The Armored Kineticist: A Force to Be Reckoned With

Though I haven't gotten around to doing full breakdowns and tips regarding the tasty classes we received in Occult Adventures, I have had a lot of folks ask me what I would do with a kineticist. While they've got a lot of moving parts, and a lot of path options, there is one thing that I would greatly enjoy doing with this particular class... making them as tanky as possible.

I wouldn't reach for that initiative die, if I were you.

While their Constitution modifier is one of their most important stats, given that it adds to damage and the saves against many of their class features, it's how their abilities function that really got my brain turning. Because as I mentioned in Add Some Spell-Like Abilities to Your Character For an Ace-in-The-Hole, being able to use your magic while encased in steel is pretty damn awesome.

A Heavily-Fortified Gun Emplacement

As a brief reminder, for those who have skimmed rather than reading into the fine details, a kineticist's abilities are either supernatural, or spell-like. Neither of these will use somatic gestures or verbal components, and neither of them will require material components. While occasionally treated the same way as spells in terms of whether they function in magic dampened areas, you never have to worry about what armor you're wearing when you're using these abilities. Or even the shield you're carrying.

They called him the Dragon Prince... but he burned hotter than any wyrm.

This means that, with a little work, you can take your kineticist, wrap them in the most heavily enchanted armor you can find, give them a shield, stack some spells on them (via magic items or party buffers), and then add in some defensive wild talents, and you'll be able to wade right into the maelstrom of battle.

The most obvious choice for this is the Kinetic Knight archetype, found in Pathfinder Player Companion: Psychic Anthology. While this archetype gives you medium and heavy armor proficiency, as well as shield proficiency, and allows you to Gather Power while carrying a bonded shield, it also gives you a significantly more rigid power progression. And a lot of the powers it assigns you are melee-oriented, in addition to the fact that it limits your ability to use some of your powers to when you have your armor on.

For my two cents, you're better off just taking a single-level dip into fighter, and eating the loss of a kineticist class level. It ensures you get to keep your freedom, you get a bonus feat, some nice boosts to your saves (though it can adversely affect your Will save, so watch for that), and you get the necessary armor proficiencies along with some snazzy weapon proficiencies on top of it! And if you want some extra cheese you could take something like the Unbreakable fighter to get Endurance and Diehard at level one, just to eke a little more out of the deal.

This puts you on a pretty solid defensive path. You can now wear the best armor you can find (which is helpful for those who only have a middling Dexterity score), and boost your AC even higher with shields when you want to. Though you will need to drop your shield to Gather Power, or eventually invest in something that dances to free up your hands. Or you could invest in a Ring of Force Shield, which can be turned on or off as a free action specifically for situations like this.

In addition to all that heavy metal, though, you've got your defensive wild talents to huck into the fray, too. The water kineticist's shroud can act as your shield, the wood kineticist gets a natural armor bonus, the telekinetic kineticist gains temporary hit points from their force field, along with utility talents like Kinetic Cover to provide full cover against attacks and magic.

And, of course, once you've got your ironsides in place, all that's left to do is blast away to your heart's content.

The beauty of the kineticist is that they are always ready for action, as long as they haven't reached their maximum burn (and even then, they can still use their powers without going over that tolerance level). And when you combine their ability to blast away endlessly with their movement powers, such as air walking on ramps of ice like one of the X-Men, or blowing themselves into the air on their own explosive beams, things can get pretty heavy metal pretty quickly.

Things To Watch Out For

Of course, no build is perfect. In addition to the sheer prep time and resources you need to get your kineticist up to their full fighting strength (armor costs, using magic items for buff spells, activating your wild talents, etc.), there are some notable chinks in your armor. Your poor Will save is going to be one of the biggest problems, but you should also keep an eye on your touch AC. Just because you're swinging heavy in plate mail surrounded by a shroud of freezing water doesn't mean you aren't easy to pick off with ray spells. Lastly, watch your saves. Some abilities just require you to hit, but pay close attention to which ones are regular attacks, which ones are touch attacks, which ones allow saving throws, and which ones don't.

Being a big gun ain't easy.

Also, it's important to ask what sort of organization such an unusual warrior might be a part of. The Knights of the Glass Sword from 100 Knightly Orders, or the Acolytes of Arannis in 100 Random Mercenary Companies are great places to get started if you're looking for inspiration!

And for those who are interested in more fun things you can do with the occult classes, you may want to check out Advantages and Disadvantages of Psychic Magic (in Pathfinder)!

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