What's the cost of this infusion?

Question

At 13th level, the kinetic knight gains the following ability:

At 13th level as a swift action, she can accept 2 points of burn to unleash a kinetic blast with the blade rush infusion.

I am now level 14, with Infusion specialization 4, which allows me to reduce the burn cost of an infusion by 4.

Does using this ability cost me 0 (2 from the ability + 2 from the normal blade rush - 4) or 2 burn that I have to take no matter what, then 2-4 =0 for the normal blade rush ?

At first it looks like a better pounce for free, but if it costs 2 burn everytime I want to use it, it will lose value pretty fast.

Answer 1

I would say that you would take the 2 burn in addition to any produced by the blast itself. The ability to make the attack as a swift action is an effect of the Elemental Blade ability, which is not itself an infusion and thus doesn't get the reduction. It's also set up to be a replacement for Metakinesis, which also applies burn and allows for swift action use at level 13 (with metakinetic master at 19, it's also the same cost to quicken). Finally, it allows you to make two attacks in one round, which is close to the increase in damage offered by a composite blast which also adds two burn.

I would say that you can still gather power to pay for the cost, again similar to metakinesis. Unfortunately, kinetic knight loses supercharge so it doesn't provide doubled attacks for free.