Advice needed for building Duelist...ranger or fighter?

[Taason the Black]

Starting lv 1. Tiefling race. Dual wielder. Jade Regent storyline

Fighter 6 benefits:

7 feats, +1/+1 from weapon training, armor training (not important since duelist works best off light armor anyway)

ranger 6 benefits

5 feats including ranger2 (two weap fight)and ranger 6 (improved 2 wf)
1 lv 1 spell, tracking, endurance, 6+int skillpts per level. +4/+4 and +2/+2 vs favored enemies. Hunter bond with companions (DM not allowing animal companion)

On paper it looks like Ranger is the way to go but two feats are a big deal when one is dealing with dual wielding.

I envision said dualist as being a disarmist, flashy character. If I go fighter, would probably go Gladiator.

Whats your thoughts?

[Jiggy]

Go Fighter[Unarmed]. Take Snake Style to make your unarmed strikes deal piercing damage. Once you're a Duelist, parry things with your bare hands.

Another advantage of this method is that an Agile Amulet of Mighty Fists is cheaper than a +1 Agile weapon.

[Taason the Black]

Thanks but I dont see the character as being unarmed. I see a rapier mh, swordbreaker dagger oh (heirloom weapon trait).

Anyone else?

[Mysterious Stranger]

If you are planning on the duelist forget the two weapon fighting. The Precise Strike does not work with two weapon fighting.

The ranger has one big advantage over the fighter which is he ignores the prerequisites of the feat which means you can have a modest DEX and still go the full two weapon fighting. If you are going up to higher levels that is going to be a big advantage. The Ranger will allow you to put more into STR and still qualify for the feats by using your bonus feats to pick them up.

[Jodokai]

I would advice against the Snake Style. It's great a lower levels when all the bad guys only attack once, but at higher levels, or creatures with more than one attack, it's all but useless (expect to improve touch attacks for armor wearers).

It really depends on what you want. A fighter will have a sick number of feats. You could eventually sepecialize in both weapons, on top of everything else. A ranger's feat selection will be more limited, but they get more skill points, and they get Lead Blades, which is FANTASTIC for a dual wielder (it increases the size damage of ALL your weapons). The loss of the Animal Companion hurts, and I would definately whine to the GM about that, but personally I would still go Ranger.