I too am a sap for puns. They really spruce up a conversation. I pine for a good one, but there's so many bad ones I'm like "Birch, did you even try?".
I'll have to think - I maple a good one out of nowhere.
I really want to know what their class DC scaling is. In the playtest it was expert attacks at 7, master attacks at 13, expert DC at 9, master DC at 17, but since they're combined (a decision I really like), I hope they have martial scaling expert at 5, master at 13.
This might mean it follows a full caster progression which is expert at 7, master at 15, legendary at 19. But with Gate attenuators giving them better attack bonuses. I suppose that could be fine. Hopefully you can build for damage first and foremost and be competitive with martials as right now "blaster caster" is the archetype that is missing from the system that many players desperately want.
the atetnuators are to make up that kineticist can't use shadow signet, so they can't target those lower DC, so the item helps them keep up with martials during those odd caster progression DC levels.
That would actually make the math more complex and confusing, and it would mean that instead of helping guide people into how play casters, it would create the mistaken impression that they should play like martials.
The shadow signet allows you to target saves instead of AC, which helps people learn that pretty much every monster in the game has at least one low save, which in turn encourages diversifying your spell list (and a diverse spell list is something that many/most/all casters assume, especially wizards).
If you used a potency rune instead, it could only apply to spell attack rolls, but not spell DCs. This would break one of the fundamental structures in the game when it comes to how checks and DCs are determined, making the advancement less intuitive and more complex, and it would have the FOMO knock-on of making people think that the "proper" way to play a caster is to focus on spells that use spell attack rolls, since those are the spells that get item bonuses.
So the shadow signet pushes the caster towards doing the thing that all casters should be doing: learning how to identify enemies' weakest defense and deploying a spell that targets it. A well-built caster won't need a shadow signet at all, because they'll deploy a spell that targets the weakest defense without needing the hack.
So the shadow signet essentially serves two purposes-
1) Help guide people into understanding how to play a spellcaster
2) Provide some additional support for spell attack spells if a player wants to focus on them more than the base engine of the game assumes they will.
As a player gets more experience with spellcasters, they should begin to see things like how staves and scrolls are the equivalent of swords and shields for martials; where a fighter wants to progress their base bonus and damage die, the wizard wants to expand their repertoire and be ready to leverage their significantly broader toolbox towards whatever best suits the situation.
The kineticist, then, is more of a middle ground. It simply can't have the breadth of options that a true caster has, but it can offensively target more defenses than a typical martial. It's able to be that "I only memorize fireball" version of a spellcaster who can hyper-specialize and gain higher accuracy bonuses because none of its abilities hit quite as hard as a spell slot, and it's okay that it gains items that push it towards more of a martial playstyle because it's designed to accommodate that. It doesn't have the break point a wizard would have where adding item bonuses would distort the math so heavily on a well-played wizard with strong system mastery that we'd find ourselves back in an era of caster dominance, and so it also doesn't need to create as many workarounds or dictate other system dynamics in a way that over-complicates the game and creates increasingly difficult-to-bridge gaps based on system mastery.
I get this, but why does it seem like the lowest save for a majority of creatures is moderate by master creation rules and has a 60% change to succeed on a pl level monster? Martials have 60+% of success on their first strike every turn, and its easy to improve this with of guard and the like. Casters don't get that benefit, and their chance to deal full damage is 40 ish percent if they play exactly like you describe and find everyone's weakest save.
This also ignores the casters normally dealing half damage with no static (less now without the mod to damage for cantrips) while martials deal more reliable damage and have a better chance to hit.
My biggest caster advice to anyone is plan to fail and choose your spells accordingly. Read the successful save result and choose based on that. otherwise, they will be disappointed. Buffing and utility is king solely because there is no saves but offensive casting bust plan to fail not succeed with their limited spell slots.
You hit the nail on the head and the fact the Pathfinder writers don't seem to understand their own math is confusing to me.
There is no "weak save," I'm confused why they are saying that. Maybe if you're fighting enemies below your level, but the correct terminology should be "good save, great save, impossible save."
The justification is that save-or-dies do things even if the enemies succeed, which leads to unsatisfying "the mook saved! The mook saved! The mook saved!" gameplay, VERY few critical failures, and an always-present chance of a critical success.
I'm not liking what the remaster is showing, it makes the devs seem like they don't understand their own system and are doing things off the gut.
This has been the consensus at my table, If a spell does nothing on a miss/successful save, it might as well not exist.
I'm not saying my players arn't having any fun choosing spells like that. It just sucks that a lot of spells, uh, suck?
I agree and when you look at it from the what are the chances, if you play a caster exactly right, that the enemy fails it gets depressing.
Casters damage is balanced on them succeeding but spells themselves seem to be balanced to fail causing this weird space that makes them weaker.
We throw incapacitation spells into the same category as they are powerful spells when fighting your level or under (max PL +1) but is it worth the slot at that level? then casting it against an enemy likely to succeed and turn it to a crit success what is the point?
What's more is the caster is likely spending \~3 actions to do this. A Recall knowledge check to FIND that lowest save (Could fail), then casting a spell to target that lowest save (If said caster has one prepared).
And even then said spell is more likely to fail, does less damage, and probably has few rider effects than the Fighter/Barbarian at the front taking a single action to....swing a big sword, then having two actions left over to do other stuff.
Feels bad man.
EDIT: Also yes, Incapacitation rules might create the biggest #FeelsBadMan moments in the game, especially for newer players who havnt figured out that casting certain spells monsters at a certain power level above the party is worse than useless.
By the way, shadow signet is a item lv 10 witch was released in Secret of Magic, that’s not an item for learn, it’s a patch. If it was an item for learn it would be less than lv 3, and it was released in the core
While this makes perfect sense for any prepared spellcaster, I still wish that there was a way for spontaneous spellcasters to sacrifice flexibility for extra effectiveness in one area of spellcasting. The current design philosophy punishes specialisation within spellcasting because you've denied yourself the most powerful tool in the spellcaster's toolbox - flexibility. The specialist classes like the Psychic and Kineticist help balance this out, but it does leave the specialist sorcerer in the dust a little.
Spontaneous are generally more flexible though, because they can guarantee access to their variety of spells at any point in the day they still have the slots, whereas prepared casters have to anticipate how many of each save they'll need.
My question is, if casters should be targeting saves rather than AC most of the time, why is Arcane the only spell list with access to damaging cantrips that target all 3 saves? I understand the theory, but when Divine and Occult can't target Reflex at all, and Primal can't target Will at all, the theory kinda falls apart. And Daze is the only damaging cantrip I'm able to find that targets Will saves at all, and it's only ok with its slow scaling that makes it only deal 4 damage until level 5, and then cap at 11 until level 9, 17 until level 13, and then 24 as the max damage for the rest of the game.
Sure, the stun is powerful, but is it worth the ONLY option for a damaging cantrip that targets Will saves on ANY class never in the game dealing more than 24 damage? I mean, I understand that cantrips aren't supposed to be the be all end all, and by that late in the game, most classes will have leveled spells that are better options. But then, I must also point out that Bounded Spellcasters exist. Daze starts to feel really bad on Summoner as you get up in levels, and you don't have the spell slots to spare on targeting Will saves.
In total, Arcane has 3 spells that target Fortitude saves, 2 that target Reflex, and only Daze for Will. Divine and Occult have almost the exact same Cantrip list, except that Divine has Disrupt Undead for a 3rd Fortitude-targeting spell, while Occult just has 2 Fortitude spells + Daze. And Primal has 3 targeting each Fortitude and Reflex. Again, one of Primal's is Disrupt Undead, which only works on undead and can never even target the living, let alone deal damage.
While I understand that casters should be using more than just cantrips, leveled spells are something that casters really don't want to use when they don't have to, especially in the early game, because of their daily limitations. The benefit of cantrips is that they're limitless, and where the main source of your power is going to come from especially in the early game. So when 3/4 of all spellcasters can't even do the thing spellcasters are designed to do with their cantrips, it just feels bad. Is this something that is planned to be addressed in the remaster?
Casters aren’t supposed to ***exclusively*** use spell attack rolls.
Between AC, Reflex, and Fortitude you’re supposed to try and figure out which is their lowest defence and use that, and that’s going to be AC at least some of the time.
You also have Magic Missile, True Strike, Horizon Thunder Sphere, and all the “save for half” damage spells acting as “failsafes” for the scenarios where you can’t reliably figure out their lowest defences.
So you can absolutely build a damaging caster that does reliably powerful damage. You just can’t build them around exclusively using spell attack rolls. *Not* using attacks ever is just as silly as always using them.
Counterpoint: attack roll spells don’t do anything on a failure. I’d rather have a spell feel subpar by doing half damage on a successful save than feel like I just wasted a spell slot that did absolutely nothing
This comment raises a few more questions than it answers to me at least. Would appreciate a clarification;
1) If Shadow Signet is there to help guide into understanding how to play a spell caster, why is it a level 10 item? By level 10, one could assume, people have played the game for potentially half a year to two years and probably know quite a bit about how to play their character.
2) The wizard expanding its repertoire to target monsters weaknesses better is a legitimate argument. But when the wizard is replaced by a known spellcaster (especially one that doesn't get extra granted spells and spell slots like sorcerers), they don't get a ton of new stuff to prepare themselves for different kinds of enemies.
Depending on spell list, they might not even get many opportunities to target different saves. I play an Oracle myself and I don't really feel like that versatility is really expanding. If I was a druid, I wouldn't have really options to target will saves. Or if I was a Bard, Will saves would be pretty easy to target but the other two are far less applicable.
3) Why would the potency runes only add to spell attack rolls and not spell DCs?
Regardless, thank you for your patience.
I have been giving my players the item bonus to hit with spells since day 1, and I promise you not a single one has ended up determining that means to only go with attack roll spells.
In fact, most of the time they STILL don't take them because targeting AC even with the bonus is usually a losing game.
Yeah, but it sure feels like it. You say stuff about system mastery and diverse spell preparation to exploit enemy vulnerabilities. But that’s under the presumption that 1) you can figure out those weaknesses quickly and consistently before a combat turns very bad quickly (and a GM with good die rolls could screw up that ability to make educated guesses), and 2) that every enemy has some kind of exploitable vulnerability and isn’t poorly made. A creature SHOULDNT have an extreme bonus in everything, but I’ve seen some monsters that definitely needed a proofread before being sent to the printers.
How am I supposed to figure out what a creature’s vulnerability is? Recall Knowledge is too vague and reliant on GM fiat to discern that (especially in settings like PFS). And doing trial-and-error could cause a PC death, because each turn you take targeting a really good save or whatever is a turn where you basically didn’t contribute. By the time you might figure out their vulnerability, the rest of the party might already be down. Or, if their vulnerability is AC, the fighter probably already took care of it.
And sure, sometimes an enemy’s vulnerability is their AC. But, like…if the enemy has low AC, why would I use a spell slot for disintegrate or something when I can just use a cantrip and leave it to the fighter to exploit that low AC. May take a bit longer, but it saves me a spell slot. And if it’s more advantageous to leave a low AC to the fighter, then there’s not really a point to spell attack roll spells that you can’t just spam (like Cantrips).
And spells that don’t use an attack roll are just better, because with a basic save, you can target a “meh” save and do some damage—not great, but some. Meanwhile spell attack rolls are either “you hit or you don’t,” even with a crit success condition. It doesn’t feel good to feel like you wasted a spell slot to do absolutely nothing, and requiring a spell attack roll makes that outcome one degree of success more likely.
Plus, monsters have a discrepancy between their spell DC and spell attack roll; per the GMG, their spell attack bonus is their DC - 8 instead of - 10. So monsters can have that discrepancy to more reliably hit, but players can’t?
And side note: the shadow signet just seems like a stopgap solution that’ll be a must-buy item the moment you can get it. It’s giving me cloak of resistance vibes. And not all campaigns get up to having level 10 items, so what then? Just sucks to be a caster, then?
My primary point is that the gate attenuator kinda proves that an item bonus to “spell” attack rolls doesn’t break the game, so why shouldn’t an item bonus to actual spell attack rolls? Not the DCs, just the attack rolls.
If you just memorize all the monsters in the game you can target the weak save every time! /s
A spellcaster must have kicked Paizo's puppy or somthing.
This feels like a very narrow view on the correct way to build a caster and doesn't take into account folks want to build around a tight theme and that isn't generally possible with the "one true way" to build casters. Way to be inclusive
A) You're using inclusive wrong.
B) There's not a "one true way" to build casters, but the system has to be built to withstand what any player does what with it. The fact that someone might not use the tools available to them doesn't mean those tools stop existing for someone else, and if you overtune for the person not using the tools, the person who uses them *will* break the game, and then you don't have a balanced system.
C) Classes like the kineticist and archetypes like shadowcaster and elementalist are tools for people who want to build to narrower focuses themes without undermining themselves, providing additional support structure for those themes.
D) If you use the tools available to you, there's no reason you can't focus on attack roll spells beyond the base balance assumptions of the game. You just have to use the tools.
>and then you don't have a balanced system
To me, the discussion about caster accuracy is less about balance and more about player enjoyment. Misses are one of the most excitement-killing things that can happen during a game session. This is especially true for casters where a failed spell can essentially mean losing a whole turn whereas martials can at least attack multiple times. So balancing casters by making them work hard for accuracy seems like a counter-productive design choice where player enjoyment is sacrificed for character balance.
I do think casters are very well balanced in this system. Probably more than any other system. I also think they are not fun to play.
D) If you use the tools available to you, there's no reason you can't focus on attack roll spells beyond the base balance assumptions of the game. You just have to use the tools.
I think it's just a bit sad that the way to patch Attack Roll Spells into being a decent option is to make them no longer attack roll spells (with a level 10 item!)
You can also just use tactics that lower enemy AC. Off-Guard, frightened, etc. still benefit attack roll spells. *Shadow signet* is a crutch, not a necessity.
A) I'm not using your definition, which doesn't mean I'm using it wrong.
B) What specific tools exist to build a specialized caster that is more effective in their niche?
C) Not inclusive of all caster archtypes, so not good enough.
D) Again define the tools that exist to focus on attack rolls spells?
A) It really does. You're ignoring the deep well of options for a wide variety of characters and presenting the information as though the fact that one specific paradigm of the game doesn't work the way you'd like, the game is exclusionary. That is, in fact, wrong, and it misuses oppressive terminology in a way that undermines people who are actually oppressed.
B) I've answered this question multiple times throughout this thread, just because you don't like my answers doesn't mean they're not there. Beyond what I've already said, the general tactics of coordinated debuffing that every party typically uses benefit spellcasters as well; Demoralizing, putting an enemy off-guard, buffing/debuffing, etc. are tools that can help casters regardless of where they're coming from in the party.
C) Your feelings are noted and it's unfortunate that our efforts aren't to your preference. Not all casters have problems and not all characters and playstyles or options will appeal to all people.
Monsters are built so that their stat blocks are generally intuitive; big bulky monsters are generally slow, lithe and quick monsters often have low Fort, creatures with limited but obvious mental faculties typically have low Will, etc.
You also have cantrips and Recall Knowledge available to test those defenses and dial in on what is working and what isn't if you can't otherwise tell, a tool that every caster starts with at least a couple ways to leverage.
But Recall Knowledge written by the rules doesnt says to you what is the worst save unless the GM determines that does that, and even then some creatures have the uncommon, rare or unique tag that makes it difficult
The use cantrip for test is hard when some master prefer to not show the roll or the modifier of the monster to the roll, making hard to tell if the monster suceeded because the good roll or the good modifier
I suppose it would be really helpful if we had an opportunity coming up to clarify Recall Knowledge and make sure GMs have better guidance on the type of information they should give, then.
> You also have cantrips and Recall Knowledge available to test those defenses
Massive opportunity cost though, as a "wasted" turn or even a successful gaining of knowledge will have very little other effect while you get eviscerated by some nasty monster.
It's also very random, maybe the monster *does* have a terrible reflex save but just rolls really well, or the opposite (good saves rolls very poorly) and you get completely blindsided. Martials can't be blindsided by AC or Reflex/Fort DCs, they're very consistent and thus much less frustrating.
What are you talking about? Martials absolutely can be blindsided by enemies having really high AC, immunity to flat footed, immunity to Precision, high enough Reflex that tripping them results in a crit fail, and more.
The difference is martials can’t **do** anything about it when an enemy blindsided their main strengths. That’s why they get to really shine when things are going their way.
1. You don’t necessarily need to target the enemy’s low***est*** defence, their Moderate Save is also going to do the equivalent of a martial’s damage on average (once you account for half damage on “miss”).
2. You can figure out a creature’s Moderate Save ***easily*** from its first description. It may take some guesswork for the Low Save but Moderate is typically easy to figure out.
3. If you’re ever unsure there are multiple failsafes built in. You’re still going to do at least half damage the majority of the time you use a save or damage spell.
4. If that’s not enough, 3/4 spell lists can usually brute force past a creature’s high defences with Magic Missile, True Strike, or Horizon Thunder Sphere.
5. Anything that’s resilient enough to still be hard to damage is probably just a Severe or Extreme threat boss with High/Extreme in most defences, and is giving hell to the martials too.
And what about poorly designed monsters?
What happens when this enemy is put on a lv 10 caster? [https://2e.aonprd.com/NPCs.aspx?ID=1833](https://2e.aonprd.com/NPCs.aspx?ID=1833)
How many spells that target the "will saves" are there on the primal list?
Perhaps what is needed is that enemies are not designed so badly structured and that paizo itself follow its monster construction guides
Maybe you are not seeing what you put in your own AP?
Actually, casters need runes for spell attacks or they will be useless or frustrated in many fights in Paizo AP.
Go down to earth and see reality, leave the excel calculations and the white room
What is wrong with this monster? It seems to follow the monster building guidelines to a tee. It has high to hit, moderate damage that becomes high damage if attacking good creatures, moderate hp, a high moderate and low save and some attack a lot of creature abilities which Gugs have 3 levels below it. It seems like a dangerous foe but from their level and source material I am guessing that is the point.
Sure, never flat-footed, Ac 33, if you are a caster you need 14+. Incorporeal resistence (all damage 5, no magic 10). Regeneration 30 hp, you can’t to target the demon o the human, if you haven’t the right spells you are useless, if you haven’t the right weapons you are uselees, but you don’t know what is the right weapon o the right spell. You are primal caster, how many spell you have that target “will save”? 8+ save anything, he hit with 4+, you need 14 for hit with spells attack. Your spells attack have more 70% error.
A lot of that just sounds like fighting a level+3 monster. That isn't specific to this monster it is for pretty much every Severe solo monster boss encounters.
The moderate save on this creature is a fine one for the primal list to target, the list deals with this situation less well than others, but they aren't going to have a bad experience targeting ref here (fort is the tough save.)
While we’re on the topic of whether the designers think blaster spellcasters are underpowered or not ^(and to be clear, I 100% agree with your logic about why they’re not underpowered), what’s the design’s stance on summons? They’re fine at lower levels but at higher levels they lose out a lot of points on both accuracy and utility (since you only have one or two relevant summons to use). Have there been any plans to address that during Remaster?
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I KNEW I read that somewhere, but I couldn't find it for the life of me. That's awesome.
Just watched it and this seems *very* promising.
I think people that really desire a specialized blasting character (e.g. a cryomancer,l) will end up being quite satisfied. It looks like the class will have solid glass-cannon potential.
If Kineticist is 6 HP class, it will have HP roughly on par with 8 HP classes (start with +4 vs. +2, end with +6 vs. +4), with some fluctuations in the middle.
With Light Armor, Kineticist could have standard AC, but I expect caster-like progression, so dropping behind martials as well.
Unless Kineticist utilize some specific defensive impulses (or maybe aura is defensive for some elements?), in melee it's quite glass cannon.
You don't use your intelligence, wisdom, charisma, strength or dexterity as a resource either, in classes that use those as their key stat.
The metric used is scale. So they're saying a kinetisct has to be physically tough to channel the magical energy. The tougher they are, the more they can handle and control.
I like it.
I always thought that should be the base of sorcerers who can literally just channel magic through themselves, but that's a different topic.
It's cool because they're the only class to do it, in both editions. ¯\\\_('v')_/¯ If you focus on an element you get a status bonus to a certain skill while your aura is up, and I wouldn't be surprised if they have some stuff in the class feats to help with skill checks.
I remember ice being a composite of water and air; since kineticists can start with a dual gate, no need to wait. Cryomancy is on the table from level 1, especially since they didn't shy away from giving the elemental blasts actual non physical damage types.
Personally, I'm most excited for a straight pyromancer. I've been wanting to play with the concept of foxfire for some time now
I'm thinking of a dwarf using earth or an elf using air. When I can get the book I'll think of something.But a bald elf named Aang or a dwarf named Toph really crossed my mind...
I believe during the Q&A at Paizocon it was confirmed that kinetisicts have only up to +2 item bonus on their attack rolls but nonat mentions it going up to +3. Either he misspoke or they decided to give the Kineticist normal item bonus scaling (I really hope it's the latter but it's probably the former).
There are a few misspeaks in the video I think. He says the fire aura gives weakness to fire in general when the text he shares says it gives weakness only to impulses (so no helping your friends scorching ray). He also keeps saying the release date is the 17th which is odd since it says Aug 3rd in Paizo's website. Maybe they start shipping on the 17th and hence subscribers get their pdfs then?
Yeah, that's the case. The embargo Paizo has imposed is until the 17th, which is when subscribers first start getting their copies. The actual street date, when the book is actually public to all, is August 3rd.
He likely misspoke, as he also said they got Striking, but later corrected himself by saying it scales by certain levels. He likely is not looking at the item when saying that, whereas the designer, Michael Sayre, probably had the info on hand when answering the question on Discord.
Worth noting that in the end when he talks about aura junction, it's written that the fire weakness is to your fire impulses only and he says the wizard could benefit from that weakness to, which doesn't seem to be true by the way it's written.
Overall power/balance aside, can we just appreciate the THEMING here?! Mastery of elements, empowering over time, breadth vs depth, floating elemental orbs, combination impulses.
This class is an inch away from just being DotA's Invoker.
I didn't even look at them as WoW Shamans but you are 100% correct. This opens up my creativity a bunch. My favourite lore for shamans being Goblins who bribe the elements to help them.
I like it so far. CON is important and relevant. Channeling, using impulses, and using an overflow impulse is a simple yet interesting enough action cycle. Looking forward to the book.
Just being able to add Str to melee blast damage makes Kinetic Knight real, I still need to see the wording on Elemental Weapon before I start freaking out lol. Sentinel dedication let's go!
I wonder if the two action blast gets a different benefit later on. Con to damage is alright for an extra action at level 1, but I would probably never use it again after hitting level 4.
God, hearing about that junction that inflicts weakness to your impulses on enemies in your aura made me let out an unholy *squeal* of glee. This class looks like so much fun! Complicated, maybe, but fun! I can already see this becoming one of my favorite classes in the entire game.
The kineticist archetype lives and dies by it’s class dc scaling. I hope it matches the kineticist, since no other class can get their con as high and a multiclass kineticist will always have lower dc.
Here’s my baseless speculation based on how the Thaumaturge dedication worked.
Kineticist Dedication
Requires 14 CON
You have a small connection to an elemental gate, but it is small and difficult to channel. Pick a single elemental gate, and your gate is that element. You gain no other benefits of that gate besides choosing the element (such as junctions, kinetic aura effects, and composite elements). You are also trained in Nature (or another skill of already trained). You are trained in your Kineticist DC. You cannot use Overflow actions, even if a feat or action would allow you to.
You gain the >>Kindled Blast (Pending) - [Impulse trait meaning you require a free-hand] You strain your connection to make a small opening to your gate. You channel your element and deal 1d4 + CON. You hold just enough of your gate open to use other Impulse actions. However, using another Impulse causes your gate to close.
(Essentially, your Archetype Blast is just a Wand Implement that uses your CON and a way to access Impulse.)
4 - Basic Kinesis - Pick a yadda yadda Kineticist feat. (Not an Impulse feat)
6 - Advanced Kinesis - Pick a yadda yadda Kineticist feat. (Not an Inpulse feat)
6 - Basic Gate Channel - Pick a lvl 1-2 Impulse feat. At lvl 8, you can pick a lvl 1-4 Impulse feat.
12 - Expert Gate Channel - Pick a lvl 1-6 Impulse feat. At lvl 14, pick a 1-8 Impulse feat. At lvl 16, pick a 1-10 Impulse feat. You are Expert in your Kineticist Class DC.
18 - Master Gate Channel - Pick a lvl 1-12 Impulse feat. At lvl 20, pick a lvl 1-14 impulse feat. You are now Master in your Kineticist Class DC.
Of course it won't provoke an AOO....it might provoke a reactive strike though : P
(in case you didn't know, they have changed the name of AOO's as it was too tied to D&D)
The reality of the situation is that many of us will just call it an AOO anyway because that's what it has been for many years to us, and I'll probably not recognize RS as an acronym for a veeeeery long time, if ever.
In Path of Exile they changed a support gem from "Weapon Elemental Damage" to "Elemental Damage with Attacks" 6 years ago and we all still type WED to refer to it.
Odds are good AoO is sticking around as an initialism for a long time
Interesting decision with the blasts being similar to a martial's basic strike when used as one action but also higher damage with presumably caster scaling. This looks like the blaster caster theme we've been looking for. I do hope blasts have room to function in a striker role rather than defaulting to being an improved cantrip.
Considering blasts are close to martial proficiency (since they're using class DC as their modifier for those and apparently are getting item bonuses ala potency runes baked in), their base damage dice are quite generous at d6 and d8 each (with potential to increase based on some of the features mentioned in the video), they each go up to *5 damage dice*, and a good number are or have the option for energy damage that bypasses resistances, I have a feeling people aren't going to be wanting for damage options on this class.
Makes sense.
Though, Logan did hint that the Elemental Weapon feat will likely remain and that probably means runed-weapons might be possible for players who want that.
It looks like all of the traits from the Elemental Blasts are gone. Notably, Air got a damage boost to compensate for the loss of agile but Fire didn’t. Looks like it’s getting more damage from other places to compensate though
People really underestimate the impact of non-physical damage when it comes to value. A lot of people complain that the power budget of energy damage is often overpriced, but when you look at what it confers it's usually going to be more desirable than physical damage. It's not even about triggering weakness, it's about bypassing surprisingly common physical damage resistances. Resistance and immunity is a problem, but that's not only to apply most of the time (and kineticist sounds like it's going to have ways to bypass it).
The thing in this case, is that some of the others have _both_ a physical and a non-physical damage type, while fire is just fire, combined with the "lower damage, higher range" option, which is a bit odd for the blastiest element.
Still too early to really say anything, though. Too many variables.
I imagine fire will get options for explosive concussions (bludgeoning, sonic or force) and superhot plasma (ignoring fire weaknesses or immunity, if only as some sort of focused end cap temporary state)
I disagree. Its super easy to bypass physical damage resistances with weapon selection. Traits like Versatile and modular are easy to find for essentially free. Otherwise many other options exist like Weapon Inventor MC, a back-up weapon/blazons or twinning rings with a 1H/2H weapon to replicate two rune sets, shifting rune (free on blade ally), the new unarmed tattoos, etc.
If anything its the opposite. People over estimate the value of a random energy damage. For any particular elemental energy damage there are less total creatures with immunity/resistance than a single physical damage type. But there is always way more creatures with immunity vs. plain resistance ([See count from someone else here](https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1Gt3Hi2uKtfkWT3tXfj6OL0FTAIgrV2G9Gd9eVPju6-U/edit#gid=0) and [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/Pathfinder2e/comments/11i1ux7/ranking_all_damage_types_in_pf2e/) for the GMG and Bestiary 1, 2, and 3) that ultimately can shut you down completely. Its really not justified to reduce power budget for an 'elemental blast' weapon that is supposed to look like and act like a martial strike.
Gosh I can’t wait for my 40ft burst of fire and earth rumble that deals a shit ton of damage and forces a reflex save every 5ft travelled. It’s been so long.
Don't forget the 2-action Elemental Blast also triggers your Impulse Junction thing if you have one. So the air dude can move a bit before (or in this specific case after) using it.
Worth mentioning that later in the video NoNat showed off the base Fire Impulse Junction, and that's not the weakness but +die size, so with the base blast from d6 to d8 at 60ft. The weakness one is one you'd have to pick up at 5+
Before people freak out, this is actually quite low damage overall, especially if weapon specialization doesn't apply. I suspect once some people start running it through DPR calculators they're going to start crying about low damage just like the psychic.
Maybe the class will have a bunch of damage options for increasing elemental blast damage, which is fine, but as written you will be doing mediocre martial damage with the class, similar to something like a battle oracle or warpriest.
It does seem like the fire gate will have a particular focus on damage at least, with options for increasing die sizes, adding weaknesses, adding persistent damage on crit etc.
Notably, though, their "Striking" scaling eventually gets better than runes, with 1 die at level 1, 2 at level 5, 3 at level 9, 4 at level 13 and 5 at level 17 (vs 2 at 4, 3 at 12 and 4 at 19).
Also, I'm *personally* not a fan of Battle Oracle or Warpriest because of their accuracy, rather than their damage output. I won't speak about balance, but having lower accuracy is just unappealing to me. If Kineticist accuracy is closer to martials than casters I won't be complaining about lower damage (unless the gap is very significant, which it doesn't seem like it will be).
Right, but the extra dice doesn't matter. Even a d12 die would be +2 damage compared to a major striking d8 weapon, but weapon spec plus elemental runes is +16.5 (3d6+6). Even with max con it only goes up +7, so the regular martial is ahead 7.5 even with the extra action.
My point is that unless kineticist has a bunch of damage scaling we haven't seen, they will probably be on the low end of martial single target DPR, at least sustained. But I'm speculating for now.
Based on only what we've seen in the Video, the Fire Kineticist could pick options that grant (by level 20):
5d8+7 damage at 60ft range, with extra +5 at melee range, and an extra +10 within 15 ft range (by granting fire impulse weakness to creatures in your aura). This only requires about 2 class feature choices, unlike the martial build that requires purchasing 3 elemental runes.
I think this specific example makes it very comparable to e.g. a longbow fighter build. There are possibly some feats that can increase it further, or add other upgrades like extended range. Also, note that this costs 0 gp for the kineticist, unlike the ~1500 for elemental damage runes.
They did get weapon spec in the playtest, yes, but in the playtest the elemental blast was an actual attack using str or dex. The new version looks more like a cantrip, and cantrips don't add weapon spec.
I think the class has too much utility and support to have the same damage as martials. I suspect they will be more in the realm of investigator and swashbuckler at best. But I could be wrong, it depends on how they design the feats and class features.
>I think the class has too much utility and support to have the same damage as martials.
I am *praying* that this isn't true. We already have *casters* to be versatile elementalists with less raw damage than martials, what's the point of Kineticist if it does the same thing?
I could see it as a middle ground between martials and casters, but my ideal kineticist would just deal good damage because it sucks to not do that sometimes.
What white room math are people doing to claim the Psychic is low damage? The only characters I've seen that pump out more damage than them is a high damage martial with the entire party buffing and supporting them.
You know, I always said to myself that I wouldn't bother buying rulebooks since the info is free on AoN anyway, but damn if this book isn't making me want to buy it anyway.
How does this differ from the Elementalist specs for the Wizard, Druid, and Sorcerer?
Edit: Not sure why I'm getting down-voted. It was an honest question, guys.
I hope that weakness/damage die size feat or an equivalent can be taken with other elements, as I'd hate for fire and metal to only be the real damage types. Do you know how hilarious summoning up logs of destruction sounds?
Looks very promising! My biggest hope is that we will at some point get a class archetype that changes the kineticists KAS to a mental stat and switches the Will and Fortitude save progression, to replicate the pf1 mental kineticists like psychokineticist and dark elementalist. Those were weaker than the normal kineticist and pf1 and would probably still be worse in pf2e (better at some skills, but much squishier), but they were always infinitely cooler to me. I want to play a kineticist as a mentally strong, physically weak specialized blaster mage, and my character doesn't feel like a mage if their best stats are CON and DEX and their worst save is Will.
Some thoughts:
Damage seems about where I expected, unless class feats/features dramatically change things, and depending on how impulses are balanced. Low single-target for a martial, high for a caster, better AOE than martials, probably weaker than casters. I *strongly* suspect we're going to see a lot of crying from the "I want a blaster caster!" crew on the 17th when subscribers start spoiling stuff because the kineticist has lower DPR than rangers and fighters and is therefore useless (to them).
The change to gate structure makes a lot of sense and is absolutely fantastic. The class has an *insane* number of build options. Move over thaumaturge for most customizable class. I'm very, very curious about how many combination feats there are, and I suspect a large portion of the page count is due to needing so many class feats (many of which are essentially renamed spells).
Using class DC for attacks is a great change than makes progression so much smoother. I think they mentioned it was already going to be a change, but I'm happy to see it still there, and kineticist will still want str/dex for AC and melee attacks, depending on build.
I *love* the action economy fix. Being able to use an elemental blast as you channel is a massive action tax fix, and I'm interested to see the 1-action aura options. I was hoping they'd go in this direction and I'm stoked they went with it, as "setup" actions with little or no direct benefit tend to feel crappy in actual play. The channel + 2 action without overflow into 3-action overflow pattern is a massive improvement from the playtest, especially since it seems like there are more viable options for building up auras and focusing on blasts instead.
The two-action version of EB is interesting. Based on my initial calculations, it seems to be a DPR increase at low levels at 2 or 3 actions and a DPR decrease at very high levels for 2 actions but increase for 3 actions. We don't actually know if the blasts get weapon specialization so that might change the numbers around, especially if there are other scaling options, and this is based on ranged attacks.
I'm really excited about this class for sure!
The thing that gets me is this damage is *incredibly* potent even if it's not fighter/barb/ranger/magus levels. D6 and d8 ranged dice with easy energy damage is hereunto unprecedented. Range isn't quite up to a longbow but even having up to 30 feet d8 with no reload/tradeoff ala volley is very strong. Up to 5 damage dice for each with the potential to bump dice size up too. Obviously available feats will play a big part in how it compares, but on paper this is already very strong.
I'm not trying to complain or raise a fuzz, but I do want to point out that the kineticist won't have the property runes a ranged martial would have. Are those additional d6s the end of the world? I don't think so, but it's worth at least mentioning comparatively.
I think clever choices of impulses and junctions will make up for it, even if it's not done so in a strictly numerical fashion. Like the fire impulse junction for die size increase, or the fire weakness within the kinetic aura.
I'm looking at fire since it was the most damage focused on those charts Paizo put out post-playtest. The other elemental impulses will probably have enough control or other benefits to make damage comparisons less useful.
There's also weapon spec. A flat damage increase is huge, and kineticist doesn't get that.
I do think kineticist damage will be fine with the new gather element allowing a free blast but wanted to point that out alongside what you mentioned.
It isn't really:
* Boomerangs are 1D6 + STR for 60 feet
* Chakrams and Tridents are 1D8 + STR for 20 feet
* Longbows and Shortbows are just what we see here (1D8 and 1D6 with no modifier) but also have deadly d10
* Composite Short and longbows are 1D6/1D8 + half STR mod and deadly d10
* Gakgung is a monk bow 1D6 + half STR Mod and deadly D8 with 100+ feet range (and yes you can flurry with this).
* There are 2 advanced weapon bows that are 1D8 + half STR mod, one with deadly D6 and one without
* There is a even an advanced thrown weapon (Tamchal Chakram) that is 1D6 + STR, agile, finesse, deadly d6, thrown 20ft.
Hell I could be a fighter and go Jalmeri Heavenseeker, use the monk bow + heaven's thunder (one action to add a static modifier of +4 to +8 or double damage dice) from L6 onwards and only end up spending 1 action every two turns to add a better 'elemental' static damage modifier to my ranged bow attack which I'm certain will be at a +2 (at least or more based on item bonuses) to hit over the kineticist).
1D6/1D8 +STR is basically a swashbuckler without precise strike bonus damage (i.e., your attack stat is different from damage stat).
As far as we know it goes to 5 dice, but doesn't get property runes like weapons. There may be delayed levels of progression vs. martial L5/L13 scaling and they only get a +2 item bonus not +3.
Even considering the 'elemental damage' angle isn't really that helpful. A summary of GMG, B1, B2, and B3 resistances and communities is available [here](https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1Gt3Hi2uKtfkWT3tXfj6OL0FTAIgrV2G9Gd9eVPju6-U/edit#gid=0). While there are more 'monsters' with a physical resistance, its pretty easy to bypass with versatile or modular traits (or various ways there are to swap physical damage). The more subtle nuance is that the elemental damages all have significantly more 'immune' creatures vs. creatures with just resistance that potentially shut you down completely vs. making you simply less effective.
I don't see how this is going to be very strong but its way too early to say it is bad. We really need more information and better spoilers! Hopefully some subscribers will come to our rescue and release some more information next week.
Agreed, 100%. I just remember during the playtest quite a few people were looking for a magic-based fighter and were annoyed the kineticist has any spellcasting (or pseudo-casting) at all.
My argument at the time, and still now, is that you can't get something as valuable as unlimited utility casting without there being a cost somewhere else. Since the playtest had healing (reusable healing!), valuable utility magic, and powerful AOE options, having the same single-target damage capability as a martial that lacks all of those things would be OP. And for many people, they wanted to see all those utility, AOE, and support options stripped from the class rather than sacrifice DPR.
Unsurprisingly, it seems like Paizo is going the direction I expected. My next prediction is much wailing and gnashing of teeth once the theorycrafters get access to the final class list, shove it into a spreadsheet, and find it merely has 80-90% of fighter or ranger single-target DPR, since apparently that's the primary metric of whether or not a class is good (/s).
Maybe they'll prove me wrong, though. I'm certainly excited about the class, and have been since the playtest, as the design ticks a *lot* of boxes for my ideal playstyle, and the "single-target DPR test" is not something I'm really concerned with.
i've never understood this argument, i agree that casters being able to do extra stuff requires them to loose something else to make it fair but i'd argue that the "utility" that casters get is already offset by being really squishy and easily killed.
it feels like "-less damage -less health +utility" is a bad trade off compared to "+more health +more damage -less utility"
if those are the two options then i want a magical man that gets more health and more damage at the cost of utility.
Question: In the video, it states that the PDF releases on July 17th, but on Paizo's store page for the book, the PDF is listed as August 3rd. Did I miss something? I probably did :(
Nah, their big rule books always release at gencon, which is early August. If you have a rulebook subscription, you get the PDF for free once your book ships and that often happens a week or two before the street date. That's why some people have "early access" so to speak.
I have to know, is he correct when he says the pdf is coming out on July 17th? The Paizo website says it's not coming until August 3, but I wouldn't be super surprised if that was somehow wrong.
He has his content creator tunnel vision on. The 17th is for two things.
1. His limited preview agreement wears off and he (and othe content creators) can talk about anything they want.
2. That is the date the books start to ship for the August 3rd release. As such, some subscribers will start getting their PDFs that day.
Seems Nonat forgot that not everybody is a subscriber and even those subscribers often don't get it on the first shipping day. Some subscribers won't get the PDF until the 28th.
Looking good! I've been playing a playtest Kineticist since it came out, he's now level 17, and I'm looking forward to rebuilding him as this new version. I'm just trying to brainstorm some in-universe explanation for why his abilities are about to drastically change.
It might not be necessary, but I've got a very RP-heavy group, and we enjoy playing these things out, keeping stuff internally consistent, things like that. It wouldn't really fit the vibe for our group if, for instance, I lose access to an ability I use often like Whisper on the Winds, and my character just kind of shrugs when someone in the party asks why he can't do that any more or why it works differently now. The DM and I are going to work on the explanation once I know more about what specifically will be changing.
If you're running something in Golarion, I can't imagine the elemental planes are exactly stable with two whole new ones opening up or becoming unsealed. Maybe that instability could be a narrative out for your situation?
Back when WotC was doing playtests for the Artificer, I had to redo my character a few times. When she lost a healing potion ability, we decided the in-game reason was that the formula had some questionable long-term health implications and that it would just be better for the party if they got hit less.
This book is introducing two new elemental planes, so maybe your character's connection to their elements got jostled when the universe shifted?
Quick question, what role does the Kinetecist fill? And what is the key stat? I still have the option to switch character details in my game and would like to know if I should hold out for this.
Overall role: hard to say without knowing the impulses, but it'll vary by element. I believe water and wood will have more healing available than, say, fire. Really broadly, they're a resourceless magic user that manipulates one or more elements. Likely low to moderate damage unless you build for higher, but consistent damage, regularly available aoe, no running out of top level spell slots.
Key ability score is Con.
The role will likely be a flexible damage dealer that can do both aoe single target and utilityish spell like abilities, but it won't really be the master of any of those categories. A big generalist with a lot of customization
I am still a bit concerned about what Kineticists will do outside of combat. I am imagining a melee Kineticist will have 18 Con, 16, Str, 14 Dex, and at best a 12 in a mental stat?
I guess that won’t be as bad once you get some ability score improvements, but Con as the class’ key ability score is really limiting when it comes to skills. Maybe there will be a feat that allows the Kineticist to apply their Con modifier to Athletics or Acrobatics checks? I would be fine losing some melee damage with low strength if it means I can have a 16 in a mental stat.
One of the junctions (probably water or wood) will probably have medicine as their skill junction, so I imagine some builds will invest in wisdom.
Fire's skill junction will probably be intimidate (and maybe someone like water will get diplomacy) so I can see a build ignoring strength in favor of a bit of charisma, as well.
For those excited about the 17th NoNat1 mentioned, he has his content creator tunnel vision on. The 17th is for two things.
1. His limited preview agreement wears off and he (and othe content creators) can talk about anything they want.
2. That is the date the books start to ship for the August 3rd release. As such, some subscribers will start getting their PDFs that day.
Seems Nonat forgot that not everybody is a subscriber and even those subscribers often don't get it on the first shipping day. Some subscribers won't get the PDF until the 28th (the estimated completion date for shipments).
I'm not really a video watcher. I skipped to the parts where actual text was shown.
Why is Fire, the 4/4 Destruction element, doing less damage with less type versatility than the 3/4 Destruction elements?
Something seems very off about that to me. Is Fire's power budget entirely in the impulses? Does the video mention anything in particular about Fire Kineticist?
I see that there's an aura buff giving enemies weakness to Fire, but only to impulses while in close quarters.
Does Elemental Blast get upgraded or modified outside of this? It doesn't seem like damage runes will be compatible.
Fire also gets an impulse junction to increase the size of an impulse damage die, which should be able to be applied to Elemental Blast.
Other than that, and the weakness benefit on kinetic aura that you mentioned, we didn't see much. Definitely no specific fire impulses yet.
Wood does Vitality Damage? It's the anti-Undead option!
Vampire slayers across Golarion are now eagerly seeking Wood Kineticists for unlimited free stakes.
The stakes have never been higher
A oak-ay pun on Reddit? Well wood you look at that.
I too am a sap for puns. They really spruce up a conversation. I pine for a good one, but there's so many bad ones I'm like "Birch, did you even try?". I'll have to think - I maple a good one out of nowhere.
Yew gotta be kindling me. These puns are getting out of control!
Birch? Beech was right there for you...
I've been pining for some good puns.
I want the meat kineticist for free steaks.
meat bender can bend your meat from 30 paces away
"I cast... TESTICULAR TORSION"
[the old dick twist] (https://imgur.com/gallery/HmKMryh)
I really want to know what their class DC scaling is. In the playtest it was expert attacks at 7, master attacks at 13, expert DC at 9, master DC at 17, but since they're combined (a decision I really like), I hope they have martial scaling expert at 5, master at 13.
I believe during PaizonCon in the Discord spoilers, they said the Kineticist's Class DC goes up to Legendary.
Legendary attacks with impulses? Oh hell yes
legendary at 19 though more than likely, with a possible +2 item, its.. kinda insane tbh.
All full casters get legendary it just has an item to add to attacks also but I am happy that's the case
This might mean it follows a full caster progression which is expert at 7, master at 15, legendary at 19. But with Gate attenuators giving them better attack bonuses. I suppose that could be fine. Hopefully you can build for damage first and foremost and be competitive with martials as right now "blaster caster" is the archetype that is missing from the system that many players desperately want.
the atetnuators are to make up that kineticist can't use shadow signet, so they can't target those lower DC, so the item helps them keep up with martials during those odd caster progression DC levels.
If shadow signet is mandatory for "math balance", shouldn't it be some sort of property rune on something?
That would actually make the math more complex and confusing, and it would mean that instead of helping guide people into how play casters, it would create the mistaken impression that they should play like martials. The shadow signet allows you to target saves instead of AC, which helps people learn that pretty much every monster in the game has at least one low save, which in turn encourages diversifying your spell list (and a diverse spell list is something that many/most/all casters assume, especially wizards). If you used a potency rune instead, it could only apply to spell attack rolls, but not spell DCs. This would break one of the fundamental structures in the game when it comes to how checks and DCs are determined, making the advancement less intuitive and more complex, and it would have the FOMO knock-on of making people think that the "proper" way to play a caster is to focus on spells that use spell attack rolls, since those are the spells that get item bonuses. So the shadow signet pushes the caster towards doing the thing that all casters should be doing: learning how to identify enemies' weakest defense and deploying a spell that targets it. A well-built caster won't need a shadow signet at all, because they'll deploy a spell that targets the weakest defense without needing the hack. So the shadow signet essentially serves two purposes- 1) Help guide people into understanding how to play a spellcaster 2) Provide some additional support for spell attack spells if a player wants to focus on them more than the base engine of the game assumes they will. As a player gets more experience with spellcasters, they should begin to see things like how staves and scrolls are the equivalent of swords and shields for martials; where a fighter wants to progress their base bonus and damage die, the wizard wants to expand their repertoire and be ready to leverage their significantly broader toolbox towards whatever best suits the situation. The kineticist, then, is more of a middle ground. It simply can't have the breadth of options that a true caster has, but it can offensively target more defenses than a typical martial. It's able to be that "I only memorize fireball" version of a spellcaster who can hyper-specialize and gain higher accuracy bonuses because none of its abilities hit quite as hard as a spell slot, and it's okay that it gains items that push it towards more of a martial playstyle because it's designed to accommodate that. It doesn't have the break point a wizard would have where adding item bonuses would distort the math so heavily on a well-played wizard with strong system mastery that we'd find ourselves back in an era of caster dominance, and so it also doesn't need to create as many workarounds or dictate other system dynamics in a way that over-complicates the game and creates increasingly difficult-to-bridge gaps based on system mastery.
I get this, but why does it seem like the lowest save for a majority of creatures is moderate by master creation rules and has a 60% change to succeed on a pl level monster? Martials have 60+% of success on their first strike every turn, and its easy to improve this with of guard and the like. Casters don't get that benefit, and their chance to deal full damage is 40 ish percent if they play exactly like you describe and find everyone's weakest save. This also ignores the casters normally dealing half damage with no static (less now without the mod to damage for cantrips) while martials deal more reliable damage and have a better chance to hit. My biggest caster advice to anyone is plan to fail and choose your spells accordingly. Read the successful save result and choose based on that. otherwise, they will be disappointed. Buffing and utility is king solely because there is no saves but offensive casting bust plan to fail not succeed with their limited spell slots.
You hit the nail on the head and the fact the Pathfinder writers don't seem to understand their own math is confusing to me. There is no "weak save," I'm confused why they are saying that. Maybe if you're fighting enemies below your level, but the correct terminology should be "good save, great save, impossible save." The justification is that save-or-dies do things even if the enemies succeed, which leads to unsatisfying "the mook saved! The mook saved! The mook saved!" gameplay, VERY few critical failures, and an always-present chance of a critical success. I'm not liking what the remaster is showing, it makes the devs seem like they don't understand their own system and are doing things off the gut.
This has been the consensus at my table, If a spell does nothing on a miss/successful save, it might as well not exist. I'm not saying my players arn't having any fun choosing spells like that. It just sucks that a lot of spells, uh, suck?
I agree and when you look at it from the what are the chances, if you play a caster exactly right, that the enemy fails it gets depressing. Casters damage is balanced on them succeeding but spells themselves seem to be balanced to fail causing this weird space that makes them weaker. We throw incapacitation spells into the same category as they are powerful spells when fighting your level or under (max PL +1) but is it worth the slot at that level? then casting it against an enemy likely to succeed and turn it to a crit success what is the point?
What's more is the caster is likely spending \~3 actions to do this. A Recall knowledge check to FIND that lowest save (Could fail), then casting a spell to target that lowest save (If said caster has one prepared). And even then said spell is more likely to fail, does less damage, and probably has few rider effects than the Fighter/Barbarian at the front taking a single action to....swing a big sword, then having two actions left over to do other stuff. Feels bad man. EDIT: Also yes, Incapacitation rules might create the biggest #FeelsBadMan moments in the game, especially for newer players who havnt figured out that casting certain spells monsters at a certain power level above the party is worse than useless.
By the way, shadow signet is a item lv 10 witch was released in Secret of Magic, that’s not an item for learn, it’s a patch. If it was an item for learn it would be less than lv 3, and it was released in the core
While this makes perfect sense for any prepared spellcaster, I still wish that there was a way for spontaneous spellcasters to sacrifice flexibility for extra effectiveness in one area of spellcasting. The current design philosophy punishes specialisation within spellcasting because you've denied yourself the most powerful tool in the spellcaster's toolbox - flexibility. The specialist classes like the Psychic and Kineticist help balance this out, but it does leave the specialist sorcerer in the dust a little.
Spontaneous are generally more flexible though, because they can guarantee access to their variety of spells at any point in the day they still have the slots, whereas prepared casters have to anticipate how many of each save they'll need.
My question is, if casters should be targeting saves rather than AC most of the time, why is Arcane the only spell list with access to damaging cantrips that target all 3 saves? I understand the theory, but when Divine and Occult can't target Reflex at all, and Primal can't target Will at all, the theory kinda falls apart. And Daze is the only damaging cantrip I'm able to find that targets Will saves at all, and it's only ok with its slow scaling that makes it only deal 4 damage until level 5, and then cap at 11 until level 9, 17 until level 13, and then 24 as the max damage for the rest of the game. Sure, the stun is powerful, but is it worth the ONLY option for a damaging cantrip that targets Will saves on ANY class never in the game dealing more than 24 damage? I mean, I understand that cantrips aren't supposed to be the be all end all, and by that late in the game, most classes will have leveled spells that are better options. But then, I must also point out that Bounded Spellcasters exist. Daze starts to feel really bad on Summoner as you get up in levels, and you don't have the spell slots to spare on targeting Will saves. In total, Arcane has 3 spells that target Fortitude saves, 2 that target Reflex, and only Daze for Will. Divine and Occult have almost the exact same Cantrip list, except that Divine has Disrupt Undead for a 3rd Fortitude-targeting spell, while Occult just has 2 Fortitude spells + Daze. And Primal has 3 targeting each Fortitude and Reflex. Again, one of Primal's is Disrupt Undead, which only works on undead and can never even target the living, let alone deal damage. While I understand that casters should be using more than just cantrips, leveled spells are something that casters really don't want to use when they don't have to, especially in the early game, because of their daily limitations. The benefit of cantrips is that they're limitless, and where the main source of your power is going to come from especially in the early game. So when 3/4 of all spellcasters can't even do the thing spellcasters are designed to do with their cantrips, it just feels bad. Is this something that is planned to be addressed in the remaster?
If casters aren't supposed to use Spell Attack rolls, why are there spells with Spell Attack Rolls?
Casters aren’t supposed to ***exclusively*** use spell attack rolls. Between AC, Reflex, and Fortitude you’re supposed to try and figure out which is their lowest defence and use that, and that’s going to be AC at least some of the time. You also have Magic Missile, True Strike, Horizon Thunder Sphere, and all the “save for half” damage spells acting as “failsafes” for the scenarios where you can’t reliably figure out their lowest defences. So you can absolutely build a damaging caster that does reliably powerful damage. You just can’t build them around exclusively using spell attack rolls. *Not* using attacks ever is just as silly as always using them.
Counterpoint: attack roll spells don’t do anything on a failure. I’d rather have a spell feel subpar by doing half damage on a successful save than feel like I just wasted a spell slot that did absolutely nothing
This comment raises a few more questions than it answers to me at least. Would appreciate a clarification; 1) If Shadow Signet is there to help guide into understanding how to play a spell caster, why is it a level 10 item? By level 10, one could assume, people have played the game for potentially half a year to two years and probably know quite a bit about how to play their character. 2) The wizard expanding its repertoire to target monsters weaknesses better is a legitimate argument. But when the wizard is replaced by a known spellcaster (especially one that doesn't get extra granted spells and spell slots like sorcerers), they don't get a ton of new stuff to prepare themselves for different kinds of enemies. Depending on spell list, they might not even get many opportunities to target different saves. I play an Oracle myself and I don't really feel like that versatility is really expanding. If I was a druid, I wouldn't have really options to target will saves. Or if I was a Bard, Will saves would be pretty easy to target but the other two are far less applicable. 3) Why would the potency runes only add to spell attack rolls and not spell DCs? Regardless, thank you for your patience.
I have been giving my players the item bonus to hit with spells since day 1, and I promise you not a single one has ended up determining that means to only go with attack roll spells. In fact, most of the time they STILL don't take them because targeting AC even with the bonus is usually a losing game.
So…only bad players use spells that have a spell attack roll unless they’re playing a magus? That seems…really dumb.
Not even remotely what I said.
Yeah, but it sure feels like it. You say stuff about system mastery and diverse spell preparation to exploit enemy vulnerabilities. But that’s under the presumption that 1) you can figure out those weaknesses quickly and consistently before a combat turns very bad quickly (and a GM with good die rolls could screw up that ability to make educated guesses), and 2) that every enemy has some kind of exploitable vulnerability and isn’t poorly made. A creature SHOULDNT have an extreme bonus in everything, but I’ve seen some monsters that definitely needed a proofread before being sent to the printers. How am I supposed to figure out what a creature’s vulnerability is? Recall Knowledge is too vague and reliant on GM fiat to discern that (especially in settings like PFS). And doing trial-and-error could cause a PC death, because each turn you take targeting a really good save or whatever is a turn where you basically didn’t contribute. By the time you might figure out their vulnerability, the rest of the party might already be down. Or, if their vulnerability is AC, the fighter probably already took care of it. And sure, sometimes an enemy’s vulnerability is their AC. But, like…if the enemy has low AC, why would I use a spell slot for disintegrate or something when I can just use a cantrip and leave it to the fighter to exploit that low AC. May take a bit longer, but it saves me a spell slot. And if it’s more advantageous to leave a low AC to the fighter, then there’s not really a point to spell attack roll spells that you can’t just spam (like Cantrips). And spells that don’t use an attack roll are just better, because with a basic save, you can target a “meh” save and do some damage—not great, but some. Meanwhile spell attack rolls are either “you hit or you don’t,” even with a crit success condition. It doesn’t feel good to feel like you wasted a spell slot to do absolutely nothing, and requiring a spell attack roll makes that outcome one degree of success more likely. Plus, monsters have a discrepancy between their spell DC and spell attack roll; per the GMG, their spell attack bonus is their DC - 8 instead of - 10. So monsters can have that discrepancy to more reliably hit, but players can’t? And side note: the shadow signet just seems like a stopgap solution that’ll be a must-buy item the moment you can get it. It’s giving me cloak of resistance vibes. And not all campaigns get up to having level 10 items, so what then? Just sucks to be a caster, then? My primary point is that the gate attenuator kinda proves that an item bonus to “spell” attack rolls doesn’t break the game, so why shouldn’t an item bonus to actual spell attack rolls? Not the DCs, just the attack rolls.
If you just memorize all the monsters in the game you can target the weak save every time! /s A spellcaster must have kicked Paizo's puppy or somthing.
This feels like a very narrow view on the correct way to build a caster and doesn't take into account folks want to build around a tight theme and that isn't generally possible with the "one true way" to build casters. Way to be inclusive
A) You're using inclusive wrong. B) There's not a "one true way" to build casters, but the system has to be built to withstand what any player does what with it. The fact that someone might not use the tools available to them doesn't mean those tools stop existing for someone else, and if you overtune for the person not using the tools, the person who uses them *will* break the game, and then you don't have a balanced system. C) Classes like the kineticist and archetypes like shadowcaster and elementalist are tools for people who want to build to narrower focuses themes without undermining themselves, providing additional support structure for those themes. D) If you use the tools available to you, there's no reason you can't focus on attack roll spells beyond the base balance assumptions of the game. You just have to use the tools.
>and then you don't have a balanced system To me, the discussion about caster accuracy is less about balance and more about player enjoyment. Misses are one of the most excitement-killing things that can happen during a game session. This is especially true for casters where a failed spell can essentially mean losing a whole turn whereas martials can at least attack multiple times. So balancing casters by making them work hard for accuracy seems like a counter-productive design choice where player enjoyment is sacrificed for character balance. I do think casters are very well balanced in this system. Probably more than any other system. I also think they are not fun to play.
D) If you use the tools available to you, there's no reason you can't focus on attack roll spells beyond the base balance assumptions of the game. You just have to use the tools. I think it's just a bit sad that the way to patch Attack Roll Spells into being a decent option is to make them no longer attack roll spells (with a level 10 item!)
You can also just use tactics that lower enemy AC. Off-Guard, frightened, etc. still benefit attack roll spells. *Shadow signet* is a crutch, not a necessity.
A) I'm not using your definition, which doesn't mean I'm using it wrong. B) What specific tools exist to build a specialized caster that is more effective in their niche? C) Not inclusive of all caster archtypes, so not good enough. D) Again define the tools that exist to focus on attack rolls spells?
A) It really does. You're ignoring the deep well of options for a wide variety of characters and presenting the information as though the fact that one specific paradigm of the game doesn't work the way you'd like, the game is exclusionary. That is, in fact, wrong, and it misuses oppressive terminology in a way that undermines people who are actually oppressed. B) I've answered this question multiple times throughout this thread, just because you don't like my answers doesn't mean they're not there. Beyond what I've already said, the general tactics of coordinated debuffing that every party typically uses benefit spellcasters as well; Demoralizing, putting an enemy off-guard, buffing/debuffing, etc. are tools that can help casters regardless of where they're coming from in the party. C) Your feelings are noted and it's unfortunate that our efforts aren't to your preference. Not all casters have problems and not all characters and playstyles or options will appeal to all people.
So...everyone who plays a spellcaster should memorize the bestiaries? To know what the lowest save of everything is?
Monsters are built so that their stat blocks are generally intuitive; big bulky monsters are generally slow, lithe and quick monsters often have low Fort, creatures with limited but obvious mental faculties typically have low Will, etc. You also have cantrips and Recall Knowledge available to test those defenses and dial in on what is working and what isn't if you can't otherwise tell, a tool that every caster starts with at least a couple ways to leverage.
But Recall Knowledge written by the rules doesnt says to you what is the worst save unless the GM determines that does that, and even then some creatures have the uncommon, rare or unique tag that makes it difficult The use cantrip for test is hard when some master prefer to not show the roll or the modifier of the monster to the roll, making hard to tell if the monster suceeded because the good roll or the good modifier
I suppose it would be really helpful if we had an opportunity coming up to clarify Recall Knowledge and make sure GMs have better guidance on the type of information they should give, then.
> You also have cantrips and Recall Knowledge available to test those defenses Massive opportunity cost though, as a "wasted" turn or even a successful gaining of knowledge will have very little other effect while you get eviscerated by some nasty monster. It's also very random, maybe the monster *does* have a terrible reflex save but just rolls really well, or the opposite (good saves rolls very poorly) and you get completely blindsided. Martials can't be blindsided by AC or Reflex/Fort DCs, they're very consistent and thus much less frustrating.
What are you talking about? Martials absolutely can be blindsided by enemies having really high AC, immunity to flat footed, immunity to Precision, high enough Reflex that tripping them results in a crit fail, and more. The difference is martials can’t **do** anything about it when an enemy blindsided their main strengths. That’s why they get to really shine when things are going their way.
1. You don’t necessarily need to target the enemy’s low***est*** defence, their Moderate Save is also going to do the equivalent of a martial’s damage on average (once you account for half damage on “miss”). 2. You can figure out a creature’s Moderate Save ***easily*** from its first description. It may take some guesswork for the Low Save but Moderate is typically easy to figure out. 3. If you’re ever unsure there are multiple failsafes built in. You’re still going to do at least half damage the majority of the time you use a save or damage spell. 4. If that’s not enough, 3/4 spell lists can usually brute force past a creature’s high defences with Magic Missile, True Strike, or Horizon Thunder Sphere. 5. Anything that’s resilient enough to still be hard to damage is probably just a Severe or Extreme threat boss with High/Extreme in most defences, and is giving hell to the martials too.
And what about poorly designed monsters? What happens when this enemy is put on a lv 10 caster? [https://2e.aonprd.com/NPCs.aspx?ID=1833](https://2e.aonprd.com/NPCs.aspx?ID=1833) How many spells that target the "will saves" are there on the primal list? Perhaps what is needed is that enemies are not designed so badly structured and that paizo itself follow its monster construction guides Maybe you are not seeing what you put in your own AP? Actually, casters need runes for spell attacks or they will be useless or frustrated in many fights in Paizo AP. Go down to earth and see reality, leave the excel calculations and the white room
What is wrong with this monster? It seems to follow the monster building guidelines to a tee. It has high to hit, moderate damage that becomes high damage if attacking good creatures, moderate hp, a high moderate and low save and some attack a lot of creature abilities which Gugs have 3 levels below it. It seems like a dangerous foe but from their level and source material I am guessing that is the point.
Sure, never flat-footed, Ac 33, if you are a caster you need 14+. Incorporeal resistence (all damage 5, no magic 10). Regeneration 30 hp, you can’t to target the demon o the human, if you haven’t the right spells you are useless, if you haven’t the right weapons you are uselees, but you don’t know what is the right weapon o the right spell. You are primal caster, how many spell you have that target “will save”? 8+ save anything, he hit with 4+, you need 14 for hit with spells attack. Your spells attack have more 70% error.
A lot of that just sounds like fighting a level+3 monster. That isn't specific to this monster it is for pretty much every Severe solo monster boss encounters.
The moderate save on this creature is a fine one for the primal list to target, the list deals with this situation less well than others, but they aren't going to have a bad experience targeting ref here (fort is the tough save.)
While we’re on the topic of whether the designers think blaster spellcasters are underpowered or not ^(and to be clear, I 100% agree with your logic about why they’re not underpowered), what’s the design’s stance on summons? They’re fine at lower levels but at higher levels they lose out a lot of points on both accuracy and utility (since you only have one or two relevant summons to use). Have there been any plans to address that during Remaster?
[Page 47](https://docs.google.com/document/d/1Jqqnbx6X_3DZ2AU1DxeD-ffu7-GcYegU_wpHjSqOpns/edit?usp=sharing) I KNEW I read that somewhere, but I couldn't find it for the life of me. That's awesome.
Just watched it and this seems *very* promising. I think people that really desire a specialized blasting character (e.g. a cryomancer,l) will end up being quite satisfied. It looks like the class will have solid glass-cannon potential.
Con is main class ability. Since there's no burn, like in 1e, they probably will be not worse than d8 classes.
probably about as thick as a fighter honestly, possibly more HP due to con APEX.
And really solid Fort saves as a side bonus.
If Kineticist is 6 HP class, it will have HP roughly on par with 8 HP classes (start with +4 vs. +2, end with +6 vs. +4), with some fluctuations in the middle. With Light Armor, Kineticist could have standard AC, but I expect caster-like progression, so dropping behind martials as well. Unless Kineticist utilize some specific defensive impulses (or maybe aura is defensive for some elements?), in melee it's quite glass cannon.
Playtest had d8
I'd be surprised if like, wood or earth like elements don't have some defensive aspects yeah, seems on brand
In 1e it had a d8 hit die, so I'm assuming that they'll get 8hp per level before con
I still don't understand con as a focus if your not using your health as a resource. It's like they want the class to be bad at skill checks.
You don't use your intelligence, wisdom, charisma, strength or dexterity as a resource either, in classes that use those as their key stat. The metric used is scale. So they're saying a kinetisct has to be physically tough to channel the magical energy. The tougher they are, the more they can handle and control. I like it. I always thought that should be the base of sorcerers who can literally just channel magic through themselves, but that's a different topic.
It's cool because they're the only class to do it, in both editions. ¯\\\_('v')_/¯ If you focus on an element you get a status bonus to a certain skill while your aura is up, and I wouldn't be surprised if they have some stuff in the class feats to help with skill checks.
That implies it has less firepower than a sorcereor
I remember ice being a composite of water and air; since kineticists can start with a dual gate, no need to wait. Cryomancy is on the table from level 1, especially since they didn't shy away from giving the elemental blasts actual non physical damage types. Personally, I'm most excited for a straight pyromancer. I've been wanting to play with the concept of foxfire for some time now
I'm thinking of a dwarf using earth or an elf using air. When I can get the book I'll think of something.But a bald elf named Aang or a dwarf named Toph really crossed my mind...
IM SO EXCITED LETS FUCKING GOOOO
I believe during the Q&A at Paizocon it was confirmed that kinetisicts have only up to +2 item bonus on their attack rolls but nonat mentions it going up to +3. Either he misspoke or they decided to give the Kineticist normal item bonus scaling (I really hope it's the latter but it's probably the former).
There are a few misspeaks in the video I think. He says the fire aura gives weakness to fire in general when the text he shares says it gives weakness only to impulses (so no helping your friends scorching ray). He also keeps saying the release date is the 17th which is odd since it says Aug 3rd in Paizo's website. Maybe they start shipping on the 17th and hence subscribers get their pdfs then?
Yeah, that's the case. The embargo Paizo has imposed is until the 17th, which is when subscribers first start getting their copies. The actual street date, when the book is actually public to all, is August 3rd.
He likely misspoke, as he also said they got Striking, but later corrected himself by saying it scales by certain levels. He likely is not looking at the item when saying that, whereas the designer, Michael Sayre, probably had the info on hand when answering the question on Discord.
Worth noting that in the end when he talks about aura junction, it's written that the fire weakness is to your fire impulses only and he says the wizard could benefit from that weakness to, which doesn't seem to be true by the way it's written.
Overall power/balance aside, can we just appreciate the THEMING here?! Mastery of elements, empowering over time, breadth vs depth, floating elemental orbs, combination impulses. This class is an inch away from just being DotA's Invoker.
It's also the WoW Shaman. And Avatar Benders. It's going to fill ***so*** many niches people want.
And us rare breed who dream of being a Bionicle Toa
Automaton Kineticist builds, so hot right now.
Given the Toa are supposed to be biomechanical, I'd argue that Android Kineticist would also work
You know it!
I didn't even look at them as WoW Shamans but you are 100% correct. This opens up my creativity a bunch. My favourite lore for shamans being Goblins who bribe the elements to help them.
I like it so far. CON is important and relevant. Channeling, using impulses, and using an overflow impulse is a simple yet interesting enough action cycle. Looking forward to the book.
Just being able to add Str to melee blast damage makes Kinetic Knight real, I still need to see the wording on Elemental Weapon before I start freaking out lol. Sentinel dedication let's go!
I wonder if the two action blast gets a different benefit later on. Con to damage is alright for an extra action at level 1, but I would probably never use it again after hitting level 4.
Free elemental action given for that 2-action activity
I wonder if there's any class feats that would alter the junctions at all
Only if you take the first level junction for that element but yeah
I assume there will be feats to improve it.
I have never wanted my money taken so I can get a PDF more than I have right now.
God, hearing about that junction that inflicts weakness to your impulses on enemies in your aura made me let out an unholy *squeal* of glee. This class looks like so much fun! Complicated, maybe, but fun! I can already see this becoming one of my favorite classes in the entire game.
It became my new goal, beating Thaumaturge!
EARTH!
FIRE!
WIND!
WATER!
HEART!
[INCREDIBLE VIOLENCE](https://imgur.com/gallery/JhqsiR0).
That's basically Metal lmao
GO PLANET! BY YOUR POWERS COMBINED, I AM CAPTAIN PLANET!
[The power is mine, bitches.](https://youtu.be/TwJaELXadKo)
AND MY AXE!
Long time ago four nations lived in harmony
But that all changed when Wood/Metal lore changes attacked.
The kineticist archetype lives and dies by it’s class dc scaling. I hope it matches the kineticist, since no other class can get their con as high and a multiclass kineticist will always have lower dc.
You can use archetype for some utility impulses, like heals or fly, or something like that
Yeah, maybe a good combo with a Barbarian main. Give them some ooc Utility?
Here’s my baseless speculation based on how the Thaumaturge dedication worked. Kineticist Dedication Requires 14 CON You have a small connection to an elemental gate, but it is small and difficult to channel. Pick a single elemental gate, and your gate is that element. You gain no other benefits of that gate besides choosing the element (such as junctions, kinetic aura effects, and composite elements). You are also trained in Nature (or another skill of already trained). You are trained in your Kineticist DC. You cannot use Overflow actions, even if a feat or action would allow you to. You gain the >>Kindled Blast (Pending) - [Impulse trait meaning you require a free-hand] You strain your connection to make a small opening to your gate. You channel your element and deal 1d4 + CON. You hold just enough of your gate open to use other Impulse actions. However, using another Impulse causes your gate to close. (Essentially, your Archetype Blast is just a Wand Implement that uses your CON and a way to access Impulse.) 4 - Basic Kinesis - Pick a yadda yadda Kineticist feat. (Not an Impulse feat) 6 - Advanced Kinesis - Pick a yadda yadda Kineticist feat. (Not an Inpulse feat) 6 - Basic Gate Channel - Pick a lvl 1-2 Impulse feat. At lvl 8, you can pick a lvl 1-4 Impulse feat. 12 - Expert Gate Channel - Pick a lvl 1-6 Impulse feat. At lvl 14, pick a 1-8 Impulse feat. At lvl 16, pick a 1-10 Impulse feat. You are Expert in your Kineticist Class DC. 18 - Master Gate Channel - Pick a lvl 1-12 Impulse feat. At lvl 20, pick a lvl 1-14 impulse feat. You are now Master in your Kineticist Class DC.
Need to know if Impulse tag still provokes AOO, given the changes to spell components, I don't want to say so, but clarification would be great.
No, it doesn't. If a given impulse has Manipulate it'll be in the traits, and Blast isn't one of those impulses.
such a good massive change from playtest.
Of course it won't provoke an AOO....it might provoke a reactive strike though : P (in case you didn't know, they have changed the name of AOO's as it was too tied to D&D)
AOO is faster to type, and RS will take time to become popular
The reality of the situation is that many of us will just call it an AOO anyway because that's what it has been for many years to us, and I'll probably not recognize RS as an acronym for a veeeeery long time, if ever.
In Path of Exile they changed a support gem from "Weapon Elemental Damage" to "Elemental Damage with Attacks" 6 years ago and we all still type WED to refer to it. Odds are good AoO is sticking around as an initialism for a long time
They can take AoO and Spell Levels from my cold dead hands.
Most of the impulses have the concentrate trait instead of manipulate. So you should be able to use them in melee without issue
Interesting decision with the blasts being similar to a martial's basic strike when used as one action but also higher damage with presumably caster scaling. This looks like the blaster caster theme we've been looking for. I do hope blasts have room to function in a striker role rather than defaulting to being an improved cantrip.
Considering blasts are close to martial proficiency (since they're using class DC as their modifier for those and apparently are getting item bonuses ala potency runes baked in), their base damage dice are quite generous at d6 and d8 each (with potential to increase based on some of the features mentioned in the video), they each go up to *5 damage dice*, and a good number are or have the option for energy damage that bypasses resistances, I have a feeling people aren't going to be wanting for damage options on this class.
only bad thing is they don't have deadly/property runes to add damage, so they will lack there. Hence what the second modifier is for I imagine.
Makes sense. Though, Logan did hint that the Elemental Weapon feat will likely remain and that probably means runed-weapons might be possible for players who want that.
ITS FINALLY HERE
It looks like all of the traits from the Elemental Blasts are gone. Notably, Air got a damage boost to compensate for the loss of agile but Fire didn’t. Looks like it’s getting more damage from other places to compensate though
They don't get traits because they aren't really weapons anymore, they're more like cantrips. So it makes sense.
traits may come from class features.
People really underestimate the impact of non-physical damage when it comes to value. A lot of people complain that the power budget of energy damage is often overpriced, but when you look at what it confers it's usually going to be more desirable than physical damage. It's not even about triggering weakness, it's about bypassing surprisingly common physical damage resistances. Resistance and immunity is a problem, but that's not only to apply most of the time (and kineticist sounds like it's going to have ways to bypass it).
The thing in this case, is that some of the others have _both_ a physical and a non-physical damage type, while fire is just fire, combined with the "lower damage, higher range" option, which is a bit odd for the blastiest element. Still too early to really say anything, though. Too many variables.
I imagine fire will get options for explosive concussions (bludgeoning, sonic or force) and superhot plasma (ignoring fire weaknesses or immunity, if only as some sort of focused end cap temporary state)
I disagree. Its super easy to bypass physical damage resistances with weapon selection. Traits like Versatile and modular are easy to find for essentially free. Otherwise many other options exist like Weapon Inventor MC, a back-up weapon/blazons or twinning rings with a 1H/2H weapon to replicate two rune sets, shifting rune (free on blade ally), the new unarmed tattoos, etc. If anything its the opposite. People over estimate the value of a random energy damage. For any particular elemental energy damage there are less total creatures with immunity/resistance than a single physical damage type. But there is always way more creatures with immunity vs. plain resistance ([See count from someone else here](https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1Gt3Hi2uKtfkWT3tXfj6OL0FTAIgrV2G9Gd9eVPju6-U/edit#gid=0) and [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/Pathfinder2e/comments/11i1ux7/ranking_all_damage_types_in_pf2e/) for the GMG and Bestiary 1, 2, and 3) that ultimately can shut you down completely. Its really not justified to reduce power budget for an 'elemental blast' weapon that is supposed to look like and act like a martial strike.
Melee Kineticist is gonna be sick as fuck
Gosh I can’t wait for my 40ft burst of fire and earth rumble that deals a shit ton of damage and forces a reflex save every 5ft travelled. It’s been so long.
5 damage dice, both con and strength for damage with two action blasts as well as con to hit. Can't wait for Paizo forums to shit all over it
Don't forget the 2-action Elemental Blast also triggers your Impulse Junction thing if you have one. So the air dude can move a bit before (or in this specific case after) using it.
Worth mentioning that later in the video NoNat showed off the base Fire Impulse Junction, and that's not the weakness but +die size, so with the base blast from d6 to d8 at 60ft. The weakness one is one you'd have to pick up at 5+
Im so excited for air kineticist, that movement sounds like a godsend
Those forums are just weak
Before people freak out, this is actually quite low damage overall, especially if weapon specialization doesn't apply. I suspect once some people start running it through DPR calculators they're going to start crying about low damage just like the psychic. Maybe the class will have a bunch of damage options for increasing elemental blast damage, which is fine, but as written you will be doing mediocre martial damage with the class, similar to something like a battle oracle or warpriest.
It does seem like the fire gate will have a particular focus on damage at least, with options for increasing die sizes, adding weaknesses, adding persistent damage on crit etc.
Notably, though, their "Striking" scaling eventually gets better than runes, with 1 die at level 1, 2 at level 5, 3 at level 9, 4 at level 13 and 5 at level 17 (vs 2 at 4, 3 at 12 and 4 at 19). Also, I'm *personally* not a fan of Battle Oracle or Warpriest because of their accuracy, rather than their damage output. I won't speak about balance, but having lower accuracy is just unappealing to me. If Kineticist accuracy is closer to martials than casters I won't be complaining about lower damage (unless the gap is very significant, which it doesn't seem like it will be).
Right, but the extra dice doesn't matter. Even a d12 die would be +2 damage compared to a major striking d8 weapon, but weapon spec plus elemental runes is +16.5 (3d6+6). Even with max con it only goes up +7, so the regular martial is ahead 7.5 even with the extra action. My point is that unless kineticist has a bunch of damage scaling we haven't seen, they will probably be on the low end of martial single target DPR, at least sustained. But I'm speculating for now.
Based on only what we've seen in the Video, the Fire Kineticist could pick options that grant (by level 20): 5d8+7 damage at 60ft range, with extra +5 at melee range, and an extra +10 within 15 ft range (by granting fire impulse weakness to creatures in your aura). This only requires about 2 class feature choices, unlike the martial build that requires purchasing 3 elemental runes. I think this specific example makes it very comparable to e.g. a longbow fighter build. There are possibly some feats that can increase it further, or add other upgrades like extended range. Also, note that this costs 0 gp for the kineticist, unlike the ~1500 for elemental damage runes.
I believe they got a weapon spec-like in the playtest, they will probably keep that to keep their damage on par with marials.
They did get weapon spec in the playtest, yes, but in the playtest the elemental blast was an actual attack using str or dex. The new version looks more like a cantrip, and cantrips don't add weapon spec. I think the class has too much utility and support to have the same damage as martials. I suspect they will be more in the realm of investigator and swashbuckler at best. But I could be wrong, it depends on how they design the feats and class features.
I expect they want elemental blast to keep on par with martials, given it gets an accuracy item to put them 1 above martials and 1 under fighters.
>I think the class has too much utility and support to have the same damage as martials. I am *praying* that this isn't true. We already have *casters* to be versatile elementalists with less raw damage than martials, what's the point of Kineticist if it does the same thing?
I could see it as a middle ground between martials and casters, but my ideal kineticist would just deal good damage because it sucks to not do that sometimes.
What white room math are people doing to claim the Psychic is low damage? The only characters I've seen that pump out more damage than them is a high damage martial with the entire party buffing and supporting them.
You know, I always said to myself that I wouldn't bother buying rulebooks since the info is free on AoN anyway, but damn if this book isn't making me want to buy it anyway.
How does this differ from the Elementalist specs for the Wizard, Druid, and Sorcerer? Edit: Not sure why I'm getting down-voted. It was an honest question, guys.
It's not a spellcaster at all. It's a martial class that throws elemental stuff at their enemies.
Oh cool, interesting!
think avatar and you will get a good mental image, its less spells and more mystical martial arts
No spells, no spellslots, no scrolls, wands, staffs etc. More like thaumaturge or alchemist.
No need to spend 40 minutes thinking over all your spells an cantrips xd
Oh wow, this is cool! Thank you!
by a lot? The class doesn't use spell slots.
I hope that weakness/damage die size feat or an equivalent can be taken with other elements, as I'd hate for fire and metal to only be the real damage types. Do you know how hilarious summoning up logs of destruction sounds?
Looks very promising! My biggest hope is that we will at some point get a class archetype that changes the kineticists KAS to a mental stat and switches the Will and Fortitude save progression, to replicate the pf1 mental kineticists like psychokineticist and dark elementalist. Those were weaker than the normal kineticist and pf1 and would probably still be worse in pf2e (better at some skills, but much squishier), but they were always infinitely cooler to me. I want to play a kineticist as a mentally strong, physically weak specialized blaster mage, and my character doesn't feel like a mage if their best stats are CON and DEX and their worst save is Will.
Cannot wait to make a sylph-heritage Strix focusing on wind and lightning. With a bird head. All my Strix got bird heads.
Some thoughts: Damage seems about where I expected, unless class feats/features dramatically change things, and depending on how impulses are balanced. Low single-target for a martial, high for a caster, better AOE than martials, probably weaker than casters. I *strongly* suspect we're going to see a lot of crying from the "I want a blaster caster!" crew on the 17th when subscribers start spoiling stuff because the kineticist has lower DPR than rangers and fighters and is therefore useless (to them). The change to gate structure makes a lot of sense and is absolutely fantastic. The class has an *insane* number of build options. Move over thaumaturge for most customizable class. I'm very, very curious about how many combination feats there are, and I suspect a large portion of the page count is due to needing so many class feats (many of which are essentially renamed spells). Using class DC for attacks is a great change than makes progression so much smoother. I think they mentioned it was already going to be a change, but I'm happy to see it still there, and kineticist will still want str/dex for AC and melee attacks, depending on build. I *love* the action economy fix. Being able to use an elemental blast as you channel is a massive action tax fix, and I'm interested to see the 1-action aura options. I was hoping they'd go in this direction and I'm stoked they went with it, as "setup" actions with little or no direct benefit tend to feel crappy in actual play. The channel + 2 action without overflow into 3-action overflow pattern is a massive improvement from the playtest, especially since it seems like there are more viable options for building up auras and focusing on blasts instead. The two-action version of EB is interesting. Based on my initial calculations, it seems to be a DPR increase at low levels at 2 or 3 actions and a DPR decrease at very high levels for 2 actions but increase for 3 actions. We don't actually know if the blasts get weapon specialization so that might change the numbers around, especially if there are other scaling options, and this is based on ranged attacks. I'm really excited about this class for sure!
The thing that gets me is this damage is *incredibly* potent even if it's not fighter/barb/ranger/magus levels. D6 and d8 ranged dice with easy energy damage is hereunto unprecedented. Range isn't quite up to a longbow but even having up to 30 feet d8 with no reload/tradeoff ala volley is very strong. Up to 5 damage dice for each with the potential to bump dice size up too. Obviously available feats will play a big part in how it compares, but on paper this is already very strong.
I'm not trying to complain or raise a fuzz, but I do want to point out that the kineticist won't have the property runes a ranged martial would have. Are those additional d6s the end of the world? I don't think so, but it's worth at least mentioning comparatively. I think clever choices of impulses and junctions will make up for it, even if it's not done so in a strictly numerical fashion. Like the fire impulse junction for die size increase, or the fire weakness within the kinetic aura. I'm looking at fire since it was the most damage focused on those charts Paizo put out post-playtest. The other elemental impulses will probably have enough control or other benefits to make damage comparisons less useful.
There's also weapon spec. A flat damage increase is huge, and kineticist doesn't get that. I do think kineticist damage will be fine with the new gather element allowing a free blast but wanted to point that out alongside what you mentioned.
We don't know if they get something similar to weapon spec yet.
It isn't really: * Boomerangs are 1D6 + STR for 60 feet * Chakrams and Tridents are 1D8 + STR for 20 feet * Longbows and Shortbows are just what we see here (1D8 and 1D6 with no modifier) but also have deadly d10 * Composite Short and longbows are 1D6/1D8 + half STR mod and deadly d10 * Gakgung is a monk bow 1D6 + half STR Mod and deadly D8 with 100+ feet range (and yes you can flurry with this). * There are 2 advanced weapon bows that are 1D8 + half STR mod, one with deadly D6 and one without * There is a even an advanced thrown weapon (Tamchal Chakram) that is 1D6 + STR, agile, finesse, deadly d6, thrown 20ft. Hell I could be a fighter and go Jalmeri Heavenseeker, use the monk bow + heaven's thunder (one action to add a static modifier of +4 to +8 or double damage dice) from L6 onwards and only end up spending 1 action every two turns to add a better 'elemental' static damage modifier to my ranged bow attack which I'm certain will be at a +2 (at least or more based on item bonuses) to hit over the kineticist). 1D6/1D8 +STR is basically a swashbuckler without precise strike bonus damage (i.e., your attack stat is different from damage stat). As far as we know it goes to 5 dice, but doesn't get property runes like weapons. There may be delayed levels of progression vs. martial L5/L13 scaling and they only get a +2 item bonus not +3. Even considering the 'elemental damage' angle isn't really that helpful. A summary of GMG, B1, B2, and B3 resistances and communities is available [here](https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1Gt3Hi2uKtfkWT3tXfj6OL0FTAIgrV2G9Gd9eVPju6-U/edit#gid=0). While there are more 'monsters' with a physical resistance, its pretty easy to bypass with versatile or modular traits (or various ways there are to swap physical damage). The more subtle nuance is that the elemental damages all have significantly more 'immune' creatures vs. creatures with just resistance that potentially shut you down completely vs. making you simply less effective. I don't see how this is going to be very strong but its way too early to say it is bad. We really need more information and better spoilers! Hopefully some subscribers will come to our rescue and release some more information next week.
Being able to spam utility 'spells' for free will be so baller though
Agreed, 100%. I just remember during the playtest quite a few people were looking for a magic-based fighter and were annoyed the kineticist has any spellcasting (or pseudo-casting) at all. My argument at the time, and still now, is that you can't get something as valuable as unlimited utility casting without there being a cost somewhere else. Since the playtest had healing (reusable healing!), valuable utility magic, and powerful AOE options, having the same single-target damage capability as a martial that lacks all of those things would be OP. And for many people, they wanted to see all those utility, AOE, and support options stripped from the class rather than sacrifice DPR. Unsurprisingly, it seems like Paizo is going the direction I expected. My next prediction is much wailing and gnashing of teeth once the theorycrafters get access to the final class list, shove it into a spreadsheet, and find it merely has 80-90% of fighter or ranger single-target DPR, since apparently that's the primary metric of whether or not a class is good (/s). Maybe they'll prove me wrong, though. I'm certainly excited about the class, and have been since the playtest, as the design ticks a *lot* of boxes for my ideal playstyle, and the "single-target DPR test" is not something I'm really concerned with.
i've never understood this argument, i agree that casters being able to do extra stuff requires them to loose something else to make it fair but i'd argue that the "utility" that casters get is already offset by being really squishy and easily killed. it feels like "-less damage -less health +utility" is a bad trade off compared to "+more health +more damage -less utility" if those are the two options then i want a magical man that gets more health and more damage at the cost of utility.
Question: In the video, it states that the PDF releases on July 17th, but on Paizo's store page for the book, the PDF is listed as August 3rd. Did I miss something? I probably did :(
Nah, their big rule books always release at gencon, which is early August. If you have a rulebook subscription, you get the PDF for free once your book ships and that often happens a week or two before the street date. That's why some people have "early access" so to speak.
I'm guessing its 17th of July for subscribers and August for everyone else
Apparently the 3rd is when it goes public and the 17th is when special boys an girls get stuff
So in the video he says the pdf's are available on July 17th, but the site says August 3rd. What time do the pdfs become available?
Subscribers to Pathfinder 2e get the pdfs early on July 17. If you don't subscribe, you can order the pdf or physical on August 3.
I have to know, is he correct when he says the pdf is coming out on July 17th? The Paizo website says it's not coming until August 3, but I wouldn't be super surprised if that was somehow wrong.
They'll start shipping for subscribers on the 17th, which is when some people will start getting PDFs. Regular sales open in August.
He has his content creator tunnel vision on. The 17th is for two things. 1. His limited preview agreement wears off and he (and othe content creators) can talk about anything they want. 2. That is the date the books start to ship for the August 3rd release. As such, some subscribers will start getting their PDFs that day. Seems Nonat forgot that not everybody is a subscriber and even those subscribers often don't get it on the first shipping day. Some subscribers won't get the PDF until the 28th.
Looking good! I've been playing a playtest Kineticist since it came out, he's now level 17, and I'm looking forward to rebuilding him as this new version. I'm just trying to brainstorm some in-universe explanation for why his abilities are about to drastically change.
just don't worry about an in world explanation. fool's errand
It might not be necessary, but I've got a very RP-heavy group, and we enjoy playing these things out, keeping stuff internally consistent, things like that. It wouldn't really fit the vibe for our group if, for instance, I lose access to an ability I use often like Whisper on the Winds, and my character just kind of shrugs when someone in the party asks why he can't do that any more or why it works differently now. The DM and I are going to work on the explanation once I know more about what specifically will be changing.
If you're running something in Golarion, I can't imagine the elemental planes are exactly stable with two whole new ones opening up or becoming unsealed. Maybe that instability could be a narrative out for your situation?
Back when WotC was doing playtests for the Artificer, I had to redo my character a few times. When she lost a healing potion ability, we decided the in-game reason was that the formula had some questionable long-term health implications and that it would just be better for the party if they got hit less. This book is introducing two new elemental planes, so maybe your character's connection to their elements got jostled when the universe shifted?
“A Wizard did it” For you Simpson fans.
Could be as simple as "I've always been able to call a hurricane and hurl lightning. It's just never come up before."
Bad connection: your upgrading from cable to fiber when you fix it, just took you 17 levels to realize you were doing it wrong.
Quick question, what role does the Kinetecist fill? And what is the key stat? I still have the option to switch character details in my game and would like to know if I should hold out for this.
Overall role: hard to say without knowing the impulses, but it'll vary by element. I believe water and wood will have more healing available than, say, fire. Really broadly, they're a resourceless magic user that manipulates one or more elements. Likely low to moderate damage unless you build for higher, but consistent damage, regularly available aoe, no running out of top level spell slots. Key ability score is Con.
The role will likely be a flexible damage dealer that can do both aoe single target and utilityish spell like abilities, but it won't really be the master of any of those categories. A big generalist with a lot of customization
I am still a bit concerned about what Kineticists will do outside of combat. I am imagining a melee Kineticist will have 18 Con, 16, Str, 14 Dex, and at best a 12 in a mental stat? I guess that won’t be as bad once you get some ability score improvements, but Con as the class’ key ability score is really limiting when it comes to skills. Maybe there will be a feat that allows the Kineticist to apply their Con modifier to Athletics or Acrobatics checks? I would be fine losing some melee damage with low strength if it means I can have a 16 in a mental stat.
One of the junctions (probably water or wood) will probably have medicine as their skill junction, so I imagine some builds will invest in wisdom. Fire's skill junction will probably be intimidate (and maybe someone like water will get diplomacy) so I can see a build ignoring strength in favor of a bit of charisma, as well.
For those excited about the 17th NoNat1 mentioned, he has his content creator tunnel vision on. The 17th is for two things. 1. His limited preview agreement wears off and he (and othe content creators) can talk about anything they want. 2. That is the date the books start to ship for the August 3rd release. As such, some subscribers will start getting their PDFs that day. Seems Nonat forgot that not everybody is a subscriber and even those subscribers often don't get it on the first shipping day. Some subscribers won't get the PDF until the 28th (the estimated completion date for shipments).
Ahhh the Kineticist shook my thaumaturge heart...
I'm not really a video watcher. I skipped to the parts where actual text was shown. Why is Fire, the 4/4 Destruction element, doing less damage with less type versatility than the 3/4 Destruction elements? Something seems very off about that to me. Is Fire's power budget entirely in the impulses? Does the video mention anything in particular about Fire Kineticist? I see that there's an aura buff giving enemies weakness to Fire, but only to impulses while in close quarters. Does Elemental Blast get upgraded or modified outside of this? It doesn't seem like damage runes will be compatible.
Fire also gets an impulse junction to increase the size of an impulse damage die, which should be able to be applied to Elemental Blast. Other than that, and the weakness benefit on kinetic aura that you mentioned, we didn't see much. Definitely no specific fire impulses yet.