Current state of KMST JOB Balance

Whether this used to be true or not, it's a joke contribution even more so now that classes don't have minimum ranges, and plenty of classes have ultimates that can obliterate the mobs faster than using slow. Unless I'm mistaken this is before 4th Job was out anyway, and that's not even why the mage was there, it's not like the mobs were all consuming most of them floated to the top corners the rest were killed super fast, the magician was using Compo, and the few that made it pass the front lines were killed within in seconds, the mages "mob control" was hardly a defining factor in that bossrun. I'd hardly consider that mage essential to the bossrun especially since Bowman and DKs had Dragon Roar ArrowRain/Eruption which could accomplish the same mobbing height as IceStrike/Explosion, but could also turn around and provide decent 1vs1 damage.

Yeah, what we're talking about was pre-4th job. When Zakum first came out, successful runs were scarce. Slow, area of effect damage, etc. were all needed to remove summons as much as possible do that the main attackers can directly hit Zakum. Whether or not this was the intention of the developers at the time, mages played a pretty badass support roll. It was only later when things like Onyx Apples came out that Zakum runs became more lax and such support wasn't as much needed.