The complaint is usually that the casters are massively outshined by martials in just about every pillar with scorlock being an exception for social where they stand on good footing due to high charisma. Regarding "Utility Caster" as a concept itself concentration and me spells tend to put a huge crimp in what they can bring.I'm confused. My question was whether people see players complain when another player brings a utility-focused caster to the table. What does the availability of AL magic items have to do with whether or not players complain about utility-focused casters? The only items on that list with active utility applications are the Ring of Animal Friendship and the Ring of the Ram.
I more often see someone desperately trying to peddle (de)buffs & control spells as leverage for some kind of strategy beyond facerolling through encounters by running up & repeatedly bashing targets. If the caster gets lucky enough to have the opponent still in a good arrangement for web or something when their turn rolls around the group might take advantage on it.
It really comes down to nobody actually needing it even slightly though. The only time I can think of it mattering was when the martials managed to get involved with both a marlinth & bunch of knolls at the same time towards the end of DiA when an artillerist managed to web the gnolls & spam temphp to keep folks up during the marling the fight. Put in perspective how "thrilled" they were, a fight with yeenagau followed where the artillerist could not even get the martials to sacrifice flanking advantage for a single round to be within range of the healing turret. Given the level & equipment the martials needed to roll like an 8-9 to hit so it's not like dropping flank would cripple them