Positionals: Ninja and Monk - Food for thought.

[Bixby]

Now, when I watch these good ol kung-fu movies, I don't see bruce lee attacking people only from the back or side like a sneaky little assassin. No, most movies show martial artists going head in, attacking their foes face to face.

Bruce Lee never had a decent tank. If he had, you can be sure he'd have taken advantage of the situation. Bones and organs and muscles are in specific places, and creatures balance themselves in specific ways, so there are some moves that are only possible, or much easier, depending on what part of a target is toward you.

And once you're engaged in close quarters combat, you're no longer a sneaky assassin. The bad guy knows you're there. You can cut a bitch from any direction.

Really, though, it's just design/balance trumping lore, and MNK originated at a different time, under a different design philosophy.

[ReplicaX]

Ninja and Monk seem to have a role reversal when it boils down to positionals requirements to output maximum dps.

I play NIN/DRG/BRD MNK is 30. The only positionals required for Ninja make sense as they are. Rear(in party) and front (solo). Granted I understand what you are saying.

However:

Mnks that don't make positional requirements indeed do not benefit from their added potency bonuses. However, they can at least still keep GL3 up as they are still granted the combos with its benefits and still benefit from Fists of Fire and also passive skills like Enchanced Twin Snakes.

Where a DRG if they can't flank with HT, they get no 15% increase period.

I wish DRG still had its combos regardless of positional and HT was non-positional to start with. Giving the positional requirements potency bonuses like MNK.

[Saigwa]

No thanks, lets not make ninja into a mnk wannabe

I Think you are missing the entire point of my thread. Ninja is not a monk wannabe... if anything, Monk is a ninja wannabe at this moment. Attacking from blind spots is a "sneaky" trait, that should be associated with a "sneaky" class. Then again, Ninja itself is a monk wannabe, since it attacks head on with an opponent - something that a "sneaky" class does not stereotypically do.

[FritoBandito]

I personally do not enjoy the idea of position-based abilities. I would have preferred to see certain enemies take more damage from melee when hit from various positions, but instead MNK and DRG are fated to always have to dance around the enemy (and fight with tank positioning) to do optimal damage every time they fight something.

[MeeDeggiThePunisher]

No thanks, lets not make ninja into a mnk wannabe

This, who the hell wants every Job to play the same? Not me.

[Saigwa]

This, who the hell wants every Job to play the same? Not me.

Not asking for every job to play the same. Just wondering why the class that is supposed to be sneaky, is not sneaky. And the class that is supposed to fight head on, hides in the opponents blind spot. Maybe they should have reversed it and gave ninja's blind spot positions. I dunno, since I'm not a DPS class. I just found the idea/logic behind SE's choice of skills for these two classes to be relatively poor in terms of context.

[Vespar]

Why not just remove "postional" requirements from ALL classes? Its kind of a hinderence especially with all of the aoe's in this game that force you to move.

[DeadRiser]

Can't really compare the two if you ask me. Monk is still the highest dps job in the game (single target).

Monk can keep their dps up constantly while Ninja has its bursts of dps and simmers down then bursts again.

[Chiramu]

Ninja has Hide openers from the front and the back of the target and also slashing debuff from the side. You could cross-class Impulse Drive, so that is one from the back too. Other than that there is no need to move around.

[Shadex]

Because the average player is inherently lazy and in accordance with Yoshi's well thumbed copy of "How to Make an Effective WoW Clone in 6 Easy Steps" we will continue to see more and more of FFXIV get dumbed down and simplified until it, like WoW can be end game raided playing with your feet while watching a Dr. Who Marathon and assembling your Lego Deathstar. (Hail Sheldon)

We will continue to see SE take more moves to remove complexity and thought from 14. Heck the next job they are even taking out the base class. It has been mentioned in this thread that some want positionals completely removed so we can watch TV while we stand in one place and face roll our keys.

The OP is correct that the positional aspect of these two jobs should have been reversed. But MNK was introduced first while some amount of depth was still being toyed with. We all know frontal Sneak Attack was added not out of lore, or good design but because people didn't like not being able to use one of their abilities while soloing. Giving Ninja, a master of killing someone who doesn't even know you are there, a signature ability that can only be used while standing right in front of their target is dumb. But I am sure someone from SE will roll out the Wookie Defense to try and justify it.