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I don’t love the implication that 5e is the reason people want a Kineticist with simpler mechanics, given that I’ve never touched 5e and have been in the tabletop hobby for close to a decade and a half. Not everyone complexity-adverse is a dumb newbie, y’know?
You seem a little turned around. You and I have both presented the base kineticist as going all in on con, while I've presented the Soul with a decent con score, which allows it to bump its wis to a 14 start as well.
I usually use a 25 point buy and it'd look like this for underwhelming str 8, dex 18, con 12, int 10, wis 14, cha 18.
Are you referring to the first 4 levels? Because I have agreed those are a slow start, but after that kinetic blade is free. Soul can move up and attack a foe as readily as a martial with a sword, without gather power.
lol it seems mighty slow and, again, the follow ups to blade take MORE burn which means they have to be put off. Blade Whirlwind, for example, is 11th level or 8th if you don't have to move. The slowness follows alone ALL of the melee abilities. You want to use the whip, well now you have to wait to 5th to use it once/round and can't move and use it. You're kind of stuck using blade rush if you want to be any kind of mobile and activating it provokes aoo.
These points are getting a little disjointed. You seem to be listing off downsides of being ranged such as "attack ranged and draw an AoO", which is more of a drawback to a ranged-primary kineticist than one focused on kinetic blade. Again, gather power in melee really isn't necessary after level 4 either, and if you decide to use it, move + standard on the same turn means it isn't getting disrupted unless somebody readied an action.
They are the limitations on backup ranged too and for melee that has to move in melee with reach foes in melee which is an issue when you're spending an action to gather. Sure you don't have to gather in melee if you're aren't using your bigger melee abilities. Every single melee ability is delayed. It's 14th level before you don't have to gather for a Whip Hurricane.
I would be happy to build the attack sequence profile for a Soul kinetic blade at level 20, or any level from 10 and upward, if you would like to do the same for a base kineticist, presumably ranged as your preference.
*shrug* don't really see the point as I've already tried it myself. I know at 10th, I have to gather for a Blade Whirlwind with the underwhelming's attacks. That, IMO, tells it all. And if you want to compare, it's only be fair to go melee to melee so how do you think underwhelming compared to Kinetic Knight or Elemental Ascetic? Underwhelming is going to be behind in dedicated melee builds, dedicated ranged builds and dedicated switch hitting builds when compared to underwhelming build that way.
A slight exaggeration, but yes, if your DPS alone is solid, then a rider that only triggers 15-20% of the time is a nice-to-have, not a priority.
The best way to increase your DPS is a failed Disintegrating Infusion [x2 damage].
Some interesting points here. 25-point buy is above average, but can be explored. However, you continue to apply the rigid mindset of building a Soul like a base kineticist, a lot like a PF1E player trying to shoe-horn PF1E tactics into PF2E, rather than assessing Soul from a fresh start to see what might work well for it. I believe you are using a +2/+2 human?
I build it like I would play it and would advice someone to build it. Dropping its main stat to a secondary one isn't what I'd do. And it's an Azata-Blooded (Musetouched) .
And really that's not optimal, since you should start with an odd number to maximise the use of 5 +1 bonuses every 4 character levels, but I'll go with the same score in dex, which ends up higher at 20 using those boosts.
It's been EXTREMELY rare for me to see a character actually hit 20 AND get to play it at that level for any length of time. I prefer to put score in for the levels I'm pretty sure I'll play as opposed to the ones I doubt I'll play.
The racial wis bonus can also be moved back to cha, or to con, there's really many better ways to make a Soul.
I mean, you can make any spread you want but I wouldn't be better for what I want to play, even as a melee focused one. I want my fancy infusions to hit and for a good chance for them to fail the DC vs them and for that I need dex and cha more than int or wis at the expense of cha.
These concerns do not apply, because a kinetic blader rarely intends to gather power beyond early levels in any case. They gain iteratives like a martial, and want to use full-round attacks to deploy them, so unless they get to gather power for an entire turn in the odd case that's more useful than attacking right away, none of these situations are relevant.
So what infusions are you using if you aren't using the higher blade infusions and you don't care about a high cha for saves? Are you just using the blade and ignoring the rest?
Yes, you've communicated the current limits of your perception. If you don't wish to expand them or prove your claims then that is, of course, your decision. My offer remains to compare builds against any kineticist you like, but if you prefer to swing a screwdriver like a hammer then I understand, and agree that will result in an underwhelming experience.
My not agreeing with you isn't a lack of perception so don't be rude: it's not a winning attitude if you really want a further debate as I'm even less inclined to continue than I was before.
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I basically see you arguing to Gray that Overwhelming soul is as good as the base class, but in order for the archetype to work, it has to be *better* than the alternatives. So, aside from not needing to manage the burn mechanic, what does Overwhelming Soul do better than other classes?
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It use Cha if you want that?<snip>I basically see you arguing to Gray that Overwhelming soul is as good as the base class, but in order for the archetype to work, it has to be *better* than the alternatives. So, aside from not needing to manage the burn mechanic, what does Overwhelming Soul do better than other classes?
Yeah, getting to use the worst stat in the game instead of one of the best isn't a feature.
A false perception. My assertation was that Soul "isn't so bad", or to put it more formally, there are a limited range of builds at which it performs decently. I'm unsure how you read that as outperforming all other classes.
The claim that "in order for the archetype to work, it has to be *better* than the alternatives" does not have a clear framing. Are you saying that it has to be better in some areas, or flatly superior to all alternatives?
It must do something better than the alternative archetypes to qualify as playable. PF1 has such a power curve that "good enough" rarely justifies play.
I mean it works; I won't deny it works because it is still 10d6 damage on a standard action. But it shows the problem of removing burn wholesale, which is you lose everything that makes the class fun.
This might just be my 3.5 side showing, but is 10d6 damage on a standard action meant to be good?
Just, as an example, Path of War classes can do stuff like:
Sting of the Cobra
By focusing destructive, life-destroying ki into his attack, the Steel Serpent disciple strikes at the very heart of his foe’s life force. The disciple makes an attack against a target. If successful the strike inflicts an additional 8d6 points of damage and 2d4 points of Constitution damage (Fortitude save DC equal to 18 + initiation modifier to halve this Constitution damage). Upon a failed save, on the following two rounds the corrupted ki energies inflict an additional 2d6 points of damage and 2 additional points of Constitution damage. This is a supernatural ability.
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Spinning Adamantine Axe
With a powerful leap into the air, the disciple of the Broken Blade unleashes a powerful spinning kick to his surrounding foes that strikes with the force of a hurricane. The initiator makes one unarmed attack against each foe in range, each successful strike inflicting an additional 10d6 points of damage that ignores the target’s damage reduction. Foes that are struck are also knocked prone from the force of this assault.
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Meteoric Crash
By rushing at a foe like a blazing comet through the sky, the Primal Fury disciple crashes through an opponent to sculpt the battlefield into a field of carnage. The initiator makes a bull rush attempt as part of a charge with a +4 bonus (this bonus stacks with the +2 bonus from making a charge); if successful, the initiator inflicts 10d6 points of damage to the target as part of the bull rush and if the target is pushed back more than 10-ft., they are knocked prone on a failed Reflex save (DC 18 + initiation modifier) and he may make an immediate attack of opportunity against his prone foe. In initiator must be able to follow or reach the target to make this attack of opportunity.
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Yes, they're maneuvers and can't be used round over round but you start with 10 readied every fight and can refresh them fairly easily. I could also just look at a proper full caster, Summoner (Chained), Alchemist and see a similar level of baseline performance. So yeah, what else ya got?
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But it shows the problem of removing burn wholesale, which is you lose everything that makes the class fun.
It shows what happens if you do it badly: overflow was built in a way that you really needed it to match up with your expected numbers so using a hatchet to chop it out and using a bandaid to patch it over wasn't going to work out well. I don't see why it can't see why burn can't be built so that it's easily attached/removed and I also don't think we'll see anything like the grab-bag of goodies we saw from overflow in PF2.
It use Cha if you want that?
LOL Yep, that's it. Unless you REALLY want to be the face character, wis, con or even int seem like better key stats.
It must do something better than the alternative archetypes to qualify as playable.
Playable is a low bar. I mean Rogue was playable but it doesn't match up to unchained rogue. It's one of those archetypes that actively makes you worse, like Oozemorph.
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Maybe the overwhelming soul debate should be its own thread?
To the Overwhelming Soul back and forth, I'll just add that my experience with it was that my at-the-time girlfriend played one in a party of 7, and was out-DPSing the Bloodrager, Paladin, Unchained Rogue, and tied with the 2 pistols Gunslinger we had. My opinion of the archetype (and class on a whole) was that it was FREAKING BROKEN AS ASMODEAS and thus think highly of it.
Moving on to the main topic, I think that between all the other ported classes we've gotten, they're more or less distilled version of the flavor, with new engine mechanics to represent that flavor without breaking the math that's been baked in from the ground up.
Witches (sad as they may be balance wise) deliver on the flavor as good as their 1e version, give or take; Swashbuckler threw points out of the window and now has a true/false mechanic that delivers on the dream magnitudes better than 1e could ever hope to; Sorcerers are now weird multi-list casters that feel distinct from other Sorcerers in ways no other system I've seen has pulled off; Rangers are unrecognizable from 1e's iteration with their loss of baked in magic and not needing to have an animal companion and they've been one of the most praised classes in the whole system.
As long as "yeet fire and lightning without spell slots" happens, and it's labeled Kineticist: they can mulch every class feature from 1e, or make a math appropriate carbon copy... I'll be happy either way.
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I know at 10th, I have to gather for a Blade Whirlwind with the underwhelming's attacks.
You can't actually take Blade Whirlwind at all until level 11, at which point Infusion Specialization immediately reduces its burn cost to 0, so you can full attack with it from the moment you get it. You also can't get Kinetic Whip before level 7 (and that's only if you doubled down on your initial element), and its cost is reduced to 0 at level 8. Similarly, you can take Whip Hurricane starting at level 13, and it's then reduced to 0 at level 14.
You do have to wait until level 5 to use Kinetic Blade without gathering power (or taking burn, if you didn't trade it out), but that's also generally the earliest you can get bonus attacks from haste or the like, and kineticists don't get an iterative until level 8 anyway. Meaning there are 2 levels where your form infusion can cost more than your infusion specialization is able to account for, but by then you also have an ability that lets you reduce the cost of a talent by 1 for a few times each day, either through Internal Buffer or the Overwhelming Soul's equivalent.
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To answer the thread question... for me, this breaks down to *two* questions.
- First, Why are we not keeping Burn sacred as a fundamental part of the class? Mostly, because Paizo thus far has been pretty consistently not keeping things sacred, and the results have been pretty good. I'm not targeting the PF1 class they had. I'm targeting the PF2 class I hope they write.
- Second, why am I personally asking for a burnless kineticist, rather than asking for some other class that does basically the same thing? Because I'm trying to hop on the train that's here. Paizo's class throughput is not great. I don't *blame* them for this, but it's a fact. I *keenly* desire a class that will let me play a caster with interesting mix-and-match infusion-style power augs and utility talents that isn't bound to daily resources. Outside of the burn mechanic, Kineticist fits that to a T, and I'm pretty sure it's going to get published in *some* form, some time within the next few years. Given what playtesting results have exposed of their internal design processes, it seems to e that they've got enough flexibility in the system that PF2 kineticist could wind up anywhere from "burn just isn't a thing" to "burn is *the* defining mechanic". I'm trying to advocate for the one that I personally want.
to be clear, I don't want the "burn just isn't a thing" option. Ideally, I'd like a fairly robust, satisfying burn mechanic that worked well with the kineticist and that was entirely opt-in, so that those who want it can have it (and reap the very real power at a very real cost that it offers) and the rest of us can ignore it. I want it to be opt-in rather than opt-out, though, because from what I've seen, if they do put in an "opt-out" class archetype or something, the practical result is that taking that archetype will be strictly worse in every way than not taking the archetype.
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Yeah, it's not what I'd pick, but it does what it sets out to do: eliminate burn management from the class. Personally, I'd rather take the burn to power up the various abilities that require taking some (like evasion or boosting shroud of water's shield bonus) and get all the bonuses from elemental overflow, but some people don't want to deal with all of that. It is nice that the archetype still gives you the same static attack bonus as a maxed elemental overflow. It's the equivalent of having a +5 weapon, but you can shape it however you want and don't have to spend a dime to get it.
Anyway, the way I'd see burn working in 2e is along the lines of this: infusions are focus spells that you add on to your blast to give it extra effects, and you can take burn instead of using a focus point. Burn would probably make you drained 1 (or increase it by 1 if you already have the drained condition), and any drained condition inflicted by it would remain until your next daily preparations. If something else would inflict the drained condition, you add it on top of the drained condition you already have from burn. Meaning, if you're already drained 1 due to burn, and get hit by something that would make you drained 1, you become drained 2. This can only add up to the max of that ability, so something that maxes out at inflicting drained 1 couldn't take you to drained 3 without you taking more burn. Drained values from things other than burn would be removed as normal (generally, by 1 every day, unless the relevant ability has a different duration).
It's wordy, but it works within the context of rules and terms that already exist. Maybe you could simulate the "pushing yourself beyond your limit" aspect by adding a requirement that you can only take burn when you are out of focus points, and/or that you can only take burn to negate the cost of your infusions (but not focus spells from other classes/archetypes).
I think another alternative would be to have the drained condition from burn be removed when you refocus, like the Oracle's extreme curse does with the doomed it inflicts. That would make it less debilitating for the entire day, while still adding significant risk/reward aspects to any fight you're using it in. This would probably be the best approach if there isn't any ability like elemental overflow to give you additional bonuses for taking burn.
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I think another alternative would be to have the drained condition from burn be removed when you refocus, like the Oracle's extreme curse does with the doomed it inflicts. That would make it less debilitating for the entire day, while still adding significant risk/reward aspects to any fight you're using it in. This would probably be the best approach if there isn't any ability like elemental overflow to give you additional bonuses for taking burn.
I admit, I'd be a lot happier with refocus burn as a thing than with daily burn. That one I'd actually try to work with. Not sure how Paizo would balance it, though.
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I think the balance comes with the fact that you're deleting hit points and weakening your Fortitude saves every time you use it. If you're in a fight where you've already used all your focus points and have dipped into using burn, you're likely in a pretty tough fight, so that's quite a risk to take!
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Oh, sorry! That's probably where I got the idea, I apologize if it seemed like I was taking credit.
For gather power, I think instead of the flourish trait (which may be better on the kinetic blast itself, particularly if the unmodified blast is a single action), you might want the open trait. Or, you could just stick with the usual metamagic requirement of "If your next action is to add an infusion to a kinetic blast..."
Oh, sorry! That's probably where I got the idea, I apologize if it seemed like I was taking credit.
For gather power, I think instead of the flourish trait (which may be better on the kinetic blast itself, particularly if the unmodified blast is a single action), you might want the open trait. Or, you could just stick with the usual metamagic requirement of "If your next action is to add an infusion to a kinetic blast..."
Oh not at all. There are dozens of posts in this thread, I was more saying "great minds think alike" than thinking you were taking any latent credit.
This is where things get interesting. The PF1E kinetic blast was used as a standard action, while kinetic blade / fist could be a full-attack set and could technically be mixed with other weapon strikes, but it was very rare to find a reason to actually do that, at least in everything I've read of.
Now, I'm not saying PF2E will naturally produce reasons to want to do some other attack before or after a kinetic blast, but I like the potential, so I'm inclined to want basic kinetic blasts to work like weapon strikes, and for it to e.g. be possible to go strike/strike/strike at 0/-5/-10 MAP with them. I'm not saying that should be a good idea, any more than it is for a conventional martial, but I think keeping things on or near to the martial framework will be beneficial to building them as all-day classes, which is what martials tend to excel at. I'd be shy about having Open as a default.
We could also have kinetic blasts effectively be scaling cantrips. There is decent merit to this, as that's kinda what they were in PF1E, at-will magical attacks that scaled with level. I think my only worry about this is the PF2E action economy tends to be less engaging for casters, thanks to all their 2-action spells, so for the fun of mixing things up I hope, at present, that kinetic blasts will basically work like weapon strikes.
It looks like you're coming back around to something that might be decent fodder for https://paizo.com/threads/rzs43mav?Describe-some-rounds-on-your-dream-Kinet icist (the thread that inspired the thread that inspired this thread)
To the Overwhelming Soul back and forth, I'll just add that my experience with it was that my at-the-time girlfriend played one in a party of 7, and was out-DPSing the Bloodrager, Paladin, Unchained Rogue, and tied with the 2 pistols Gunslinger we had. My opinion of the archetype (and class on a whole) was that it was FREAKING BROKEN AS ASMODEAS and thus think highly of it.
Your entire party was made up of some of the least powerful classes in PF1. If you thought an Overwhelming Soul was good, I shudder to picture what a good class would have done to your game.
Playable is a low bar. I mean Rogue was playable but it doesn't match up to unchained rogue. It's one of those archetypes that actively makes you worse, like Oozemorph.
I don't consider either version of the Rogue in PF1 to be especially playable. I a world where I could be a Wizard or a Cleric, it's just hard to measure up.
To the Overwhelming Soul back and forth, I'll just add that my experience with it was that my at-the-time girlfriend played one in a party of 7, and was out-DPSing the Bloodrager, Paladin, Unchained Rogue, and tied with the 2 pistols Gunslinger we had. My opinion of the archetype (and class on a whole) was that it was FREAKING BROKEN AS ASMODEAS and thus think highly of it.Your entire party was made up of some of the least powerful classes in PF1. If you thought an Overwhelming Soul was good, I shudder to picture what a good class would have done to your game.
I mean, probably add to the fun. We had a good time, steamrolled encounters and enjoyed the plot decent enough. It was an Investigator (me), Witch, Kine, Gunslinger, Un-Rogue, Paladin, Bloodrager, and a Cleric GMPC Healbot (which also filled a faction role because this campaign had factions that you had to balance.) I don't care what were 'good' or 'bad' classes in PF1 because then, nor do I now, I was just there to laugh with me bros! I would ask what the good classes are, even though I don't really play PF1 anymore, as it'd be interesting to see what was 'meta' back then.