LETTER TO THE DEVELOPERS FROM THE PUPPETMASTERS OF VANA'DIEL

[Anza]

Dear FFXI development team,

Puppetmasters appreciate the increased attention given to our job since the beginning of 2010, after several years of feeling that PUP was a neglected job. Because we feel that the current development team is paying more attention to the players in general, and the PUP job in particular, we would like to bring to the attention of the dev team several key issues that the English-speaking PUP community has struggled with for a long time. These are not just my concerns, but an attempt to clearly voice some longstanding issues from many in the community. Your consideration of these issues would be greatly appreciated.

(1) Mage puppet AI.
Likely the most widespread complaint within the English-speaking PUP community. Despite the former development team suggesting that all was working as intended, the PUP community generally dislikes the Soulsoother head's priorities forcing a status removal spell over a cure whenever the master or puppet has a status effect (no way to force a Cure VI over Blindna when the master is at 50hp is not very helpful!). Many monsters that seem perfectly in line with what a PUP with adequate control over the automaton could solo become highly impractical, and usefulness of the automaton in parties is also compromised.

In addition, the high automaton HP/MP thresholds for Spiritreaver head choosing to cast Drain/Aspir is a problem for PUPs using that head. This becomes a very big issue when fighting targets where Aspir or Drain are ineffective - the puppet will cast Aspir and get a tiny amount of MP back, meaning that as soon as it can cast Aspir again it will do so and waste a cast. PUPs need a way to override this behavior and force the automaton to not cast Drain/Aspir (just as we have a way to avoid Absorb-INT, simply don't use a Dark Maneuver)

How about some AI modifications? Some possible suggestions:

a)Maneuvers.
Make Soulsoother head only use -na spells on the master and itself when a water maneuver is active (the same current prerequisite for the automaton to use those spells on other party members). For Spiritreaver, only allow Drain/Aspir when a dark maneuver is active (same condition as Absorb-INT).

b) Attachments.
Make an attachment modify the normal priorities. For example, with Damage Gauge equipped, Soulsoother will prioritize Cure spells above all else. Or make this an opportunity for Tactical Processor to do something useful.

c) Adjustments to default priorities.
Simply change the default priorities. Make the automaton always choose a cure above a -na spell, or adjust the threshold for casting Aspir or Drain (lower automaton MP/HP level).

d) Separate spell timers for Cure/-na.
Instead of operating on the shared spell timer for all spells, break status removal spells out on their own unique timer. This way the puppet can still cast Blindna, Paralyna, Poisona, etc., but that cast will not mean a long wait for the spell recast timer for an opportunity to cast that needed Cure.

There is a possible argument that the PUP can take steps to avoid the pitfalls of quirky automaton AI priorities. For example, to avoid the vicious cycle of automaton focusing only on status removal, the master can stay out of range of nasty enemy abilities as well as keep puppet at a distance. However, forcing the player to take these drastic actions to avoid AI priorities that seem non-sensible does seem to be an unnecessary limitation on the players.

(2) Weaponskill priority.
The system by which automaton weaponskills are triggered by a particular dominant maneuver is becoming cumbersome, and will become even more of a burden with new automaton weaponskills that PUPs hope are coming in the journey to level 99. In addition, some weaponskills simply get in the way (mage puppets with high HP, like Soulsoother which cures itself, become useless with vital light maneuvers since they will use the undesirable Magic Mortar). PUPs need to hold back and use otherwise useless dark maneuvers to trigger desired WS on Valoredge (Cannibal Blade) and Sharpshot (Armor Piercer) frames. Perhaps it is time to adjust this aspect of the job.

One suggestion is a simple menu - perhaps accessed through an NPC similar to the Rendezvous Point menu (changing Fellowship NPC job, use of area of effect WS, etc.) This NPC could allow the PUP to program the automaton to choose appropriate WS for the master's liking, or even set "trigger" maneuvers as chosen by the player for each automaton WS. This "Automaton Adjuster" NPC could even be expanded to address the spellcasting AI issues described above.

(3) Tactical Processor.
The PUP community has done testing for years and cannot figure out what this attachment does. Can the dev team explain this item, or adjust it? The community believes this item to either be not working as intended, have such an unusual use that it has not been discovered, or that the attachment is simply useless/nearly useless. Perhaps a change could be made to give this attachment more utility.

We appreciate your attention and hope to continue a more open dialogue with the dev team.

Sincerely,

The PUPs of Vana'diel

[Auraeon]

Extremely well written. You tackled all of the biggest concerns we Puppetmasters have about the current state of the job we hold so dear. I truly hope the development team will finally hear us out on these topics. Thanks for putting for the effort into this post!

[Linny]

I'm agree with this. Maybe this post should be in "Feed-back & Suggestion".

[Thango]

I think the problem is here.

Status Removal → Cure VI → Silence → Slow → Blind → Paralyze → Bio II → Poison

When it will be.

Cure VI → Status Removal → Silence → Slow → Blind → Paralyze → Bio II → Poison

It seems easy to fix it.

Thanks Anza.

[Zhronne]

Was about to write something like this. Would have tried to keep it shorter, but nonetheless excellent work on your side Anza.
I really like solution d) for caster issues, of all the hypothesys I've been reading and making all these years, it's the best.
Don't forget they should fix the Silence on enemies with MP. Currently mage automatons cast Silence on any target with MP, despite the fact that target does or doesn't cast spell.
But here it's probably hard to overcome the issue. I guess the AI has some "variables" it uses to tell wether or not it should do an action. Probably they had no way to put monsters in two different groups ("those who cast spells", "those who does not") so they used the presence of MP as a discriminant variable for the AI mechanism.

Also, other few things you may want to add:

1) While Puppetmasters can define themselves pretty happy with their Mage automaton damage, the same can't be said for Melee and Ranged automatons. The first needs either a new WS or some deep and big modifications to the current WS damage calculation methods (i.e. buff up damage of at least bone crusher), the second needs more TP damage. For example make it so automaton's ranged attacks can crit, just like every other ranged attack currently in-game.

2) Please make the "Ashu Talif" 8 attachments available through other means. Some of those still are the best attachments you can get, and they still are unreasonably expensive and hard to find on AH/Bazaars.

3) Stout servant is an excellent idea, but at the moment its potency is a bit lackluster. We understand additional tiers of the trait will be released, but developers are probably reluctant in doing so because it could potentially make the automaton too powerful. There is one way to give the trait more potency without ruining the balance in power of automatons: simply make it work so it greatly reduces the AoE damage of spells/abilities not directly cast on master/automaton. That way abilities/spells that directly target master/automaton will still do full damage, but other dangerous AoE will have their damage greatly reduced. This would also solve the issue that ranged automaton and mage automaton need to be under 20yalms from the target to be able to attack/cast, making it unviable in a wide range of fights.



Edit:
A very very very secondary thing I forgot about. This only affects Abyssea (which may or may not be a big part of our daily time in FFXI in the future, about that I have no clue), but it's a shame pets aren't affected by Cruor buffs. Stats do not really make a huge difference, but the MP and especially HP do. It's a shame Any ideas to go around this problem?

[Lushipur]

everything said by the OP will make all of us pup really happy.

and the cruor buff too please ^^

[Siviard]

I second everything that has been mentioned in this thread.

Great job, Anza

[hakrev]

Another large concern that many pups are having problems with is not being able to adequately control the nukes our puppets cast. Lets say my party triggers yellow with blizzard V, my auto continues to cast blizzard V and thus I get yelled at by my party for something i can't really control except to deactivate my auto altogether and just sit there and do nothing. Why should we be stuck standing there during a big boss fight doing nothing while every other job in the game can participate to some extent. The solution is simply make a system like blue mage has where we can select the spells we wish to use, that solves the debuffing problem and gives us a measure of control over our automatons that will allow us to be useful during big fights.

Also there is the problem with a lack of usefulness of our melee frames. At the current time there is NO reason whatsoever to even bother skilling up these automatons because they are so horribly overlooked by the dev team that their damage output and tanking ability are so sub-par that they can't even compete with the worst tank in vanadiel or the worst melee job in vanadiel. The black mage spells given to us have been the only things we have gotten from 75~90 (also the tactical switch and cure 6) but those are simply a given and haven't required any thought, it's just a copy and paste method and it's just a blatantly pathetic effort. How about give us something, ANYTHING that can make our other automatons useful and give us more automatons (be creative like the square-enix I grew up with), there's so much that can be done to make us unique and fun and I just don't think any effort whatsoever has gone into the job in years, it's very disappointing. I am a fulltime pup and I'm just tired of my job being completely ignored while other jobs get MASSIVE bonuses and fun new things all the time.

[Zhronne]

Another large concern that many pups are having problems with is not being able to adequately control the nukes our puppets cast.

This is a problem only in abyssea and only in certain circumstances, I'd say.
Sure... it can be annoying, but no way of solving it. I think this is one of those things we'll have to learn to live with.

[Lushipur]

thing is, scanner (attach or built is) should see if a mob is immune/absorb or triggered by a spell and avoid it.