Ah, my bad. CR 27 and with normal minimum of CR 21 and then CR 19 if you go with 8 class levels. I remember max number class levels (or PrC levels) is 8.<br/><br/>Although my own advice would be that you pick one level as swordsage and if you qualify you could enter Master of Nine to get lot more stances and maneuvers available. But considering your heavy shadow theme, would not shadowblade (http://dndtools.eu/classes/shadowblade/) PrC with some shadow hand maneuvers learned via feats sound good?