Puppets, Puppets Everywhere! (Puppet Builds Guide)

[Wingshadow]

I realize that some of you are new to this sort of game. Perhaps you are just having trouble finding the puppet to help you get past a specific boss. Perhaps you have already completed Touhou Puppet Dance Performance's main game and even the post-game content and wish to begin selecting puppets for competitive use. In either case, there are a lot of puppets to choose from, and it can be a daunting task to sort through which ones you wish to use. Every puppet has a use, even if it is an extremely niche puppet, but it is important for proper team-building that you can find the one that suits your needs.

I have tried out several different puppets myself (and leveled several of them past 70 just to see how they hold up) and as I expand my experience with using them, I will share what I have learned here for everyone's benefit. Now, please understand that the opinions I share in this topic are strictly opinions, nothing more. Feel free to disagree with me or come to your own conclusions. I wish to inform, not start disagreements on which puppets are the best and which ones are entirely outclassed. With that in mind, let's move on to a discussion of puppet classes.

Puppet Classes

No, I am not referring to use ranking or anything of that sort.

Puppets come with different typing, base stats, and abilities each unique to that specific puppet. This makes them suited to take different roles, which I call "Classes". That's the terminology I'll be using throughout this guide, but feel free to coin your own terms if you so desire.

From what I can tell, there are four different Puppet Classes, as follows:

Tank Puppets (Typically Defense or Power forms)

Tank Puppets (such as Defense Suika, Defense Yukari, and Defense Yuuka) tend to have low speed stats (around 65 speed or below) and moderate to high health (80 health and above) as well as decent to high defensive stats. Their attacking stats also range from moderate to high, usually concentrated in a single attacking stat. Their purpose is to soak attacks (since they won't be out-speeding anything without priority moves) while dealing back significant damage in turn. Tank Puppets can become sweepers when under the effect of Genbu, and appreciate paralysis support in order to get the first hit in. They are, however, vulnerable to sweepers which can target their weaker defense (if they are lopsided in terms of defensive stats) They also do not appreciate opponents which can switch out with Lightning Speed or Changeling and negate their damage through resistances or immunities.

Sweeper Puppets (Typically Speed or Power forms)

Sweeper Puppets (such as Power Aya, Speed Marisa, and Speed Suwako) typically have high stats in either one or both attacking stats (120 and up). They also usually have moderate to low defensive stats (80 and below) and high speed (110 and up). Some mixed sweeper puppets such as Power Rika and Power Utsuho have low speed as well, but we will get into how they are useful later on in the guide. Sweeper Puppets pack massive damage in order to out-speed and OHKO opposing puppets with impunity. They appreciate status support in order to ensure they out-speed opponents and appreciate exploiting immunities/resistances in order to switch into play and wreak havoc on the opposing team. However, they are often rather frail and tend to be OHKO'd by puppets that they themselves cannot OHKO. Sweeper puppets should have coverage moves (moves outside their typing that allow them to damage a wide range of puppets) in order to keep opposing puppets from switching in with ease. Some sweepers have setup moves (moves that boost relevant attacking stats or speed) that allow them to take advantage of the occasional free turn due to switching.

Wall Puppets (Typically Defense or Assist forms)

Wall Puppets (Defense Alice, Defense Shingyoku, Defense Kikuri) do exactly what you think they might. They pack high defensive stats (120 and up in one or both areas) and decent to high health (80 and up) with low speed and low to moderate attacking stats. Their main purpose is to stop sweepers in their tracks by absorbing damage or exploiting immunities. Many Wall Puppets also possess self-healing moves in order to keep themselves healthy. Depending on the puppet, they may also pack status-inflicting moves or team support moves that will assist your sweepers or improve the overall defensive of your team. Wall puppets can help stall out weather teams or field effect teams, giving you an opening to counter-attack. Walls also may provide stable platforms for initiating your own field effects, weather effects, or entry hazards.

Support Puppets (typically Assist or Defense Forms)

Support Puppets (Assist Eirin, Assist Hina) tend to fill particular niches that no other puppet fills, and tend to have have average stats, or spreads that mimic that of other classes. Some specialize in laying down entry hazards, while others focus more on building up stats boosts before passing them on to another puppet via Backup Plan. Some can even pass healing to other puppets via Power Spot or eliminate status effects in the entire team with Forest Therapy. Many different puppets can be built as support puppets, and their usefulness varies based on what sort of team you wish to build.

That's all for this post. I'll move on how to plan out a team starting in the next post.

[Wingshadow]

Alright, then... What Puppets Should I Choose?

A proper team should include a mixture of different puppet classes and types. If you want to use lots of sweepers, you would do well to choose 3-4 sweepers that have different types, along with two tanks/walls or a single wall/tank along with one support puppet. You do not want to choose puppets with similar types or a team of puppets which share a weakness. This is to keep your own team from being destroyed with ease. Learn and exploit resistances and immunities. Pay close attention to what weaknesses/resistances your puppets have and plan your team in order to cover for them. If you have a wall/tank/support puppet with a certain weakness, it would help a lot to have a sweeper/tank with a resistance/immunity to said weakness.

For a very basic example, Power Toyohime has a double weakness to electric moves. If you have an earth-type puppet like Defense Tenshi, she can switch into an electric move and take no damage as a result. Power Toyohime also has a weakness to poison, which Defense Tenshi also resists, so Defense Tenshi would make a good teammate if you can predict a poison or electric move being used against your Power Toyohime.

Ok, so what keeps the metagame from becoming a series of switches and resisted hits? Two things: predicted switches and coverage moves.

Let's say you have your Power Toyohime out at the moment and you have a Defense Tenshi ready in case an electric move is sent her way. Your opponent has a Power Iku out in play as well, but your opponent predicts you will switch into an earth-type, so instead of using Thunder Force (an electric-type move), Power Iku uses Cold Rain (a water-type move) and hits your Defense Tenshi when you switch her in. In this case, your opponent predicted your switch and took advantage of it.

The second thing you will notice is that some attacking types that your puppets can learn are not the same as your puppet's type(s), like Cold Rain in the earlier example. Some of these can serve as coverage moves, that is, if you predict a switch you should use them instead of your same-type moves in order to damage the puppet that is switching in for neutral, 2x, or 4x damage. Using the above example one last time, instead of your opponent predicting that you will use an earth puppet, let's say they don't know what kind of puppet you will use. Power Iku has access to Gravity Blast (an Illusion-type move), which only two puppet types resist (Steel and Nether) and one type is immune to (Void, a rather rare type). Thus, it makes a decent coverage move for Power Iku in this case.

For Sweepers, it is important to carry moves of the same type as your puppet in order to gain some much-needed bonus damage from using a move of the same type. It is known as STAB in pokemon, so that is what I will call it for now. You should also carry at least one coverage or switch-prediction move, that is, one move that hits a wide range of puppets neutrally, or one move that can hit puppets it would normally be weak to for barrier-breaking (x2) damage. If your puppet cannot learn any useful moves outside its typing, it might be hard for you to use her competitively unless her typing is already well-suited for such a purpose.

Tanks are much like Sweepers in respect to move choices, only coverage moves are even more important for them. While Sweepers can (and often do) simply switch out when faced with an opponent that they cannot beat, Tanks usually stay in and take the hit in order to land a hit of their own (due to their inherently low speed). This makes it all the more important that they carry coverage moves because they will be facing a switched-in puppet on an almost regular basis.

Walls pack status moves in order to cripple opponents. Have a pesky sweeper ruining your fun? Slap some paralysis onto her and she how she likes it. Is a tank or opposing wall healing back the damage you deal with impunity? Hit her with a severe burn or severe poison and watch the health melt away each turn despite their attempts to heal. Walls are intended to help open up the opposing team while providing a much-needed barrier, and their moves should be chosen accordingly.

Supports can operate in a variety of roles, so it is hard to pin down what moves they should use unless you have a good idea of what your team needs.

To summarize, you should choose puppets based on how well they compliment each other. You should not build your team around a single puppet, rather, you should select your puppets with resistances in mind in order to make it more difficult for your opponents to pick your team apart with ease. Also, you should not choose to run a team full of walls, for example (its annoying and due to their low attack stats its hard for them to knock out puppets). Similarly, a team full of sweepers is disadvantageous because it limits your ability to switch out puppets to avoid being OHKO'd by faster puppets or priority moves. Sweepers are also rather delicate, so they can be knocked out or picked off with predicted switches or coverage moves without tank or wall support. Moves should be chosen with the role of the puppet taken into consideration, and puppets that cannot fill the role you need them to should be avoided, despite how cute they are.

I know, the temptation is very great to do otherwise.

That's all for this post. Next time I will provide some examples of my own puppet builds and why I use them.

[Wingshadow]

In the following posts, I will detail the power point distribution, purpose, and move set of some of my puppets in order to illustrate how to go about selecting, building, and fitting your puppets into your own team. I will also give my puppets amusing titles in order to illustrate their purpose and differentiate them from other puppet builds.

Juggernaut Suika (Defense Suika, offensive/trap build)

Base Stats: 110 hp, 100 Focus Attack, 100 Focus Defense, 70 Spread Attack, 100 Spread Defense, 60 Speed

Nature: Focus-Attack Boosting

Ability: Charge! (moves with additional effects are 33% more powerful, but the additional effect never occurs) or Battle Mania (prevents opponent from switching)

Power Point Distribution: 64 Health, 64 Attack, 2 Spread Defense

Moves:

Meteor Impact (warrior, focus, 150 base damage, 100% accuracy, -3 priority. Fails if hit before use),  Field Protect (halves physical damage for entire team for 5 turns), or Barrier Option (creates a protective barrier with 1/4 total health)

Heaven Ascension (warrior, focus, 120 base damage, 100% accuracy, reduces self focus defense and spread defense one stage)

Grand Liberation (earth, focus, 80 base damage, 100% accuracy, high critical hit rate)

Hellfire Dance (fire, focus, 120 base damage, 100% accuracy, user suffers 1/3 damage recoil, 10% chance to burn)

This Suika hits like a truck, and all those that see her will learn to fear her presence. Defense Suika has only two weaknesses, water and wind, and can take full advantage of both of her amazing abilities. With her Charge! ability, Hellfire Dance becomes 33% more powerful, increasing the attack's base damage to 160, without even factoring in STAB! Puppets which seek to avoid Suika's flames of death by switching have to beware of Meteor Impact, as switching gives her free reign to lay the smack-down on opponents foolish enough to do so. If you prefer to trap opponents instead, then you should use Battle Mania to prevent them from running, and use Hellfire Dance or Heaven Ascension to destroy trapped steel, nature, or dark-type puppets. Grand Liberation gives her some much-needed coverage against enemy fire-types and poison-types, but watch out for wind-types. Hellfire Dance is often enough of a threat to make opponents think twice against switching into Defense Suika, however. Use Field Protect instead of Meteor Impact if using Battle Mania to give your team some physical damage negation if you happen to catch a puppet that can't hurt Defense Suika. You could also try Barrier Option with Meteor Impact and the Charge! ability (if you really like SubPunch from Pokemon), but Suika misses out on coverage if you forgo Grand Liberation and she severely misses Heaven Ascension's one-turn use.

Charge!-ability Juggernaut Suika appreciates entry hazards (as she forces a lot of switches when using Charge!) and Genbu support (due to her inherently low speed) but requires anti-wind-type and water-type support from her teammates. She is neutral to earth, however, and can hit earth-types back hard with her fighting moves, giving her an advantage over other fire-types. Give Suika some teammates that help cover her weaknesses, and she will be plowing through teams and trapping troublesome puppets with ease.

[Wingshadow]

Nature Goddess Kanako (Power Kanako)

Base Stats: 130 hp, 120 Focus Attack, 75 Focus Defense, 80 Spread Attack, 85 Spread Defense, 90 Speed

Nature: Focus-Attack or Speed-Boosting

Ability: Unjustness (doubles opposing puppet SP use) or Empty Heart and Empty Mind (grants immunity to status effects under Calm weather)

Power Point Distribution: 64 Focus Attack, 64 Speed, 2 Health

Moves:

Foehn Winds (Wind, focus, 120 base damage, 100% accuracy, user takes 1/3 damage recoil)

Wind God's Blessing (Wind, Support, doubles entire team speed stat for 5 turns)

Grand Liberation (Earth, focus, 80 base damage, 100% accuracy, increased critical hit rate)

Voice of Famine (Nature, 95 base damage, 100% accuracy, 10% chance of inflicting weakness status)

With usable speed, high health and focus attack, and a good spread of offensive move types, Nature Goddess Kanako can serve a variety of purposes in your team. She has the necessary bulk to soak non-fire or steel-type moves with relative ease, allowing her to set up Wind God's Blessing for a cleanup sweep or to support your more speedy sweepers. Her high attack allows her to attempt a sweep on her own, using Voice of Famine as her primary means of attack. Foehn Winds is her highest-damaging attack, but the recoil cuts into her overall survivability with repeated use so use it with caution, but if it can secure that much-needed OHKO, then by all means do not fear to bring Kanako's might to the fore. Grand Liberation serves as Kanako's coverage move, giving much-needed support against steel and fire-types which she would otherwise be unable to scratch. Unless they are slower and more frail than Kanako, however, you will need to hit them on a predicted switch.

Use Nature Goddess Kanako to support your sweepers or throw up a Wind God's Blessing and sweep on her own. She is a fairly self-sufficient puppet that can fit into most teams that need a bulky sweeper or speed buff support.