[PaladinAlik]

I just thought i'd make a topic for all pup pvp experiences whether you fought one or fought as one.


Pup/thf vs pld/dnc: I was the pup in this fight and was intimidated by the /dnc sub so i wanted to experiment with the strobe and SA howling fist. Didnt work since the pld ignored provoke complete and took the beating and waited for voke to wear off. Even so I took the pld/dnc to the brink exhausted his mp and he was working purely off tp. I had him at 50% hp when i dropped.

pup/nin vs Pld/dnc: he tried the same stratedgy of ignoring voke but this time with shadows he really couldnt get hardly any damage off on me. He had a joytoy and hit me like 3 times the entire fight, i had capped eva and about 35ish + eva, and shadows. not to mention voke and flash to fall back on. The fight was quick because he seemed to be slow on the cures this fight and around 40% hp Serenade used Bone crusher on him for 220 and stunned him, I jumped behind him and howling fisted him for about 350 and finished him off.

Pup/nin Vs Pup/War: Honestly i dont know how i won this fight. I was /nin the other pup was in full pahluwan gear and hades sainti. The difference between us was he was geared with all out acc gear (i dont think he sacrificed any eva maybe in earring but i dont think so) and he had war sub for dmg boost. I was in a mostly eva build I think i had near 30 acc gear and the afforementioned 35 eva buff. the /war guy had like the high +40's in acc.
He started by sticking his puppet on mine and coming after me himself. I sent my puppet on his but i also went after his puppet. Its worth noting that I dont think he had the Coiler equipped. me and serenade beat on his puppet and I tried to tank the master with shadows and i did somewhat well. When his puppet went down i was like 60% hp and serenade was about 80% (towards the end of the fight the master adopted my stratedgy and focused on my puppet) by that point the fight was over, I had serenade tank him, gave him an oil and just double teamed him, he did get serenade very low tho as he opened with a strong howling fist which took serenade down to about 30-40% and whaled on him through the oil. Serenade came out of that fight with about 10% hp left.

Pup/nin Vs Mnk/???(think it was war): like many other melee he tried to ignore the provoke and focus on me, he did occasionally pop serenade a few times. What im surprised at is my spells seemed a lot mor lethargic and recast seemed longer than usual. I evaded a number of his strikes pretty well it just seemed the length i was exposed without shadows was longer. ultimately I beat him but just barely with about 117 hp left. we did another fight and the margin of victory was even smaller, but i still took him out both times. I fought him once without a puppet and took him to 50% hp before dying, but i dont count that.

Pup/nin vs Thf/nin: first two fights i won. first fight was by a good margin. 2nd fight i caught the thf by surprise with role reversal restoring serenade and crippling my hp (but he didnt pay attention and didnt notice). the 3rd fight he managed to beat me. this thf had a TON of eva gear and he was an absolute nightmare to hit for both me and serenade. i got my revenge with my pld/rdm but still meh

If you have some experiences with pup or against a pup feel free to share^^/.

[Temadian]

pup is interesting, not enough good pups that people dont really know how to approach them half the time. While on fenrir there was Dansieg, on the video the clip of me fighting him as war/sam vs pup/drg, I wasnt the job I wanted to be to fight him, would have rather been drk for the sleep and what not, but decided, Im so going to kill his dam puppet...haha ended up with a lot less hp then I thought I would have been when the thing died. I dunno seems like a good job to play with, but not enough good ones around, and everyone is very different to fight

[PaladinAlik]

yeah I can tell you the two thfs i fought were way better than others ive fought. usally on pup i walk all over thfs, but the one i fought had insane eva rate i had a horrible hit rate of lik 20-30% if i had had more I could have won.

I tried danieg's pup/rdm diaga silence combo on blms and rdms and basicly owned them hard, using role reversal and puppets self cure is essential against a rdm and blu

the mnk i played switched to drk and i fought him at the end of pvp. He did try the sleep idea, but he didnt play it quite right as i was able to deactivate and turn him back on and sick again. if he had attacked serenade just once it wouldnt work but he was focused on me. and in a pup fight time is a puppet's friend. so every time he took trying to cast sleep was time he wasnt attacking me and getting beat on, added to the fact shadows helped to back me up when serenade was down and it was a pretty easy fight. he tried to sleep serenade again but was interrupted and then promptly put down. (<3 double attack on puppet) but the fact of the matter is that even a sleeping puppet isnt completely useless as i can syphon hp off of him if need be, and of course with af boots repair will fix sleep.

on those thfs i should have retooled serenade for more acc when i lost to the thf he had: Heatseeker (gradual acc boost) Stabilizer I and Coiler. I started to realize that double attack is useless if i cant hit, so i retooled him with heatseeker and Stabilizer II. if i fought him again id probably place more emphasis on thunder maneuvers and forget the ws he uses

id be curious to try fighting a drg because they can zerg a pup far more effectively than say a drk or war or thf. I know on drg ive owned drk/sams by just going all out on them and with both me and ember the enemy is very hard pressed to get spells off.

[Temadian]

I always liked to absorb agi pups lmao....or to mnks, absorb str vit, same with plds, so dam great =P hahaha But Im not the greatest to 1on1, prefer the full ballista experience, can care less what people can do when they all ahve timers up, more on the caring if they can still perform during a real match when they have no timers up

[Cream Soda]

I fought with a pup the other night who had claimed to never lost to a monk before. I won 3-0, the only close one being the match my chakra recast timer wasn't up yet from the previous fight. He was using the pld frame, having it spam voke (it had about a 40%ish land rate) and then have it activate blaze spikes, which hurt pretty bad, forcing me to swap to footwork (good thing I was mnk/blu, queasyshroom for shadows). When he was almost dead, he hit role reversal (which i knew was coming to i saved TP), then before he could use repair (My macro is /ws "Asuran Fists" ) I took out his automaton and with about half of my HP left, easily took the puppetless pup down. Rasetsu Hakama also help with the additional effect of ice spikes.

[PaladinAlik]

im about 50/50 most time with mnks, RR + oil isnt really a good policy imo, i use oil to keep him going longer. with a mnk ill generally try to have serenade tank and yeah i use spikes but I use oils before RR and i only use it as a last resort. When i fight mnks serenade usually gets given enough tp to cannibal blade 350ish hp back so oil and cannibal keep him going usually long enough to finish the mnk off. and pups can be a pain to hit with full eva gear and /nin i took a mnk to 50% without a puppet.

usually when i fight a mnk serenade goes down and i squeak out the win, its really a matter of luck if this steam jacket works right tho mnks will become much easier in future fights

[Blueyes]

Hmm it seems like Puppetmaster + melee frame is a common choice for one on one PvP. Anyone try messing with the mage frame? A quick tier IV nuke at the start, deactivate, change configuration to soulsoother and bring him out to drop a cure V mid battle. Or if you're good on HP bring out spiritreaver again for another nuke. Pup/War seems like it would be good for that strategy so you can provoke to keep their attention on you until you can deactivate again. (Animated Flourish work the same way?)

Puppetmaster just seems interesting because their are so many things you can do with the job. It's like a wild card. Strategy can be unpredictable. I think the mage puppet is even capable of silencing other real mages.

Earlier the Linkshell was talking about Ballista and I asked which would be more lethal, Puppetmaster or Corsair (my top two jobs) and of course the first response was "neither?" Most people don't realize what Puppetmaster is capable of doing; same goes for Corsair. A well timed Quick Draw can be quite lethal, and that goes for light and dark shot too. While neither would make the best "up font" job in a large battlefield, they would probably be better off working behind the scenes and being sneaky. Most players would probably ignore the little Puppetmaster off to the side and focus on something more threatening... next thing they know they get hit by a tier III nuke.

[Cream Soda]

I always hit the pet first when it comes to a wyvern or automaton just for that purpose that they can't be deactivated and reactivaed lol. As for the mage puppet, its not very durable. A pup tried to come at me with one today and i dropped it to 2% with 1 melee round followed up with an asuran. Then I chi blasted it and it was dead. Then he just whiffed me and did about less than 200 dmg before i died (I eva whored that match.)

[Blueyes]

Interesting. Well like I said, not a smart idea without provoke. You should be able to use provoke every time you pull the puppet out (and you shouldn't leave it out). Just have to be careful about AoE moves.

[Cream Soda]

Funny you mention that. Although I was /dnc at that particular match, I sub blu 95% of the time and have battledance and claw cyclone both equipped at pretty much all times.

[Blueyes]

Yeah that would pretty much screw up the mage strategy. I guess that's why most Puppetmaster's use melee frame. Ranger frame is probably too fragile. Harlequin might be fun. It's the second toughest puppet after Valoredge, can cure itself, enfeeble, and has access to magic mortar.

[IronPandemonium]

Ironguy uses Tachi: Jinpu.
Spicyryan takes 1365 points of damage.
Spicyryan was defeated by Ironguy.

That's why I just can't take Puppetmaster seriously, hate to admit it (and be blunt at the same time). Sounds like a good time for /BLU, I can only imagine, no?

[Blueyes]

Sam vs Pup is just mean. You know we can't take hits like that.

[PaladinAlik]

Pup does pretty well against sam, well or at least it did before sekanoki. Whenever I fought sams in the past i could drop them before or just after my puppet died but that was before guignol earring (every little bit counts)

and remember im not the greatest pup either I only have 1 melee merit and 1 optimization (and most of the time i use af, but ive recently throw in a more evasive build that still uses a lot of af)

i have taken sams to like 50% with no pet before (the sam missed 2 gekko's) so maybe he wasnt the greatest sam ever idk but ive fought maybe 3 sams in my pup lifetime

as for the mage frame in 1 on 1:

its viable in SOME situations, sam is NOT one of them. provoke can miss and even then if it doesnt last the duration of the time you put your pet in jeapardy at best. at worst it gets beat on to the point where it favors drain over Tier 4.

Vs say a blu.... its possible if u silence them first (SW head for this)
It might even have a play vs a pld/anything
and it is essential against a rdm/nin
outside of those situations its really kind of not worth it.

anyone here ever fought a drg as a pup? I havent yet, and that could be a rough fight, but i suppose if you can survive the initial onslaught of jumps and penta's youre probably ok (especially if the drg was dumb enough to burn em on the master instead of pet) maybe a /drg would work against a drg. In that kind of fight i imagine itd all be about dropping the other as fast as possible, the wyvern would eat shadows which could make for a bad day. So... idk

[IronPandemonium]

Using Sekkanoki is stupid, as you're basically wasting 100 TP to miss your enemy and look like a douche. Better off keeping the TP and making the single strike better.

And for reference: Monks are just as much a bitch to deal with as a Samurai; MNK/BLU, it'd take AGES to kill them. Don't see how Samurai's "better", lol.

As for taking Samurai to fifty percent, you say he missed two Gekkos? As much as SAM should have capped WSACC on ANYONE, NO MATTER WHAT, I'm going to have to say that Samurai was garbage. I've beaten a Puppetmaster down with a Shinai (Lv.1, DMG:2, DLY:480 event katana), if that says anything.

Is that Puppetmaster bad at Ballista? Perhaps, but until they allow you to log onto a Ballista server without screwing yourself out of your current server for three months at the cost of twenty-five dollars, he's my best source.

[Cream Soda]

Thing about mnk/blu is you don't even lose a lot of dmg. I guess its the low weapon rank easy to cap Fstr shit. Cause the time I tried sam/blu with a high defense build, the damage was absolute shit.

[IronPandemonium]

What do you define "shit" as, in particular? I'm currently leveling /BLU due to I'm a vendetta-holding savant and even if I know I'm running into the most obvious death trap, I'll still attack, in hopes of killing my enemy atleast before they kill me, and well... That doesn't work too well in official matches.

Because I mean... You keep Hagun, and you also keep TP, compared to the other defensive support job that eats it up (/DNC), coupled along with the fact that Soboro' puts out gross numbers. Can't be THAT bad, since I've used /DRG before and it's basically going as 75SAM/nothing, but with two free jumps to interrupt magic and gain TP.

Granted, that grouped with Tomoe's five hit is kind of... Yeah. Also, how's blue magic activation rate against enemies in uncapped (physical magic, example Head Butt)? I haven't a clue.

[Cream Soda]

Well, the point of /blu mainly is a killer defense build, so for it to work in that sense, youw ouldn't gear the same way as sam/war or even sam/dnc. It would be all defense shit like Genbu hat, Jelly ring, ect ect. I don't have hagun, but was doing 400dmgish average, and like 60-120 dmg/hit with onimaru in a full defense build. As opposed to my mnk doing asuran/howling for 500+ and hitting for 40-50/fist and much faster with the same build. Even polearm was topping 400-500 penta in OM. I just find it better to do mnk when i go /blu and with faith knuckles it tears shit up, as well as having 300+ more HP.

[IronPandemonium]

Yeah, for sure MNK'll have it easier as a DPS job, where SAM is a WS job (which is much heavier effected by equipment when you're fighting something you're near capped on accuracy in the first place, additionally that most WS equipment is not very defensive-friendly, example Shura Zunari Kabuto/Haidate and Rutter Sabatons), but nonetheless, I'm positive it'll be enough damage to get the job done for me.

I'm very familiar with Ballista might I add, so I'm fully aware of how difficult Monk is compared to other jobs (atleast in my case, Monk is the only one I have trouble with as a Samurai). On that note though, because I still play official matches as if they're a death match, I'm not quite effective as a team member (but doesn't mean I don't know what's right and wrong in Ballista, regardless). /BLU will hopefully straighten that out.

Speaking on that note, Arhat's Jinpachi +1 or Genbu's Kabuto (as well as Arhat's Gi +1 or Kirin's Osode)? Been overlooking it, and the pure DEF loss seems unworthy in the situation, but after all: It IS -15% Physical equipment. Ontop of that too actually, could use Iron Ram Lance for another -10% damage taken, -as well- as turning Samurai into a more DPS-persistant job (though Meditate Penta Thrust spam with that thing's still damn mean), which is never a bad thing in Ballista.

I'll assume /BLU activation rate is awful, huh (Blastbomb, Sheep Song, Head Butt, and Bludgeon all in particular).

[PaladinAlik]

pup is really situational with the job you fight. a well -% dmg geared mnk has the defense advantage, so really the best chance is to just pummel them as hard and fast as possible. I'd prob go /war or /drg (prob /war for a couple reasons)

one of the strengths of pup is we can jerk the guy back and forth with voke. it can be disorienting, and while not as big a deal on a melee that doesnt have any self cures and what not, it can capitalize on the disorientation. and a -dmg geared mnk sacrifices some dmg, couples with a pup's evasive build a pup can do fairly well with a war sub. The idea is whichever one the mnk fights, the other vokes. so if the mnk goes for me serenade vokes, if he goes for serenade i voke. (but would let serenade tank for awhile if he does go for serenade first)

the disorientation factor is good because the opponent has to manually shift targets which does take some time and can save you from a hit or 2. Some guys ignore provoke and take the hits unanswered, others shift targets either way it buys me precious seconds. /war dishes out good numbers especially with a double attack pup. pop berserk for a quick howling and then cancel it. then of course theres role reversal as needed.

still by no means an easy fight, but its winnable


As for that sam. I dont lvl sam so i'm the wrong guy to ask about that. I probably just got really really lucky i suppose, I still ultimately lost that match. While a pup is gimp without their pet they're far from defensless, and i pride myself on making other dd's sweat a little when petless. If that sam hadnt eventually silenced me with a gekko i would have put up shadows and been able to get the tp for a howling and won (and man I'd count that as a major accomplishment if i had won)