Trast-9000's page

If a 3/4 BAB class is doing great, I have to wonder if I need to reconsider my 2nd element for my Kinetic Knight. I was planning on going Aether into something with a touch attack so I can hit with iteratives, but all of the choices have problems.

If I go Water for Cold (and shimmering mirage), frost giants will be immune.
If I go Air for Lightning (and Wings of Air), storm giants will be immune.
If I go Fire for Fire, Fire Giants will be immune.

Even though void is lacking in utility I guess I could pick a negative energy blast and just hope I don't run into a lot of undead, since I can use that against all the giants. Plus centering "Darkness" on people you hit might be fun since Giants don't have Darkvision usually.

Or if hitting more than once with a bunch of 3/4 BAB attacks isn't a big deal, I might not need a touch attack.

The adventure path could shake things up but you are a lot more likely to be fighting the normally evil Frost and Fire giants than you are the good Storm Giants.

Air seems like the best choice in element and utility. Flight is likely to be invaluable in a campaign that has you travel through mountains, it also couples well with the sneak element. Airs basic power hinders scent and magical flight means no footsteps.

VS metamagic rods/feats: empower, maximize & extended range(s) are already baked into the class, so skip those too. Note that there was a thread on Kineticists during the playtest that ran hundreds of posts, so the devs (principly John Compton) got a lot of feedback. So, generally speaking, the class does not need to be tweaked.

That is no more the equivalent of a metamagic rod than a metamagic feat, unlike the rod, the feat and metamagic are not a boost, they require you pay the difference in either burn or higher level spell slots.

But it seems there is a rod equivalent, a really poorly designed one. It maximises blasts but costs the same as a greater maximise rod. I understand why they did this but it borders on useless, something that almost no game will reach high enough level to afford and even if they did they are unlikely to buy this.

A better way of mimicking it would have been to have had rods that are restricted based on the amount of infusions and such being applied to the blast.

If it helps anyone I'm going to try and give a rundown of how good (or bad is often the cast) some of the new material is.

A few missed archetypes for now

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Aquakineticist: Blue/Yellow

Basic Aquakinesis- It's altered so that instead of being able to create water you are able to alter your characters bouyancy while retaining the ability to make mild currents, a minor situational upgrade but I would advise that you make sure another player takes create water, this is the sort of thing some DM's may take note of to later bite you in the ass with and as this archetype is best for aquatic campaigns fresh water could be an issue.

Call of the deep- An excellent ability, it gives you the 3rd level waterdancer utility in place of your first level utility and the 4th level watersense in place of your 3rd which frees up those higher level slots for other options.

Oceans caress - In place of the standard water defence ability from second level onwards you are given the permanent ability to breathe underwater (something that normally requires a 5th level utility) as well as a much improved version of the cold adaption utility, although the standard water bonus is very nice (a kineticist is still capable of wearing armor and a masterwork buckler without issue to compensate) this ability is invaluable in underwater campaigns, I've often found that the ability to breath underwater was heavily delayed only gaining it at 10th level, this gives it to you from the 2nd level and frees up a 5th level utility slot.

Ice Propagation - a straight bonus, when underwater you have the choice of treating your cold simple blast as if it is physical with the added bonus of being allowed to apply to an ice blast.

Overview - for someone playing a pure water kineticist in an aquatic campaign it's an exceptional choice with the only competition being the Terrakineticist. It frees up a lot of mid level utility slots for abilities you would normally be obligated to take to survive underwater, it's major downside or course being that it locks you into being pure water limiting your options for games that go far into the teens but as most games don't go on that long it's fantastic. Just to point out that the 2nd level slot is open for the invaluable silent image kinetic invocation option.

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Arakineticist: Red

Accursed shadow - Replaces the 4th level utility for a scaling save bonus against necromancy and death effects. Although the overall bonus becomes hefty it is still situational and a bit redundant for a class that will already have incredibly high fort saves.

Curse spinner - Tthe 6th and 8th utilities are removed, one for the extremely situational ability to remove curses and the other to use bestow curse as spell like abilities, what makes it particularly bad is that both require burn.

Accursed infusion - At 13th level you gain this infusion that can apply a large penalty to opponents for one round on a failed will save, not bad, the penalties are substantial and as it's part of a blast the DC scales well. The burn cost is hefty so unless you want to take burn you won't be applying it to anything but basic blasts until level 14.

This archetype is weak but worst of all it's boring, locking you out of all but your first utility until level 10 and replacing them with abilities you will rarely get any use out of, void is one of the less interesting elements but you will still look on in envy of the other void kineticist flying around with gravity control. The 13th level ability is decent but it's too little too late.

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Blightburner: ?

This archetype is based around a campaign specific mechanic radiation that I know little about.

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Blighted defiler: yellow to red.

Steal Power - The main ability of the archetype can at times be a nice power boost. The ability requires that you drain life from the surrounding area, this has no real positive or negative mechanical effects in combat (a generous GM may grant it the ability to instantly kill swarms) but it can have potentially harsh roleplaying consequences (dependent on GM and the story, you will not be partnering with any Druids or Paladins). This can allow you to heal but more importantly you can use it to further increase the cost of blasts or even utility talents. The strength of this ability is heavily dependent on how much you travel as it requires a months before you can use it again in the same area, if you often fight in the same areas or barren landscapes it's close to worthless.

Elemental might - class abilities that are keyed off constitution are now keyed off of strength. This is a downgrade, although you aren't as dependent on constitution to fuel burn costs you gain very little from having a high strength score although certain builds could make this work, a kineticist the wields 2 handed weapons and uses the infusion that channels elemental damage for instance.

Life buffer - a downgrade from internal. Internal buffer let the player refill it simply by paying into it the day before. This requires the player seek out healthy terrain to refill the buffer.

Stolen strength - this archetype does not give the player the size bonuses a player would normally acquire by using burn, instead the player must use steal life a number of times before they receive them meaning unlike a normal kineticist they will almost never start the days combat with them without a lot of effort. Finally, this archetype loses can never gain the 2nd level defensive utilities.

Overview- overall a weak and awkward archetype that has some potential but it requires work and one that you should take up with your GM if you ever consider trying it.

JiCi wrote:

They can't use Metamagic Rods or even Metamagic Feats.

Well, Expanded Metakinesis gets you access to Disruptive, Ectoplasmic, Furious, Merciful, and Piercing. It's just those aren't the ones people want (people want Dazing).

But those again still depend on resources, in this case your characters health.

It is not directly comparing the power of the metamagic feats but that the caster has metamagic rods, essentially money for resources, the kineticist does not have this option.

Would being able to pay for an extra +3 to hit and damage at level 11 break the kineticist? That's the important question.

So Trast, I guess you aren't actually asking "would giving kineticists items that boost their blast be imbalanced?" You've already decided that kineticists need items.

You compared the damaging abilities of a kineticist with full casters and what was essentially the warrior npc class. So do not try to spin this.

You're even aware that you used a class without modifiers, what was the point? you are aware that is a terrible representation of any character in combat.

Trast-9000 wrote:

The 5th and 11th boost is the classes attempt to mimic attack progression. 7th level is not a major boost, permanently weakening yourself for the day to gain extra damage is counter-intuitive.

7th is when you get Expanded Element (composite blasts). I'm not sure what you mean by "permanently weakening yourself for the day." Elemental Overflow?

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I said I wasn't comparing them with casters, casters have utility, there primary purpose is not damage but the sad thing is they do not actually beat casters made to be blasters. Even without using the dual archetype they can take safe options that at 11th level let them do 12d6 + 20 damage, that's with an archetype, feat and blood thing and surely other feats to enhance it.

If you don't want to compare them to casters, that's fine. My original point stands that a non-archetyped, plain old kineticist is better than a blaster caster. Mainly because that 12d6+10 (or more) the kineticist puts out is ALL DAY LONG. Not limited by spell slots.

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But then casters also have METAMAGIC RODS, items, for 9'000 they slotlessly increase the damage they deal by 50%.

For one point of burn the kineticist increases the damage done by 50%. They also have options for maximize and quicken.

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Then evem further casters have the ability to use the dazzing feat which far surpasses any of the riders kineticists can attach to a blast.

That's a matter of opinion. In this case, I happen to agree with that opinion :) (Although the three spell level bump does hurt.)

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It also makes no sense for you to compare the kineticists single blast with any melee class when the blast requires a full around and is should be compared to other ranged attackers

But the first post of the thread compared them to "Magus, Inquisitor, Skald, Paladin, Bloodrager, Monk, Druid..."

And the blast doesn't require a full round, it's just usually better to gather power and use a composite blast than take burn....

1.This should have been obvious, using composite at 7th requires burn which weakens you for the day.

2. A point that means nothing, there was no reason to compare them with casters other than false comparisons and as I pointed out, still does better damage, if we where to compare optimised, it would be no contest, the blaster sorcerer/wizard has options. I mean if you go the battering blast build it breaks the scaling formula with the intense feat

3. Awful for the same reason as in step 1, it brings the class closer to the grave, if they had some magical item equivalent it would be the same and I wouldn't have an issue. It also far easier for a blaster to quicken.

4. I question your judgement if you think that's a matter of opinion. The dazzing metamagic is infamously potent. Kineticist blast riders tend to be extremely weak, as if paizo fears giving them any good save or suck effects. I mean the best is probably being blind for a round.

5. Your choice of comparison is a ranger without factoring in spells or favored enemy in effect, that's barely above comparing it with the warrior npc class or other magic items and affects that exist for weapon users.

Surely you must realise the issue if you need to use awful choices to make it look good.

Trast-9000 wrote:

Belafon wrote:

It really depends on how you define the kineticist. You compare it to a bunch of (mainly melee) classes dealing damage with a natural or manufactured weapon. (Usually boosted by class features, but still attacking with a weapon.)

I'd define the kineticist as being closer to a blaster/ray-attacking caster. Compared to those, the kineticist has about the same amount of items that can boost attacks.

And overall, the Elemental Overflow class feature really does make it "even out." +1attack/+2damage every three levels, plus size increases to physical scores. Kineticists hit A LOT and do pretty good damage. Most importantly, they do it consistently for long periods of time. Adding an AoMF-type item would make them even better than they currently are.

Oh I definitely wouldn't compare them to ray casters who have vastly superior utility.

That's why I tried to compare them with other classes that have similar utility but also have a damage focus.

A lot of damage compared to a wizard casting a ray spell or the classes I listed?

Both.

One thing that makes it difficult to compare kineticists to other classes is that they make huge jumps in power at certain levels, while most other classes are more gradual. 5th, 7th, and especially 11th are all major upgrade levels for kineticists.

At 11th level, a kineticist can fling out one ranged touch attack a round doing at least 12d6+10 damage, with 3 additional points of infusions, FOREVER. Because their abilities mitigate all the burn they would take from that. If they are willing and able to take burn, they can do even more. That's with just the base class features.

So they easily beat any blaster caster (from a damage-dealing viewpoint, not from pure utility). It's pretty close to the damage a full-attacking melee PC is going to do as well, even with the items the melee PC has. Except for a few builds/situations, the kineticist beats almost any melee who only gets a single attack...

The 5th and 11th boost is the classes attempt to mimic attack progression. 7th level is not a major boost, permanently weakening yourself for the day to gain extra damage is counter-intuitive.

I said I wasn't comparing them with casters, casters have utility, there primary purpose is not damage but the sad thing is they do not actually beat casters made to be blasters. Even without using the dual archetype they can take safe options that at 11th level let them do 12d6 + 20 damage, that's with an archetype, feat and blood thing and surely other feats to enhance it.

But then casters also have METAMAGIC RODS, items, for 9'000 they slotlessly increase the damage they deal by 50%.

Then evem further casters have the ability to use the dazzing feat which far surpasses any of the riders kineticists can attach to a blast.

It also makes no sense for you to compare the kineticists single blast with any melee class when the blast requires a full around and is should be compared to other ranged attackers

It really depends on how you define the kineticist. You compare it to a bunch of (mainly melee) classes dealing damage with a natural or manufactured weapon. (Usually boosted by class features, but still attacking with a weapon.)

I'd define the kineticist as being closer to a blaster/ray-attacking caster. Compared to those, the kineticist has about the same amount of items that can boost attacks.

And overall, the Elemental Overflow class feature really does make it "even out." +1attack/+2damage every three levels, plus size increases to physical scores. Kineticists hit A LOT and do pretty good damage. Most importantly, they do it consistently for long periods of time. Adding an AoMF-type item would make them even better than they currently are.

Oh I definitely wouldn't compare them to ray casters who have vastly superior utility.

That's why I tried to compare them with other classes that have similar utility but also have a damage focus.

A lot of damage compared to a wizard casting a ray spell or the classes I listed?

At the moment if you have kineticist on one hand and a Magus, Inquisitor, Skald, Paladin, Bloodrager, Monk, Druid etc, on the other. If the party was deprived of being able to magically enhance their attacks with items it would be a huge penalty to the latter classes but have no affect on the kineticist.

Now I believe the idea is that the kineticist is suppose to have this sort of feature baked into the class but does it equal out, almost all of the described classes have boosting methods baked into the class as well.

So the question is simple. If an item existed, similar to say the Amulet of mighty fists for monks that worked for the kineticist, would it be imbalanced or would it just help for a class that seems to have a dire lack of item support?

For race it more or less balances out between Hobgoblin and Gnome so pick what you feel would be the more interesting, personally gnomes just don't jive with me but it may be different for you.

Now on to mechanics.

Now for wizard I think people don't realize how limiting playing a wizard can be, especially for the first 10 or so levels, you can lay down powerful spells but you are a very resources conscious class and a water kineticist will be better than a wizard for most of skull and shackles with the water manipulator quirk alone, at will control water but better will be invaluable in this campaign, faster boat speed by creating a constant water ramp and the ability to just shut down enemy ships. You will never not be useless in combat with at will blasts as well.

I recommend playing water primary, air secondary, yes water gets a form of flight but it's a weak version that limits your actions, you fly like a bird with air.

With air you can also take the air reach utility power, normally having extreme reach is of limited use in pathfinder but in skull and shackles with extreme range you can snipe the enemy on ships at nearly a 1'000 feet away and when you get ride the blast you can teleport at will at that range.