Class Feature Friday: Battledancer Style (PF2 Swashbuckler Style)
The art of combat can be seen as an intricate dance, sometimes quite literally.
The fact of the matter is that with the fluid and intricate movements of trained martial arts, both those with or without a weapon, it would only make sense that someone would attempt to take the next step and make styles of combat that emphasize stylish and grandiose movements.
Of course, this manner of thinking has its critics, who claim that such styles are all style and no substance, and exist more for onlookers, or perhaps judges, than they do for actually claiming victory over your opponent, and perhaps they have a point. However, it cannot be denied that for all but the most disciplined fighters, such movements can be distracting and hard to read right up until the moment you’re suddenly flat on your back.
Whether they are professionally trained in a flashy style, or just really want to look cool by incorporating dance-like movements into their combat style, today’s subject gives us a swashbuckler that never stands still in combat, moving to the rhythm of the battle in an almost hypnotizing way.
This style relies on overwhelming foes with your movements, so these swashbucklers learn not only the art of performance, but also how to fascinate foes with their movements. They also can use such performances to achieve a state of panache for use in combat.
Such styles also have a special effect when the swashbuckler performs finishers. In this case, they dance away from foes immediately after their strike, repositioning themselves slightly.
The following feats suit battledancer swashbucklers quite well: Focused Fascination, Nimble Dodge, Unbalancing Finisher, Leading Dance, You’re Next, and Mobile Finisher, though others will also serve them well.
With this style, your play style as a swashbuckler leans towards debilitation and positioning, and works extremely well with allies that you can maneuver with to flank foes, inhibiting them with both dances and finishers that you can then slip away from them towards the next foe in line.
Depending on how silly your campaign is, you might have your swashbuckler actually dancing while utilizing this style, but I recommend looking up various acrobatic and graceful combat styles to get an idea of what this sort of style would actually look like, helping you visualize it.
Shakku is different from other goloma. While most can scan wide areas but have trouble with details, he memorizes everything. Such was the case when he observed an outlander with the most graceful fighting style he had ever seen, one that he knew he had to copy.
Dancing around the beast and decapitating it with a single blow, the stranger destroyed the vrykolakas and freed the village from its curse… or so it was believed. However, the undead creature was merely the spawn of a full-fledged vrykolakas, one eager to extract revenge for the loss of its “child”.
When the nation of Neshaa goes to war, they do so loudly, their drums echoing for miles. This is more than a mere march, however. Once engaging the enemy, their elite battle-dancers move in, brandishing deadly blades and carving into foes to the beat of the drummers.