Red Mage ---> Dark Knight? Good idea or no?

I never said any sub would work. I said I care more that the sub is properly levelled and your character properly equipped than whether your sub is the one people demand. I'm cookie cutter myself - a taru whm/blm. I just think that subjobs are meant to add diversity to characters. Reducing every job's subjob list to one or two seems to me to be defeating the purpose. Also on my list of things where players defeated the purpose are not letting Red Mages be the melee/mage hybrid they were meant to be, and reducing their entire list of tricks to refresh/convert/dispel/enfeeble. They have more varied abilities than almost any other class, and are reduced to a handful. Summoners that aren't allowed to be real summoners till level 70+ (who picked a Summoner class to be their whm subjob anyway). I think the high numbers you talk about are great, but not at the cost of keeping every last scrap of original thought "looking for group" in lower jeuno. Originality should be appreciated, so long as it's not completely worthless.

There's a big difference between originality and a galka whm/war. There are some real stupid choices. Though originality is a good thing, most things that are "original" aren't the best selections. Like Lionx said, the cookie-cutter set-ups are so common because they work. I don't believe you can tell me you'd rather take a blm/war than a blm/whm, even if the blm/war was 15/7 and the blm/whm was 15/6.

If you want to be original do it so it wont waste my exp time. Thats all i got to say ><; Dont just think originality, its a party, not just you.

Its a Support job anyway, the subjob i never knew how it got there. But the purpose of it is not to diversify. RDMs were diversfied before. They did NOT have Refresh, Convert, Dispel and things like that. Before they were 1/4 of everything you want in a party member. Hence RDM=Worthless. Now with these abilities they fit a ROLE and into the support category and therefore invited.

A B in Sword is pretty damn good, just not at ITs. You can melee yes, but that will hinder every other person. MP=exp=time. You dont waste your MP healing yourself if you dont have to. They were meant to be Support, and they filled that role nicely. i DONT want a melee/mage hybrid that is subpar in everything. Plus have you seen a RDM? That handful, is too much of a handful to do as it is. You want to add more? The concept of a RDM in pure FF sense, does not work in an MMORPG and before those abilities were introduced it was shown that.

SMNers i agree the first 20ish lvls sucks, but you are building your power, then they are support and then they are power dmgers. SMN is not a perfect job, but it has a place now. And that is what matters, else no one invites.

That cost is nothing really when y ou look at your tnl and its like 37K tnl...you do not go out there to a hard to get exp place and waste time. You either lvl as good as you can or dont. The higher lvl you go, the less exp you gain per hour, it just digs at your time, and your montly fee and your fun too. Sorry but its true. You do your best for the party, i expect everyone else to do the same.

I got the term subjob, as well as many of my pet peaves about FFXI from the Gamefaqs FFXI message board. Anyhow, I wouldn't be a waste of someone's time. I'm the much worshipped Tarutaru Whm/Blm. My subjob is levelled beyond capped. I have every spell possible, and the spells of the levels I intend to hit in a party. My equipment, aside from a lack of Astral Rings, is pretty much top notch for my level. I eat pies and drink juice. I keep my abilities capped. The only time when our difference of oppinion on cookie-cutter importantness would come to factor, is if we were both invited to the same party. A party that you might decline because the party was full of less than optimal combinations, I would still give a try. I don't make my own parties because I don't need to, so noone would have to worry about my inviting them into a group of less than optimal players.

Sorry if i sounded a bit rude...but really the point i am trying to make accross is that please try to pick a right sub and read up about it at least and try to make the party's life easier thats all i can ask. Decent Equips(Astral Rings are actually luxery items, i dont expect everyone to have em), good sub or at least a decent sub, and just do as well as you can is enough for me.

I actually do join up bad and no optimal parties(ones with no RDM or BRD, as long as its fun i guess). As said on the Wierd party threads thats one of em i went to. And also there are Parties that really piss me off and i am sure Omecle who i play with knows sometimes what we go through...WAR with full scale armour with nothing else and scythe? yup... It doesnt have to be optimal in terms of everything, but i like everyone to try to be as optimal as they can in what they do...and picking a good sub is important to help them do what they do. WAR/WHM? Did that once in beta...waste of my time -_-;;

As for subjob i think it came from importers before the game was here...you know translation errors. There isnt english translations so i thin they use subjob. But I am pretty darn sure when you change jobs it says Support Job..and its there to support and help you do your main job.