Truth is Jason already said that he wanted the swashbuckler to be like a full class version of the duelist prestige class, which I'm guessing is where that design philosophy came from.
That makes me wish they created a deed that let's you Deflect Arrows with a sword or parry a ranged attack. That would have been really awesome! Okay, that sounds like a certain type of knight from a galaxy far far away, but let's face it -- those guys were basically monk swashbucklers. Hm...*Rubs beard in contemplation*