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Until the devs say that it is going to be nerfed, I'm not too worried.
Particular aspects of the class may be brought in-line. But I think the general idea of the class is good to go.
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As I said in another topic I don't want that the class to be nerfed (instead I hope that Players Core 2 classes like Oracle get some good spell boosts and Psychic receive a good errata boosting it too, maybe extending the unleash time).
But I'm hurt after about 4 years in PF2 getting unpleasant nerfs or over-limitations IMO specially for casters. So I try to avoid hypes currently. Yet in the deep of my heart I really hope that the remaster and rage of elements could be a mark where the things finally goes better in general for casters instead of goes down.
The Spirit dmg and the new refocus system, improvements in clerics MAD and armor, removal of the restriction to metal armor to druids and making martial weapons default do bards (probably improving their martial muse) gives me such hope. I just don't want to hold on to it too much so I don't regret it later.
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Yeah, balance is good but a lot of the suggestions some of the class' critics have offered are genuinely terrible suggestions that often seem to involve stripping the class of most of its compelling features, and often don't have any basis in the actual functionality of the class at all.
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I am not worried, tbh. Our job is talking about what we like and what we dislike about this iteration of the class, not coming up with a solution. That's Paizo's job. It is still fun, though, so people will keep doing it anyway.
So far I'd say that the most prominent topics are all things I can get behind. What I've seen the most is Sage feeling meh (well, both subclasses being a bit bland too), focus spells being good (maybe too good) and the split casting system maybe being a bit convoluted.
So no, not worried that Paizo will take our armchair dev solutions seriously, since what's behind those comments is what matters and thus far feedback seems to go in a very clear direction.
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Remember too that the developers are testing the ideas they are least certain about and most experimental. Have fun. Test them out. See how the options feel in play.
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So has anything changed from last time is everyone still confident the animist wont be over-nerfed?
The only new news that I am aware of is this note. Which doesn't change anything that I have said.
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Thanks for the update, to be fair even if one apparition or even many end up under-powered it wouldn't be as bad because you can always add more like bloodlines and eidolons, apparition spells can also be fixed easily with a errata so if its only small changes them its fine because it won't be as damaging in the long run, I'm more worried that cool features will removed like how the animist can become a avatar of his apparition/spirit or class feats being removed because that is much less likely to be rolled back later.
As someone who's spent a lot of time lately talking about how the Animist is overtuned and in need of nerfs, I'd say that the special Avatar form and the class's feats are just about the least controversial parts of the class. The general controversy in discussion has been around the versatility of apparition stacking and the power of some vessel spells, but having a different form for your Avatar has so far registered as completely unproblematic, particularly as it's one of those features that manages to be really flavorful without really adding much power (divine casters get to cast Avatar anyway for similar forms).
As for class feats, I've seen people praise Sustaining Dance in particular for its action compression and asking for more feats like it. Most other feats don't appear to have caused too much trouble, and in fact there's requests to free up the Animist's action economy somewhat because right now, it's very difficult to use stance or spellshape feats with all of the other stuff the class has to manage on their turn.
Really, for all the criticism, there's also a lot of requests to buff the Animist in certain respects, chiefly by making their action economy less restrictive. I'd also add that currently the Animist is the only class in the game who can end up with no master proficiency in any saving throw, which I don't think is right.
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Honestly I also think that the most complains about staking Earth's Bile and off-encounter Garden of Healing are overrated and after further analysis both are different from what we normally get but still OK. It's just efficient in what they need to be.
About Garden of Healing being strong in off-encounter this is true but for other side the Animist is so focused in use of its focus spells that you usually have to wait 30-40 minutes to full refocus basically taking the same time that other off-encounter healings would take to do same healing.
So I don't se a real need to nerf. Currently my only complain about the class is its spell slot clunkness due it divide its spell slots by half addming more micro-managament and restricting the flexibility of its spell casting.
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As a concept, I like the dual nature of the spellcasting. About half of the magic is the Animist's own, and the other half is coming from the Apparitions.
You get to choose what you cast for your own magic, but what the Apparition brings is chosen for you.
Apparition spellcasting is both quite flexible, and very inflexible. Flexible because you can choose which Apparition to use for the day if you want to choose that based on which spells the Apparition comes with. Inflexible because you don't get to choose the spells for the Apparition. If you choose a particular Apparition for some other reason, like what focus spell it has, or what Wandering feats it allows, then you can't change what spells you get as a result.
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Honestly I also think that the most complains about staking Earth's Bile and off-encounter Garden of Healing are overrated and after further analysis both are different from what we normally get but still OK. It's just efficient in what they need to be.
About Garden of Healing being strong in off-encounter this is true but for other side the Animist is so focused in use of its focus spells that you usually have to wait 30-40 minutes to full refocus basically taking the same time that other off-encounter healings would take to do same healing.
So I don't se a real need to nerf. Currently my only complain about the class is its spell slot clunkness due it divide its spell slots by half addming more micro-managament and restricting the flexibility of its spell casting.
Your graph shows Earth Bile does more damage sometimes and close to a min/maxed Kineticist who offers almost zero utility outside of damage and is in melee until level 10+. Also, the Sorcerer/Kineticist is doing partial single target damage. How can you say it doesn't need a nerf?
I guess I am mostly just upset that I really enjoy the Kineticist, but Earth's Bile and Garden of Healing just do what a specialized Kineticist healing/damage (Water/Fire) does but better while having spellcasting. Also requires a total of two feats for the Animist to do this.
Of course, Kineticist still have a lot of fun abilities at higher levels, at low levels Animist overshadow other classes. I guess this mostly comes down to them get everything at level 1. Other classes progressively get better focus/different abilities as they level up.
I am surprised they did this. While leveling I would get bored of this character really easy... There wouldn't really be anything to look forward to that really changes my gameplay. Yes there are some powerful feats but other than sustaining dance I didn't see many that changed my gameplay much. Normally other characters you are constantly getting new special attack or focus spells...
As someone who's spent a lot of time lately talking about how the Animist is overtuned and in need of nerfs, I'd say that the special Avatar form and the class's feats are just about the least controversial parts of the class. The general controversy in discussion has been around the versatility of apparition stacking and the power of some vessel spells, but having a different form for your Avatar has so far registered as completely unproblematic, particularly as it's one of those features that manages to be really flavorful without really adding much power (divine casters get to cast Avatar anyway for similar forms).
Focus spells are mostly just more powerful version of other classes to me. I just wanted to say Avatar forms would have been really unique/fun if they were lower level... I would guess very few people get to level 19 and if they do the campaign ends shortly after.
Surprised they didn't have them as scaling form spells like animal form. Having to wait until level 19 (I am not aware of a way to get them earlier). This would make the class way more unique for me rather than just being X class but with better focus spells and weird spellcasting. Feel like the class would feel much more unique this way.
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Honestly I also think that the most complains about staking Earth's Bile and off-encounter Garden of Healing are overrated and after further analysis both are different from what we normally get but still OK. It's just efficient in what they need to be.
One thing that surprised me in a Playtest session yesterday is that Garden of Healing is actually pretty decent IN COMBAT healing as well.
I was playing a channeler (obviously :-)) planning on using Garden just for out of combat healing.
First round, stance and bile (the GM interpreted the wording on bile that only one bile spell could be sustained a round which I actually quite like).
Then things went south and my plans changed :-). Danced my way into an optimal position while sustaining bile, whirled, and cast Garden. 3d4+3 group healing ( level 5) that round was enough to bring one character up while topping up some others who needed it.
Next round 2 sustains and a 1 action heal spell.
Not great healing and totally unplanned for but turned out to be adequate and sufficient. And had enough duration remaining after combat to still heal us all up without needing to spend another focus point (mostly irrelevant but it was amusing)
Garden of Healing is decent IN COMBAT it just need that you and your party pay attention in your positioning. If everyone work together you will create many situation where it will be useful in combat. This helps to save some healing spell to situations where you need a more emergency healing to that player who is to far or behind the enemy lines.
It's a cantrip. It still better than other cantrips but cannot compete with resource limited spells like focus spells and spell slot spells.
Just for a fun comparison: 3 Earth's Bile in Channeler's Stance VS 3 Flaming Sphere with Burn It! VS 3 Mirror Malefactors VS 3 Ignite the Sun+2 Blasts+Thermal Nimbus
This is a just for math comparisons only. To keep Spheres/Mirrors requires Cackle or Effortless Concentration (both together can reach up to 4) what's not sustainable due the limit of spells that you can cast in a day.
But keep the 3 Ignite the Sun is pretty easy and any fire kineticist can do. The up 2 aditional blast comes because Effortless Impulse and the level 20 second blast come from Kinetic Pinnacle.
The curious is because Ignite the Sun is a lvl 18 Impulse no-one complains about you can do 3 of it resourcelessy.