Quote Originally Posted by Irenia View Post
Anecdotally, the reason for that is probably that myself and people I've spoken to don't identify themselves as a role. Rather, for example, they identify as a WHM that happens to be a healer, for example.

This is a bit personal too, as whenever I play SCH or AST, I don't really enjoy myself. I've been asked a couple of times to do it in pugs and statics and I hated it. Guess I just won't be able to pug if the pf strat calls for astro and sage to use their unique, unhomogenized tools, and I only enjoy white mage.

If SE wants to avoid having people feel like that, then I can see how this homogenization has come about. I wonder if they can avoid this situation, while also giving each job unique tools still... and how impactful can those tools be.
This is precisely the reason they don't place higher emphasise on role diversity. They don't want players to feel obligated to play jobs they aren't interested in even within their own role. It's hard to fault them either when looking back at Heavensward and Stormblood. If you were a White Mage, you were likely asked to play Astro incessantly, and had difficulty finding a static willing to accept you as a White Mage. Meanwhile, Dragoon players practically had a red carpet rolled out for them.

While that issue isn't nearly as prevalent nowadays due to rDPS, but if stronger job diversity created an imbalance, it would happen again.