Thunderstriker fighter archetype? No penalties for two-handed weapon + buckler at 3rd, shield bashes with bucklers at 7th... even two-weapon fighting with a buckler.
Benefit of a buckler over a light shield is its description as not being 'held' in the off-hand for certain prereqs, such as Dervish Dancer feat in Inner Sea World Guide.
The Klar is awesome. Looks cool, is the same AC benefit as a light shield and can be used as a light off hand weapon. If you want to really tear some stuff up look at the Thunder and Fang feat. That being said if it is truely buckler and sword combo you are hunting I believe there are some Taldor Combat Style feats connected with a buckler and sword.
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There's a whole Fighter archtype if the Inner Sea Primer called Tondelero Duelist that focuses on using a weapon with a buckler. It's optimized for using a falcata and a buckler, allowing you to buckler bash, catch opponent's weapons (disarm effectively) and a few other things. It pushes back your armour training, but you actually still get it later on.
Taldan Duelist is a feat that works when you again have a falcata and a buckler, improving your AC.
Ok, First off:
Thunderstriker
Rondelero Duelist
Both Awesome, both might be what you are looking for.
Thunderstriker is a switch hitter capable of two handing his weapon or two-weapon fighting with buckler and weapon. I've seen it played where the guy was dishing out nice damage one round then spiked his AC into the stratosphere the next. Very Cool.
Rondelero Duelist is a Falcata and buckler fighter. He gets bonuses to hit and damage with both his falcata and buckler like weapon training (not named that so RAW doesn't work with dueling gloves, talk with your DM), can disarm with his buckler and can sunder without provoking AoO and shield bash with a buckler as if it where a light shield.
BUT WHAT I SUGGEST:
Aldori Swordlord
Uses Aldori Dueling sword (don't have to be proficient, in that case you just use it as a longsword) You get the ability to:
Disarming Strike: Deal damage every time you disarm someone
Steel Net: When you fight defensively you reduce the penalties by 2 and increase the dodge bonus by 2
Counterattack: When you are hit by an enemy in melee you can attack them back!
Best part? You can have all this by level 11. You can continue the Crane Style feat tree and eventually you can fight defensively for no penalty, deflect one attack a round that would normally hit (Crane Wing), then get an immediate attack against that enemy (Crane Riposte), then if they hit you again you can attack them a second time! (Aldori Swordlord Counterattack)
[Edit] With the Aldori Swordlord the focus is not on the buckler, but there is nothing in the build that precludes using it. He can still use it to boost his AC even higher and it stacks with his fighting defensively to give an AC that would make even heavily armored fighters salivate. It still leaves his hand free for Crane Wing and Deflect Arrows.
If your focus is to simply use a buckler to boost AC, then you may want to consider Aldori Swordlord. If you want to make the buckler the focus of your build consider the Thunderstriker or Rondelero Duelist.
Acrobatics states "If you have 3 or more ranks in Acrobatics, you gain a +3 dodge bonus to AC when fighting defensively".
Crane Style states "You take only a –2 penalty on attack rolls for fighting defensively. While using this style and fighting defensively, you gain an additional +1 dodge bonus to your Armor Class."
Steel Net states "When fighting defensively the swordlord’s penalties on all attacks in a round are reduced by 2, and the dodge bonus to AC is increased by 2 for the same round."
I interpreted all this to mean that the Steel net ability applies after Crane Style and Acrobatics since it reduces the penalties and increases the bonuses. Others may interpret differently.
I'd love to see it work effectively with a ranger, but I don't think thats likely.
Why not? In my experience, your weapon choice is one of the least important ones you'll make in your career. Any full BAB character (and many 3/4 BAB characters) will do just fine with a decent STR score, power attack, and whatever +hit and +damage modifiers they can get their hands on (be they weapon specialisation/training, smite evil or favored enemy (or whatever it is the urban ranger has). The penalty for using a weapon one handed is a lot smaller than people seem to think, and the bonus to AC from a magic buckler (on top of magic armor) will save you time and time again.
Hell, take a darkwood or mithral buckler on a rogue. They may not be proficient, strictly speaking, but they also suffer no penalty for using one (the nonproficiency penalty basically doubles any armor check penalty and then adds it to your attack rolls, a penalty the mithral and darkwood bucklers are notably lacking).
Really, it's a marvel the SWASHBUCKLER archetype doesn't get buckler proficiency already...
Also definately check out the above archetypes, and pop into the advice forums for the "aldori duelist" guide, which might be some help in creating your character. There's a great defensive fighter build that throws combat reflexes around like anybodies business.