Linear usually refers to a storyline which Crimsonlung has failed to even mention, this should be a forum about lack of diversity in skills. At first I found the game to have a much more limited skill list than FFXI but then again so many skills in FFXI are highly situation or just go unused altogether (the lower level black magic and healing skills) One thing FFXIV has done very well is to make players utilize every skill they learn throughout the entire game. a great example of this is Stone 1 vs Stone 2, Stone 2 does more damage but does not put on the heavy effect that Stone 1 has... not only is this brilliant but SE has also removed the useless money sink of purchasing skill upgrades every few levels. All in all I'm quite a fan of how they have designed their current jobs.