For Beast Tamer, You say Bear is the only option, and end-game that's all you play, well as a BT main, I can confirm I use Bear a lot, but for actual end-game stuff like raids/bosses and other party-related things, Cat is the true end game. Bear is great for mobbing, and really really fun, too (the most wild and zany animations in the game come from Bear). Cat is all about support and a good Cat can make any boss run twice as quick as any other healer class. Leopard is good for early-mid leveling if you want to use a SP reset scroll at about 150 to move all SP in Leopard to Bear (I just did Bear the whole time, screw Leopard). And Bird is great for mobility, a REALLY GOOD second animal if you hate support and don't want to use Cat. Otherwise, once you max Bear and Cat, you can put a few more points into Bird for extra mobility on-the-fly (no pun intended). There are 2 Bear skills that you only need 1 SP in, Deep Breath and Really Deep Breath, so you can put all that unused SP into Bird for that extra mobility which is crucial for end-game stuff.
Edit: Keep in mind that switching to Bird and back to Cat/Bear is really quick and easy. Most people think, "Oh, I have to be Bird to use the mobility, but it has bad attacks, oh well, I guess it's bad." When in reality, I actually got someone to time how long it takes me to get from the bottom left of Horntail attacking its body with Bear, switch to Bird, jump up to the top right and switch back to Bear to attack its head. I got 1.20 seconds. Switching for mobility is NOT a crutch. You just gotta practice.
