Unchained Kineticist


Homebrew and House Rules


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I already posted this in N. Jolly's thread about his Kineticist guide. Unfortunately, I have little time to work on this, because family business is coming up and I'll be away from the internet for a good while, but for now, I present the Unchained Kineticist. 1/2 Kineticist Rework, 1/2 More Kineticist content, it's something I've been throwing around in my head for a long while.

Most things are unchanged from the normal kineticist, but the math has been streamlined somewhat to make it easier to calculate in normal play. Unfortunately, it is incompatible with normal Kineticist archetypes, but I am entirely open to converting an archetype to work with it.

The Unchained Kineticist
All Unchained Kineticist content

Other things I'm working on:

Converting older archetypes to the Unchained Kineticist, writing new archetypes, and fleshing out infusion and wild talent lists.

An Unchained Medium, eventually.


I'll take another look at this later tonight when I've got the time to write out a proper response. I think you maybe pulled some things back a little too far. On the other hand, I just noticed the PoW archetype, so I'm super excited to check that out.


The path of war archetype is definitely going to be changed


Hmm. So buffer zone is essentially internal buffer, but it automatically recharges, you can spend multiple points from it on each wild talent, and it still applies for things like elemental overflow? I don't see the auto-recharge being that huge an issue, but I'd say it should work identically to internal buffer otherwise (meaning you'd need to define those rules).

Bonus feats are... eh, I dunno. Kineticists usually don't need that many feats anyway. I'm also unsure of what Rapid Shot or Clustered Shots would do, since you normally can't make a full-attack action with a ranged blast. Shot on the Run might work with them (although I don't know for certain how it interacts with these), but you can't nab that until 10th anyway. Pinpoint Targeting would be bloody frightful though, since a kineticist will be highly likely to be using their move action to gather power anyway. I can see a unique playstyle evolving with these feats if the kineticist gets their hands on a conductive bow, but otherwise several of these feats are just pointless. In addition, Elemental Focus is useless, since it applies to spells, which kinetic blasts are not. You'd need to specify that the feats work differently for them if you truly want to stick to these bonus feats.

I'm not so sure about getting composite specialization at 8th. You basically get a free composite at 11th this way, and can use aetheric/gravitic boosted composites at 16th for free.

Supercharge's change I like. I don't know why they didn't allow a swift-action supercharge, frankly. However, it probably should be specified that you can't use it as a move or full-round in the same round you use it as a swift. I don't know about the double-full-turn gather power though; seems like a far-too-risky move to ever bother with unless you're completely out of a creature's reach or they're already incapacitated.


Onyx Tanuki wrote:

Hmm. So buffer zone is essentially internal buffer, but it automatically recharges, you can spend multiple points from it on each wild talent, and it still applies for things like elemental overflow? I don't see the auto-recharge being that huge an issue, but I'd say it should work identically to internal buffer otherwise (meaning you'd need to define those rules).

Bonus feats are... eh, I dunno. Kineticists usually don't need that many feats anyway. I'm also unsure of what Rapid Shot or Clustered Shots would do, since you normally can't make a full-attack action with a ranged blast. Shot on the Run might work with them (although I don't know for certain how it interacts with these), but you can't nab that until 10th anyway. Pinpoint Targeting would be bloody frightful though, since a kineticist will be highly likely to be using their move action to gather power anyway. I can see a unique playstyle evolving with these feats if the kineticist gets their hands on a conductive bow, but otherwise several of these feats are just pointless. In addition, Elemental Focus is useless, since it applies to spells, which kinetic blasts are not. You'd need to specify that the feats work differently for them if you truly want to stick to these bonus feats.

I'm not so sure about getting composite specialization at 8th. You basically get a free composite at 11th this way, and can use aetheric/gravitic boosted composites at 16th for free.

Supercharge's change I like. I don't know why they didn't allow a swift-action supercharge, frankly. However, it probably should be specified that you can't use it as a move or full-round in the same round you use it as a swift. I don't know about the double-full-turn gather power though; seems like a far-too-risky move to ever bother with unless you're completely out of a creature's reach or they're already incapacitated.

Better to have an option than not have one. The bonus feats list came from an earlier iteration when kinetic blasts worked identically to mystic bolts (I.e could be affected by ranged weapon perks, benefitted from iterative attacks). I have incredibly little time to work on this homebrew, so changes will be slow to implement, and my access to the PFSRD and Paizo materials is going to be limited. I'm thinking about listing out some unique bonus feats at the bottom of the document and simply allowing kineticists to pick from those, like a fighter has fighter-only bonus feats.


The unchaining I'd like to see is a kineticist thats easier to understand from level 1. The first time I tried to make one, I gave up. I started another last week and its mostly done, but I've been gaming for a long time I feel like it should't be as difficult as it is. There are a lot of choices at 1st level, and figuring out what you are supposed to choose is a little complex.

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i don't understand why you gave the kineticist bonus feats. Kineticists are not martials and they're not feat needy at all. Point-Blank Shot, Precise Shot, and Spell Penetration are pretty much the only staples, but even those aren't "must haves" since you have options to target touch AC or bypass SR depending on your blast choices.

In fact, for my kitsune kineticist, I planned to just take PBS and Precise Shot, and then spend the rest of my feats on Magical Tail.

Ciaran Barnes wrote:
The unchaining I'd like to see is a kineticist thats easier to understand from level 1. The first time I tried to make one, I gave up. I started another last week and its mostly done, but I've been gaming for a long time I feel like it should't be as difficult as it is. There are a lot of choices at 1st level, and figuring out what you are supposed to choose is a little complex.

It took me 4 hours to stat an NPC as a high level kineticist. Then when my players fought her, the only thing she got to do was use flame jet and run away.

I long desired to rework the kineticist. It's a cool class, but it's so sloppy and has so many needlessly complicated parts. It has a talent pool with powers that work like spells but aren't spells with multiple different types of talents that you have a limited amount of each type. Some of your class features work on some talent types, but not others. Many of the class's features are just different ways of reducing burn costs, and you have to manage them all. Burn causes you to get temporary hit points that break the rules for temporary hit points. Ugh, it's a mess! A shame because the class is really cool.


Cyrad wrote:

i don't understand why you gave the kineticist bonus feats. Kineticists are not martials and they're not feat needy at all. Point-Blank Shot, Precise Shot, and Spell Penetration are pretty much the only staples, but even those aren't "must haves" since you have options to target touch AC or bypass SR depending on your blast choices.

In fact, for my kitsune kineticist, I planned to just take PBS and Precise Shot, and then spend the rest of my feats on Magical Tail.

Ciaran Barnes wrote:
The unchaining I'd like to see is a kineticist thats easier to understand from level 1. The first time I tried to make one, I gave up. I started another last week and its mostly done, but I've been gaming for a long time I feel like it should't be as difficult as it is. There are a lot of choices at 1st level, and figuring out what you are supposed to choose is a little complex.

It took me 4 hours to stat an NPC as a high level kineticist. Then when my players fought her, the only thing she got to do was use flame jet and run away.

I long desired to rework the kineticist. It's a cool class, but it's so sloppy and has so many needlessly complicated parts. It has a talent pool with powers that work like spells but aren't spells with multiple different types of talents that you have a limited amount of each type. Some of your class features work on some talent types, but not others. Many of the class's features are just different ways of reducing burn costs, and you have to manage them all. Burn causes you to get temporary hit points that break the rules for temporary hit points. Ugh, it's a mess! A shame because the class is really cool.

The bonus feats came from an earlier iteration of the unchained Kineticist. I'm planning on adding in Kineticist-only feats, like those listed near the bottom of the page. Additionally, I am going to look into simplifying and streamlining things. The Kineticist IS one of the coolest classes in the game. Shame it has weak mechanics.

Grand Lodge

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Why bonus feats? You're just giving an unneeded powerup..

Only thing Kineticist needs is easier calculated class mechanics and more talents. (that aren't overpriced on burn) I like the way you're putting them in the levelup table. :)

An "unchained" Kineticist should be a side-grade, not an upgrade in power. More diversity with simpler mechanics.


Varun Creed wrote:

Why bonus feats? You're just giving an unneeded powerup..

Only thing Kineticist needs is easier calculated class mechanics and more talents. (that aren't overpriced on burn) I like the way you're putting them in the levelup table. :)

An "unchained" Kineticist should be a side-grade, not an upgrade in power. More diversity with simpler mechanics.

Yeah. I was inspired by Dreamscarred Press and the tables for their Psionic and Initiating classes. Anyways, i limited the bonus feats to just stuff marked as Kineticist feats at the bottom of the page. Most of them are just fun feats, which I would consider a bonus- I.e being able to get two weapon fighting with kinetic blade, Eldritch Heritge but Kineticist focused and dragon based, and a pair of kinetic fist feats that allow you to deal some more damage and end up being able to use a flying kick as an unchained monk

Which reminds me, I might redo Elemental Ascetic to let the Kineticist snag style strikes and a Ki power or two

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ASharkInAPanzerNamedShark wrote:
Which reminds me, I might redo Elemental Ascetic to let the Kineticist snag style strikes and a Ki power or two

Why? They have powers that are as good, if not better, than spells.


Varun Creed wrote:


An "unchained" Kineticist should be a side-grade, not an upgrade in power. More diversity with simpler mechanics.

If we're unchaining one of the worst classes in the game it should decidedly be better afterwards.

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swoosh wrote:
Varun Creed wrote:


An "unchained" Kineticist should be a side-grade, not an upgrade in power. More diversity with simpler mechanics.
If we're unchaining one of the worst classes in the game it should decidedly be better afterwards.

Kineticists are pretty good, actually. They're strong, interesting, and have great flavor. It's not a bad class, just not very well written.


Cyrad wrote:
ASharkInAPanzerNamedShark wrote:
Which reminds me, I might redo Elemental Ascetic to let the Kineticist snag style strikes and a Ki power or two
Why? They have powers that are as good, if not better, than spells.

Elemental Ascetic is the Monk/Kineticist archetype. It is disallowed from using any infusion that requires a ranged attack roll. That's a lot of infusions. I figure style strikes and a ki power or two might not be that gamebreaking compared to losing all ranged infusions.

As well, losing your constitution-focus really hurts, because if you still want to take burn, you end up having to focus on Strength, Constitution, AND Wisdom to use your abilities effectively.


Alright, I wrote up a quick rewrite of the Elemental Ascetic archetype. It gains style strikes as the Unchained Monk class feature of the same name, which replace the infusions known at 5th, 9th, 13th, and 17th levels. Additionally, it automatically ups the damage die of your kinetic fist, from d6s to d8s to d10s to d12s. You get the die step-ups two levels later than the Chained Elemental Ascetic, however, because you get them for free, and each die step up is effectively +1 average damage.

Unchained Elemental Ascetic

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ASharkInAPanzerNamedShark wrote:
Cyrad wrote:
ASharkInAPanzerNamedShark wrote:
Which reminds me, I might redo Elemental Ascetic to let the Kineticist snag style strikes and a Ki power or two
Why? They have powers that are as good, if not better, than spells.

Elemental Ascetic is the Monk/Kineticist archetype. It is disallowed from using any infusion that requires a ranged attack roll. That's a lot of infusions. I figure style strikes and a ki power or two might not be that gamebreaking compared to losing all ranged infusions.

As well, losing your constitution-focus really hurts, because if you still want to take burn, you end up having to focus on Strength, Constitution, AND Wisdom to use your abilities effectively.

Style strikes are pretty flippin' strong and a big perk of the unchained monk. The elemental ascetic essentially turns the character into a full-BAB fist fighter with bonus attacks. The ascetic doesn't take away any utility talents nor does it stop you from using form infusions that create AoE effects, such as fan of flames, or infusions that add bonus effects to your kinetic fist attacks. As a result, they don't really need to be poaching ki powers and style strikes from the monk.

My biggest problem with the elemental ascetic is that I really dislike how kinetic fist and kinetic blade were implemented. Kinetic blade basically lets you melee full-attack with your kinetic blast. Kinetic fist, on the other hand, just adds bonus damage to your unarmed strikes at the cost of making you really MAD. In addition, it's worthless unless you take a feat.

If you want players to have the option of being a monk/kineticist, I think making a monk archetype with kineticist powers would be a better idea than a kineticist with monk powers.


Cyrad wrote:
ASharkInAPanzerNamedShark wrote:
Cyrad wrote:
ASharkInAPanzerNamedShark wrote:
Which reminds me, I might redo Elemental Ascetic to let the Kineticist snag style strikes and a Ki power or two
Why? They have powers that are as good, if not better, than spells.

Elemental Ascetic is the Monk/Kineticist archetype. It is disallowed from using any infusion that requires a ranged attack roll. That's a lot of infusions. I figure style strikes and a ki power or two might not be that gamebreaking compared to losing all ranged infusions.

As well, losing your constitution-focus really hurts, because if you still want to take burn, you end up having to focus on Strength, Constitution, AND Wisdom to use your abilities effectively.

Style strikes are pretty flippin' strong and a big perk of the unchained monk. The elemental ascetic essentially turns the character into a full-BAB fist fighter with bonus attacks. The ascetic doesn't take away any utility talents nor does it stop you from using form infusions that create AoE effects, such as fan of flames, or infusions that add bonus effects to your kinetic fist attacks. As a result, they don't really need to be poaching ki powers and style strikes from the monk.

My biggest problem with the elemental ascetic is that I really dislike how kinetic fist and kinetic blade were implemented. Kinetic blade basically lets you melee full-attack with your kinetic blast. Kinetic fist, on the other hand, just adds bonus damage to your unarmed strikes at the cost of making you really MAD. In addition, it's worthless unless you take a feat.

If you want players to have the option of being a monk/kineticist, I think making a monk archetype with kineticist powers would be a better idea than a kineticist with monk powers.

I only had it snagging style strikes, that's it, and boosting the power of kinetic fist. No Ki Powers, because to be frank, I'm of the opinion that utility wild talents blow ki powers out of the water.

EDIT: Additionally, you only ever get a single style strike per elemental flurry, and you don't gain as many as a straight UnMonk. I figure that's a good trade, because you keep utility talents and get boosted damage with Kinetic Fist, which I see as a fair trade.


Alright

Bonus Feats have been changed into Magus Arcana-like "Kinetic Techniques" that are much more kineticist-focused. I've also got the infusions/wild talents known staggered such that there are no "dead" levels on the table.


I really think you need to drop the whole nonsense with listing out every bonus from Overflow instead of just going with ability score increases. It doesn't change the amount of math involved at all, and, because of your insistence on labeling bonus types, just makes it... weird in the application.

Whether a bonus to attack rolls, dex skill, reflex saves, initiative AC and CMD is coming from an untyped bonus, or because your dex modifier increased by +1 doesn't change the fact that you have to go back and add in those +1s everywhere. It is 100% the same math, regardless of how you go about achieving it. In fact, there is even more math involved in your Overflow bonuses, because you include natural armor bonuses, which the previous Overflow didn't grant.

The only thing it does, is list out where the bonuses actually end up, except you list "Con based skill checks" of which, there are none, and your forgot to include abilities that use Dex or Con for their DCs, like infusions. It is unnecessary verbiage, and introduces immersion breaking ideas; like suffusing your body with elemental energies from the extra-planar sources, somehow, grants your Kineticist an alchemical bonuses to your saves and initiative.

Also, why doesn't it add to strength anymore? A kineticist can still be weighed down by his gear if he doesn't pay attention to his strength. Sure, he doesn't need to carry weapons, but that doesn't mean he can go weightless either, and not everyone is going to have access to ant haul or muleback cords. I just don't see why you are so insistent on removing the ability score increases, considering you are trying to add in the exact same bonuses. If you absolutely, must list out the bonuses, do it in a side-bar, not the class itself.

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ASharkInAPanzerNamedShark wrote:

Alright

Bonus Feats have been changed into Magus Arcana-like "Kinetic Techniques" that are much more kineticist-focused. I've also got the infusions/wild talents known staggered such that there are no "dead" levels on the table.

Why? The kineticist never had dead levels. And now you're adding yet another talent pool that gives a lot of really powerful abilities? You're just making the class more complicated (opposite of what most would prefer in a kineticist rework) while giving the class a lot of unnecessary buffs.


Tels wrote:

I really think you need to drop the whole nonsense with listing out every bonus from Overflow instead of just going with ability score increases. It doesn't change the amount of math involved at all, and, because of your insistence on labeling bonus types, just makes it... weird in the application.

Whether a bonus to attack rolls, dex skill, reflex saves, initiative AC and CMD is coming from an untyped bonus, or because your dex modifier increased by +1 doesn't change the fact that you have to go back and add in those +1s everywhere. It is 100% the same math, regardless of how you go about achieving it. In fact, there is even more math involved in your Overflow bonuses, because you include natural armor bonuses, which the previous Overflow didn't grant.

The only thing it does, is list out where the bonuses actually end up, except you list "Con based skill checks" of which, there are none, and your forgot to include abilities that use Dex or Con for their DCs, like infusions. It is unnecessary verbiage, and introduces immersion breaking ideas; like suffusing your body with elemental energies from the extra-planar sources, somehow, grants your Kineticist an alchemical bonuses to your saves and initiative.

Also, why doesn't it add to strength anymore? A kineticist can still be weighed down by his gear if he doesn't pay attention to his strength. Sure, he doesn't need to carry weapons, but that doesn't mean he can go weightless either, and not everyone is going to have access to ant haul or muleback cords. I just don't see why you are so insistent on removing the ability score increases, considering you are trying to add in the exact same bonuses. If you absolutely, must list out the bonuses, do it in a side-bar, not the class itself.

Y'know, you're probably right. I'll list the bonuses in a sidebar for quick, easy reference, and just make that an option, but you can peg the typing on the bonuses to my being extremely tired the other night and discussing this with N. Jolly.

Cyrad wrote:
ASharkInAPanzerNamedShark wrote:

Alright

Bonus Feats have been changed into Magus Arcana-like "Kinetic Techniques" that are much more kineticist-focused. I've also got the infusions/wild talents known staggered such that there are no "dead" levels on the table.

Why? The kineticist never had dead levels. And now you're adding yet another talent pool that gives a lot of really powerful abilities? You're just making the class more complicated (opposite of what most would prefer in a kineticist rework) while giving the class a lot of unnecessary buffs.

Then again, the Kineticist doen't have very many actual FEATS that apply to them. Kinetic Techniques are a middle-ground between actual wild talents and bonus feats, and i'm pegging the power level lower than actual wild talents because they're meant as extra customization.


Cyrad wrote:
Kineticists are pretty good, actually. They're strong, interesting, and have great flavor. It's not a bad class, just not very well written.

They most certainly are not pretty good. They struggle with damage outside niche scenarios and struggle with utility outside niche scenarios and don't really offer much else to the group. They can be interesting and do have great flavor, but that doesn't change the fact that they are quite bad.

The primary thing about them that's poorly written after all is how bad various mechanics are.


swoosh wrote:
Cyrad wrote:
Kineticists are pretty good, actually. They're strong, interesting, and have great flavor. It's not a bad class, just not very well written.

They most certainly are not pretty good. They struggle with damage outside niche scenarios and struggle with utility outside niche scenarios and don't really offer much else to the group. They can be interesting and do have great flavor, but that doesn't change the fact that they are quite bad.

The primary thing about them that's poorly written after all is how bad various mechanics are.

I will make the argument that a Kineticist with Kinetic Blade does end up being very competitive with damage, compared to a fighter, and has the option to hit either touch AC for less damage or normal AC for lots of damage. Other than that, the Kineticist really needs a lot of help, which is why I'm writing most of this- I've drafted out a number of new utility wild talents and a number of new infusions to expand options, which is roughly 75% of what this homebrew is.


ASharkInAPanzerNamedShark wrote:
swoosh wrote:
Cyrad wrote:
Kineticists are pretty good, actually. They're strong, interesting, and have great flavor. It's not a bad class, just not very well written.

They most certainly are not pretty good. They struggle with damage outside niche scenarios and struggle with utility outside niche scenarios and don't really offer much else to the group. They can be interesting and do have great flavor, but that doesn't change the fact that they are quite bad.

The primary thing about them that's poorly written after all is how bad various mechanics are.

I will make the argument that a Kineticist with Kinetic Blade does end up being very competitive with damage, compared to a fighter, and has the option to hit either touch AC for less damage or normal AC for lots of damage. Other than that, the Kineticist really needs a lot of help, which is why I'm writing most of this- I've drafted out a number of new utility wild talents and a number of new infusions to expand options, which is roughly 75% of what this homebrew is.

If we are honestly talking about fixing Kineticist damage output, you need to up the damage of the base kinetic blasts. If you compare them to a moderately optimized archer (aka, an archer that uses a composite longbow and takes the archery feats), they look quite bad. Heck, compare the kineticist single-target damage to a wizard/sorcerer using evocation spells, and they do worse damage (and that's ignoring that the caster is doing damage in an AoE). Let's also forget that the Kineticist can't match the range of a longbow or fireball unless they use a specific set of form infusions, which further reduces their versatility (since they can only have one form infusion).

If you did up the base blast damage, you'd have to account for that Kinetic Blade deals more hits (perhaps halve the damage you do w/ Kinetic Blade per strike?), and figure out how to make composite blasts balanced (because doubling damage that is competitive sounds insane), but that is just number tweaking.


I like that KBlade is auto unlocked an 0 burn. I disagree with the TWF part of it. Maybe let it unlock at a later level but not right away.

Buffer Zone should work just like internal buffer except that it automatically recharges after a full rest. It should keep the 1 per round max limit.

Composite specialization was fine as is, just maybe a level or two sooner compared to base class.

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Letariel wrote:
If we are honestly talking about fixing Kineticist damage output, you need to up the damage of the base kinetic blasts. If you compare them to a moderately optimized archer (aka, an archer that uses a composite longbow and takes the archery feats), they look quite bad. Heck, compare the kineticist single-target damage to a wizard/sorcerer using evocation spells, and they do worse damage (and that's ignoring that the caster is doing damage in an AoE).

The kineticist should not deal as much damage as an optimized archer. Archers churn out some of the highest damage in the game at the cost of being a one-trick pony due to action economy, feat hunger, and the design of martial classes. Kineticists have much more options, versatility, and ways to bypass defenses all while not requiring any weapons or long feat chains to be effective.


Cyrad wrote:
Letariel wrote:
If we are honestly talking about fixing Kineticist damage output, you need to up the damage of the base kinetic blasts. If you compare them to a moderately optimized archer (aka, an archer that uses a composite longbow and takes the archery feats), they look quite bad. Heck, compare the kineticist single-target damage to a wizard/sorcerer using evocation spells, and they do worse damage (and that's ignoring that the caster is doing damage in an AoE).
The kineticist should not deal as much damage as an optimized archer. Archers churn out some of the highest damage in the game at the cost of being a one-trick pony due to action economy, feat hunger, and the design of martial classes. Kineticists have much more options, versatility, and ways to bypass defenses all while not requiring any weapons or long feat chains to be effective.

Nor should a class be dealing that much damage if it cannot be disarmed, run out of ammo, or run out of resources allowing that amount of damage.


Tels wrote:
Cyrad wrote:
Letariel wrote:
If we are honestly talking about fixing Kineticist damage output, you need to up the damage of the base kinetic blasts. If you compare them to a moderately optimized archer (aka, an archer that uses a composite longbow and takes the archery feats), they look quite bad. Heck, compare the kineticist single-target damage to a wizard/sorcerer using evocation spells, and they do worse damage (and that's ignoring that the caster is doing damage in an AoE).
The kineticist should not deal as much damage as an optimized archer. Archers churn out some of the highest damage in the game at the cost of being a one-trick pony due to action economy, feat hunger, and the design of martial classes. Kineticists have much more options, versatility, and ways to bypass defenses all while not requiring any weapons or long feat chains to be effective.
Nor should a class be dealing that much damage if it cannot be disarmed, run out of ammo, or run out of resources allowing that amount of damage.

Tels and Cyrad have it right. The only way to prevent a Kineticist from blasting is to either knock him out or bind his hands, both of which can be rather hard- all kineticist elements have some method of transportation other than walking, climbing, or swimming, which can make them very hard to get to, and the number of enemeies who would tend towards binding hands are rather few and far between. Archers almost always win the DPR olympics. That's a given.


ASharkInAPanzerNamedShark wrote:
Tels wrote:
Cyrad wrote:
Letariel wrote:
If we are honestly talking about fixing Kineticist damage output, you need to up the damage of the base kinetic blasts. If you compare them to a moderately optimized archer (aka, an archer that uses a composite longbow and takes the archery feats), they look quite bad. Heck, compare the kineticist single-target damage to a wizard/sorcerer using evocation spells, and they do worse damage (and that's ignoring that the caster is doing damage in an AoE).
The kineticist should not deal as much damage as an optimized archer. Archers churn out some of the highest damage in the game at the cost of being a one-trick pony due to action economy, feat hunger, and the design of martial classes. Kineticists have much more options, versatility, and ways to bypass defenses all while not requiring any weapons or long feat chains to be effective.
Nor should a class be dealing that much damage if it cannot be disarmed, run out of ammo, or run out of resources allowing that amount of damage.
Tels and Cyrad have it right. The only way to prevent a Kineticist from blasting is to either knock him out or bind his hands, both of which can be rather hard- all kineticist elements have some method of transportation other than walking, climbing, or swimming, which can make them very hard to get to, and the number of enemeies who would tend towards binding hands are rather few and far between. Archers almost always win the DPR olympics. That's a given.

Ok, forget the archer comparison, and instead go with the sorcerer comparison. A sorcerer going for evocation (let's say fireball or battering blast as the most common) will always do more damage, assuming it's not a total marathon game (which is pretty rare). And the sorcerer will also being flying/invisible/untouchable and have utility spells, so the utility comparison will be similar. Am I wrong?

Grand Lodge

swoosh wrote:
Varun Creed wrote:


An "unchained" Kineticist should be a side-grade, not an upgrade in power. More diversity with simpler mechanics.
If we're unchaining one of the worst classes in the game it should decidedly be better afterwards.

I don't think it's one of the worst classes in the game, at all.


Letariel wrote:
ASharkInAPanzerNamedShark wrote:
Tels wrote:
Cyrad wrote:
Letariel wrote:
If we are honestly talking about fixing Kineticist damage output, you need to up the damage of the base kinetic blasts. If you compare them to a moderately optimized archer (aka, an archer that uses a composite longbow and takes the archery feats), they look quite bad. Heck, compare the kineticist single-target damage to a wizard/sorcerer using evocation spells, and they do worse damage (and that's ignoring that the caster is doing damage in an AoE).
The kineticist should not deal as much damage as an optimized archer. Archers churn out some of the highest damage in the game at the cost of being a one-trick pony due to action economy, feat hunger, and the design of martial classes. Kineticists have much more options, versatility, and ways to bypass defenses all while not requiring any weapons or long feat chains to be effective.
Nor should a class be dealing that much damage if it cannot be disarmed, run out of ammo, or run out of resources allowing that amount of damage.
Tels and Cyrad have it right. The only way to prevent a Kineticist from blasting is to either knock him out or bind his hands, both of which can be rather hard- all kineticist elements have some method of transportation other than walking, climbing, or swimming, which can make them very hard to get to, and the number of enemeies who would tend towards binding hands are rather few and far between. Archers almost always win the DPR olympics. That's a given.
Ok, forget the archer comparison, and instead go with the sorcerer comparison. A sorcerer going for evocation (let's say fireball or battering blast as the most common) will always do more damage, assuming it's not a total marathon game (which is pretty rare). And the sorcerer will also being flying/invisible/untouchable and have utility spells, so the utility comparison will be similar. Am I wrong?

One issue with this is that the Kineticist is starved for content. You've got two books, with a number of wild talents spread between them, and a number of talents just tossed all over the place. The Kineticist hasn't existed for nearly as long as the sorcerer, which has been in since the start of Pathfinder. You can't compare a class that has a year and a half of content at most to a class that has had more than a decade to mature from its inception. I dislike comparing them. When more content comes out that increases the amount of damage a kineticist can do, maybe they're comparable, but I dislike making this comparison between classes.

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ASharkInAPanzerNamedShark
Paizo has done a great job giving the kineticist a lot of support since its release. Two books introduced tons of new content. In the realm of 3pp, Purple Duck Games's Kineticists of Porphyra is pretty well done.

Letariel wrote:
Ok, forget the archer comparison, and instead go with the sorcerer comparison. A sorcerer going for evocation (let's say fireball or battering blast as the most common) will always do more damage, assuming it's not a total marathon game (which is pretty rare). And the sorcerer will also being flying/invisible/untouchable and have utility spells, so the utility comparison will be similar. Am I wrong?

The sorcerer should still be doing more damage with single uses of spells because they don't have an at-will blast aside from cantrips. Nearly all of the kineticist's utility is either at-will or can be at-will.


Cyrad wrote:

ASharkInAPanzerNamedShark

Paizo has done a great job giving the kineticist a lot of support since its release. Two books introduced tons of new content. In the realm of 3pp, Purple Duck Games's Kineticists of Porphyra is pretty well done.

Letariel wrote:
Ok, forget the archer comparison, and instead go with the sorcerer comparison. A sorcerer going for evocation (let's say fireball or battering blast as the most common) will always do more damage, assuming it's not a total marathon game (which is pretty rare). And the sorcerer will also being flying/invisible/untouchable and have utility spells, so the utility comparison will be similar. Am I wrong?
The sorcerer should still be doing more damage with single uses of spells because they don't have an at-will blast aside from cantrips. Nearly all of the kineticist's utility is either at-will or can be at-will.

Cyrad: In theory, I agree with you, but for realistically, I've never heard of a sorcerer that ran out of spells after lvl 2 (before which, as you stated, they just use their cantrips). Sure, there are some DMs that run marathon games where an kineticist would shine, but a typical game has characters resting when they are out of resources (spells, arcane points, judgements, hps, etc). In those typical circumstances, "single uses of spells" are pretty much infinite.

ASharkInAPanzerNamedShark: As for not wanting to compare to the sorcerer because there isn't as much content for the kineticist, isn't that the point of this thread? To make more content?


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Letariel wrote:
Cyrad wrote:

ASharkInAPanzerNamedShark

Paizo has done a great job giving the kineticist a lot of support since its release. Two books introduced tons of new content. In the realm of 3pp, Purple Duck Games's Kineticists of Porphyra is pretty well done.

Letariel wrote:
Ok, forget the archer comparison, and instead go with the sorcerer comparison. A sorcerer going for evocation (let's say fireball or battering blast as the most common) will always do more damage, assuming it's not a total marathon game (which is pretty rare). And the sorcerer will also being flying/invisible/untouchable and have utility spells, so the utility comparison will be similar. Am I wrong?
The sorcerer should still be doing more damage with single uses of spells because they don't have an at-will blast aside from cantrips. Nearly all of the kineticist's utility is either at-will or can be at-will.

Cyrad: In theory, I agree with you, but for realistically, I've never heard of a sorcerer that ran out of spells after lvl 2 (before which, as you stated, they just use their cantrips). Sure, there are some DMs that run marathon games where an kineticist would shine, but a typical game has characters resting when they are out of resources (spells, arcane points, judgements, hps, etc). In those typical circumstances, "single uses of spells" are pretty much infinite.

ASharkInAPanzerNamedShark: As for not wanting to compare to the sorcerer because there isn't as much content for the kineticist, isn't that the point of this thread? To make more content?

Okay, first of all, please stop exaggerating. You can't honestly say that you've never heard of a sorcerer, or any other caster, running out of spells past level 2; that's extremely dishonest, or you never speak to anyone about games.

The system cannot be balanced around the idealized 5-minute work day; this isn't reality. Lots of GMs don't let their parties rest unhindered. Lots of GMs cause disruptions in parties forcing them to keep going. Pathfinder, at it's base, is built upon the assumption of having multiple encounters in which parties expend resources during adventuring. Granted, not every day is going to have 5+ fights, but it should during any significant location of enemies, i.e. dungeons, castles, ships, etc.

If you honestly think that the Kineticist needs more damage, and be capable of matching evocation focused casters, or DPR Archers, then you should not be giving advice on the Kineticist. The kineticist does perfectly acceptable damage, and brings quite a bit to the table as long as you are aware that the kineticist is intentionally designed, from the ground up, on purpose not to be the heaviest hitter in the lineup! It is not intended to be dealing more damage than other classes focused on doing so, nor is it intended to bring more utility than other classes focused on doing so. It is intended to be a hybrid of the two.

Stop comparing kineticists to Archer Fighters, or Fireball Sorcerers, and start looking at them in comparison to Bards, or Inquisitors, or Magus. Sure, those classes can push beyond the kineticist in damage and utility, but they also blow through their resources doing it. The kineticist holds up just fine when you compare it to the classes it should be compared to.

It is not the king of AoE blasting. It is not the king of single target damage. It is not the king of utility. But it's pretty good at all three of them, and never has to worry about not having enough resources for the next fight. Other classes do, and they do it frequently. Full casters, partial casters, and martials, they all run out of resources, while a Kineticist can very often go whole adventures without needing to take more burn than what she uses to charge up her defense.


I'm not really sure that that's a compelling argument though Cyrad. Kineticists aren't supposed to be good at damage and aren't supposed to be good at utility... so what then is it that they are supposed to be good at?

If the class is designed from the ground up to be bad at everything then maybe it needs a second look.

Plus if someone wants to play a damage oriented kineticist I don't see why you should be screaming badwrongfun at them for it.

Because even if we take your suppositions as entirely true, it still shows a horribly lacking design because it forces players to play this unimpressive jack-of-some-trades mess rather than whatever character they may actually want to build off the kineticist chassis to make.


Tels wrote:
Lots of stuff

I'm not speaking dishonestly or exaggerating, but it sounds like your gaming experiences are much different than mine, and there doesn't seem to be a point in arguing with you about the average number of fights in a day and the number of spells per fight, since that's all up to the GM. Suffice to say that as an arcanist (which has much fewer spells than a sorcerer) playing through RotR, and I have never run out of spells before the rest of the party was ready to call it quits. And we don't do any of that 5-min workday crap; we've only ever needed to rest in the middle of a dungeon twice, and that's typically when we have a character down. We are now in book 5. *shrugs*

As for comparing the kineticist's damage to other damage dealing classes; I really thought that was the main draw of the class. If the intent of the kineticist is a jack-of-all-trade class then comparing it to a bard is fair. But as far as I can tell, a bard is a lot more flexible and powerful. Bards can be built can deal great damage (using a greatsword or longbow with bard buffs and Arcane Strike), great debuffing/SoS, amazing buffing/support, or amazing out-of-combat utility, just depending on what you specialize in. And when specializing, the bard doesn't give up that much (typically just picking between spell caster or weapon user) and can still do all the bard buffs during combat or use utility spells and skills out of combat.

The kineticist can't optimize/focus at all, as far as I can tell. The kineticist can't really optimize damage at all (the optimization floor and ceiling is about the same). They can't do much team support, as almost all their buffs are self only (the notable exceptions being Celerity), and their healing is a joke. They can do some debuffing (notably Magnetic or Entangling infusions), but they don't compare favorably to a comparable debuffer bard (Confusion, Slow, Fear, etc). Their out-of-combat utility is the high point (if you are a Telekineticist or Geokineticist), but even then it doesn't compare well against a bard's insane skill bonuses and various utility spells that they can get (invisibility, dispel magic, glibness, etc.). It feels like the kineticist can do many things passably but nothing well, and have no way of getting better at anything if they want to specialize.

I really love the concept of the Kineticist, and I really want them to be great. I'd love to be able to say I'll never make another class again. But I'm having trouble justifying playing one when I can make a different character class that does the same thing better.


swoosh wrote:

I'm not really sure that that's a compelling argument though Cyrad. Kineticists aren't supposed to be good at damage and aren't supposed to be good at utility... so what then is it that they are supposed to be good at?

If the class is designed from the ground up to be bad at everything then maybe it needs a second look.

Plus if someone wants to play a damage oriented kineticist I don't see why you should be screaming badwrongfun at them for it.

Because even if we take your suppositions as entirely true, it still shows a horribly lacking design because it forces players to play this unimpressive jack-of-some-trades mess rather than whatever character they may actually want to build off the kineticist chassis to make.

So your argument seems to boil down to: if it can't match archer damage, it deals bad damage, if it can't match wizard utility, it has bad utility?

The kineticist doesn't have "bad" damage, or "bad" utility. It deals good damage, and has fairly decent utility, considering it doesn't ha traditional spell casting.

What the kineticist needs most, is tweaks here and there to fix problematic options. For example, the telekineticist has no method of levitating anyone. All energy kineticists should naturally gain resistance, and even immunity to their element at a certain point; not only when they take those terrible utility talents that grant resistance equal to "twice your current burn." Some talents need to be adjusted up and down levels, and be made more widely available; such as many of the AoE abilities should probably come with reduced levels (not-fireball, I'm looking at you!). Meanwhile, other abilities, like fan of flames, i.e. 15-ft. cone, should be made more widely available. Or pure flame being the only true touch composite blast; I know this was done to ensure fire was special because it was the only energy blast that could truly ramp up it's damage and still target touch AC, but there are better ways of doing this.

So many little things should be done, like letting earth, water/ice, and wood make a wall of stone/wall of ice spell effect, but using their element. They should be able to make walls, and bridges, and little huts and stuff out of earth/ice/wood/plants.

Tweak things to make the kineticist better, instead of just trying to ramp up damage. For example, the telekinetic can levitate objects and creatures using it's basic telekinesis; this means that taking telekinetic haul to increase your weight limit will let you levitate people and monsters.

Or grant energy kinetics resistance to their element equal to 5 times their current burn.

Or let a kineticist automatically overcome their character level in damage, but let their be a utility talent that lets them overcome twice their level, and they can accept 1 burn to deal half-damage to creatures immune to their element.

Instead of trying to make cool sounding names for essentially the same ability (flame jet, self telekinesis), or using names that precludes another element from taking it (fan of flams), just use more generic names so other elements can use it too instead of having a bunch of different names for no reason. I mean, fan of flames could have easily been named "Elemental Spray" and made it a universal talent so anyone could take it.

If you want fire to still be the "top dog" when it comes to dealing damage, then simply increase the die size. Fire does 1d8 instead of 1d6, and the Blue Flame blast deals 2d8 instead of 2d6. This combined with Fire's Fury will let the pyrokinetic deal quite a bit more damage than other element types.

Tweak the little things that make some aspects of the kineticist frustrating, instead of just bumping everything to 11. The changes to the burn makes burn a total non-issue, which defeats that whole thematic purpose of it. There is no risk/reward with burn because you've got tons you can take for free each day. Same with Gather Energy/Supercharge, it just gives too much.

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swoosh wrote:

I'm not really sure that that's a compelling argument though Cyrad. Kineticists aren't supposed to be good at damage and aren't supposed to be good at utility... so what then is it that they are supposed to be good at?

If the class is designed from the ground up to be bad at everything then maybe it needs a second look.

Plus if someone wants to play a damage oriented kineticist I don't see why you should be screaming badwrongfun at them for it.

Because even if we take your suppositions as entirely true, it still shows a horribly lacking design because it forces players to play this unimpressive jack-of-some-trades mess rather than whatever character they may actually want to build off the kineticist chassis to make.

Tels does an excellent job explaining.

Kineticists are many things, but they're best described as versatile, sustained blasters. They deal decent burst damage at-will. They don't need to worry about spell slots or weapons. They have multiple ways to augment or change up how they do damage, and several tricks to keep them useful beyond just dealing damage. They're not the best at doing damage or providing utility, but they don't have to be.

You become a kineticist to be that cool guy that can throw fire blasts every round, and use his blasts to create AoEs, set people on fire, or propel himself up into the air when he feels like it. You don't play a kineticist to be the best at nuking or ranged DPR. And the classes that excel at nuking or ranged DPR pay a price for it that might make them less appealing to play.


Tels wrote:

...What the kineticist needs most, is tweaks here and there to fix problematic options. For example, the telekineticist has no method of levitating anyone. All energy kineticists should naturally gain resistance, and even immunity to their element at a certain point; not only when they take those terrible utility talents that grant resistance equal to "twice your current burn." Some talents need to be adjusted up and down levels, and be made more widely available; such as many of the AoE abilities should probably come with reduced levels (not-fireball, I'm looking at you!). Meanwhile, other abilities, like fan of flames, i.e. 15-ft. cone, should be made more widely available. Or pure flame being the only true touch composite blast; I know this was done to ensure fire was special because it was the only energy blast that could truly ramp up it's damage and still target touch AC, but there are better ways of doing this.

So many little things should be done, like letting earth, water/ice, and wood make a wall of stone/wall of ice spell effect, but using their element. They should be able to make walls, and bridges, and little huts and stuff out of earth/ice/wood/plants...

I like where you are going with this. I really like the concept of being able to increase the effect of an infusion by sinking more burn into it (like with the Pushing infusion), and I think we can use that for these more generic infusions. Here's some ideas as a starting point:

-----

Utility:
(Greater) Self Propulsion - basically a consolidated flame jet/self-telekinesis/gravity control

Kinetic Wall - basically Wall of Stone, but adapted to use different materials. Probably needs a clause that if you are making it out of non-solid materials it's more limited (Wall of Cold doesn't make much sense for building a bridge), and it it's solid, how hard it is to break it.

Infusion:
Kinetic Spray - "Fan of Flame" with all the elements, and subsume "Spray" infusion by adding "You can increase the burn cost of this infusion to increase the range by 5 feet per additional point of burn accepted."

Kinetic Explosion
Element(s) Any; Type form infusion; Level 3; Burn 2
Prerequisite(s) extended range
Associated Blasts All
Saving Throw Reflex half

You focus your energy on a point in space and create a controlled explosion. You can center the explosion anywhere within 120 feet of you, and you can choose the radius of the spread to be 5 or 10 feet. You can increase the burn cost of this infusion to increase the radius by 5 feet per additional point of burn accepted. All creatures and objects within the explosion take your blast's damage. The saving throw DC is Dexterity-based.

Amp up the Heat
Element(s) fire; Type substance infusion; Level 1; Burn 2
Associated Blasts blue flame, fire

Your flames burn hotter the more you burn. Your kinetic blast does +1 damage per d6 of damage. You can increase the burn cost of this infusion to increase the damage by an additional +1 per d6 per additional 2 points of burn accepted.

-----

That final one is to give fire some damage to compensate for stealing all their form infusions.


Good to have some free unchained kineticist stuff out there. ;)

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