On the Removal of Positionals

[Eudyptes]

But WoW has also had positionals: Backstab, Ambush, Shred, Ravage, Pounce, avoiding the front and sometimes back of bosses to not get parried or tail smashed, etc.

You know what, you're right about that first part of the sentence. But there is also a reason they are all gone now. They are largely a bad idea because mechanics make them inconsistent, just like they do now in this game. And as for the second part...those are literally just enemy mechanics. A tail smash is a boss mechanic that prevents you from getting behind an enemy to do those back positionals. So like, what's the point of having a danger zone AND being punished via doing subpar damage?

[Aco505]

A tail smash is a boss mechanic that prevents you from getting behind an enemy to do those back positionals. So like, what's the point of having a danger zone AND being punished via doing subpar damage?

You can hit a Backstab without getting hit by a tail smash. It requires proper positioning. Also abilities such as Backstab still behave as positionals to this day in WoW.

[Taliriah]

You know what, you're right about that first part of the sentence. But there is also a reason they are all gone now. They are largely a bad idea because mechanics make them inconsistent, just like they do now in this game. And as for the second part...those are literally just enemy mechanics. A tail smash is a boss mechanic that prevents you from getting behind an enemy to do those back positionals. So like, what's the point of having a danger zone AND being punished via doing subpar damage?

You move into the danger zone when you need to hit a positional and out of it when you don't. And if you can't move in for the positional because of a mechanic or because the tail swipe is being telegraphed, you use true north instead. The whole point is that you have to move instead of comfortably sitting in one place.

[Eudyptes]

You move into the danger zone when you need to hit a positional and out of it when you don't. And if you can't move in for the positional because of a mechanic or because the tail swipe is being telegraphed, you use true north instead. The whole point is that you have to move instead of comfortably sitting in one place.

I see this "explanation" all the time but it does not work outside of a vacuum (bosses don't just simply stand still). In actual boss fights there aren't enough TN charges to cover every positional you can't hit due to mechanics on like 90% of bosses now. I mean this is literally why they have been removing them more and more and reducing the potency lost over the years. Because even SE knows it's just not feasable and if they left it as it used to be melee would either be flat out the inferior role, or they would have to make the bonus so high that they would be insanely broken on the boss fights that remove positionals already.

I'm sorry, but it's just a bad system. Imo they should be removed entirely so boss fights can be designed entirely without them in mind. It'll allow for even more unique and interesting mechanic options. Which I mean already seems to be the direction they are going anyway.

[Taliriah]

I'm sorry, how did we go from talking specifically about "A tail smash is a boss mechanic that prevents you from getting behind an enemy to do those back positionals. So like, what's the point of having a danger zone AND being punished via doing subpar damage?" to "mechanics on like 90% of bosses now"?

You certainly have no trouble repositioning those goalposts.

[Eudyptes]

I'm sorry, how did we go from talking specifically about "A tail smash is a boss mechanic that prevents you from getting behind an enemy to do those back positionals. So like, what's the point of having a danger zone AND being punished via doing subpar damage?" to "mechanics on like 90% of bosses now"?

You certainly have no trouble repositioning those goalposts.

I didn't reposition anything. Those were the goalposts from the start. This entire convo was about positionals in general, and he brought up boss mechanics as being "positionals" themselves. If you only wanted to talk about the WoW tail swipe mechanic that we were talking about, then why did you bring up TN, which doesn't exist in that game?

[Taliriah]

Let's circle back to this "90% of boss mechanics" then. I could say with equal accuracy "90% of bosses have gigantic hit boxes", which justifies the existence of positionals even more, because if the only requirement is to stay inside the giant hitbox it becomes almost as easy as playing ranged.

[Eudyptes]

Let's circle back to this "90% of boss mechanics" then. I could say with equal accuracy "90% of bosses have gigantic hit boxes", which justifies the existence of positionals even more, because if the only requirement is to stay inside the giant hitbox it becomes almost as easy as playing ranged.

Which is exactly why they stated they were reducing the sizes of hitboxes this xpac. Which they largely did (save for the EX's, but those don't even require positionals anyway). I think most melee would agree in general that staying in range was a non-issue in SW and ShB. There were still mechanics that would keep you out of melee range of course, but I don't think anyone is really defending the enormous hitboxes they had before.

But one bad design choice doesn't make another bad design choice good.

[Arohk]

Positionals themself arent the problem, the problem is that bosses always turn around and almost always in the moment you do your positional attack, as if the game is programmed that way.

[Aco505]

In actual boss fights there aren't enough TN charges to cover every positional you can't hit due to mechanics on like 90% of bosses now. I mean this is literally why they have been removing them more and more and reducing the potency lost over the years. Because even SE knows it's just not feasable and if they left it as it used to be melee would either be flat out the inferior role, or they would have to make the bonus so high that they would be insanely broken on the boss fights that remove positionals already.

I'm sorry, but it's just a bad system. Imo they should be removed entirely so boss fights can be designed entirely without them in mind. It'll allow for even more unique and interesting mechanic options. Which I mean already seems to be the direction they are going anyway.

People have been hitting almost if not all positionals in the hard content where they're actually challenging to get like Ultimates, P3S, P5S or P11S.

Also, missing positionals hardly means taking huge damage losses, quite the opposite. Whether this should change or not is a different question.

Positionals have never dictated fight design, otherwise all omnidirectional fights would be great yet they're not (e. g. P7S).