December 2017 Version Update

Must get since SB is what makes a dd these days *cough lolmnk.

Subtle Blow gear is nearly useless. Did try to tune in to MNK discussions but the reading comprehension still wasn't quite there? :( Try again next time!

I would continue to resist replying because this isn't really about December update, but since there's really nothing else to talk about besides relic hands (yay HQ abjuration prices for mostly unimpressive gear) and Ambuscade (which has its own detailed topic now)...

So, the only reason I mentioned PUP in the first place was in response to a trolly comment that the job needs super-powered relic armor to fix it being a "worthless" job (with the predictable follow-up complaint that since it isn't a SMN or its preferred support jobs, the job has no point... along with 18 other jobs, apparently)


Despite what Saevel claims, PUP doesn't really have a problem holding hate in situations you'd want to use it - as several more reasonable people have already mentioned. Fighting something with ranged strats or mages (less popular now outside of maybe Kei, but this was the trend for like all of 2016 prior to the "GEO nerf")? Don't want a lot of people in range of deadly damage AoEs or Charm (like Bastok Dynamis boss this month, FWIW)? PUP is excellent. And hey guess what, that kind of setup describes a lot of the new content over the past year+. That's certainly a viable niche that isn't at all uncommon with current content, even if it's not the ideal tank for EVERYTHING.

Also nice that an automaton doesn't even require a healer in the party or any buffs on the tank, allowing for some pretty good lowman setups (kinda nice when you're fighting mobs with HP scaling).

I get that different tanks are good for different things. I also play an Epeolatry RUN and a well geared NIN (now that's a job that's barely a tank but is sometimes cited as such, it's straight up not a viable tank outside of super niche applications that rarely come up in the current game). I also love when we can make one of the LS PLDs tank stuff so I can go DD.

Perhaps if you have mega buffed WAR DRK kind of jobs in a zerg situation, PUP isn't your best tank option due to hate control. It's also pretty awful for holding hate on multiple mobs at the same time. That's perfectly fine. But PUP is pretty far from a useless job, and it actually does have a role where it's an ideal solution for situations that have been fairly common in the current era of FFXI. That's a hell of a lot better than things were for the first 9 years of PUP's existence, where it was basically a bottom tier melee DD, with some ability to go solo using a healer bot in a pre-trust era.


Don't need relic RNGs, I normally PUP tank ranged setups that include Gandiva RNGs and Fomalhaut RNG/CORs. Outside of stuff that would be a problem for any tank (people going nuts right after a hate reset move, specific mechanics like 99k SCs on Fu) there's really never an issue.

Also, PUPs shouldn't be fulltiming a single set of DT- gear, or trying to mix and match DD and tanking attachments when trying to act like a tank. S-E actually paid attention to this issue and gave a pretty damn nice Su3 set this year, with 5/5 pieces having large chunks of pet enmity. Should be swapping into those for voke/flashes whenever enmity is a concern, not just sitting in one DT- set.

I don't think you got the reference.

The robot is full timing a single gear set. The robot doesn't change gear for fastcast or use an enmity midcast set. They aren't optimizing their recast either. They are a HELP I AM TRAPPED IN 2006 PLEASE SEND A TIME MACHINE WAR/PLD with no gearswaps but are virtually indestructible.

Master swapping into pet enmity+ gear before a puppet enmity generating ability is basically an enmity midcast though.

Yeah, they don't use haste/fastcast gear for enmity abilities because everything is on a timer. That's just different.

I actually don't disagree with your categorization as a virtually indestructible HELP I AM TRAPPED IN 2006 PLEASE SEND A TIME MACHINE WAR/PLD. But sometimes that's a very effective tool :)

Don't forget pup tanks pretty good keeping the rest of your group safe from AoE magic like meteor

I agree here and will add that puppets actually have 2 sets of gear, attachments work as non-swap gear (at least with pet out) that gets greatly enhanced by maneuvers.

Then you have master gear that again, enhances massively the pets performance, heyoka set is just incredible for those hate tools.

Im doing some omen lately with a pup tank with not many ppl (party of 6 or less) and its a brilliant, unkillable machine of holding hate under controlled hate situations, for example just having 1 frontline DD and 1-2 summoners.

People should stop thinking as if every situation in this game all DDs will have capped-everything, only server with a big population is asura really, for the rest its either lowman scenarios with 1 mule around or multi-boxers with 6 characters hyperbuffing themselves, i just know 1 group in ragna that goes alliance-type (or almost), the rest is 6 or less.

In situations where you lack many people to play around or people you dont want play with, havin a couple friends with pup smn and such is brilliant lol, 140k hallmarks this month abussing puppet.

A good chunk of the time automatons aren't casting anyways, they would hardly require fast cast anyways. Flash is a job ability, not a spell, so for that it's all about attachment+enmity. Would be interesting if there was an in-game interface only available to PUPs to allow them to see when their pet's timers on stuff is about to be ready so masters could more appropriately time their gear swaps. Something that would allow them to see what the automaton was going to use next, so we could coordinate our swaps accordingly. But I digress. There is no real reason for a FC set, unless you are nuking or using a Naga Cure set.

Everything is based on maneuvers. If you are going to swap in Fire, just use a pet enmity set to make the most of your pet's voke. If you're going to swap to light, same thing for flash. PUP is in a unique category of being the only pet job whose direct actions cannot be controlled and are only influenced by it's maneuvers and attachments. That aside, it will perform it's abilities when they are ready. But it takes a skilled PUP to fine tune their skills and apply the appropriate swaps at the proper time. That's where the real tanky fun starts.

I'll just also add that had I not had PUP levelled for last ambuscade, I would have earned 0 hallmarks because I joined no groups for frog. But due to its tank invincibility, earned over 100k hallmarks just "not" tanking with other PUPs/COR setup. It was fun, and it was good to see other PUPs get some opportunity as well. Everything is always SMN this and that, people are always close-minded to new ways of getting stuff done.

Automaton is similar to blue mage this way.

*Stumbles in* Is this the PUP thread? must be, musta missed that update thread on the way over here.

Anyone tested to see if SE fixed the personal loot drop in Dyna?

Don't dismiss this. It has actual value.

And PUP tank is fine - you just have to build a group around its strengths (being invincible with practically no support) while compensating for its weaknesses (mediocre enmity generation). This isn't rocket surgery or some crippling flaw in the job, it just means you have to play differently with one. If that lets different groups of people complete content, why does it matter to anyone else?

LOL, unfortunately the flashy looking WSD+10% on PUP hands drew some early discussion (kinda overhyped for a job that doesn't make good use of any single hit WS), and it snowballed from there.

Yes, S-E said in the update notes that they fixed the personal loot drop issue so I'd assume it's really fixed. Haven't personally observed it yet though.

Doin a LS run in Sandy tonight so ill try to remember to report back here with info.
Last 2 runs I got 0 Personal drops so I hope its changed.

10% WSD on DRG hands

Dispel added to PLD Shield Bash.

Very cool!

I got 3 medals and 11 cards from the statue boss tonight, so I would say it's probably fixed.

The gear the master use's is FAR inferior to what RUN / PLD actually get, which I said earlier.


Umm Haste / fastcast is used by players ... wait a minute ... reduce a timer. Robots are too stupid to do this, thus their hate generation is absolutely garbage. I was serious with the HELP I AM TRAPPED IN 2006 PLEASE SEND A TIME MACHINE WAR/PLD reference, the person who has no idea what their JA's are for and has to be reminded to provoke and Flash every minute or so. Being unable to hold hate is the definition of a ***tank.



Oh I never dismissed it, we've used PUP tanks for things before and they've always been other pet jobs or the occasional relic RNG. But that's the absolute limit to what you can do because the moment you introduce any sort of heavy damage it immediately falls apart. People going around saying stuff like "PUP is a great tank" are no different then those saying "MNK is a great DD" or "SMN is a great buffer". Factually incorrect and powered entirely by irrational emotions.

As I said earlier


It's like boosting your the strongest person in the world, if we remove everyone who's stronger then you. A statement can not qualify itself and objective qualifications must be done on the whole. It's the same *** people defending the exact same three jobs, SMN, MNK and PUP. Those jobs are ***outside if a very specific niche that practically qualifies itself because of how specialized it is. MNK is a ***DD, it's the weakest of the DD's and it's only saving grace is feeding minimal TP. PUP is a ***tank, it's the weakest of the tanks who's only saving grace is being almost invulnerable, which doesn't matter when the NM ignores the robot. SMN is a ***support job, the weakest of the support jobs who's only saving grace is a broken AC.

Saying stuff like "PUP tank is the best when we're using PUP tank" or "SMN is the best job for using AC SMN" is dumb. Red is the best color of red, water is the best at being wet, sunlight is the best light for getting sunlight.

Are you using ad hominen to attack the character quality of an AI robot in a video game to prove your point?

I mean what are you even arguing anymore? A Tank is just something who holds the mob and takes damage and a PUP is a tank in a good bit of instances in this game, shouldn't that be the end of the discussion? Or is your obsession with being right going to prevent this from ending?

RE: +enmity on the auto.
https://www.bg-wiki.com/bg/Strobe
https://www.bg-wiki.com/bg/Strobe_II

With OF1+2 and a light maneuver, increase those by 50%, or 100% during OD and add them together. Then add Pet: enmity gear on top.
OD with strobes caps VE with invincible.

The problem isn't lack of +enmity, it's lack of CE generation. You can get around that to some degree with /BLU a decent master enmity set and 5/5 ventriloquy. Or can just have a SCH use Caper Emissarius on the master when the pet loses hate then vent it over.

Who takes a tank to a full on melee zerg and expects them to hold hate on the main target? Adds? Sure. Main NM? You're gonna have a bad time unless your DD are gimp.

It's not the lack of Capital but the lack of Money. The robot doesn't switch into gear before doing something.




And you just showed your ignorant on high level mobs. CE/VE from damage is greatly effected by level difference, meaning on a high level NM a tank like RUN or PLD can actually hold hate half the time due to the level difference muting the CE/VE generation from damage. The DD's will still eventually pull hate, switch to DT gear, the NM hits them a few times and goes back to the tanks. The most important part is that when the DD's take high damage, that's enough of a CE loss that it ends up going back to the tank instead of threatening the DD further. The tank doesn't need to hold the monster 100% of the time, 50% would be sufficient enough.


Now I've been talking about ***that people actually care about CL140~150. Anything less then that really doesn't matter.

Only to you. Many real people still care about and struggle with things like VD Ambuscade, Omen bosses, Halphas, etc.

The master does, which influences PET: stats. How are you not getting that?


Dat backpedal...

I'm happier having just erased the reply I typed out. Gotta let this die lol.

Most people seem to get that there are multiple possible tanks, each of which has their advantages and disadvantages. I'll continue using my PUP to tank stuff with my Gandiva and Fomalhaut toting friends (who are apparently terrible since they don't rip hate of my puppet and aren't required to use Anni/Coronach onry...), get wins on current content in a reasonable time, and enjoy myself.

Or when the situation calls for it, I'll switch to my RUN, make one of the PLDs tank, etc. Not that hard to get.

This one word, is the entirety of the discussion.


You can't use that word when you're talking to someone unreasonable.

Your RNG peeps use a stronger weapon than anni and are forced to hold back (or, are /actually/ terrible. cause they should easily pull hate off a puppet.)

Meaning you spend /more/ time doing something you could've done faster.

The name of the game is efficiency. Pup tank (works) but only if everyone is terrible, or you go slower than you need to.

Which by some definitions = not working

Going to double, to add a second point here.

When we were doing RNG exclusive content, we'd always have that one guy who insisted on using a bow instead of Anni.

"it does more damage" .... Obviously.

But when you pull hate and you get us all hit with aoes, it slows down the OVERALL speed of the event.

Yeah, you did more damage, but caused the event to take 3 minutes longer. Time IS money.

If Time = Money, then PUP tank = not tank. Unless you don't care about money.

I'm honestly not terribly concerned if fighting an Omen boss or Ambuscade NM takes a couple minutes longer than some optimal setup, especially considering that the boss fight is only a small portion of the total time clearing the zones, obtaining Ambu KIs and all that zoning, etc.

I will admit my group is not the top 1% and the most efficient in the world. But we clear the current content, enjoy doing it, and somehow manage to not self-destruct when we occasionally use a puppet to tank. Shocking that I can still bear to play the game, no?

Plus, while my teammates might not be the finest players who ever played, they're not incompetent and generally pretty pleasant to spend a couple hours with. That counts more to me than if I was in an LS with the best of the best and I didn't really like being around them. I also don't want to play with total idiots, but I'm in a situation where we're good enough to get stuff done and the game and company entertains me. That's really all I need.

Also, some of you must only see kinda bad PUP tanks (which honestly isn't very shocking). It's way, way overblown these past few pages: the results from a well geared PUP taking advantage of proper maneuvers, attachment setups, and gear swaps is not like you're using a WAR who stands there and forgets to voke. That's kinda the vibe people are incorrectly giving off here.

Ok since you didn't bother to read. The auto has more enmity in DT set just through strobes and maneuvers. I'll bold the next part and maybe you'll read this time. The master switches gear before the auto acts.



And you just proved you don't actualy read what people are saying, you just skim, assume, then parrot easy to find information like it's something people don't know to try to show superiority.

Case and point. You pull hate off an auto with instant capped VE (50% of overall cap) apparently by WSing once on these mobs with reduced hate generation due to level difference. So your second WS pulls it from the RUN assuming they can cap CE and VE within the time it takes to WS twice.

See above. I agree, you've been talking about ***, but it's not stuff people care about.

On that note, it's time for a block. I like info, and a lot of the info you share with people is good, but it's tainted by your terrible better than thou attitude. It's a game, not everyone lives and breathes XI.

Doesn't Decoy shot work on the puppet? I may be misnformed but couldn't the Gandiva RNG just decoy shot, AM, Camo and just spam autos for pretty good damage while transfering hate to the automaton?

Also with like 2-3 RNGs using Decoy shot the hate should stick pretty well correct?

I don't think it does (Trick Attack doesn't)