Now I know they probably would never bring dots back for SMN but hear me out

[TheDecay]

This is more likely than not. Every expansion, they have to combine/remove abilities to make room for new abilities. They've been doing this since HW was released. Keep in mind that our hotbars were near full at the end of ARR... yet somehow they've added 40 more levels and we still have free room. Yes, I know some of them are just traits that update existing abilities. But even so, jobs always get some new buttons to click. We just lose other ones in the process.

Makes more sense on a job like SAM than a job like SMN where you can't even fill up two hotbars.