On the Removal of Positionals

[W00by]

They should definitely have melee jobs that do not have flank positionals. Rear alone should be enough for the job based on assassination and stealth(nin), yet it gets flank for some reason.



This forum has a big problem with projecting personal beliefs onto an entire demographic.

I don't deny that there is a demographic that exists that dislikes positionals. There are people who dislike just about every element of the game -- nothing in this game is a monolith.

But I ask you: who should melee DPS be designed for?

The people who are playing melee DPS, who have for years, and who dedicate great effort to improving at the class?

Or people who don't play melee DPS, and have no intention to?

To me, classes and characters should be designed for their most dedicated players first. Don't get me wrong, I'm strongly against massive barriers of entry that make it impossible for casual players to even play a job. I think gatekeeping like that is elitist. But, as I and many people here have explained, positionals are not a massive barrier to entry -- they are 40 or 60 potency here or there every now and then. No one who wants to play a melee is completely incapable of doing so because of positionals. (I also believe the barrier of entry to melee would get BIGGER if positionals were removed: see my prior post about that a couple pages back.)

The fact of the matter is, do I go to another country and vote in their elections? Do I visit other people's family gatherings and tell them how they should settle familial disputes? No. So I think melee players' voices should be weighed more heavily here. It's not that the voices of other demographics don't matter -- just that their voices lack a key insight that being an actual melee player provides. After all, if I don't understand something, how can I explain to someone else how it works? I can't cook, and I wouldn't tell a 5-star chef to take garlic out of his pasta recipe because I don't like garlic. He knows what he's doing way better than I do and it's probably in there for a reason.

My effort is not to gatekeep melee, but rather to explain to non-melee players why positionals remaining is better for everyone than them going away. Most of all for melee players, who I believe should matter most in a discussion about melee DPS... if that even needs to be said.

Edit: Also, just thought I would add again that there already is a melee DPS job that barely has positionals. That job is RPR, and I made a post a while back in this thread about how you can practically ignore the existence of positionals on that job and still hit pretty much all of them. Check my post history for more details! There are already plenty of places to go if you want a melee with no positionals (like Tank, as Naomishtola insightfully said).

[HikariKurosawa]

So much yapping I actually cant be bothered to read that post.

I pretty much only play melee and would celebrate the removal of positionals. TLDR.

Then there are all the people that would be playing melee if not for positionals. You are not the voice you think you are.

[Lyth]

...

You are well within your rights to dislike anything you want. Some people dislike the fact, in this game, you have to stand in one spot to cast spells. You might even have a broader audience of player that's willing to play Magical Ranged DPS if the game used a system of walking or even full movement casts. But here's the thing that you're missing. Not everyone needs to be able to play every job. In fact, the 'majority' doesn't even need to like every job.

A recurrent mistake that the devs have been making is in designing roles around people who don't actually enjoy those roles. We have tanks which no longer position bosses. We have healers that no longer have to keep their tanks alive. Over time, every role is losing its unique identity and unique values. Over time, every role is devolving into a formless, indistinguishable mass without personality or soul in the name of 'accessibility'. And as much as I dislike saying it, the core problem that Physical Ranged is experiencing right now is just that it has gotten there first. Let's not repeat that mistake here.

There are 21 combat jobs in this game and more are added with each expansion. Niche jobs are part of the long tail. It's perfectly fine to have a gameplay mechanic that even the majority of players don't like. You need a mix of both popular and less popular jobs in order to attract the broadest audience.

It's also worth noting that there are plenty of people who do like positionals. VPR, which was recently released, had the highest positional count out of any melee job on launch (although they apparently aim to change this). It was also probably the most popular job that they've ever released in the history of this game and is by far the most represented job in the released DT content (it's actually a little too successful). Who would have thought that a high APM job with positionals could be so appealing? I think when you hit an unexpected blockbuster success like that, it's important to stand back and reflect on why it happened. Maybe you've got it all wrong. Maybe simplifications aren't the answer.

I can appreciate that you have strong views on this, as do the rest of us. But unfortunately, if you dislike melee to the point that you don't even have a single melee job unlocked, then you probably never were the target audience in the first place. And that's perfectly fine.

If you design for everyone, you design for no-one. Design jobs for the people who love them.

[W00by]

So much yapping I actually cant be bothered to read that post.

I pretty much only play melee and would celebrate the removal of positionals. TLDR.

Then there are all the people that would be playing melee if not for positionals. You are not the voice you think you are.

If you don't want to participate in a discussion about melee DPS, then why are you in a thread dedicated to discussing melee DPS? That's not really the own you think it is...

"I can't defend my position, so I'll just ignore everything you said." The ancient techniques of internet arguments are alive and well.

Regardless, you've helped me prove my point that we care more and our words should have more weight, since you can't even be bothered to ... read. And such.

Edit: Oh, and regarding that last part: I'm so glad you brought that up, because it's always fun to discuss.

The argument that there are a ton of people that would be playing melee if positionals did not exist is complete and utter nonsense.

Melee is the most popular role in the game. It's also the role with the most jobs in the game, but even if you want to go pound-for-pound, job-for-job, jobs like Samurai, Reaper, and Dragoon are consistently winning popularity polls and demonstrating census data comparable to other roles' most popular jobs, like Caster's Summoner, Aiming's Dancer, and even tank's Warrior. And this is of course ignoring the frankly titanic presence of Viper, which is the most popular job in the game (and maybe the most popular job the game has ever had). Square Enix is surely aware of melee's popularity, too, if they were willing to launch two Melee DPS in a row in Endwalker and then Dawntrail.

If positionals were scaring everyone off, would you be able to double Dancer's playerbase and still not even get close to the amount of Vipers in PF? Viper has the most positionals, after all. It's pretty clear, statistically and scientifically, that positionals are not a massive barrier to entry.

And hey, even if they are, maybe they should stay that way. Do we really need LESS aiming DPS players...?

[HikariKurosawa]

Positionals can be ignored and are by most players, it's not a barrier to entry it's just an annoying mechanic.

[W00by]

Positionals can be ignored and are by most players, it's not a barrier to entry it's just an annoying mechanic.

Right. And if it's not too consequential, and some people find it annoying but they can easily ignore it... does it really need to go, if there are people who do like it?

[HikariKurosawa]

Right. And if it's not too consequential, and some people find it annoying but they can easily ignore it... does it really need to go, if there are people who do like it?

I think it should go from most jobs, yes. Not every melee job needs positionals, and reaper is a very poor choice to make the one that isn't positional dependent. Even then, reaper has positionals.

[W00by]

I think it should go from most jobs, yes. Not every melee job needs positionals, and reaper is a very poor choice to make the one that isn't positional dependent. Even then, reaper has positionals.

WHY should they go, though? You personally disliking them isn't a sufficient reason. (And if you read my previous post, I went into detail, as a top-10 Endwalker Reaper in Abyssos on content, about why Reaper's positionals literally don't matter and you can ignore almost all of them. Please look into that regarding Reaper.)

There are lots of reasons for them to stay, but other than "I don't like them," I've never seen anyone provide a SOLID reason for them to go. They aren't barriers to entry, they don't heavily impact other players if you aren't doing them, and they don't even heavily impact YOU if you aren't doing them. What is the reason?

[CKNovel]

I think both your points are valid.

Positionals are a way to make melee DPS more engaging, dance around the boss and to rewards them with a bit of DPS.
Positionals are worthless and can be ignored. But at the same time we're a community that seeks to optimize Sanctuary Island.
When shifting from any other class to melee, positionals can be difficult to get the hang of it and be frustrating at first.
The rewards doesn't seem to be the problem, but the execution.

Wouldn't it be possible to keep what works as positionals and remove what feels frustrating for the melee beginner?

[Supersnow845]

I’m gonna say that I came around on positionals as my original position was I think there should be a melee without positionals, but in reality there functionally is- RPR

it’s probably not optimal but I just started getting my soul gauge to 100 before I spent it to get shroud gauge and using that you can basically use true north to cover every positional (except maybe like 1 around gluttony)

With RPR you need to do like 1 positional every 2 minutes when you plan around true north, that’s fine with me, the rest of the melee can keep the positionals I don’t want to remove them for people who like them