Pup sucks in Zergs. This is a fact.Follow

EVERYONE, PLEASE @#%^ING ACCEPT THIS, AND STOP TRYING TO ARGUE THAT IT IS NOT TRUE.

I realize that we have pride. You all know damn well that I love pup more than anything else in this game, and have played the job since the day it was released. You also know that I'm very well read in terms of game mechanics/mathematics, so when I post something math related, I'm not posting my opinion, I'm posting the math, regardless of how I feel about it, and there's a very high chance I'm @#%^ing correct. If I don't think the math is within a 1% margin of error, I don't @#%^ing post it, unless I'm blatantly theory crafting, or trying to work out something that takes a @#%^ton of time, such as the puppet damage equations I've been working on. I don't like the fact that pup sucks in zergs any more than you guys do, but I've @#%^ing done the math on it countless times, and the results are always the same.

For those of you who aren't aware of why I sound so aggravated, I'm not yelling at every single one of you, just the ones who blatantly refuse to accept math as fact and think their opinion has more weight than @#%^ing math, which either they are incapable of doing themselves, or are to @#%^ing lazy to bother. Chief among these individuals is Zelduh. However, I have no intention of turning this into a personal attack against someone with selective hearing reading, and who often quotes MY OWN @#%^ING MATH when posting, but refuses to accept it if it disagrees with his opinion. No, while I could very easily explain everything that's @#%^ing wrong with your logic, Zelduh, instead, I'm going to post the goddamn math you refuse to accept, again, explain to you in idiot proof logic what it means, and finally put this sh*t to @#%^ing bed.

Ok, having gotten the "I'mgoingto@#%^ingstrangleyou" out of my system, let's start with a clarification of terminology.

"Pup sucks in zergs" is a very, very shorthand way of expressing the following; Puppetmaster, as a melee DD Job, is at the bottom rung of usefulness in Short Duration, High Haste, Speed Damage events. This phrase does not mean pup's damage output sucks. This phrase does not mean that pup is incapable of performing with a moderate degree of success in these events. This phrase also has an addendum that is usually excluded because it only applies to 16 individuals as of the last census; "Pup sucks in zergs, unless they have kenkonken." Effectively, the reason this phrase is used is because it clearly and concisely conveys that pup is not among the best choices for a zerg event, while being simple enough that even a retarded monkey can understand it.

Now then, let's quickly cover "why"' pup sucks in zergs, before looking at each point individually;

First and foremost: Pup IS NOT DESIGNED FOR zerg type events. The very core aspects of the job are a major part of what holds it back during zergs.

Secondly, many of the game's universal mechanics also contribute to limiting pup's performance in zerg type events.

Third, zerg type events heavily favor certain things, none of which pup can provide as well as other jobs.

and Finally, and this is the reason why so many pups end up like Zelduh, spouting out nonsense and not understanding what they're saying, yes, Pup has a @#%^ing stigma attached to it. The fact that every goddamn event for the last several years has been a zerg event has done nothing to improve this, in spite of SE completely overhauling the job and greatly increasing it's ability to perform.

Before I explain each of these four points individually, I'm going to first clarify exactly what a "zerg" event is, because it's important to understand.

A "Zerg" event, as it is often called, is an event where in the group's Melee DD jobs are given a very small window of time (usually 5 minutes or less, though there are some exceptions) in which to put out a very large amount of damage, and in order to do this, they are given damn near every goddamn buff they and their party can muster, chief amongst them, though, is the required high haste. Typically, the haste present is enough to nearly or completely cap most jobs (ie: universal delay floor; 20%), such that most weapons will be swinging at least once nearly every 1-2 seconds for as much time as is physically possible. This means that any melee present is going to be subject to very high levels of haste and attack, as well as potentially, regain, critical hit rates, double attack, etc. In other words, it is essentially putting each individual melee as close to their "Best Case Scenario" as is physically possible.

First and foremost: Pup IS NOT DESIGNED FOR zerg type events. The very core aspects of the job are a major part of what holds it back during zergs.

Now, to explain the first point, pup is designed as a Hybrid Job. That is, a job that is capable of pulling off several different play styles successfully. Hybrid jobs, because of their ability to fill multiple roles, also suffer from reduced ability to perform each individual role; ie, while a pup can melee like a mnk and nuke like a blm, a pup cannot melee as well as a mnk, nor can they nuke as well as a blm. Zerg events, however, heavily favor singular-focus jobs, specifically, pure melee DD jobs (ie: mnk, war, sam, drk, drg) as opposed to multiple role jobs, like pup.

That said, Pup's nature as a hybrid, multi-role job is further exacerbated by other issues. Pup is, at the same time, both the least, and most versatile of the hybrid jobs. By this, I mean pup is the closest to the single-focus jobs, in terms of ability, in nearly every field it has a major role in (whether pup or sch is the better nuker is heavily situational and highly individual), but at the same time, pup takes the longest time, and needs the most amount of work, to switch between it's various roles, where as most other hybrid jobs can switch between roles in a minute or less, even the fastest pup will typically need 2-3 minutes to switch between any given role, and each individual role is more individually focused, so switching from one to another means that it's much harder for a pup to continue doing what it was doing before switching, compared to other jobs. Pup CAN semi-switch, and stop halfway between two roles, but it this still has a noticeable impact to their ability to perform both roles.

Further, pup is the only hybrid job that lacks a "Party Support" role as one of it's available roles. Pup can act as a melee DD, a magical DD, or a healer (remember that in this game, healing and support are two very different things), but has no unique way to enhance the performance of the rest of it's party members, either via buffs or debuffs. Those unique party boosts are what allow other hybrid jobs the ability to be effective in zerg situations, even with their reduced melee potential relative to pure DDs.

Additionally, it goes beyond pup's nature as a hybrid job, and is made worse by the fact that we're also a pet job. of all job types, pet jobs are the least able to take advantage of zerg situations, for two very simple reasons. The first is somewhat situational, and that is pet survivability. While our automaton is more durable than a drg's wyvern, a drg's wyvern is a significantly smaller part of their overall damage output. Avatars and Jug Pets are both fairly sturdy and fairly plentiful, but automatons, with the exception of valoredge, are very much not sturdy, and of all of the puppets, the one that is best suited to zerg type damage, Sharpshot, has the worst survivability. The second issue, and the far more important one, is that pets do not gain the benefit of party buffs. Your pet will not gain the huge boost in haste, attack, and anything else, that you do, and as the pet is a significant chunk of a pup's over all damage, that is a serious issue. Properly geared, in a non-zerg but heavy DD situation, Sharpshot (provided it can stay alive) will account for approximately 40% of the pup's over all damage. This means that, in full-buff situations, while other DDs gain 100% of the benefit, pup will only gain around 60% of the benefit of zerg buffs, which, when you're trying to put out as much damage as possible within a small time frame, is a major hindrance.

Something I should make very clear here, Zerg events are a situation where "I just want to have fun with my friends" does not come in to play. They are annoyingly time consuming to set up, and allow for little wiggle room. They have very small margins of error, and are almost universally a one-shot deal. If you @#%^ up, you've gotta wait on timers to reset and possibly farm/buy pops all over again. This is why the normally viewed as "elitist" attitude of heavy emphasis on efficiency is used even in more casual groups, when zergs are involved. If you want to argue "but I can do almost as well on pup as I can on (insert DD), so I should be allowed to use pup because it's more fun" then you need to get the @#%^ out, because your opinion on the matter is not even remotely relevant to the topic at hand. And yes, I will be getting to the math, but I'm fully explaining the logic behind it, first, for people who don't speak Math.

Now, there are two other parts to this point, both specifically related to how the automaton is controlled, but those are better covered in the next point's issues, because that point deals more closely with the math behind it.

Secondly, many of the game's universal mechanics also contribute to limiting pup's performance in zerg type events.

Ok, I need to point out the specific game mechanics I'm talking about here first. The main list of offenders is as follows (in no particular order); Delay floor, Job Ability Delay, Pet Mechanics, Pet AI, and Pup gear availability.

Delay Floor: Under no circumstances can the effective delay of a weapon drop below 20% of it's base delay. This includes both haste, and traits like Martial Arts and Dual Wield. Note that these effects fall into separate categories (One is haste, one is Delay Reduction) and do not stack additively. The main issue here is that Martial Arts is a type of Delay Reduction, which influences TP/hit, as well as reducing the haste cap. At level 99, pup has MAV, which gives them a base 320 delay when using h2h weapons. This is a good thing, I'm not at all bashing it, but you need to understand just what it does. H2H's true base delay is 480 (read: any job without MA using no weapon or a h2h weapon will have 480+weapon delay, as well as pup prior to level 25), and THAT delay is what's taken into consideration when determining the delay floor. Let's take a weapon like Oxyuranis, which has a delay of +61; that means that it's base delay is 541, and that it's effective delay cannot go below 108. with MAV, Oxy's delay is set at 381, before haste. which is a ~30% reduction in total delay. If you account for the mandatory Cirque Pantaloni +2, drop it to 371, and you get a ~32% delay reduction. now, that means that you can only lose 263 more delay through haste. However, haste works AFTER martial arts, and it's own total cap is still 80%. To clarify, haste uses 371 in it's calculations and treats THAT as your base delay, not 541. Basically, what this means is that to reach the delay floor, you need 71% haste, not 48% like that previous 32% would have you believe.

Now, on the surface, this is a good thing, because it makes it possible for us to hit the delay floor more easily than some jobs (most of the 2h jobs require /sam and haste samba, in addition to gear and magic haste, to reach the floor, the notable exception being drk, because of desperate blows) however, unlike mnks, we cannot hit the delay floor ithout a dnc present for haste samba (gear and magic combine to cap at 68%, which is just about where monk falls in terms of haste cap, due to MAVII). That said, the reason this is important is because of the next issue, job ability delay.

JA delay is, quite simply, the time between using a job ability, and when the next attack round starts. Job ability delay is universal between all jobs, and exists in 2 parts. The first second after using a job ability, no action may be taken (except moving), and in the second, you may use another ability, but you still will not attack. Thus, as an absolute rule, there is always a 2 second wait after every job ability. Now, let's look at the floored out delay, 108. The general rule of thumb is that 60 delay = 1 second, but that's rounded for easy of numbers, in a high-haste situation like this, you want to use the full 58.75 delay/second value. This means that at the delay floor, there's a 1.838 second gap between each attack round. Now, let's take a look at a major part of pup... Maneuvers. If you want your puppet to be at it's absolute best performance, you need to have three maneuvers running (in this situation, it's gonna be 3 wind maneuvers to max out turbo charger). Each maneuver lasts 1 minute, so the longer the zerg, the more apparent this issue becomes. in a 3 minute zerg, at best you're going to end up using 3 maneuvers per minute, even if you get to get three up before the actual zerg commences, and there is absolutely no way to guarantee that you land each maneuver the EXACT fraction of a second following your attack round to allow for the least time wasted, in fact, it's highly likely that every single maneuver will cause a net loss of 2.5-3.5 seconds.

Now, you might be thinking "2.5-3.5 seconds? Why are you being so @#%^ing anal about it? IT'S THREE @#%^ING SECONDS" but remember what a zerg is, milking out the MOST POSSIBLE DAMAGE in the SHORTEST AMOUNT OF TIME. if you average it at ~3 seconds lost per maneuver, that's 9~10 seconds per minute of zerging. In a 5 minute zerg, that's ~45 seconds lost, or in other words, 24 attack rounds. Assuming you're subbing warrior, and based on a general pup zerg set and typical zerg buffs (specifically, Fighter's Roll, which given that it's a zerg, and the nature of phantom roll currently, I'm just going to assume that it's an 11), you'll have 46% double attack, and 3% Triple Attack (epona). Assuming you're managing a respectable hit rate against the big nasty you're pummeling for 5 minutes, keeping up maneuvers on your puppet costs you 70 attacks, of which 63-70 (63 is 90% Hit rate, but up to 70 is possible because of the RNG) should land, which equates to (assuming +19 store TP from gear, and thus 6.1 TP/hit) 384.3 to 427 TP, or in other words, maintaining maneuvers on your puppet costs you a bit less than 1 WS per minute. You should be able to see how quickly losing Zerg Buffed WS would add up, even without me doing that math for you. That's just from losing 3 seconds per maneuver.

However, there's even more to that issue, because if you opt to forgo maneuvers, while you get back your ws, your puppet's overal damage will suffer, though not quite as much. Let's assume you're using Sharpshot, and have only Pantin Gloves +2 for pet haste gear, since every other pet: haste piece would be a serious reduction in your damage. Do note that I used Cirque Guanti +2 for the previous example, as it would potentially reduce the loss to your own dps more than pantin +2, and that's the same reason I'm using pantin here, to reduce how much you'd lose. Now, Turbo Charger with 3 Wind Maneuvers is 25% haste. It's 5% by default, meaning that with no maneuvers, your puppet will get at least 9% haste, while maintaining all 3 gives it 29%. Let's also assume Sharpshot has Drum Magazine set, and that you're not using Barrage Turbine, because that would make sh*t even worse for your own DD, and it's useless if you're not using maneuvers.

Sharpshot gets 9.3 TP/hit on ranged attacks, which will be every 20 seconds for no wind maneuvers, and every 12 seconds with 3, as well as 10.2 TP/hit on melee attacks (with base delay at 400). Haste doesn't influence ranged attacks, but it does help sharpshot indirectly via also activating drum magazine. Now, remember that 58.75 delay/sec, let's apply that again. 400 delay becomes either 364 delay (9% haste) or 284 delay (29% haste), which equate out to 1 attack per 6.195 seconds and 1 attack per 4.834 seconds. I'm not even going to bother with coiler, because with sharpshot, you're going to want target marker and stabilizers to make sure the C+ skill actually lands.
Now, the difference between 5 minutes of 3 wind maneuvers and 5 minutes with no wind maneuvers is fairly large:

No wind: 15 ranged attacks, 20 seconds apart, and ~3 melee attacks between each of them (based on JA Delay and how long ranged attacks take, I'm being a little generous and fudging this slightly in favor of sharpshot, but not enough for it to change the outcome), or in other words, 45 attacks, and 15 ranged attacks, for a net TP of 598.5

3x Wind: 25 ranged attacks, 12 seconds apart, with ~2 attacks between each, which results in 50 attacks and 25 ranged attacks (net gain of 15 attacks) for a net TP of 742.5, or two extra WS.

However, the most important thing to note here, is that regardless of which you CHOOSE, you have to CHOOSE, and thus, it's impossible to reach pup's true damage potential because of how frequently maneuvers need to be used, and the JA lag they cause. Also, remember that this only relates to Maneuvers, it doesn't even account for using repair/maintenance/ventriloquy/role reversal/tactical switch, all of which will also create JA lag and further reduce effectiveness at high haste. Tactical Switch is the only one that can potentially negate it's own loss, but even that's minuscule since you're essentially just taking a ws away from one of you and giving it to the other.

Guess what... we're still not done. Next up is Pet Mechanics and Pet AI; specifically, Sharpshot and Valoredge do not possess efficient AIs. They WS whenever the @#%^ they want, and almost always hold TP well past 100% (usually to anywhere from 120% to 150%) which will severely reduce their ws rate, and by that nature, their overall damage output. We've gained some ground, since we no longer need to use maneuvers to trigger our best ws (Armor Shatter and Stringshredder are the defaults, with wind maneuvers triggering AS, and not influencing VE's WS choice in any way), but the fact that our puppets waste TP every single ws round is a rather huge issue. Also worth noting is that sharpshot, if hit by knockback, won't run back into melee range, unless the knock back is severe enough to knock it outside of the "to far, run in now" distance, so if knock back is present at all, that adds a constant need to retrieve, wait, deploy, which is more JA lag and more damage cutting (though slightly offset by the fact that knock back will be affecting you as well, unless it's something that can be avoided by shadows, but usually, if you have to cast shadows during a zerg, something else is going wrong.)

Finally, there's the old issue of pup's available gear. This one goes two fold. First, it's a lot @#%^ing harder to get the good quality gear for pup, and there's a lot less of it to choose from, so we miss out on some really useful sh*t. However, the bigger half is that we don't have anywhere remotely close to the same level of available -P/M/DT gear that other melee jobs have, which significantly reduces our survivability, because no matter how amazing our evasion is, when you're fighting something that's got 5-10 levels on you, and is a roid-raging NM, your evasion doesn't mean sh*t.

Third, zerg type events heavily favor certain things, none of which pup can provide as well as other jobs.

I've already covered this one a little bit in the first point, that we lack the ability to add anything to a zerg alliance except DD and healing. Our healing is limited to party only, and is pretty much the antithesis of Zerg Healing, so it's really not at all practical, especially given how easy it is to just slap a couple whms in the alliance instead. That leaves us with DD, on which I've already thoroughly explained the issues. However, there are some other things worth pointing out, here.

Everything is relative. An alliance is 18 slots, meaning that each and every member needs to be worth using. If you account for the jobs necessary to make Zerg Buffs work best, you're basically left with 4-8 melee DDs with which to maximize your damage (depending on whether you're doing a single party zerg or a full alliance zerg). Each of those individual DDs has to be able to pull their weight and keep up with the others, and that very issue is what pup simply cannot do. In a zerg situation, pup just can't keep up. In a zerg setting, pup simply will not ever be able to put out the same numbers as a mnk, a drg, a drk, a war, or a sam, of equal gear quality and player competence, because if it could, it would be absolutely over powered, by the nature of being a hybrid job.

Also worth noting is the oft pointed out exception to all this sh*t; Kenkonken. Kenkonken's impact on a pup's ability to do damage is @#%^ing enormous, and easily skews the damage ratio of pup:pet from 60:40 to 70:30, if not more, while also allowing pup to cap haste without a dnc, and giving stringing pummel a sizable boost to damage. And that doesn't even touch on the OA2/3 Aftermath's potential impact. However, as I said earlier, there are currently 16 kenkonken owners, none of whom post on alla (that I'm aware of) so that really becomes moot. Verethragna will lessen the blow a bit, but they're still not enough for a pup to keep up against evenly geared (read: other empy users, as well as some of the higher quality non R/M/E weapons, when used by the heavy hitting 5) players.

The last bit to cover is the issue of the stigma.

Yes, I realize that pup has a @#%^ing stigma. I've done a sh*tton to try and correct this, to the point where half the time someone mentions me, it's to make a joke about me saying something about how awesome pup is. Our stigma is, at this point, mostly legacy. Pup is one of the strongest jobs in the game anywhere outside of Zerg events, and anyone who's had the pleasure of playing with a well geared, intelligent pup, knows this. However, the vast majority of pups do not fall into the "well geared,intelligent player" category, and there's not really a middle ground with this job; either you play it well, or it @#%^ing sucks. You all know that just as well as I do, so there's really no point in trying to delude yourself.

Now, Zelduh, I'm going to direct this net bit solely at you, and I'm not intending to insult you with it, so if any of it comes off as insulting, just take it as "the way I talk" because I do tend to talk rather crudely at times, especially after spending five @#%^ing hours writing out something like this. My issue with you, personally, has more to do with your posting style than your posting content. You should be aware of how much the community derides people like Mellowy or Lobivopis, and after such a long time, it's caused a lot of people around here to (sometimes) unintentionally associate their attitudes with those of the bulk of the people who play the jobs those two are prone to bitching about (smn and thf, respectively). You have to remember that outside of the pup forum, your @#%^ing representing or job to everyone else, and now that our sh*t is finally fixed, we don't need to bitch about it any more. You haven't stopped bitching about it. That's why I give you sh*t. I don't dislike you, you're obviously competent, but you seriously need to shut the hell up with your bitching about the injustices pup's facing, because while the rest of us have already gotten over that hump (since SE fixed 95% of what was wrong with pup) and are enjoying life on the other side, you, as one of the more vocal members of the pup community outside of the pup community, are doing a terrible job representing us to people who don't know us, and I don't post enough any more to counter act it. Basically, what I'm saying is that you need to stop complaining about this stuff in such a way that it sounds like "This is what's wrong with pup" when what you're really talking about is something that's wrong with the game itself. Also, you really do need to accept the fact that pup is not, and never will be, a zerg job, and you need to stop trying to convince people otherwise, because it's spreading false information that's going to severely hurt future pups' understanding of the job.

And one more thing, I would really, sincerely appreciate it if you stopped blatantly ignoring the large number of contributions I've made to the pup community, and thinking that they make me an arrogant prick. I will not deny that I'm a very arrogant person, but it has absolutely nothing to do with the sh*t I've done for pup, it's just my personality. That said, the contributions I've made are something I am very @#%^ing proud of, for a number of reasons; firstly, do you have any idea how much @#%^ing time I've spent trying to figure out all the sh*t I've posted? Do you realize how much work that took? It's not just me, either, by spitting in my face and acting like the sh*t I've done doesn't matter, you're essentially saying that anyone who's put in the same level of work that I have is in the same boat. You're basically saying that other highly regarded individuals in the pup community, past and present, are equally worthless, and that sh*t pisses me the @#%^ off, especially when it's said by someone who has made no memorable contributions. You can insult me all you want, and I'll laugh it off, but don't you dare insult the likes of Nateypoo or Anza, who've put in the same level of work, or more, that I have.

I'm not at all saying "I've done all this awesome sh*t, so you have to @#%^ing respect me. I'm your queen, bitch." so please don't take it that way. What I'm saying is that "I don't care if you insult me, but don't ignore all the sh*t I've done just because of the way I talk." I'm a rude, arrogant bitch who enjoys @#%^ing with people, but that doesn't change the fact that I'm also a very well read, intelligent, contributing member of this community. I've @#%^ing earned the right to talk the way I do, dammit, and anyone with any sense of humor knows that most of the time, I'm not intentionally being mean when I say something, I'm just @#%^ing with people because it amuses me. If they politely ask me to stop or change my tone in a topic, either posting or pming me, unless I sincerely don't like them, I do. For the most part, my vicious posting style in =10 is a Character I enjoy playing, and anyone who's seen my regular posts in the job forums, like you, should be well aware of that.

I'm going to finish by saying that you guys have no idea how proud I am of alla's pup community. We've been around since 2006, and I've watched it grow and flourish, and among all the job forums, we've easily had the least amount of internal drama. Even when people cropped up that disagreed with one another (lookin at you, xbobbobx <3), it always remained mostly civil. That's the other reason why you piss me off, Zelduh. You completely ignore that, and talk with an attitude of "If I disagree, you're a @#%^ing idiot" that really has no @#%^ing place here, and that you've yet to demonstrate the knowledge and understanding to back up. You should be fully capable of respectfully disagreeing, but you never @#%^ing do. Or at least, I've never seen you disagree with anything less than audible disdain for the person you're disagreeing with, which is entirely unnecessary most of the time.

Now, if after all of this, you STILL refuse to accept that I'm right when I say "pup sucks at zergs" then you give me the following information, and I will math that sh*t out for you to make it absolutely clear:
Target fight, time limit, number of brds and number of cors, whether or not pre-buffing and pre-TP building is in play, and how close to best-case-scenario you want the numbers (mostly in regards to hit rate and how often each individual DD has to deal with switching to survival gear and trying not to die, such that best case scenario would be 100% (yes, cap is 95%, but the Random Number Generator is Random) and never, respectively).

Given that he thinks that facts are something that can be invalidated by beliefs, I'd say he didn't have any credibility to begin with.

Jinte....that post should be required reading for everyone playing FFXI imo. Damn good job!

The only things i disagree with

1) The bit about you being arrogant. I don't see it. Yes, you have a way of getting your points across, but that's cause you know the score more times than not and can't be assed to dick about. You and Anza are the dude's i look up when i need some tidbit of info on PUP i can't remember. I actually keep premium just so i can do that. And trust me, coming from me that's very high praise.indeed. So no, not arrogant.

and

2) I've said it before, Natey contributed quite a bit to the PUP knowledge base(no denying that), but that guy WAS an arrogant prick. The way he conversed with ppl was beyond rude. While i agree that no one should downplay the work he put in, i think we should try to not forget the rest of the Nateypoo package. He could come up with a cure for cancer and i'd STILL feel the urge to rap him a few times in the ole Jack Johnson....who am i kidding? I'd beat the ever-loving sh*t out of him if i ever saw him in the street and knew for certain it was him.

Again though, VERY good OP!!!

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@Zelduh

I really hope you suck it up and read what Jinte wrote out. That's scripture there buddy. All of it. And its laid out alot nicer and respectful than i personally think you warrant.

And this post isn't about hero worship or anything like that. Incidentally i don't have any heros, never have really-don't believe in them. I'm writing it because i support the info and message its trying to convey. I've told you point blank to STFU in the past, but have never given a damn enough to actually try to articulate why you should(STFU). The OP gets a crap-load of cool points in my book for actually trying to get you to see that current situation of PUP for what it really is.

=



I admit to having been a "PUP can do anything you can do better PUP". However after playing the job for 4 years I have through my own efforts proven this mindset to be untrue. Sure I've had my moments of who's the I'm a moron now gaining the respect of LS/PTY members but in the end PUP is a Hybrid that given the chance and the right circumstances can and will shine. Though more often than not I know w/o asking that I will not be gearing PUP for an event because I have something more suited for the job available. PUP is by far my Favorite Job as it requires me to focus and pay attention, just not button smash my way through. I play the job with the skills JA's and JT's available to it and don't concern myself with why I don't have Desperate Blows, Phalanx II, Impetus, Triple Attack ... available. I just don't I'm a PUP and I use the tools available to Shine at my job.

Jinte lives in Realville where PUP is concerned accepts the facts and helps develop viable methods for getting the most out of PUP based on the facts.

PUP is PUP no amount of QQ will change that.

I'd even generalize, in a few words, what Jinte says: PUP (as well as most, if not all pet DDs) suffers in high-buff environments, whether the buffing comes from spells/JAs, like when preparing for a Zerg, or it comes from an endless stream of temps that only benefit the master, (that's VW summed up for you). VW also has the problem of too many FU AoE attacks that can only be reasonably managed with Fanatics/Fools... and of course the Automaton won't receive their effects.

In lowman situations, where self-maintenance matters the most, WE RULE. I wish there was more endgame events that covered that... Maybe the new dungeon crawl system? The 15 minutes timer probably will lead to Embrava and plowing through mobs with heavy DDs, but maybe there's hope.

Are Autos affected by Fanatic's Drink or Perfect Defense?

No? Okay, I guess it's pretty safe to assume that the Auto's contribution to damage is a close approximation of 0 when zerging then. There's no need to go through a rigorous mathematical derivation of why PUP is inferior to many other jobs that call themselves "melee" in a zerg. You just have to point out that they're a gimpy monk without the auto and that nothing survives for 10 seconds without PD in any kind of real zerg these days.

Funny pic, but comeon, Leave the Christian aspect out of it. I hate that kind of broad-brushed Judgment whether its from Christians or Athiests or whatever group you want to point it from and to. Zelduh is showing that track record.

Its really painful when someone "on your side" (likes pup job) does more damage to your argument than the ones opposed to you.

Maybe YOURS does.

*gigglesnort*

That kind of post ought to merit a ban.

I'll keep it simple: We have provided reasons as to why PUP doesn't work in zergs, the main one being having the automaton dead fast due to the high aoe damage present. You claim that keeping the automaton alive and maintaining an offensive in a zerg situation is possible, but haven't explained how.

My question is simple: Zelduh, what do YOU do to keep your automation alive in high-end zerg situations, while maintaining an offensive on the NM? Examples would be awesome, too.

If you reply to this, either we all learn something amazing from you, or you are proven wrong. I'll be happy in both cases.

Idk much about much. But that OP. That is a crapton of text aimed at an issue that maybe 4 people care about. Yet i am bored at work and it appears well written. Sigh. *puts on gas mask, riot gear, jetpack* I'm goin in!

If memory serves, he was meaning seeing changes in the performance of the actual Automaton between Turbo Animator and Animator +1, like it reacts differently with the two animators (Deluxe didn't exist at the time) and drastically changes your Automaton's performance.

This.

That's pretty much exactly what he was claiming, "You can see an obvious difference between the three animators in terms of automaton behavior" and rather than providing his evidence for testing he would always respond "Test it yourself and you'll see what I mean" while ignoring the fact that several ofus HAD tested it, AND posted our findings that completely disproved everything he said, claiming that we did it wrong.

Here's what they do:
Animator: allows you to use Maneuvers
Turbo Animator: allows you to use Maneuvers, and has the following hidden effects: DEX +2
Animator +1: allows you to use Maneuvers and has the following hidden effects: DEX+4 Valoredge: HP+60, Sharpshot: HP+45, Stormwaker: HP+40 MP+60, Harlequin: HP+50 MP+50
Deluxe Animator: allows you to use Maneuvers and has the following hidden effects: DEX+6

According to the testing of a large group of very intelligent math-fluent pups, including myself, there is absolutely nothing else the animators do. If, somehow, we've missed something they do, the resulting something is so absolutely minuscule that it's nigh impossible to measure, and will have absolutely no impact on pet performance whatsoever.

Things that have been tested and debunked:
Influencing Casting Casting Time
Influencing Global Recast Time
Influencing Spell Recast Time
Influencing Attachment Recast Time
Influencing Ranged Attack Rate
Influencing Weapon Skill Frequency (How often the puppet uses a ws, and how long it holds TP)
Influencing Overload Rate
Influencing Maneuvers in any way other than allowing them in the first place
Influencing Automaton AI
Influencing Automaton Stats (Atk, Def, Haste, Eva, Acc, MAB, MDB, etc, etc, with the exception being the frame-based max HP/MP bonuses on the animator +1)
Influencing the Automaton in absolutely any obvious manner
Influencing the Automaton in any subtle, but still noticeable manner
Influencing the Master in any way whatsoever (aside from the aforementioned +DEX and access to maneuvers)

The only thing that hasn't been tested is:
Influencing the Automaton in some minuscule way that is impossible to accurately test

which hasn't been tested because, well, it's impossible to accurately test.

Also, I'm waiting for Zelduh to say ANYTHING that my OP doesn't outright disprove

As an After thought I realized Jinte read my post and went on to reply with precise helpful info and not once berated me for my ignorance.

I feel proud of Jinte and perhaps a little cheated personally.

And you are still dodging my question.

A better troll would have just left the thread after they were called out. Shape up, Zelduh.

And too craven to own up to it when you've been called out for spewing BS, again.

So, assuming you're not a troll (and if you are, bad move staying on the topic), but apparently can't even provide proof of your beliefs. The "you people won't belive me" is not an excuse, hard proof is not subject to belief. Provide proof and I'll consider your statement more than just blind beliefs from someone extrapolating his EP Dynamis farming to endgame content.

As I said before, I am willing to be amazed at your zerg method... Even if I'm ready for disappointment.

You're right we don't need to be convinced PUP is a Damn Good Damage Dealer. We all know it is!

This Topic has nothing to do with PUP being a Damage Dealer it has to do with PUP in a Zerg Situation.

Enlighten us with your knowledge on How PUP is superior in Zergs to other jobs so that we may go forth and change the mindset of the FFXI community.
You champion the cause of the PUP Do not go forth alone allow us to battle with you so that we as a collective can show all non believers our true strength.
But alas you seem content to hoard your specific knowledge at the very least point us in the right direction so that we may figure it out for ourselves.

Zelduh you do the entire PUP community by not sharing your knowledge with us. All we can hope for is that we blindly stumble upon this secret and wonderous knowledge you possess and join you so that you are not alone.