On the Removal of Positionals

[HikariKurosawa]

You're right I should just unsubscribe from this game. Enjoy your positionals. I like how your opinion isn't personal because you already get what you want lol. What an entitled elitist jerk. I hope the game dies because of people like you. I can always resubscribe when you're the only ones left and they are forced to change the design to cater to people like me. Elitists are the smallest minority.

Just in this thread I get people looking up logs another player took of my gameplay to invalidate my opinion because I didn't hit 100% of positionals. You people are toxic and horrible for the game's health. You don't deserve to be pandered to and I genuinely hope that the game's health suffers because of you. Dawntrail MSQ is not good like endwalker was. The devs are not lucky this time with WoW controversy and asmongold giving them the success that endwalker had for free. All of the reviews are complaining about the game, and even the elitists are unhappy with the job design. If you're pushing away the casuals and not even happy as elitists, what is the company going to do? Something has to give. I hope they ban things like fflogs and remove positionals to start off. Clearly it's not good if people are weaponizing them on the forums to invalidate the voices of others.

You don't play healer because you don't enjoy it. I play melee because I enjoy it aside from positionals. I can't help wanting to be optimal. I can't win because I feel bad to not hit positionals, but I find hitting positionals to be annoying busywork that takes away a lot of fun. Have you ever heard of a catch 22? Because that's what positionals are for me. Can't win either way. Only choice is to unsubscribe. Which I did. My account runs out august 7th. I haven't played more than an hour this entire month because the MSQ is so bad this time around. It literally puts me to sleep within minutes of playing it, but I don't want to skip the storyline. Another catch 22. Can't win with this game currently so what's the point of subscribing? The community is toxic and entitled, the gameplay doesn't care about what I want, and the story is unengaging.

[W00by]

You're right I should just unsubscribe from this game. Enjoy your positionals. I like how your opinion isn't personal because you already get what you want lol. What an entitled elitist jerk. I hope the game dies because of people like you.

I am sorry that your experience is negative right now, but I assure you, I am not saying "you should just unsubscribe." And I'm sorry that you aren't enjoying the game right now. But who's being a jerk here -- me, trying to have an evidence based discussion with you? Or you, telling me you hope the game I love dies? I didn't look up your logs, and I didn't invalidate your feelings -- quite the opposite. I'm just trying to engage in discussion here. You, who have accused me of "yapping" and being a toxic elitist, are the one being unkind here. But I understand you're frustrated.

Also, my opinion is personal. Part of the reason I want positionals to stay is because "I like positionals." But that would not be a strong enough argument for them to stay in the game. If anyone in this thread had provided me a real reason they should be removed -- something rooted in the game's design, or the objective implementation of positionals -- I would weigh that objectively. But people rarely do. And any objective criticism of positionals, I feel has a stronger argument to the opposite as to why they are an effective mechanic.

"Positionals limit fight design!" No they don't. They enhance it by making mechanics more engaging on melee since melee have to both do the positionals and the mechanic simultaneously. There are some bad mechanics, but the great ones feel so great on melee this expansion.

"Positionals limit job design!" No they don't. Square Enix has never removed something from the game and added back something cool and interesting to take advantage of the absence, not once. Until there's precedent for this, I refuse to believe they wouldn't just remove them wholesale.

"Positionals are trivial and boring busywork!" Not any more than cast times are busy work in fights that don't allow you to move. Sure, sometimes the boss doesn't challenge you to do them, but in the content where the extra damage from positionals hypothetically matters, positionals are very challenging and engaging (while not forcing you to pursue that challenge if you don't want to).

"There should be melees without positionals!" There basically are, RPR and MNK are barely thinking about them right now, and with Huton removed, NIN is almost never caught unawares and can always manipulate whether they want to do a side or a flank. Even SAM has enough timer leeway to switch order between side and flank combos depending on what Sen they have. Pretty much only Dragoon and Viper feel "prohibitive" with their positionals at times.

"Positionals make it hard to optimize!" Not really. The gain for hitting all of them is very small, and even then, a player who misses all their positionals but crits more can still do more damage than a player hitting all their positionals. The very top end shouldn't be factored into analysis, optimization should hardly matter here.

Other than "I don't like them," I haven't seen an argument that can't be countered in favor of positionals. I don't cite these arguments because I like positionals. I cite them because they're true, and have been confirmed to be true for me in my years of playing this game.

I'm really not trying to be elitist or gatekeep. It's fine to dislike them. But until someone can provide me arguments based on in-game design or numbers, I can't see any argument for positionals to be removed. I assure you that if I truly thought it was for the best, I'd welcome their removal. But, come on -- Aiming DPS is hemorrhaging players, and healers are on strike! Is melee really the role that needs changes right now?

I hope someday, you can return to the game and enjoy it, but maybe it's time for a break.

[HikariKurosawa]

Holy TLDR. All you do is yap about your own opinion with zero consideration for the experience of others. You are the one being a jerk. You might as well have ignored every post I made and just yapped about your own feelings this entire time. It's like me posting just gave you justification to say your own takes rehashed.

Good for you getting what you want. Hope it works out for you, real happy for you and stuff. All you demonstrated is that you like positionals and think they should stay because you like them and they are largely inconsequential to ignore. So inconsequential that they are part of the reason I unsubbed from the game.

[W00by]

Holy TLDR. All you do is yap about your own opinion with zero consideration for the experience of others. You are the one being a jerk. You might as well have ignored every post I made and just yapped about your own feelings this entire time. It's like me posting just gave you justification to say your own takes rehashed.

Good for you getting what you want. Hope it works out for you, real happy for you and stuff.

I really hope so too, thank you!