What SHOULD happen is AoE kits should go away. That would make for much better gameplay.

Either, give people a stance that makes their single target rotation cleave and hit multiple enemies, or just make all single target attacks cleave. Make it so that the single target rotation is the only rotation and get rid of the anemic, boring AoE rotations (This also allows you to play around with focus targets in packs more since damage fall-off abilities deal more damage to your target).

For healers, keep the 3 attacks and have their stance only affect heals.

SAM's button bloat would have been easily improved by:


Have Shoha upgrade to Shoha II with a high potency plus AE fall-off damage

Combine Shinten and Kyuten into 1 ability with high potency plus AE fall-off damage

Combine Guren and Senei into a single attack with high potency plus AE fall-off damage



Alternatively, make it so the AE versions can't be placed on your hotbar and the "AE stance" replaces the ST version with the AE version (if people feel like they "need" to have control over that for some reason)