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Ugh, finally came out with this. Still alpha build (as of this posting) meaning I have a lot of work left to do, but I have the general stuff up.
Couple of things:
1)Sorry, I couldn't figure out how to do a good star rating system. Still looking for one that won't take me forever and a day, so if you are color-blind . . . I'm looking for a fix.
2) Please, give me CONSTRUCTIVE feedback. I'm willing to put stuff in the guide if it works and you think of it (I'll even credit you.) Just. . . let's be civil.
3)I've repeated myself a couple of times throughout the guide because I figure no one is going to read all the pages in one go, and so I repeated the most important parts.
4) I copy-pasted the basic format from my psychic guide, so if you see a reference to psychics, let me know. It should be kineticists.
Anyway: here you go: I'd appreciate some feedback (and yes, I need to finish ranking the class feats and elemental feats and combination feats.)
Thanks guys, didn't catch that, I'll fix it when I can.
Any other thoughts?
Rating all the elements green suggests they are roughly equally good.
In a vacuum and as single elements, I feel Air & Wood are blue, Earth, Fire, and Water are green, and Metal is orange.
The differences aren't huge, but even if you don't agree that Air and Wood are standouts at blue, I think Metal is pretty clearly too situational to be green.
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Thanks guys, didn't catch that, I'll fix it when I can.
Any other thoughts?
Rating all the elements green suggests they are roughly equally good.
In a vacuum and as single elements, I feel Air & Wood are blue, Earth, Fire, and Water are green, and Metal is orange.
The differences aren't huge, but even if you don't agree that Air and Wood are standouts at blue, I think Metal is pretty clearly too situational to be green.
I actually used a different shade of green just to denote that was the element section. I'll fix it. I actually say that I'm not ranking the elements because, basically, there's not a good way to rate them. Air might be best on its own, but maybe fire plus earth beats it? And while air is good at some stuff, it can't heal . . . I felt it was too much of a difficult thing to boil down to one rating system.
I really appreciate your Sample Combat and Adventure Path sections. Those are unique!
I do wish the Sample Combat section showed off a bit more what the Kineticist can do. In particular, I'd like to see Kaku leverage one of the Kineticist's greatest strengths, Elemental Blasts vs. AC and Impulses vs. Saves in the same turn. On both turns, Kaku just uses 2-action EB.
I think a better turn 1 (at least to show off the Kin abilities) would be 1-action Channel Elements -> free 1-action Elemental Blast vs. AC + 2-action Aerial Boomerang vs. Reflex -> free action Impulse Junction Move or Step.
Turn 2: 1-action retrieve Boomerang +
2-action EB -> free action Move/Step
To me, this shows off more of the class and it's unique advantages.
In the Adventure Path section, I noticed you left out Kingmaker. Was that intentional or an oversight?
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I really appreciate your Sample Combat and Adventure Path sections. Those are unique!
I do wish the Sample Combat section showed off a bit more what the Kineticist can do. In particular, I'd like to see Kaku leverage one of the Kineticist's greatest strengths, Elemental Blasts vs. AC and Impulses vs. Saves in the same turn. On both turns, Kaku just uses 2-action EB.
I think a better turn 1 (at least to show off the Kin abilities) would be 1-action Channel Elements -> free 1-action Elemental Blast vs. AC + 2-action Aerial Boomerang vs. Reflex -> free action Impulse Junction Move or Step.
Turn 2: 1-action retrieve Boomerang +
2-action EB -> free action Move/StepTo me, this shows off more of the class and it's unique advantages.
In the Adventure Path section, I noticed you left out Kingmaker. Was that intentional or an oversight?
The sample combat was there basically as a ‘let’s put this altogether’ kinda thing. In other words, it is there to demonstrate how you have to open up your gates, blast, and impulse junctions. I didn’t want to make it more complicated than that because I was trying to do a simple demonstration. Throwing more impulses in the mix, I think, would have confused it.
Kingmaker. . . I dunno. It’s the odd duck for me. I’m just going by the schedulers base AP releases. Not the remake project.
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"Ancesties" is missing the 'r'.
Some of your ancestry arguments are... weird Like... kobold really isn't that good for a kineticist. Among other things, there's lots of ancestries that offer resists, kineticist itself offers resists, and in many cases, having resist to your own elements isn't all that useful.
I'm not going to pile into the debate here, but I invite you to wander into this thread both to get thoughts on the matter of advantages/disadvantages of varying ancestries for the kineticist and to discuss your own.
For the AP section I can offer some more inside advice on AOA and BL. AOA you end up running up against quite a few enemies that are immune to fire. Some of these have elemental traits for Extract and some don't. As well as age of ashes having a ton of golems in books 2-5 (at least 1-5 per book). I would say that a metal kineticist with plate in metal for on-demand cold iron/adamantine would really help in that campaign too.
Bloodlords as well has another stipulation. Despite wood being a very good anti-undead element it also has a strict ban on positive (vital) energy. Its not a deal breaker but its worth mentioning as channeling positive energy can result in you getting the capital punishment of The Eternal Vigil which traps you in a statue for the rest of your immortal life.
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Small correction:
In Counter Element, you ask "what happens if you pick up a 2nd element at level 10?" but you could get a new element at 9/13 not 10.
I feel like all of the standard builds could use a little more specific build advice. Since you're not doing full 1-20 breakdowns, the way some guides try to, I think mentioning one or two good impulse feats on 1, 4, 6/8 would go a long way towards being actionable enough to get people on a path.
Like: "If you want to play a wood tank, you can pick up either Hardwood Armor or Sentinel dedication. Drifting Pollen plus Safe Elements can really help to weaken your enemies, increasing your survivability, especially after picking up Aura Shaping at level 10."
Additionally, I think utility could be broken up into two builds:
Support and Control, for helping allies and hindering enemies, respectively. Your write-up does say that metal, water, and wood are better at different aspects of "Support", but more specific build advice can help players make more informed decisions.
Also, I think a Blaster build would be a well-received build section. Less focused on mobility than the Scrapper and more on straight damage. Sort of the Kineticist version of the "white room dps build".
While I don't think it's necessarily the best way to play, some people just want big damage numbers.
Finally, only the Tank build, arguably the least complicated of those outlined, has a "How to play" section.
Oh, and you refer to "Expanded Kinesis" a few times; I think you mean "Extended Kinesis" (though frankly your name is more appropriate to what the feat does, imo).
The sample combat was there basically as a ‘let’s put this altogether’ kinda thing. In other words, it is there to demonstrate how you have to open up your gates, blast, and impulse junctions. I didn’t want to make it more complicated than that because I was trying to do a simple demonstration. Throwing more impulses in the mix, I think, would have confused it.
I dunno. People are smart. I bet you could explain it well, and they could figure it out. In fact, you do explain it all well just above that section. But then you only highlight Channel Elements and Elemental Blast.
And besides, the combat you describe just isn't very cool. And if there's one thing that stands out about the kineticist it's that playing one in combat feels cool. I think you should sell the sizzle a little more. Kaku *misses* for goodness sake! Why? C'mon! Make it a hit!
If I was just learning the class and read that combat flow, I'd think, "That's it???"
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The sample combat was there basically as a ‘let’s put this altogether’ kinda thing. In other words, it is there to demonstrate how you have to open up your gates, blast, and impulse junctions. I didn’t want to make it more complicated than that because I was trying to do a simple demonstration. Throwing more impulses in the mix, I think, would have confused it.
I dunno. People are smart. I bet you could explain it well, and they could figure it out. In fact, you do explain it all well just above that section. But then you only highlight Channel Elements and Elemental Blast.
And besides, the combat you describe just isn't very cool. And if there's one thing that stands out about the kineticist it's that playing one in combat feels cool. I think you should sell the sizzle a little more. Kaku *misses* for goodness sake! Why? C'mon! Make it a hit!
If I was just learning the class and read that combat flow, I'd think, "That's it???"
Kaku misses because in the animated gif above, Kaku's attack is deflected by Zoru's swords! It's linked to the gif!.
And . . . I know plenty of people that have a hard time with super intricate classes like this. So that's who the example is for. I could do another sample combat elsewhere maybe, but my idea was "I know some people who are going to say 'this is too complicted.' So I made a demonstration that kinda showed the basics off."
Did some more updates that people asked for, made a 'blaster' standard build, also explained why I don't do 1-20 builds.
I've yet to give this more than just a glance, I've been procrastinating on a few things since Rage of Elements was published so I've some catch-up to do, but I will say I'm glad to see you put in the time and effort to explain this class. Quite a few things about the class took me a few re-reads to understand so I'm sure this will be a big help for some people. ;-)
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I think for Weapon Infusion i'd mention how the thrown and propulsive traits are pretty nice for Kineticists that get an Armor option. Earth effectively gaining +3 damage on their EB if the enemy is in 20 feet range is pretty great, especially at low levels. Propulsive even INCREASES the range of all EB aside from fire and air while also giving it added damage.
The biggest draw back here is that it is a free action you can do before a blast. So you CANNOT use it for the blast you can do as part of Channel Elements. For some builds that might be the only kind of Blast they do if they focus on doing Overflow impulses most turns.
I mention several times that weapon infusion can get you the throwing benifit, but I put it in the weapon infusion feat entry. Not sure why it's best with armor options, but I listed it in the tank build, the blaster build, and the armored knight build.
I'll call out that infusions can't be used with the free startup for opening your gate.
Best for armor options because they invest in strength, presumably.
Some feedback:
Imperious Aura: the point of this feat is to facilitate frequent swapping among different stances on a stance-heavy build that isn't dropping very many Overflow Impulses (and therefore isn't using Channel Elements very often).
Aerial Boomerang: you say "if you don't move" you can spam the Impulse plus the return, but I would amend that to something like "if you don't take other actions" since you CAN move if you have the Air Impulse Junction.
Thermal Nimbus: I think this is better than you're rating it, thanks to the synergy with Fire's Aura Junction. Note that your allies will usually be safe since they're gaining DR = level and taking damage = 1/2 level resulting in no damage, but in niche circumstances like an ally with a fire weakness you could potentially add Safe Elements.
Crawling Fire: I don't like using this for extended scouting because you take the damage from any attacks directed at the creation. If you trigger an encounter you could suffer up to a full round of focus fire before you can dismiss it, and that could easily be enough to kill you.
Metal Carapace: while not as strong as the other armor Impulses, this is better than worthless thanks to the regenerating shield. It lets you use Shield Block with impunity since it's so easy to make a new shield. Wear Studded Leather underneath so you aren't taking as much of an AC hit when it shatters. Beyond the obvious hardness scaling, there's extra synergy with Plate in Treasure to give the shield Adamantine stats, and with Destructive Block from the Bastion archetype.
Recommended archetypes: I'd add Medic for Kineticists focusing on healing; there's just so much value to be gained from the dedication feat boosting healing values and overriding the default cooldown, and then you have some fantastic feats like Doctor's Visitation.
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The three action overflow capstones can in fact be spammed every round once you get Final Gate. Important to note.
I feel you're underrating Shattered Mountain Weeps a bit - the ongoing damage is solid, and works when spamming it too - just keep it raining right over the front line of enemies and they're going to be taking 12d10 per round total if they don't back off.
Scorching Column has significant synergy with the fire weakness aura, I think it plays nice if you're building battlefield control stuff, as is scales up to 13 damage per square, plus another 10 from weakness. If you or an ally are forcing enemies back into that over and over it adds up.
Thermal Nimbus is one action (that can be done for free as part of Channel Elements even) to throw out damage every turn for the rest of the fight, and it has a built in answer to fire resist by switching to cold. And it applies weakness, a lot.
Solar Detonation's incap trait hurts so much, agreed. If that somehow only applied to the debuffs it'd be respectable (and utterly backbreaking against undead)
Forgot about Final gate. Added a bit at the start of the Air Feats section explaining that. Also added a bit about the fire weakness aura at the start of the fire section.
Crawling Fire: I don't like using this for extended scouting because you take the damage from any attacks directed at the creation. If you trigger an encounter you could suffer up to a full round of focus fire before you can dismiss it, and that could easily be enough to kill you.
It's also hampered in scouting because it only lasts for a minute and can by default only travel 40 feet in a round. (it can travel faster if you have a fire impulse that provides movement)
Now, if you get *lucky*, you can do things like drop your heftiest damaging impulse on the enemy and then let the crawling fire vanish by failing to sustain, or possibly even do that more than once if it takes a while for the enemy to figure out where you are, but that's not the sort of thing that's likely to happen *often*.
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Crawling Fire: I don't like using this for extended scouting because you take the damage from any attacks directed at the creation. If you trigger an encounter you could suffer up to a full round of focus fire before you can dismiss it, and that could easily be enough to kill you.It's also hampered in scouting because it only lasts for a minute and can by default only travel 40 feet in a round. (it can travel faster if you have a fire impulse that provides movement)
Now, if you get *lucky*, you can do things like drop your heftiest damaging impulse on the enemy and then let the crawling fire vanish by failing to sustain, or possibly even do that more than once if it takes a while for the enemy to figure out where you are, but that's not the sort of thing that's likely to happen *often*.
I think you are forgetting that most dungeons are pretty small. 40 feet a round is plenty of time to move to the next room or two, or see if the hallway is trapped. Also, your fire guy can use any impulses you can, so he can burning jet for 100 feet a round (as long as 60 of it is in a straight line) so yeah, I think it's valid to use it to scout in dungeons.
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I think you are forgetting that most dungeons are pretty small. 40 feet a round is plenty of time to move to the next room or two, or see if the hallway is trapped. Also, your fire guy can use any impulses you can, so he can burning jet for 100 feet a round (as long as 60 of it is in a straight line) so yeah, I think it's valid to use it to scout in dungeons.
I did say "it can travel faster if..."
I'm perplexed how it's supposed to trapfind for you, though. I mean, you can have it trapfind just like you have yourself trapfind, but you're not likely to have the best perception in the party, you can't spend actual actions searching, and if it triggers one, the damage is coming right back at you. Also, the stealth of a critter who's literally walking flame isn't likely to be great, especially since you can't take sneak actions with them. There's a lot of ways in which it's inferior to just going yourself. The only real advantage it has is that you can release it and return to your old position... and the Kineticist would not normally be the party member I'd choose to send in cases like that.
That said, there is one potential advantage, if you have those extra mobility options. Specifically, you don't use the movement you get from your sustains. You launch yourself across the floor on jets of flame, and then of you see danger, you just don't sustain, and the thing winks out at the end of your turn.
I still say that's pretty niche, and not a particularly good value for your feat.
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imo you are severely underestimating Shattered mountain weeps:
a)one of the highest initial damages of all the 18th level impulses (only behind tsunami).
mountain: 9d10 (49.5)
million needles: 13d6 (45.5)
end in flames: 13d6 (45.5)
tsunami: 10d10 (55)b)the persistant damage has 2 amazing upsides compared to similar impulses like million needles:
1)doesn't need sustain.that alone means you can have a different sustain effect going simultanously with your free sustain. It is almost as good as an extra action per turn.
2)no save.
that's 3d10s that they take every turn no matter what as long as they are in the area.million needles is 3d12 with base reflex.
this is 3d10 without any saving throw.that makes it about 50% more damage overall.
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the above upsides bring it at least on par with million needles, if not outright better (for reference, the needles upsides are slightly bigger area, immobilize+hazardous terrain vs prone+difficult terrain being slightly better)
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in general, reading through your guide, i feel like you are really underestimating incremental damage, especially those with either duration, area, or both.
take fire nimbus as an example, let's say level 14, with your aura impulse that's "just 14 damage" yes. Now, in a 3 round fight vs 3 enemies, that comes out as 126 damage, without spending actions.
or how you say that the million needles 6 damage hazardous terrain is useless, but someone walking from its center to your group, will take an extra 24 damage, which is half of a greatsword swing at those levels. Make those 4 enemies? that's 2 greatsword swings "for free".
even spike skin, while starting indeed pitifully, it scales quite nicely, at the aforementioned level 14, it's "just 8 damage" per retaliate. You get hit 8 times during a combat (which really is just round 3ish for a frontliner)? that's 64 damage as a "bonus" (the main function still being at will stoneskin)
I mean, you aren't wrong in anything you say, but at the same time, I have some other issues. Shattered mountain leaves a hazard area in place that can hamper your friends, and . . . well, I'm used to a lot of paizo fights being against one really big bad guy. So when I see that they can take 24 damage walking through some razors I'm like . . . who cares, he has 400 HP? Compared to the Barbarian over there doing 4d12+6+13+3d6 (from runes) per hit and I'm like "Eh, that's probably not going to do much comparatively. But I'll go back and look at them again.
Well, if it's one enemy they're going to be taking the initial hit as well as the hazard damage (assuming the Kineticist has properly evaluated that the target will want to close to melee instead of staying at range), so in that case I think the appropriate damage figure to have in mind is (49.5*(success formula) + 24) and that's starting to look reasonable against the Barbarian's (56.5*(success formula)) -- 24 automatic damage is competitive with an attack that has a 40%-45% chance to hit, so likely a little worse than a MAPless attack and a little better than the 1st MAP attack.
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So when I see that they can take 24 damage walking through some razors I'm like . . . who cares, he has 400 HP? Compared to the Barbarian over there doing 4d12+6+13+3d6 (from runes) per hit and I'm like "Eh, that's probably not going to do much comparatively. But I'll go back and look at them again.the average of that barbarian hit on a first attack, when adjusted for miss chance, is somewhere around 33 damage, and even quite lower vs "single boss monster" that will have higher AC.
so, getting 24 damage as a side effect, of an AoE effect, that's basically higher than the damage of the 2nd swing of a greatsword wielding barbarian, is actually quite impressive.
As for your experience, i mean, the ratio of fights vs 1 single enemy without any mooks, vs the fights that have mooks, or all the fights leading to that boss, usually is tilted towards the "more than 1 enemy" by quite a margin.
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as a separate note, on your Clad in Metal, you mention that you can only do so with common metals except with GM permission. That is infact wrong, you can do it with any metal "you have access to" OR with uncommon/rare that GM gives permission.
usually, by the time you are fighting adamantine resistant enemies, at those levels, you usually have access to adamantine.
Eh, usually. I'm just remembering the start of outlaws of alkenstar that has enemies with DR 2/adamantine at level 1.
There are several lower level enemies with DR X/Adamantine, like Golems and Gargoyles. It reflects their skin being item-like or hard, and mechanically works as effectively as if vs. all physical because yeah, Adamantine is a high-level metal.
Note how Gargoyles, level 4, have such poor hit points, 40. So you'll get lopsided battles depending on how much a party relies on weapons vs. magic or multiple small hits vs. singular big hits (or ones that stack like Flurry/Double Slice). Just realizing how it'd be neat to juxtapose them w/ Will O' Wisps and/or Trolls, each so different in one's approaches.