Quote Originally Posted by Ardour View Post
It's just unimaginative and promotes a homogenized role design for no good reason.
The existence of positionals is hardly homogenization. Homogenization is what has happened to tanks and healers over the past four years. Homogenization is what people are demanding, while claiming to hate it, when they talk about removing them entirely from the game.

Positionals, as they currently exist, is a major reason why melee jobs are more than just a shorter range version of MCH or DNC. It's a means of actually distinguishing melee from other DPS options, and the "dependence" on positionals varies among the melee DPS in question, which in turn contributes to their individual identity.

Similarly, the existence of castbars on every magic DPS/healer isn't homogenization. Each caster has additional mechanics that build off that in different ways. Obviously, BLM is the immobile glass cannon that wants to find a certain spot in the fight to stand and deliver. A RDM offers a seemingly speedier form of play with its dual cast mechanic, which also ties in to its unique class meter. Summoner was the DOT caster.

If a caster dps had zero cast bars to be concerned with, that'd sure be a unique design. I wouldn't want anywhere close to BLM or RDM in terms of personal dps unless its personal mechanics were somehow challenging enough on the player that it could be equal to the struggle a BLM faces in fights that demand a lot of movement, and I feel the same about a melee without positionals.

As you succinctly point out, Ranged dps don't necessarily have innate drawbacks... save for their limited damage. That's the trade off SE has gone with, and it makes perfect sense. Ranged DPS get to maintain uptime without the same risks that a Monk would have to take during certain mechanics. It also would make perfect sense for a melee without positionals to not have the same personal output as a Monk, a DRG, or a SAM, because that would be a melee that doesn't have to work as hard to maintain optimal uptime as any of those three.

If you're worried about homogenization, you probably shouldn't want more jobs added to the game that do what legacy jobs do, but better and with less difficulty. Inevitably, SE will choose to borrow elements from more popular jobs wholesale to try and correct for that. All it takes is a fancy animation to get people to ignore that bit of homogenization, after all.