General Discussion: Kineticist


Rules Discussion

4,151 to 4,200 of 4,774 << first < prev | 79 | 80 | 81 | 82 | 83 | 84 | 85 | 86 | 87 | 88 | 89 | next > last >>

Kinetic Healer is neither a form nor substance infusion. Kinetic Healer is part of a group of wild talents that manipulate the energy used to blast to create a variety of effects, like flying, or shaping their element, or healing.

Shadow Lodge

Pathfinder Lost Omens, Rulebook Subscriber

Okay. So because kinetic healer is not a "blast" infusion it would not be viable to use with anything else. Thank goodness my players asked and the wording was odd on that one for us.


What happens when you have wings of air and have it activated and become unconscious or asleep?

Do you fall to the ground or stay flying?


So...

What are some builds people are making? I'm a min/maxer by design, but I wanted to see what I could do with this guy.

Level 12, I'm showing as roughly 6D6+11 damage (prior to items).

Any gimicks people are using? This guy isn't coming anywhere close to my ranger I've made...

How is the use of weapons effecting earthadontist (or whatever the earth kineticist is called). Is having a unholy weapon going to add damage to the good aligned target, etc?

Curious to see if someone was able to "break" this class or not.

Looking at trying this guy out in a on-going campaign, wanted to be able to explain the min/max, anything over powered, etc to the group before I even brought him up.

Thanks!

Sczarni

Pathfinder Lost Omens, Rulebook Subscriber

I'm not entirely sure, but I think you can turn your weapons into blades and do a composite for 12d6 + 11 * 2 at lvl 12 without items.


You definitely want to be making use of Gather Energy (Use a move action to reduce burn cost of your next blast by 1, 2 at level 11 if Mark's proposed changes go through, which is likely). With that you can do a composite blast every round for a move + standard. So that's probably around 12d6+12+CON+FtB, plus stuff like entangling from infusions. If you're willing to spend a point of burn you can empower it, dishing out 18d6+18+CON+FtB. It's not fantastic compared to a pouncing barbarian or something, but it's certainly not shabby.

Shadow Lodge

Pathfinder Lost Omens, Rulebook Subscriber

Min maxing, this class is kind of fun
Kinetic blade is sure one way to go. Especially if you are using vital strike would be fun. The limited BaB makes it hard to do amazing things to it. Taking the feats quicken/maximize spell like ability is a must.


Does the kineticist have a caster level? His abilities all have effective spell levels, but I don't think it's spelled out whether they have a caster level.


Milo v3 wrote:
Does the kineticist have a caster level? His abilities all have effective spell levels, but I don't think it's spelled out whether they have a caster level.

If he does, it's a psychic caster level, not divine or arcane. This means that he can't use a feat like Arcane Strike as it requires an Arcane caster level, nor can he qualify for prestige classes with arcane or divine caster requirements (like Eldritch Knight)


Tels wrote:


If he does, it's a psychic caster level, not divine or arcane. This means that he can't use a feat like Arcane Strike as it requires an Arcane caster level, nor can he qualify for prestige classes with arcane or divine caster requirements (like Eldritch Knight)

Of course, I'm just mainly wondering for the purpose of Item Creation feats.

Shadow Lodge

Pathfinder Lost Omens, Rulebook Subscriber

Yes they do count. I can't find the link, but it was a big discussion with races with spell like abilities count as casters of their HD for those abilities. It was to qualify for PrCs early like aasimar going into mystic theurge. With that logic I would assume because kineticists have a base spell like ability...we would count ad a caster = our level, and natural spell like abilities count as arcane, if that makes sense. Its loosely based on a post from devs but no clear yes or no as of yet.

Sovereign Court

Whos_That wrote:
Yes they do count. I can't find the link, but it was a big discussion with races with spell like abilities count as casters of their HD for those abilities. It was to qualify for PrCs early like aasimar going into mystic theurge. With that logic I would assume because kineticists have a base spell like ability...we would count ad a caster = our level, and natural spell like abilities count as arcane, if that makes sense. Its loosely based on a post from devs but no clear yes or no as of yet.

While mostly true, the only thing is you count as a Psychic caster, not arcane. The abilities are specifically Psychic, thus trumping the normal ruling on SLA's being arcane.


Speaking of breaking the class, a high level kineticist can do a fantastic job of creating superman (you get heat vision, cold breath, damage reduction, and flight, as well as energy resistance if that is a change that makes it).


I hope they do get energy resistance, I can't see them as a master of there element if they are not even resistant to it.

Shadow Lodge

Pathfinder Lost Omens, Rulebook Subscriber

Where was it said that the kineticist is psychic?


Whos_That wrote:
Where was it said that the kineticist is psychic?

It's the 'Occult' playtest and all of the classes use psychic magic instead of traditional arcane or divine magic.

That said... link:

Mark Seifter wrote:
Rory wrote:
Fomsie wrote:
Where is the Arcane Strike qualification coming from? I believe earlier today Mark replied to a question stating that the Kineticist SLAs do NOT qualify you for Arcane Strike. That would cut a piece out of the damage totals.

I took Arcane Strike out of the comparison. If Mark said it doesn't count, then hey... I'm not sure why the spell-like abilities don't count. That's beyond my pay grade! :-)

I also fixed Feel the Burn to be +2/+2 at 6th instead of the +1/+1 carryover from levels 3 to 5. Thanks!

It doesn't count as a prereq because it isn't arcane, it's psychic.

Shadow Lodge

Pathfinder Lost Omens, Rulebook Subscriber

Question, is it possible to reduce the burn cost of a composite blast through nove actions? It says wild talents, and expanded element is a wild talent but are composite blasts included? I know it doesn't work for the empower/maximise etc. But if not, why would it ever be better to use aethric boost than empower? +150% for 1 burn, or 1 damage per die for +2 burn...

Shadow Lodge

Pathfinder Lost Omens, Rulebook Subscriber

Move actions, and I have found it is not. Rewording will do this class wonders. Great job all in all


The move action gather energy thing works whenever you do a blast: Composite or metakinesis (empower, maximize, etc). Max of 1 burn reduction (for now anyways) though.

Look at the first post of this thread. That move action thing got errata'ed to only apply to blasts.

Shadow Lodge

Pathfinder Lost Omens, Rulebook Subscriber

Blast wild talent. The composite blasts are not wild talents. They are composite blasts if the wording is taken as is. It would make the lvl 15 ability waaay more useful if it applied to both, but for balance I don't believe it does.


It does apply to both, otherwise gathering energy would be worthless until you get metakinesis.

Shadow Lodge

Pathfinder Lost Omens, Rulebook Subscriber

I don't believe it does. Because gathering energy lets you reduce from blast infusions, so like for example: reduces the cost of kinetic whip by 1, so you can only have it cost 1, or 0 with form specialization. Why would it make more sense to have an empowered blast every round for free?

Designer

Simple blast wild talents and composite blast wild talents are both blast wild talents. They have "blast wild talent" in their name.


Mark Seifter wrote:
Simple blast wild talents and composite blast wild talents are both blast wild talents. They have "blast wild talent" in their name.

Yes, but if a tree falls in the forest, was it due to the Kineticist or Sorcerer?


I hope both, I would an archetype that grants the Kineticist a Sorcerer's bloodlines and an archetype that grants the Sorcerer's the Kineticist's blast and few other abilities.


I was wondering, can the composite blast be combined with the kinetic blade.

Shadow Lodge

Pathfinder Lost Omens, Rulebook Subscriber
Dolequbo wrote:

I was wondering, can the composite blast be combined with the kinetic blade.

I would say yes, it does not say basic or simple blast, and as long as you are paying burn for both, I would think so.

Shadow Lodge

Pathfinder Lost Omens, Rulebook Subscriber

Thanks Mark for the reply on the compulsive blasts!


Whos_That wrote:
Dolequbo wrote:

I was wondering, can the composite blast be combined with the kinetic blade.

I would say yes, it does not say basic or simple blast, and as long as you are paying burn for both, I would think so.

Ok, thanks. One more thing, can you activate kinetic blade to make an attack of opprotunity?

Designer

1 person marked this as a favorite.
Dolequbo wrote:
Whos_That wrote:
Dolequbo wrote:

I was wondering, can the composite blast be combined with the kinetic blade.

I would say yes, it does not say basic or simple blast, and as long as you are paying burn for both, I would think so.

Ok, thanks. One more thing, can you activate kinetic blade to make an attack of opprotunity?

No, but kinetic whip stays out at the ready to make AoOs, so I recommend it to people who like AoOs.


I had to take about a month off for the birth of my son, so, when I rejoined the game, we were all level 5. I believe that, of every level, the Kineticist is proportionally strongest at 5th, and my experience this past session confirmed my belief.

There were some additions to the party. We now have:
Me (Human Hydrokineticist, using what we interpreted as Mark's suggested changes)
Human Barbarian with a Greatsword
Human Blackbladed Hexcrafter (strength) Magus
Gnome Iron Priest of Brigh (focused on buffing and crafting)
Human Hunter, focused on throwing weapons, with a Tiger
Dwarven Drunken Master of Many Styles
Human Switch Hitting Fighter (Greatsword and Longbow--I wish I was there to help him make this disaster)

We had one fight, as most of the session was spent on the party leveling to 5 and telling me what happened.

I currently have +10 to hit and deal 3d6+9 with my water blast (with our interpretation of Elemenal Overflow, I get +1 to hit, +2 damage, +1 Natural Armor, and +2 to a physical stat from it). Altogether, I have 20 Dex, 18 Con, 24 AC (best in the party), and he gave us Max HP for 65 (second best in the party only behind the Barbarian with 80).

We fought a massive Akata--I don't know what templates were used to make it so--and several smaller ones. I won initiative, gathered energy, and Empowered an extended blast to hit it before it could charge. I hit it with a 23 and dealt 33 damage.

The Akata went next, and charged our front line. The monk took a 16 damage hit, but saved vs. the (disease?) effect. The cleric gave us Prayer. Everyone else attacked the large one, but everyone whiffed (with attacks as high as 21) except the Hunter, who landed with a single hunga munga for 6 damage (he's still waiting for the pieces of his build to come into their own...).

On my second turn, I gathered energy and Empowered again. I landed a crit, confirming with another 23, and dealt 63 damage on my crit, killing it (I dealt 96 myself, the hunter did 6, so it had no more than 101 HP). The GM was shocked and questioned whether or not you would double it from the crit and multiple by 1.5 from empower, or if it should just be multiplied by 2.5. I've always assumed doubled and 1.5, but I could see the other interpretation. It was still a ton of damage, regardless.

The new players that had not seen my character before were stunned that I could blast all day. I have to admit, I felt like a total badass here, and I was struggling trying to explain how I wasn't really overpowered, I was just at my most powerful (proportionally) right now, how the full BAB guys would be getting a second swing next level, how the 6 level casters would be getting 3rd level spells at 7th and a second attack at 8th, etc.

The rest of the party cleaned up the smaller Akata with ease--everyone landed attacks that killed in a single blow until they were all down.

I have felt about average throughout this game, as far as mechanical power was concerned, but this past session, I felt like the star. It's very strange how swingy the class's power level is from level to level. Empower made a HUGE difference, and it'll take a few levels until that power jump evens out with the rest of the party (when I am ultimately eclipsed).

Still loving this, though. I'll keep updating as we play.

Designer

5 people marked this as a favorite.

I'm surprised this thread is actually still going, all things considered! Anyway, in honor of your tenacity, here's another fun wild talent for a kineticist of any kind to toy around with for a while before July. This will let you be like Magneto with a spinning ball of metal, waterbenders with that glob of water they keep around them, Gaara with his sand that's always somewhere about, etc. It's also sort of a spoiler of the way I'm dealing with adding new powers that would normally be attack spells. It's like I said to a playtester in my personal group who was asking for some of those as wild talents "Why make it a wild talent that you have to activate separately when it can be either a form or substance infusion and work with all the other cool things in your blast?" Keep up the kineticist dream, everyone!

Mobile Blast:
Mobile Blast
Element universal; Type form infusion; Level 3 this is correct, try to figure out why; Burn 2
Associated Blasts any
Saving Throw Reflex negates
You send an elemental mass, energy ball, or object into a particular square within 30 feet, dealing 1/4 your kinetic blast’s damage (or half damage for blue flame, cold, electricity, fire, and force blasts) to all creatures in that square. The mobile blast lasts until you dismiss it as a free action, lose consciousness, or move farther than 30 feet from it. Each round on your turn, as a move action, you can move the mobile blast to another square within range, and either way, it continues to deal damage to all creatures in its square each round if they fail their saving throw. You can only have a single mobile blast in existence at a time. If the mobile blast’s total burn cost before applying any reduction for gather power is 0, it has no maximum duration. Otherwise, it lasts a maximum number of rounds equal to your Constitution modifier, and afterwards you can’t create another mobile blast for a number of minutes equal to the number of rounds it existed. A mobile blast is always extremely loud and visible. The saving throw DC is Dexterity-based.

Liberty's Edge

Uh mark, how heavy does an object have to be to inflict damage for a telekeneticist? I see nothing that is stopping me from weaponizing a teacup, a pair of female unmentionables or a nearby gnome as a weapon.

Designer

snickersimba wrote:

Uh mark, how heavy does an object have to be to inflict damage for a telekeneticist? I see nothing that is stopping me from weaponizing a teacup, a pair of female unmentionables or a nearby gnome as a weapon.

Teacup is fine. I mean, a bullet isn't that heavy either, right? For a gnome, you would need foe throw.

Liberty's Edge

Uh, yeah, but this still makes anything like a small pebble a lethal object to this character and for roleplay purposes is absurd.

Heres a situation that my players got into

Dwarven keneticist was arrested for getting into a barfight with the captain of the guard who was still very much sober

Dwarf gets arrested.

Dwarf levitates a small pebble to smash a guard in the face, does this over and over until guard is finally RIP. Guard never found out what was causing this.

Designer

snickersimba wrote:

Uh, yeah, but this still makes anything like a small pebble a lethal object to this character and for roleplay purposes is absurd.

Heres a situation that my players got into

Dwarven keneticist was arrested for getting into a barfight with the captain of the guard who was still very much sober

Dwarf gets arrested.

Dwarf levitates a small pebble to smash a guard in the face, does this over and over until guard is finally RIP. Guard never found out what was causing this.

The captain of the guard would have noticed that the kineticist used a spell-like ability, though if he didn't have Spellcraft, he might not be able to identify what it was. Still, not too hard to put two and two together. But yes, without resatraining the kineticist's hands to prevent aiming, you pretty much aren't going to be able to jail one very easily. The non-tele are even harder to jail. At least you can conceivably make a room with no pebbles.

Liberty's Edge

You forget, the tele can pick locks, easily.

the party ended up having to save the dwarf from permanent dispellation by angry uptight wizards in overly fancy robes with with elaborate mustache styles.

We have a gnome named mark, atleast for our occult adventures playtesting group. Even though the playtest is still over, these classes are awesome.

He is a spiritualist who has a zealous ghost named simon who REALLY REALLY wanted to kill evil stuff and murder the undead.
Simon uses a mace to beat things to death, just as a fluff mechanic.

He never did manage to stay a paladin, due to the fact he always charged headfirst into combat even when it was stupid.


Mark Seifter wrote:
snickersimba wrote:

Uh, yeah, but this still makes anything like a small pebble a lethal object to this character and for roleplay purposes is absurd.

Heres a situation that my players got into

Dwarven keneticist was arrested for getting into a barfight with the captain of the guard who was still very much sober

Dwarf gets arrested.

Dwarf levitates a small pebble to smash a guard in the face, does this over and over until guard is finally RIP. Guard never found out what was causing this.

The captain of the guard would have noticed that the kineticist used a spell-like ability, though if he didn't have Spellcraft, he might not be able to identify what it was. Still, not too hard to put two and two together. But yes, without resatraining the kineticist's hands to prevent aiming, you pretty much aren't going to be able to jail one very easily. The non-tele are even harder to jail. At least you can conceivably make a room with no pebbles.

To be fair, it doesn't matter what is used, but as long as the Telekineticist has something with which he can manipulate, he can use his blast. He could spit in the air and then use that as his blast, or pull a piece of hair from his head, or if he defecates, kill people with feces, etc.

Conceivably anything could be used as a weapon, so restraining or capturing any kinticist would be just as difficult as capturing or retraining any spontaneous caster, and similar methods would have to be taken.


Tels wrote:
Conceivably anything could be used as a weapon, so restraining or capturing any kinticist would be just as difficult as capturing or retraining any spontaneous caster, and similar methods would have to be taken.

God, after re-reading this, it makes me want to make a telekinetic that uses attacks like "Atomic Loogie" "Sweat Sabre" and "Poo-poo Blast".

Mark... What have I done?


I am sure we can find an anime that uses "Atomic Loogie" or "Sweat Sabre" but as for "Poo-poo Blast", we will have to wait for season 25 of South Park;)


Mobile Blast
Is it on level 3 because you need it to kill swarms?

If I move it from point A to point B do it deal damage to every thing in between or do it teleport there?


Zautos' wrote:

Mobile Blast

Is it on level 3 because you need it to kill swarms?

If I move it from point A to point B do it deal damage to every thing in between or do it teleport there?

I suspect it's because there are now more options to take wild talents.


It's at level 3 because once again they don't want us to have any options in hurting swarms at 1st and 2nd level when they are most common.


snickersimba wrote:
Dwarf levitates a small pebble to smash a guard in the face, does this over and over until guard is finally RIP.

First, I hope that wasn't the same pebble, because the object you throw takes the same damage as the target. It would probably have been smashed to powder in one blow.

Second, this is no different than if my hydrokineticist was captured--I could waterblast the guy all day, as well. Dealing with being captured and having our stuff taken away is one of the Kineticist's specialties.

Dragon78 wrote:
It's at level 3 because once again they don't want us to have any options in hurting swarms at 1st and 2nd level when they are most common.

I spoke earlier in the thread about how, as a weaponlike spell like ability, it is most likely that we actually can hurt swarms with our regular blasts.

That said, the level of the blast is not the Kineticist level that you can take it. Level 4 powers, for example, are taken at Kineticist 6.


Personally I think you should be able to create a 30ft line or 15ft cone dealing half your blast damage at level one with no cost. Then you can spend burn to increase damage and/or range.

Designer

mplindustries wrote:
That said, the level of the blast is not the Kineticist level that you can take it. Level 4 powers, for example, are taken at Kineticist 6.

Ah, quite so, but only your explanation indicates why 3 would be...unusual.


mplindustries wrote:
The new players that had not seen my character before were stunned that I could blast all day. I have to admit, I felt like a total badass here, and I was struggling trying to explain how I wasn't really overpowered, I was just at my most powerful (proportionally) right now, how the full BAB guys would be getting a second swing next level, how the 6 level casters would be getting 3rd level spells at 7th and a second attack at 8th, etc.

I play my level 4 pyro in PFS (+8 attack and 2d6+3 with feel the burn +1, Dex 18 with belt, and Con 19.), so I'm stuck with the playtest document with none of Mark's nice potential changes/updates. I picked fire element because it's specifically considered the weakest one from the playtest document (lack of non-touch elemental based attack, and lack of utility talents), and not many have reported on the pyrokineticist on the playtest forums; but despite that GMs and some players still raise their eyebrows at my touch-attack at-will blasts, however not bat an eye when the bloodragers/barbarians do 2d6+15 when raging+power attacking:

"Oh you raged and did 28 damage? Oh your second attack critted and did like 50? Awesome!"
"Oh your fire blast rarely misses and you did 12 points of damage? Oh you actually rolled a natural 20 and confirmed the critical and you did 20 points of damage? I think this playtest class needs a round with the nerfbat." (>.<)

I personally think previous gunslingers in their parties have left a bad taste in their mouths about touch attacks. Some recognize (and were present when it happened) that I'm terrible against hardness and/or fire resistance. I haven't fought anything with spell resistance yet, but I'm sure that's gonna suck.

Most folks haven't read the class yet and I haven't been playing up the class's hard parts: I keep burn and nonlethal damage to a minimum when I can though will move and kinetic blade and take the unhealable nonlethal damage whenever absolutely necessary; move action gather energy whenever possible, so folks don't even know about the nonlethal damage being an issue for kineticists most of the time because it comes up so rarely; picked up kinetic blade and extended range, Point Blank Shot + Precise Shot + Weapon finesse for switch-hitting so I've been able to contribute in combat most of the time; picked up diplomacy as class skill with Int instead of charisma using trait and Liberty's Edge Eagle Knight vanity so I've been able to contribute in social encounters; I haven't been in any scenarios since Trial by Machines that had a lot of hardness except for a recent one which I mitigated issues by mostly tumbling+withdrawing so the chasing robot provoked an AoO from the melee heavies. I try not to spam burning infusion anymore, too many skeptical looks of at-will set-target-on-fire attempts.

Some think the kineticists actually needs to be and most likely will be nerfed when the final book comes out. I don't have the heart to tell them with Mark's expected changes, at the very least the kineticists are gonna be more versatile (yay skill points) and have even more abilities compared to the current playtest's bare-bones minimal version.

mplindustries wrote:
I have felt about average throughout this game, as far as mechanical power was concerned, but this past session, I felt like the star. It's very strange how swingy the class's power level is from level to level. Empower made a HUGE difference, and it'll take a few levels until that power jump evens out with the rest of the party (when I am ultimately eclipsed).

I look forward to level 5 (one more scenario!) for the same reasons. Empower would definitely be nice to help keep up with the bloodragers I've been partying with. With the expected infusion specialization (form infusions) I plan on getting, getting into melee can finally be more of an agressive action rather than the wait for targets to approach so I can move-action gather energy instead.

I think I'll play until end of level 6 where I can enjoy flying around with flame jets. I'll probably wait until final book comes out before bringing Wang Fire out from the spa he'll be resting at unless something fun for fire comes along.

Anyone have an opinion if flame jets have the same limitations of flight? It doesn't reference spell fly or natural flight or anything and I'm wondering if I can be medium/heavily encumbered or using whatever lifting/pushing/dragging rules with a party member hanging off my back (Str 12) and flame jetting us up a wall or cliffside or something. I'm pretty sure I don't have to worry about maneuver bonuses or fly skill checks because the flame jet only propels me in a straight line.


I also have been very careful with Burn, but I explained how it worked in full to the party, since I had Kinetic Healer. That would be considerably harder to do in a rotating party like PFS, though.

You mentioned rarely missing with your touch attacks--let me say that I have actually been the most accurate character so far (from 3rd to 5th level) using only a physical blast (Water), both on paper and in practice (I missed only twice so far, on round one and two of our very first fight n the entire campaign). With Point Blank Shot, I have a +11 to hit right now within 30' (which is very common, especially given my toughness/AC). The Barbarian with 20 base Strength only matches that when Raging (because, Power Attack, of course). Everyone else has +9 or less. Plus, as I said, I have the second most HP behind the Barbarian (and I'd be beating her if we didn't do Max HP). There is absolutely no way we need a d10 HD/full BAB.

I'm deliberately not going for Kinetic Whip + Empowered Vital Strike (even though we're going Mythic eventually) because, even if Mark didn't outright say it, that just shouldn't work. It should not be better to melee than blast at range. I have Kinetic Blade as a back up in case I get grappled, but that's it.

I might consider grabbing this rolling ball of water, though. Weak damage, but it's interesting at the least.

Designer

Weak damage with the limitless duration one, for sure, but it's a good choice if you're looking to find a vector for a substance infusion or if you have a high-AC low Ref enemy. The limited duration version can do a lot more damage than you might think with setup, since a pyro could conceivably charge up for the full round to get like a blue flame empowered one for 0 burn at level 7, and it keeps the blue flame and the empower for each round of slamming it into people, thus being worth more than empowering your regular blasts on those rounds with the same move action and making you less likely for a total whiff each round.


My dice have been pretty terrible at times and I would have missed plenty of occasions if not for Touch ACs of 10-14. In PFS the numbers can go all over the place especially when playing at a higher tier. There's been some encounters where the pyro was the only one, or I wished was playing the pyro in that encounter, that can hit a target reliably because the spell-enhanced AC of a target requires every attacking regular AC to roll a 17 or higher on the actual die roll. In Wrath's Shadow, I'm looking at you!

4,151 to 4,200 of 4,774 << first < prev | 79 | 80 | 81 | 82 | 83 | 84 | 85 | 86 | 87 | 88 | 89 | next > last >>
Community / Forums / Archive / Pathfinder / Playtests & Prerelease Discussions / Occult Adventures Playtest / Rules Discussion / General Discussion: Kineticist All Messageboards

Want to post a reply? Sign in.