String Theory: A Puppetmaster's Guide *NEW*

nothing readily available. but getting them shouldn't be too hard.

just need a cor or 2 to come help.

apex toads are a good target for physical damage.

Long overdue update, but I finally got around to it.

Updated the guide

• Various formatting/icon fixes throughout the guide
  

• Added Karambit/Kaja Knuckles
  

• Added Xiucoatl
  

• Updated Master-Only TP Set (High and Dream)
  

• Updated Automaton Magic Set.
  

• Updated Fast Cast/Cure Potency set
  

• Updated Shijin Spiral, Howling Fist set
  

• Updated Attachment Purchasing Priority to add new Attachments, and upgraded priority of buffed attachments.
  

• Updated all Automaton Attachment Sets
  

• Separated Overdrive Attachment set and created its own section.
  

• Added Aerix as a Contributor and added a link to his Automaton Skillchain video. (hope you don't mind :P)

... whew..

Feel free to comment or PM me any changes/suggestions you'd like to see.

Nice update Fab & thanks for adding me to the list!

One thing I saw right away I think that could use changing is to drop Dynamos by one or two tiers in the attachment rankings and bump up Steam Jacket.

Dynamo is almost never useful because the only WS that benefits from it is String Shredder, which is pretty meh even if you gear for it all the way. And crit rate on white damage is not great for DPS as we have so many better choices for DD attachments now.

Steam Jacket, on the other hand, gives very noticeable -MDT% for repeated magic damage of the same element. It makes Chainspell from stuff like Sarama or Suzaku almost a complete joke even without Water maneuvers--and it only costs 1 capacity. All the other attachments in its current tier are nowhere close to being as useful even situationally. And there are quite a few fights where you can expect magic damage of only a single element.

Edit:

1. Under Pet WS sets, it would be good to add any tier of Xiucoatl/Pitre Fists/Pantin Fists as they should always beat Gnafron's Adargas or Ohrmazd for damage.

2. And for the RNG maton setup, I would maybe add a small note to "Speedloader II or Heat Capacitor II instead of Scope IV (provided Ranged Accuracy is not an issue) if you are using this set for Overdrive."
It isn't always needed, but since the RNG setup doesn't use Target Marker typically, Scope 4 can potentially do some heavy lifting.

3. It might be worth noting that Amplifiers provide a large amount of Fast Cast for the BLMaton regardless of whether it's trying to MB or not (since the update?). This makes them quite useful even when just free nuking, imo.

Aerix if you have a maxed Xiucoatl. You should build a set for Raging Fists / Howling Fist. Howling Fist hits better unbuffed and Raging hits better when buffed by support.
It's doing quite respectable damage with the same WSD set. My set is quite similar to the Howling fist set in the guide.
Raging Fists hit 10-25k in E Ambu depending on buffs and self buffs.

The benefit of having a Armor Shatter ranged automaton. Is that Armor shatter does decent damage even with selfish master gear.
Because the biggest benefit it gets is from Xiucoatl. Whereas Arcuballista and Daze both require TP bonus to do respectable damage.

I admittedly haven't tested Raging Fists or Howling Fist with Xiucoatl at all so far, but I have my doubts whether a weapon without TP Bonus would make those WSs better than Victory Smite.

I'll test it out later today on Apex Toads.

Well the benefit of Xiucoatl build is pet also receives bonus accuracy and it's ranged attack,job ability and weaponskill do +25%

Yeah, but as I mentioned previously in this thread, the Automaton is just a small part of your overall DPS if you're meleeing with the master. And by using HF or RF you can't even make powerful Light SCs with your Automaton.

All right, I tested WSs a bit on Apex Toads. Either with low buffs (only Sam/Chaos rolls) or full buffs (Sam/Chaos/Idris Fury+Frailty/Berserk+Aggressor+Warcry). In both cases I had Sublime Sushi, Dia 3 from Koru-Moru and songs from Joachim/Ulmia.

As sharazisspecial said, HF and RF actually do surprisingly well with Xiucoatl, but R0 Godhands still outperformed them by like 3k+ damage for the most part (i.e. when I WS'd at 1k instead of getting a lot of TP overflow).

Low buffs:
HF (13k-14k) and VS (11k-14k) did very similar damage with Xiucoatl C, although HF was more consistent and I admit I'm missing some WSD pieces since I never bothered to augment Herc for HF/RF.

However, my R0 KKK also did like 11k-15k SPs with AM3 and completely outpaced Xiucoatl for TP speed.

High buffs:
This is where Xiucoatl C and Raging Fists really surprised me. I was consistently doing 20k-25k Raging Fists on the Apex Toads. But Godhands did roughly 3k more damage per WS on average, pretty much as expected.

R0 KKK AM3 Stringing Pummel did roughly 18k-19k usually. So even though I could definitely still improve my RF gear by a bit, I'm pretty sure a R15 KKK would get about 22k SPs and completely outmatch Xiucoatl simply due to the TP speed. AM3 would also allow a maton to Arcuballista frequently without Inhibitors when needed--although HF will trigger Arcu even with Inhibitors.

tl;dr: For those with Xiucoatl C but without KKK, gearing for HF and RF seems like a very solid choice for master DD.

Thank you

No problem! I hope you keep posting your findings in this thread for everyone to discuss and learn from :D

I also agree with your suggestions and have added them to the guide.



vvvvvvv corrected :)

Thanks, Fab! But I think the word "Scope IV" and its icon got swallowed in the wiki edit somehow and don't show up.

So, regarding PUP WSs as discussed earlier. I tested Tauret/Kaja Knife as PUP/NIN with the same Idris GEO and Sam/Chaos rolls on Apex Toads with a decent, but not BiS Evisceration set (i.e. Heyoka+1 instead of well-augmented Herculean with DEX/CritDmg), but the numbers were quite pleasing. Evis was consistently at around 20k and spiked to 26k-27k very frequently.

As I mentioned before, with PUP/WAR, Xiucoatl A and full buffs I was hitting 20k-25kish Raging Fists. Given the extra white damage, it's definitely superior to dual daggers, but it could be situationally quite useful on piercing weak mobs like Maxentius has been for Undead on other jobs.

In regards to the wiki, would you recommend the "Pet Only TP Set" for an Overdrive set?

Depends.

This is not optimal, but I do not use my Pet TP Set for Overdrive -- I usually sit in my Pet WS (Arcuballista/Daze) or Pet Tanking sets (depending on how dangerous the target is/how low health the automaton gets) during Overdrive.

Your Pet will gain a monstrous amount of +store TP/double attack in Overdrive and will be able to self 4 step skillchain back-to-back without being in Pet TP Set. Ideally, you would swap to Pet TP set during 0-999 TP, and then swap to Pet WS for the weaponskill, but the TP gains and WS frequency are so quick and erratic that I've missed WS windows and pet ends up WS'ing in TP set and then I'm sad when my arcuballista numbers are low.

This is probably due to my laziness, but sitting in Pet WS usually accomplishes the job so ;<

Yeah, WS set is my next build. Sylph is so dead that it's hard to get PUP stuff. Been playing around with the idea of leveling goldsmithing for Xi and leathercraft for heyoka +1 cause no one sells anything for pup lol

Personally, I use a specialized OD setup that caps Pet: Haste while also maximizing WS damage and Accuracy as much as possible.

Given that Inhibitors allow for a 3-hit build under OD with Pitre Tobe & the bonus DT and massive Regen, there's no real benefit to switching between regular TP and WS sets while OD is up. Any kind of advantage you gain is pretty much wasted if you miss even a single WS swap--something that is very likely to happen with how fast the maton TPs and WSs for the 4-step. And any missing DT can be easily compensated by adding Armor Plates or the like.

ItemSet 353094

Aerix thanks for the work you have done.

I have a request if you have the time. Are you able to test the effects of Geomancer's frailty on Sharpshot's weaponskills?
Particularly on Armor Shatter and Arcuballista .

Can do, but I'm not sure yet when I'll have the time. Any specifics for the conditions under which I should test? 1 Fire Maneuver with and without OD?

Yes without OD and with Atunner.
Could even test no Atunner to see if maybe that attachment could be causing an issue with GEO frailty.
Whatever you consider are optimal maneuvers for Arcuballista or Armor Shatter build is what you should use.

Before the PUPdate I've made PUP-burn ambus but when inviting GEOs i haven't noticed much difference in WS numbers. It may of been an Ambu only issue.
Not had the chance to make successful PUP-burn only ambu runs this month because its not been a good month for PUP tanking.

In genereal Attuner+Shatterer turns Frailty into a relatively minor boost if you have Beast Roll, depending on target. Under OD it pretty much just becomes irrelevant. But GEOs can also weaken enemies in other ways, so they're always useful to have regardless.

In any case, for Arcuballista double Fire + Wind is usually the way to go. Shatterer just Light/Wind/Fire. I can test them like that if you want. Or just Light/Wind/Fire for either and force them via skillchaining.

But as a sidenote: Attuner is weaker on NMs compared to non-NMs, so the results are kinda biased if I test them on Apex mobs. I guess I could test them on Selkit if you want.

Probably been asked already but the search function isn't working for me.

PUP plugins for windower? Like Auto attachment sets and such do they exist?

AutoControl, it's in the addons list for Windower. Lets you save and load attachment loadouts.

Awesome! Thanks a bunch!

Soloed a few whales and made my Karambit. So disappointed, I would like an exchange!
Its a selfish master weapon yet it's boosted weaponskill Asuran fists hits for around half(or less...) as much as Xiucoatl's Howling fist/Raging fists.
Is Asuran Fists just a really bad weapon-skill?

1.0 ftp that doesnt transfer, 15% str/vit mod, acc varies with tp.

You tell me

I think with Karambit you have to capitalize more on the Auto-Attack special effect than worry about high WS numbers, i.e. quantity over quality.

It's pretty likely that only MNK really benefits from this weapon because of Impetus, though.

What does your asuran fists set look like?

Asuran Fists is pretty much one of the hardest WSs in the game to really boost with gear. TP does nothing, multiattack does nothing, terrible stat mods, no fTP transfer. All you can really do is stack as much Acc/Atk as possible.

It was a good WS when regular HTH punches still hit like a truck during 75 days, because AF essentially just let you have 8 of them in one go even though it barely boosted them.

Gonna sound silly, but since I been gone for a bit and came back a month ago, any chance anyone can fill me in on what af/relic/enjoy gear should definitely be reforged, situationally useful, and no need to be reforged? I know another guide (blu I believe has something like this in their post) and it was pretty helpful. Might even be useful to be added to the wiki for future reference, as well. Plus, saving money not upgrading something that'll be used in one very specific instance isn't something I'm really interested in upgrading...

Anyway. I know the piere tobe is one, but anything else worth it? Thanks.

AF boots, gloves should be a priority there
relic body as you mentioned, maybe feet if you want an easy mab option
empyrean head, body, feet, and legs are all worth reforging

everything else is fairly optional until you get into +2/3 type things