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Elemental weapon?
Stone shield?
This class seems balanced similar to thaumaturge in the sense they want you to stick to one hand. Even elemental weapon dictates a one handed weapon.
I can are the aesthetic of a two handed weapon for earth is appealing.
I actually wondered if metal was gonna get something like that or not in a feat.
Oh, and medium armor is kinda needed yeah, for it to work.
Oh, and medium armor is kinda needed yeah, for it to work.
Or an Earth/Metal Heavy Armor Impulse
IMO to Kineticist works at melee range need to remove the manipulate and concentration traits from Impulse trait allowing some Impulses like Shield Block, Elemental Blast and Deflecting Wave reaction that have only one-action to work using concentration only (this already happen with 1-action spells, they usually are concentration or manipulate only almost never both). This probably will be enough to work.
Oh, and medium armor is kinda needed yeah, for it to work.Or an Earth/Metal Heavy Armor Impulse
So we can eat attack of opportunity when we don our armor
I like it lol
Every blast ability works with either ranged or melee aside from chain blast, which is only ranged. Having a couple melee only impulses would go a long way for this.
Only if they didn't provoke attack of opportunity. A systemic problem currently in this playtest. In good faith I'll imagine this being addressed before release lol.
.. that 100% destroys the fantasy.Or just get a real shield and grab shield block if you aren't earth.
Melee does get to use the kinetic auras and have enemies be affected more often, without needing Aura Mastery.
It's just like Monks with Tower Shields! :D
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It's unclear why I would want to fight in melee as a kineticist in the playtest. Your melee blast isn't significantly more powerful than your ranged blast, and you provoke when attacking in melee. You could use elemental weapon, but you would then do the weapon damage rather than your blast damage and you're not really here because you think weapons are cool.
Like other than "you literally can't get away" I would rather eat the AoO from striding and blast at range than blast in melee. If I could get a melee blast that moved my opponent away from me, that would be interesting though, since I can switch hit it's just that I have no reason to want to hang out within the reach of dangerous things.
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Because some people like to melee.
But yes blast's need not provoke. At least the melee ones.
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As to "why melee", there are actually a good number of reasons:
1) flanking support to both yourself and allies
2) manuevers
3) str to damage
4) spreading damage out among other melee charactersBeing ranged is good too of course, especially when long ranged or flying enemies are around, or if the terrain stops melee from doing their job efficiently.
But having everything except kinetic blade strikes provoke AoO is really annoying, as is the lack of medium armor on a class that otherwise has good support for Con+Str as main ability scores.
With this 4 points you showed a lot of problems that Kineticist currently have to fight at close quarters:
1) flanking support to both yourself and allies:
Flaking is one of the best melee strategies since the D&D 3.0. But to real benefit from flaking it's supposed that your char will receive some real benefit from it or that you are ready to accept the frontline risk to benefit from flat-foot condition.
So to a Champion/Fighter and Rogue goes to front and do this with a heavy armor, shield and Deny advantage+Precision damage it's one thing. The other is the Kineticist going to same risky situation without any real advantage or protection (basically it has only disadvantage because melee just diminish your Impulse options).
2) manuevers
This is a thing that Kineticist don't have. Str isn't even a KAS for it. The class also don't have any ability of feat that helps to do maneuvers like fighters, barbarian, monks and even eidolons have.
3) str to damage
OK you can have, but once again isn't your KAS and if you strongly invest in it using str APEX you will end even with less HP and less "strike" power than any other martial at same time.
4) spreading damage out among other melee characters
Well I don't need to stay in front line to do this...
My point here is. The currently Kyneticist design is completely unfavorable to act melee. It's basically a caster build with a martial chassis and a strange "Strike" mechanic.
If Paizo designers really want that Kineticist being able to act fluently between melee and range, theres a lot of things that needs to be revised to this worth.
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Every blast ability works with either ranged or melee aside from chain blast, which is only ranged. Having a couple melee only impulses would go a long way for this.Only if they didn't provoke attack of opportunity. A systemic problem currently in this playtest. In good faith I'll imagine this being addressed before release lol.
After the inventor, magus, and thaumaturge there is zero chance the Kineticist won’t provoke in melee. Paizo absolutely loves this on new classes.
If you don’t want to provoke you’re supposed to work around it - get reach, don’t spellstrike, don’t use your inventor or thaumaturge ability, don’t use your elemental blast.
Or use elemental weapon with those restrictions and downsides.
Every blast ability works with either ranged or melee aside from chain blast, which is only ranged. Having a couple melee only impulses would go a long way for this.Only if they didn't provoke attack of opportunity. A systemic problem currently in this playtest. In good faith I'll imagine this being addressed before release lol.After the inventor, magus, and thaumaturge there is zero chance the Kineticist won’t provoke in melee. Paizo absolutely loves this on new classes.
If you don’t want to provoke you’re supposed to work around it - get reach, don’t spellstrike, don’t use your inventor or thaumaturge ability, don’t use your elemental blast.
Or use elemental weapon with those restrictions and downsides.
there is a HUGE difference between using a class ability, vs your basic attack.
basic melee strikes shouldnt provoke. the rest is fine though. a magus can cascade and swing as example.
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I'm not entirely convinced the class needs medium armor prof.
It's a thing dictated by your attributes.
Any time you get a class with a non-Dex/Str KAS, and someone starts with an 18 in their KAS, a 16 in their Strength, and a 12 in their Dex they are going to want to grab medium armor.
Every blast ability works with either ranged or melee aside from chain blast, which is only ranged. Having a couple melee only impulses would go a long way for this.Only if they didn't provoke attack of opportunity. A systemic problem currently in this playtest. In good faith I'll imagine this being addressed before release lol.After the inventor, magus, and thaumaturge there is zero chance the Kineticist won’t provoke in melee. Paizo absolutely loves this on new classes.
If you don’t want to provoke you’re supposed to work around it - get reach, don’t spellstrike, don’t use your inventor or thaumaturge ability, don’t use your elemental blast.
Or use elemental weapon with those restrictions and downsides.
there is a HUGE difference between using a class ability, vs your basic attack.
basic melee strikes shouldnt provoke. the rest is fine though. a magus can cascade and swing as example.
Your basic attack is raged. You can have a little melee, as a treat.
Medium armor prof feels like a lazy way to solve yhe issue rather than simply add in a cool defense that fills in the gaps that changes depending on element.I'm not entirely convinced the class needs medium armor prof.It's a thing dictated by your attributes.
Any time you get a class with a non-Dex/Str KAS, and someone starts with an 18 in their KAS, a 16 in their Strength, and a 12 in their Dex they are going to want to grab medium armor.
my thought is, as neat as cool unique elemental defences for each of the 6 elements that will be in the book would be, that would eat up a ton of page space, meaning something else would have to be cut to make it fit, and i would much rather them print "and medium armor" and leave that page space for other fun goodies
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The weird thing about the melee kineticist is that (I think) Elemental Weapon uses the stats of the weapon rather than the damage of your melee blast.In PF1 the analogous infusion "Kinetic Blade" used the stats of your blast and just let you use it in melee range without provoking.
There are some contexts where using the weapon's die size is beneficial (like an aerokineticist getting a d6 finesse weapon) and sometimes when it's not; a geokineticist has only so many common 1d8 1 handed martial weapons available, and most of them don't have a trait as good as forceful.
I guess this is a consequence of there being a wide variance in die size between kinetic blasts.
Medium armor prof feels like a lazy way to solve yhe issue rather than simply add in a cool defense that fills in the gaps that changes depending on element.I'm not entirely convinced the class needs medium armor prof.It's a thing dictated by your attributes.
Any time you get a class with a non-Dex/Str KAS, and someone starts with an 18 in their KAS, a 16 in their Strength, and a 12 in their Dex they are going to want to grab medium armor.
I disagree because it makes flexible blasts worse.
What if someone wants to be a strength air using throwing 1d4+3 air daggers.
Medium armor isn't so much lazy as it is accurate solution. You could still maybe get element specific fun stuff. But you don't need to limit the classes versatility for the sake of it.
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Your basic attack is raged. You can have a little melee, as a treat.Every blast ability works with either ranged or melee aside from chain blast, which is only ranged. Having a couple melee only impulses would go a long way for this.Only if they didn't provoke attack of opportunity. A systemic problem currently in this playtest. In good faith I'll imagine this being addressed before release lol.After the inventor, magus, and thaumaturge there is zero chance the Kineticist won’t provoke in melee. Paizo absolutely loves this on new classes.
If you don’t want to provoke you’re supposed to work around it - get reach, don’t spellstrike, don’t use your inventor or thaumaturge ability, don’t use your elemental blast.
Or use elemental weapon with those restrictions and downsides.
there is a HUGE difference between using a class ability, vs your basic attack.
basic melee strikes shouldnt provoke. the rest is fine though. a magus can cascade and swing as example.
It's not though. It's squarely both. Or it wouldn't give the option at base.
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A thing about Armor is that Earth does have a thematically cool power that mimics armor. It's just that it's at level 14, and it actually reduces your armor class and saves relative to the magic armor you would own by then.
A reasonable solution is to give earth (and maybe water) a low level impulse that gives them an elemental suit that gives them better armor. You'd just need to make sure it isn't invalidated by "how magic armor scales". Like let us inscribe runes on it and don't make us spend 2 actions to turn it on at the start of combat (make it a "when you have a gathered element" kind of thing).
A thing about Armor is that Earth does have a thematically cool power that mimics armor. It's just that it's at level 14, and it actually reduces your armor class and saves relative to the magic armor you would own by then.
A reasonable solution is to give earth (and maybe water) a low level impulse that gives them an elemental suit that gives them better armor. You'd just need to make sure it isn't invalidated by "how magic armor scales". Like let us inscribe runes on it and don't make us spend 2 actions to turn it on at the start of combat (make it a "when you have a gathered element" kind of thing).
So fire, air, and water that's clearly strength based, is SOL?
Doesn't really speak to the versatility of the class.
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It's not though. It's squarely both. Or it wouldn't give the option at base.Your basic attack is raged. You can have a little melee, as a treat.Every blast ability works with either ranged or melee aside from chain blast, which is only ranged. Having a couple melee only impulses would go a long way for this.Only if they didn't provoke attack of opportunity. A systemic problem currently in this playtest. In good faith I'll imagine this being addressed before release lol.After the inventor, magus, and thaumaturge there is zero chance the Kineticist won’t provoke in melee. Paizo absolutely loves this on new classes.
If you don’t want to provoke you’re supposed to work around it - get reach, don’t spellstrike, don’t use your inventor or thaumaturge ability, don’t use your elemental blast.
Or use elemental weapon with those restrictions and downsides.
there is a HUGE difference between using a class ability, vs your basic attack.
basic melee strikes shouldnt provoke. the rest is fine though. a magus can cascade and swing as example.
It’s squarely ranged, or it wouldn’t provoke in melee.
It’s squarely ranged, or it wouldn’t provoke in melee.It's not though. It's squarely both. Or it wouldn't give the option at base.Your basic attack is raged. You can have a little melee, as a treat.Every blast ability works with either ranged or melee aside from chain blast, which is only ranged. Having a couple melee only impulses would go a long way for this.Only if they didn't provoke attack of opportunity. A systemic problem currently in this playtest. In good faith I'll imagine this being addressed before release lol.After the inventor, magus, and thaumaturge there is zero chance the Kineticist won’t provoke in melee. Paizo absolutely loves this on new classes.
If you don’t want to provoke you’re supposed to work around it - get reach, don’t spellstrike, don’t use your inventor or thaumaturge ability, don’t use your elemental blast.
Or use elemental weapon with those restrictions and downsides.
there is a HUGE difference between using a class ability, vs your basic attack.
basic melee strikes shouldnt provoke. the rest is fine though. a magus can cascade and swing as example.
just like magus isnt supposed to be in melee, or inventor right?
It’s squarely ranged, or it wouldn’t provoke in melee.It's not though. It's squarely both. Or it wouldn't give the option at base.Your basic attack is raged. You can have a little melee, as a treat.Every blast ability works with either ranged or melee aside from chain blast, which is only ranged. Having a couple melee only impulses would go a long way for this.Only if they didn't provoke attack of opportunity. A systemic problem currently in this playtest. In good faith I'll imagine this being addressed before release lol.After the inventor, magus, and thaumaturge there is zero chance the Kineticist won’t provoke in melee. Paizo absolutely loves this on new classes.
If you don’t want to provoke you’re supposed to work around it - get reach, don’t spellstrike, don’t use your inventor or thaumaturge ability, don’t use your elemental blast.
Or use elemental weapon with those restrictions and downsides.
there is a HUGE difference between using a class ability, vs your basic attack.
basic melee strikes shouldnt provoke. the rest is fine though. a magus can cascade and swing as example.
Squarely ranged is a bow that has no melee strike.
You have no leg you stand on here
just like magus isnt supposed to be in melee, or inventor right?It’s squarely ranged, or it wouldn’t provoke in melee.It's not though. It's squarely both. Or it wouldn't give the option at base.Your basic attack is raged. You can have a little melee, as a treat.Every blast ability works with either ranged or melee aside from chain blast, which is only ranged. Having a couple melee only impulses would go a long way for this.Only if they didn't provoke attack of opportunity. A systemic problem currently in this playtest. In good faith I'll imagine this being addressed before release lol.After the inventor, magus, and thaumaturge there is zero chance the Kineticist won’t provoke in melee. Paizo absolutely loves this on new classes.
If you don’t want to provoke you’re supposed to work around it - get reach, don’t spellstrike, don’t use your inventor or thaumaturge ability, don’t use your elemental blast.
Or use elemental weapon with those restrictions and downsides.
there is a HUGE difference between using a class ability, vs your basic attack.
basic melee strikes shouldnt provoke. the rest is fine though. a magus can cascade and swing as example.
Both of those have ways to play that don't provoke.
Nice try.
just like magus isnt supposed to be in melee, or inventor right?It’s squarely ranged, or it wouldn’t provoke in melee.It's not though. It's squarely both. Or it wouldn't give the option at base.Your basic attack is raged. You can have a little melee, as a treat.Every blast ability works with either ranged or melee aside from chain blast, which is only ranged. Having a couple melee only impulses would go a long way for this.Only if they didn't provoke attack of opportunity. A systemic problem currently in this playtest. In good faith I'll imagine this being addressed before release lol.After the inventor, magus, and thaumaturge there is zero chance the Kineticist won’t provoke in melee. Paizo absolutely loves this on new classes.
If you don’t want to provoke you’re supposed to work around it - get reach, don’t spellstrike, don’t use your inventor or thaumaturge ability, don’t use your elemental blast.
Or use elemental weapon with those restrictions and downsides.
there is a HUGE difference between using a class ability, vs your basic attack.
basic melee strikes shouldnt provoke. the rest is fine though. a magus can cascade and swing as example.
Both of those have ways to play that don't provoke.
Nice try.
yes they do, but they are presented in art as melee first classes, and have far more options for speccing into melee then they do for ranged.
yes they do, but they are presented in art as melee first classes, and have far more options for speccing into melee then they do for ranged.just like magus isnt supposed to be in melee, or inventor right?It’s squarely ranged, or it wouldn’t provoke in melee.It's not though. It's squarely both. Or it wouldn't give the option at base.Your basic attack is raged. You can have a little melee, as a treat.Every blast ability works with either ranged or melee aside from chain blast, which is only ranged. Having a couple melee only impulses would go a long way for this.Only if they didn't provoke attack of opportunity. A systemic problem currently in this playtest. In good faith I'll imagine this being addressed before release lol.After the inventor, magus, and thaumaturge there is zero chance the Kineticist won’t provoke in melee. Paizo absolutely loves this on new classes.
If you don’t want to provoke you’re supposed to work around it - get reach, don’t spellstrike, don’t use your inventor or thaumaturge ability, don’t use your elemental blast.
Or use elemental weapon with those restrictions and downsides.
there is a HUGE difference between using a class ability, vs your basic attack.
basic melee strikes shouldnt provoke. the rest is fine though. a magus can cascade and swing as example.
Both of those have ways to play that don't provoke.
Nice try.
And can still melee without provoking. Plus it's not like there isn't ways to rob reactions or direct them.
This isn't 1 player vs DM monsters.
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So fire, air, and water that's clearly strength based, is SOL?Doesn't really speak to the versatility of the class.
Well, I'm not sure there is a mechanical reason to build a strength based aero or pyro kineticist. There's a thematic reason too, but there's also thematic reasons to build a wizard who uses a maul.
Earth gets propulsive on its ranged blasts and Earth and Water are the two elements without finesse on their melee blasts.
You could make "Kinetic Armor" an impulse that has different effects based on what element you have gathered (different armor stats for every element so like heavy armor for earth and metal, medium for water and wood, light for air and fire). Require a some sort of focus thing worn on your body (like a headband) that you can inscribe fundamental runes on (or just make it stack with the item bonus from bracers of armor), and make it automatically up when you have an element gathered to reduce the number of "turn things on" action taxes in the first round.
I mean if I'm destined to only ever make human kineticist unless my campaigns start at a higher level so be it.
Seems pretty silly to be tough.
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The Kineticist gets one measly armor proficiency boost through it's lifetime, so I'm not sure the value of "spending more than one feat on this" for the strength based kineticist.
Like the General Feat "Armor Proficiency" will get you trained in medium armor (so max AC with a dex of 12) and you get expert in light armor at level 13, so if you can get a dex score of 16 by level 13 (which should be easy if you started at 12- dex is one of those scores you boost because it's save relevant) then you'll have max AC with Studded Leather or a Chain Shirt at which point you can retrain out of "Armor Proficiency."
The awkward bit is that some ancestries/heritages can get a general feat at level 1 (e.g. Versatile Humans) and some have to wait until level 3.
So I don't think that Strength based kineticists are stronger necessarily than Dexterity based ones. The big difference is that the Dex character can afford to bump Int or Cha and the Str based one is sort of locked into boosting Str/Dex/Con/Wis for levels 1, 5, and 10.
You boost athletics because you're Str based and that's your one skill, but nothing in your class kit makes you better at maneuvers and you're constantly fighting the action economy anyway.
More maneuver support in class would be great though. The PF1 kineticist had all sorts of infusions that could be used to trip, shove, or grapple at range so you should at least be able to use "you control the ground" to be decent at them from the normal range.
exactly, id only play human kineticists at that point if i started a game at level 1.
considering ive been taken from full to dying 1 with a optimally built character with 18 ac and 14 con more than a few times in this system.
starting with less than 18 ac with a melee character at level 1 sounds like im never going to make it to level 2.
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Sentinel's a waste of feats, probably even if you are playing with free archetype. It doesn't do anything more than the general feat for 13 levels, would have to be delayed to after you get your first general feat if you want heavy armor (or retraining shenanigans).
Three feats (one general) is a lot to spend on what is effectively +1 AC versus what you can get for one feat.