Quote Originally Posted by Eorzean_username View Post
I agree that the gameplay value of positionals — as currently designed — to the "average" player's game experience, at this point in FFXIV, is probably being overexaggerated.

However, I am perplexed by the assertion that this statement:

...can be "literally" false?
• It adds potency

• It can be failed

• Not missing a single one usually requires planning and anticipation
It seems to me that, by conceptual definition, attempting to strike every positional on a complex or fast-moving encounter is, literally, a part of the optimisation process.

There's a massive can-of-worms to get into about whether it's a good optimisation process, but it's definitely there — just like a Caster striving not to drop a single cast, a Machinist striving not to be out of range for heals, and etc.
The raids are not exactly random with their mechanics. Some minor scenarios are different here and there based on individual responsibilities, but in the grand scheme of things savage raids are literally a dance and your rotation will be the exact same at every mechanic every single time. I literally memorize mechanics based on where I am in my rotation lol. Once you have that dance memorized, knowing when and where true north is a waste or not becomes pretty easy. Can you miss 1 or 2 in a fight? Sure. Does it matter? Not really.

Even when positionals actually had meaning and proc things like heavy thrust or changed how much kenki you gained instead of being a potency difference I just never really felt positionals were all that engaging. Kaiten didn't really take that much effort to optimize, but it was fun and engaging to do. Positionals? Meh. They just don't add any value to the game for me, especially now with so many oGCD's making combat seem much faster than it really is I find less value in positionals. Back in ARR they were kinda neat because they filled the gap of an otherwise excruciatingly slow and boring combat and even then the abundance of positionals on MNK wasn't really enough to keep me from being bored. I didn't really fully appreciate the combat till HW with DRG and by that point the combat was busy enough for DRG that I felt the filler of positionals to make the slow combat feel more engaging had lost is merit and the devs have clearly felt that to as they made them less and less impactful. I just don't see the point of them anymore and I definitely don't see the need to add something in place of them since they add zero value to the combat engagement to begin with.