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The current form has none of the action economy boosts of dual and ALL elements. It needs to wait to 14 to get one and action economy is kinda important to damage.
Plus you are kinda gating Elemental Activation by going some elements with few spells associated (though I imagine they will get some in Rage of Elements).
Not to mention you throw away a bunch of utility variety.
Just seems like it takes a lot of hits.
What kinds of action economy boosts are dual and omni getting?
Not getting. Have. Dual and Omni get a fairly early feat to blast and gather or the reverse, Omni gets one at ten to gather lots of elements.
What kinds of action economy boosts are dual and omni getting?
Level 6 feat for Dual or Omni lets you Gather/Blast for one action as long as you're using two different elements to do it.
Level 10 feat for Omni that lets you gather every element at once for two actions (but treats all impulses as overflow so you lose each gather no matter what impulse you use).
The level 10 Dual feat is just basically power attack at level 10, which kinda sucks.
Dedicated gets a single action that increases the damage you do with your first impulse next turn at 6 and the ability to counteract stuff with their element trait at 10 and lets you gather for free if you succeed.
IDK though, Dual's 10th feat is trash and free Gathering when you Counteract is potentially really strong, provided you can actually Counteract with any regularity, which makes single element's 10 very campaign dependant.
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Single element has stoke element as their exclusive feat, but it is on the weak side. Basically dangerous sorcery but for blasts but costing an action is a bit much.
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Maybe I missed something but Stoke Element just seems bad. You spend a turn doing no Impulses at all, unless the wording means you just can't do one after you use Stoke Element but could still do one before it, and then an action to do a small status bonus to damage. The damage does scale but it is at best equivalent to a damage boosting class feature, except you have to use the action each time you want the damage boost instead of once per target or something.
What kinds of action economy boosts are dual and omni getting?Level 6 feat for Dual or Omni lets you Gather/Blast for one action as long as you're using two different elements to do it.
That has the impulse trait though, so it is not an action saver vs a dedicated kineticist. It just removes the penalty for going dual or omni.
Gather Amalgamation is neat, but pretty restrictive, as well.
I don't think dedicated is lagging behind all that much.
Maybe I missed something but Stoke Element just seems bad. You spend a turn doing no Impulses at all, unless the wording means you just can't do one after you use Stoke Element but could still do one before it, and then an action to do a small status bonus to damage. The damage does scale but it is at best equivalent to a damage boosting class feature, except you have to use the action each time you want the damage boost instead of once per target or something.
Stoke Element's bonus damage does apply to all creatures in an area blast. It's not something I would use to boost a regular Blast unless I had no other actions in mind.
That might almost make it worthwile if it cost 1 action and didn't have the other restrictions. But even then it doesn't really feel all that useful for the cost of 1 action each time you want to use it. If it lasted a minute or something affecting all your Impulses during that time it might be different. Or even if it affected all of your Impulses until the end of your next turn, while also not preventing you from using Impulses that turn, it might be okay-ish.
It just seems like an extremely bad feat, especially if you can't use it after using another Impulse that turn.
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The action savers don't really save actions and the single element can start with 5 1st level feats [3 impulse, 1 class, 1 Natural Ambition]. So I think it's fine.
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The action savers don't really save actions and the single element can start with 5 1st level feats [3 impulse, 1 class, 1 Natural Ambition]. So I think it's fine.
The bigger problem is that it is difficult to pick 5 class feats at level 1 and have any hope of using even most of them.
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I passed on Stoke at first glance, but it adds up pretty fast on things like Ferocious cyclone, or even Arial Boomerang.
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The action savers don't really save actions and the single element can start with 5 1st level feats [3 impulse, 1 class, 1 Natural Ambition]. So I think it's fine.The bigger problem is that it is difficult to pick 5 class feats at level 1 and have any hope of using even most of them.
Flexible Blast, Elemental Weapon/Stone Shield and Elemental Familiar can be taken and mostly used in the background and/or before combat starts. Air Cushion is a reaction you can use in exploration. Stepping Stones is a general use exploration ability. Tremor/Flame Eruption/Air Boomerang is an area effect spell for those perky swarms. Eternal Torch is an unlimited time light source + fire starter equal to your level. Burning Jet gives movement that doesn't trigger reactions. Warming Nimbus is variable resistance to everyone in the aura. Water Dance can give movement to another or improved movement to yourself. Tidal Hands gives 2 area effects or a bigger area effect. Deflecting Wave gives some good resistances on a reaction.
For 1 elements, I see no problem using all 5 feats with regularity.
For instance Tidal Hands, Deflecting Wave, Water Dance, Flexible Blast and Elemental Familiar. Seems like you can use them all regularly.
Or Flame Eruption, Eternal Torch, Burning Jet, Warming Nimbus and Elemental Familiar
Or Air Boomerang, Air Cushion, Elemental Weapon, Whisper in the Wind and Fair Winds.
Or Geological Attunement, Stepping Stones, Stone Shield, Tremor and Flexible Blast.
EDITED for mistakes.
The action savers don't really save actions and the single element can start with 5 1st level feats [3 impulse, 1 class, 1 Natural Ambition]. So I think it's fine.The bigger problem is that it is difficult to pick 5 class feats at level 1 and have any hope of using even most of them.
Flexible Blast, Elemental Weapon/Stone Shield and Elemental Familiar can be taken and mostly used in the background and/or before combat starts. Air Cushion is a reaction you can use in exploration. Stepping Stones is a general use exploration ability. Tremor/Flame Eruption/Air Boomerang is an area effect spell for those perky swarms. Eternal Torch is an unlimited time light source + fire starter equal to your level. Burning Jet gives movement that doesn't trigger reactions. Warming Nimbus is variable resistance to everyone in the aura. Water Dance can give movement to another or improved movement to yourself. Tidal Hands gives 2 area effects or a bigger area effect. Deflecting Wave gives some good resistances on a reaction.
So even if we mainly stick with 1 element in fights, I see no problem using all 5 feats with regularity. In fact, I wouldn't mind more. ;)
For instance Tidal Hands, Deflecting Wave, Water Dance, Flexible Blast and Elemental Familiar.
Or Flame Eruption, Eternal Torch, Burning Jet, Warming Nimbus and Elemental Familiar
Or Air Boomerang, Air Cushion, Elemental Weapon, Whisper in the Wind and Fair Winds.
Or Tremor, Geologic Attunement, Stepping Stones, Tremor, Stone Shield and Flexible Blast
EDITED for errors.
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My initial readthrough of the class was that I would pretty much always spend the feat slot on a feat specific to an element than any of the ones that have a specific kind of gate as a prerequisite.
Like I'm taking Storm Spiral, Rolling Boulder, or Slippery Sleet instead of Stoke Element or Cycling Blast.
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Well remember all of these do have the Manipulate trait so will still probably trigger Attacks of Opportunity if used in melee. I do like the idea of starting with 3 feats for being single element, but while that is good at 1st level it feels a bit underwhelming at higher levels when dual or universal kineticists can branch out to Impulses from multiple elements.
That said I do feel the class needs some bonus feats specifically for Impulses in general.
I would probably be much more into Stoke Element if it wasn't an action, and prevented the use of other Impulses, if it was more of a passive ability that just gave a Dedicated Kineticist a constant damage boost on their Impulses to make up for breadth of ability with just straight damage.
Also Thaago's interpretation would make it slightly better, still not worth it but slightly better, but while that might be RAI it really isn't how the wording is actually written. It literally says "You can’t use
another impulse this turn" which is not the same as you can't use another impulse later this turn, the actual wording suggests you can't use it if you had already used an Impulse. It definitely needs to be reworded.
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Rules don’t have memory. Unless it is listed as a requirement, rules affect future actions.
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It literally says "You can’t use
another impulse this turn" which is not the same as you can't use another impulse later this turn, the actual wording suggests you can't use it if you had already used an Impulse. It definitely needs to be reworded.
You can't use another impulse this turn. So as soon as you use the action, you can't use another impulse.
There's no requirement section in the ability's activation.
The main problem for me of Dedicated Gate it's basically just gains 3 extra Impulse feats at lvl 1 and can take Stoke Element at lvl 6. After this they are the same of Dual Gate and Universalist but their progression still the same. Let's take a look:
Feats
LvL 6: Stoke Element: Dedicated
LvL 10: Deconstruct Element: Dedicated
LvL 10: Fusion Blast: Dual
LvL 10: Gather Amalgamation: Universal
The only real advantage is Stoke Element but as this feat worse the currently action economy hell that Kineticist already suffer this goes far from being really useful.
So over time Dual and Universal gain some advantage. Elemental Flexibility and derived feats also gives way more possibilities for Dual and Universal than Dedicated. So how much more the level progress less advantage and proportionaly more restricted the Dedicated Gate becomes. In the end dedicated just ends with less option and combination possibilities.
IMO Dedicated Gate needs more. Needs something that really compensate the loose of access to other elements than just receive the access to give some level 1 feats and the access to a feat that uses another action to improve you damage a little.
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It feels like the gates should be something that are auto-upgraded by class features (since you're going to get better at using your internal gate just by virtue of gaining levels as a kineticist). Since the feats are sort of underwhelming in that they compete with options with your element(s).
So giving people a choice of something that potentially only ever gives you something at first level is less than ideal. Like Barbarian instincts give you something at level 1, and also unlock feats, but they also give you something at 7th and 9th.
It's the closest (only?) example of something that gets an extra feat in exchange for whatever else the class does.I think Fury is an exception to how they've done subclasses, rather than the rule. Almost all subclasses get a lot more focus and love.I don't think it's going to get more. Right now it already gets more than Fury Barbarian does in relation to the other Barb subclasses.
I do feel like Stoke should just be baseline for them or something though. Kinda like a Singular Expertise for your element.
Universalist wizards.
Sort of. They get "more" drain bonded item, but it's instead of a school spell slot.
Effectively it means they have one less spell slot, not more, since specialists get a school slot plus one use of drain bonded item.
Fair, given what I said. I should have specified "only". Universalist gets more Drain Bonded Item uses as well.
Well taking a single element gets you more than an extra feat too: you get 3.
Sort of. They get "more" drain bonded item, but it's instead of a school spell slot.
Effectively it means they have one less spell slot, not more, since specialists get a school slot plus one use of drain bonded item.
And they get no focus spell.
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One benefit of single element is a package of options that are always available when fathered. If your feats are split between two or more elements you have an action cost to swap if you need to access more than one (there are mitigating feats for this) and some combinations across elements can’t be used together.