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Oh, I've seen a few melee going into whip builds. Just that most I've seen stay at range, and the melee are doing melee and not getting off ranged attacks.Yeah, you can turn any kineticist into a melee capable one at level 9 through 2 wild talents (kinetic blade and whip) and 2 feats (weapon finesse and combat reflexes). Ideally you will have 1 or 2 of the good elemental defenses (aether, earth, water) and you may want to take Kinetic Form later (it honestly doesn't really do anything useful before Kinetic Whip though.)
Before then, you just stay out of melee range, using Kinetic Blade for those situations where you end up there anywhay and can't 5' step and blast (remember, even if it seems like it really ought to, gathering power does *not* provoke AoOs.)
Some of this may change with the Kinetic Knight though.
I must disagree. I've been getting in close to bring down water's wrath since I dropped out of the Houses of Perfection to join the Pathfinders. You don't need anything but a little finesse and the patience to gather energy before striking. The elements hit harder than most small folk can with weapons, even early on.