L5R General: Great White Ninja Edition

>>44661324
All of the above, as circumstance dictates.

>>44661324
The fuck was WITH all that bullshit anyway?

I still have my ancient 1e book that goes all;
>"Do ninjas exists? No, but also yes! And it's super secret and you only get to know about the super secrets if you keep buying our books, kekekeke!"
And then unaligned ninjas show up everywhere in the CCG just to confuse shit even more then it's already confused, and then there's that ENTIRE BOOK who's premise is theoretically about the economy of Rokugan but it's actually the Kolat book if you read the Super Secret GM Section.....

>>44661900
Ninjas were originally the literal embodiment of metaplot in L5R; they "didn't exist" and we're "totally optional" except they were referenced all the time in the books, PC's couldn't be one no matter what, their origins were full of retcons, their powers and abilities were "secret", their backstory literally driven by the needs of the current plot (Emperor need overthrowing? Scorpion Ninjas. Empeorer gets kidnapped? Darkness ninjas. Unicorn secretly heavily infiltrated? Kolat ninjas.), they had special rules that applies only to them, and you could only find out about them in secret GM sections that you had to buy more metaplot books to find out about.

Kinda glad that in later editions they did away with that shit and just made them more like the real thing; basically they were just samurai trained in sketchy guerilla warfare and commando tactics.

>>44661900
Aaaah the Merchant's Guide to Rokugan.
Now there was a misleading book title.
Come to think of it, there's a lot of AEG producets that give you one genre or type of thing as a basic starting point then reveal through secret GM's sections that you're playing actually different sort of game and that there's a "secret truth" to the setting.

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>Tfw new character idea I really like, but too attached to current character to retire him
>Tfw can't find another L5R campaign anywhere, and current campaign will probably last a year or more.

First world problems compared to all the people that can't find a game at all, but man it hurts.

>>44662513
Why not have the other character be related by marriage or blood to your current one and have him "trade out" with the new character?
Samurai tend to have decently sized families (in Rokugan some even more so), and they "adopted" worthy successors all the time to create strong familial loyalty ties. In fact, chances are if a famous samurai had a famous son he was probably adopted.

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Best Mantis or bestEST Mantis?

>>44662653
Because the game is very character-focused and it'd be a dick move for me to swap characters when my current one has so many plot lines circling around him. Besides, I like my current character, I don't want to retire him. Ideally, I'd be able to play both on separate days, but since it was a stroke of luck finding just one game, I'm not holding out hope of finding another one any time soon.

>>44662871
I getcha.
In any case your current game seems like a pretty good one of character focus is that important.

>>44662789
He's so ronin it's not even funny

Not only is he explicitly a ronin, but his attitude is so ronin that tying it down to any one clan simply does not work

>>44662789
At first I was all like "nu-uh", then I thought about it for a second.

>Ex-pirate, mercenary sensibilities
>Doesn't care about Bushido
>More peasant then samurai
>Not book smart
>Actually acts sorta decent to people who are weaker then him, if a bit brusque
>Born on an island off the coast of the main area, leaving him heavily tanned
>Fights in a hugely unorthodox style

If you gave him kama he's almost be a by-the-numbers Yoritomo Bushi. Weird.

>>44662993
Actually, if you watch the series he's not even properly a ronin; he's called that because most people assume he is one just because he's armed (which the laws say only a samurai could be), but his backstory suggests he's nothing of the kind and he's really just some guy from the Ryukyu Islands, who didn't even really share much of a culture with mainland Japan at the vaguely-assumed Edo Period it took place in.

>>44662993
Those were my thoughts too, but pretty much all stereotypical "ronin" traits are also stereotypically Yoritomo traits too.
The biggest difference is that Mugen is wholly lacking in the reckless ambition that the entire Yoritomo family seems to share.

Right like there are supposedly only a few true descendants of any samurai family right?
Like there are only a few Matsu who are actually related to her, the rest are all vassal family members.

Can members of these vassal families be made the family daimyo or are they not eligible?

>Find L5R campaign on roll20
>Interested, end up talking with the guy some
>Voice is kinda annoying. He stutters a bit and does that thing where he repeats his last word a couple time while he searches for what to say
>Ask him about all the players in the campaign (He had 6 players already and was looking for 2 more)
>Apparently he's doing this expecting people to flake, so he's gathering a bunch of people in the hopes of getting a core group that sticks around.
>Guess I can see the logic in that. Still, the game's been going for 4 sessions and those people are still there, probably because L5R games are incredibly rare, yet he's still looking for more.
>One guy he did kick out though, because apparently the guy had to work on Friday at the listed time but didn't mention it until later, so he kicked him out
>Guy calls said person an idiot, complains about him for a bit and makes that annoying "uck!" sound some people make when they complain.
>Cuts me off a few times when I try to interject to ask a question or get him to elaborate on something

I'm getting some serious mixed signals from this. The guy wasn't immediately bad, it's not like he started talking about his furry porn stash or how much he loves MLP or anything immediately concerning like that, but I've been in plenty of bad games before, and I'm getting a real strong vibe of "This will be a bad game" when I talk to him.

Should I suck it up and go through with it, or back out now while I'm ahead?

>>44664600
I'd say go with your feelings but L5R games are rare. Try sticking around for a couple sessions and if nothing bad happens stay with them.

>>44664253
That's not really how it works

All Matsu are descended from Matsu, as are all members of old families descended from their founder, but the relationship is very, very distant.

In cases where the founder was recent, then yes, chances are the majority of samurai in the clan are not his/her descendants, but the daimyo will always be a direct descendant, because the first daimyo will always be the founder, and the second the founder's child, and so on

>>44664600
Leave, leave now and never looks back

L5R works best with two to four players, at five things start to fall apart, and more than that is just terrible

>>44664253
What >>44665035 says is basically true, though it's trickier in L5R since family daimyo are determined by CCG events for most of it's history after the setting "begins" for players.

Where he's wrong is about all of them being descended by blood from the original founder; you take the Family name when you swear fealty to the Family, regardless of any actual relation. New samurai being sworn into the family isn't really that unusual either; it's an excellent way to build up your ranks quickly to ensure you have enough people for war.
There's also the obvious inbreeding problem; the CCG of course does otherwise (it's honestly a terrible fucking metric for the setting) of course, but certain families actually almost exclusively marry within the Family in most normal cases; the Matsu, Utaku, Doji, and Moshi are known to do this explicitly, but the Hida do it too. Doing this when anyone and everyone is related by blood would be disastrous eventually and cause inbreeding, which we know is a thing in Rokugan (and isn't ignored for convenience's sake) because Shinjo gave really specific commands about who a Unicorn could marry to avoid it while traveling. With a small family like the Moshi (who were a very insular minor clan for centuries) they'd be more inbred then the Hapsburgs were.
Most families in an overall Family (which is confusing as shit to say since what they refer to as a "Clan" in Japan in real life is basically what the Families are) have their own immediate family names; they'd technically be "Surname-Given Name-Family Name", but they only use use the Family name in polite company for reasons that amount to "the CCG writers already have a hard time with the Chip Chong Nip Nong names, let's not confuse them with more".

>>44665239
In-breeding always occurs to some degree, though

In fact, given the thousands of years between the founding of some clans and the current time, it's almost guaranteed that all samurai are descended from all clan founders

>>44665239
Examples of Clan Families adopting lots of unaligned samurai or samurai who swear fealty are brought up in the Time of the Void campaign, where it's mentioned by some characters that the Matsu are doing it a bunch recently like they're preparing for war and it's making their immediate neighbors nervous as hell.
As to why the adopted samurai suddenly can use the Family School when they are likely untrained? That's hard to say, but it might just be one of the game's many "fluff says one thing, gameplay does another" things like shugenja in theory being detached priestly types while in every example of the written fluff they actually act more like D&D "court wizards" or something and not being detached from worldly matters or anything of the sort.

From a "trying to make the setting actually work and reconciling the fluff" standpoint I'd say technically most familial groups in a Clan Family are Vassal Families, but the "official" listed Vassal Families are actually larger familial groups that have significant presence in the overall Clan Family due to age and size.
Example; you could be Kawakami Gensai no Daidoji (or just Daidoji Gensai to most folks), but the other Kawakami in the Daidoji are likely your immediate blood relatives; your parents, siblings, perhaps an uncle to two, etc.
Meanwhile the Hiramori Daidoji have an official Vassal Family status in the overall Daidoji so there are TONS of those guys, all vaguely related by intermarriage and blood and thus make up a notable portion of the Daidoji.

The fluff is sort of inconsistent in how vassal families work, but some of the bullshit the fluff IS consistent on is the Fucking Spider Clan, which nobody I know actually uses, so I actively try to fix little parts of the fluff where it contradicts itself, especially later fluff when the story writers stopped even trying to keep the culture looking semi-authentic after Wick left.

>>44665299
True that, and it's actually probably why Eplispy is common enough that it's a basic Disadvantage, just as it's common in Japan for identical reasons.
But there are roughly 100k Matsu (the Empire's largest Clan Family) in the setting, so they can probably find someone who isn't TOO related to you. Same with the Doji, who keep incredibly anal pedigree records about that stuff.

>>44665438
True, but the original point was whether or not all Matsu were descended from the original Matsu, and I believe they are.

>>44665472
The fluff contradictes you; by the early points in Rokugani history (like the Dawn of the Empire setting, which is canon) the families are maybe 50 years old and many still number in the 100's, including the Matsu.
Since Matsu herself was STILL ALIVE at then years died relatively early in the founding of the family (during the Second Day of Thunder roughly 45 years into the Empire's existence) she's have to have fucked out dozens and dozens of kids in her 30 or 40-odd years of life or had a literal harem.

Meanwhile it talks a lot about the "followers" of Kami and their immediate vassals who become the Families in modern day Rokugan, so they didn't grow just by breeding in-house.

Are they all related distantly by modern day? Yeah, probably a little, the same way any small elite group of people living in the same area over 1200 years are, but I'm guessing for most of them it's a lot harder to trace all the way back to the family founder.

>>44665631
Well yes, that's pretty much exactly what I was saying

Recently-formed families aren't all descended from the founder because most of the "family" consists of followers and vassals, but families formed thousands of years ago are almost certainly all a little-bit descended from the founder

>>44665672
It's one of the pre-Wick leaving story-team things that shows some surprisingly good research.
That actually happened a lot; like how he made mention of how "fire gangs" we're basically criminal syndicates way back in the 90's when nobody knew shit about that and nobody had easy Wikipedia access or whatever, or how with the Imperial Families he actually pretty remarkably accurately replicated the Heian Period court system and how succession worked for the Tenno back when nobody knew what the Heian Period WAS because the only things anyone makes movies about are the Sengoku and Edo Periods.

Wick's not totally wrong about EVERYTHING he knows about Japanese culture, he just refuses to admit when he's wrong and gets defensive and obstinate when you try to correct him.

>>44665776
Too bad the heian period is boring as sin

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>>44665842
It's interesting from a cultural standpoint, but yeah; there's a fairly good reason why most historical or semi-historical fiction takes place AFTER the Genpei War, not before it.
That said, Seirei no Moribito is a pretty cool series that is quite obviously based off the Heian Period.

Ageha Family: +1 to awareness
Ageha Bushi School
Benefit:+1 void
Skills: Any Artisan skill, Etiquette, Kenjutsu (Katana), Kyujutsu, Iajutsu, Meditation, any other skill
Honor: 5.5
Outfit: Sensible Clothing and Light Armor, Daisho, Kumi with 20 arrows, traveling pack,
5 koku.
1) Perfection through Patterns
The Ageha Bushi chases the moment of perfection in all things. A number of times per day equal to your School Rank, you can add your skill level in Iajutsu, Kenjutsu or Kyujutsu to any Artisan Skill Checks, or add your skills in an Artisan Skill of your choice to an Iajutsu, Kenjutsu or Kyujutsu roll.

2) Empty, and Become Wind
The Ageha Bushi can sense the flow and intent in all things, if they but focus. While in the Center Stance, increase your TN by your School Rank x 2. You also gain +1k0 to making Assessment rolls in Iajutsu duels.

3) Enter the Void
In a moment of nothingness, time vanishes. You may attack as a simple action with weapons that have the samurai keyword.

4) Tempest from the Wing-Flap
When facing an opponent with a lower void ring than yourself, gain a number of free raises equal to the difference between the two rings.

5) The SwallowTail Cut
The Ageha has mastered the attack of No Thought, striking without thinking. Whenever you are attacked, once a turn, you may spend a Void Point to activate an attack of No Thought - with a katana if attacked in close combat, or a yumi if attacked at range. You may attack before the enemy does, and however much damage they take from the attack is added to your TN for the resolution of their attack.

>>44666171
I like how this writes up.
Mind if I use it in my house campaign?

>>44666171
latest update to the butterfly minor clan homebrew. There has been some arguments on whether they should be given light armor to start, but considering literally all other bushi schools start with it I saw no reason not to include it. I threw something together for rank 4, but I'm still not sure that its the best. It was hovering between that and the ability to attack from center stance. other current concerns is how rank 5 behaves in a duel.

All of the above. Every clan has ninjas, usually indirectly contracted, as deniable assets, and sometimes peasants or other criminal groups take up the mask and chain out of desperation. The Kolat claim to have invented ninjutsu, but never too loudly. Ninja clans exist, usually competing for contracts with influential lords and families, and always afraid of becoming too exposed and being wiped out by angry samurai. Samurai H A T E ninja because they fucking cheat worse than Scorpions and their whole social class is based around certain rules being followed.

Basically Usagi Yojimbo is my guidebook for ninjas.

>>44666318
>Basically Usagi Yojimbo is my guidebook for ninjas.

You're a cool guy then, because Usagi Yojimbo is THE SHIT.

>>44666372
Stan Sakai's an amazing workhorse who's won a shitload of awards and is STILL under appreciated.

Its also great to page through and get ideas for an L5R adventure. I wanna run one about the kite making festival.

>>44666203
I would hold off until we figure out balance with ranks 4 and 5.

>>44664253
Here's what happens if the lead family's wiped out.

Suddenly there's a distant cousin and the family histories were revealed to show that he has a direct link to the founder! What a miracle! Thank goodness for those hardworking scribes keeping sense of the family line.

>>44666403
Didju get the chance to see that time on /co/ when a guy storytimed ALL of the series that had been released up until that point.

>>44666520
That's basically how it always happens in real life too.
Tokugawa Ieyasu after he became Shogun miraculously produced a lineage chart showing how he was distantly related to an earlier line of Shoguns.

>>44666537
FUCK

>>44666537
I saw some of it! Then the archive broke and it fell apart, but it was great.

>>44666559
Yeah, man, there's an adventure for you. Someone robbed the family archive!

>>44666171
The question is, how do they fare against a kakita duelist.

>>44666677
Glad someone appreciated my hard work then. I haven't had nearly as much fun on 4chan as when I did all of that.

>>44666738
Hey! Yeah, that was a great storytime, and apparently you encouraged a buncha people to start buying the series, so good job.

It was like an old school /co/ storytime.

>>44667036
Fucking baffles me how nobody had done it before.
I still need to read The Scorpion, the most recent collection book.....

>>44663032
>he's not even properly a ronin; he's called that because most people assume he is one just because he's armed
That happens in Rokugan a lot, actually. Although it's usually because a peasant found a daisho (Often scavenged from a battlefield) and decided that being a ronin is better than being a peasant.
For the vast, vaaaaast majority of ronin, the only proof they have is their swords, so it works as long as nobody recognizes him.

>>44666723

They should probably be a little lower on the dueling scale because they're a minor clan.

Actually, the big question is... can they use their Rank 5 Swallowtail cut during a duel? That seems a little horrifying if they manage to lose on who goes first but just "hahaha no MUH VOID"

>>44665035
Not really. All of the founding kami collected followers who took their names. None of the great old Families started with just the founder and their blood relatives. There are distinct bloodlines in each of them that are unrelated to the main line. Many of them have intermarried, yes, but that makes most of the "family" only related by marriage.

>>44666171

Oh, here's a question - is there a way to adapt Rank 4 to benefit when there's not a direct opponent, like in making art? Because Free Raises are at least more useful then. Or is it still only if the art is somehow "contested" - i.e. trying to impress a critic.

>>44667733
It was a thing during the middle and later Edo Period too, actually.
To make money as peacetime caused economic prosperity as their stipends remained fixed, samurai would sell their skills and teach wealthier commoners how to fence. Then the wealthier' commoners would buy a sword of some kind and nobody could prove they weren't samurai since most don't carry their pedigree on them and a lot of legit samurai often didn't have any real money as there was less and less need for them and many lacked the skills to be productive bureaucrats in the Bakufu.

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>http://l5r.wikia.com/wiki/Kakita/Meta
>http://l5r.wikia.com/wiki/Mirumoto_Hojatsu/Meta
If the duel between Kakita and Hojatsu showed them to be almost evenly matched (with Kakita having a slight edge)... why did AEG make Hojatsu's RPG stats so much better than Kakita's?

>>44667758
I think rank 5 will be reworded so as to only happen in a skirmish. The clan however I think is being envisioned as being scary good at dueling, what with their rank 2 technique.

>>44667811
I'm thinking we could add
"additionally, once per day the samurai may add their void ring value to an artisan roll"
or something like that.

Currently it's not very clear what the clan's theme is, beyond void based duelists that have a side hobby in bonsai. I feel like if we could peg down whether or not they see much combat outside of duels then we could finish wrapping up the homebrew.

>>44668493
No editorial control and a frequent case if actual stats going against what is stated in the fluff.
Example: badass ronin duelist Dariya would actually be a really shitty character versus a Kakita of equal skill simply because he has no school, yet we are led to believe he has defeated dozens of them.

>>44668493
Probably because the Dragon Swordmaster was the only Advanced School developed at the time.
Kakita definitely has the edge in dueling, though. Great Potential (Iaijutsu) and multiple specialties in it.

>>44668584
Skills and (Especially) stats are more important than Techniques. Techniques give you the edge when you're otherwise mostly equal. Someone with more Iaijutsu skill and better Reflexes will wipe the floor with less skilled and statted Kakita duelists.

>>44668538

Well, their theme, if anything, is "Void" - hence the Butterfly, a creature of the Void, and the style of their techniques. Basically they are focused around mastering some of the techniques described in the fighting section of the Book of Void.

Also, I made a history thing.

https://1d4chan.org/wiki//tg/_Custom_L5R_Minor_Clans#Butterfly_Clan

>>44668745
That's a really well done history. I would suggest that honor be upped considering that they're a dueling school. I would also suggest dropping yumi from the 3rd rank simply because it could lead the school to being OP. But besides that I think we're close to being done. 4th rank still bugs though, but I have no idea what else it should be.

>>44668842

Well, lets sort of think about a theme, if only for fighting. They're clearly designed to be using the Center stance alot, and being better at it, but only their Rank 2 really affects it. Like, their whole fighting style is supposed to be "Float... then strike". I'm thinking maybe the Rank 5 should be limited to not only just in skirmishes, but also only in the Center Stance, to avoid people just going Full Defense then using it.

>>44668909
Sounds good. Maybe make rank 4 allowing strikes from center stance? Or giving raises after spending a round in center stance?

>>44668962

Well, right now, that's kinda how Center Stance works - you wait a round, then next round get +1k1+VR, or an initiative boost.

Maybe the bonus could be higher? I don't think it should stack too ridiculously with Rank 1. And Rank 5 kinda has the "strike from center stance" thing down.

>>44669210
Maybe when facing opponents with a lower void ring than yourself the bonuses from center ring are doubled?

>>44669356

Might be a bit less insane if the boost in the center ring is equal to the Void Ring gap.

>>44669429
Hmmm...maybe "using your center stance gives you x number of free raises equal to the difference between yours and your opponents void rings"

>>44669501

Hah, now we're back where we started.

I'm almost wondering if we shouldn't take a different tac. One idea I ditched was letting you do assessments in skirmishes, which we could do if we can find a way to simplify it. Another thing might be taking a turn in Center stance to make a Meditation roll (with a limit per day) to regen Void points.

>>44669613
Do we want to focus on void ring, dueling, artisan stuff or center stance? Hell, something Jedi like? Let's nail that down.

>>44669694

Well, as mentioned, their focus is on the Void Ring and the Center stance and things associated. They can duel good, but as a side affect of this, same with artisan. I kinda feel we need something else applying to that aside from the Center TN bonus. Meditating would be good, or potentially getting Reduction in the Center Stance, or ignoring wound penalties when they exit it (since they are forgeting the physical world)

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If Sezaru had decided to take up a position of leadership in the Phoenix (as I think he would have the right to do so, descended as he was from the previous Master of Void and a skilled shugenja) and had to fight Shiba Ningen; which of them would win?

>>44669922
Hmm, how about when in center stance void points spent are not counted?

>>44670005
Heck, if he had pressed for leadership, would Ningen even been able to deny his request?
Ningen is just a man, while Sezaru is the son of the Oracle of Void and the Emperor.

>>44670040

In the center stance you'd mostly be using VP to boost your TN and Armour right? Or do an initiative exchange I guess.

Man, speaking of making minor clans, check this out.

http://www.theforgottenbay.com/t925-imperial-archives-content-that-was-cut

>>44670005
>>44670218
I think Sezaru would probably win as he was so attuned to the Void that he seemed constantly mentally unstable; that whole "truth of the universe" stuff really seems to wear down a human mind.
That said, I actually think he would've made a better Jade Champion; it's an official title that mostly revolves around doing what he already always ended up doing anyway, and it isn't tied to the Phoenix who, let's face it, have something of a denial problem when it comes to their faults as a Clan.
Most of the issues that beset the Phoenix (excepting maybe their war with the Mantis; that's just the Yoritomo doing what they always do and taking what they can get away with) are ultimately their own damn fault as they are usually completely convinced of their own infallibility.

I don't know if it's just an Isawa thing or what.

>>44670369
Dude, these Shark Clan guys seem like fucking badasses, why cut them?

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>>44670369
There's a PDF of all that.

>>44670503

Reading the thread, it seemed like they just didn't give enough fucks to playtest them. The fluff is all in Imperial Archives, they just never gave them rules. Which sucks, the Shark sound like classic villains.

>>44670503
They didn't cut them, they just cut their mechanics.

>>44670369
>Tanuki Clan
Aaaah, finally there is a minor clan for Nutsack Raccoons.

>>44670520
Or good "friends that you're a bit wary of".

>*Mantis win a victory against the Crane*
>Tsuruchi-san: "Wow Yoritomo-sama, those Shark guys sure were helpful in the battle before! Are we offering them status in the Mantis?"
>Yoritomo-sama: "Fuck no dude, those guys are FUCKING SCARY. We pay them to kill the other guys so they'll leave us alone."

>>44670535
Actually, the Tanuki Clan predates a lot of other minor clans. They were used in 3rd edition as an example of a lost minor clan. They're also the only one on that list that is completely canon, with the others only existing if convenient for your game.

>>44670575
More like
>Fuck no dude, the Otomo bureaucracy would rip us a new asshole for trying.
>Why?
>Who the fuck knows?

>>44670456
>constantly mentally unstable
>better Jade Champion.
I think you need to reread the first thing you said there friend-o. Plus it would be taking way the one good thing to come from the Asahina family.

I think my next character will be a Tanuki samurai who wandered out of the woods one day to find that his entire clan has been gone for centuries.

>>44670625
My father, who is a very wise man, once told me that a bureacrat's job is to find a way to convince everyone else that they're totally necessary for civilization to function.
>>44670638
You're looking at this the wrong way; he was always MOST stable when he had a goal. Since the goal for the Jade Champion is a simple and unending one (namely "kill shadowlands") he'll always be too busy to do too much damage, especially since most Jade Magistrates are of a like mind anyway right?

Meanwhile if he became the Elemental Master of Void he'd be the "first among equals" for an ENTIRE GREAT CLAN, and since we've already seen the fucking disastrous consequences of what happens when the Phoenix loose their shit the potential for long-term damage is a lot worse.
In theory the Phoenix Clan Champion should sort of be able to temper the craziness of the Elemental Council (who fall prey to literally every "Wizards Are Assholes" flaw ever made at least once), but in practice that just never happens.

>>44670792
It's also that the Emperor himself and the entire Imperial government was protecting the Shark to an excessive degree. The only reason they don't get crushed by retaliation or politic'd out of their status as a clan is Imperial blessing.

>>44670792
Didn't the Elemental Council get butthurt about the Jade Champion anyway because they thought it infringes on their turf so they found ways to politically neuter it?

>Phoenix: "You can't make a Master of Magic position, that infringes on our Clan rights!"
>Jade Champion: "The position is mostly used to stamp out maho. Are YOU stamping out maho?"
>Phoenix: "Mostly we leave that to just the Kuni and the Asako."
>Jade Champion: "Then why are you bitching?"
>Phoenix: "We don't want anyone to take away our Smug Wizard Asshole Rights, REEEEE!"

>>44670866
Looking at the Clan description (namely that they are unstable bloodthirsty whackos) I'm kinda guessing the Shark themselves wouldn't care that much.

>>44670625
probably because a great clan swearing a shitload of minor clans to their banner without imperial sanction is basically building a bigger army.

Which is a direct threat to imperial power.

>>44670261
Hmm...I'm really thinking that maybe wound reduction may be the way to go. There's a similar technique of ignoring wound penalties to TN. Something like that in center stance?

>>44670792
But when he had his own force of evil hunters in the kingdoms he caused nothing but strife. Do you think that giving him legal authority to do whatever he wants is a good idea?

>>44670005
That dude's probably in his twenties and all ready has old man hands.

>>44670929
The new Jade Champion is a phoenix though; Isawa Kaname.

>>44671032
Hmm...true that.
Maybe just give him to the Moshi like in the Shadowed Throne alternate timeline and be done with it.
>>44671091
Another reason the Phoenix original protests are kind of retarded; with more shugenja and more talented shugenja training facilities then any other Clan, nine times out of ten the Jade Champion would be a Phoenix ANYWAY.
The Elemental Masters got butthurt over a principle that literally was a non-factor; it's like gun owners who hate gun regulation not because it'll make BUYING guns harder (which is a highly debatable subject that I can see both sides of easily enough), but because they're afraid they'll "take away" their existing gun collections, which would be both illegal and impractical; while both sides have a point, the basis for one side's arguments isn't actually a part of the discussion at all.

>>44671018

Wound Reduction limitation is pretty fluffy I'll admit. Also, this school is probably going to risk getting beat on a lot as they prep their one super-powerful finishing move.

Actually, on the topic of the Clan, where do you think their holdings should be? It just says near Crane lands, but that could be between the Crane and the old Imperial lands, or maybe near the mountains between crane and Scorpion, or quite far south near the Crane and all those minor clans.

>>44671364
The problem with "near Crane lands" is that it could mean basically anything isn't it?
I mean their lands border practically every single Great Clan in the Empire's lands.

>>44669922
How about this. Once per skirmish while in center stance you can roll to assess all visible enemies. You then gain either TN against their attacks or free raises against them (idk which is better for balance) equal to the difference in void rings.

On another note, looking at the firefly clan I did see some techniques that might be worthwhile to take inspiration from.

>>44671364
Let's look at what we got. Rank 1 is basically a skill buff once a day. Rank 2 is a defense buff in center stance and an assessment buff. Rank 3 is classic simple actions. Rank 4 is undecided. Rank 5 allows you to better defend yourself in center stance but also to retaliate.

Looking at that I'm thinking rank 4 at least needs to maybe include another assement buff

>>44671396

Well, exactly, that's why we have to pick. One one hand, after Otoson Uchi gets rekt, a lot of that land nearby is fairly open or Imperially owned. But putting them near some mountains might explain why no one cares too much about their land.

>>44671320
9 times out of 10 the Jade Champion would be a Phoenix anyway
But would they be an Isawa?
See the Jade Champion's whole shtick is fighting against the Shadowlands, rooting out maho, spooky things, and tainted individuals. The Isawa don't do that, they leave that to the Asako Inquisitors.

And even if it was just a Phoenix, I doubt they would like a powerful shugenja that has more political power then they do not under their thumb. Like the current issue with the Unicorn and their gaijin blood; Isawa Kaname told everyone about it when the Masters might have wanted to keep such information to themselves.
If one Master has a way to circumnavigate the limitations put on them by the other four than it throws their whole way of governing things out of whack.

>>44671769
I'm thinking that crane lands near the Phoenix would work thematically best with the whole void thing.

>>44671769
The Mountains of Regret are mostly open territory, though they're also supposed to be fairly dangerous; they're named such because of all the people that die because of ogres, goblins, and bandits there every year on it's passes.
>>44671783
I remembering reading that though the Phoenix Champion in recent times seems to be completely neutered thanks to the pull of the Elemental Council that it was a relatively recent phenomenon because of how relatively dickless the current Phoenix Champion was just before the Scorpion Coup; originally the Champion sort of had "veto" poorer if the Elemental Council got too crazy.

You'd think they'd listen to the Champion since every single new Champion inherited the Soul of Shiba and the collective life experiences of every single prior Champion and a Great Kami on top them, but I guess not.

>>44672062
Every member of the elemental council is a physical embodiment of arrogance.

>>44672151
Something Isawa with them had in common with them apparently.
Who the hell needs to be ASKED to save everyone in the world from dying because Satan is destroying everything? Isawa, that's who!

>Shiba: "Hey Isawa, Shinsei says you're one of the Seven Thunders! You get to save the world!"
>Isawa: "Don't wanna"
>Shiba: "....sorry?"
>Isawa: "Don't wanna save the world?"
>Shiba: "What the fuck?"
>Isawa: "Ask politely."
>Shiba: "Are you fucking serious right now?"

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Angry Matsu tiddies bump.

>>44672062

Mountains of Regret or Spine of the World would both be possible.

What would people want to see from a Phoenix Elemental Master?

>>44672268
Isawa did have a point though.
The whole mess was because of the Kami and they weren't dealing with it.

So someone on the wiki posted a rank 4 that had some meritt, but I think it needs to be more than just an ijiatsu assessment made in a skirmish. I'm thinking like if you pass the roll you get free raises equal to the difference in rings.

>>44673562

Don't you already get a bonus for going into Center stance?

>>44673325
According to Shinsei for whatever reason they COULDN'T deal with it and it needed to be mortals to saved the Empire anyway, so there wasn't really anything they could have done according to him.
Which actually is something of a recurring theme early in the setting; every time a deity or celestial being acted out of order or against it's nature it threw things out of balance and caused an equal and opposite reaction which meant you just had another problem in the place of one you just solved.
But if a mortal human solved the problem then it's just mortals solving mortal problems, and nothing is thrown at all out of balance, hence why "fortune favors the mortal man".

Of course later storyteam junk had gods and divine superbeings just showing up and interfering or solving shit left and right ("New Taint" my ass....), but whatever.

>>44670456
Doesn't the feud with the Mantis ultimately stem from the Phoenix harbouring Osano Wo's murderer, though? That seems like the Phoenix's own damn fault too.

>>44673818
The Phoenix gave that fight up as soon as Osano Wo told a city gate to sit down and shut up.

>>44673905

Man, historically speaking, the Phoenix kinda sound like a bunch of retards, huh?

>>44673905
Sure, but by that point the Mantis already had a grudge. Even if the Phoenix stepped down from that fight, it was only after having pinned a ''Yoritomo stab here'' sign to their collective kimono.

>>44673744
You get buffs to attack rolls after

>>44673949
They, like the Lion, have to wear the dumbass hat for plot advancement a lot.

Well weren't the Mantis just a bunch of Ronin at that point?
The Isawa probably would have had the man put on trial instead of handing him over to mob-justice of a bunch of lawless pirates.

>>44674412
They were specifically dispatched by the Crab to get the job done, though, weren't they? Even if they were Robin, which I can't say either way, they were under orders from another great clan, not some disorganized rabble.

>>44674555
Osano-wo's Crab son couldn't afford to chase after vengeance, since he had just violently inherited the Clan champion position and was dealing with a lot of shit at the time.
So he asked his half brother (Leader of the Mantis) to do it. Mantis boy tracked the murderer to the Phoenix, who basically called him a liar and wouldn't let him pursue vengeance. He got so pissed that he basically cursed them out in daddy's name and daddy responded with lightning. The Phoenix really should have gotten a lot of shit over the entire situation. They harbored a criminal and actively blocked righteous revenge. Either of those acts should have allowed the other clans to shit all over them in court.

>>44674355

Well, most clans have their moments of sheer dumbassery, but the Phoenix seem to make a constant habit of making poor choices.

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>>44673818
Yeah, but that's debatably not the real reason.....debatably.
>>44673949
Yes. They really do.
Or wait, scratch that; the ISAWA sound like total retards, the fiction always has some long-suffering Shiba yojimbo going "no, let's think about this, this is a retarded plan" and then the Isawa ignoring him or her.
>>44674355
In all fairness the primary Lion flaw (that they have a shitload of warriors, are extremely warlike in general, and often use Bushido both to excuse their martial excesses and start wars as an aggression outlet) is a fairly realistic flaw as it plagued Japan's samurai class for close it's entire history as a nation.

The Elemental Council doesn't have an excuse beyond pic related.

>>44674728
Like what?
Aside from opening the Scrolls they had I can't think of a time they've been really stupid.

>>44674750

Very true. And the poor Asako just want to be nerds.

But the Isawa are without a doubt total retards because I guess you don't have to be smart when you have MAGIC.

>>44674837

Everything we've been discussing?

>>44674662
Speaking of the Fortune of Fire and Thunder, it occurred to me that Osano-wo is perhaps one of the more authentic and clever Japanese mythology references in the entire setting, albeit with some details shifted around.

>>44674886
That they tend to be jerks and once stopped the Mantis from catching a killer.
Woah look out scorpion we've got a new contender for Assholes of Rokugan.

>>44674866
Asako also have that "we can all become superhuman deities" thing they're keeping under their belt that they safeguarg, plus the Inquisitors who actively hunt down harmful magic.

>>44675042
Honestly the Asako are the most odd of all the Phoenix in that they don't have just one theme to their family and try to do everything.

>>44675004
The killer was a Kolat Assassin who had killed the son of one of the Great Kami and they stopped Kaimetsu-uo from chasing him for literally no stated reason other then pride and dismissive arrogance.
They don't unseat the Scorpion, but the Scorpion Clan is aware of their flaws and sort of embrace them (they've taken upon themselves to be the "bad guys" for the Empire after all), but Isawa's brood not only remain blind to their own flaws they never LEARN from them (despite being a supposedly educated and spiritual clan) even when they do things like turn half of the Elemental Council into Tainted madmen like during the Clan Wars.

They're also the single strongest argument for renaming shugenja, because the Phoenix refuse to act like the priests shugenja supposedly are supposed to be but DO frequently act like traditional know-it-all wizard assholes.
If anything, the Dragon are more priests then the Phoenix are.

>>44675182
Here's how the Phoenix Clan works; the Shiba protect and maintain their borders while being diplomatic, the Asako study the Path of Man, fight maho, and be the functioning administration of the clan, and the Isawa cause the problems the other two families have to clean up.
The Agasha later on are a shugenja family that's slightly less fucking crazy in their decision-making process.

>>44675193
>Dragon
Are warriors before they're priests.
They frequently disregard the rules of standard shugenja; specializing in combat, wearing swords and fighting.

>>44675193
That's because there are a few kinds of "priests" in Rokugan, and they only overlap a little bit. It's a fairly complicated religion that is only kinda based on Shinto-Buddhism.
1: Anyone who is sufficiently pious and willing to lead rites or rituals can be a priest of the fortunes. Education not strictly necessary. It's kind of a fuzzy category, but anyone can do it, including peasants. Monks and people who maintain public shrines qualify most of the time.
2: People born with the ability to interact with the elemental Kami. They are priests because the elemental Kami find them personally interesting, not because they have the right temperament or willingness. These are the shugenja.
3: Samurai and a few kinds of monks who study the ancestors function as "priests" of ancestor and divine Kami worship. They're who you go to when you need help living up to the expectations of your birth.
4: Enlightenment isn't really part of the religion that can have priests, since it's an intensely personal experience, but people further along might be able to show those who have yet to start along that path some places to start.

>>44675300
The Agasha started out as Dragons. You have to wonder why they ever left to join the Phoenix.

>>44675471
Hitomi was corrupted.

>>44674750
The Isawa should be the religious and spiritual heart of Rokugan but it turns it its easier to write monks than priests so the Dragon usually serve that role in stories.

>>44675768
The Isawa piss off too many people to be the heart of anything except for Shugenja academia. The only families outside the Phoenix that regularly interact with them are the other Shugenja, and even then, the Kuni are the only ones who seem willing to unabashedly ask for help when they need it. Probably because their duty is more important than their pride, but still.

>>44675839

That's the problem with the Isawa, they're a shitty heart of Shugenja academia because they just focus on mocking anyone who doesn't do things their way.

>>44675871
I liked the whole "do we embrace the new spiritual stuff we're learning in the ivory kingdoms or do we burn it because gaijin are soulless monsters" debate, it was the first shugenja stuff I was really into in a while.

Speaking of Minor Clans, considering how they like it as a nickname and how much they just love making minor clans, is anyone else surprised the Crab never founded a Bear Clan?

>>44676324
they need all their baras in the main clan.

>>44676324
They've had bad luck with B's since the boar clan...
Although, we are getting pretty close to being done with the butterfly clan.

>>44676324
It's entirely possible that they did. There are a LOT of lost minor clans. Many only last a single generation before being disbanded, folded back into their parent clan, or destroyed. A lot of the time it's not even because something horrible happens. A lot of times, their mission got completed, or their parent clan gets the resources to fulfill their mission better than they can, and a clan without a mission has no reason to be a clan at all.

>>44676324
>>44676495
>>44676503

Honestly, with the fucking Shadowlands Marsh, and then the fucking Spider Clan living in it, you'd think they'd want to found a clan that mixes Hida Stronk with Hiruma Innawoods to sit in the south-west part of the forest just so the main clan doesn't have to always have that pain in the ass on the back of their minds.

>>44676495

And thanks to everyone who helped with that - it was a lot of fun to make a Minor Clan, it turns out. We should do it again and maybe test them out one day.

>>44676624
It'd be interesting for them to petition for a Hummingbird Clan. It's literally just some Hiruma, Hida, and Kaiu camping in the woods, but they deal with their own logistics and politics, allowing for a wider area of Crab control.
Kinda like how modern corporations make child companies to deal with specific IPs and free up their core employees for other projects.

>>44676717

Butterfly looks really good but I can't help but think the Rank 3 looks overpowered at the moment - doesn't it mean you can basically double strike with any weapon? I think it should be limited maybe to just Samurai weapons, or just Swords

>>44676847
Your right it still needs some work. That finally come ring up with a better rank 4.

>>44676624

Actually as far as a Bear Clan goes, you think the Phoenix would have made one to act as a blocker/intermediary to the Yobanjin so they have a level of deniability in messing with them.

>>44676907

Actually, Rank 4 is looking better with the small buffs. Its a bit wordy, but its flexible and I think would be fun to play - and because of what you roll, it still penalizes enemies for having a low Void, just like we wanted. And lets you boost your Center stance attacks, also like we wanted.

>>44676952
Shoot. I just edited it again. If there's support for the old rank I'll switch it back.

>>44676922
That's pretty much the badger though.

>>44676922
Why not the Ox?
They're in Phoenix lands and aren't doing anything now that the Kolat shouldn't be a thing.

>>44677053

I'd keep it as it was before, personally.

>>44677237
>>44677391

Well, the Badger are straight "just keep 'em out", and the Ox seem to become a clan of criminal punches and magistrates.

I'm just saying, a clan that let you learn how to use Yobanjin weapons, even in secret, would be pretty dank.

>>44677511
If there's another call for it I'll switch it back (though with better wording). Personally I think the new one is better as it isn't straight copying the duel assessment mechanic, but this is a group effort and what not.

>>44677532
It's possible to pick up gaijin weapons as a hobby, it's just not tasteful or acceptable to use them "seriously". There's mentions of exotic weapon collectors and a healthy trade in gaijin curiosities.
Presumably, everyone involved just pretends that the things being passed around were taken from raiders or obtained waaaaay back when some gaijin trade was allowed.

>>44677606

I would change it back with better wording - or at least, put in the option to get the Raises by making Raises on the assessment. It sort of worked fine - they have a lower void, you can more easily raise to get more out of it. But it still lets it do something if the other guy is super high void.

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>>44677680
Alrighty, seeing the consensus I will revert it. I think with this agreement that we will be done working on the butterfly clan. All in all I think it came out well.

On a tangent, does anyone else think this guy is the epitome of a butterfly?

>>44676847
Are we looking at the same thing? Because it specifically says "weapons with the samurai keyword."

There's only three weapons in the game with the samurai keyword.

>>44678000

Someone probably changed it.

Since we had so much FUN with home-brewing the butterfly; is there any interest to doing the same with any other new minors? The names of bear, hummingbird, eel, gull and chameleon were tossed around earlier.

>>44678850
Hummingbird was only tossed in because that's the motif of the Hiruma, similar to the Yasuki and their carp. Half of their famous heroes have been "the X hummingbird" and a lot of their Techniques and Kata draw direct comparisons to hummingbirds flitting back and forth effortlessly.

>>44678850

Yeah, we might not want to directly rip off a Family animal, though not all families have one.

Bear clan sounds kind of fun as an "innawoods Hida" sort of clan, regardless of where they are. Also "Kuma" or "Higuma" are both awesome family names.

>>44678850
Eel might be interesting as a rivergoing clan, tasked with keeping a stretch of river clear of problems.

>>44679075
maybe invert a trope and make them the royal beekeepers. Nice, gentle, portly artisans that happen to fly into a berserk rage if their bees (or anyone they care about), are harmed?

>>44679150
I like that. The original pitch had them as slippery grapplers, but their lands and fluff weren't really fleshed out.

>>44679150
>>44679193
Come to think of it, though, I think the grappler thing was based off of morays, which are salt-water eels. I don't actually know anything about freshwater eels, but I doubt they're as formidable.

If water type wasn't a concern, another neat angle might be to base them off of electrical eels, focusing on using other sense than eyesight in combat, and on stunning foes.

>>44679150
I say they should use spears, bows, and weapons with hooks. Anything with reach that can be used to push or pull a boat around would be useful for a river marine.

>>44679325

That seems a little too obscure, and I don't know if electric eels are that common outside of a few places in Rokugan, or the Colones.

>>44679157

Sounds fun, but more like a vassal family than a full Minor Clan. Even if they are a warrior clan though, bee keeping is a nice rural touch.

>>44679150
>>44679193
>>44679325
>>44679348

looks like we're going with Eels. The river clan idea seems like a winner. I also like the idea of grappling. Maybe base the buhsi (or maybe even shinobi) school off of raiding criminal boats in the night covered in river mud, and grappling pirates down silently and non-lethally.

>>44679470
I don't know if grappling is really such a great idea in a river. Maybe using chain weapons and mancatchers...
I would think that range (even in melee) would be more important, being able to fuck someone up just by poling your boat up next to them, rather than having to get onto their boat directly.

>>44679470
I do like the idea of a technique called Coils of the Eel or something similar. Maybe something about bogging down enemies that engage with you? I like the Rank 5 Firefly technique from the pdf upthread, what about something like that, but for initiating a grapple with some kind of bonus, instead of making an attack?

>>44678850
I like the idea of a Bear Clan. What if they had a school that focuses on Jiujutsu and grappling? Teaching their students how to crush their opponents with a mighty bear hug?

>>44679656
Probably founded by a Hida Pragmatist.

>>44679470
With their boating expertise, would they be a Mantis offshoot? I could see some unusually honourable Yoritomo or long-suffering Tsuruchi getting fed up with all of that smuggling and leaving the clan to keep all these damn criminals off of the waterways.

>>44679716
Also, are kappa a thing in Rokugan? Because I bet the Eel would have a serious bone to pick with them if they were.

If the Eel police a river, then Unagi Magistrate is my vote for their School name.

>>44679716
Eh, the Mantis are seagoing, these guys are river

>>44679656
>>44679674

Yeah. Not sure what they would do then though. They could guard the south-west of the Shinomen Mori but I'm not sure bear hugs are advisable against things coming out of the Shadowland Marshes.

An anti-Spider Crab clan spin off would be pretty awesome though. I guess dirty tricks really help there.

>>44679470
>eel clan
I've seen enough hentai to know where this is going.

>>44679716

Tsuruchi makes more sense than Yoritomo. But with rivers, they could also just be angry ex-Lion.

Also this entirely depends on what part of the Empire their purview is. I would heavily argue for the Three-Sides river, since the Lion, Crane and Scorpion all fuck with it.

>>44679790
You're thinking of the Octopus Clan.

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>>44679833

>>44679790

You don't want to fuck an Unagi Samurai-Ko?

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>>44679833
Whoops, meant to spoil that.

>>44679833

>The Octopus Clan is founded only to make lewd prints.

>>44679893
God, I can see it now, some crazy Kakita artisan manages to make it to court with a woodcut of a woman in an amorous embrace with an octupus, and before any of his countless family members can get wind of it and stop him he presents the damn thing to the emperor, and the Crane courtiers are all just standing there hiding behind their fans hoping against hope that they haven't just lost all credibility forever when the Emperor bursts out laughing and congratulates Kakita Hentai on his masterful artwork in embarassing, perverted detail, and the nearest Doji leans in and suggests that perhaps Hentai-san should be rewarded with his own minor clan-- somewhere far, far away from Crane lands. And now everybody knows the emperor is a huge deviant, and no one dares say anything about it, so the suggestion just goes uncountered and the emperor agrees and makes it so on the spot.

>>44680068

And in future generations the Imperial Palace keeps getting stacks of lewd scrolls, but are too embarrassed to even bring up such a Clan existing, so the Tako clan continues on in their divine duty.

>>44680068
Godammit, now we have to stat the octopus artisans; masters of perversion.

>>44680219

More of a joke clan than anything. Then again, everyone thought the Tanuki were a joke clan...

>>44680324

I like to imagine they live on some island off in the ocean, and have become so distant from the current courtly styles that they honestly think the stuff they make is top tier and amazing and with profound artistic value.

Their abilities would resolve around accidentally flustering courtiers with their art, and being immune to criticism with how deluded they are - after all the Emperor liked this stuff once!

>>44680431
I'd probably have them take it more seriously. Have their Artisan school be low Honor due to their chosen subject matter, but have the Clan be fairly wealthy for a Minor Clan since nobody else produces erotica in volumes as great as they do.

>>44680431

Honestly, they'd probably be a city-based family, wherever the most people are. And are fairly demure about their minor clan status.

And you know what? You could actually make them semi-serious. Think about what honourless artists could do aside from porn. You need top tier forgeries of letters or art? You need things smuggled in ikebana vases? You need art stolen and replaced with a replica so no one knows? You need porn planted on a courtier you want to ruin? You want a wall scroll but are too poor to commission a Kakita? You want prints to circulate among the peasants urging them on to rebellion?

The Tako clan are artists with no fucks to give and nothing to lose.

>>44680620

Dear God, they're the Tortoise Clan of Artisans.

>>44680620
I think they should be a former ronin clan granted minor clan status by a perverted emperor

>>44680699

Bonus points - they made porn for an Emperor or Imperial family member and then blackmailed him into giving them minor clan status.

Because the Tako Clan gives no fucks.

Question: what's the most isolated clan? Trying to make a samurai who doesn't know much about rokugan.

>>44680620
You know what they should do to give them some legitimacy (Probably after the original emperor died)? Making "wedding night manuals". These were real things that actually existed to give newlyweds some very explicit ideas of what to actually do now that they're married. Considering that the society is pretty sexually repressed, it's an important kind of media.

>>44680811

Badger Clan, or the Unicorn Clan when they just arrived back. Also look at Falcon Clan, and Boar Clan when they were still a thing (though they become a thing again later).

>>44680814

Yeah, exactly. The Octopus Clan is all about providing all the OTHER art that makes the Empire go round, but that no one is willing to admit is needed. For example, Geishas were like celebrities in that time period and got lots of prints of them - but can you see any Kakita or Shiba wanting to try their hand at producing that? At the same time, will the Geisha's patron samurai really want a peasant to draw her?

The Octopus clan is also probably, like the Yasuki and the Kasuga, heavily in with ronin, criminals, smugglers and the like.

>>44680955
Its a dirty job, but someone's got to do it.

>>44681039

They probably secretly do incendiary graffiti too.

>>44681064
Octupusses have 8 legs. So do spiders. Coincidence? I think not!

>>44681222
I can see both the spider and octopus clans resenting the other for that association

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The Octopus Clan is one of the least known clans of Rokugan, and one of the most bizarre – and they prefer both of these things to be true. Their motto has always been “nobility is art, but not all art is noble” – they are a clan that blends the roles of artisan and shinobi together in equal measure – like the Kasuga, Daidoji or Yasuki, they have deep roots amidst the more unsavoury parts of Rokugani culture.

>>44681529

The formation of the clan is cloaked in quite a bit of mystery. What is known is that their founder was Kakita Tako - though even this is uncertain, for Kakita Tako admitted himself to altering his name to give himself a new identity. Tako was a Kakita Artisan who had nothing notable about him, except, perhaps, his lack of notability. He was constantly compared unfavourably to his classmates, and his sensei deemed him worthy of only a life of mediocrity. Disillusioned and wanting for money, Tako let his honour slip in order to make ends meet, killing his integrity as an artisan and happily making good for rich merchants or upstart local magistrates, eager to gain “Authentic Kakita Artwork” for money, where usually such objects would only be obtainable through gift giving or large sums. Tako soon found that his new contacts opened up a whole new, disreputable world for him which he took to with a gusto that surprised even himself – for the first time in his life, he no longer felt like he was useless. It was a dishonourable living – but it was a living! Tako was a flexible artist – one reason he had never really excelled at his studies was because he dabbled in many fields, a little interested in all of them. Now he found himself forging documents and artwork, inventing poems for merchants to impress their mistresses and even printing propaganda leaflets for people he never asked questions of.

>>44681542

To Tako’s surprise, his skills started to earn him work higher and higher in the Rokugani social structure – while no one had wanted Tako the honourable artisan, now many people had need of the “Ronin Artist”. Tako realized there were certain things that Shiba and Kakita artisans simply would not do. Soon samurai patrons were requesting, very discreetly, for him to make wedding night manuals, portraits of their favourite geisha and personally commissioned pieces that regular society would find shocking. Tako was so useful because he would happily produce these pieces, while, at the same time, having a level of quality beyond the normal peasant artists who would usually create these sorts of things. It wasn’t long before Tako had to get help in meeting the demand – he scraped at the least prestigious members of the famous artisan schools, and began to tutor ronin samurai.

>>44681561

What is still vague is exactly what earned Tako the grandest prize of a Minor Clan, for whatever it was apparently it was sworn to secrecy. The records only state that he did a “Great Service to the Imperial Family”, without saying anything more on the matter. Tako took the Octopus as his symbol to represent how he was not the master of one focus, but of many, and as homage to one of his personal favourite works. The Octopus also represented the distribution of the clan – instead of having any central holdings, the clan instead established humbler bases in most major Rokugani cities. To this day the Tako Family, as they became known, provides a coarse, freewheeling, anarchic approach to art, existing in the shadows beyond the higher artisan families. This position never bothered Tako much – to him, all art serves a purpose, in one way or another.

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>>44680811

Play a gaijin who gets adopted by the Mantis

Mechanically speaking, I think Tako artisans should be sort of artisan equivalents to bayushi courtiers. Because everyone wants Tako art and no one wants to admit it

Hey /tg/ whatchu think of this alternate rank?

Master of the Calm Heart
Blah Blah Blah Fluff Stuff I Hain't Gotten To About Yetish
Technique Rank: 5
Replaces: Any Bushi 5
Requirements: Iaijutsu 5, Kenjutsu 5, Honor 6.0 or greater. In addition, must be trained in the art of Calm Heart Dueling.
Technique: THE SWORD OF SERENITY
A master of the Calm Heart learns strikes with her honor. As long as your honor rank is greater than your opponent’s and you are wielding a katana or a wakizashi, you gain a free raise on all Kenjutsu and Iaijutsu skill rolls. This free raise may not be used for the Increased Damage maneuver. In addition, you may add your honor rank to your ATN while in Center Stance.

>>44681784

Yup. They're like a combination of Bayushi and Yasuki, but an Artisan. Their skills would involve Forgery, Blackmail, appealing to the masses and criminal shit.

>>44666171
Change the benefit to anything but Void. Perhaps Reflexes. Rank 2 is stupidly fucking OP at higher insight ranks. Model it after Striking As Void instead. Rank 4 should give a single free raise tops. And I just don't like that Rank 5. It's OP in all the wrong ways. Perhaps instead, if you hit with the attack, your target is dazed and you gain +10 ATN.

>>44681576

Tako Family: +1 Agility

NEW BASIC SCHOOL:
TAKO ARTISAN SCHOOL [ARTISAN]

Benefit: +1 Awareness

Starting Honor: 2.5

Skills:
Commerce, Courtier [Manipulation], Forgery, Lore (Underworld), Sincerity, Temptation,
any two skills chosen from the following list: Artisan (Ikebana, Origami, Painting, Poetry, Sculpture or Tattooing), Calligraphy

Outfit: Simple Clothing, Wakizashi, Art Supplies, Calligraphy Set, Any 1 Weapon with the “Small” Keyword, Traveling Pack, 5 Koku

>>44682004

No reason to not have the bonus be Void - Mirumoto Taoist Swordsmen get it, for example, and that's probably the closest existing class fluffwise to this.

Rank 2 can be modified but I'm not sure how it's OP - is 10TN really that terrifying? Plus, even if you center spam, it will only help half the time.

Rank 4, yeah, might want to cap the raises and Rank 5 could possibly lose the secondary part - its main thing fluffwise is the strike, which should be giving them wound penalties anyways.

>>44682293
That's one skill too many.

>>44682004
So, for example, maybe:

Rank 2: Empty and Become Wind
While in the Center Stance, you may add your Air Ring to your ATN. In addition, you gain a bonus of +1k0 to your Iaijutsu (Assessment) Skill Rolls.
Rank 4: Tempest From the Wing Flap
You gain a free raise to all Bugei Skill Rolls against opponents with a lower Void Ring. In addition, whenever you hit an opponent with an attack, you gain +3 to your ATN against their attacks. This bonus stacks.
Rank 5: The Swallow's Tail Cut
Once per turn, when an opponent declares an attack against you, you may spend a Void Point to activate this technique. You may immediately declare an attack against your attacker: this attack is resolved first. If successful, you gain +10 ATN until your next attack, and the target must make an Earth Ring Roll versus a TN equal to the damage dealt by your attack or be Dazed. (If they become Dazed, their attack automatically fails.)

>>44682356
Yes, +10 ATN is terrifying.

And Void is really, really, really good. Mirumoto Taoist Swordsman at least has the graces to be a pretty meh school outside of its schtick.

>>44682356
Void is way too good of a bonus for a minor clan school. Yeah, the Mirumoto Taoist gets it, but they're a Great Clan school, and a total oddity in that regard as well.

>>44682371

Oops, miscounted. Assume Sincerity is dropped.

>>44682421
>>44682440

This clan is designed to be an oddity. I think its fine to nerf them through specialization, but the +1 Void is sort of the entire reason they exist - a Void based bushi school. Change that to Reflexes and they're just Kakita wannabes.

The Rank 4 idea has some merit possibly. I'd narrow it down to attacks being made after Center Stance, possibly even.

Rank 5 I'd honestly just say "free attack before they do" that seems powerful enough without added benefits. If the enemy gets hit they'll like take wound penalties anyways.

>>44682440

It's also a shitty school in general.

Level 4 Simple Action Attacks and no real synergy between it's unarmed and it's sword options.

>>44682293
Rank 1: Eight Arms, Seven Virtues
When making Artisan or Perform Skill Roll, as long as you possess more total Artisan and Perform skills (not ranks!) than any of your opponents, you gain a free raise. In addition, whenever you succeed in a contested Artisan or Perform Skill Roll against an opponent who has more ranks in that skill, you gain 1 point of Glory.

>>44682500
You can do whatever you like, but giving them +1 Void is shenanigans.

>>44682531
>You can do whatever you like, but giving them +1 Void is shenanigans.
Especially for a minor clan school.

>>44682531

I nerfed them slightly on the wiki, but I think +1 Void is here to stay. As mentioned, its their entire schtick. Kill the void, kill the clan.

As for the Tako, that's a neat school idea. I was also thinking
-Rank Skill for bonus to Forgery and letting you fake and copy other art styles
-A general boosts for Low Skills and maybe Knives and Unarmed attacks, representing them living in a more dangerous world
-Something regarding getting a Bayushi-esque Blackmail affect on anyone who actually buys their stuff. Maybe let them use Artisan for Temptation for keks.
-Maybe getting a wide octopus arm spread of contacts to find demand for their stuff, or using their art to get the lower classes all pissy.

The butterfly rank 5 is like the Firefly rank 5, only better because they gain the benefits of Center stance on the next round.
Maybe if you make it so they're getting their next attack early, rather than getting a free attack in retaliation, it wouldn't be so bad. "When you use this option, on your next turn, you must act as if you have already made an attack."

>>44682610
>but I think +1 Void is here to stay. As mentioned, its their entire schtick. Kill the void, kill the clan.
You already killed the clan by insisting on keeping the void.

You turned them from an interesting concept to a speshul snoflake.

>>44682641

True, that's a possibility.

Whaaaat? Could it be that some homebrew that was slapped together in a day based on someone else's concept is imbalanced?

>>44682500
The only equivalent for the free attack before your opponent is from an Advanced School (Lion's Pride). And yeah, I went waaaay into OPland with that, whups!

Maybe....
Rank 5: The Swallow's Tail Cut
Once per turn, when an opponent declares an attack against you, you may spend a Void Point to activate this technique. You may immediately declare an attack against your attacker: this attack is resolved first. If successful, the attack does no damage, but your target is Dazed.

>>44682610
+1 Void isn't a schtick. A schtick is a thing you do. Reflexes helps the things this school does just as much as Void--it even gives them Air 3 to start--but without being 4 free xp.

>>44682642

Well shit son, I guess a lot of monk clans are speshul snowflakes too. Yep, this was a school designed around being super OP and speshul, not entirely based around fluffing a clan out of the book of void and experimenting with what a void based clan would look like.

You sure are a sharp one anon. Good thing we have you around to stop all these shenanigans.

>>44682706
Monk schools are bushi schools, retard.

Nah, I'm done, fuck you and your shitty homebrew.

>>44682725
you accidentally'd a not

in general i think its a bad idea to publish any homebrew to a wiki without testing it extensively to make sure it's (roughly) balanced. it's doing a disservice to the GMs who go to these places to look for content resources, and can't be expected to test it all themselves.

I really think that a school that gets +1 Void should overall be weaker than a regular bushi school, for obvious balance reasons.

>>44682725

Not even my homebrew bro, but I was actually there when it was being designed so I know what the actual concepts were.

Still, you continue to do us all proud. Good god, where would be without an actual L5R team member with knowledge of the sacred rules of homebrew to tell us how its all done? Without your shining guidance we might have to get creative in how to balance a +1Void school - but fuck that creative bullshit, am I right? We need more men like you anon, looking on from on high and telling us what's shitty.

God bless.

>>44682787

Well, obviously, it hasn't been tested yet. Someone should maybe disclaimer it.

And yeah, it's best if we find an alternate way to nerf it down a little bit. A cruel as it sounds, maybe the double attack at Tier 4?

>>44682787
Daoist Swordsman gets a mandatory Ascetic Disadvantage for no xp, for example, on top of being poor in synergy terms. I don't think having weakly integrated techniques is good design in general, and I feel Taoist Swordsman does too much to compensate for it's +1 Void, but a similar mandatory Disadvantage would certainly not be out of place, though picking a thematic one would be paramount.

>>44682829
simple attack at tier 4 is a start. a school that gives large bonuses to dueling getting simple attack at 3 is unheard of.

simple attack with yumi need to go entirely, I think. bows are extremely powerful and being able to do both swords good and bows good is probably not okay.

i don't like the idea of this school doing dueling good and bows good and kenjutsu good, something needs to go.

>>44682835
I would say touched by the void, as it's the most thematically fitting

But that disadvantage is cheesy as hell and is almost an advantage by itself

>>44682787
Not the guy who's making it, but the guy making suggestions on alternatives: I always try to make homebrew a little weaker than Great Clan stuff.

>>44682829
That could work.

>>44682887
touched by the void is garbage. you get dazed before you roll the actual roll you boosted.

New Skill
Crossbows (Intelligence)
Emphases: Light Crossbow, Heavy Crossbow, Repeating Crossbow
Description: All crossbows must be restrung between each shot as a complex action, in addition to reloading. All crossbows require 2 hands to use and operate. You may not assume the Full Attack Stance while using a crossbow.

Mastery Abilities:
Rank 3: Stringing a crossbow becomes a simple action.
Rank 5: Increase the maximum range of all crossbows by 50%.
Rank 7: You gain +0k1 damage with crossbows.

New Weapons
Crossbow, Light
Keywords: Small
DR: 2k2
Range: 100’
Special: A light crossbow’s damage is modified by Perception.

Crossbow, Heavy
Keywords: Large
Strength: 2k4
Range: 175’
Special: A heavy crossbow’s damage is modified by Perception. A heavy crossbow requires 3 strength to string.
Mastery Ability:
Rank 7: Attacks with a Heavy Crossbow ignore the effects of Armor on Armor TN
and halve the target’s reduction from armor or natural toughness.

Crossbow, Repeating
Fine mechanisms in this crossbow simultaneously string the bow and load a bolt from a gravity-fed magazine in the same action, producing a weapon that, applied en masse, can darken the sky.
Keywords: Large
Strength: 2k2
Range, 100’
Special: A repeating crossbow’s damage is modified by Perception. The Repeating Crossbow is automatically restrung as part of the reload action. Replacing a repeating crossbow magazine requires 1 complex action. Each crossbow magazine holds 5 bolts.
Mastery Ability:
Rank 3: You may reload a repeating crossbow as a free action.
Rank 7: You may replace a repeating crossbow’s magazine as a simple action.

>>44682914
>All crossbows must be restrung between each shot as a complex action
Wut?

>>44682908
What?

Holy shit that's awful, I thought it was afterwards

>>44682871

Simple attacks with yumi are long gone. Make sure you're looking at the most up to date version on the 1d4chan.

>>44682835
A Disadvantage would be neat and fluffy I think. I'd also trim the koku and honour a bit - they're duellists, sort of, but a kind of creepy obscure kind.

>>44682927
Crossbows take longer to fire than bows. This makes that happen mechanically. It's more that you have to reset the string between each shot.

>>44682914
Ahem.

Oyumi (Crossbow)
Within the Empire, the crossbow – known to the
Rokugani as the oyumi – is a weapon used only
occasionally by bandits or other criminals. The oyumi’s
physical concept was originally devised by the Kaiu family
of the Crab as a massive siege weapon, used to hurl giant
spears at oni and other Shadowlands beasts. Smaller-scale
versions were eventually developed, but the Rokugani
found them to be crude and lacking in the artistry and
beauty of the bow, and largely rejected their usage.
The Yobanjin, however, feel no special scruples over
distinguishing between “honorable” and “peasant”
weapons, and use the crossbow freely. Indeed, some tribes
employ it preferentially over the bow, especially those who
rely heavily on flying mounts such as eagles or wyrms. (A
loaded crossbow can be fired one-handed, unlike a bow.)

New Weapon: Crossbow
cc Keywords: Medium, Peasant
cc DR: 4k2
cc Range: 150’
cc Special Rule: Reloading a crossbow requires two
Complex Actions.
cc Price: 5 koku
cc Note: A crossbow relies on its own mechanical
force to deliver damage, and thus does not add the
wielder’s Strength to its DR.
New Skill: Crossbow (Agility)
The Crossbow Skill is considered Bugei by the Yobanjin
and other gaijin cultures, but is treated as a Low Skill in
Rokugan.
cc Mastery 5: You may now reload a crossbow with
only one Complex Action.

>>44682939
No, you test for dazed when you decide to use void. If you become dazed your pool gets reduced. So it is in fact during.

>>44682943
Ooooooh.

That's not what "stringing" means. "Stringing" a bow is attaching the string to the bow itself, pulling the string back is not "stringing."

>>44682955
What's that from? It's awful.

>>44682971
Okay! I'm not changing my wording!

>>44682970
Wow, from cheesy as hell to totally debilitating in an instant

>>44682993
The word you're looking for is "cocking."

Shield, Light
Keywords: Small, Blunt
DR: 0k2
Special: You do not suffer dual wielding penalties while carrying a shield in your off-hand. Adds +3 to your Armor TN, in addition to the usual defense bonus from dual wielding. You may only gain the bonus to your Armor TN from one shield at a time.

Shield, Heavy
Keywords: Medium, Blunt
DR: 1k2
Special: You do not suffer dual wielding penalties while carrying a shield in your off hand. Adds +5 to your Armor TN, in addition to the usual defense bonus from dual-wielding. A heavy shield is large enough that, worn on one’s back, it provides its defense bonus against attacks from behind. You may only gain the bonus to your Armor TN from one shield at a time.

Shield, Formation
Keywords: Large, Blunt
Special: All allies standing behind a formation shield gain +7 to their Armor TN. Requires two hands to carry, but may be planted in the ground as a simple action. You may only gain the bonus to your Armor TN from one shield at a time.

>>44682993
It's from Imperial Archives and at least doesn't use "Stringing" (Which is something that requires two or three extra people and can take hours) when it means "cocking".

>>44682940
Antisocial, maybe? They're weird and insular, after all. Or maybe Consumed (Perfection)?

>>44683001
That's actually helpful. I accidentally'd the word when I wrote that up.

>>44683017

I bit weird if you want to play a cheerful Butterfly.

Honestly, shifting them closer to monks might be the answer - no starting armour, koku yes, but not much, a penalty to gaining Glory, since it's about the art, not the victories.

>>44683014
Leave it to AEG to make sure there's never a reason to use anything interesting.

>>44682531
>>44682610

As fun as Void Point flame wars are, any more ideas on this?

>>44683098
The Tako Artisan? Not really, no.

>>44681863
I'm still looking for input here, though

>>44683241

Iunno. If you gave more fluff we could tell what it's SUPPOSED to do, and then help you figure out how to make it do that.

>>44683251
See Calm Heart Duelist in Strongholds of the Empire.

It's a rank 5 technique that builds off the Calm Heart Style.

>>44683241

Rank 1: Eight Arms, Seven Virtues
When making Artisan or Perform Skill Roll, as long as you possess more total Artisan and Perform skills (not ranks!) than any of your opponents, you gain a free raise. In addition, whenever you succeed in a contested Artisan or Perform Skill Roll against an opponent who has more ranks in that skill, you gain 1 point of Glory.

Rank 2: Natural Camouflage
When making a Forgery Roll, you gain a Free Raise when using it to Forge Artwork, and do not lose Honour for this specific application of the skill. As well, the skill roll of anyways making trying to determine the source of any Art you produce is giving a +10 increase in the difficulty TN.

Rank 3: Floating Existence
Gain a +1k0 on all Low Skill rolls, and on Unarmed Attack rolls and attack rolls made with weapons with the “Small” Keyword.

Rank 4: Grasping Tendrils
When rolling Commerce or Temptation when trying to sell a piece of artwork you have creative, or have someone accept it as a gift, add your Artisan skill ranks for the appropriate type of artwork to the roll. When someone is currently in ownership of a piece of your artwork, gain the Blackmail advantage against that person. Anyone wanting to destroy or get rid of one of your pieces of Artwork must succeed in a Willpower roll against your Temptation skill

Rank 5: Reach All Corners
-Something to do with finding buyers easy, and influencing the lower classes – getting lower classes mad or placating them, doing fun stuff with Rank 4, iunno.

>>44683451
If yo're giving bonuses for lowskill rolls, you should also give some means of avoiding continuously losing honour for low skill rolls

>>44683574

Aha, good point. That's also fluffy because I assume they don't give a fuck, and are good at covering their tracks. Should all honour they lose be halved, or ignored? Or can they spend VP to ignore it?

>>44683451
Rank 2: Natural Camouflage
You may add your Ranks in Forgery to the total of any Artisan or Crafting Skill Roll. When making a Forgery Skill Roll to Forge Artwork, you may spend a void point to add the sum of all ranks in Artisan, Crafting, and Perform Skills you possess to the total. Using this ability also increases the TN to determine the forgery by the same amount.

Rank 4: Grasping Tendrils
You gain a bonus of +2k0 to all Social Rolls against targets currently in ownership of a piece of your artwork. In addition, you may add your ranks in a single Artisan or Crafting Skill to the total of your Commerce Skill Rolls.

>>44683595
ignored, but only for specific low skills, sort of like shosuro infiltrator, but with stuff like forgery and whatnot

>>44683598
Actually, let me try again on that Rank 4.

Rank 4: Grasping Tendrils
You gain a bonus of +2k0 to all Social Rolls against targets currently in ownership of a piece of your artwork. In addition, you may add your ranks in a single Artisan or Crafting Skill to the total of your Commerce Skill Rolls and you gain a free raise to your Commerce Skill Rolls against targets who have fewer total Artisan and Perform skills.

Thanks, this also looks pretty good.

>>44683625

Hah, I like this, very scammy. I'm tempted to say that this should count for Temptation too - it's possible to use the artwork to "gift" to people in exchange for favours.

Here's what it looks like now.

Rank 1: Eight Arms, Seven Virtues
When making Artisan or Perform Skill Roll, as long as you possess more total Artisan and Perform skills (not ranks!) than any of your opponents, you gain a free raise. In addition, whenever you succeed in a contested Artisan or Perform Skill Roll against an opponent who has more ranks in that skill, you gain 1 point of Glory.

Rank 2: Natural Camouflage
You may add your Ranks in Forgery to the total of any Artisan or Crafting Skill Roll. When making a Forgery Skill Roll to Forge Artwork, you may spend a void point to add the sum of all ranks in Artisan, Crafting, and Perform Skills you possess to the total. Using this ability also increases the TN to determine the forgery by the same amount.

Rank 3: Floating Existence
Gain a +1k0 on all Low Skill Rolls, Performance Rolls and on attack rolls made Unarmed and with weapons with the “Small” keyword. You also do not lose Honour for using Low Skills.

Rank 4: Grasping Tendrils
You gain a bonus of +2k0 to all Social Rolls against targets currently in ownership of a piece of your artwork. In addition, you may add your ranks in a single Artisan or Crafting Skill to the total of your Commerce Skill Rolls and you gain a free raise to your Commerce Skill Rolls against targets who have fewer total Artisan and Perform skills.

Rank 5: Reach All Corners ???

>>44683658
Rank 5: Reach All Corners
Whenever you produce a piece of art for another, you may spend all of your current Void points to either gain them as an Ally with a devotion rating of 1 OR gain Blackmail against them. This ability may not be used more than once per month.

>>44683644
You already get the +2k0 to Social Rolls if they have your art. If you need more temptation, there's other ways to get it.

Hmmmm.
Rank 5: Reach All Corners
Whenever your artwork is accepted by a target of a higher Status than your own, you gain additional Fame equal to the difference between your Status Ranks. In addition, you may spend a Void Point to gain them as an Ally at devotion 1 or to gain the Blackmail advantage against them. This benefit is lost in 30 days.

>>44683768
Ally/Blackmailmind

>>44683770
Uh, go ahead and switch this up to:
Rank 5: Reach All Corners
Whenever your artwork is accepted by a target, you may spend a Void Point to gain them as an Ally at devotion 1 or to gain the Blackmail advantage against them. This benefit is lost in 30 days. In addition, you gain Fame equal to the difference in your Status.

>>44683658
>>44683794

Rank 1 is okay - I'm a little leery about free glory gaining but it's not terrible.
2: Uh, what's the point of this? Am I misreading it?
3: Not losing honor for using low skills at all is super silly. Needs some sort of RP restriction.
4: cool
5: Seems a little cheap to, say, blackmail the Emperor.

>>44683863
Well, you could try to blackmail the emperor, but it's likely that you'll end up dead in a ditch with your name stricken from all records for the attempt. Blackmail isn't a blunt tool, and the stronger your target, the more finesse is needed to use it.

>>44683863
>5: Seems a little cheap to, say, blackmail the Emperor.
Yeah, probably.

And you're probably misreading it, yes. But then, I'm now wondering why the latter half doesn't work with all forgery skill rolls. Forging Artwork is very, very niche.

Stuck a basic outline of the Tako on the wiki with a little balancing to Rank 3. Now I am sleepy.

Master of the Calm Heart
The famous Dueling Grounds of Dark Edge Village are not without swordmasters. Though there is yet no formal school of advanced teaching, like the Crane’s Kenshinzen, enough duelists have survived Court and Tourney to develop their own techniques, improving upon the Calm Heart’s teachings: to resolve disputes without needlessly taking life. Though the stances and strikes of the Masters of the Calm Heart may differ, they each have mastered the Serene Blade.
Technique Rank: 5
Replaces: Any Bushi 5
Requirements: Iaijutsu 5, Kenjutsu 5. In addition, must be trained in the art of Calm Heart Dueling.
Technique: The Sword of Serenity
A master of the Calm Heart strikes without killing intent. When you are wielding a katana or a wakizashi, you gain two free raises on all Kenjutsu and Iaijutsu Skill Rolls. These free raises must be used to declare a maneuver and may not be used for the Feint or Increased Damage maneuvers. Whenever you deal damage with a melee attack, you may discard the highest showing die to add half its total to your ATN until your next attack.

>>44683066
In all fairness, it says oyumi crossbows are used mostly by the Yobanjin.
Since Yobanjin are apparently Chinese (albeit heavily divided up along tribal lines), I'm guessing their crossbows are of the light to middle weight crossbow the Chinese stuck with for much of their history, which really wasn't as powerful as later models at all and their regular bows often had more power but took longer to train to use.

The Yotodai might have better crossbows; Romans loved those things.

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>>44684381
I decided to tweak this to add the entire total of the discarded damage die to your ATN. Otherwise it's rather piddly.

Also I was bored so I kept going as though it were an advanced school.

Rank 2: The Willow Bends, The Branch Whips
A master of the Calm Heart can surprise her opponents with darting speed, leaving them fumbling. A number of times per skirmish equal to your School Rank, when an opponent declares a melee attack against you, if you have not taken your Turn this Round, you may spend a Void Point to take a Simple Action to make an attack against that opponent. This attack resolves before your opponent’s attack. If your attack hits, it deals no damage and the target must roll his Earth Ring against a TN of 20 + half the amount by which your attack exceeded his ATN or be Dazed. If you use this Technique, you may only perform one Simple Action during your Turn this Round. (You may take Free Actions as normal.) You may use this Technique while in the Defense Stance. You may not use this Technique while in the Center or Full Attack Stances.
Rank 3: Heart of No Conflict
The greatest swordmasters of the Calm Heart style act without inner conflict, knowing their strikes are sure. A maximum number of times each skirmish equal to your School Rank, whenever you discard a damage die, you gain a temporary Void Point. These temporary Void Points expire at the end of the skirmish. In addition, whenever you kill an opponent, you may spend a Void Point to restore him to life with 1 wound remaining.

>>44677777

Hey dude cool quintuple sevens but have you smelled a samurai that looks like sunflowers?

N-no?

Just started reading the third ed Legends of the Burning Sands book.
Holy fuck the Yotodai are scary as shit.

>Iuchi Yue: "How large is their empire? How many troops can they call upon?"
>Nakima: "You mean here in the Sands or as a whole?"
>Iuchi Yue: "Both?"
>Nakima: "In the sands, tens of thousands. The Senpet a proving difficult to tame and they have had some losses, but are conquered people all the same. I would say perhaps a hundred thousand; that was sufficient to defeat the Senpet Empire."
>Iuchi Yue: "And as a whole?"
>Nakima: "Who can say? If I were to guess? Millions."
>Iuchi Yue: "Millions."
>Nakima: "They ad the ranks of each culture they conquer to their own, and they have conquered MANY. The assimilation process takes decades often, but they are patient. They remove their gods and make them speak the Yotodai language, and in a few generations the conquered people know nothing of who they were; now they are Yotodai. I imagine if they assembled their armies in their entirety they would outnumber the population of your Emerald Empire."
>Iuchi Yue: "They worship the Kami, you say?
>Nakima: "Do they?
>Iuchi Yue: "The Kami would never favor gaijin!"
>Nakima: "Perhaps not. And yet the Yotodai have conquered half the world in the name of their gods. What have the people of the Emerald Empire accomplished in the name of theirs? Sitting on the same patch of land for a thousand years? Congratulations."

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>>44674051
1. At that point the "Mantis" were just a bunch of Ronin defectors from the Crab. If anyone has a right to vengeance, it's the Crab, not the kid that Osano'wo told to fuck off.
2. The Phoenix apologized and Kameitsuo accepted it. That should be the end of the matter. Further pressing it basically says the Mantis founder was a stupid shit and his descendants don't accept his decision.
3. There were no Yoritomo yet. Yoritomo himself would not be born for centuries.

The Mantis-Phoenix slap fight comes from the Mantis pushing to have the Phoenix stricken from the rolls of great clans so that the Mantis could sieze Phoenix lands. In retaliation, the Phoenix refused to recognize the Mantis as a great clan. We all know how fragile Mantis egos are. So of course this lead to honourable chal- no wait, it lead to piracy galour and the Taint Queen of the Mantis (Kitao) stirring the pot to provoke the less Tainted Queen of the Mantis (Kumiko) to war on them.

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>>44675193
FYI, Shugenja doesn't mean Priest.
In Japanese (and yes Rokugan isn't Japan) Shugendo is basically what Kiho are in L5R. Shugenja are mystics, but priests are Kannushi (God Master, people who do literally what Shugenja do in Rokugan, invoke gods to make magic) and Shinshoku (God's servants) who are basically in charge of cleaning shrines and tending to metaphysical imbalances... The other half of what priests in Rokugan do. Why Wick ran with Shugenja... Is likely related to the rest of his ineptitude.

>>44685484
>In Japanese (and yes Rokugan isn't Japan) Shugendo is basically what Kiho are in L5R.
I know. I was saying that it's stated repeatedly in L5R that shugenja are shamans or priests, even though yamabushi are more like Monks are in L5R.

>Why Wick ran with Shugenja... Is likely related to the rest of his ineptitude.
In my two meetings with Wick, I will say this about him; when he knows his shit, he knows his shit. He knows/remembers some good shit too.
But when he doesn't he refuses to acknowledge it and not only is he still right, YOU are wrong about everything forever and fuck you and fuck your character and fuck your shit.

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>>44685531
I've met the.... person... as well.
He reminded me of George Lucas.
An energetic, enthusiastic, and supremely arrogant man who needs other people with authority to reign him in or his overzealous impulses shit all over everything he wanted to created.

>>44685583
Pretty much.
He also has very specific ideas of what a "good" game is like that I don't necessarily agree with. Or even a little bit agree with, actually.

>>44685368

>Nakima: "They ad the ranks of each culture they conquer to their own, and they have conquered MANY. The assimilation process takes decades often, but they are patient. They remove their gods and make them speak the Yotodai language, and in a few generations the conquered people know nothing of who they were; now they are Yotodai. I imagine if they assembled their armies in their entirety they would outnumber the population of your Emerald Empire."

I must admit: I'd love to see when the Yotodai turn up to have one FUCKTONNE of divine support come for the Emerald Empire from the gods of the lands the Yotodai stripped of identity.

>>44685583
Looks like Daigotsu is doing curls there or something.

>>44683891
As it is, the technique is literally 'get someone to take something from you, in a culture that highly reveres gifts and gift-giving, and they're blackmailed'. That's a problem, moreso because it's so cheap and spammable.

>>44685630
Yeah, apparently the Yotodai know when they are magically outmatched; they were very careful about taking over the Senpet because they had more magic then any culture they had fought before and in the Burning Sands the Yotodai got their asses handed to them in their second proper defeat in their entire history as a culture.

So when they invaded the Senpet they waited for a full Legion, then summoned the spirit-warriors of every single Warlord that has ever led the Yotodai in battle, another full legion of spirit warriors (doubling their numbers), and Aurelian (their current Warlord) personally summoned a physical manifestation of their chief God, Conquest to help out.

And that was pretty much that.

>>44685657

If they ever lost the favor of their gods for some reason (Like say, Sacking a Moshi Shrine might lose them their sun god's favor if they ARE the same gods), they could be in deep shit?

>>44685630
In the backstory of our house Rokugan setting, the Yotodai Invasion is basically the Rokugani equivalent of the Mongol Invasion, forcing Rokugan to change some of it's basic military tactics.
It turns out when your tactics heavily revolve around semi-formalized skirmishes between elite military units (as Heian Period samurai and Rokugani warfare is frequently stated to devolve into, regardless of what tactics are used prior to the battle) then you loose against highly skilled professionally drilled armies.

Only the Emerald Empire didn't get lucky like Japan did and have a tidal wave destroy the Yotodai naval fleet, because the Yotodai arrived on LAND in this timeline.

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>>44685611
A good game is one where the GM tells the players what happens and the rules, when not ignored outright, are there for decoration.
Anyone who disagrees is roll player, a cancer in the hobby, and should be summarily executed.

That's what I got out of him.

He really does not like having a lack of fluff-crunch agreement pointed out.

>>44685632
It's the Taint.

>>44685667
Not really; it's implied that their gods are definitely the Kami (the origin stories are too similar to be ignored), but their gods never abandoned them or died....so if it's the Kami then they somehow STILL remain in contact with them.

And their spirit armies are totally different; they don't have "priests" that call them down; any Yotodai that believes hard enough can do it. Effectively it's like when Rokugani pray to their ancestors and emulate what they do, except the Yotodai ancestors get their asses in gear and show up to fight alongside their descendents.

>>44685738
>That's what I got out of him.
Ditto.

>>44685738
L5R is kind of a crunchy game, it's surprising that he holds that view

>>44685874
He holds kind of interesting views on gaming in general.

There's a pretty infamous article he did where he said a) characters taking abilities like Luck were selfish because they didn't benefit the team and b) the best way to do something about it was to make their luck actually fuck them over (the example he gave was a superhero who had taken luck escaping an aoe only to either see their friends all die or woops they suddenly ran into a mob of supervillains, who's lucky now, or they got to watch their friends all die because some power they had could have negated the AoE).

I've never met him, but he's arrogant as shit even in his writing.

>>44685924
He's basically That GM with official branding.
I have a friend who thinks his word is gospel. We don't let him GM anymore.

>>44685120
I never even noticed that.

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Hey, L5RG!

I suspect this question was asked multiple times, but because I didn't see it previously, I'll ask again.

What era do you personally prefer to play the game in? Why?

Also, is there some place I can find a consolidated history of Rokugan, that tells me about the eras of play w/o the need to read 500 pages?

Thanks!

>>44686143
Late tenth century

Basically right before the meta-plot starts

>>44686143
Before the Mantis took over the Fox.

>>44686143

Colonies. It's a time of change and pretty fun if you ignore the major metaplot of the time.

>>44686143
Custom timeline (which has gotten increasingly complex) that ignores everything after the Hidden Emperor arc.

Hey, guys, is there any info about the Atlas PDF release? Will it be happening?

>>44685368
>>Nakima: "Perhaps not. And yet the Yotodai have conquered half the world in the name of their gods. What have the people of the Emerald Empire accomplished in the name of theirs? Sitting on the same patch of land for a thousand years? Congratulations."
We're gonna need a rank 5 Isawa water shugenja in here to take care of that burn.

>>44685484
>In Japanese (and yes Rokugan isn't Japan) Shugendo is basically what Kiho are in L5R
Not really, no. There's no elemental focus in RL shugendo, the closest thing in L5R would probably be those Lion shugenja that channel ancestors, except replace ancestors with kami, and not the wonky L5R definition of kami, either.

>>44686461
There will never be an atlas pdf unless someone is willing to scan their book, and the overall consensus about that seems to be "fuck you, that's never happening."

So, PDF never. Stop asking. It's not happening.

>>44686521
It's a fairly legitimate one too.
I mean, Japan's xenophobic excuses comes from naval technology not advancing quickly because of lots of earthquakes and tidal waves making navies hard to make, then later they got over that problem in the Sengoku Period before the Tokugawa Shogunate made seclusionist policies standard for 150 years.

Rokugan has no such excuse; they're on a mainland nation with more resources and territory to build ships (the Mantis have an impressive fleet for example) and because of one battle 500 years ago they stick their heads in the sand and pretend the rest of the world doesn't exist, even when shit like one of their literal gods (Shinjo) stomps in from the Burning Sands and makes it quite evident that what goes on outside of the Empire might be a BIT more important then then Rokugan thinks.

>>44686739
To be fair, as far as most Rokugani (other than the Unicorn) knew, outside of Rokugan to the north was just a desert wasteland, to the south was a radioactive wasteland of evil and horrible monsters, to the east was a vast ocean with some douchebag gaijin with cannons and guns on the other side, and to the west was unconquerable wilderness filled with more horrible monsters and gross brown "people."
Plus they didn't have a real NEED to go beyond the Empire, the lands they had provided more than enough for the people.

>>44686825
Just look at China for examples. Historically they control a large cobtinous area of land, and don't do all that much outside of it.

>>44686878
China wasn't always necessarily one big country for most of its history, as much as their bullshit propaganda says otherwise.

>>44686878
>>44686910
Plus virtually all of China's neighbors sans Russia and India were tributary states.

Though not directly, China pretty much conquered the known world around it.

>>44686910
well yes, they did pretty much go through cycles of one dynasty uniting the core into an empire, gobbling some neighbors up, having a solid state for about 100 years, then disintegrating again.

>>44686699
show me on the doll where Anon hurt you

>>44686910
Yeah, a lot of that comes from the PROC saying unification is always "inevitable", because that fits their party byline when for much of China's history there were different countries where China is now.
The areas around Canton for instance weren't really a part of most of the early and middle dynasties, and the farther outside of the central plains you go the more completely unrelated countries spring up in it's history.
>>44686825
China is also over three times Rokugan's size according to Atlas if Rokugan, so they have a lot more land to fail at controlling.

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>>44687078
Things wouldn't have to be like this if someone would just scan the damn book...

>>44687173
I understand the pain, but scanning usually implies tearing apart a very fine quality and likely going going to be very rare book since I somewhat doubt the Atlas is going to get many dedicated printings from AEG.

>>44687248
The best we can hope for is FFG either does a few runs under their banner or prints something identical to it once they get of their asses and fucking do something with the IP.

>>44687142
The nation spreads out to the limits of mountains, in both china and rokugan

>>44687248
Is AEG not releasing this book as a PDF?

>>44687310
Nope. No PDF release from AEG.

>>44687321
ADAIK there was no official information on PDFs.

So for purposes of balance I switched ranks 3 and 4, and dropped the second artisan skill. If the school needs any more balance I would suggest first dropping the free raise from (now) rank 3 and adding a mandatory negative trait ala Ascetic or some sort.

>>44679740
Kappa are totally a thing, the game just looks over traditional yokai types because its writers think shadowlands zombies are more interesting.

>>44687483
Technically shibito ("corpse-people") are a thing in Japanese myth, though they do not usually resemble the Shadowlands version admittedly.
Too bad, because some yokai like scythe-weasels sound way more terrifying then yet another horde of zombies, demons, and NotOrcs from the Shadowlands.

>>44687588
Doesn't japanese mythology contain giant skeletons?

I recall giant skeletons being a thing

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>>44687854
Gashadokuro (literally, "starving skeleton"), yes. Made from the massed bones of people who starved to death fused into one giant skellyman.
Traditional Japanes yokai are many and quite varied, easily rivaling things like Nordic mythology in numbers of deities and monsters. I think the reason they aren't used as much in Rokugan is...well...they aren't really Mordor Monsters; they don't travel down in huge nicely organized hordes where each monster clearly fits into a sub-class of troops. Instead they're all very weird and very unique.

>>44687948
Seems like a good end-boss monster for a gaki-do themed campaign

>>44687991
Gashadokuro are supposed to be invulnerable or invisible (seems like most mythological creatures can become invisible), and apparently wander the country at night picking up travelers and ripping their heads off so they can drink the blood that squirts out, because Japanese myth is pretty metal.

>>44688041
I think in a gaki-do focused campaign, they'd have some crystal and means of detecting restless spirits by the time they're up to the final big fight of the campaign

>>44683892
They're a minor clan, they're supposed to be niche.

>>44686143

Either Great Famine, or the 13th Century but assuming the Sapphire Throne continuity where the Toturi dynasty continued and none of this retarded bullshit happened.

>>44685484
Yeah, but I'm talking about the role of Shugenja in the setting, which is a combination of the two priest roles with some fantasy wizard mixed in. And that's not the end of the world, its okay for Rokugan to be a fantasy setting based off of Japan and to retain some fantasy tropes y'know?

But getting back to the original "what can phoenix do besides suck at magic" point, ideally they should be as important to Shugenja and non-spellcasting religious types alike as Crane are to artists and diplomats. The guys who set the standard.

A lot of it goes back to the rebel mystics, the Dragon, being easier to write positively than the traditionalist mystics. The Phoenix, like the Lion, are sold to players as "the best at X" so fucking up at X is an easy story beat. You don't get stuff like warlords furiously competing for a Phoenix spiritual adviser to assure their victory with portents and omens because...I don't know. That'd be a cool reason to have the Phoenix leave their mountain once in a while.

>>44687404

Thanks. Do we think the butterfly are properly nerfed enough now? Since they do get +1Void we have to make sure they're a bit of a step behind Bushi school designed for pure war. I'm almost tempted to have Rank 1 just boost art and not give any fighting bonus at all....

>>44685924
I remember that one. Like, dude, its his POWER.

There was a lot of push to turn player purchases against them in some circles in the 90s, and that attitude is still alive and well, if less vocal, these days. Like the pinnacle of GMing is breaking a guy who built his entire character around shooting's pistol over and over again.

Doing it ONCE could be an interesting challenge, but man vary that shit up. Its okay for your players to feel like the time they put into the character is worth it.

>>44688811

It's also autistic in the extreme because if you really felt Luck was a bad power or that it wouldn't fit, why wouldn't you man the fuck up and talk to the player before hand? I laugh how many "badass, super serious, top tier GMs", are just people unable to speak to their players like human beings without dropping spaghetti all over the gaming table.

>>44688786
I thing we're in a sweet spot now. Any more would take away from the flavor of the class.

>>44686143
I admit I've warmed up to the colonies, so I usually customize around then. I generally like the Mantis being a part of the political scene so I don't do pre-Clan War stuff too often but I'd be willing to play it.

>>44688920

Fair enough. Of course, it does need to eventually be tested but I think its a fairly decent take on "Can we do a Void based bushi school without it being super OP or total shit"

>>44687588
Dude I know. I've been pro-more weird yokai for YEARS.

>>44688909
Sometimes players (and GMs) don't listen. Its like the Henderson story, you have to hear that the GM "had it coming" before its properly amusing. The extended Henderson really shows that this player tried to get along before swearing revenge.

We dunno if Wick's group is as autistic as he is, I mean.