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I've already done a thread on this subject with the contention they aren't accurate enough, one thread later I was wrong. Starting with 18 Dex and investing 2 level up bonuses in it buying a +6 belt and Charing your elemental overflow you can hit average AC on a 5 for CR20, which by max level which isn't much investment. And there are some easy ways for more boosts cracked pale green prism is +1 for 4K weapon focus and PBS are feats worth having, it's not like they have a load of feats they need anyway. Said boosts put you at a2 to hit average AC and you can boost it further with manuals.
They are slightly top heavy if you go physical blast at level 1 but basically if you're missing a lot you probably did something wrong, if an archer has 16 Dex and doesn't get precise shot they're in a worse place than a kineticts with the same stats because they can go touch AC. We would probably suggest said archer was pretty poorly built. Same goes for the kineticts.
If you don't invest stats, money, feats or class features into being accurate you will miss. If you do you won't, same as every other class.
Focused Blast was not mentioned at all here for some reason.
I've already done a thread on this subject with the contention they aren't accurate enough, one thread later I was wrong. Starting with 18 Dex and investing 2 level up bonuses in it buying a +6 belt and Charing your elemental overflow you can hit average AC on a 5 for CR20, which by max level which isn't much investment. And there are some easy ways for more boosts cracked pale green prism is +1 for 4K weapon focus and PBS are feats worth having, it's not like they have a load of feats they need anyway. Said boosts put you at a2 to hit average AC and you can boost it further with manuals.
They are slightly top heavy if you go physical blast at level 1 but basically if you're missing a lot you probably did something wrong, if an archer has 16 Dex and doesn't get precise shot they're in a worse place than a kineticts with the same stats because they can go touch AC. We would probably suggest said archer was pretty poorly built. Same goes for the kineticts.
If you don't invest stats, money, feats or class features into being accurate you will miss. If you do you won't, same as every other class.
The archer can get +5 bonus on the weapon to hit, and has access to the same stuff as well as bracers of archery. The Kineticist gets stacking stat buffs from overflow which offsets some of the equipment advantage an archer has.
The reason they feel so different is iterative attacks - the ranger in my game can put out 6 arrows in a round (at level 15) and the first three are at +20 to hit. That means 5 attack rolls (manyshot is a single roll for two arrows) and 5 chances to crit and if a couple miss then no biggie. The Kineticist has a single roll - if you miss you miss - crits are few and far between. The class just plays differently.
They are less accurate than other class, BUT that is okay because other classes need to over-inflate their attack rolls to have iterative attacks hit. If you do one big hit you don't need over-inflated accuracy, you just need enough accuracy.
Example, a lv20 paladin smiting should not be satisfied with his first attack needing a 2 to hit, but should be looking at his second or maybe 3rd attack needing a 2 to hit. Thus if the enemies AC is 40, his attack bonus should be like +48, letting his 3rd attack hit on a 2.
A kineticist doing one big hit just needs his first attack to hit on a 2, so he only needs +38 to hit to always hit the enemy. So yes, the kineticist is down +10 on it's accuracy, but he still only needs a 2 to hit.
The main issue I hear from your story is you built an "archer" but didn't have the best stats for an archer, nor did you have the archer feats, thus you had a bad archer.
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If you use a physical blast, you have the same problem as archers: It's hard to call yourself a dedicated ranged attacker with a straight face before you have Precise Shot. You need that feat at level 3 at the latest.
Considering Physical blasts and their higher damage output, you can afford to have slightly higher Dex at the cost of slightly lower Con. I'm a fan of a 18/16 split, myself. Assuming a race with a bonus to Dex (or Human) of course.
Noo.... still nobody adding Focused Blast to their calculations.
C'mon, fellas, they SPECIFICALLY created that to handle:
1. Physical blast accuracy
2. Physical blast DR bypassing.
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I suspect people aren't talking about it because I just googled focused blast and got a WOW spell xD
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Element universal; Type form infusion; Level 2; Burn 2
Associated Blasts any; Saving Throw none
You focus your blast in a concentrated attack. You gain a
+1 enhancement bonus on your attack roll with the blast and
your caster level check to overcome spell resistance. You can
increase the burn cost of this infusion by 2 to increase the
enhancement bonus by 1, to a maximum of +5 for 10 burn. You
can reduce your blast’s total damage by half to reduce the burn
cost of this infusion by half as well.
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Noo.... still nobody adding Focused Blast to their calculations.
C'mon, fellas, they SPECIFICALLY created that to handle:
1. Physical blast accuracy
2. Physical blast DR bypassing.
Not an actually magically enhanced weapon, so I don't think it does anything about DR bypassing. It does help accuracy. The reason it's not talked about is it's from a new book that most probably don't know about, and it's at a higher level than the OP's 1 example build and that no one is really doing any sort of actual calculations.
I feel like elemental overflow is their version of an enhancement bonus it's a +6/12 to hit and damage and if you go all in on Dex and it's +9/14(13 for energy blasts).
Given they're an incredibly SAD a built in +9 to accuracy on what can be a touch attack is pretty decent.
Honestly you should be hitting like 32-35 to hit pretty easily and much more cheaply than most other classes by the end of the game which is as good as you need, and if you're still struggling you can hit touch....
Most 3/4+ classes have a similar feature though, and they stack a +5 weapon bonus on top of it. Kineticists get a very nice damage boost with their accuracy true, but they normally get one hit per round so that damage only comes in once compared to another class that might only get 2/3 of the damage boost but will have far more attacks per round that carry that bonus.I feel like elemental overflow is their version of an enhancement bonus it's a +6/12 to hit and damage and if you go all in on Dex and it's +9/14(13 for energy blasts).
Given they're an incredibly SAD a built in +9 to accuracy on what can be a touch attack is pretty decent.
Honestly you should be hitting like 32-35 to hit pretty easily and much more cheaply than most other classes by the end of the game which is as good as you need, and if you're still struggling you can hit touch....
Yep, and if you start with a physical blast it's a rough climb until you start seeing the bulk of those bonuses. When I tried it it was quite painful.
Focused Blast was not mentioned at all here for some reason.
Because the burn cost is hideously high...
I would be hesitant to start with a physical blast unless I was playing a knight or was a human, and yes 3/4 BAB classes will have accuracy boosters but not to such a degree and in some cases they don't really get them at all. Deducting the would be enhancement bonus it's a +4/+9 to hit and damage from class featureswhich isn't bad it's no inquisitor with their +7/+6+4D6 and another +8/+6 with spells but then it's better then some classes and pivitially good enough to hit reliably. Also you didn't have to buy a weapon, get kinetic blade and weapon finesse and you can full attack too
That Focused Blast has to be some kind of joke. Don't get me wrong, I understand the choice to make it a Form infusion - the additional attack bonus on iteratives could unbalance Kinetic Blade and Whip - but that burn cost is absurd. Out of curiosity, which book was that from?
The main issue I hear from your story is you built an "archer" but didn't have the best stats for an archer, nor did you have the archer feats, thus you had a bad archer.
The difference is that the archer doesn't have to wring out every bonus to get up to average. You got other 'archers', they can pick up a magic weapon then use a class ability to boost again. Maybe you're a warpriest and you cast divine favor, an archeologist bard that uses luck, a bolt ace that's making his attack touch... THEN you remember, that all of those 'archers' also can get free feats they can use to back up their archery so they subsidize your ranged attacks.
So the kineticist out of the gate is lagging significantly behind the archer. Once you get high enough with a touch attack it's not so bad but it's getting there that's an issue.
I would be hesitant to start with a physical blast unless I was playing a knight or was a human, and yes 3/4 BAB classes will have accuracy boosters but not to such a degree and in some cases they don't really get them at all.
From 1st, take a warpriest with divine favor [plus trait], archeologist with luck [plus trait], an inquisitor with judgment [and maybe divine favor & trait], hunter [aspect of the falcon, tiger focus], ... If you take a 3/4 class as an 'archer' there is an option for a substantial boost, either in feats, accuracy boosters or both. Kineticists lack options like that.
Also you didn't have to buy a weapon, get kinetic blade and weapon finesse and you can full attack too.
We're getting into a LOT of feats for a class that doesn't get bonus ones. archery feats, finesse feats, hp boosters... You want melee, you push off ranged, want ranged and you push off melee and both push off hp ones. granted at high level you can pick them up but it's getting there that can be a problem.
That Focused Blast has to be some kind of joke. Don't get me wrong, I understand the choice to make it a Form infusion - the additional attack bonus on iteratives could unbalance Kinetic Blade and Whip - but that burn cost is absurd. Out of curiosity, which book was that from?
Psychic Anthology. At 1/increase I'd have to think twice at using it. 2 per increase? Yeah, that's on the 'never use' list.
Most kineticists will have a touch attack by level 7. As the level goes up, touch attack rarely keeps up. You need to worry about SR and energy resistance, but that's why you have multiple types of blast.
Most kineticists will have a touch attack by level 7. As the level goes up, touch attack rarely keeps up. You need to worry about SR and energy resistance, but that's why you have multiple types of blast.
I think people are taking into account those levels from 1 to 6: being awesome at 7th doesn't change 1-6 being less than optimal and it removes lots of options.
On touch attacks: most times they drop, not go up: they just keep getting lower.
The difference is that the archer doesn't have to wring out every bonus to get up to average.
Except for them them average is plenty because they never have to worry about landing iterative attacks, yeah a inquisitor can hit 40+ at LV20 where as a kineticts is more likely to hit 35 but th per are both still hitting on a 2 so what the problem?
You got other 'archers', they can pick up a magic weapon then use a class ability to boost again. Maybe you're a warpriest and you cast divine favor, an archeologist bard that uses luck, a bolt ace that's making his attack touch... THEN you remember, that all of those 'archers' also can get free feats they can use to back up their archery so they subsidize your ranged attacks.
They can pick up a magic weapon at level 4 at the earliest elemental overload comes online at level 3, and you talk about the bolt Ace making his attacks against touch as if Kineticts can't choose to do the exact same thing. You don't pick the accuracy boosting option then complain about lack of accuracy ...
The Kineticts needs exactly 2 feats to function point blank shot and precise shot, other archers want PBS, precise shot, rapid shot, many shot, cluster shot and deadly aim and not all 3/4 classes do get bonus feats like that, inquisitors for example, or occultist or spiritualists or Mesmerist.
So the kineticist out of the gate is lagging significantly behind the archer. Once you get high enough with a touch attack it's not so bad but it's getting there that's an issue.
Except they can and should pick up exactly the same accuracy booster as the one you mentioned for bolt ace ...
From 1st, take a warpriest with divine favor [plus trait], archeologist with luck [plus trait], an inquisitor with judgment [and maybe divine favor & trait], hunter [aspect of the falcon, tiger focus], ... If you take a 3/4 class as an 'archer' there is an option for a substantial boost, either in feats, accuracy boosters or both. Kineticists lack options like that.
The inquisitor and the war priest are the two best archers in the game according to a recent thread so saying look a Kineticts isn't as good as them is like complaining about melee classes that are worse than rage lance pounce barbs.
Also Kineticts does have an option for a substantial boost from level one it's called energy Blast so what you're saying is patently not true.
Also Occultist, Mesmerist, Spiritualists do not have accuracy boosters like the ones you listed above just to show not all 3/4 classes do. Also you talk about inquisitors judgements at the levels before inquisitors have precise shot, which are the same levels Kineticts don't have it, their judgement is a +1 to hit once per day how is that more significant than, targets touch AC all day, which is the Kineticts boost?
It's like I said if you don't pick the accuracy boosting options you will miss.
We're getting into a LOT of feats for a class that doesn't get bonus ones. archery feats, finesse feats, hp boosters... You want melee, you push off ranged, want ranged and you push off melee and both push off hp ones. granted at high level you can pick them up but it's getting there that can be a problem.
By a lot you mean 4 right? Yeah being a bit disingenuous there. PBS, precise shot, weapon finesse. There Kineticts is now full functioning melee and ranged combatant an inquisitor can't do that. Because the Kineticts is sad it's accuracy comes from Dex and it's damage from Con and it needs literally nothing else except maybe decent wis to sure up will. Mean while an inquisitor wants wisdom to cast, con for hit points, Dex for accuracy and strenght for damage. Result at the first levels of play where accuracy is the biggest problem, lower static damage boost(0 unless they start with composite or buff turn one), less accurate (if the Kineticts takes an energy Blast), less hit points, and can't function in melee, meanwhile the Kineticts is perfectly happy both in melee and at range by level 5. Although inquisitors do gain the ability to nova at level 5.
That's not to mention inquisitors have to contrive a way to a longbow either through worship, a trait or a race, all resources they have but never the less, ones they must spend.
Kineticts literally only ever want 5 feats through their whole career PBS, precise shot, Improved precise shot, toughness and weapon finess. That's it they're done and they don't want weapon finess till 5 because Kinetictic blade burns them before then and they can't pick up IPS until like level 15. That means the feat slots at 9/11/13/17/19 are always free for them to do whatever they want with. I suggest weapon focus if you're struggling with accuracy but my Kineticts didn't take it because it was never a problem, just use overflow and start with an energy Blast and you are done.
It's kinda unfair to pick some of THE BEST 3/4 classes to boost accuracy, and not care that some of the buffing going on takes a round to buff with, and then compare that to a kineticist and complain about that difference.
(also bab at 6 is 4, not 3.)
4 bab + 2 overflow+1 size +1 belt +1 PBS +4 dex does still get the 13, since you overvalued the size bonus. But if you're wanting accuracy you pick a touch one and that's +13 against touch. also by lv6 you can probably afford the ioun stone of accuracy for +1, now you're at 14. If the party gets a haste that you're factoring in for magus that puts you at 15. Being small gives another +1 for 16 for some. Also they can take WF too instead of toughness if you're worried about accuracy putting you to 17.
And now lets compare to some other 3/4 classes.
Cleric is at bab 4, str4 belt1 weapon1 DF2 for +12. and spent a round to buff.
Hunter is at bab4, dex4, animal focus1, weapon1, pbs1 for +11
Druid is at bab4 str4 belt1 wild shape +2-1, AoMF1 for +11
How about a full bab?
fighter is at bab6, str4, belt1, weapon1, wf1, wt1 for +14
fighter is at bab6, dex4, belt1, weapon1, wf1, wt1, pbs1, rapid-2 for +13.
Oh look, when we don't compare it to THE VERY BEST OPTIONS, but normal options it suddenly looks quite reasonable. your example build is just at -1 to a fighter and is over these 3/4 bab classes.
And yes, if you miss you're damage is 0, but when you hit your damage is really big. So your DPR is probably like the same, it just has a different convention. Rather than attacking many times and stacking up damage in small chunks, you miss and then hit and have caught right up in damage.
I'd suggest Weapon Finesse over toughness, you have infusion specialization which means the majority of the time you won't be taking burn, you can gather for empower and still do ranged or blade for 0 burn. So actually taking that build the Kineticist can operate at any range.
The recommended armor class according to monster creation guides is 19 for CR 6 so your to hit is 70%.
Kineticists are using exactly no burn to do this so the magus using Arcane pool will run out of resources first. For a the Inquisitor to pull that off they have to spend a turn buffing and use turns of bane which they have exactly 6 turns of and only 2 judgments a day. So the Inquisitor is legitimately novaing.
also by level 6 a Kineticist should have a cracked pale green prism Ioun stone in my opinion, what the f$*@ else are they gonna buy xD.
so 14 to hit 75% to hit. If they go touch they're hitting on a 2 most of the time and the damage drop off is not that big. My kineticist started with 17 CON (+1 at 4) and energy. His normal damage at 6 was 3D6+8 (with pbs) if he had had a physical blast it would have been 3D6+13.
obviously the gap widens with with empower (by 2) but even so I would take the slight damage hit for the massive accuracy boost although this is admittedly more prominent at levels 1-3, unless you play human, then its kind of a wash.
Most kineticists will have a touch attack by level 7. As the level goes up, touch attack rarely keeps up. You need to worry about SR and energy resistance, but that's why you have multiple types of blast.This option ignores half of the simple blasts in the game and all but.. . umm, two? maybe three composite blasts? The answer to accuracy is not 80% of the class options are trap options.
At levels 1/6 6 out of ten blasts are physical. After level seven, then you have the option of two blasts. If you chose two physical blasts, then I would expect you to take that into consideration when making your character and build to focus heavily on dex. I expect that many people will mix a physical and energy blast to be able to switch between damage and accuracy as needed.
Kineticists are a "one big attack" class. They get one shot, but the damage for that shot scales up more than most other attacks. It's not as accurate, but you are almost always at full effect.
If that is not the type of class you want to play, then don't play that class. Complaining that you don't have the accuracy of an archer who doesn't even get a full stat bonus to damage without paying for the privilege is sort of pointless.
Where is this fallacy that 80% of the class is being ignored if you take any energy Blast 4 of the simple blasts are energy and 6 are physics, it's as close as it can be without being 50/50
Furthermore from level 6 we've shown you should have a 75% chance to hit on CR creatures with physical so pick energy at one physical at 7 and swap between them depending on which fits the enemy better no-one is saying ignore physical.
man, I had a post that was eaten.
Yes, we should use other classes stuff, that's fine, hence why I used the fighter feats and WT, and hunter's focus, and DF for the cleric. But the magus and inquisitor are classes that easily outpace most full-bab classes for accuracy and damage. So comparing to them you look bad, compare yourself to the full fighter and you're right on track with him. Only the top 3/4 classes are pulling out more accuracy, compared to most of the others the kineticst is ahead or equal.
Mulitple hits don't matter. If a kineticist takes 3 rounds cause he missed once and some other archer is hitting some every round but takes 3 rounds then they are the same-ish DPR.
If a barb is fighting someone with 100hp and deals 35 damage a hit, if you deal 25 damage before his third turn you've not actually helped him take the baddie down as it still took 3 turns.
The kineticist is a different paradigm, 1 big hit for a full attack vs lots of littler hits adding up. SO if you care about how often you land a hit then it loses cause it's making less attacks, if you care about how much you are helping in combat then DPR can tell you if you're doing okay.
Also who cares if the fighter is making 2 attacks or if the cleric will be making 2 in a few levels, you've been making a full attack worth of DPR since lv5 when you could empower blasts every round.
Playing a kineticist is playing a different game than normal. Your DPR is big hits that are pretty likely to hit rather than a hit that will always hit, a hit that might hit, and a hit that rarely hits. This is very much enough to cause one to not like the style of the class.
Most kineticists will have a touch attack by level 7.
I don't know about "most" but when you start getting up there around the level range where you get your 2nd element, you start getting access to those AoE infusions that hit saves and not AC.
But I think the biggest mistake a lot of people make with Kineticists is that this is really not a very good class if you insist on "balanced stats" in a point buy. A physical blasting kineticist starting with a dual-talent human with 19 in Dex and Con isn't all that out of bounds, honestly. If you had more accuracy fixes, you might not need to get Dex quite as high, but that runs the risk of making you SAD and CON-dependent.
In practice you're akin to the Arcanist or Psychic in that you really want to get two stats really high, and the rest don't matter except defensively.
Isn't bullseye shot also an option to improve the physical blasts? It would take your move action, subjecting you to burn, but if you just need to hit then the +4 attack is nice.
Or, is this feat not compatible for some reason?
Yeah an empowered Energy blast is almost always going to be better (and more accurate) than a none empowered physical blast and since you can't get it till 7 its very unlikely to ever come up since by then you really should have one of each.
I wonder how useful constitution really is to your damage. It seems pretty big at level 1, but when you're rolling 3d6+3+con for damage, that bonus from constitution doesn't seem to be adding a whole lot. I'm not saying to dump it, but it looks like a very secondary concern compared to dexterity.
I wonder how useful constitution really is to your damage. It seems pretty big at level 1, but when you're rolling 3d6+3+con for damage, that bonus from constitution doesn't seem to be adding a whole lot. I'm not saying to dump it, but it looks like a very secondary concern compared to dexterity.
It's pretty handy as a means to enable you to walk around with more burn without risking death from a slight breeze. You're going to spend most of your life within charge range and for accuracy reasons you're going to be sinking an increasing amount of burn to top off your elemental overflow.
You're still going to want it high, but for physical blasters prioritizing dexterity might be more sensible. Though since you have little need for other stats, why not both?
It dictates some DCs but more importantly how much burn you can take.
By level 20 realistically on an empowered blast it's bringing 15 damage, so yeah not that big a deal for damage.