Command options are a direct result of party chemistry. Streamline your groups so they are tailored to present the command options you want. If you have jack of all trade groups, then yes, you will end up with a grab bag of commands. In the 360 version, you got like 5-6 commands per turn. 3 of them you could pretty much count on:
1) Normal Attack
2) Mystic Arts attack
3) Combat Arts Attack
The rest of it gets filled in from the special skills of each party member. Just 1 healer can be beneficial but throw the command choices in to chaos. Add in stuff like item arts, or mixing Mystic and Combat Arts together can also lead to more issues. I ran with 2 Blackout and 2 melee the first time. Then I did 1 Blackout 1 mixed (botched idea) and 2 melee groups. Item arts are extremely hard to raise unless you use them religeously. Herbs you will use, lotions are useful but hard to raise (unless you use the skill up whole army trick). Traps and bombs kinda meh. Shards which you really get too late in the game can be pwerful but it's expensive and might as well use mystic. Hexes can be useful but you need a hexer group to make it really potent (Animacule).
Another annoying thing that can happen is how you use your characters can lead you to class professions. If your main character ends up in a class like Guardian, you could suddenly find yourself flooded with defense commands added to the normal batch of commands . I never dug deep in to that area. I am sure by now someone out there has a good guide for it and I imagine it has a lot to do with weapon choices and how much you use certain arts over time. It's not something you choose directly, but something you gravitate towards over time, directed by your choices and actions.
My last run through that happened to me. I got stuck with Guardian as a class. I went dual wield runic swords for a nice boost to Blackout (was hitting for 60-80k area attack, was pretty sweet). But I think because of the 2 swords, and the fact I also did a lot of melee with that group, I got stuck with Guardian. When that happened, my odds of getting Blackout via command menu went down, and so did the chances for a synergystic command option that would trigger Blackout. Was kind of bummed.
Also keep in mind that the command line Blackout is often intercepted if you don't lock everyone down and also requires a pinch of luck. The AI will even raid lock you (attack with something out of range i.e. cheat it's ass off) just to interrupt it. Blackout through synergy is far more successful, but requires focused command pools to use often. The same with Whiteout (if not more). I found it really difficult to put together a party that would use Whiteout effectively when compared with Blackout.
One final edit and I will shut up
This game is better after you play a perfect game. In a perfect game, you see everything, you experience everything, and along the way, your main character gets loaded down with every skill set in the game through orbs. As you add more and more of these, your command pool will get trashed with random skills that you may not even care about developing. Once you finish the game and see everything, you can go back and skip the quests that load you up with these bogus skill sets and you can tailor a better main character. Or use an editor since it's PC.
This comment was edited on Apr 11, 2009, 10:01.
PS3 resurgance by GOW3 - Check! Mass Effect for PS3 - Check! Diablo 3 for consoles? I say "For sure"!