String Theory: A Puppetmaster's Guide *NEW*

My anwig is dt10 and haste5. I'll swap out earring and try again tonight. I also didn't have AAMR out for my beast roll I remembered now.

how are you not getting hit by hammer?

...? By not being in range of it? It's that simple.

I mean there's a video on the previous page.

He seems.pretty close to it which is why I asked

30' From target. Means you can be ~25' from frog if you're behind it.

Exactly. You have to be 30' from his TARGET, not him. So if you base the distance of your pet while behind him you can just make it in range to see your damage.

So, how much haste does Charger II give under overdrive with zero winds?

25% + 7% + 3%? 35 right?

I guess it really doesn't matter, you need both chargers to hit 43%

With gear you won't need both chargers

How much better is KKK over path C Xiucoatl (I'm assuming its only better with AM3).

EDIT: Not including master damage, just for puppet only fights.

To my knowledge, with one Light Maneuver and double OF it's:

25% Overdrive + 7*1.75 TC2 (probably floored) = 37%

With dual TCs, it is:

25% Overdrive + 7*1.75 TC2 + 5*1.75 TC1 = 43.75% (actually 45%-46%, if it weren't capped)

Add 25%-26% from gear Haste for a possible total of ~68.75% possible Haste. No DW/Martial Arts/JA Haste for matons.


This isn't entirely correct. Attachments/Overdrive are magical Haste while gear Haste is just that and both forms stack with each other as explained above. It is essential to cap all forms of Haste for maximum DPS with the sole exception being VE/SS Overdrive as its TP gain is already solid enough to be able to replace TC1 with a damage attachment instead. VE or Harlequin almost assuredly still benefit from the extra Haste that TC1 provides under OD without Wind Maneuvers, especially if you aren't using Inhibitors when paired with other PUPs.

Rostam Companion's Roll is excellent, but it doesn't carry a maton's TP gain entirely on its own. Now if you are someone who uses the COR/Comp Roll exploit, that's a different matter, but there's little point in talking about mechanics/optimizing builds in such a way when someone is using exploits to win. It trivializes everything about the job.


I did some parses a while ago with regard to this: https://www.ffxiah.com/forum/topic/52194/string-theory-a-puppetmasters-guide-new/13/#3419703

Due to Flame Holder now being useful the optimal setup likely no longer uses Speedloader II, but including SC damage AM3 KKK (and only with AM3) is about ~200 DPS ahead of Xiucoatl with rolls. Probably less if you have something better than Barataria Comp roll.

Is that also true for solo Automaton fight with Overdrive like this month Ambu (when you use bruiser) or duo automaton fights with Overdrive?

Actually I have to correct myself, I completely forgot I used Comp Roll and didn't bother to read my own post lol. The numbers are all with rolls. So AM3 KKK is ~200 DPS ahead of Xiucoatl and likely more without rolls.

As for OD, that kinda changes everything and becomes situational. For VE/SS AM3 is absolutely a waste because it can easily get a 3-hit build with something like ~70% Double Attack rate, making AM3 entirely useless as TP overflow does little due to TP Bonus gear and Shatterer doesn't benefit from it.

For VE/VE and SoS/VE AM3 is excellent due to the improved TP gain (can't use Thunder Maneuvers) as well as multiattack for Bone Crusher. On Harlequin it depends on what WS you're using (not sure if Slapstick has fTP transfer), but it should be decent as well.

However, setting up AM3 and maintaining it is very difficult for most fights, especially this month's Ambuscade. Further, if your maton is using Inhibitor/Speedloaders, you cannot hold TP to reapply AM3 midfight as it will prevent the maton from WSing entirely.

By the way, for what it's worth: the other day my triple Ice Maneuver BLM maton was nuking for 63k~ Thunder V and 57kish Fire V on Kei with Idris Malaise. No Udug body (/sadface) or max MAB Herc to boot, only a mix of Relic+3, Rawhide, Naga and Tali'ah. No Overdrive or Manafont, either. I'm sure those would have pushed the damage to cap, but I didn't get to test it as I had to step in and tank after Fullers killed the previous tank.

I don't know exactly how much a high-end BLM nukes for on Kei and obviously matons still can't compete as they don't double MB and miss half the skillchains, but that buff to Ice Maker was really nice.

im sorry im noob pup that only uses pup to hold mobs in dynamis, but i want to improve it past that and possibly add 2nd pup on 2nd char. Is KKK worth getting at all then or Xiu has complete priority before it? afaik back in days when matons was nuking KKK was suppose to be good because it required 3 ice manuevers and overload was an issue. That is still true?

KKK is still useful for the BLM maton, but the BLM maton itself is practically irrelevant for most fights due to its wonky AI. The damage per nuke is good, but the DPS can't match a real BLM.

As far as Xiucoatl vs. KKK goes: Xiucoatl C is generally more useful for all kinds of pet burning, whether you're ODing or not, because maintaining AM3 is a lot of trouble. KKK is excellent if you plan to melee with the master or if you have the opportunity to use niche setups like pure RNG maton (3x Wind) or BLM maton (3x Ice) often enough to warrant the price tag. Or one can just pursue it simply because they're a career PUP.

tl;dr: Get Xiucoatl C first. Or Pitre Fists if you're hurting for gil, as they're very close in overall performance.

Either you never tested KKK vs xiucoalt since the attachment update or you're just biased.
I have both Xiucoatl and KKK, Xiuco will never out-dps KKK if using truesights (or w/o) +double magniplugs + flame holder (which are the best pet ws attachments atm. Xiuco just can't pull KKK numbers because it will overdrive quickly if using flameholder (assuming you have a good pet store tp set for quick tp gain/ ws spam. -Burden gear is not enough to keep it up on xiucoalt

Did you completely ignore everything else I wrote? I explicitly said KKK beats Xiucoatl while AM3 is up in my previous post and even posted a link to my parses as proof (attachment changes made everything stronger, it didn't tip the balance). That doesn't change the fact that Xiucoatl is better in general because maintaining AM3 is a lot of trouble, i.e. rarely worth it in longer fights. And not worth it at all for VE/SS Overdrive.

I never mentioned in my reply about AM3, we all know that AM is hard to keep up which I didn't even bother to bring that up, with no AM3 Xiucoalt still gets out-dps by KKK especially on longer fights since you can't overload with KKK, flameholder burden spam is delicious to eat with KKK, you can't afford that with Xiucoatl.

Random person jumping in, trying to give an RKO to Aerix. Hold on, let me get my popcorn.

KKK literally adds nothing to the maton's damage outside of AM3.



If you're referring to this: you do realize you can just swap in KKK when using Maneuvers and then back to Xiucoatl C for damage? I've used my VE/SS maton extensively with double Fire/Wind and Flame Holder and never once overloaded with proper use of Cooldown. Even if you do, it's easily rectified by using Deactivate/Activate/Deploy (Xiucoatl easily makes up for the loss of damage). There's no need to fulltime KKK whatsoever.

You're just randomly typing stuff that i never mentioned, i don't full time KKK, Xiucoatl C swap will never beat KKK @ petws ,You will get overload a lot if flameholder is used on xiucoalt, no such thing as "proper cool-down timing" when maton is wsing a lot.. I did several tests and it overloads a ton with xiucoalt because pet uses too much flameholder effect. It's hard to keep it up when you're starting a fight spaming maneuvers each min.

tl;dr: missdivine made false claims, but KKK is nonetheless good. Get both weapons if you care about PUP, but Su4/Su5 is very likely still the better first choice for most people.

True, you never mentioned fulltiming KKK, but you also provided very little detail on exactly how you used the weapons until that post. However, for overall DPS swapping in KKK on WS does nothing for damage unlike Xiucoatl C, so if you're Accuracy-capped then it's essentially the same as fulltiming KKK (as to whether KKK has any effect on FH burden, read on).

And while KKK does say it suppresses Overload, there's no evidence it works on anything but Maneuvers. To make sure I'm not talking out of my *** I just went to Dho Gates and made my maton fight Apex Bats for 30 mins with Regal Beast/Drachen/crooked Comp Roll + 2xFire/1xWind. I burned through entirely too many oils to remove Attack Down. Please press F for my sacrifice.

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First test: Can Flame Holder + WS overload your Automaton?
According to the overload meter I had a 41% chance after I reapplied Fire Maneuvers, yet despite WS spam the maton never once overloaded on its own.

Conclusion: Flame Holder+WSs and similar attachments cannot overload your Automaton on their own. The overload check only happens when you use a Maneuver. Which is where a KKK swap-in matters.

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Second test: Does Kenkonken affect the burden created by Flame Holder on WS?
I let my maton melee and WS continuously for the parses and both (Xiucoatl WS+KKK Maneuvers vs. KKK WS+Maneuvers) exceeded 0% overload chance around the 3m to 3m20s mark.

Conclusion: Kenkonken has zero effect on burden caused by attachments. "Suppresses Overload" only affects Maneuver use and it won't reduce FH's burden or prevent it from overloading you. It just makes Maneuvers add less burden to the total. Update: According to my testing I posted later in the thread, KKK actually seems to raise the burden threshold rather than reducing Maneuver burden. It's possible the old tests made wrong assumptions.

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So if you have 5 minute Maneuvers overload is literally a non-issue due to Cooldown's recast. And if you run into overload issues despite that, you can easily DAD to reset the burden.

Further, here are the parses for damage comparison. I think 4 min parse duration with no waits between fights is sufficient proof this works for almost any content. I didn't run into any overload risk until the aforementioned 3 minute mark and, like I mentioned, Cooldown or a simple DAD was an easy enough fix to continune without issues.

Xiucoatl C + Truesights + FH + Inhibitor 1+2 + Attuner + Magniplug 1+2:


This was like 40-50ish DPS higher for the maton DPS (but not the SC damage), but the parser kept ticking down after the fight finished. Not sure why.

Xiucoatl C + Truesights + FH + Inhibitor 1+2 + Attuner + Magniplug 2 + Speedloader II:


Just to show that Speedloader II does more DPS than Magniplug 1 if Skillchains are relevant.

KKK on WS + Truesights + FH + Inhibitor 1+2 + Attuner + Magniplug 2 + Speedloader II:


There you have it. I'm happy to be proven wrong if you have any actual proof to the contrary, but I very much doubt it.

However, I will say this proves KKK is a worthwhile investment for any PUP even if you only pet burn, as it's invaluable for maneuver swaps. In which case KKK might be worth getting before Xiucoatl C, but as I said: Cooldown and DAD easily deal with Overload issues. For those of you who only OD zerg stuff for clears then Xiucoatl C is almost always superior.

pitre is +20% automaton ws dmg? if thats the case then it sounds like its best to get Pitre + KKK lv75? that would cover maneuvers and ws swaps with little loss to Xiu for the price of Xiu?

If I remember correctly, yes. Someone please correct me if that's wrong, just going by my memory here.

Assuming Asura prices: 75 KKK is about 180m, Pitre Fists 10m and Xiucoatl 150m. So if you're on a budget (obviously still expensive) that seems like a very good compromise.

They shine in different situations.

Kenkonken is our best melee option. It's our best master + pet option. su5 is our best Overdrive zerg option. I'd also argue that it's simpler to use for pet-only because you don't have to finagle an opportunity to put up (and maintain) AM3.

I was talking with an lsmate about this the other day. If you can only have one, get the Xiucoatl. Ohtas are easier to gear around for master + pet, Godhands or Vere are both fine master melee weapons and can do double-duty on monk. That said, I love my Kenkonken. They look unique and having AM3 up with your auto beside you is a ton of fun.

I go by pettp and auto swapping for things like that. ***is too chaotic otherwise

I dont plan to cover master at that account tho. On my main account I have MNK and if I would make PUP there it would have more sense, but on alt I only want to have PUP to tank/solo/duo with automaton only. Is KKK BLMmaton powerful and smart enough to solo damage Kei for example? Lets say I would tank it on THF and make skillchains, so automaton can nuke it (and I would use RDM on 3rd account for debuff and keep regen off). Is this even possible for automaton to do enough damage? Would that require KKK?

I would never, ever, put "BLMaton" and "smart" in the same sentence, lol.

If you want to use PUP for Kei, I use it as a pure tank. For pet setup on Kei I do PUP/BST/SMN, make Impaction skillchains, and burst Thunderstorm.

Just solo tank or tank/DD with PUP I'd do su5 for sure.