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Honestly that's fair AnimatedPaper. I can honestly see a few classes that could potentially fit that. But if I am understand it right you want something closer to a proper word caster than a kineticist.
I’m honestly a little curious what you think would meet my minimum requirement of “full caster proficiency to legendary” and “no daily resources”. But to answer your question, no, not a wordcaster.
I would be sad if the various infusion talents did not make a transition, and I think they could be balanced on an encounter or at-will level instead of needing daily expenditures of burn to power it. That’s what I meant by moddable; I see kinetic blast as a focus cantrip that gets empowered by class feats, some kind of Unleash mechanic (that gives a free boost while active, balanced by a drawback like an oracle curse), and your choice of elements.
I know you don’t want to see kinetic blast the same as me, and I understand your reasons without sharing your reasoning. It’s all good though; I’m not trying to convince you, only sharing what I mean when I’m describing what I’d like.
For me my dream version of the Kineticist would involve some form of stance swapping, something like being able to switch stances for free once per turn after Striking or using a spell like ability. They would also have focus spells that can be amped by taking burn, reducing max and current HP by a fixed amount.
So something like:
Round 1, combat starts, enemies are afar: 1st action, Stance that empowers attacks from a distance (could be just more range); 2nd action, Focus spell that makes an empowered strike using the stats of one of your focus cantrips which inflicts a mobility debuff and in case you take burn, it increases the damage dealt and the strength of the debuff; 3rd action, Strike; Free action, switch to a defensive Stance (something like incresed defensive stats but less damage per attack).
Round 2, enemies start closing in: 1st action, Strike; 2nd and 3rd actions, buff with daily uses/focus spell that deals recoil damage to melee attackers; Free action, Swap stance to melee only focus cantrips that have increased damage die.
Round 3, enemies closed the distance and one of them was debuffed by other PC: 1st action, stride into flanking position; 2nd action, Focus spell that deals the same damage a focus cantrip strike would do but forces a save instead and deals increased damage when taking burn and inflicts small persistent damage on a failure; 3rd action, Strike; Free action, switch to a defensive stance.
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This thread is really making me realize that I'm not likely to get the feeling I'm hoping for. I currently play a elemental sorc, one of the best blasters in the game, and against bosses and such it doesn't blast all that well (better to go the debuff route and let martials do their thing). And it is likely that a kineticist blast will be pretty far behind a focus spell like elemental blast or dragon breath.
It pains me to say it but maybe martial kineticist would be the better way to go as far as damage dealing goes. Mechanically I feel it would perform better even if I dislike the flavor. Also one of my favorite parts of 1e kineticists was the lack of reliance on gear, they were pretty self reliant. Making them a martial would force them to get handwraps (a scaling unarmed attack would be amazing but I've given up hope of seeing anything like that in 2e short of a battle form)
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I don't have the document in front of me, but back during the first few months of PF2's lifespan I made a lvl 1-6 Kine class chassis. It was mostly a "short rest" limited class like the 5e Warlock or the PF1 Arcanist (to an extent, since PF1 didn't really LIKE short rests.) 1-3 actions to use a Blast that was either melee; 30'; 30' with more damage, and you had Infusion feats that worked like meta-magic and also counted for charging up actions for the Blast, but cost a Focus Point unless you Gathered Power or Burned yourself (Gather Power was 1 action, and you could Step during it, it had the Manipulate and Concentration traits. Burn was a free action that gave you a focus point that lasted until the end of your next turn while taking Drained. The Drained went away on a Refocus activity along with healing you of the damage it dealt.)
So a general turn could be:
1st Gather Power (and step away from the baddie)
2d Infusion a 15' Cone
3d Emperor Palpatine brand UNLIMITED POWAAAHHHH!!! (Burning Hands but with lightening typed damage)
1st Infusion for an EXPLOSION! 30' that's 15' wide away (while Burning yourself)
2d Charge the Blast
3d BIG BANG ATTACK! (120' range, 30' wide because you spent 3 actions charging it. Many d6 of fire damage)
1st Gather Power (stepping in)
2d Kinetic Blade (extra die size and removing AoO chance in exchange for melee only)
3d WITCH HUNTER (d8 or d10 positive damage)
So on and so forth.
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Finally, I care about the daily nova because Paizo cares about it and they have shown time and time again that they will nerf classes they see as "too powerful" because of nova. They have also shown time and time again that any class that uses magic is heavily restricted with what they can do while still being able to do magic. So guess what? Given how Paizo has balances classes a kineticist with 0 resources will never ever have any of the magical effects that class should have, much less the damage to remain relevant. The Alchemist dared to offer a bit of extra utility and got shafted, the witch dared to offer a bit of extra utility and got shafted, the warpriest dared to want a bit more martial power and got shafted.
So how dare you say to use the sorcerer when the class I want is a proper kineticist. Just because paizo has not made a class for you yet does not allow you to demand or complain about people wanting the classes that they enjoyed for years (in part or whole).
Okay. Your second paragraph here is fair, and I haven't been giving enough respect to that side of things. I will try to do better on that. The first? I disagree with your fundamental thesis, in a number of ways but I can at least understand where you're coming from.
So your basic position, if I'm understanding it, is that you really liked the PF1 kineticist specifically, the existence of burn as a daily resource mechanic specifically is a meaningful part of that for you, and you want to play something that feels basically the same way in PF2. Also, you're really leery of adding any unnecessary bells and whistles on, because your assessment of things is that any class that tries to add on any sort of bells and whistles gets shafted. Possibly, you'd like to lean in on the burn mechanic, because (by your assessment) being strongly bound to daily resources is an important part of not getting shafted in this way, for classes that are doing what you want Kineticist to be able to do. I will at least acknowledge that that's a reasonable position to take.
By contrast, I'll admit that I couldn't care less about the PF1 Kineticist specifically. I *strongly* desire a caster who is not bound by daily resources, and who isn't spending any of their power budget on them. Further, I'd like them to have some utility on the side, and be more weighted to control rather than damage. By my read, at the rate that classes come out, Kineticist is the best bet we're going to have for anything like that for quite some time. I'm trying to jump on that boat as a result. At the same time, if you offered me some other class that would give me more or less what I'm looking for, but with a different name/flavor/history, I'd be happy to take that instead. I just don't expect to see it any time soon.
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My personal expectation is that when the Kineticist shows up, we're going to wind up with something like the Magus. It's not going to be exactly the same as the PF1 version, but it's going to work, and it's going to be viable, and it's going to do pretty well at giving people a nice, satisfying expression of what the class is supposed to be. ("I don't want to have to choose! I want to stab people and set them on fire at the same time.")
At the same time, it seems like Kineticist generates especially divergent ideas of that "what the class is supposed to be" thing... and I now realize that the questions I was about to ask here would be better served in their own thread. So I'll make a thread for them.
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non-focus point use, non-burn use
1 - Metakinesis [Metakinesis infusion] (increase die size of next kinetic blast)
2 - explosion infusion [form infusion] (the next kinetic blast instead has a 60ft range and does a 10ft burst, basic reflex]
3- Kinetic Blast
Focus point use, non-burn use
1 - Metakinesis (increase die size of next kinetic blast)
2 - explosion infusion [form infusion] (the next kinetic blast instead has a 60ft range and does a 10ft burst, basic reflex]
1FP - increase explosion infusion radius by 10ft
3- Kinetic Blast
Focus point use, burn use
1 - Metakinesis (increase die size of next kinetic blast)
2 - explosion infusion [form infusion] (the next kinetic blast instead has a 60ft range and does a 10ft burst, basic reflex]
1FP - increase explosion infusion radius by 10ft
1 burn (temporary drained condition +1) - burning infusion [substance infusion] (on failure and critical failure: 1d6 persistent fire [(heightened +2) +1d6 persistent fire]
3- Kinetic Blast
Edit: thoughtful note: kinetic blast would have the attack trait
Edit: thoughtful note: kinetic blast would have the attack trait
I note that putting the attack trait in something that targets a save DC gets a bit weird.
I don't know about "gets weird". It is odd maybe, but interacts with the rules in a very straightforward way.Edit: thoughtful note: kinetic blast would have the attack traitI note that putting the attack trait in something that targets a save DC gets a bit weird.
Sure, but it means that order matters. Attacks against a save DC dont' care about MAP, while those that target AC do. Basically, it gives a strong incentive to always make the vs-AC attack first, if you're doing both.
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Sure, but it means that order matters. Attacks against a save DC dont' care about MAP, while those that target AC do. Basically, it gives a strong incentive to always make the vs-AC attack first, if you're doing both.I don't know about "gets weird". It is odd maybe, but interacts with the rules in a very straightforward way.Edit: thoughtful note: kinetic blast would have the attack traitI note that putting the attack trait in something that targets a save DC gets a bit weird.
Sure. And?
Sure. And?
So why do it that way? Why not only have the attack trait if it's targeting AC?
I could see a kinetic blast starting w/ the Attack trait, since its basic use would be a spell attack roll (or melee/ranged perhaps even). But when upgraded to an AoE (or other form which requires a Ref save), then it should lose that trait.
Of course, then it'd have to be built around sometimes having a 2-action kinetic blast coupled with a Strike, which means it likely wouldn't get improved weapon proficiencies (unless there's a sub-type which trades, but then is somewhat limited to using non-Ref kinetic blasts/Strikes OR Paizo builds it as another gish (i.e. Magus/Summoner) where doing both is expected (which I wouldn't like since that'd cap kinetic blasts pretty hard)).
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Sure. And?So why do it that way? Why not only have the attack trait if it's targeting AC?
If I understand his points, the blast doesn’t natively use reflex save; by default it WOULD target AC, but the particular form infusion selected makes it target Ref instead.
Which kind of makes me want to see one targeting will or perception. That “phantom flame” idea someone had seems like it might work for that.
Of course, then it'd have to be built around sometimes having a 2-action kinetic blast coupled with a Strike, which means it likely wouldn't get improved weapon proficiencies
Personally I’d be fine with that, as long as kinetic blade ran off spell proficiency.
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Of course, then it'd have to be built around sometimes having a 2-action kinetic blast coupled with a Strike, which means it likely wouldn't get improved weapon proficienciesPersonally I’d be fine with that, as long as kinetic blade ran off spell proficiency.
Me too. :-)
(Though it might get odd if adding Str to damage...hmm.)
Just add Con to damage, that is the Kineticist's core stat.
It doesn't have to be for the new version, especially if you don't have to spend the start of your day punching yourself in the face enough times to get enough burn for all your Elemental Overflow bonuses...
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If there is a class that can work with CON as its main stat, it is Kineticist. Sadly, unless they make it so it has CON to hit, which I'm not that sure it will happen, It is going to end up in a similar place to Inventor stat wise, which personally I don't like (it feels like a "fake" main stat).
What I'm pretty sure is that Paizo is not going to make a class have both CON to hit and damage. I would rather need STR to damage or have no damage boost on my attacks rather than having the class be in a similar spot to Inventor with its main stat.
All of this assuming Kineticist will be a martial. If it ends up working more akin to a caster, this is irrelevant.
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Con as the casting stat. This would cause the focus cantrip to end up with Con to hit and Con to damage (maybe [I'd prefer it that way]).
With Con to hit and damage, it makes my version of burn (temp drain) interact in an interesting way. Essentially, if you choose to take burn to nova, almost everything you do for the rest of the day will be weakened.
I tentatively agree that removing the attack trait for save based form infusions makes sense.