1.) Sequencers that allow you to edit 32/64/128 steps in the same view.
Yes, you can easily have a XOX-style 16 steps with 4 or 8 pages, but paging around just kills the mood for me; I wanna see everything at once dammit.
AFAIK the only piece of gear that offers this ability is the WMD Metron (which is cool in its own right, but not as adept at fast melodic sequencing). Hypothetically it’s easily doable on the likes of Polyend Play, Hapax, and Oxi One, with their fuckload of grid buttons. However, unless I’m mistaken there’s no way to drill down and focus on a track where every grid represents a step.
Said step could then be tweaked with a knob(s) to modify notes, gates, etc.
2.) More musical-sounding randomization/generation tools.
For me, the absolute king of randomizing sequencers is the Erica DB-1 (follwed by its modular cousin, the Black Sequencer). These are super intuitive (although limited to 16 step views), and also allow you to easily tweak how much various params are modified by said randomization. The most important part is that the results often sound incredible.
I’ve been thinking about connecting my DB-1 to Ableton or modular gear just to take advantage of its sequencer (without necessarily using the synth itself). It would be INCREDIBLE to see the DB-1 approach in a M4L device.
In the Ableton realm, IMO the best generative tool is the ubiquitous M4L device Sting (from Iftah). It’s fun to just crank it up and let the device play the part of collaborator/bass player while I do other stuff.
Anyway, these types of tools are also great for live performance, especially if they can be quickly tweaked. It would be awesome to see musical randomizers built into more sequencers. Hapax and Oxi might fit the bill here, with an intuitive combo of creating new musical patterns and making tweaks on the fly, although it wasn’t clear to me from watching tutorials.
Honorable mention goes to the Metropolix, which can get pretty random pretty quick. However, its form factor makes it harder to just quickly hit one button and have a randomized (but also musical-sounding and repeating) pattern.