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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Torx" data-source="post: 3442255" data-attributes="member: 2730">In my campaign right now, one of the players is playing a Changeling Rogue 5/Cleric 1/Swashbuckler 3 (I waived the XP penalty cuz cleric is for RP reasons and actually has hindered the character a bit).When CS came out, it was right when he was leveling up to 6th (Rog 4/Clr 1) and he had to make the decision.  He knew he would have to take at least two levels of swashbuckler before he would be able to take the feat and have them stack.  That meant that his sneak stagnated at 2d6 until he was 9th level.  His character had always had a high Int since he was the group's skill-monkey, so the swashbuckler made a lot of sense for him.  6th and 7th levels were tough for his character as he lagged way behind in power level in every aspect save skills.Since 8th and subsequently 9th level, he has been an excellent contributor in combat.  Having his sneak go back up to 4d6 as well as having the bonus damage from Int, Dex-wielding rapier-ness has made it so that he can enter combat and deal an average of 20 damage on a sneak.  That is a little more than half of what the fighter does on any given attack.My view is that (for a RogX/Swsh3 at least) it's a tough feat to take.  Since you have to be Rog2/Swsh2 before you qualify for the feat, it seriously hamper development when the character is played through.  Most rogues will benefit from the free Weapon Finesse, but won't have too high a Intelligence, since they get 8 skill points/level anyway.  Grace is almost a non-factor.  My player has said the largest benefit for him was the d10 HD.  He was lucky and had an 8 or above for each of the three levels, and that has made him confident enough to enter melee.I think the feat is fine where it's at.  Those two sub-optimal levels make it tough to get into, and rogues & swashbucklers get few enough feats as it is.  It's made my player's skill-monkey into someone who can contribute in a big fight if need be.  And that's made him happy and has done naught to upset any other members of the group (quite the contrary).</blockquote>

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