key mechanical elements for a cinematic/swashbuckling game

[barsoomcore]

IAoO's are bit trickier IMO. I'm hesitant to remove them altogether because the impact on the system is fairly large.

Oh yeah, you don't want to just yank them out. You need to mainly review your feats list. Many d20 feats derive their value from AoOs, so if you pull those out you need to reconsider how helpful those feats are and if they need to be removed or adjusted.

I would look over True20's feat list as a good guideline for what needs changing.

 

[NCSUCodeMonkey]

What about lowering the DC's of skills like Jump, Tumble, Balance, Climb, etc for adding more swash to the game? Thoughts?

That would be a great start. It might also work to increase skill points or to start rolling skills together (athletics, acrobatics, etc. instead of jump, climb, tumble, balance, etc.). I'd also consider offering better light armors (i.e. armors with more AC bonus but low skill penalty). I've always been non-plussed by the abysmally low ACs of the swashy classes (swashbucklers, monks, duelists, etc.). Maybe I'm just bad at building 'em, but I seem to get hit an awfully lot, even when using the hit-and-run style. Obviously, doing all of those things would probably make it too easy to use those skills, but there's got to be an appropriate mix in there.

Also, you mentioned altering AoOs, iterative attacks, etc. upthread. I think Star Wars: Saga Edition contains similar changes, but I haven't had the time to read through my copy in depth. Might be worth checking out?