General Discussion: Kineticist

Energy resist is kinda the nine hundred pound silverback in the room isn't it? I feel like those resistances presume full casting to fall back upon.

This, of course, is obvious to Mark already.... And yet I'm still typing.

Energy resist is great. It's a second level spell for most, then a 1st level for Rangers. Communal is 3rd level for most and a 2nd for Rangers.

Protection from Energy is 3rd, communal is 4th.

These spells can absolutely trivialize a Pyrokineticist up till level 15 when they pick another element.

Against intelligent humanoids with moderate access to spellcasting and knowledge of the party, those spells will be a wall.

Some examples where this could be a problem in some Paizo APs I played

Kingmaker Book 3, Book 5, Book 6.
The second half of Skulls and Shackles. Also Book 2.
Carrion Crown Book 3, some later encounters especially 5 and 6.
Pretty much any scenario with a leader who has intel on you.

As a player, if I knew the BBEG we were hunting was a Pyrokineticist I'd be laughing so hard because I have the perfect 2 spells to trivialize him and he has no method to bypass those defenses or dispel them.

Mark has already said that the pyrokineticist is probably going to get abilities that let him burn through enemy protective spells, though creatures with natural resistance will still probably be an issue.

Mark has already said that the pyrokineticist is probably going to get abilities that let him burn through enemy protective spells, though creatures with natural resistance will still probably be an issue.

The fun part of the one I'm looking at right now is that it sizzles it away before calculating the damage. Oops, thought you were safe from the flames? :D

Matrix Dragon wrote:

Mark has already said that the pyrokineticist is probably going to get abilities that let him burn through enemy protective spells, though creatures with natural resistance will still probably be an issue.

The fun part of the one I'm looking at right now is that it sizzles it away before calculating the damage. Oops, thought you were safe from the flames? :D

:D :D :D

Matrix Dragon wrote:

Mark has already said that the pyrokineticist is probably going to get abilities that let him burn through enemy protective spells, though creatures with natural resistance will still probably be an issue.

The fun part of the one I'm looking at right now is that it sizzles it away before calculating the damage. Oops, thought you were safe from the flames? :D

Things are definitely looking up for them then! Thank you.

Any word on the SR front?

Matrix Dragon wrote:

Mark has already said that the pyrokineticist is probably going to get abilities that let him burn through enemy protective spells, though creatures with natural resistance will still probably be an issue.

The fun part of the one I'm looking at right now is that it sizzles it away before calculating the damage. Oops, thought you were safe from the flames? :D

Sizzles away spells is good, but what about if you're having a terrible day as a pyrokineticist and you come up against a red dragon, or a hydrokineticist (using touch attacks) and you come up against a white dragon, and so on ...

Yup. for the moment multi element is an aboslute must. Solo elementing like I've tried is pretty difficult.

I'l llikely end up with my aetherist picking up lightening for a touch attack and elemental form and ride the blast.. Sadly.

Though extra wild talent does add give a pretty good use for all the feats. In later game I'm honestly not sure what feats to pick up after all. Most of the ones I thought of off hand were fighter restricted stuff.

I don't know if this is still helpful, but I decided to do Shiroi's test with a level 10 version of the Hydrokineticist I'm making to play in a custom AP (written by the GM) starting after Thanksgiving. Now, there are some minor houserules and campaign specific things to deal with first:

Hopefully, I'll be able to make an alternate level 10 character to test out soon.

Can you use Water Manipulator on ice? Does it count as water for these purposes?

Has anyone made a "every element you can " kinetcists?

I think i'm going to build a rainbow kinetcists.. (though only one attack from each element instead of both)
lots of "extra wild talents" feats

What type of role does the kineticist count as for the purpose of determining a monsters CR when throwing class levels of it on them?

For instance if I'm throwing some kineticist levels on a morlock are they considered combat role classes or something closer to a spell class?

Making another for a game but somehow i think I've been playing slightly wrong.

the move action aspect of the Burn that reduced burn by 1. Can that be applied to metakinesis?

can not right? no way to reduce it till lv 19?

Aether TK Blast consensus question

it says "You throw whatever unattended object
happens to be nearby at a single foe as a ranged attack"

So is that near you, or the target? or is it basically "unatteneded within your attack range" ?

I took it to mean anything withint your TK blast. What do people think in general?

Can you use Water Manipulator on ice? Does it count as water for these purposes?

Ice IS water, so there's no reason it should have to "count as water" for those purposes. Its literally just solid water.

Has anyone made a "every element you can " kinetcists?

I think i'm going to build a rainbow kinetcists.. (though only one attack from each element instead of both)
lots of "extra wild talents" feats

Expanded Element can only be taken twice: once at 7th (or later, I suppose) and a second time at 15th.

the move action aspect of the Burn that reduced burn by 1. Can that be applied to metakinesis?

It unqestionably can. The only restriction is that it has to be used on a blast, not just a regular utility power. You can reduce the cost of any blast by one, no matter the reason for the cost (form or substance infusion, composite blast, or metakinesis), but you can't use it on Kinetic Healer or making Slick last rounds per level.

Aether TK Blast consensus question

it says "You throw whatever unattended object
happens to be nearby at a single foe as a ranged attack"

So is that near you, or the target? or is it basically "unatteneded within your attack range" ?

I took it to mean anything withint your TK blast. What do people think in general?

It doesn't really matter, as long as you're not trying to use object placement to avoid line of effect/sight issues, cover, or concealment.

Zwordsman wrote:

the move action aspect of the Burn that reduced burn by 1. Can that be applied to metakinesis?

It unqestionably can. The only restriction is that it has to be used on a blast, not just a regular utility power. You can reduce the cost of any blast by one, no matter the reason for the cost (form or substance infusion, composite blast, or metakinesis), but you can't use it on Kinetic Healer or making Slick last rounds per level.

Doesn't that move action to reduce specify the burn resulting from wyld blast talents?

or is there something im missing?

If she has both hands free, as a move action, a kineticist
can visibly gather energy or elemental matter around her,
allowing her to reduce the total burn cost of a wild [blast via page 1 correction] talent
used in the same round by 1 point (to a minimum of 0
points). If she takes any damage while gathering power
and before the kinetic blast that releases it, she must make
a concentration check (DC = 10 + damage dealt + effective
spell level of her kinetic blast) or lose the energy in a wild
surge that deals her 1 point of burn.

and thanks!

Hmm. now to decide self tk/tk haul/snaking or extra element and extra defense for the DR reduction combo with Aether's temp HP.
looks cool but pretty hefty cost

mplindustries wrote:

Zwordsman wrote:

the move action aspect of the Burn that reduced burn by 1. Can that be applied to metakinesis?

It unqestionably can. The only restriction is that it has to be used on a blast, not just a regular utility power. You can reduce the cost of any blast by one, no matter the reason for the cost (form or substance infusion, composite blast, or metakinesis), but you can't use it on Kinetic Healer or making Slick last rounds per level.

Doesn't that move action to reduce specify the burn resulting from wyld blast talents?

Metakinesis isn't a wild talent right?

or is there something im missing?

If she has both hands free, as a move action, a kineticist
can visibly gather energy or elemental matter around her,
allowing her to reduce the total burn cost of a wild [blast via page 1 correction] talent
used in the same round by 1 point (to a minimum of 0
points). If she takes any damage while gathering power
and before the kinetic blast that releases it, she must make
a concentration check (DC = 10 + damage dealt + effective
spell level of her kinetic blast) or lose the energy in a wild
surge that deals her 1 point of burn.

and thanks!

The phrase becomes "blast wild talent." If you look at the Kinetic Blast class feature, it refer to "selecting one of your element's simple blast wild talents."

In other words, your blast wild talent is your blast, so anything that modifies the blast can be reduced.

Mark Seifter wrote:

Matrix Dragon wrote:

Mark has already said that the pyrokineticist is probably going to get abilities that let him burn through enemy protective spells, though creatures with natural resistance will still probably be an issue.

The fun part of the one I'm looking at right now is that it sizzles it away before calculating the damage. Oops, thought you were safe from the flames? :D

Sizzles away spells is good, but what about if you're having a terrible day as a pyrokineticist and you come up against a red dragon, or a hydrokineticist (using touch attacks) and you come up against a white dragon, and so on ...

In the wild talents thread I mentioned the idea for a talent to turn your blast into a single target no attack roll no resistance fort for half useable against creatures with the right type or subtype. The idea was that you don't blast fire at the red dragon you pull the flames out of him.

mplindustries

Ah I see. thank you!

Man I really wish Earth had a touch attack.....

I'm building my Aetherist. I'm stuck on level 7 and 8 wild talents.

Debating Self TK and Foe Throw,
or losing out on mobility and foe throw (because the DC is 14+con....) to gain expanded element Earth and expanded Defense earth. Just for the DR.

Since Force Ward from my aether gives me 8 temporary hp +4 per burn, and the earth gives 4 DR/adamantine +1 per burn.
I feel like the force ward is pretty negiligble in usefulness and horrible returns on temp hp by spending real life. But the DR seems like it would combo well with it and be more worthwhile spending my daily need for 2 burn on rather than an extra 8 temp HP.

While those two defenses seem like decent combo, the two K-blasts are pointless repeats.

Note:
You develop DC for wild talents based on the talent's level, NOT your K-Blast's spell level. . right?

@Mark:
I've seen the new spirits on the medium thread (good ones!). Can you give us something new on the kineticist?

Kolokotroni wrote:

Note also in some groups there isnt even a guarantee of a +4 dex item. I've played in games where I only had a +2 item until level 16, because the gm just had whatever items were in the adventure or were randomly generated, and exchanging them wasnt an option (no magic marts).

That is going to mess with other classes much much more than the kineticist, though. The guy who specializes in falchion and can never get a +1 falchion even at level 16 because the monsters only dropped other weapons most of all. Games where you are level 16 and only have a +2 stat item are not the norm, and the math of the game actually does assume a baseline of certain key items— As a side note, I too love the idea of no magic marts and am not necessarily a fan of the fact that these assumptions exist, and Unchained will have a useful option for your group to fix the math and avoid magic marts. But the fact is, whether you limit the ability to find obscure magic items from later books (I do too!), access to core items like +X weapons and armor, +X stat boosters, +X cloaks of resistance are assumed by the game's math.

While its true that this will limit all classes, this is another case where not all classes are affected equally. Primary combatants will first all be more likely to have their items included (+x magic sword ofcourse that will be in there, etc etc). But also, their base level of success without the +x is much higher then the kineticist.

That said, even with a +4 item at level 12, in my group, you are looking at a 22 instead of a 26. That is a 10% difference in success rate. Definitely noticeable. And I am not trying to say that style of play has to be accounted for in all cases, but its worth mentioning since we are talking about how people get the impression of lower accuracy. If a group doesn't optimize or even allow exceptionally high stats, it will skew the results away from what other playtesters are experiencing.

So..
TK blast causes the damage to the item and the person being attacked. and doens't use the properites of the item.
so we're all not sure what happens if the item is the type that uses on break.. they'd still activate right?

say this
SMOKE PELLET
Price 25 gp; Weight —
This small clay sphere contains two alchemical substances separated by a thin barrier. When you break the sphere, the substances mingle and fill a 5-foot square with a cloud of foul but harmless yellow smoke. The smoke pellet acts as a smokestick, except the smoke only lasts for 1 round before dispersing. You may throw a smoke pellet as a ranged touch attack with a range increment of 10 feet.

This would be interseting to use as a TK blast item to start a fight with blinding say the archer or caster. Though it only lasts one round so not as useful as say a smoke stick.

Though i doubt this would be worth spending a move action to pull out.

makes me tempted to throw bear traps. even if it doesn't do anything just the visual.
bag of caltrops might be nifty though

heh you can still use "inhale powder" or contact poisons I guess depending on how your gm feels about poison taking damage- unless it's in a vial. the vial should more than shatter and then poison. unless the poison is damaged too at which point no clue what happens

If the Pyrokineticist can have some way of dealing with natural energy resistance, then I am sold.

I still advocate a "Burn Pool" of sorts, that a Kineticist can call upon, prior to taking damage.

Mechanically, there is no class feature that has a drawback, that cannot be lessened, negated, or made irrelevant, with a proper investment.

It does not exist.

Why does it need to do so now?

Oracles have the curse class feature.

The only way to make most (not all) of the curses irrelavent is to throw additional money and resources into it. That's the same as Feel The Burn. I'm okay with Feel The Burn adding negative hitpoints. I just think the whole thing is a very wasted mechanic.

*********************************************

Mark explains how he barely gets hit and has DR to compensate for his lower hitpoints. EXCEPT, he doesn't account for any additional Burn usage for the day. Where is all the "fun" for using Burn in combat supposed to come from if it is all assumed to be already spent via Feel The Burn? When do you really get to use it? What is the typical day expectation?

Applying all the burn for defenses and maxing Feel The Burn and assume 1 Burn per combat is used at level 13... should not be out of line as a typical daily example. Maybe it is though.

Mark's level 13 character would then be walking into the 4th combat with ~50 hitpoints max effective. That would decrease to ~40 hitpoints max after the 1 Burn used in that combat.

blackbloodtroll wrote:

Mechanically, there is no class feature that has a drawback, that cannot be lessened, negated, or made irrelevant, with a proper investment.

It does not exist.

Why does it need to do so now?

Oracles have the curse class feature.

The only way to make most (not all) of the curses irrelavent is to throw additional money and resources into it. That's the same as Feel The Burn. I'm okay with Feel The Burn adding negative hitpoints. I just think the whole thing is a very wasted mechanic.

*********************************************

Mark explains how he barely gets hit and has DR to compensate for his lower hitpoints. EXCEPT, he doesn't account for any additional Burn usage for the day. Where is all the "fun" for using Burn in combat supposed to come from if it is all assumed to be already spent via Feel The Burn? When do you really get to use it? What is the typical day expectation?

Applying all the burn for defenses and maxing Feel The Burn and assume 1 Burn per combat is used at level 13... should not be out of line as a typical daily example. Maybe it is though.

Mark's level 13 character would then be walking into the 4th combat with ~50 hitpoints max effective. That would decrease to ~40 hitpoints max after the 1 Burn used in that combat.

It feels to me as though we are intended to keep up with the party without burn, and get ahead when we use it. Once mark makes many of the hinted at changes for this class, I'm confident that burn will be your *overkill* option. Not so much a daily usage class feature (beyond activating FtB) but a built in right to use powers you shouldn't normally have access to. It's like saying a sorcerer can take burn to use a spell two spell levels higher than the highest spell level they currently have access to. But for practical reasons, requiring that sorcerer to pick their spells learned two levels in advance. That's what this class does. If you get a new ability but can't use it without taking burn, you aren't "supposed" to have that ability yet. But you can, if you want it badly enough.

Yup yup. There will likely be a mitigation ability.. maybe from racial bonuses? or items.

Though I still just want Con mod in free per day (that only gets insane when your really high level.. but everything is pretty insane at that point so it's hard to judge) after which it burns for hp or con sorta stuff.. Somehow that feels less generic than a "burn pool" despite that being basically exactly what it is. and it fits thematically as your body learns to accept more burn as you grow stronger...
1/2 class level free burn per day might be more reasonable in the end though.

but in either case as of the above burn per day would have to be expanded a lot or taken out entirely (considering how much it damages you to burn in either hp or con)

As it stands I"m always hesitating between : spend burn in the morning on the defense to fill FTB out. (but Aetherists gives seriously bad returns for burning more...) or waiting until the first fight and starting it off with my one biggest blast of the day.

Can you wear a buckler on your arm and still have two free hands to perform the move action burn reduction?

Can you wear a buckler on your arm and still have two free hands to perform the move action burn reduction?

Pretty sure Bucklers don't take up a hand.

Can you wear a buckler on your arm and still have two free hands to perform the move action burn reduction?

Should be able to wear it, but not benefit from the AC bonus in a round you use your Burn Reduction Build Up

By the way, if I did decide on blowing a nova for my first attack of the day, would FtB apply to that attack, or the one after? It seems as though it would depend on the order of events (who takes damage first?)

It feels to me as though we are intended to keep up with the party without burn, and get ahead when we use it. Once mark makes many of the hinted at changes for this class, I'm confident that burn will be your *overkill* option.

I hope this is not true. Burn is a wildly different mechanic and could be strategic fun used over the course of a combat/day. If it was never meant to be used, then that is a missed opportunity.

I want the Burn mechanic to work, and I noticed a "potential" error of omission in the designer's analysis and playtest. Hence the questions.

Shiroi wrote:

It feels to me as though we are intended to keep up with the party without burn, and get ahead when we use it. Once mark makes many of the hinted at changes for this class, I'm confident that burn will be your *overkill* option.

I hope this is not true. Burn is a wildly different mechanic and could be strategic fun used over the course of a combat/day. If it was never meant to be used, then that is a missed opportunity.

I want the Burn mechanic to work, and I noticed a "potential" error of omission in the designer's analysis and playtest. Hence the questions.

I can understand that. The problem for me lies in the choice between thematic appropriateness (I'm hurting myself to do something more powerful than the things I can do without hurting myself, overtaxing my body because it's less dangerous to gamble with the forces of the Planes than to try to argue with this troll for three more rounds) vs mechanical availability (Oh look, I can do this awesome thing x times a day, it's like Ki Point or Arcana Points or Grit or Rage or any number of other things that do EXACTLY THIS).

The only other potential I see for using Burn many times and it still being relatively different and have a potential for balance is to make each time you invoke burn cause Burn damage. So the first time you use burn, it causes 1 lethal damage. The second time you invoke burn, it costs 2 lethal damage. Because you can heal burn in this situation, you get a lot of burn over the day as long as you heal up frequently... But eventually it starts to get to where if you aren't at full health, you kill yourself to use it.

The problem is the mechanic would vastly favor a heal friendly party at that point, would make a 3 combat 5 round/combat day deal at most 120 damage, all of it healable. So at that point it's no longer balanced between all DM's and all parties and all groups, it's balanced when you need to use it "x times a day" and under or over balanced any other time. Even if you made it non healable as things are, it would make classes better for the first lvl uses of burn, and worse not long after that. So here's the real question.

Can you make a burn mechanic that holds the "flavor" of burn and still isn't built to discourage use? I don't think anyone can. If it doesn't discourage use, it literally fails to capture the concept of the feature. Unless you're seriously sadomasochistic you don't usually like to hurt yourself, even if it means hurting your enemy more. Consider Bruce Willis in Live Free or Die Hard. Remember the final scene, with the guy [redacted] the [redacted] to his [redacted]? Yipee Kaye, [redacted]. If he did that every single time he used a gun, he'd quickly kill himself. But for that one moment, that one glorious moment of the enemy thinking he was invincible, it was worth it. That's burn. Sacrificing your health and safety to do the impossible. The hail mary of the Kineticist class. The thing nobody else thought we could. That's Burn. And it's doesn't come without a price, and if you make the price so low that nobody thinks twice about using it, you've just made it another daily use class feature. And I'd be highly disappointed when I had to homebrew it back in.

If not in the class, maybe a feat, or magic item, that creates a "Burn Pool"?

"Can you make a burn mechanic that holds the "flavor" of burn and still isn't built to (prevent) use? I don't think anyone can."

That is a good challenge for the community!

******************************************************

Here is my first attempt...

Change the current Burn mechanic nonlethal damage to be healable. All means and methods to lower Burn used lowers the nonlethal damage taken, just as it does now.

This keeps the flavor of Burn intact, but establishes a "per combat" usage of Burn instead of a "per day".

Accrue Burn Points when you use Burn that add up over the course of the day. 1 Burn experienced = +1 Burn Point. This lowers your maximum hitpoints for the day (until you rest to remove all Burn). All means and methods to lower Burn do not lower this Burn Point addition (e.g. taking a move action to reduce the Burn usage on a blast does not lower the Burn Point addition by 1).

This establishes an ongoing daily penalty for using Burn, but isn't instant massive character destruction for the entire day just for using Burn. It still is per combat. The Burn effect of each ability shrinks as you level (cost remains static while hitpoint pool grows).

Feel the Burn changes to be based off Burn Points accrued. Add +1/+1 to blasts for every 5 Burn Points taken, maximum of +1/+1 per three levels.

******************************************************

Overall, you can burn yourself out in combat, but you can recover from it. Every Burn usage weakens you overall for the day though.

You still only track 1 number daily = Burn Points.

Having the nonlethal hitpoints be healed outside of combat is no different from a barbarian taking more damage when raging and using Come And Get Me. Classes and character concepts dependent on healers (in or after combat) is a current game fixture already.

Well my cryokineticist just hit L3, so he'll be seeing how much the Feel the Burn mechanic improves his Burn issues. Looking forward to getting his accuracy above 42%. (Dex 17, Point Blank Shot, Precise Shot, Ranged Touch attacks...and yes firing in the clear.)

Posted playtest results on everything he'd played so far, including a session with almost all occult classes. So far it's been a rough 3 levels with the constant missing, SR checks, cold-immune creatures, no knowledge checks, and not being able to help out of combat due to his skill deficiency/no out of combat spells/abilities/utility.

First thing I learned: much to my regret I went and followed a recommendation to see how he would play by not dumping stats. To sum up, it was a pile of unfun. He doesn't have skills so he doesn't actually use those other stats. And by not dumping his con and dex are not high enough to keep up with the baseline ability scores of other characters.

He cannot rebuild since it is PFS. If I ever play another one, I'm going to dump like crazy.

That said...I love the class concept. Going to play him until the playtest is over. Never give up, never surrender!

If not in the class, maybe a feat, or magic item, that creates a "Burn Pool"?

To be fair, a level-based boost to hp (say, 1 or 2 per kineticist level) would accomplish this in everything but name, though I understand that spending "my hp" rather than "my burn pool" feels inherently more dire even if they're functionally the same.

blackbloodtroll wrote:

If not in the class, maybe a feat, or magic item, that creates a "Burn Pool"?

To be fair, a level-based boost to hp (say, 1 or 2 per kineticist level) would accomplish this in everything but name, though I understand that spending "my hp" rather than "my burn pool" feels inherently more dire even if they're functionally the same.

I think people also forget that the Feel the Burn mechanic is kind of this class's key to reliably punching people with rocks. Going from "hit point" burn to a burn pool would throw off the balance of that mechanic.

Are people still bothered by accuracy issues in here? This thread moves so fast that I have never before bothered to post in this thread. A fix to the accuracy issue could be as simple as increasing the progression of Feel the Burn (to a max of +1 for every two levels which kind of approximate's the inquisitor's studied combat save for the continued absence of weapon enhancement bonuses) and introducing a small "burn pool" as well. Like: you could have a 1 point burn pool at five and an additional one at levels 10, 15, and 20. I feel like that won't get out of hand and you could limit things further by only letting the Kineticist draw points from the pool one at a time.

On a separate note: I don't like kinetic blade. It is too clearly the optimal damage dealing strategy as it stands.

An aside from my big test run that I thought was worth asking separately:

Is it intentional that composite blasts don't add Con to damage? The trouble is, I can move action empower my regular blast or I can move action and composite blast. The composite still costs 1 burn until 15th, but only barely out damages the empowered blast.

When you compare the two (given that a d6 averages 3.5), it looks like this (X = base dice of damage, F = Feel the Burn, C = Con mod):

Composite Blast:
9X + F

Empowered Blast:
6.75X + 1.5F + 1.5C

So, if you're, say, 7th level when composites first become available (and we know X=4 and F=2), you can do the following:

Composite: 38

Empowered: 30 + 1.5 Con

So, if you have a +4 Con, that's 1 Burn for 2 additional damage. It's a Trap!

To be worth doing, it's got to double Everything, not just dice. And even then, it's of dubious benefit.

The good news, though is that Blue Flame actually does fair better, since there are far fewer static mods involved.

Mark Seifter wrote:

Kolokotroni wrote:

Note also in some groups there isnt even a guarantee of a +4 dex item. I've played in games where I only had a +2 item until level 16, because the gm just had whatever items were in the adventure or were randomly generated, and exchanging them wasnt an option (no magic marts).

That is going to mess with other classes much much more than the kineticist, though. The guy who specializes in falchion and can never get a +1 falchion even at level 16 because the monsters only dropped other weapons most of all. Games where you are level 16 and only have a +2 stat item are not the norm, and the math of the game actually does assume a baseline of certain key items— As a side note, I too love the idea of no magic marts and am not necessarily a fan of the fact that these assumptions exist, and Unchained will have a useful option for your group to fix the math and avoid magic marts. But the fact is, whether you limit the ability to find obscure magic items from later books (I do too!), access to core items like +X weapons and armor, +X stat boosters, +X cloaks of resistance are assumed by the game's math.

While its true that this will limit all classes, this is another case where not all classes are affected equally. Primary combatants will first all be more likely to have their items included (+x magic sword ofcourse that will be in there, etc etc). But also, their base level of success without the +x is much higher then the kineticist.

Either the GM is altering treasure load from the adventure to fit the party or not. If the GM is not altering treasure, then the chance of finding a +X weapon that's the same kind that the melee guy has is pretty slim. If the GM is altering treasure for just the melee guy and not the other characters, then that isn't really fair, in my opinion.

That said, even with a +4 item at level 12, in my group, you are looking at a 22 instead of a 26. That is a 10% difference in success rate. Definitely noticeable. And I am not trying to say that style of play has to be accounted for in all cases, but its worth mentioning since we are talking about how people get the impression of lower accuracy. If a group doesn't optimize or even allow exceptionally high stats, it will skew the results away from what other playtesters are experiencing.

Hmm...I definitely see how you're getting below 26 (start with elite array), but I don't see how you're getting below 24 unless your group also has a houserule that prevents putting the level-up raises into the same ability score.

The good news is that so far, I don't think I've ever hit anything on the nose except the freakishly high AC 43 menace, so if I did have 24 Dex instead, it wouldn't have changed things much.

An aside from my big test run that I thought was worth asking separately:

Is it intentional that composite blasts don't add Con to damage? The trouble is, I can move action empower my regular blast or I can move action and composite blast. The composite still costs 1 burn until 15th, but only barely out damages the empowered blast.

When you compare the two (given that a d6 averages 3.5), it looks like this (X = base dice of damage, F = Feel the Burn, C = Con mod):

Composite Blast:
9X + F

Empowered Blast:
6.75X + 1.5F + 1.5C

So, if you're, say, 7th level when composites first become available (and we know X=4 and F=2), you can do the following:

Composite: 38

Empowered: 30 + 1.5 Con

So, if you have a +4 Con, that's 1 Burn for 2 additional damage. It's a Trap!

To be worth doing, it's got to double Everything, not just dice. And even then, it's of dubious benefit.

The good news, though is that Blue Flame actually does fair better, since there are far fewer static mods involved.

Wait, say what now? They definitely should be adding Con modifier. Whoah Nelly! Let me get down to the office and check that they don't for sure, and if so, I'm going to make that an official clarification in the first post.

mplindustries wrote:

An aside from my big test run that I thought was worth asking separately:

Is it intentional that composite blasts don't add Con to damage? The trouble is, I can move action empower my regular blast or I can move action and composite blast. The composite still costs 1 burn until 15th, but only barely out damages the empowered blast.

When you compare the two (given that a d6 averages 3.5), it looks like this (X = base dice of damage, F = Feel the Burn, C = Con mod):

Composite Blast:
9X + F

Empowered Blast:
6.75X + 1.5F + 1.5C

So, if you're, say, 7th level when composites first become available (and we know X=4 and F=2), you can do the following:

Composite: 38

Empowered: 30 + 1.5 Con

So, if you have a +4 Con, that's 1 Burn for 2 additional damage. It's a Trap!

To be worth doing, it's got to double Everything, not just dice. And even then, it's of dubious benefit.

The good news, though is that Blue Flame actually does fair better, since there are far fewer static mods involved.

Wait, say what now? They definitely should be adding Con modifier. Whoah Nelly! Let me get down to the office and check that they don't for sure, and if so, I'm going to make that an official clarification in the first post.

Ok, reading comprehension fail. The Con mod is added to the first xd6 instead of the second and my eyes just weren't picking it up as I glanced.

Still, 6 damage for 1 Burn is not enough. You should get at least double con. Is 10 damage enough? I don't know.

But yeah, I feel like the conventional way to write out the formula would be "xd6 of y damage and xd6 + con of z damage" not "xd6 + con mod of y damage and xd6 of z damage."

Maybe it's just me.

I hope in the final iteration of the class, there will be WTs or feats that grant bonuses or abilities while you are carrying Burn or trigger when you incur Burn.

I also hope that you'll be able "undercast" your blast for less Burn (i.e. if you step down your Blast 1 damage bump, you incur 1 less Burn point).

Finally, perhaps there will be WTs that will add effects to a blast like several Rogue talents do.

If not in the class, maybe a feat, or magic item, that creates a "Burn Pool"?

You forgot Traits that creates a Burn Pool. :P

Composite Blast:

9X + F

Empowered Blast:
6.75X + 1.5F + 1.5C

...

Still, 6 damage for 1 Burn is not enough

Here is another data point you could add for your analaysis.

Maximized Blast:
7X + 1.0F + 1.0C

Maximized Blast for 2 Burn (1 after move action reduction) doing less than Empowered Blast for 1 Burn (0 after move action reduction) is a big anomally. I don't think Feel The Burn and CON mod are supposed to be multiplied by 1.5 though. I think it must be...

Empowered Blast:
6.75X + 1.0F + 1.0C

That would help Composite Blast stand out better for the additional Burn cost.

I think people also forget that the Feel the Burn mechanic is kind of this class's key to reliably punching people with rocks. Going from "hit point" burn to a burn pool would throw off the balance of that mechanic.

They don't forget it, they just don't want to start the day off by throwing away a bunch of hp. My players didn't want to and I don't blame them. I don't expect a scared witch doctor to pay a 20hp tax to start the day off. You have to remember that even if you think it ends up being a good trade off, it just seems wrong to some to spend your hp just to get where others already are.

Add to that some focus some on con instead of just raising dex as high as possible.

Are people still bothered by accuracy issues in here? This thread moves so fast that I have never before bothered to post in this thread. A fix to the accuracy issue could be as simple as increasing the progression of Feel the Burn (to a max of +1 for every two levels which kind of approximate's the inquisitor's studied combat save for the continued absence of weapon enhancement bonuses) and introducing a small "burn pool" as well. Like: you could have a 1 point burn pool at five and an additional one at levels 10, 15, and 20. I feel like that won't get out of hand and you could limit things further by only letting the Kineticist draw points from the pool one at a time.

If someone is cautious about spending burn, they aren't going to want to drop a large chuck of hp no matter how you pretty it up. A burn pool is nice but doesn't change the FtB's burn requirement.

On a separate note: I don't like kinetic blade. It is too clearly the optimal damage dealing strategy as it stands.

For a class that says it's role is "Kineticists generally use their powers to assail their foes from range." Iit seems quite odd that the best attack option is melee.

An aside from my big test run that I thought was worth asking separately:

Is it intentional that composite blasts don't add Con to damage? The trouble is, I can move action empower my regular blast or I can move action and composite blast. The composite still costs 1 burn until 15th, but only barely out damages the empowered blast.

When you compare the two (given that a d6 averages 3.5), it looks like this (X = base dice of damage, F = Feel the Burn, C = Con mod):

Composite Blast:
9X + F

Empowered Blast:
6.75X + 1.5F + 1.5C

So, if you're, say, 7th level when composites first become available (and we know X=4 and F=2), you can do the following:

Composite: 38

Empowered: 30 + 1.5 Con

So, if you have a +4 Con, that's 1 Burn for 2 additional damage. It's a Trap!

To be worth doing, it's got to double Everything, not just dice. And even then, it's of dubious benefit.

The good news, though is that Blue Flame actually does fair better, since there are far fewer static mods involved.

It does add con, just not twice. Not sure if you are just not quite being clear or if there's actually a misunderstanding of the trick.

Let's look at...
10D6+10+con
10D6+10
3.5 x 20 + 20 + con
90 + con
Vs
10D6+10+Con
5d6+5+1/2con
3.5 x 15 + 15 + 1.5 x con
67.5 + 1.5 x con

Now this requires a con mod of +...
90-67.5= 22.5 so....
+45 con.
that would add 45 to the composite, for 135. It would add 45+22.5 to the empowered for 67.5. Hey, that's fun! I happened to find the point at which a mod is equal to the rolled damage average! *math geek out moment*

Ehem. So in other words, it may not give you *exactly* double, but it's much closer than you'd expect and it's certainly more damage than empower.

Now, there is another situation, BFB. Which is 2d6+ 1/2 con. At the same level,
20d6+ 1/2 con

15d6+ 3/4 con.
this one comes out
90 + 1/2 con
67.5 + 3/4 Con

Which, in the above example of +45 con mod,
112.5
78.75
means that empowered falls behind much faster, since more of the damage is resultant from the dice instead of the static bonuses and con. It would take truly outrageous con bonuses to make the two damages equal with BFB.

Excaliburproxy wrote:

I think people also forget that the Feel the Burn mechanic is kind of this class's key to reliably punching people with rocks. Going from "hit point" burn to a burn pool would throw off the balance of that mechanic.

They don't forget it, they just don't want to start the day off by throwing away a bunch of hp. My players didn't want to and I don't blame them. I don't expect a scared witch doctor to pay a 20hp tax to start the day off. You have to remember that even if you think it ends up being a good trade off, it just seems wrong to some to spend your hp just to get where others already are.

Add to that some focus some on con instead of just raising dex as high as possible.

Excaliburproxy wrote:

Are people still bothered by accuracy issues in here? This thread moves so fast that I have never before bothered to post in this thread. A fix to the accuracy issue could be as simple as increasing the progression of Feel the Burn (to a max of +1 for every two levels which kind of approximate's the inquisitor's studied combat save for the continued absence of weapon enhancement bonuses) and introducing a small "burn pool" as well. Like: you could have a 1 point burn pool at five and an additional one at levels 10, 15, and 20. I feel like that won't get out of hand and you could limit things further by only letting the Kineticist draw points from the pool one at a time.

If someone is cautious about spending burn, they aren't going to want to drop a large chuck of hp no matter how you pretty it up. A burn pool is nice but doesn't change the FtB's burn requirement.

I think it works out pretty well. In the morning, the kineticist relies more on touch attacks to hit and incurs burn to deal more damage. Then by the end of the day, they feel more comfortable using their standard ranged attacks for hit and damage and don't need to incur so much burn to put up reasonable numbers.

I guess the burn pool does not really jump out as bad to me. I never thought of this class as being fightgar king of constitution. It is a ranged blaster. It is a mage. It is going to be kind of fragile (though the nonlethal nature of burn damage means that you are still probably not going to die). I know people are cautious about dropping damage but they are the ones that are confused about what this class is, in my opinion.

I will also note that my version of the burn pool would count points from the pool as counting towards the bonuses of feel the burn. So at level 15, you could be getting that +3 bonus while still being an unreasonable tank of a wizard man.

Well my cryokineticist just hit L3, so he'll be seeing how much the Feel the Burn mechanic improves his Burn issues. Looking forward to getting his accuracy above 42%. (Dex 17, Point Blank Shot, Precise Shot, Ranged Touch attacks...and yes firing in the clear.)

Wow, it seems like your dice don't love you. Doing the math, a fighter with the same stat swinging into melee would only have a 2 point better to hit than you have (BAB on a 2nd level fighter is 1 better, and the fighter would be using a masterwork or magic weapon).

Rerednaw wrote:

Well my cryokineticist just hit L3, so he'll be seeing how much the Feel the Burn mechanic improves his Burn issues. Looking forward to getting his accuracy above 42%. (Dex 17, Point Blank Shot, Precise Shot, Ranged Touch attacks...and yes firing in the clear.)

Wow, it seems like your dice don't love you. Doing the math, a fighter with the same stat swinging into melee would only have a 2 point better to hit than you have (BAB on a 2nd level fighter is 1 better, and the fighter would be using a masterwork or magic weapon).

Plus the fighter is targeting full AC. I think maybe poor Rerednaw played through 2 levels in "The Ice Tombs of the Ghost Ninja Drow, and their White Dragon Rakshasa Queen" or something, to have tons of SR, cold immunity, and touch AC equal to full AC. SR is quite rare at level 1-2.

Hey mark Im completely okay with the burn mechanic and sacrificing hp for power but i do agree with the lack of another way to boost accuracy

It does add con, just not twice. Not sure if you are just not quite being clear or if there's actually a misunderstanding of the trick.

Let's look at...
10D6+10+con
10D6+10
3.5 x 20 + 20 + con
90 + con
Vs
10D6+10+Con
5d6+5+1/2con
3.5 x 15 + 15 + 1.5 x con
67.5 + 1.5 x con

Now this requires a con mod of +...
90-67.5= 22.5 so....
+45 con.
that would add 45 to the composite, for 135. It would add 45+22.5 to the empowered for 67.5. Hey, that's fun! I happened to find the point at which a mod is equal to the rolled damage average! *math geek out moment*

Ehem. So in other words, it may not give you *exactly* double, but it's much closer than you'd expect and it's certainly more damage than empower.

Like I said, I missed the composite con mod because I expect static mods to show up at the end of dice equations, not int the middle. Also, you forgot Feel the Burn.

And my point was never that empower outdid composite blast, just that the amount by which composite blast outdid empowered was not sufficient to justify its cost (until 15 when it has the same cost, a move action and 0 burn).

20d6 + 20 + 6 (ftb) + Con = 96 + Con

10d6 + 10 + 6 (ftb) + Con = 51 + Con

However, empowered, that actually equals 76.5 + 1.5 Con

So, it breaks even at 41 Con. Yes, ridiculous.

However, at level 7 when you'll actually first get this, it's:

8d6 + 8 + 2 + Con = 38 + Con
Vs.
4d6 + 4 + 2 + Con = 20 + Con
Empowered = 30 + 1.5 Con

It breaks even at +16 Con. But, as I said, with just +4 Con, the damage is 42 vs. 36. Would you pay 1 Burn (that costs you 7 HP) to deal +6 damage? I wouldn't.

And yes, as someone pointed out, Maximize is a terrible idea for physical blasts.