Introduction

Version 9.6 is one of most highly anticipated patches to come to Puzzle and Dragons as it features numerous overhauls to existing game mechanics as well as introducing to new content. For the most part, this patch has greatly streamlined the Skill Inheritance (now named Assist System) as well as the Skill Up components of the game to reduce frustration and save stamina. In addition, we now have the opportunity to acquire Killer Latent Tamadras along with numerous quality of life improvements.

This article will focus on all the changes that occur through the King Tan system. I will cover the other material in a subsequent article as this has turned out longer than expected. You can read about the Skill Inheritance/Assist System changes HERE.

Video commentary

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King Tans

Skill Inheritance (now known as Assist System) was an effective mechanic that enabled players to add further customization to their teams to better tackle challenging content. However, the system was somewhat cumbersome as you required excessive amounts of Tans to transfer a skill. As such, the Tan process has been removed in order to cut down on the tediousness required.

Tans have been reworked to include a new ultimate evolution that will enable them to help you skill up your monsters. The Skill Up system was often one of the more infuriating aspects of Puzzle and Dragons. Whenever there is an aspect of luck or variance, people will often remember the times they were on the wrong end of the distribution curve regardless if they eventually normalized after numerous attempts.

Through the King Tans system, players will gain access a reliable method of fusing skill up fodder as they now provide 100% success rate and can be viewed as a pseudo Py .

How King Tans work

King Tans are created via an ultimate evolution process that uses a regular Tan and 5 more regular Tans of the same colour. This process applies to all colours. Thus, it takes 6 of the same colour Tan to create a King Tan.

Once the fusion process has been completed, you can now use the King Tan as part of a Power Up Fusion to guarantee skill ups. This process requires you to use the same attribute King Tan as the base monster along with 1-4 skill up fodder with the same active skill as the receiving monster. Thus, from the below example, Hades requires a King Badtan to ensure 100% success rate. The fodder material must have the same active skill as Hades, but can be any attribute and does not have to match.

The number of skill ups received will be based on the number of fodder material used. Thus, from the above example, Hades will achieve skill level 5 through 4 successful skill ups.

Implications for King Tans

With King Tans, we are now able to easily skill up any monster that has a farmable fodder. Now let us do some math to determine if this is actually worth the stamina. I am going to simply use all stamina costs from a coop perspective.

It requires 6 Tans to create a King Tan and each Tan Infestation has 4 floors with 5 different possible drops on each floor. Thus, an 80% chance to acquire the coloured Tan you require which means you spend on average 7.5 runs to complete. This will cost you 187.5 stamina for a King Tan of a particular colour.

The amount of stamina required to acquire a single skill up fodder does vary, but for the most part, they will cost 25 or 50 stamina (regular/rogue descend VS Machine dungeon). As such, to acquire 4 skill up fodder, you require either 100 or 200 stamina.

However, we need to compare this efficacy against fusing under 4x or 3x skill up rates (assuming 40% or 30% success rate) and acquiring 4 skill ups:

King Tans VS 4x & 3x Skill Up Rates – 1 colour
Stamina	King Tan	4x	3x
25	287.5	250	333.3
50	387.5	500	666.7

As you can see from the above chart, it is actually more stamina efficient to farm for the 25 stamina drops and fuse under 4x rates than acquiring the King Tan assuming all the other Tan drops are irrelevant. However, that is not the case as you will in theory acquire a King Tan of every other colour when completing 7.5 runs. Thus, the stamina cost when evenly splitting between all the Tans leads to a cost of only 37.5 stamina assuming you require all the colours.

King Tans VS 4x & 3x Skill Up Rates – All colours
Stamina	King Tan	4x	3x
25	137.5	250	333.3
50	237.5	500	666.7

What does this mean?

From a purely stamina efficiency point of view, using King Tans is the most efficient method provided you actually require all the Tan drops (which should always hold true moving forward in PAD). Another factor to take into consideration the difficulty a player experiences in acquiring those drops as well as the time spent farming the drops.

It will almost always be faster to play the Tan Infestation 7.5 times along with the descend 4 times instead of the descend 10 times. You also have to take into consideration player fatigue, length of the dungeon, time allocated to play, along with the team being used. King Tans can easily be acquired and playing Tan Infestation does allow you the opportunity to skill up other cards from all colours. Thus, King Tans are a wonderful system provided you do not wish to play the dungeon excessively for collateral drops.

To Py or not to Py?

Pys will always provide a guaranteed skill up for monsters of the same attribute. This is quite amazing and with the easier access to clearing Arena 1, many players may have a stockpile of them readily available. However, you should always prioritize Py-ing cards that do not have a farmable skill up material. This is mostly limited to the Awoken/Reincarnated Gods; however, once this has been achieved, you can use your judgement on who to Py next.

Farming Arena 1 can be more easily done nowadays and in theory, if you require every colour, each skill up costs 50 stamina. For example, if you play Arena 1 twenty times, you will have acquired 4 skill ups of each colour. Thus, it costs 200 stamina when fusing for 4 skill ups which becomes more efficient if the dungeon in question costs 50 stamina for the skill up fodder.

In addition, you could also follow the sage advice from GungHo: “Just Py It”

Conclusion

The King Tan system provides a wonderful alternative to brute forcing a skill up. It also proves to be a more stamina efficient method for acquiring skill ups provided you require every colour Tan.

Who do you plan on skilling up first when the updates goes live?

Happy Puzzling!