Welcome to Iconic Design, Private Sanctuary’s source for innovative and evocative character builds for the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game, written by Everyman Gamer Alexander Augunas. Today, we’re going to be looking at a build for Zorro.

I don’t think we could POSSIBLY do Intriguing April without doing the king of vigilantes. The one, the only, Don Diego de la Vega aka ZORRO!

He’s like the most iconic non-super masked hero EVER. Let’s dive in and take a look!

Build Concept

Here’s what we’ll be using to build Zorro.

• Human: Zorro’s human. Duh.
• Vigilante: This is also pretty obvious.
• Mounted Fury: So its my personal opinion that the mounted fury was based around being Zorro. As a character, Zorro doesn’t fight from horseback often. That being said, having a loyal steed is a huge part of Zorro’s vigilante identity, so I’m picking the mounting fury archetype this!

Let’s get started!

Early Levels (1–7)

• Classes: vigilante (mounted fury) 7
• Feats: Combat Expertise (Bonus), Fox Style (1st), Fox Insight (3rd), Combat Reflexes (5th), Improved Dirty Trick (7th)
• Abilities: dual identity, furious charge, mount (Tornado; horse), seamless guise, startling appearance, thorough change, unshakable
• Social Talents: social grace (1st), renown (3rd), safe house (5th), loyal aid (7th)
• Vigilante Talents: lethal grace (2nd), cunning feint (4th)

Diego’s character (aka Zorro’s social identity) is a bit less consistent in his abilities then, say, Zorro himself is. Diego is usually portrayed as someone who is indifferent towards romance, shuns action, and rarely brandishes a sword. He’s usually portrayed as a man who is well-versed in art, poetry, literature, and science, and all of those are true; he simply exaggerates those interests to throw others off his trail. Sounds like social grace to me! I also picked up renown and safehouse, so Diego can hide his stuff. (In some versions of the tale, Diego has a secret laboratory.) Finally, he usually has a small cadre of friends and/or lovers who helps him (especially in the Disney versions of the story), so I picked loyal aid.

As Zorro, Diego is an extremely competent fencer and wickedly intelligent. As a result, I picked up Weapon Finesse at Level 1, then promptly traded it in for Fox Style (from Ultimate Intrigue), when I reached Level 2. Fox Style is SUPER appropriate for the character; not only does it let him use his BAB for feinting, but the name Zorro literally means, “Fox” in Spanish, and Zorro is constantly compared to a Fox. Sounds good to me! I quickly tore through the chain on this character, and picked up Combat Expertise and Combat Reflexes for good measure, and Improved Dirty Trick so I can qualify for Fox Trickery in the mid levels. I also took the cunning feint vigilante talent because it goes perfectly with Fox Style, and traded my 6th level talent for the furious charge, which is basically the cavalier’s charge class feature. Very helpful for when Zorro needs to mount and charge.

Let’s look at the mid levels and see what’s next for our hero!

Mid Levels (8 –14)

• Classes: vigilante (mounted fury) 14
• Feats: Combat Expertise (Bonus), Fox Style (1st), Fox Insight (3rd), Combat Reflexes (5th), Improved Dirty Trick (7th), Weapon Focus: rapier (Bonus), Weapon Specialization: rapier (Bonus), Fox Trickery (9th), Power Attack (11th), Step Up (13th), Vital Strike (Bonus)
• Abilities: dual identity, frightening appearance, furious charge, mighty charge, mount (Tornado; horse), seamless guise, startling appearance, thorough change, unshakable
• Social Talents: social grace (1st), renown (3rd), safe house (5th), loyal aid (7th), feign innocence (9th), great renown (11th), incredible renown (13th)
• Vigilante Talents: lethal grace (2nd), cunning feint (4th), signature weapon: rapier (8th), surprise strike (10th), vital punishment (14th)

Mid levels are truly excellent for this build. At 8th level, we grab the signature weapon: rapier feat to net Weapon Focus and Weapon Speicalization in one fell swoop. Despite trading the vigilante specialization ability, a mounted fury still counts as an avenger for the purpose of talents, so this works out well for Zorro. I pick up Fox Trickery asap, which lets you make dirty tricks attempts off of attacks of opportunity, and take surprise strike at Level 10, which gives you bonuses on attacks against foes that are denied their Dexterity to AC. Vital Punishment rounds out my talent choices, and I pick up awesome feats like Power Attack and Step Up too.

Diego’s social identity is mostly focused on improving his renown at this level, but feign innocence is pretty awesome for him; now he’s pretty good at lying even if he doesn’t need the Bluff skill for combat whatsoever. Cool.

Let’s look at the end game and finish this build off, once and for all!

Endgame (15+)

• Classes: vigilante (mounted fury) 20
• Feats: Combat Expertise (Bonus), Fox Style (1st), Fox Insight (3rd), Combat Reflexes (5th), Fox Trickery (7th), Weapon Focus: rapier (Bonus), Weapon Specialization: rapier (Bonus), Improved Dirty Trick (9th), Mounted Combat (11th), Step Up (13th), Vital Strike (Bonus), Improved Vital Strike (15th), Greater Vital Strike (17th), Power Attack (Bonus), Devastating Strike (19th), Spirited Charge (Bonus)
• Abilities: dual identity, frightening appearance, furious charge, mighty charge, mount (Tornado; horse), seamless guise, startling appearance, stunning appearance, thorough change, unshakable, vengeance strike
• Social Talents: social grace (1st), renown (3rd), safe house (5th), loyal aid (7th), feign innocence (9th), great renown (11th), incredible renown (13th), instant recognition (15th), subjective truth (17th), triumphant return (19th)
• Vigilante Talents: lethal grace (2nd), cunning feint (4th), signature weapon: rapier (8th), surprise strike (10th), vital punishment (14th), expose weakness (16th), shield of blades (18th), combat skill (20th)

End game! Let’s do this.

I decided to round out the build by grabbing all of the good Vital Strike feats, so Zorro can really devastate enemies on attacks of opportunity. I also took Shield of Blades, which adds a very strong defensive element to the character; now when he uses Power Attack and Combat Expertise, he gets a total of +10 to his AC by 20th level; 5 from Combat Expertise and 5 from shield of blades. For good measure, we can even add fighting defensively for a monstrous +12 to AC, plus a heavily penalized attack. I also took expose weakness, as this helpful vigilante talent will allow Diego to reduce his foes’ DR for a short time as a dirty trick. I also got to swap my earlier selection of Power Attack for Mounted Combat, and as my 20th level feat, I decided to take Spirited Charge. So now Diego can Power Attack Devestating Greater Vital Strike with bonus damage from lethal grace. And if he happens to get the heads up on an enemy, he can add vengeance strike in there too. Nasty.

So what do you think of my Zorro build? Leave your comments and requests below, and I’ll see you back next week for another all-new installment of Guidance! Take care.

Alexander “Alex” Augunas has been playing roleplaying games since 2007, which isn’t nearly as long as 90% of his colleagues. Alexander is an active freelancer for the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game and is best known as the author of the Pact Magic Unbound series by Radiance House. Alex is the owner of Everyman Gaming, LLC and is often stylized as the Everyman Gamer in honor of Guidance’s original home. Alex also cohosts the Private Sanctuary Podcast, along with fellow blogger Anthony Li, and you can follow their exploits on Facebook in the 3.5 Private Sanctuary Group, or on Alex’s Twitter, @AlJAug.