So, I've talked it over with my GM. We're using 20 point buy, he's allowing Tieflings (because Hell's Rebels), and at my request he's letting me play a small-sized Tiefling (halfling instead of human). I'm using Devilspawn for +2 CON and WIS. I'm taking Negative Energy Blast at level 1, and I think my DM is going to let me use Draining Infusion to affect Undead with it.
Given all this, I'd like some advice, and I'll start by saying what my general plan right now is. I'll happily take any feat or trait suggestions you have. I'd rather stay Void for this character, at least at level 1, and I want to expand Void eventually.
My current plan is to take Void again at 7 (the Void/Void blast looks really fun) and Aether at 15 (so I can finally get a decent elemental defense). I plan to use things like Enervating Blast, Darkness Infusion, Weighing Infusion... I reckon that entangle is great defensively, as is darkness (concealment for me, but I have Darkvision so I get no penalties), and neither eats up a standard as it's part of my melee attacks. Enervation is just rude.
If I take Aether at 7, that gives me early access to its awesome defensive ability, but also to Kinetic Healer. Whatever order I take Aether/Void in, I'll have access to rudimentary flight via Gravity Control / Greater Gravity Control.
For stats, I was considering a straightforward but balanced build: 14/12/17/12/14/10. I considered 14/12/18/12/14/7 with Clever Wordplay for diplomacy, but this seems a lot to pay for 1 extra CON which will only help me in the early game (at 20 I'll have even stats all around with the first set). I think having 10 CHA is better for this campaign, as Hell's Rebels should involve a lot of city play, right? It'll make it viable to have a decent Bluff and Diplomacy.
My DM will let me use Artful Dodge to use INT for DEX and CON for INT, so I can qualify for combat feats that require DEX with CON. Not sure if that helps me.
This is a good aligned character, so as much as I like the idea of Corpse Puppet, I don't think I can reasonably take it without breaking alignment. I'm considering taking the ability that lets me summon elementals, however, so I can conjure Aether Elementals at higher levels.
I was considering Nature Soul / Animal Ally for a time, but I don't think that benefits me terribly much.
Any advice, comments, or concerns to offer?
Oh, and given the nature of this campaign, how useful would permanent non-detection be?
Absentia wrote: Element(s) void; Type utility (Sp); Level 1; Burn 0
Prerequisites emptiness
You are always under the effect of nondetection as if you had cast it on yourself. If the effect is dispelled, you can call if forth again as a standard action. You can accept 1 point of burn to grant a creature touched the effects of nondetection.
EDIT: Final aside - this character will have the Pass For Human (well, Halfling) racial trait, as well as either Light From Darkness or Soul Seer. Any suggestions as to whether I should take Light From Darkness or Soul Seer?
Artful Dodge on a kinetic knight doesn't help as much as you'd think. Aside from Redirect Attack I couldn't find any especially attractive use for it when I went looking once.
Small, not especially high str or dex, 3/4 BAB, on the front line; you may want to look at boosting your CMD somehow, or at feats like Shielded Stand. That's after toughness & probably weapon focus.
Kineticist feats like Mobile Gathering or Kinetic Invocation might be of interest.
Enervating Infusion & Darkness Infusion have the problem that you'll usually prefer a full attack to gathering power (mobile gathering may mitigate this slightly). Without gathering power you may have difficulty paying the burn cost for those plus empower/maximise & maybe kinetic whip. Also the penalties from a negative levels are not particularly large at 15th+ level and you only darken a single square with darkness infusion in melee, which you do not occupy.
I don't get Empower/Maximize I don't believe. Kinetic Knight loses Metakinesis.
Is there any way to make the Darkness Infusion cover more than just the enemy's square with Kinetic Knight? I feel like concealment is pretty key to staying alive in this situation.
Any suggestions on boosting CMD? Agile Maneuvers is a no-go. I do hope to get Improved Trip to try and knock medium sized foes around, possibly with Imposing Bearing or whatever it's called to affect Large foes too (not that I'll have much hope knocking them down). I know that Dodge, Deflection, etc. bonuses to AC also apply to CMD, so my instinct is to stack defenses ASAP.
Sadly, Kinetic Invocation would mostly grant spells I shouldn't be using as a good-aligned character, given the Void specialty. Creating undead, healing undead, etc. - those are things that push a character toward an evil alignment, and Hell's Rebels is all about fighting the bad guys, aye?
I love the look of Mobile Gathering, however.
If I'm using Kinetic Blade, do I apply my Substance infusion more than once? I.E. if I use Enervating Infusion with Kinetic Blade, I may take a full attack action with each attack potentially applying a negative level, right? (This requires me to have considerable attack bonus to be effective, obviously.)
EDIT: And odd as this may sound, would Tower Shield Proficiency be worth taking on this character? That's a flat-out +2 AC with no penalty to attack, with Shield Focus at 3 for another +1. Toughness at 5?
Tower shields give -2 attack, you'll need more than proficiency to negate that. I think there's a way but it requires multiple feats IIRC.
Yes, that's how enervating infusion works. With BAB +11/+6/+1 when you get it, it'll still take a couple of rounds to rack up major penalties and hopefully your target will be dead by then anyway.
Kinetic Invocation (void) does give you options of death ward, life channel and mind blank, and command/halt undead are more anti-undead measures. You certainly don't have to take all the powers there, just the ones that look better than the usual void wild talents at that level.
Defensive Combat Training helps CMD, and yes, dodge, deflection, luck, insight (get a dusty rose prism ioun stone), sacred etc. bonuses apply, just not armor/natural armor/shield bonuses. So would raising str/dex with items of course. Losing one of your few but very damaging attacks to trip sounds like a poor bargain BTW.
I think you'd need a non-kinetic knight archetype to cover multiple squares with darkness infusion. Delay blast might help if you can prepare the battlefield at all - have it go off on a timer, then step into the square darkened. Or you could invest heavily in UMD and use a wand of darkness perhaps.
No metakinesis? Damn. Well, it does make infusions easier to use as you point out.
Quote: Tower shields give -2 attack, you'll need more than proficiency to negate that. I think there's a way but it requires multiple feats IIRC. Not quite... That's how it was in 3.5, but according to the d20pfsrd...
Quote: You are trained in how to properly use a tower shield.
Prerequisite: Shield Proficiency.
Benefit: When you use a tower shield, the shield’s armor check penalty only applies to Strength and Dexterity-based skills.
Normal: A character using a shield with which he is not proficient takes the shield’s armor check penalty on attack rolls and on all skill checks that involve moving, including Ride.
Special: Fighters automatically have Tower Shield Proficiency as a bonus feat. They need not select it.
Meaning that by being proficient in tower shields, you do NOT get a penalty to attack rolls. Pretty nifty.
Ah, nevermind. I see where I got confused - it applies an ADDITIONAL -2 penalty to attacks. I thought Pathfinder had changed it and I'd just not noticed until now.
I'll keep the Kinetic Invocation in mind then. And I'll definitely take Defensive Combat Training!
I keep considering Combat Expertise with Threatening Defender as a trait, but that means that at levels 4+ I start taking penalties again, so that's probably a no-go. Perhaps I should just nab Dodge, then Tower Shield Proficiency at 3, then Defensive Combat Training at 5? And from there I can take Weapon Focus and Ability Focus and such.
One last silly thing I was considering was the Siegebreaker dip for 2 levels, using Pushing Infusion to knock enemies around. Increase Strength to like 16 potentially and this becomes a pretty threatening whammy. With Improved Bull Rush, Improved Overrun and Kinetic Whip, I could knock foes around (from melee range) 5 feet away, then again as they only skid 5 feet back, bull rushing and overrunning them each time. I'm not sure this is a wise idea, however, given my BAB. It'd be funny, though.
Edited the above post after realizing how I got confused.
Also, to clarify: I don't think the Siegebreaker dip is a serious choice. It's not something I plan to do. But it's a funny idea.
The -2 for tower shields isn't the ACP, which is -10.
Quote: When employing a tower shield in combat, you take a –2 penalty on attack rolls because of the shield’s encumbrance. If you weren't proficient the penalty would be -12: -10 from the ACP, -2 from the shield's own rule. With proficiency the penalty is -2. Also you can only attune to a light or heavy shield, not a tower shield, buckler, madu or any other type.
Small size, 3/4 BAB, no class attack bonus and a mediocre strength mean combat maneuvers are not your friend either on attack or defence. Funny to use them on a small character, but not especially effective. If you built towards it sure, but kinetic knight doesn't offer much to that build.
Defensive Combat Training at 5 sounds good but not the tower shield prof. And Dodge is a feat I only take if I'm building to something. Spring Attack wouldn't be impossibly weak for you BTW.
Ah, I was mostly considering Dodge for the +1 Dodge AC that applies to most situations - including CMD. It's better than Combat Expertise, at least, and applies to more things than Shield Focus would.
With that said, a serious build for this feat-wise would probably be...
1. Dodge or Toughness
3. Weapon Focus (Kinetic Blast)
5. Defensive Combat Training
7. Kinetic Invocation (void)
9. Ability Focus (Kinetic Blast)
And from there, a few other options exist. I can throw Iron Will on for +2 Will (which is a weak save for Kineticist). Nature Soul / Animal Ally / Boon Companion could help a ton if I want to ride a wolf around in battle (wolf trips foe, I smash foe for +4 attack), but that could actually limit my mobility eventually as I can't make my wolf fly with my kineticist powers. However, I probably wouldn't need Mobile Gathering or Spring Attack if I had a mount, so there's that.
I could potentially take Monstrous Companion if I went the Animal Ally route, yes? Meaning I could have a Giant Eagle or the like as a mount, or a Hippogriff, providing a fly speed after all. Note that I'm not sold on the idea of an animal companion, but this could be a good way to spend my feats. I'm open to alternative ways to spend 'em.
As far as Infusions go, it looks like Darkness is out; however, Enervating and Weighing Infusions should still be useful. I'll have Draining Infusion at 1, but I can later retrain that into something more useful.
I'm going to have Fed Up Citizen as a campaign trait, as well as something to give me Bluff as a class skill, so I'm going to try and cover Bluff/Diplomacy/Disguise. Background Skills are in, and my INT is 12, so this should be doable. Small size should help me with Stealth, which I also want to take, counter-acting the penalties I'll have for wearing heavy armor (mostly). Other skills I want to handle are Sense Motive and Perception, for probably obvious reasons, and 1 point into Acrobatics will help in the early levels (before I get flight).
Finally, Void/Void/Aether or Void/Aether/Void both seem like solid routes. I'm also considering Void/Void/Air or Void/Air/Void, as Aether doesn't provide an energy composite blast, but Air does. Thoughts?
Dodge is probably better value at low levels than Defensive Combat Training, certainly. You could reasonably leave DCT until 9th level. And they stack. You might want to find space for Mobile Gathering too.
Getting to fly via Animal Ally + Monstrous Mount/Mastery is a 5 feat chain. That's ... a lot on a class without bonus feats. If you scrapped every feat listed you'd have it online at 9th level which is OK level-wise but leaves you a bit lacking otherwise. If you kept any of those feats it'd take longer. Variant Multiclass (druid) would get you a flying mount for less feats but would require you to use non-metal armor; dragonhide exists but this could be annoying.
Aetheric Boost does exist. Not great, but it is a sort-of composite blast option. Negative Admixture on a lightning blast (or a fire blast, cold blast, or technically a positive blast) is better, true. Hmm. Negative + positive energy blasts (and the wood healer wild talent) could be funny and practical.
Thanks for taking the time to answer me here, by the by. I highly appreciate it!
What do you think of Void/Air/Aether, out of curiosity? You can Aetheric Boost Composite Blasts at 15, so I could take my negative energy lightning touch blast and apply Aetheric Boost to it. That wouldn't be a terrible source of damage - what do I lose by NOT doubling up on Void?
No animal feats is fine. VMC is out of the picture; I love the idea, but my DM hates Variant Multiclassing with a passion. He pretty much smacked me when I asked if I could be a paladin VMC barbarian. :/
1. Artful Dodge (I don't have the stats for Dodge)
3. Weapon Focus (Kinetic Blast)
5. Kinetic Invocation (void)
7. Ability Focus (Kinetic Blast)
9. Defensive Combat Training
11. Mobile Gathering
Out of curiosity: what's your stance on Combat Style feats for this sort of character? Archon Style could be nice if there are other melee characters around; I could focus on having high AC and giving them Attacks of Opportunity via Archon Justice. It's costly, though, and encourages a dip I'm not sure is a good idea. Similarly, Saving Shield is tempting.
I'm also considering the merits of Crane Style. With the Cautious Warrior combat trait, fighting defensively with Crane Style would incur a -2 attack penalty, but give me +4 Dodge AC - which, of course, applies to CMD. Not a terrible trade, but -10% chance to hit needs to be mitigated somehow. I suppose my small size helps with that, as compared to a medium creature.
I'm also considering Artful Dodge > Shield Focus > Missile Shield > Ray Shield. Wind Stance is also interesting, as it would provide Concealment just for moving, and I could be using Mobile Gathering or a flight ability at the same time. But as interesting as these feats are, they're far from necessary, and I understand that just because my character is tanky doesn't mean my character can save the party.
Any offensive feats to keep my accuracy up you'd suggest? Or items?
As an aside, I definitely plan to get Heroism by some means if the party can't provide it, and I definitely need that ioun stone that increases attack by 1. That *does* exist, right? I'm not crazy?
Archon Style is worse than Combat Reflexes + Bodyguard, Archon Justice would cost 5 feats total; it's a character-defining ability. If you want to aid your party look at teamwork feats and consult with the others, Outflank can be great for example and it costs just the one feat to you. Crane Style becomes obsolete once you get kinetic whip - threatening a large area is good enough that you will usually want to do it and you won't have a hand free then. Mostly styles are good for unarmed characters IMO.
If you can get others to get Outflank too that's a solid offensive feat. Combat Reflexes wouldn't be terrible even with Dex 12 once you get the whip. The ioun stone you're thinking of is some variety of Pale Green Prism. A Dusty Rose Prism is also worth getting, tho' not the flawed one.
No matter what you can't get every feat you want of course.
I started answering questions here to teach myself the ins and outs of PF, but then I found I enjoyed it.
My DM decided to make things 15 point buy, so in the end I had to sack my CHA. This means that my stats are 14/10/17/12/14/7.
My DM rolled for me on the alternate racial stuff for tieflings chart. He rolled a 2, so my tiefling can have All-Around Vision if I choose to give it to her. I think I will take that + Pass For Human (well, Halfling in this case). Never being flanked is REALLY good.
This is a city-based campaign that explicitly points out that certain charisma-based skills are super important, and that charisma is key for playing the rebellion management phases. In light of that, I've decided on the following:
1. Natural Born Leader (campaign trait) lets me count as having 14 Charisma for the purposes of campaign-specific mechanics. Turning my -2 into a +2 is nice.
2. Student of Philosophy gives me a solid Diplomacy and Bluff so long as I'm not gathering information or feinting.
3. Witty Repartee gives me bluff as a class skill and a +1 in it.
4. For a Drawback, I'm taking Righteous Indignation. Its penalty shouldn't be that big, and it also makes great RP fluff.
I've decided to go with the following feat setup through fifteen:
1. Artful Dodge (I don't have the stats for Dodge)
3. Weapon Focus (Kinetic Blast)
5. Kinetic Invocation (void)
7. Ability Focus (Kinetic Blast)
9. Defensive Combat Training
11. Mobile Gathering
13. Missile Shield
15. Ray Shield
HOWEVER, if there's another melee player, I may try and convince them to take Outflank and help me out that way. If that happens, I get to swap out a feat and take that.
Level one is gonna be painful. I can afford a Hide Shirt for armor, and unless I take a shield I have no proficiency with... that's it. 14 AC, 12 HP at level 1 is something I can bear, but I sincerely hope I do NOT end up being the only melee character given that. The Oracle is gonna have 20 AC, so I assume they'll do the tanking at level 1. Level 2 will be a serious upgrade.
I'll be carrying a sling and some stones as a backup ranged weapon, as I don't have access to ranged blasts. It's the cheap route to go. I reckon 10 stones is enough ammo.
Anything else you suggest?
Level 1 kineticists are amazingly gold-poor. I didn't know that until now. And no, nothing more to suggest except that you loot some gear off the first small humanoid to lose a fight to your party.
One last issue has come up...
So, you only ever get three basic forms for Blasts? Is there any way to get more? In an ideal world I'd be able to create Negative Admixture AND Gravitic Boost while taking Void twice, but it seems like I can't do that without sacrificing an extra infusion or utility talent.
Originally I wanted to do Void/Air/Void, but I have to choose between getting a 2d6 per level energy attack OR getting Gravitic Boost (2d8+2 physical > 2d6+2 physical). Aether gives me the opposite problem: I can't get 2d6 per level energy attacks if I go Void/Aether/Void.
Do you have any advice here, or a means of grabbing a fourth basic blast?
Like I suggested, Void/Wood/Void gets you both Negative Admixture and healing. That aside, you are limited to 3 basic blasts until 20th level when you get Omnikinesis. If you go Void/{any element with a energy simple blast}/Void then you get negative blast at 1st, another energy blast and Negative Admixture at 7th, gravitic blast, void blast and gravitic boost for use on those at 15th.
Sadly, the positive energy component would be useless against most enemies, so they'd ignore 1/2 my damage with that ability anyway. It's a fun idea, but not super strong.
I'm glad I'll eventually get the fourth attack though. Void/Air it is, I think. Thanks!
As a final aside: what are your thoughts on spending my 3rd level feat on Deific Obedience, assuming my character worships Iomedae? This nets me an immediate +4 to Diplomacy and Knowledge (Nobility), which is *pretty freaking big,* especially at the low levels. I end up delaying Kinetic Invocation if I do this, however, or perhaps Mobile Gathering (which may not be as useful to me as I don't get Metakinesis and have Kinetic Whip for free).
If I do this, I was strongly considering going down the Exalted route, but can you use Righteous Strike with a kinetic blast?
Iomedae's boons wrote: 2: Righteous Strike (Sp) Once per day, you can channel the effects of holy smite through your weapon. You must declare your use of this ability before you roll your attack. On a hit, the target is affected as if targeted with holy smite. But if it DOES work, declaring a holy smite attack and then WALLOPING someone with it while also doing my negative energy shenanigans could be silly. It wouldn't come up until level 16, but it could be fun.
With kinetic blade maybe not - creating the blade and using it are the same action, and it doesn't exist before that. With kinetic whip, yes it should work IMO.
Mind you, that obedience could be a problem for you. Takes an hour, remember. If you can make it work it's a worthwhile investment of a feat.
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