NINJA...New Pet Class!

[Duelle]

I'm not saying that you'd need to have some sort of sub-set (or advanced job) of the Paladin job that takes a turn for the offensive, only that the fundamental components of the job should be such that it can play multiple roles given intelligent (not necessarily even "correct" per say) gearing.

Considering the intent of the jobs is to be role-specific, this isn't really going to happen without some strict lines in terms of design. Even then, balance would be wonky because the intent of the jobs has been made clear by Yoshida.

In all honesty, I don't consider a class role as a unique identifying factor of a class.

Depends on the context. Final Fantasy jobs are for the most part one-trick ponies with the exception of hybrids like RDM. We can try to come up with progression paths for each job, but that doesn't mean anyone would take to them, much less want to see them in-game.

All that said, in most future class sets, I don't see jobs as being attainable from only one class either. Let's take Beastmaster for instance. Is there any reason why you can't fight alongside your pet with a sword or an axe or a bow rather than a whip?

Wouldn't really fit the job's aesthetic and motif. Axe can squeeze through using FFXI as precedent, but not the others. Even then, this butts heads with the armoury system.

But taken as too strong a rule, or each class as nothing but a weapon and line of abilities meant only to be adapted into a job once in party play, it'll be interesting to see how SE will deal with mixed-stem jobs like Red Mage, Dark Knight,

Rapiers on Fencer/Red Mage, Great Sword for Gladiator/Dark Knight makes the most sense to me.

Corsairs

The way the armoury system works, they could just have the pistol/hexagun as their main weapon, bypassing the need for swords.

Blue Mage

Considering FFVI's version of Blue Mage, I don't see why we should give them access to swords.

[Shurrikhan]

Rapiers on Fencer/Red Mage, Great Sword for Gladiator/Dark Knight makes the most sense to me.
The way the armoury system works, they could just have the pistol/hexagun as their main weapon, bypassing the need for swords.

I'm a Swordsman--I am thereby limited to arming swords?

I don't know. Practically, speaking, in the event that nothing is willing to change in the armory system, adding two-handed swords, rapiers, whips, and pistols would work. It just still seems like a rather slap-on solution, closer to mimicking chess pieces than being actual characters. Though, I guess that's the Tactics-lead point of jobs in the first place. Staying true to that really has very little to say about MMO character development ability. Choose the best gun for the task and learn how to shoot it. Done. That just doesn't feel very RPG to me. It feels like assembly and polish.

Edit: By "arming swords" I'm referring to the relatively broad spectrum of mid-level, hefty-ish one-handed blades often paired with bucklers, not an official "arming sword" (in the same specificity as say a broadsword).

[Duelle]

Practically, speaking, in the event that nothing is willing to change in the armory system, adding two-handed swords, rapiers, whips, and pistols would work. It just still seems like a rather slap-on solution, closer to mimicking chess pieces than being actual characters. Though, I guess that's the Tactics-led point of jobs in the first place. Staying true to that really has very little to say about MMO character development ability.

It's not meant to be, as here and in FFXI the main aspect of character development is having numerous jobs leveled because of the ability to switch jobs. If we had stand-alone jobs and talent trees/advanced classes, then you could link character development to a singular job and open options within said job. Again, that ship has long since sailed.