The problem with positionals is that most players do them incorrectly and move too much. They don't realize the point of them is to reduce as much movement as possible.

There are sadly tons of really bad and misleading guides filled with misinformation. For example, this is incorrect:



This is correct:



Ideally you'd want to hug the orange line where flank meets rear, and stay there, only taking a baby step to the left or right as needed. Too many people follow the first example, and scramble to do this, which is what gets party members killed:



when what they ought to be doing is this:



A combination of community-borne misinformation, people making a bigger deal out of positionals than they really are, and inexperienced players moving way too damn much when they don't need to, is where the problems come from.