Oh my god how long has it been since I posted in this thread, not even two weeks?! Holy shit! Me and Theron have been chatting about the Kineticist in detail in DMs so as not to clutter up the thread. Sometimes I wonder if we might know more about kineticist than the actual people who programmed the kineticist.
you have saved me bro, also second on the naming scheme of the ability names being super lame. Maybe the Writers or Gamplay Devs haven't seen enough psychic-oriented media but Acid Cloud or Thermal Sunder sound so basic asf from mind powers? Or the fact that we only get staves for weapons.
Thermal Sunder needs a rewrite for the action description alone; you "spray it", god sake man.
You're welcome, when this class is more finished maybe I'll make a definitive build guide for the kineticist. Still feels like the class is in testing, and until that is announced by fenoxo, I'm going to leave that post there. Maybe I'll update it, though for some reason I've been getting flagged as spamming or posting questionable content for some reason recently? Last time I edited a post it sat around for a week waiting to be approved by a moderator before I gave up and deleted it.
I can tell you my thoughts on builds have changed and I have more build recommendations for when the class is finished with some off the wall ones as mentioned by Theron.
Kineticist seems pretty underpowered and in need of a moderate reworking.
I'm not sure I would agree with this statement and considering how many times I've beaten up Dr. Lash testing things out I don't think he would either. Is kineticist perfect, no. Is it finished, definitely not. Is it underpowered, probably not. Things just aren't where they should be yet is how I feel.
1.
In my opinion there are just too many active abilities that end up cluttering the UI, and it would be preferable to have a few less but keep upgrading the ones you do have; instead of picking a new active ability nearly every level up you instead have the option of upgrading an existing power one level, passive ability the next, and then a new active ability the level after that, or something similar. Instead of picking geothermal spike for example, perhaps you could just upgrade thermal sunder into a slightly buffed version of geothermal spike?
As my buddy Theron has mentioned this goes along with the Wizard theme (though I'd disagree with the kineticist being the wizard analogue, I'd say more psychic monk). You have a lot of options, some more situational than others. Even with all the active abilities I tend to use most of them (though admittedly there are some options I never choose like mindcrush, reality schism, or psychic slam) most of the abilities stay relevant depending on what you're fighting an where you are.
Also thermal sunder might seem like it's a worse version of geothermal spike but behind the scenes it scales pretty well as you level. Theron did some digging and if you don't have geothermal spike then it's basically your go to attack against any enemy strong to cold damage (basically all of Uveto)
2
A lot of options you have aren't worth picking over their counterparts in any case. (Thermal Sunder > Kinectic Burst, Psytuned Vitality > Psionic Shielding, Psychogenic Vim > Vitality Siphon, Debris Field > Vortex Brand, Gravity Crush > Psychic Slam)
The only thing I'd argue with here is that Psionic Shielding isn't as bad as one might think. It's very easy to make a Kineticist that basically never gets hit with how high their evasion gets, an easy source of blind, and the ease of stunning with some builds; me and Theron have theory crafted a couple builds where Psionic shielding is better than Psytuned Vitality because you're never going to take anything but shield damage anyway.
Vitality Siphon and Vortex brand are trash though, utterly worthless for reasons that have already been stated in previous posts most notably mine where I mention how there's never a reason to take either of them. I agree with Theron that the idea behind Vitality Siphon is that it's probably more of a healing ability than an energy ability but you need all the energy you can get as a Kineticist.
3.
Compared to the other classes, Kineticist seems to have considerably worse counterparts in the auto-assigned perks, for example 'Unnatural Reserves' is pretty poor compared to 'Die Another Day' (Same effect as the Kineticist's, except with 25% energy AND a free flash grenade), 'Single Minded' and even 'Shield Regen' I'd argue, since shields recharge between fights, stop you from taking damage in the first place, and you get it a full four levels before the kineticist gets 'Unnatural Reserves'.
The Mercenary class getting a larger potential willpower increase from 'Iron Will' than the Kineticist gets from 'Steel Will' also doesn't sit right, not to mention the aformentioned 'Single Minded' willpower bonus.
I will admit I never actually noticed Unnatural reserves even when I had Psychogenic Vim and my health got dropped low. Maybe I would have died without it? Still I agree, it's a very forgettable ability. Would be cool if you got a free stun or something with it as well, something to at least let you know it happened. The willpower ability from Mercenary makes no sense to me, I guess it's a cool thing you can get that will get you a ton of willpower on a class that mostly doesn't care. Would be really nice on a kineticist, maybe replace one of the choices you currently make at level 6 with it except with intelligence instead? Could have one choice be based off intelligence and the other off of physique to really go with the weapons vs powers aspect they currently have going.
4.
Some perks are just bad, even useless, such as 'Telekinetic Warrior' and 'Third Eye Aim' (both on level 7, spoiled for choice really). I can see the logic in 'Telekinetic Warrior' as being immune to disarms (in a roundabout fashion) is situationally useful, unfortunately it's on a class that most likely isn't using their weapons for the vast majority of their damage anyway. And 'Third Eye Aim' is just... not good, if it were additional instead of a replacement that'd be getting somewhere, but I think just replacing these with different upgrades for Force darts or something would be a better option.
I also understand the thinking behind 'Mind Trick', an expensive but guaranteed way to break a grapple, one of the most dangerous and annoying status effects! It just doesn't work in practice, given that there is nothing stopping the enemy from just... grapplnig you again. And again. And even again! And now you don't have any energy left and you're still grappled. Making this a much cheaper action, or keeping the high cost and making it work for multiple rounds as a passive defense could work to fix it.
Don't even get me started on the Telekinetic Warrior and Third Eye Aim (they're both level 6 actually, have to be the pedant here). Theron might forgive TEA but I won't. I get why they do it I just disagree because I also don't think Intelligence does enough to make not maining physique worthwhile anyway (and outside of a very specialized ranged weapon trip build I don't think ranged weapons are useful on the Kineticist). I get it has its place but so does telekinetic warrior; and that place is a garbage can. I'm more forgiving of telekinetic warrior but it's still bad, it's only useful until you get to Myrellion or Uveto anyway after which it stops keeping up.
As for force darts, I think that's an interesting idea though I can tell you from experience that force darts is an incredibly powerful ability that you can build a whole character around if you wanted to. Probably one of the safer builds too. As for mind trick, I agree that it's overpriced and mostly worthless. Theron mentions that it's there for if you didn't invest in Physique and/or intelligence. Chances are you're going to invest in at least one of those two so why does it exist and why does it cost so much?
Having 3 entire perks dedicated to increasing your energy pool is a waste of potential, and leaves you weaker than the other classes considering that these upgrades are essential to play a very energy-intensive class. A single perk that gives extra energy for every point willpower might work, say 2 energy per point in willpower or 1 energy per libido for bimbos could be a good starting point.
That's only one more than every other class and arguably Kineticist is more reliant on their energy pool than every other class. Increasing energy based on willpower is an interesting idea though, it would end up meaning that Kineticists have one fewer energy perks than other classes.
I'd also argue that 'Mind Crush' really doesn't need it's cooldown, it's already fairly expensive, doesn't always work, and doesn't work against some enemies altogether, feels a bit needless when the Mercenary gets a low-energy, spammable stun move from level 1. I also think that crits from 'Acid Cloud' and 'Geothermal Spike' should trigger 'Deep Impact', that might be overpowered in practice but it'd sure be fun as hell, and it be a quick fix if no other changes to the class are implemented.
Mind crush probably needs a shorter cooldown but I don't think having one is bad. I think something needs to be done with it to make it equal to deep impact. There's some fun things happening with Deep impact that make it very unique and interesting. As for low cost spam moves I can tell you a deep impact force darts kineticist has that and it's probably better than headbutt. You just have to wait for deep impact.
There are already powers that can trigger deep impact (the game doesn't tell you which ones they are unfortunately) namely force darts, entropic whip, and gravity crush. I can see why they made it so only random crits proc deep impact, if they didn't there'd never be any reason to take mind crush. You would have listed that in your first point with deep impact > mind crush. Notably though, I don't think you would be wrong if you went back and did that. I'm not a huge fan of mind crush though I suppose it has its place as Theron will probably no doubt point out.
5.
Unlike the other classes, the Kineticist doesn't have two clearly defined upgrade paths.
They do, but Theron beat me to this point.
6.
'Acid Cloud' needs a cooler name and description
Acid Cloud or Thermal Sunder sound so basic asf
Glad I'm not the only one who thinks this. As for thermal sunder, the name is fine but if you're going sunder something with heat why are you spraying heat at it. Describe Steele cutting through something with a blade of solar fire or something.
Kineticist is in a kinda weird place, it's like "Squischy psychic wizard but not really" MAYBE adding something related to tease would spice things up but then it would be an over glorified tease attack class.
I would argue that kineticist is one of the tankiest of the classes. I've heard (from Theron specifically) of tankier smugglers but the kineticist is probably second out of the classes for how hard they are to kill. If you take Psytuned Vitality you have the most health out of all the classes by a lot and a flat regen of 5 health (less useful than the just having more health part honestly, if you're taking health damage 5 health a round isn't going to cut it). If you take Psionic Shielding you have the only class that has a consistent way to recover both health and shields while in combat.
You get additional defense equal to your level, you have ready access to blind that you can set and forget, you can fly which makes some enemies just a joke. Drayfox said that levitation is really cool and they were right. You also get a solid heal no matter which one you take (though you're taking psychogenic vim because it's better) and you have a bunch of abilities and weapons (one of which is notably better in your hands than any other class) that inflict conditions that render enemies unable to attack for a turn. You get stuns on crits and if you build for it you can make them fairly reliable.
I would never describe the Kineticist as squishy.
As for the lust attacks, I've seen a lot of suggestions for it but the same argument works for all of them: tease exists already and it's very effective.
Yeah I think this is the core issue with Kineticist, it has situational options, the problem is that a lot of said situational options aren't very useful compared to other classes' alternatives, it's a "This is a Job for Aquaman" situation but with the other classes having a rather much easier time depending on the situation.
Most builds of kineticist I've played are situationally ineffective and the situations are rare. My favorite build of melee/acid cloud handled everything in the game very easily. The real question is what do you want your main power to be? Geothermal spike, entropic whip, acid cloud, or force darts? No matter what you're playing though you have your back up of entropic leach and thermal sunder to see you through. Or just rely on your weapons, staves are really good when you get to the hook staff and the sleet shaft. Sleet shaft in the hands of a level 12 kineticist ties for the hardest hitting weapon in the game except it can also freeze and crush.
People keep ragging on Third Eye Aim, but it lets you ignore Physique and Aim, so long as you're not using a Status attack weapon. Cybernetic Subprocessor gives +5 to both Melee and Ranged damage (where Muscular Stabilization System reduces Physique and Steroidal Muscle Augment penalizes Will). It lets you keep access to more Damage Types and you can use the weapons as Stat Sticks, while actually getting benefit from the Perk.
The real problem with Third Eye Aim is Intelligence doesn't do enough for Kineticists natively*, so there's little incentive to max it out, unless you take TEA.
*Accuracy for 3ish powers? Speed of Thought.
Yeah, and I'm going to keep ragging on TEA until it has more of a reason to exist than "less stat grinding"!
Because of the way Perks are implemented, I'm afraid the name cannot easily be changed.
Why do you have to be such a buzzkill? Is it also hard to change the description of powers as well? Are we going to be stuck with spraying heat at things rather than actually sundering them?
