Going back to what I was saying about job identity, I do think there's some heavy overlap in some of the healer jobs and some of the tank jobs at least for part of their rotations or actions.

Honestly, I kind of see the buttons being pressed like keys on a piano and the sheet music being the rotation we have to play. None of them are exactly the same, but they definitely have shared sections. For me, when mechanical identity (the meters and effects used) and input identity (the cadence and kinds of keys pressed) are too similar the jobs do start to feel similar to play. This is independent of other differences. It can even be subtly different, but my brain is going to recognize the patterns (it is a pattern-finding machine after all).

Some examples of a few areas that stand out to me as feeling similar:

* 100 meters that go up by multiples of 5, with spenders at 50 and optionally have a +50 ability
* 1, 2, 3 ST combos
* 1, 2 AoE combos
* role abilities (kind of by definition)
* 30% mits
* rezes
* early healer spells with the exact same stats
(benefic, benefic 2, helios, aspected helios compared to cure, cure 2, medica, medica 2)

Now this doesn't mean that anything should be done about those similarities like these, but I totally understand the people who are bothered by them. I also think there's a ton of additional design space that isn't being used that could add a lot of distinctness at the cost of balance.

Taking it back to music, I would also say there's nothing wrong with building and reusing themes within a job, maybe even a role. You see that in movie scores especially as they reuse core bits to make the whole feel connected.

I do think it's important to feel where SE has done well in this regard.

* Sage felt like an extension of a theme, but definitely felt different to me in triggering alt behavior for skills.
* Certain jobs have nice little mini-input games (DNC dance, NIN mudra, MNK stances, MCH blast, RPR shroud; with RDM and SMN getting an honorable mentions)
* Certain jobs have distinct acting meters to track (BLM everything, SAM coins, MNK nadi; RPR shroud)

In the cons I'm left to see a lot of tank and healer issues and in the pros, I'm seeing a distinct lack of them. For me it reinforces why some people are feeling the way they are.