On the Removal of Positionals

[mallleable]

My biggest gripe with giving phys ranged positionals is that they inherit the jank that comes with the mechanic, that jank being the lack of feedback from doing them correctly, and that the mechanic is removed depending on the enemy's hitbox. It circles back to I think the mechanic should be replaced with something better.

[StriderZessei]

I can't say anything to positionals fitting a job's fantasy, because aside from a Ninja backstabbing a target, I've never once considered positionals as being part of the fantasy.

I will say though, that I strongly disagree that anyone benefits from their inclusion. Getting stuck with a dps who doesn't care about landing them hurts the entire party.

Also as just a personal opinion, Kaiten was boring, and Zanshin is an amazing new use of Kenki.

[W00by]

How can no one benefit from their inclusion if myself and the other players in this thread like them? It's simply untrue to say no one benefits from their inclusion, unless you're saying we don't exist. And I'm standing right here.

Besides, it's insane to say that they should be removed because you're with another DPS who doesn't care about landing them.

It hurts the entire party when a Healer doesn't care about doing damage.

It hurts the entire party when any DPS doesn't do their opener and burst phases at the right time and in the right order.

It hurts the entire party when tanks position the boss incorrectly.

It hurts the entire party when all 7 of the other members of your team aren't from a World First Raid Group, but that doesn't mean you can just get rid of all class design because some people don't use it as well as others. That makes no sense.

[Mikey_R]

I will say though, that I strongly disagree that anyone benefits from their inclusion. Getting stuck with a dps who doesn't care about landing them hurts the entire party.

The difference in damage between a DPS who does positionals and one that doesn't isn't that big. I done some quick dirty maths here:

https://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/...=1#post6542102

[Aco505]

snip

What you are replying to is just one of the usual posts when a thread on positionals pops up, and sadly it does happen often!

You will find people say that positionals...

1 - Add nothing to game play.

2 - Just require moving one step to the left and one to the right.

3 - Affect encounter design and removing them would "free" melee DPS jobs of a burden to achieve some mysterious hidden potential.

4 - Are irrelevant because you can miss them due to someone else's actions.

5 - Require zero challenge because True North exists.

And so on...

In the vast majority of these cases (let's say +95% of them), these comments and points against are made by non-melee DPS mains, or players that don't do content where they are challenging, that think that missing positionals prevents them from enjoying the role and demand them to be removed because of this.

Most of their arguments could be applied to anything else and be "valid", yet it's never the case. You don't see this directed at cast times or Swiftcast.

Obviously, it doesn't mean that positionals are perfect. We could argue about how much they should matter DPS-wise or which jobs could do with more tools to deal with them. But that's normally not the intention of these kinds of posts.

It's kind of an uphill battle to defend what little we have, but we have to keep trying. SE won't give us anything at all if they were removed.

[Valence]

I... actually really like this idea for a new physical ranged job. It would be a very distinct trait compared to the rest, and would synergize well with the physical ranged mobility. Honestly, slapping this on MCH (which somewhat even works with its chess theme) and then upping its damage would be an interesting idea.

It wouldn't work well with how ranged is supposed to behave. While it's true that in theory you end up at melee-ish range with the group, you can't hit positionals reliably as soon as you disconnect for obvious angle/geometrical reasons. Unless the idea is to give true north to rphys so that they can ignore positionals when they have to disconnect from the boss in the wrong direction due to mechanics, but then... doesn't it make that a purely melee mechanic? Why slap it onto ranged instead of melee?

Ultimately while it sounds cool in idea, I don't think it would work well with rphys. If we want to model something about hitting specific parts of the target, it should probably be encompassed into the basic combo with specific mechanics, perhaps, but not the way you position yourself relative to the boss for the aforementioned reasons. I'd rather rphys to be unique on its own, and that's why I'm not super fond of cast times on it beyond iajutsu style casts (and they would not bring it back anyway, people hated them with a burning passion in HW). I'm also not convinced by the pvp slow walk casts either. Ultimately I can't say for sure how it would feel, but it would essentially turn them into casters because with such a slow motion, you wouldn't be able to dodge much more stuff than with normal casts anyway (and they're more annoying to cancel than regular casts since you need to press escape BEFORE the slide casting threshold, which is a short timeframe, and you can't just move to cancel, those types of pvp casts are actually the best way to shoot yourself in the foot and it happens in pvp a lot too when you need to react quickly). It just works in pvp because it forces ranged players to be less mobile so that melees can get to them on top of the sprint mechanic. What would it serve in pve?

[W00by]

It's kind of an uphill battle to defend what little we have, but we have to keep trying. SE won't give us anything at all if they were removed.

Hundred percent agree, we just have to keep trying. It's just frustrating, when after I make a post about how positionals:

1. enhance job feel and gameplay

2. require thoughtful planning and engaging movement

3. enhance encounter design and mechanical nuance

4. can almost always be hit if played properly, even with less skilled other players

and 5. involve unique planning around True North and the like,

people still call them pointless. They just don't read what I say, so it becomes discouraging quickly. But I won't give up!

[Lyth]

...

You could make positionals work on physical ranged if you wanted to, and this wouldn't be the first game to try it. Lost Ark did it as well.

I know what you're getting at with arc lengths increasing proportional to the distance from the center. One way that you could work around this is by incorporating strafing movement tools. There's a built in lock-on feature in the game that melee players used to use to maintain directional autos while performing positionals. You'd basically just need to take the same feature and make it such that your strafe speed was significantly faster than your standard walk speed. Alternatively, you could let players strafe-roll along an arc into position. It could work really well for a Shaaloani-themed dual pistol gunslinger.

I don't think there's anything wrong with adding in a mix of positionals and/or casts to physical ranged. You might be able to argue in favor of more damage if you could incorporate a mix of casts and positionals, but you'd need to get physical ranged players on board with it first, get it implemented, and then argue the change, which is very roundabout. The big problem is that physical ranged doesn't really offer anything in terms of damage, uptime, or support utility that magical ranged doesn't do equally well or better. If there wasn't a role party bonus for physical ranged, I'm sure that it would always be replaced by an additional caster. The devs basically need to identify why this role exists and what value it adds.

[StriderZessei]

I read what you're saying, W00by, I just respectfully-but-fundamentally disagree on each point.

I'm my opinion, positionals are easy, tedious busywork that add nothing positive to the game.

[CKNovel]

Positionals could perfectly work on ranged and would make them a bit more interesting. It's kind of a shame to be that mobile and never put it to use.
But positionals still worthless, I wish they would at least grant a buff or be part of the jobs mechanic.