Pathfinder Pathfinder: Kingmaker Builds and Strats Thread

[Haplo]

Rather high elemental damage with some utility infusions (such as Magnetic for electric/plasma, which reduces AC by 4 (no save); earth Bowling for tripping (CMB check); water Pushing for Bullrushing (CMB check); entangling, blinding, staggering - saving throw checks with not very high DCs), initially delivered as ranged touch attacks (energy, like Kanerah's fire blast, subject to Spell Resistance checks) or ranged physical attacks (physical, like Kalikke's Water blast, no SR check, reduced by Damage Reduction). Also you can eventually make combined, dual-element blasts (all physical, except double-fire). Make sure your second element will allow for a combined blast with your primary, as that's very high damage. Later on you shape blasts into various aoe forms (so some you no longer deliver with ranged attacks). Best one that is available reasonably soon (at level 13) is Deadly Earth - by far. Cloud is decent also, but comes at level... 17? So you'll want to teach at least one of the girls Earth. Probably Kalikke, as Kanerah's archetype kinda sucks due to Burn limitations. For Kanerah it might be best to simply go for double fire for boss killing with Blue Flame - the only elemental combined blast, which incidentally may eventually ignore Spell Resistance with Pure Flame infusion. Earlier you'll also want Wall infusion at level... 11?

For Kalikke I like the build that can be found here:
https://af.gog.com/forum/pathfinder_kingmaker/ineffects_guide_v2?as=1649904300

 

[ArchAngel]

I wish someone told me to bring as many scrolls and potions of Remove Disease as possible into House on the edge of time...

 

[Wolfe]

Thank you. This seems to be the most complicated class in the game but I'm starting to make sense of it.

What about the concentration checks? At lvl 12 she's got a bonus of 12 and the DC is 21, so almost half of the time she fails to Gather Power. Am I missing something?

 

[Efe]

I wish someone told me to bring as many scrolls and potions of Remove Disease as possible into House on the edge of time...

been said on this thread many times to bring many heal and mass heal scrolls (maybe shitty moderator that split the thread misplaced those)

 

[ArchAngel]

I wish someone told me to bring as many scrolls and potions of Remove Disease as possible into House on the edge of time...

been said on this thread many times to bring many heal and mass heal scrolls (maybe shitty moderator that split the thread misplaced those)

Heal and mass heal are not needed, just remove disease

 

[ArchAngel]

Thank you. This seems to be the most complicated class in the game but I'm starting to make sense of it.

What about the concentration checks? At lvl 12 she's got a bonus of 12 and the DC is 21, so almost half of the time she fails to Gather Power. Am I missing something?

Are you letting someone attack your kineticist in melee? These companions are not melee characters. Also you can get Combat Casting if you want.

 

[Wolfe]

Nope, I was just testing attacks and using Water and Earth Blasts from far away with Kalikke on those frogs in the area where she asks you to meet her. It's strange.

 

[ArchAngel]

Nope, I was just testing attacks and using Water and Earth Blasts from far away with Kalikke on those frogs in the area where she asks you to meet her. It's strange.

Ah, in that case the problem is that those frogs entangle those they hit and entanglement forces concentration checks to use spells or gather power.

 

[Wolfe]

Phew, that's fine then. This class seems really, really strong.

 

[Haplo]

Thank you. This seems to be the most complicated class in the game but I'm starting to make sense of it.

What about the concentration checks? At lvl 12 she's got a bonus of 12 and the DC is 21, so almost half of the time she fails to Gather Power. Am I missing something?

Yeah, I guess it's the entanglement. I haven't played that much with Kineticists yet, but haven't seen much Concentration checks needed. You should generally keep them out of melee. Although if you want to dip Crane Style and use Water Shield, they can become reasonably tanky with some good equipment. Then again, Burn increases their chance to hit and damage (and stats for Kalikke with Overflow) but reduces effective HP, so...

 

[Daidre]

I had a complete playthrough with vanilla range Kineticist and never even noticed that there is possible concentration check on blast. My elements was fire-earth-water and its crazy strong, even comparing to Arcane Trickster in the endgame (really after the Wall and Deadly Earth on lvl 13). Cleaned like 3/4 of the House encounters solo with whole party standing bit behind, needed help only with couple of ambushes.
Kineticist Knight is pretty lacking comparing to no archetype. His melee AOE has small radius and its difficult to hit more then 2-3 mobs, also pain to use with Gather Power that eats move action. Wall, Deadly Earth and Cloud with empower and maximize all two heads above anything Knight is capable of in DPS department.

 

[ArchAngel]

I had a complete playthrough with vanilla range Kineticist and never even noticed that there is possible concentration check on blast. My elements was fire-earth-water and its crazy strong, even comparing to Arcane Trickster in the endgame (really after the Wall and Deadly Earth on lvl 13). Cleaned like 3/4 of the House encounters solo with whole party standing bit behind, needed help only with couple of ambushes.
Kineticist Knight is pretty lacking comparing to no archetype. His melee AOE has small radius and its difficult to hit more then 2-3 mobs, also pain to use with Gather Power that eats move action. Wall, Deadly Earth and Cloud with empower and maximize all two heads above anything Knight is capable of in DPS department.

I multied Valerie into KK, she is best tank I had. I don't think you are supposed to build KK as a DPS character.

 

[user]

Am I the only one who thinks that wild shape has to be ironed out? Only wolf form gets additional speed and some other animal animation (smilo) seem weird without it, the last animal form is only smilodon which doesn't scale, same with elemental forms, so they seem pretty useless at endgame compared to sorcerer's dragonform for example. Wish there was some kind of end-game melee form with bite (so that it also takes advantage of the tripping cloak) and elder elemental forms.

 

[Daidre]

I multied Valerie into KK, she is best tank I had. I don't think you are supposed to build KK as a DPS character.

My main problem with KK tanking is their inability to do any AOO. Couple of patches ago I tried KK Valerie too, and she was not properly profiting from any good teamwork feats. Precise Strike was not working outright, Outflank rarely applied AB bonus and Seize the Moment I've not even got to. For me tank is usually best "activator" for teamwork feats with high crit range weapon and KK was failing it this role, bugs or design I do not know.
Back then KK was hit pretty hard with movement bug too and my attempts to use Gather Power resulted in some really wonky experience.

 

[Haplo]

Yeah, I try to equip my melees with 15-20 crit range weapons, minimum 17-20, to enable those sweet extra two-handed Attacks of Opportunity at max BAB. That's not something the KK can really do. Even if he had the KWhip and could do AoOs and help with Flanking&Outflank&Freebooters Bond (+6AB total !), it would still be a 19-20 weapon at best (with Imp. Crit.), so not very good for Seize the Moment&Outflank combos.

But he may work fine in parties that are not so focused on melee damage - focus on ranged and/or spells.

 

[Incendax]

My main problem with KK tanking is their inability to do any AOO. Couple of patches ago I tried KK Valerie too, and she was not properly profiting from any good teamwork feats. Precise Strike was not working outright, Outflank rarely applied AB bonus and Seize the Moment I've not even got to. For me tank is usually best "activator" for teamwork feats with high crit range weapon and KK was failing it this role, bugs or design I do not know.
Back then KK was hit pretty hard with movement bug too and my attempts to use Gather Power resulted in some really wonky experience.

Precise Strike only works with physical kinetic blades, which slightly defeats the point. Outflank works with energy blades and is the only offensive one definitely worth taking. The others are mostly just placeholders so other melee can get the benefit. Or you can take a Tactical Leader and skip the issue entirely, which is my recommendation.

I actually get more value out of Kineticists/Knights being a skill monkey. All those wild talents can be pumped into Familiars, Skill Focus, Skilled Kineticist, Persuasive, and other such things. Or skipping the requirements on Blindfight/Trip so your primary feats can be used for skill monkey business.

 

[hell bovine]

I have a theoretical question: how would Jaethal work as a kineticist? Since she has no constitution.

 

[Incendax]

I have a theoretical question: how would Jaethal work as a kineticist? Since she has no constitution.

I tested this, and she gets a max of 3 Burn points and forever counts as having 0 Constitution regardless if you give her +Constitution or +Charisma items. This includes no bonuses to damage from constitution or charisma. She does take the -HP from those 3 Burn points as a normal Kineticist.

However, she functions perfectly well as a Dark Kineticist or Psychokineticist.

 

[ArchAngel]

I multied Valerie into KK, she is best tank I had. I don't think you are supposed to build KK as a DPS character.

My main problem with KK tanking is their inability to do any AOO. Couple of patches ago I tried KK Valerie too, and she was not properly profiting from any good teamwork feats. Precise Strike was not working outright, Outflank rarely applied AB bonus and Seize the Moment I've not even got to. For me tank is usually best "activator" for teamwork feats with high crit range weapon and KK was failing it this role, bugs or design I do not know.
Back then KK was hit pretty hard with movement bug too and my attempts to use Gather Power resulted in some really wonky experience.

I don't really use teamwork feats. Offensive powers of our parties are already good enough. I rather spend extra feats into Iron Will and Greater Iron will. And that +4 works very nicely now in endgame as Valerie has 20+ will save.
And you don't gather power with KK as you lose extra attacks (also means you attack slower and don't provide flanking bonuses) and you get your defensive fighting bonus later in the round. 3 attacks +1 from haste is better than one empowered attack.

 

[Haplo]

I guess electric element might be nice for a KK. It goes against Touch AC and with Magnetic Infusion that's -4 AC for enemies he hits (can you afford Burn 2 Infusions as a KK?). Or Synaptic Infusion to Stagger enemies if they fail a Will save. It's not a very good element for traditional Kineticists, as its missing all worthwhile shapes and also offers little in the way of combined blasts.

 

[Daidre]

Is it even possible to use composites without burn on KK? No gather power because full attack and no (? - no game at hand to check) Composite Specialization.
So electro + earth for DR + Enveloping Winds indeed looks very nice on tank, no point to worry about composites.

 

[tindrli]

is the game still bugged as hell?

 

[user]

is the game still bugged as hell?

Nope, it's perfectly playable now.

 

[ArchAngel]

Is it even possible to use composites without burn on KK? No gather power because full attack and no (? - no game at hand to check) Composite Specialization.
So electro + earth for DR + Enveloping Winds indeed looks very nice on tank, no point to worry about composites.

Yea I wish I went electro instead of cold, I didn't know that in end game cold is almost useless element. Before end game Cold is good as it is touch attack and you can stagger them if they fail a fort save (stagger makes it so they can only attack once per round, like how Slow spell works). At very high levels you can do a composite melee attack without gather power and it costs 1 burn. Probably not worth is since I rather use burn to buff up my DR.

 

[Haplo]

Well, Electro with Synaptic Infusion staggers if the enemy fails a Will save, which is a more common weak save among the enemy hordes, I think.