I will be joining a Giantslayer campaign here very soon and I think it would be really fun (and funny) to play a halfling swashbuckler whose attitude is as big as his giant foes. Only, I'm afraid that small weapons vs giants would just plain not count for a hill of beans. I fully expect such a PC to be much more about his social role than his combat role, but I don't want to be useless.
My only thought is to focus on Combat Maneuvers and be a kind of a melee debuffer.
Any suggestions to make this idea a bit more viable?
Most of a Swashbucklers damage comes from precision the weapon size makes little difference (d4 vs d6) for a rapier is 1 pt on average.
So the damage for being a halfling vs a human is pretty much the same, presuming you take Dex to damage.
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If you go flat damage, you'll be fine. As the game progresses the Weapon die size begins to matter less and less. This is doubly true for Swashbucklers who get level to damage and can get Dexterity to damage. I would recommend keeping dex pretty high, see if you can make a 13 str work with your point buy or die rolls or however your stats were generated (difficult with the Str penalty but worth it for Power Attack).
Or if you can use it take Piranha Strike which works similar to Power Attack but just needs Dex instead.
Sacrifice AC to hurt creatures at least 2 size categories larger than you, plus it scales.
Oh, and after picking up the Low Blow racial, Improved Low Blow +2 to confirm crits plus a 1-per-day reroll if you fail a confirmation, on larger foes...
In addition to what Doki-Chan said, the Mouser archetype works wonderfully for this type of a character. Since this is for Giantslayer, Just Out of Reach could be a really solid feat choice for when you're engaging those pesky foes with reach.
Agile maneuvers could really help with CMB/CMD on this build. And dipping a level into underfoot adept and martial artist (to remove the lawful requirement/flavor reasons) monk could be a really good investment.
These are all great suggestions. I'm feeling really excited about this.
Take four levels of the Unchained Rogue and the rest in Swashbuckler. First level you get Weapon Finesse for free. Third level you get to use your Dex bonus for damage for one weapon (rapier included). Fourth level rogue gets several abilities with the sneak attack damage.
Big game hunter will not be helfull, at least not in the beginning.
Risky Striker is much better there.
There are several other feats that could help.
I recommend Comcat Maneuver defense for better CMD.
What is always a good idea on a halfling is (maybe with a level of monk or two) get Crane Style and follow ups, making use the special dodge feat for halflings and some other dodge feats as well as osyluth guile.