Pupdate 10-28-2011

[autobot]

Gambits for the automatons would be great. It would still give that customization that PUP has, plus its like you are "programming" your puppet which still fits the style of it being a machine. And the maneuvers are still useful in the way that you use them to override the gambits you have in place to further customize for the battle at hand.

At least this way if we can put curing above everything else or whatever else we want.

Still though it shouldn't be this hard to use logic to see how things should work. Especially when it comes to using the red and white heads. We use these for the purpose to receive cures, otherwise we use a different head. I think even the Fellows have a better curing AI than automatons. at least they cure when you take damage.

You really shouldn't need more than one maneuver in any case to get it to do its most basic use like nuking or curing. Reduce the timer on maneuvers and that will become more understandable but having to wait 10 seconds (for 2 maneuvers, 20 if you don't already have one up) can mean life or death. I never understood why maneuvers had such a long recast anyway. I think 2-3 seconds is long enough. Spam your maneuvers too much and you overload, so its not like you can sit there spamming over and over again anyway. And cool down would have a purpose.

[Psion]

I hate having to ask more than once for a Whm to cure me. I love when I don't have to ask at all. That's what you're effectively telling us we need to do: ask our puppets more than once to do the job we geared them to do. Soulsoother should require 1 maneuver to prioritize curing above all else, Stormwaker 2, and Damage Gauge should lower the requirement by 1 maneuver just from being equipped.

The automatons are supposed to have their AI modeled after the finest mages in the Empire. I've always thought that this meant that the Aht Urhgan Empire had the stupid mages to ever pick up a staff. Now you're tinkering with the AI, make it not suck, yeah? If you really want us to use Cooldown that badly, lower maneuvers to 5 seconds. Or give us a Hasso style stance for our puppets that doubles burden per maneuver. Just give it to us and see how it works out, I mean that's the point of the test server, isn't it?

See, now this is what I'm talking about. Better yet, make maneuvers 1 second recast, which lets us spam maneuvers if needed, and also makes cooldown useful. Hasso type stance sounds neat too, or better yet a stance that doubles burden generated, but allows our pet to be hit with songs/AoE buffs/sambas/etc like any other party member. If you did that, I can gaurantee cooldown would find use.

And yes to the lowrering light maneuver requirement to 1 or 0 for forcing cure. Honestly, I saw what you said about damage gauge lowering the requirement by 1 maneuver by being equipped, so that with your suggestion of stormwaker needing 2 and then damage guage lowering it to one... But I don't trust the dev team to see that, considering they're still pulling this crap on us. Lower it to 1 or less for both frames I say, because obviously it would be less work than recoding damage gauge even more, and less chance of a lost in translation error.

[Tetsujin]

hate to bug the devs like this but... how soon will we see these updates implemented into the non-test server gameplay?


Also, for what it's worth I think that these adjustments are worthy of celebration. There's obviously a lot of work put into making these adjustments, so I'm in hardly a mood to complain/ask for more. Keep up the good work!

[Nezha]

-Current function of Damage Gauge-

Soulsoother [Stormwaker]:

0 Maneuvers: Enh. > Enf. > Cure [Enh. > Enf. > Elemental > Cure]

1 Maneuvers: Enh. > Cure > Enh. > Cure [Enh. > Cure > Enh. > Cure] (Cuts off Enf./Ele. magic from this point onward unless Cure timer down and all buffs are up)

2 Maneuvers: Cure > Enh. > Cure > Enh. [Cure> Enh. > Cure > Enh.]

3 Maneuvers: Cure VI > Cure V > Enh. > Cure V [Cure IV > Cure IV> Cure IV] (Until Masters HP reaches a certain threshold, then returns to using Enh./Enf. again even with 3 Light Maneuvers. This threshold is a lower HP percent for Stormwaker (~50%) than Soulsoother (~75%))

Overrides:

-If the monster can be one shotted Elemental Magic will override everything

-If Cure recast is not ready in time for Global Cast Soulsoother moves on to Enh. (If buff is missing) > Enf. and Stormwaker moves on to Enh. (If buff is missing) > Enf. > Ele. ---- This is most apparent with Soulsoother + 3 Light Maneuvers, Soulsoother will Cure VI > Cure V > then Enh(If buff is missing)/Enf. because Cure V recast is down and master doesn't meet the requirements for Cure VI > then Cure V again.

Suggestions:

1) Force Cure VI, even if master doesn't meet the requirements if Cure V recast timer is down and master is in need of a cure

2) Give Soulsoother access to Cure IV if master doesn't meet the requirements for Cure VI and Cure V recast timer is down.

3) Shift Damage Gauge "up" such that:

0 Maneuvers: Enh. > Enf. > Cure

1 Maneuver: Cure > Enh. > Cure > Enh. (Cuts off Enf./Ele. Magic from this point onward unless Cure timer is down and all buffs are up)

2 Maneuvers: Cure > Cure > Enh. (because of recast timers)> Cure (Cuts off Enh./Enf./Ele. onward unless cure timer is down)

3 Maneuvers: Cure > Cure > Cure > Cure (recast timers short enough for constant cure spamming)

---For those who believe haven't found a use for Cooldown (and I will say I did before also), you will definitely need it as well as other Overload Supressing gear/attachments next update, from testing the new attachment fixes (mainly speaking of Armor Plate I/II for PLD, Drum Magazine for RNG, and hopefully Damage Gauge if it gets fixed WHM and RDM frames), I find that the with 3 maneuvers + whatever attachment, the automaton performs near perfectly (exactly how'd we'd want/expect) and proportionately less with less maneuvers.---

Near Perfect Pet operation:

PLD tanks with near capped PDT-% (with proper gear) [82% to be exact, while cap is 87.5%)

RNG Ranged Attacks with 1-2 sec between the end of one ranged attack and the start of another [5 sec delay between the start of one ranged attack and the start of another to be exact]

WHM/RDM (if damage gauge is fixed) Prioritize Cure over EVERYTHING and have recast times short enough to spam Cures (i.e. Cure > Cure > Cure > Cure > continuing indefinitely or until MP runs out.)

[Dfoley]

Few issues with this... as I could not reproduce this...any you are missing -nas

-Current function of Damage Gauge-

Soulsoother [Stormwaker]:

0 Maneuvers: Enh. > Enf. >-na (and will continue to -na untill all debuffs are gone)> Cure [Enh. > Enf. > Elemental > Cure]

1 Maneuvers: Enh. > -na (and will continue to -na untill all debuffs are gone)> Cure > Enh. > Cure [Enh. > Cure > Enh. > Cure] (Cuts off Enf./Ele. magic from this point onward unless Cure timer down and all buffs are up)

2 Maneuvers: -na (and will continue to -na untill all debuffs are gone)> Cure > Enh. > Cure > Enh. [Cure> Enh. > Cure > Enh.]

3 Maneuvers: Cure VI > Cure V >-na > Enh. > Cure V [Cure IV > Cure IV> Cure IV] (Until Masters HP reaches a certain threshold, then returns to using Enh./Enf. again even with 3 Light Maneuvers. This threshold is a lower HP percent for Stormwaker (~50%) than Soulsoother (~75%))

• As you can see the -na is a significant inhibitor to healing.
• As far as 2 maneuvers I am not sure yours is correct because I was still getting haste at 25% hp with 2 light maneuvers up.

Suggestions:

1) Force Cure VI, even if master doesn't meet the requirements if Cure V recast timer is down and master is in need of a cut

2) Give Soulsoother access to Cure IV if master doesn't meet the requirements for Cure VI and Cure V recast timer is down.

Fine with those two, as they make perfect sense when you consider what a real whm would do.

3) Shift Damage Gauge "up" such that:

0 Maneuvers: Enh. > Enf. > -na> Cure

1 Maneuver: Cure > -na/Enh. > Cure > Enh. (Cuts off Enf./Ele. Magic from this point onward unless Cure timer is down and all buffs are up)

2 Maneuvers: Cure > Cure > -na/Enh. (because of recast timers)> Cure (Cuts off Enh./Enf./Ele. onward unless cure timer is down)

3 Maneuvers: Cure > Cure > Cure > Cure (recast timers short enough for constant cure spamming)

Pretty sure this is what you, me, jinte etc have all been saying from the start, just including -nas for clarity. If you are using a damage gauge with light maneuvers, no one wants enfeebles, they want that dang cure to save their life! Please dev's realize this.

[Nezha]

[*]As far as 2 maneuvers I am not sure yours is correct because I was still getting haste at 25% hp with 2 light maneuvers up.

Did you mean 3 light Maneuvers? For two light maneuvers I was consistantly getting Healing > Enh. > Healing > Enh. where as one light meaneuver is Enh. > Healing > Enh. > Healing, which is pretty much the same thing if you just shift them up one spell. And not to mention I was in abyssea with HP+ Atmas on so I would have a lot more HP to be cured.

We can do some testing together if you online on the TServer. But how I did it was Deus > Role Reversal > Deactivate > Activate > Light Maneuver > Light Maneuver > Deploy and Record Spell Casts. Did this 5 times with the same result.

The only wierd one was 3 maneuvers for RDM frame because sometimes he Cure IV spam, and others he did some Enh. in between, but I noticed he only Cure IV spam until a certain HP threshold and then began to operate as if he only had 2 light maneuvers up even though there were three.

Thanks for adding the -na ... I just tested against Bats so they don't give many status effects. And your right about -na being a big inhibitor, if I do anything serious on the test server I don't really trust/rely on Soulsoother as much as I do my evasion gear/Stormwaker's buffs/status ailment healing items.

[Treyd]

On a testing Soulsoother note, has anyone actually gotten it to protect/shell/haste a full party or even 3+ members? I've done limited testing but have only gotten it to buff whoever the mob was currently targeting(similar to the way it does regen). If anyone is interested in testing I'll help if a time is set up for it.

Edit for random griping: Is there a way to change my main job on my profile to PUP 95? Getting tired of seeing RDM 91 when I rarely play it... -.-

[Dfoley]

harle works again! he was casting this morning for me with the updated test server. Shame they didnt post what the changed/fixed for pup so we know what to test.

[xbobx]

SE seems to have no clue at all how testing should work. SE to test properly it involved dissemination of information. Hello?

[Camate]

Just wanted to let you all know we confirmed a couple more issues with puppetmaster.

This is in regard to Soulsoother C-1000 malfunctioning.
The first enemy I confirmed this issue with was the crab from Walk of Echoes #1. This bug occurred even against weak opponents. The automaton would stop for about 3 seconds while facing the opponent right after summoning or cast a lot of spells after throwing down against the enemy. Attachments don’t seem to make a difference.

The above is from a post on the Japanese forum and we were able to confirm this bug, and we are working on a fix.

First, I feel like the effects of flame holder haven’t been changed.
Secondly, when you stack a wind maneuver with a drum magazine equipped, the rate for ranged attacks is not shortened.

This is also in regards to a Japanese post (above), but regarding flame holder, upon consultation with the development and QA teams, we decided that the effects of flame holder did not need any adjustment. Thus, for now the effects of flame holder are unchanged.

We confirmed a bug with drum magazine, so we are working on a fix. After this fix, the attack speed for ranged attacks will be slightly shortened when one wind maneuver is used. We will let you know when this change is implemented on the Test Server.

Please continue to let us know if you notice anything odd on the Test Server.