggro/damage.

He quit last night: "This is unfun, boring and tedious"
I cannot fault him on this, I delierately used a fate to sync from Lv70 to Lv15 and got destroyed.

It appears that the arcanist was changed so much it's only playable if you are with a party now and no solo capability.