String Theory: A Puppetmaster's Guide *NEW*

Makes sense, I barely ever ran pup with actual buffs so looking at how potent the regain is ontop of the white dmg from the additional hits. Thats pretty good

For what it's worth, this is a slightly improved version of the Pet TP set that doesn't use the risky Kyrene's Earring:

ItemSet 368176
- Boasts Accuracy+25/DA+6%/DT-5%/Regain+10 over the previous set with perfect head augments

Due to Anwig I've never bothered augmenting a Taeon Chapeau with Acc/DA/DT, but given this set I'll probably have to do it at some point.

So this attachment setup is for DPS or tanking? My first assumtion is pure DPS

Yes, pure DPS. Hence the good performance in the parse I linked to.

Thank you Aerix for the help. Took down V1VD this morning with plenty of time remaining. (Still no relic body)

COR with +5 rolls (companion,beast) /cor Drachen and dia3

Used repair twice.

For a Xiucoatl Path C Howling Fists/ Raging Fists WSD set how does Epaminondas's Ring compare to Regal, Niqmaddu and Gere. What would be the best two rings for that set.

HF/RF mods are pretty low, so Epaminondas is quite good. Niqmaddu Ring also usually beats Gere Ring (no DEX/VIT) and Regal Ring (no multiattack), making it BiS for most situations.

I checked the MNK spreadsheet and it showed Epaminondas/Niqmaddu as BiS for HF when you have good Attack buffs. For RF it's Regal/Niqmaddu, but Gere is almost tied with Regal. Epaminondas/Niqmaddu at Attack cap for both WSs.

This is the Attack cap WS set:
ItemSet 368203
- Herc Head/Feet with STR/WSD or DM WSD
- Max Lilitu is basically equal to a decent STR/WSD Herc Helm

Why are we not talking about Cait Sith Prime in here?

Cause literally no one cares about that HTB, or alexander for that matter?

(it also has it's own thread, but again, literally no one cares lol. https://www.ffxiah.com/forum/topic/53811/cait-sith-htbf-discussion)

I couldn't find that thread for some reason.
Neither ring seems worthwhile? That doesn't seem accurate, but maybe I've just been gone too long.

All the drops are "useful" there just isn't anything to talk about. Ninjas cheese it, or throw pets at it. or use ea/scherzo if you're a tryhard.

Yeah it's pretty easy to throw a couple of autos on it so unless you trying to really push the limit and solod VD with pup not sure it adds much

Just got to properly test out BLMaton on Kei. Was consistently nuking for 40k-60k with Thunder V/Fire V barring resists. Equipping Scanner also completely prevented the maton from casting Aspirs, so it could focus entirely on nuking and ended up catching pretty much every SC.

Very viable overall, in my opinion.

Nice! I guess people lost faith in BLMmaton a while ago and weren't motivated to check it again after recent changes. I'm glad you went that far to answer my question about BLMmaton and now we might all benefit from your findings (again :D)

I made PUP on my main and I'm at around 1300JP now. Almost finished with 4/5 Taeon. My plan is too make ~50-100 VD Ambuscades, before update :) Thx for PUP hype :)

So, pet store tp herc pieces not in fashion?

Think it still has a purpose but with rolls the dt/da taeon setup will provide similar dps output ontop of giving you a good 20~% DT

Aerix can you provide your BLMaton build? Because I think the one in String Theory guide is outdated?

ItemSet 368252
- Naga Path C
- Ambu cape with Pet: Regen+15
- Ohtas instead of Denouements also work for less Regen/Refresh
- can be used for WHMaton as well (I recommend using Mephitas Ring NQ/HQ to counteract all the HP+ from Naga, or the WHMaton will focus on healing you too much)

Idle in this set to give your maton Fast Cast as a sort of pseudo-Precast as well as some Regen/Refresh to keep it going longer (you also don't want it to waste time on Drain). As soon as it starts casting you need to switch to the following:

ItemSet 352991
- Rawhide/Naga Path D
- Ambu cape with Pet: MACC+20/MDMG+30/Haste+10%/Regen+5 (might reroll MDMG+10 to MACC+10)
- for Kei mentioned above: I'm missing Udug/Cath Palug Ring; had only +5 Puppet Roll; non-Idris Malaise; no Languor (GEO was doing Indi-Focus in BLM party to nuke without being hit by AoE) so there's still tons of room for improvement despite the already decent performance

It was likely just the lack of Languor, but the noticeable amount of resists might make Rawhide/Naga/Kyrene's more useful over their pure MAB counterparts depending on the content level (if this becomes more popular). I'm still not sure if Herc can roll Pet: MAB/MACC at the same time without DM augments. Would be great if someone could confirm that.

Attachments:
- Ice Maker
- Loudspeaker 3
- Arcanoclutch 1
- Scanner
- Amplifier 1+2 (useful even for free nuking as they provide FC passively regardless of MB windows)
- Heatsink
- Turbo Charger 2 (for individual spell recasts)
- Optic Fiber 1+2
- Mana Tank 3+4 (more MP = fewer reactivations to restore MP)

LS3 + Arcanoclutch 1 beat LS4 by about 500-600 damage. Maton was having some recast issues on Thunder 5/Fire 5 so I think Turbo Charger 2 made a bit of a difference to keep nukes consistent, as for some reason it refused to cast Aero V or any tier 4 nuke.

It sucks losing damage because of Scanner, but the attachment is absolutely essential. Without it, the maton just spams Aspir/Aspir 2 on recast all the time (except on Undead), even if MB windows are open. It seemingly takes priority no matter what you do, even if you keep the maton disengaged and deploy only for MBs.

So Tranquilizer is useless attachment for magic accuracy or you will lose too much damage?

Hmm. Looking at the values for Tranquilizer 4 it provides significantly higher values to MACC than Loudspeaker 5 does for MAB. Assuming that lower Tranquilizers are also better than Loudspeakers it might be better to gear the maton for pure MAB while equipping Tranquilizers.

At least for Head/Hands/Ear. I don't think giving up Xiucoatl's MACC+50 is a good trade for Ohrmazd's MAB+25. As for Herc, it caps at MAB+30 (assuming it can't roll MACC) while Rawhide and Naga provide a combined total of +35 and +40 to stats respectively. So it's kind of difficult to gauge which is better overall.

Might be wrong here Aerix so sorry if I barge in, but unless you're getting a form of Pet: Macc buff like COR rolls and/or Languor, I think you will have to equip Tranquillizers AND some macc in gear.

Going full macc in gear then no tranq, or full loudspeakers then full macc in gear are two approaches which, in theory, should get more resists than desired, without any other buffs.


Talking about targets like Kei and taking into consideration the huge macc bonus Magic Bursts give.
If nothing changed, it should be like I said, unless SE ninja buffed automaton base Macc but I don't think that's the case alas (they should have!)


I'm referring to the tests me and someone else (was it Capuchin? I can't remember) did on Apex monsters. Granted your set is better than the one I used (I own Udug Jacket, but have no Xiuacoatl or Relic+2 nor Neck+2, all of which didn't exist back then), that alone provides a good chunk of mab AND macc at the same time.
For the most part during my tests in the majority of slots I had to choose between either macc or mab.
But it's also true our tests were on Apex mobs, which are lower level than a target like Kei...

Well, I personally have a COR mule to buff me with Puppet Roll whenever, so my perspective on this is definitely skewed. Even if Barataria CORs are easy to come by.

I think I remember reading that post you guys made back then, but I'm not sure if you guys were freenuking or MBing for everything. Though you have a point--I was getting quite a few resists despite Puppet Roll and MB bonus MACC. But as I said, the only slots up for question are Head/Hands/Ear anyway. All other slots are definitive BiS and provide good MACC.

Honestly, I'm kinda happy with Rawhide/Naga at the moment anyway. I'm pretty sure I would only replace them if SE releases some new gear or if Herc can actually roll both stats like for player gear.

I have a Kei x4 event coming up in 2 weeks, so if my LS mates can tank for me like last night I will try to do some more thorough testing with attachments/gear plus Languor. Tali'ah Head/Hands and Kyrene's are definitely worth a try. No amount of MAB is worth it if you're losing half or more of your nuke damage to regular resists.

wouldnt the cait ring not be a better choice in ring for nuking over tali'ah

I only posted my personal sets, not BiS stuff. As I mentioned in my post I'm still missing that ring, so BiS would be C. Palug Ring + Tali'ah instead of Thurandaut+1.

Neat! Now you're going to make me want to revisit my BLMaton sets, ugh, my inventory is dying... also, C. Palug Ring over Thura/+1 Ring... I wish the Adoulin ring had pet macc and mab too.

You and me both. But I'm happy that we at least have relevant nuking stats in every slot now. Like 2 years ago a third or a fourth of the slots were still empty.

Just tried augmenting Herculean Gloves with Pellucid Stones and easily got both Pet: MAB and MACC at the same time. Whoever initially reported this wasn't possible must have messed up somehow. And it's unfortunate nobody else bothered to test it up until now. Guess that just shows how unpopular the BLMaton was.

This means well-augmented Herc Head and Hands are definitely BiS for nuking.

Edit: It's actually pretty difficult to get decently high values for both stats at the same time. I vaguely recall that the person mentioned that may have been the issue, not that you couldn't get both. Does anybody else remember this better?

Edit #2:



After burning about 2000 Pellucid stones (thank god they're cheap) this is the best I could get. It seems like it's capped at a stat total of +45 that is weighted so you can either get MAB+15/MACC+30 or MAB+30/MACC+0 at most, but not MAB+25/MACC+20. Not sure if this is even worth attempting for most people, even if it's better.

Getting MAB+15/MACC+30 and some INT would be the most realistic BiS option, but that seems prohibitively expensive and rare as hell. Aside from that, DM augments seem like the only option to break that +45 cap. Too bad that MAB/MACC+25 helm I posted a while ago was on my gimp mule...

Edit #3: Countless stones later I couldn't improve those augments whatsoever. So this is pretty much as good as it gets unless you are insanely lucky.

That was me. After a few thousand stones I can confirm that if 1 was over 15 the other couldn't.

It's been awhile so I'd have to look back but I seem to remember in addition to that if MAB was over 15 you'd get no macc so your best bet was going for higher macc.

I've also tried a lot with DM stuff but it's just incredibly hard just to get more than 1 pet stat at a time let alone the ones you want at higher values. Not sure I even saw any cap break ones either

Actually, I noticed the same thing but just shrugged it off as bad luck as I was trying for higher MACC anyway and figured the 30/15 worked both ways. So I guess perfect rolls are either MAB+30 or MACC+30/MAB+15. Pretty annoying.

Sorry for misrepresenting your findings from back then. I had completely forgotten the real details.

It's ok honestly you had pretty much the same thing and shits been awhile. Actually had to go back and look things up some. Could've sworn I'd put in a bug report about it too but could only find all my other ways still in the several years of backlogged accepted bugs lol. Good to have some confirmation since rng can make you see funny things sometimes and it did seem weird to me.

I seem to remember the base stats were a little weird too like not all could get to 15.