I would strongly recommend a mix of Battlemaster Fighter and Bard College of Dance.
Battlemaster gives you the melee skills of the fighter and some great maneuvers. College of Dance lets you add your Charisma modifier to your AC, gives you a disengage reaction, and lets you use Bardic Inspiration to give your entire party a boost to Initiative. I think College of Dance is the closest 2025-canon substitute for the as-yet-to-be-reformatted Swashbuckler. And after all, what is combat really, but an elaborate dance?
If you start at level 8 I would say level 5 Battlemaster, level 3 Bard. Then 1 more bard, then 1 more fighter, then whatever up to 12 fighter, 8 bard.
But it's not just a dance bard. It's a dance bard multi-classed with a battlemaster fighter. The fighter brings the damage. The dance bard gives you the initiative boost, the AC boost, the movement boost, and spell capability for ranged attacks, healing, and crowd control. Plus, the dance bard gives you a massive unarmed strike capability. You get to use your Dex mod for unarmed strikes and the damage is your Bardic die + your Dex modifier. And that doesn't even use up the Bardic die. That's just always on.
Not every single line on every single character sheet has to add a damage bonus. The battlemaster fighter provides the damage. The dance bard provides literally everything else.
There was a thread asking something similar to this in the Fighter subforum a while ago. My suggestion was a Wood Elf for the race because of the base 35 foot movement speed, a focus on Dexterity (so a background/custom which has bonuses to DEX and CON), Dueling for the Fighter's Fighting Style.
Battlemaster for the Fighter subclass, and a selection of some of these maneuvers would fit: Evasive Footwork, Feinting Attack, Lunging Attack, Parry, and Riposte.
Possibly the Speedy feat at level 4, for even more movement, the possibility to ignore difficult terrain, and disadvantage to enemy AoO's. Defensive Duelist could be another good feat.
You could combine it with two levels in Rogue for Cunning Action to let you Disengage or Dash with a bonus, saving a use of a Maneuver die, but that could delay your fighter progression too much.
Swashbuckler is a good basis. Personally I'd suggest taking it to 10th or 11th if you're starting high and leveling from there- gets you the extra ASI which is always a plus and Reliable Talent if you want to lean into being a skill monkey. Go Battle Master after that and you'll have a solid foundation to work from.
Alternatively, there's the Swords Bard- they get 3 Flourishes that work similarly to Maneuvers. Might be a little MAD, but Bard has the repertoire to lean into a support role with casting if you prefer to focus on your DEX first. DPR will be less impressive than a Fighter or Rogue like that.
It depends a little bit how you want to play it, Zorro is certainly a DEX-based character which means Rogue, Fighter, Ranger, or Monk. However, now the choice is whether you go for one big attack (Rogue) or multiple weaker attacks (others), as well as if you want a charming character (Fighter/Rogue) or an insightful wise character (Ranger/Monk).
Combining Battlemaster and Rogue is pretty unnecessary if using 2024 rules since all Rogues get Cunning Strike and can grab Sentinel which does much of the same things as Battlemaster Fighter, however if you do want to multi-class them, you should do either 5 levels of Fighter or only 3 levels of Fighter and everything else Rogue.
Regardless of your class/subclass choice you'll want the Defensive Duelist and Sentinel feats. If you choose Rogue you might want Magic Initiate to pick up Booming Blade,
well i was thinking charming combatant which was why i did consider skipping the rapier for a scimitar and a shortsword , and maybe dual wielder feat so i would actually have 3 attacks per turn making him quick with battlemaster 3 riposte , brace, menacing and then rogue the rest maybe assasin to do more damage sticking to the 2024 subclasses because i want to be someone who can be in front but just have the charming nature of zorro
two weapon style require a light weapon so can i make my 2 main attacks with the hand crossbow and then trigger bonus with my scimitar or do the 2024 rules still require it to be melee
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
To post a comment, please login or register a new account.
I want to build a dashing musketeer wielding rapier type and need ideas think mid level 8 or 9 but will go higher.
Since it is a rapier i think rogue levels is obvious but what more was also thinking maybe the dragonborn that gets a riposte help me with ideas...
I would strongly recommend a mix of Battlemaster Fighter and Bard College of Dance.
Battlemaster gives you the melee skills of the fighter and some great maneuvers. College of Dance lets you add your Charisma modifier to your AC, gives you a disengage reaction, and lets you use Bardic Inspiration to give your entire party a boost to Initiative. I think College of Dance is the closest 2025-canon substitute for the as-yet-to-be-reformatted Swashbuckler. And after all, what is combat really, but an elaborate dance?
If you start at level 8 I would say level 5 Battlemaster, level 3 Bard. Then 1 more bard, then 1 more fighter, then whatever up to 12 fighter, 8 bard.
Anzio Faro. Protector Aasimar light cleric. Lvl 18.
Viktor Gavriil. White dragonborn grave cleric. Lvl 20.
Ikram Sahir ibn-Malik al-Sayyid Ra'ad. Brass dragonborn draconic sorcerer Lvl 9. Fire elemental devil.
Wrangler of cats.
I was thinking a swashbuckler rogue. Adding the battlemaster levels as the above poster suggests could work well, also.
the problem i see is that the dance bard dont bring anything damage wise
But it's not just a dance bard. It's a dance bard multi-classed with a battlemaster fighter. The fighter brings the damage. The dance bard gives you the initiative boost, the AC boost, the movement boost, and spell capability for ranged attacks, healing, and crowd control. Plus, the dance bard gives you a massive unarmed strike capability. You get to use your Dex mod for unarmed strikes and the damage is your Bardic die + your Dex modifier. And that doesn't even use up the Bardic die. That's just always on.
Not every single line on every single character sheet has to add a damage bonus. The battlemaster fighter provides the damage. The dance bard provides literally everything else.
Anzio Faro. Protector Aasimar light cleric. Lvl 18.
Viktor Gavriil. White dragonborn grave cleric. Lvl 20.
Ikram Sahir ibn-Malik al-Sayyid Ra'ad. Brass dragonborn draconic sorcerer Lvl 9. Fire elemental devil.
Wrangler of cats.
no i agree but i do think they will just fall behind also the kick is only maybe 3 times with a charisma of 16 so i just feel its better to go rogue
There was a thread asking something similar to this in the Fighter subforum a while ago. My suggestion was a Wood Elf for the race because of the base 35 foot movement speed, a focus on Dexterity (so a background/custom which has bonuses to DEX and CON), Dueling for the Fighter's Fighting Style.
Battlemaster for the Fighter subclass, and a selection of some of these maneuvers would fit: Evasive Footwork, Feinting Attack, Lunging Attack, Parry, and Riposte.
Possibly the Speedy feat at level 4, for even more movement, the possibility to ignore difficult terrain, and disadvantage to enemy AoO's. Defensive Duelist could be another good feat.
You could combine it with two levels in Rogue for Cunning Action to let you Disengage or Dash with a bonus, saving a use of a Maneuver die, but that could delay your fighter progression too much.
Swashbuckler is a good basis. Personally I'd suggest taking it to 10th or 11th if you're starting high and leveling from there- gets you the extra ASI which is always a plus and Reliable Talent if you want to lean into being a skill monkey. Go Battle Master after that and you'll have a solid foundation to work from.
Alternatively, there's the Swords Bard- they get 3 Flourishes that work similarly to Maneuvers. Might be a little MAD, but Bard has the repertoire to lean into a support role with casting if you prefer to focus on your DEX first. DPR will be less impressive than a Fighter or Rogue like that.
It depends a little bit how you want to play it, Zorro is certainly a DEX-based character which means Rogue, Fighter, Ranger, or Monk. However, now the choice is whether you go for one big attack (Rogue) or multiple weaker attacks (others), as well as if you want a charming character (Fighter/Rogue) or an insightful wise character (Ranger/Monk).
Combining Battlemaster and Rogue is pretty unnecessary if using 2024 rules since all Rogues get Cunning Strike and can grab Sentinel which does much of the same things as Battlemaster Fighter, however if you do want to multi-class them, you should do either 5 levels of Fighter or only 3 levels of Fighter and everything else Rogue.
Regardless of your class/subclass choice you'll want the Defensive Duelist and Sentinel feats. If you choose Rogue you might want Magic Initiate to pick up Booming Blade,
well i was thinking charming combatant which was why i did consider skipping the rapier for a scimitar and a shortsword , and maybe dual wielder feat so i would actually have 3 attacks per turn making him quick with battlemaster 3 riposte , brace, menacing and then rogue the rest maybe assasin to do more damage sticking to the 2024 subclasses because i want to be someone who can be in front but just have the charming nature of zorro
but also the fey wanderer doing the leonin , get shillelagh on a light club
two weapon style require a light weapon so can i make my 2 main attacks with the hand crossbow and then trigger bonus with my scimitar or do the 2024 rules still require it to be melee