Endless Query
2016-07-01, 01:49 PM
So, looking through the various resources for Psychics, I came across the Psi-Tech discovering Kinetic Enhancement (Adds your Int as a bonus to CMB, CMD, and Str checks to break things), in addition to whatever you get normally.
My first, immediate thought was that it'd be amusing with some sort of telekinetic maneuver specialist, since you'd then get Caster level + Int x 2 as your base bonus, and, really, you wouldn't have to get the Improved Maneuver feats since you don't provoke AoOs or anything.
Of course, from there the build got a little weird, as I noticed that, since you were still using the standard grapple rules, for example, if you VMR'd Monk, you'd... Actually increase how much damage you did while telekenetically grappling someone, and, especially if you took Self Perfection as your Psychic discipline (or any of the Wis ones I suppose), you could toss in Kraken Style, which would end up being 2 feats for +4 CMB for grapple, and +Wis on damage to every grapple attack (... And at that point you could almost use it as a fallback if someone tried to rush you during the first third or so of the game since you'd've stacked so many bonuses to grapple you could probably actually outgrapple a lot of 3/4 BAB characters or even some full BAB characters depending on their CMD modifiers.
Though after thinking about it a bit more, the fact that you don't get TK Manuevers until spell level 3 (though at least it's better than TK at 4 [5 for everybody else]), burning 3rd level spell slots, and 3-4 feats, to grapple someone really well from 40 feet away or something, seemed a bit... Dangerously overspecialized? Especially because you apparently still suffer size penalties while using TK? (... Which is weeeeird)
So I was half looking at a Lore Warden that splashed 1 level of Psychic, combining adding Str + Int to Combat Maneuvers along with the Lore Warden's innate bonuses (and briefly considered some sort of full Psychic/Monk multiclass thing but OH MY GOD SOOOO MAD), but I'll admit I was having some issues getting full mileage out of it in a manner that satisfied me.
So, really, at this point, I'm either trying to find a way to refine concept #1 (maybe there are some other TK maneuver sort of spells at lower levels I missed to get extra mileage out of it?), find some other way to use/abuse it (some Lore Warden thing is seriously the best I got so far...), or, failing all of that, just being able to crush people with my mind would be neat =P I mean, grappling/pinning/crushing them with psychic powers was so very close. And just literally using Psychic Crush doesn't count, that's more like psychic brain hemorrhage. Also, two saves? I mean, it's about as literally "save or die" as it gets, I know, but still.
Sooo, yeah, seems like a cool toy, I'd like to do something cool with it, but my own efforts have proven non-ideal, any suggestions?
My first, immediate thought was that it'd be amusing with some sort of telekinetic maneuver specialist, since you'd then get Caster level + Int x 2 as your base bonus, and, really, you wouldn't have to get the Improved Maneuver feats since you don't provoke AoOs or anything.
Of course, from there the build got a little weird, as I noticed that, since you were still using the standard grapple rules, for example, if you VMR'd Monk, you'd... Actually increase how much damage you did while telekenetically grappling someone, and, especially if you took Self Perfection as your Psychic discipline (or any of the Wis ones I suppose), you could toss in Kraken Style, which would end up being 2 feats for +4 CMB for grapple, and +Wis on damage to every grapple attack (... And at that point you could almost use it as a fallback if someone tried to rush you during the first third or so of the game since you'd've stacked so many bonuses to grapple you could probably actually outgrapple a lot of 3/4 BAB characters or even some full BAB characters depending on their CMD modifiers.
Though after thinking about it a bit more, the fact that you don't get TK Manuevers until spell level 3 (though at least it's better than TK at 4 [5 for everybody else]), burning 3rd level spell slots, and 3-4 feats, to grapple someone really well from 40 feet away or something, seemed a bit... Dangerously overspecialized? Especially because you apparently still suffer size penalties while using TK? (... Which is weeeeird)
So I was half looking at a Lore Warden that splashed 1 level of Psychic, combining adding Str + Int to Combat Maneuvers along with the Lore Warden's innate bonuses (and briefly considered some sort of full Psychic/Monk multiclass thing but OH MY GOD SOOOO MAD), but I'll admit I was having some issues getting full mileage out of it in a manner that satisfied me.
So, really, at this point, I'm either trying to find a way to refine concept #1 (maybe there are some other TK maneuver sort of spells at lower levels I missed to get extra mileage out of it?), find some other way to use/abuse it (some Lore Warden thing is seriously the best I got so far...), or, failing all of that, just being able to crush people with my mind would be neat =P I mean, grappling/pinning/crushing them with psychic powers was so very close. And just literally using Psychic Crush doesn't count, that's more like psychic brain hemorrhage. Also, two saves? I mean, it's about as literally "save or die" as it gets, I know, but still.
Sooo, yeah, seems like a cool toy, I'd like to do something cool with it, but my own efforts have proven non-ideal, any suggestions?