New PUP Automaton Ideas

[Kaelthas]

What the title says:


Attachments:


Magnetic Absorber
A Dark-based automaton attachment

Required capacity: Dark x 3

Functionality:
-Converts the energy of a Dark maneuver into an Occult Acumen effect when casting elemental or dark magic spells

How it works

Just like Ice Maker, it will convert every Dark Maneuver into the effect of Occult Acumen upto Tier III. If no Dark maneuvers are present, the attachment will not function.
E.g.: A Spiritreaver Automaton with Magnetic Absorber and 2 Dark Maneuvers up casts Aero III on a rabbit, which took 500 damage. The 2 Dark Maneuvers are converted into a Tier II Occult Acumen, resulting in a +5% MP gain in TP. The automaton gains the 5% of 500 damage as 25 TP.


Nitrogen Booster
A Wind-based automaton attachment

Functionality:
-Grants a Fast Cast effect

Required capacity: Wind x 2

How it works

Functions similar to the Turbo Charger in which it has a passive 10% casting time and 5% recast delay with no maneuvers up. Each wind maneuver will count as a new tier of Fast Cast upto Tier IV. This will also stack with a Turbo charger, resulting in a maximum of 12.5% recast and 25% haste, producing a 34.375% recast bonus.

How I worked that out:
Took the number 100 to start off with as the base recast. 100 multiplied by 0.75 (the 25% haste from turbo charger which is 1 minus 0.25) gives a recast of 75%. Took the 75% recast and multiplied it by the maximum fast cast that the nitrogen booster gives (12.5%) which is 1 minus 0.125 equals 0.875. So 0.75 multiplied by 0.875 equals 65.625. So the fast cast bonus is 100 minus 65.625 equals 34.375%

E.g.: A Soulsoother automaton with Nitrogen Booster, Turbo Charger and 3 Wind Maneuvers up casts Cure V on itself. The casting time is reduced by the number of wind maneuvers proportion to the tier of fast cast granted, so a base of 1 + 3 from the maneuvers grants a Fast Cast of Tier IV (negative 25% casting time). The cure took 1.875 seconds to cast (2.5 seconds minus the 25% casting time) and 6.5625 seconds to be able to recast it (10 seconds minus the combined reduction of the Turbo Charger and Nitrogen Booster of 34.375% equals 6.5625, and if it was allowed to spam the same spell). The normal casting time for Cure V is 2.5 seconds and the normal recast of Cure V is 10 seconds.


(Name undecided)
A dark-based automaton attachment

Functionality:
-Consumes a Dark Maneuver to add an elemental celerity effect to elemental magic spells.

Required capacity: Dark x 3

How it works

Functions similar to the ice maker, in which it consumes a single dark maneuver to add a Tier 1 elemental celerity effect. Having multiple Dark Maneuvers up will only consume the first dark maneuver used which is currently up.
E.g.: A Spiritreaver automaton with the attachment and 2 Dark Maneuvers up casts Stone IV on a ghoul, and took -15% off the casting time, resulting in a 5.95 second casting time. A Dark Maneuver was consumed and was converted into a -15% casting time for the next elemental magic spell used, in this case it's Stone IV. Stone IV usually takes 7 seconds to cast without any special attachments like the Magnetic Absorber one mentioned previously. 7 seconds -15% equals 5.95 as 10% of 7 is 0.7 so halve it to get 0.35 (10%/2 =5%) and add them together to get 1.05 which is the 15% taken away from 7 seconds. This attachment can stack with Nitrogen Booster to achieve a maximum casting time reduction of 36%, so 7 - 36% = 4.48 seconds.

How I worked it out
Took 100% as a base casting time. 1 Dark maneuver and 2 Wind maneuvers up. The 1 Dark maneuver is converted into Elemental Celerity, giving a negative 15% casting time, so 100% minus 15% equals 85% total casting time. The 2 Wind maneuvers stack with the casting time of Nitrogen Booster, giving a maximum of Tier III Fast Cast (Base 1 + 2 Wind Maneuver modifier) so a reduction of 20% to casting time. 85% minus the 20% gives a total of 64% casting time. (The 20% is taken away from the 85% and not as a whole). Then I took the 7 seconds and multiplied it by 0.64 (as 1 minus 36% is 0.64) which equalled to 4.48 seconds.


Weaponry

Just like you have your frames, heads and attachments, we should be able to customise our weaponry based on which frame we have. For example, a Sharpshot frame should be able to use an axe or a dagger for when the enemy comes into its melee range. On that note, 2 of the attachments we have: Hammermill and Barrier Module enhance the use of a shield. Looking at our frame assosrtment it looks like the Valoredge frame can use these exclusively as its the only one with a shield. So please add more unique ones like Hammermill/Barrier Module that only a specific frame can use.


Please leave feedback

[Shinron-PUP]

This is a bit unrelated to the post, but adding to the new attachments you are proposing. I'd like to also see an Auto-Cover attachment that allows it so that when behind your pet, he takes damage that you would have received similar to cover of Paladin. Either this could be a permenant effect in which would make the it so that you could literally alternate who takes damage by merely steping infront or behind your pet, or it could be a job ability like strobe/shock absorber/etc... which is done on the person with the highest amount of hate. In this case, the job ability would state the name of the person it is covering so that you know when to run behind the pet. Its duration I would imagine would be 30~60 seconds.
* Just to clearify the significance of this attachment when using Valor Edge, this means that:
1. Tanking alternation would be possible no matter what the enmity of the pet or the Master is.
2. This would allow the pet time to recover when taking a beating if we have hate because we can step infront of the pet or vice versa
3. We could sub warrior and go all out while having our pet take all the damage despite hate levels
*This would probably be only for solo unless they allowed this to be used on party members.

[Kristal]

Metal Detector ()
* Effect: Treasure Hunter (level 50+: TH II)
* Can increase existing treasure hunter effect, chance depending on light maneuvers:1%/2%/4%/8%.
* Optical Fiber increases maximum TH effect by +1.

[Tesahade]

What the title says:


Nitrogen Booster
A Wind-based automaton attachment

Functionality:
-Grants a Fast Cast effect

Required capacity: Wind x 2

How it works

Functions similar to the Turbo Charger in which it has a passive 10% casting time and 5% recast delay with no maneuvers up. Each wind maneuver will count as a new tier of Fast Cast upto Tier IV. This will also stack with a Turbo charger, resulting in a maximum of 12.5% recast and 25% haste, producing a 34.375% recast bonus.

How I worked that out:
Took the number 100 to start off with as the base recast. 100 multiplied by 0.75 (the 25% haste from turbo charger which is 1 minus 0.25) gives a recast of 75%. Took the 75% recast and multiplied it by the maximum fast cast that the nitrogen booster gives (12.5%) which is 1 minus 0.125 equals 0.875. So 0.75 multiplied by 0.875 equals 65.625. So the fast cast bonus is 100 minus 65.625 equals 34.375%

E.g.: A Soulsoother automaton with Nitrogen Booster, Turbo Charger and 3 Wind Maneuvers up casts Cure V on itself. The casting time is reduced by the number of wind maneuvers proportion to the tier of fast cast granted, so a base of 1 + 3 from the maneuvers grants a Fast Cast of Tier IV (negative 25% casting time). The cure took 1.875 seconds to cast (2.5 seconds minus the 25% casting time) and 6.5625 seconds to be able to recast it (10 seconds minus the combined reduction of the Turbo Charger and Nitrogen Booster of 34.375% equals 6.5625, and if it was allowed to spam the same spell). The normal casting time for Cure V is 2.5 seconds and the normal recast of Cure V is 10 seconds.

Mana Booster says hi or the future Mana Booster. iirc they said the Mana Booster will be changed to a fast cast effect. Even though its not the same as the wind based attachment you suggest it is a fast cast attachment.

and just to nitpick Nitrogen Booster would better fit a title for a ice type attachment seeing as nitrogen is cold

[Saiken253]

You're thinking of liquid Nitrogen ^^;. Also, the way Occult Accumen works is not the damage that you dealt with your spell, but the MP that was used to cast the spell. just clarifying a few things ^^; otherwise DRKs wouldn't be as upset about OA hehe

[Saiken253]

I kinda want another frame to come out, but idk what it would be. or increasing the elemental thresholds that the frames have and adding more cool attachments.

[Thango]

Metal Detector ()
* Effect: Treasure Hunter (level 50+: TH II)
* Can increase existing treasure hunter effect, chance depending on light maneuvers:1%/2%/4%/8%.
* Optical Fiber increases maximum TH effect by +1.

I like this, like BST.

[Theytak]

WARNING: WALL OF TEXT

All four frames have a total of 24 elemental slots
All four original heads have a total of 12 elemental slots
the two additional mage heads have a total of 13 elemental slots

For elemental slots;
Highest amounts:
Fire (7): full valoredge
Thunder (6): full sharpshot
Earth (7): full valoredge
Wind (7): full sharpshot
Ice (7): full stormwaker, spiritreaver+stormwaker frame
Water (6): stormwaker head, soulsoother head, or spiritreaver head, combined with any frame (all three heads have 3 water slots, all frames have 3 water slots)
Light (6): soulsoother+any frame

Thus, we have 3 elements that haven't been given their full potential, relatively speaking; Thunder, Water, and Light.

Of these three, Light is played out by soulsoother perfectly, so the only real thing it needs is for soulsoother to have an extra light slot, but no head has higher than +3 to a slot, only frames have +4, and soulsoother is already 1 slot over the norm. the extra light slot, while handy, is also not necessary, since it wouldn't allow for the use of an extra attachment given the current combos anyway

Water is typically associated with magic defense, but since it's played fairly well by all three mage puppets, and we don't really need ANOTHER mage puppet, we can leave it be.

this leaves thunder, which, of the three, is the easiest to play out into a puppet frame we don't already have.

Valoredge fills two roles for us; first, it's a sturdy, tank-like pet, emphasized by it's 7 earth slots. Second, it's a strong melee pet; emphasized by it's 7 fire slots, lower attack delay, and stronger per-hit damage (ignoring sharpshot's ranged attacks). Valoredge's scissorclawthing is effectively a mini-2h weapon in terms of strength, somewhere between a club and a staff in both delay and damage (clubs are the highest damage/delay 1h weapons, staves are the lowest damage/delay 2h weapons; note that with martial arts, h2h is the weapon that fills the "between 1h and 2h" spot). This is made apparent when watching VE fight; on weaker mobs, or when it's attack is significantly buffed, such as in abyssea, you can see that it will average about the same, or slightly less, damage in a single attack as our 2 punches do in a single round when added (ignoring crits). Based on this, and the fact that valoredge actually has fairly high natural evasion, I think the job it most resembles would be somewhere between sam and drg, rather than war or pld. From a tank aspect, VE resembles sam; moderately sturdy, with decent evasion. From a DD aspect, it resembles drg; lower 2h delay with a single fairly strong crit ws (compare string shredder to drakesbane). Of course, in both cases these resemblances are reduced based on the fact that VE is a pet, and is thus subject to different standards and equations.

Sharpshot fills two roles as well; first, it's our ranged attach pet, and has fairly strong evasion, emphasized by 7 wind slots. Second, due to how powerful ranged attacks are in general, it's our strongest damage dealing pet. Sharpshot is a fairly straightforward analogy to rng; high damage output, low survivability.

I'm not going to get in to harlequin very much. It's a rather lackluster frame outside of a few special situations, due to it's absurdly low MP pool and lackluster melee capability at higher levels. It fills the "balanced" slot of the frames, with identical 5 elemental slots for each element except light/dark, for which it has 3 of each

looking at these, it's hard to really find a niche for a new frame to fill, that we don't already have. VE is a durable quasi-tank that deals moderate damage, SSh is a powerhouse DD, SSo is out and out whm, SR is effectively a blm/drk sans -gas and AM (and no, we do not want AM), this last update has finally bumped SW into it's rdm niche, and done so quite nicely with stoneskin and phalanx, and harlequin fills the "Hybrid-Icandoanythinglulz" role. The only thing really missing is a fast 2hits-per-round attacker like mnk or nin, but that's what the master does, and having a pet that does exactly what we do already, just not as well, would be rather redundant.

Now wait, I know what you're going to say; "but we don't have a support, party buffing pet! And no, protect/shell/regen don't count!!"

well to that I say: We really, really, really, really, really, do not want or need one. I mean sure, it would fill up the one niche in a party we can't already fill fairly well, but look at how the only pet job that can actually do that does it. Do you really want to waste the small chance of us getting a new frame on it being a repackaged Bloodpact: Ward system? There's no way they would give us a bard pet that could do as effective a job as a brd, and there's absolutely no way they would bother trying to figure out how to make a cor PET. If they gave us a party-buffing automaton, it would lead to only two outcomes: 1) the frame becomes effectively worthless because the buffs will be to complicated to perform reliably, and will be too weak or situational to bother using the frame at all, or 2) the frame will be effective enough that we never get to use any other frame ever again. Both are situations none of us want, so why bother even trying to rationalize it when they are the only possible outcomes? I've got an idea for a compromise for people who adamantly want us to be able to party buff, but that's for later.

First: The only reasonable, logical (SE Logic) way to handle giving us a new frame/s:

They've already done it for us once, and it worked perfectly; higher level branched "advanced" frames. When I say they've done this, I'm obviously referencing the whm/blm heads. Rather than giving us new puppets, they gave us half of two puppets; and it worked. it took some tinkering, but it worked. So, for those of you who want a new frame or two, I would suggest this:

Revamp Valoredge. Give us two new frames, based on the old valoredge, both functioning with the valoredge head.

New Valoredge Frame #1: Valorguard; a frame possessing a sturdier shield, built in shield blocking (rate further enhanced by barrier module), higher natural damage reduction, stronger magic resistance, and natural MP, allowing self and master cures, up to cure IV. The trade off is that this frame would possess lower damage output than it had. This would effectively turn VE into a real pld

New Valoredge Fram #2: Fierceblade; a frame possessing stronger damage output, either through a boost to the frame's weapon damage, or through a boost to natural % WS damage; the trade off being a lower natural damage reduction (half of VE's current amount), loss of it's shield blocking (it could keep shield bash, in the form of weapon bash), and lower over all defense than VE currently has. Its damage output would be enough for it to more easily keep up with sharpshot, though it wouldn't beat sharpshot for raw damage, but it would allow for having a strong DD pet with at least some survivability (read: it wouldn't be torn apart like a wet paper bag when hit by AoEs like sharpshot is)

the Valorguard Frame would have an elemental lay out something like:
Fire: 3 Wind: 2 Thunder: 2 Light: 3
Ice: 3 Earth: 4 Water: 4 Dark: 3

the Fierceblade frame would have an elemental lay out something like:
Fire: 4 Wind: 3 Thunder: 4 Light: 3
Ice: 2 Earth: 3 Water: 3 Dark: 2

The reason I used valoredge is because it can easily be split, where as sharpshot can't really be split as cleanly, and harlequin is... well.... harlequin.

Now, for the party buffing bit:

If you really want to allow us to fill a party buffing role, don't ask for the pet to be the means. Ask for the player to get the party buffing abilities.

there are three jobs identified as entertainers; Bard, Dancer, and Puppetmaster. Bard is one of the strongest support jobs in the game, and is capable of fairly decent melee damage, if the bard in question has the gear and the knowhow (most don't). Dancer is fairly evenly split between damage and support, despite not having as wide of a variety of support abilities as brd. Pup has almost no support ability and is typically fully focused on damage; what little support it does provide through either tanking or healing, are done better by a handful of different jobs. If you want us to be able to join the other entertainment jobs as a party support job, understand that our damage output is the highest of the three, so we'll still be the weakest of the three in terms of party support (ie: to keep it balanced (and not SE's convoluted definition of the term), our buffing ability would have to rival bard's melee ability; occasionally useful but not game changing).

In my mind, the easiest and simplest way to do this would be giving maneuvers an aura-type bonus effect for our party members. Think something like smn's Favor abilities in terms of implementation; give us a stance-type ability that grants our maneuvers a bonus aura effect at some cost to us.

JA: Spotlight
Duration: 2:00:00 Recast: 3:00~5:00
Increases the duration of, and Augments "Maneuver" effects and allows them to influence nearby party members, but increases likelihood of overloading

Duration increase is a straight double, from 1 minute to 2 minutes, so it's helpful regardless. Overload increase is a straight double burden, so each maneuver acts like 2 maneuvers in terms of whether or not you'll overload

Augments:
Fire Maneuver: Str and Attack Bonus Aura (Str+5 and Attack +5% to you and any party member nearby for each active fire maneuver)
Thunder Maneuver: Dex and Crit Rate Bonus Aura (Dex+5 and Crit Rate +5% to you and any party member nearby for each active thunder maneuver)
Wind Maneuver: Agi and Haste Aura (Agi+5 and Haste +5% to you and any party member nearby for each active wind maneuver)
Earth Maneuver: Vit and Damage Reduction Aura (Vit+5 and PDT -5% to you and any party member nearby for each active earth maneuver)
Ice Maneuver: Int and Magic Attack Bonus Aura (Int+5 and MAB +5 to you and any party member nearby for each active ice maneuver)
Water Maneuver: Mnd and Damage Reduction Aura (Mnd+5 and MDT-5% to you and any party member nearby for each active water maneuver)
Light Maneuver: Chr and Regen Aura (Chr+5 and 10hp/tick regen to you and any party member nearby for each active light maneuver)
Dark Maneuver: Refresh Aura (2mp/tick to you and any party member nearby for each active dark maneuver)

is it perfect? no. But actually, it would give people a reason to invite pups, since it would allow for jobs outside of drk to cap JA haste (Drk is the only job that can do it currently; 2h jobs /sam with hasso and a dnc main can get to 20%), and would account for pup needing to be within a certain range to deploy. And it's not like we don't already greatly benefit from triple wind maneuvers thanks to turbo charger. If we're in a /sam heavy group with a dnc, we wouldn't even need to limit ourselves to 3x wind maneuvers, we could account for WS maneuvers too.

Sure, the bulk of the time we'd end up spamming wind maneuvers, but given the large amount of AGI gear, and our currently almost useless JA designed to help while spamming maneuvers (cooldown), overloads would only be about as much of an issue as busts are for a cor with fold.

..dammit, that idea is TOO good, there's no way it'll ever be implemented.

[Dragkon]

I purposed this Idea years and years ago...
Relic Frame like Onion Knight
Virtually a Super Version of Harly!
I haven't thought it thru in a while but I think Relic like or even Magian trials for a new frame with "relic" like AI standards instead of new attachments and so on or relic like attachments too...
I would like this more than anything honestly

[Kristal]

I'd like to also see an Auto-Cover attachment that allows it so that when behind your pet, he takes damage that you would have received similar to cover of Paladin.

Something like this?

Tactical Analyzer
Has a chance of triggering Cover, Sneak Attack and Trick Attack depending on positioning of master and enemy.
Maneuver effect: 5%/15%/30%/50%
Notes:
* Valoredge frame gets double effect on Cover.
* Applied effects are on par with subjob usage