Sucking Counts as Airbending, Right? A Guide to the Kineticist

[Nyaa]

Link pls?

Sure. 4700 posts. Next ones have 900, 500, 450.

[Tulya]

Elemental Annihilator seems like it's meant to be the spiritual successor to 3.5's Soulknife.

Devastating form infusions are analogous to the Mindblade, with Blast Training taking the place of the automatic bonus progression. You can't trade bonus for specials, but the Mindblade fixed list was mediocre.
Like the Monk conversion, you get a conditional upgrade to full BAB. On top of that, you still get the Elemental Overflow bonus on attack rolls.
You get comparable bonus feats, but you actually get to choose them from a small list.
You can freely switch between melee and ranged weapon combat from the start. While the Con to damage puts you behind SAD Str melee, it does enable you to snag Weapon Finesse and have the same to-hit and damage bonuses at either range.
Substance Infusions are loosely similar to Psychic Strike and Knife to the Soul. You can't use the former on Flurry attacks, but you can't charge Psychic Strike and full attack in the same round either.

[Agent281]

After looking through this thread I decided to make some homebrew changes to the Kineticist class. I have put together a Google document here. The first part contains the changes. The subsequent parts discuss the problems I was trying to solve and my thoughts on how well it worked out with my implementation. Since there seems to be a lot of people here who are critical of the class. Would people be willing to give me some feedback? Comments are allowed in the document.


Also, my apologies if this was a poor choice of location for this post. The document is largely a response to criticisms of this class from this thread.

*Edit*

I added a summary of changes to the document. Basically, I realized that I am waaay too verbose and broke down my points in bullets. Hopefully it is more clear what changes are meant to go together.

[Wushu]

This seems as good a place as any to post a Kineticist query.

One of my friends is running a Gestalt game at first level (while allowing some 3.5 feats and equipment). I've been thinking of running the Unchained Monk/Kineticist for the "Last Airbender" flavor the Kineticist is clearly trying to invoke. The GM has also working it that sooner or later there will be a quest that will allow me to use my fists as Guided weapons (Wis to attack and damage).

With that in mind, is Kineticist viable as a Gestalt character with d10 hit die and full BaB? Is it worth going into Elemental Ascetic?

[Kira_the_5th]

This seems as good a place as any to post a Kineticist query.

One of my friends is running a Gestalt game at first level (while allowing some 3.5 feats and equipment). I've been thinking of running the Unchained Monk/Kineticist for the "Last Airbender" flavor the Kineticist is clearly trying to invoke. The GM has also working it that sooner or later there will be a quest that will allow me to use my fists as Guided weapons (Wis to attack and damage).

With that in mind, is Kineticist viable as a Gestalt character with d10 hit die and full BaB? Is it worth going into Elemental Ascetic?

A brief disclaimer before I start; I am not incredibly well acquainted with Gestalt, having never actually played a Gestalt campaign before. I have played around with making Gestalt characters before, so I at least know the basics.

At first glance, it should be fine. Getting full BAB and d10 hit dice is a pretty nice addition to the Kineticist, and having an alternate form of attack in the form of the new flurry of blows and style strikes means you can focus your element to utility. However, you may still want to be careful. Gestalting two weaker classes together makes for a fine playable character, but players who picked up something like Wizard/Slayer might still leave you in the dust. That said, This is probably the best way to actually pull off a full Elemental Bender, so if you're just looking for a fun, if not perfectly optimized character, you should be fine.

I'd personally advise against going with Elemental Ascetic on this one. Having full levels of Unchained Monk already gives you almost everything you would get from the Ascetic, but leaves you holding the disadvantages. The Elemental Ascetic's primary draw is free Kinetic Fist with Flurry of Blows, which, being Gestalt Monk, you can already do by just taking Kinetic Fist at level 1. Using Kinetic Fist for free stops being a bargain at 5th level, when you can reduce Infusion costs by 1, at which point you're left unable to use ranged blasts. Everything else, except for Powerful Fists, you already get by Gestalting Monk, so all you're doing there is trading away features for ones you already have.

[Brandenfascher]

Kudos for the guide! I only just learned of the Kineticist a couple of days ago by chance, and this really helped solidify the how-to's and basic mechanics of the class.

The real draw for the class to me is definitely the whole TLA inspiration, although a number of the mechanics don't quite line up if wanting a truly bender inspired character. I'm knew to this kind of thing, but I enjoyed developing a homebrew archetype the last two days to address this. I haven't play-tested it, and I welcome comments and critiques from those who are more mechanically inclined than me (let me know what sucks, what's overpowered, and what doesn't make sense).

[TwiceBorned]

Thx for the guide! But may I add some through? Firstly, ride the blast can be used as out of combat traveling method - just ride the blast+extreme range and target square(AC 5). This can give you a speed around 50+ mph - and twice as much with air kineticist(and also thematically cool - flying around the world as blast of fire/lightning/forcewave). Second - kinetic blade/whip. Just it. It isn't green, it's straight up gold(better than blue). I mean, full attack with empower-maximize-pure flame blue flame whip(lvl 19).. (20*6+10d6+0.75*con)*4=480+40d6+con*3=650(!) damage. Ignoring spell resistance(not fire resist through..). (burn 2+2+4+2+1-1-5-1-3=1). With 30 ft range.(kinetic form to huge). Ofc at lvl 19 650 damage with 1 round preparation(silence + invisibility to ignore the noisy part of gathering power) isn't something that spectacular, but still good(and it touch AC, so probably will hit with all 4 attacks).
Actually that's why Kineticist lack full BAB - 5 attacks(everyone have hast past lvl 7 or so..) will be too much.
And Kinetic blade just rock from lvl 8(2 attacks from bab +1 from hast for 4d6+half con with reach is a thing to consider).
AND this only eat up 1 infusion(blade or whip later) and one feat(weapon finesse), so this isn't a thing like "melee build kineticist", every build can do all this(may be with less damage cause only fire have composite energy blast and you need energy one with full attack to hit something with this -5/-10 second and third attacks, but still)
Oh, and note for alternative multiclass - wizard with air school alternative MC give familiar at lvl 3, fly at 10 and some other usefull abilities in really late game(like hurricane at lvl 19 - you will attack with melee 30 ft range whip, so ranged attack penaltu doesn't affect you)

[aeolegion]

Haven't seen anyone make this point, but half-orc (and orc) have an additional option that may shift them from solid to swell.

As discussed above, Burn's nonlethal damage results in a huge buffer between the KO threshold and death. So why not consider the following feat tree:

Endurance
Diehard
Ironhide
Deathless Initiate
Deathless Master

Huge investment, but I can't think of a time the cost of Deathless Master is more justified, since the effect appears to completely negate the downside of burn.

In sum: You remain fully conscious and stable while below 0 HP, able to act as normal (full or move+standard) without HP loss, you gain +2 to damage and melee attacks while in this "burn" section of your HP (which seems oddly thematic with overflow, but that might just be me), and a general +1 nat armor, +endurance perks.

Five feats well spent, right? In more concrete terms, setting aside the other perks, it acts like one instance of Toughness per active point of Burn; if you can roll with >5 Burn (shouldn't be hard with all the Con you'll want), you've already squeezed more than 5 good feat equivalents into 5 feat slots.

(I guess you could also think of it like doing a variant multiclass scheme with some highly synergistic orc-only class. But now I'm probably overthinking.)

Combined with Force Ward, this becomes downright obscene. Max your burn and you're effectively walking around with >150% max HP, plus nice regen that scales with Con in a linear fashion -- likely even breaching into per-round territory. And if you're feeling daring, I believe this even opens up the unique possibility of accepting more than max burn -- taking lethal damage to push oneself harder than any other kineticist could muster.

[Triskavanski]

I have to disagree with your assessment on delayed Blast being red. Having an ability that you could set up to 5 rounds later when you use Kinetic blast is a wonderful thing.

Why?

Remember Stealth is a class feature of the Kinetist. What that means of course is that you have the ability to throw down a blast, and spend the next 4.5 rounds walking away from it, before it finally goes off striking whatever you set it to do.

Basically, you don't even have to be in the same room anymore as your blast. Though while that doesn't jive with a lot of groups who are just kick in the door, smashy smashy everything, It could work with one that is more stealth oriented and needs a distraction.


Of course what would have been really lovely with it is the ability to use it with interweave composite blast.



And the Aether specialist composite blast.. With the Teamwork feat, the two kinetists could create a more greater more amplified amount of damage, doing the same amount of damage as a composite blast, +1 per die rolled.

[Tulya]

In sum: You remain fully conscious and stable while below 0 HP, able to act as normal (full or move+standard) without HP loss, you gain +2 to damage and melee attacks while in this "burn" section of your HP (which seems oddly thematic with overflow, but that might just be me), and a general +1 nat armor, +endurance perks.

Unless there's something I'm missing in the feat chain, the nonlethal rule is unaltered:
"When your nonlethal damage exceeds your current hit points, you fall unconscious. While unconscious, you are helpless."
Even a single point of nonlethal damage at 0 HP or less renders you unconscious.

This problem with Die Hard and similar effects has actually brought criticism and calls for errata well before the Kineticist - and actually even before Pathfinder was a thing, since it's an inherited rules issue - but as it's never been changed, the rule stands as-is.

[aeolegion]

Aw. I was real proud to have noticed that, too.

Good catch, Tulya.

Guess it'll still fly for folks who houserule it -- and judging by the handful of old discussions on Diehard/nonlethal I just dug up, it may not be altogether uncommon.

[Tulya]

Mark Seifter:
"Overflowing rod was intended to be one that you just carry on your person and not in hand to get passives, like rod of splendor. The other two do require being in hand, so you'll probably want gloves of storing or the like (which are pretty cheap compared to the two items in question); things that let you draw super-fast are also really helpful on that front. "

If the above is implemented, Overflowing Rod is not quite so horrible. Its benefits are comparable to Greater Bracers of Archery, which is priced identically. +1 attack/+2 damage is worse than +2/+1, but it's untyped and slotless. Competence bonuses to attack and damage aren't that uncommon - Inspire Courage is one of the more typical effects to overlap.
On top of that, you may also see early access for ability score size bonuses. An extra +2 to Dex or Con can improve attack rolls, damage rolls, and/or negate the extra point of burn you accept to get the above bonuses, among other things. This is only relevant on a very narrow set of levels, becoming completely obsolete at 16th.

===
On the other end, Fire's Fury has been clarified as not intending to make a blast actually count as adding the elemental overflow damage bonus. You can't use it to make Kinetic Blade/Whip qualify for the Half-Orc's FAQ-nerfed favored class bonus or the Kineticist's Diadem.
Furthermore, although I've seen several builds readd the normal overflow damage bonus (double your overflow bonus), you only add the base overflow amount - the same amount your attack rolls get. Thus, the most damage you'll ever get out of Fire's Fury is +7 damage at 18th level, with an Overflowing Rod accepting 7 points of burn.

[Rerednaw]

Sorry late to this...but one thing to consider is race traits.
Dwarf Stonesinger makes your earth powers (including blast) function at +1 level. That means getting extra dice sooner.
Ditto for gnome and pyromaniac with fire.

Note this does not grant early power access, but it does say allow your dorf geokin to have higher DR via the defense power and such.

AFAIK those are about the only ways to get a boost. All other races don't spec that it works with kineticist and Paizo has chosen to not address it yet.

[Kurald Galain]

.
Dwarf Stonesinger makes your earth powers (including blast) function at +1 level. That means getting extra dice sooner.
Ditto for gnome and pyromaniac with fire.

I'm afraid not. Both have an explicit list of what they increase, which does not include kinny powers. E.g. the dwarf ability explicitly only boosts (1) spells with the earth descriptor, (2) Earth domain, (3) deep earth and earth elemental bloodlines, and (4) oracle’s stone mystery.

Turns out it was RAI that kinny's abilities stack with nothing else in the game and cannot be boosted by anything else in the game. This intent has succeeded rather well (not that that's a good thing...)

[Meiliken]

The Aether does in fact have a 9th level talent. Aether Architect. You can create and entire permanent city made entirely out of aether force.

[Kris Moonhand]

The Aether does in fact have a 9th level talent. Aether Architect. You can create and entire permanent city made entirely out of aether force.

You're about two years late on that one. Much like Aether Architect itself, which came out two years after Occult Adventures, the book which introduced Kineticist.

Guides are very often out of date, and the chances of that are inversely proportional to how much the guide maker likes the class in question. This one in particular was written in 2015, shortly after the class dropped (literally less than a week after) and Kineticist hate was high, as can be seen from early posts.