Draeth Darkstar's page

Have you ever looked at the Ninja alternate class in your trusty old copy of Ultimate Combat and thought, "Boy, you sure are an awkward blob of mechanics hung together by dental floss and strung over a weaker version of the already underwhelming Core Rulebook Rogue's chassis?" Ever wondered how you could create a character that evokes the stealth, combat power, and psycho-spiritual pseudo-magic of Ninja Gaiden's Hayabusa Ryu, Darker than Black's Hei, X-Men's Psylocke, or Naruto's... well, everyone? Look no further! You've found your class.

The first thing you need to know about the Kinetic Shinobi is that it's built on a very clever premise. The authors marry the bare bones of the Kineticist – elemental focus and a version of kinetic blast that comes coupled with a weapon creator form infusion somewhat reminiscent of the Occult Adventures Elemental Annihilator's Devastating Infusion at first level, with a small array of other rethemed Kineticist features that come with deeper levels – to the good ideas behind the flawed execution of the UC Ninja – a version of the ki pool that feels impactful, sneak attack, and access to ninja tricks – while leaving behind the flaws of both parents: the much-maligned burn resource and the Ninja's narrow and overall weak focus. This gives the Kinetic Shinobi a ton of flavor right out of the gate, unburdened by overly-restrictive baked-in mechanics. The one “downside” (and I use that term loosely, here) to the approach taken with this core design is that the Kinetic Shinobi does, more or less, render the Ninja obsolete. Under normal circumstances, I would count that as a harsh penalty against a hybrid class. In this case, however, the Ninja was arguably a worse version of the CRB Rogue it's based off already, and Paizo put the final nail in its coffin long ago with the Pathfinder Unchained Rogue. I can't fault this book for burying a dead horse.

The second, and arguably most important aspect of the Kinetic Shinobi to be aware of, is that the skeleton I've described above is fleshed out with an enormous variety of customization, offering a unique experience for every character. The straight use of the Kineticist's elemental focus makes the Kinetic Shinobi fully compatible with all (7, as of this writing) Paizo Kineticist elements, any further options added in the future, and the plethora available in other third party books, such as the excellent Kineticists of Porphyra series also by this team of authors. The real value of both the class and the book, though, is the Shinobi Talents feature, gained at every odd level starting at 1. There are some 50-odd of these, ranging the gamut from alternate weapon forms (known as Hadou techniques), poison use, skill tricks, special defenses, and a few very anime-inspired one-offs (Bunshin Rush and Dragonbreath will remind you of a certain pair of ninja from a village hidden in leaves). Included are even a handful of options that facilitate both manufactured weapon and unarmed strike builds (although they are in large part outshone by the archetypes that focus on those styles). Also accessible through Shinobi Talents are the Kineticist's basic and composite blasts, substance infusions, and utility wild talents, and the aforementioned Ninja Tricks, including Master Tricks (and, by proxy, Rogue Talents and Advanced Rogue Talents). All accounted for, I would be surprised if there were less than 200 options available.

If that doesn't sound like enough material to you, there are also a whopping 11 archetypes included with the Kinetic Shinobi, which include a couple of slgihtly-more-Ninja variants, a couple slightly-more-Kineticist variants, and a series of gish archetypes that hybridize in a third class, including: gunslinger, fighter, monk, vigilante, swashbuckler, bloodrager, and magus. Each is, of course, provided with a twist that makes them more than a simple combo deal. Alternate Favored Class Bonuses for every race in the Advanced Race Guide and a handful class-specific Feats round out the player material, and a sample NPC (featured in the cover art) is provided as the finishing touch on the book.

I have only two gripes with this book; both are small. The first is that, as written, there is an issue of clarity in the function of the advanced Hadou techniques, which are central to the class's combat mechanics from very early on. I was able to suss out the correct Rules As Intended in every case after a single reading of the class, but there's enough ambiguity to the wording that an inexperienced player might find themselves lost (or a malicious player might find themselves tempted to exploit the Rules As Written). I can't hold this fault too strongly against the book, but it is a bit jarring, if only due to the fact that the rules text of the rest of the material (which far, far outnumbers the Hadou techniques) is very meticulous. The second is that the core class offers no way to attain an enhancement bonus or weapon properties on its attacks, which is a problematic oversight for an iterative attack focused class – solved by allowing an amulet of mighty fists to affect the class's form infusions. That said, the authors were very quick to answer all the questions I had about clarity (too verbose to repeat here), and offered easy solutions to the few problems I noted, so I would strongly recommend any would-be player or GM of a Kinetic Shinobi give a brief read over N. Jolly's and Onyx Tanuki's clarifications on the Product Discussion page unless or until the text is updated following the date of this review (3/10/17).

Overall, I give the Kinetic Shinobi 4.5/5 Stars (rounded up for this platform), for excellent flavor that fills a badly needed niche, creative and fun mechanical design, and a body of work that is high in both quantity and quality, having extraordinarily few issues for a fully featured class.

The previous reviewers have gone into plenty of detail about the exact content of this Bullet Point, so I am here just to add that, while all of the feats presented in this primer are fun and interesting options for the already highly customizable Shadow Assassin, there are two things I really love about this book:

1. None of these feats require you to be a Shadow Assassin. They are for any class with a "shadowy" thene. That makes them far more versatile than they could have been, which is great. The strength of d20 has always been options, so more is always better.

2. Hide in Plain Sight, with some restrictions and appropriate prerequisites, as a Feat. This is something that should have been in Core ages ago and, AFAIK, still isn't. This ability becomes incredibly crucial to stealth-based characters at high level play and the hoops you have to jump through to get it are crippling to build diversity by core. It's also one of the only abilities Shadow Assassins don't have any way to acquire from their class features that I found myself really wanting while playing one.

All in all, short, sweet, to the point, and a very useful little pamphlet. Definitely worth your dollar.

I have played, played with, or DMed for innumerable third party classes over the last ~12 years that I have been playing 3rd, then 3.5th Edition D&D, then Pathfinder, and I have to say that the Shadow Assassin is among my all-time favorites.

The greatest thing about this class is its versatility. With two different sets of customizable class features ("Shadow Styles" and "Shadow Talents"), there are dozens, possibly into the hundreds of different, viable builds for this class, particularly because it multiclasses so well in addition to being a fun and unique blend of abilities when played all on its own.

Two of the favorites in my group so far are to play this class as a lightweight ranged Fighter, focusing on consistent, high single-target damage output with their many abilities that can be used to boost the damage of shurikens, or as an elusive and shadowy Rogue-replacement, capable of moving practically undetectably through darkness with a high base speed and many acrobatic tricks, or flight at higher levels, passively perceiving and rapidly disabling traps, and detecting just about anything with their ability to gain low-light and darkvision as class features and a Feat option for +Perception and, later, Blindsense in dark areas in the supporting "With a Bullet" product.

What makes the Shadow Assassin truly bemusing to witness is their signature "Deadly Focus" and "Greater Deadly Focus" abilities, however. 1-3 times per day, with Greater Deadly Focus, even a completely utility-built character can activate what the first DM in my group to run for one of these bad boys coined as, "Super Kill Guy Mode," and unleash more DR Bypassing damage on that annoying BBEG than anybody ever saw coming. It is truly an awe-inspiring and giggle-inducing moment the first time you see it in action.

The Shadow Assassin was the first Super Genius product I ever used, and since then I have become a dedicated fan - they are now by far my most-owned 3PP publisher, in fact, I would wager I own more of their products than any tabletop manufacturer except Paizo themselves, and I love every single one of them.