/l5rg/ - /l5r/ - Legend of Five Rings General

>>47910760
It's weaboo fantasy samurai.
You have to read the fluff and the rules to GM it. Emerald Empire has the most comprehensive fluff in a single 4e book.

>>47910818
BTW, anon means weeaboo not in the sense of "Japanese stuff" like so many people have debased the term to mean, but in the "white person with a superficial at best understanding of Japanese culture and history".
The designer of the setting is a much less clever man then he thinks he is.

>>47910849
Yes. It's very much a fantasy setting first. Historical accuracy is left at the door.

>>47910818
It is weeb in the way it was to be weeb before anime got big despite as a game being made after that point. It is old school weeb.

>>47910818
So I read Emerald Empire and Core and I'm good?

>>47911369
You're bare minimum, yes.
Don't do a game focused on any specific clan(s) without looking at the Great Clans book entry for them, at least.

I super hope FFG reboots the whole thing and gets rid of all the dumb bullshit that plagues the lore.

>>47912665
And not let the fucking card game plot seep into the RPG.

>>47912682
Yeah they should run Gencon larps to decide the plot instead. :^)

>>47910760

A fantasy setting that uses Japan (and chunks of the rest of Asia) as its crib sheet/framework instead of Europe. 4E Core and Emerald Empire are all you NEED, but you'd be well served read Great Clans as well. There's a LOT of setting information out there.The Spider Clan are controversial at best, so be careful with them (or just truncate them entirely; it's not particularly difficult).

>>47912713
Hurls internally

What does L5R do well, mechanically?

>>47913384
Lethal, high-impact combat.

>>47913384
Mechanically, it captures the feel of the setting quite well. Fights are dangerous things and the way stats and skills are handled reflect the semi-magical nature of humans in the setting.
The balance isn't perfect, but it is better than you'd expect from something with this many unique class-like character progression schemes. Spellcasters aren't extremely overpowered and can't directly replace other characters, and there are fluffy ways for a GM to reign them in without being too meta if they do break things over their magically charged knees.

>>47913517
Caveat on balance: It's decent enough within one social group. Great Clan schools are all mostly okay, but they collectively shit on Minor Clan schools, which themselves collectively shit on Ronin, who shit on anything that isn't a samurai or monk.

>>47913426
What do you mean by "high-impact"?

>>47913517
>stats and skills are handled reflect the semi-magical nature of humans in the setting
Can you elaborate on this?

>>47913636
If the guy you're fighting gets one solid hit in you FALL DOWN, or at least are so seriously injured that beating him becomes increasingly difficult.

This is dubbed the "Death Spiral" effect by fans.

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>>47913636
>>What do you mean by "high-impact"?
you heard me.

>>47913636
Every stat is connected to a "ring", which is an elemental concept. Air, Earth, Fire, and Water. There's one physical and one mental stat within each of the elemental rings, and increasing both is required to increase the Ring itself. Your Earth Ring affects how much damage you can take, your Water Ring affects how fast you move, and all of them are affected by and affect magic.
There's also the fifth Ring, Void, which is entirely standalone. It gives you Void Points, which are like fate points or destiny points or what have you. Only humans have this strong connection to the Void.
Skills are more related to how the culture actually handles education, with specific groupings that are universal within the culture, but not outside of it. Rokugani swordsmanship uses a different skill with different mastery effects than any given gaijin swordsmanship skill.
A core part of normal characters are Techniques, which are semi-supernatural, well, techniques. Special, secret ways to fight, or argue, or cast magic that ONLY students of your School know. The strong cultural focus on ongoing education is linked to character progression. You get better because you went back to your sensei and learned more, not because you magically got the next ability out of the aether. Your School is a combination preschool, grade school, middle school, high school, college, and grad school, and is at least as important as family and feudal ties.

>>47913795
>preschool
Minor quibble. A child's parents are supposed to take them for the first seven years.

>>47914333
The parents are primary caregivers for sure, but they do prep them for their school, and often the little kids will play with slightly older children who are already in School.
On average, a kid bound for a bushi school is going to have a more rough and tumble early childhood.

>>47913636

>What do you mean by "high-impact"?

He means it's deadly combat fairly easy to die in 1 or 2 shots as a starting character and it leads to a fairly grueling death spiral.

It's not ridiculous D&D HP.

>>47913636
Its do DND as Dwarf Fortress is to base builders.

>>47916329
Crane be limp-wristed as fuck. Didn't anyone teach this bitch how to hold a sword?

>tfw you'll never be an all Kitsuki-family party and play Law and Order: Rokugan edition.

>>47916347
Crane got cut. I doubt they teach them how to hold a sword when you've lost.

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>>47916347
He needed to go smelt more metal to get swole.

>>47918153
Also stop bleaching his eyebrows I guess.

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>>47918188
Goddamn it, now I can't stop looking at it. I'm going to have to check all my Crane art. Thanks, anon

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Has anyone ever ran the 'tournament of Minor Clans" before, and if so, any house rules or changes I should do? Or any tips and suggestions otherwise, like for prizes or whatever.

>>47913636
>What do you mean by "high-impact"?
You can die in a single attack, it'll average around 2-3 though.

Not even joking.

>>47919270
Not all Crane bleach. Some are naturally white-haired. It's considered a sign of power in shugenja.

>>47922328
Also, it's likely that some pluck their eyebrows entirely and paint on a replacement.

Why does HOR3 use 4e rules but set itself in 1137 and have Toturi on the Throne?

>>47924306
Because the time period for each edition of the RPG is only the default, not the sum total of what that edition can accomplish.
4e itself has two entire sourcebooks for playing in other eras (Including some theoretical and what-if scenarios).
Also, I'm pretty sure HOR is one of those alternate timelines.

>>47924306
Because they play with an alternate history that kicks off before the lore went to shit. IIRC AEG made that a cannon alt history setting in Imperial Archives?

>>47924455
Imperial Histories.

>>47924450
>>47924455
Would you recommend the post-Hidden Emperor setting? I want to run a few games and these seem to be the only 4e premades around.

>>47922328
If you bleach you think you'd remember to do your eyebrows too.

>>47924508
I've done it, but I ignore the dumbest stuff and don't play it up. And rewrite other things I hate. Basically you can seriously run a game set in any era, or in one of those nice still in between times, but as a GM you have to know what dumb is to be found and how you personally want to deal with it.

>>47928400
why does the horse wear a mask?

>>47928400
horse dick

>>47928491
No one cared who she was until she put on the mask.

>>47928562
Why does anyone care who the horse is?

What's going on?

>>47928491
Because it passed Scorpion horse gempukku

>>47911119

Yeah you gotta remember the age of the person writing it. Kids were watching the animu while he was probably being a weeb for Shogun and Rising Sun and shit.

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>>47930317
I fucking loved Shogun, even though it is about as historically accurate as L5R is, but if that was what Wick was reading he had a very weird interpretation of their ultra selfish/pragmatic honor in that book.

>>47933643
That doesn't look like a normal oni. I like the idea that the Scorpion's pit vomits up more Indian themed monsters due to that being where Kali died. I'm going to include that in my game now since it is set a century after the Destroyer War and ignores most of the canon since to try and do an AU thing specifically for my group

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>>47933956
>>47933643

The one from the other angle is great too

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>>47935333

I love Ki no Oni's design. Something about how strange and different it is compared to other oni

>>47935348
I always liked the Oni no Tsukakoro.
It's just a rolling bonecage (covered in spikes) that ricochets off people until it can tangle someone's limbs in itself. Then it manifests tentacles, holds them down, and digests them on the spot.

>>47935435

Ah, good ol'Oni no Tsukakoro. Brings back fond memories of "Mirror, Mirror".

Man, I wish I had "Bearers of Jade" and "Way of the Shadowlands". Those old First Edition books were so strange and weird and awesome.

>>47935542
>Brings back fond memories of "Mirror, Mirror".

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1AfNOKQdY-U ?

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>>47935949

>>47935996
Not as immediately delightful, sadly

>>47936923
There's no shame in delayed delightfulness.

There is any School focused in the Firearms of Iron Rokugan? Oficial or Houseruled?

>>47941295
Read the clan specific firearms.

>>47942793
It really triggers me when I see Crane without dyed hair. Hayaku died for your sins. Show some respect.

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>>47943073
It isn't compulsory or anything.

https://app.roll20.net/join/1485553/toeMpg

Okay fagmos. Starting at the Topaz Championship. If someone wins they will be more powerful than everyone else. If your character dies you rejoin the party with reduced XP. Schedule pending.

>>47943719
Oh, and no ninja.

>>47943719
Schedule is really important, especially relative to the time zone too.

>>47943979
Made a thread in the roll20 for scheduling.

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>>47943073
>Dyed hair
>Not natural white/silver

>>47944532
Not all Cranes are from that one family.

>>47943719
Text or voice?

>>47944579
IC will be text. Optional VoiP for OOC/coordination. Probably be using a discord server.

>>47944667
I've found a lot of people you recruit online aren't comfortable with voice. Maybe use a second text based service just for the OOC channel or something?

>>47944735
Discord does voice and text. It will be used for OOC.

>>47944735
Which makes it really annoying for those that prefer voice. So much typing.

>>47944769
I don't like talk unless it is for /v/ games. I stutter and talk over myself when I get excited so kind of ruin dramatas for important IC scenes. Coordination OOC would probably fly with me, but some people are even more reclusive.

>>47944875
>I stutter and talk over myself when I get excited
Yeah, I fell you man, so do I. Ironically for L5R, I have the opposite accent/speech impediment common to asians, my Rs come out as Ls.

I still prefer voice, because I just don't care, and writing so much is a pain in the dick. Reading too, if you've been away for a minute and need to catch up or something.

So if L5R is so deadly, how long does a typical campaign even last? Do you just endlessly cycle through characters?

>>47944951
You just don't get into a lot of fights, and you're a lot more careful when you do.

There's no such thing as a dungeon crawl in L5R. There's no endless featureless rooms of monsters for you to slaughter for loot.

>>47944951
It's only deadly if you lose.

Really, in most skirmishes, one of your dudes will finish off their enemy first, then help others mop up. If the opposite happens, well, either you manage to run away (shamefur dispray) or TPK.

Duels are rarely to the death, but you shouldn't be throwing duels around like candy.

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>>47945017
oops wrong vader.

>>47944975
>>47945017
So is there no monster fighting whatsoever in L5R, mostly courtly intrigue and mano e mano duels? Because if a skilled human can kill you in one hit how on earth do you defeat a monster?

>>47945067
Oh no, there are monsters. The shadowlands and spirit realms are there for a reason. It's just that monster in L5R deserve respect / fear and disgust.

>>47945067
Monsters are incredibly rare and they are very dangerous. You generally don't fight anything of that caliber until you've got a significant amount of XP under your belt and you're more resilient.

In a generic campaign, the majority of fights you're gonna get into are with people less skilled than you are. Peasant infantry, criminals, maybe some zombies or other lesser shadowlands creature like goblins.

>>47945067
You don't usually get one-shot by people. You CAN, but only if they are incredibly lucky. On average you last for 2-4 hits, but the first hit is the most important, because wound penalties are a bitch.

>>47945067
This one-hit-kill thing is only true at low levels and under specific circumstances. An unoptimized guy attacking with a subpar weapon will need as many as 6-7 hits (or even more) to kill a prepared PC.

>>47945067
That's when you send in the Witch Hunters, Vindicators, or Inquisitors.

But seriously though, in groups or when everybody's at round IR3 is when you start tangling with the nasties in my experience.

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>>47945749
That first line sounds very 40k. I know what you mean, but still.

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So does anyone else have trouble remembering to use glory rules? Honor I award/take at the end of a session, barring some egregious sin or major act, letting me look back over events without having to stall the game by checking evry few minutes, but I for some reason am garbage at doing the same for honor. Should I just print off the table and tape it to my forehead or something, am I a retard?

>>47948603
There really shouldn't be rules for glory. Just try to remember what the party has done and have people recognize them every now and then.

Hey, what's the latest info we have from FFG?

>>47949084
The latest news is that we'll get news at Gencon.

>>47948809
I strongly disagree. Glory should be awarded formally. I recommend having players track their glorious deeds and then brag about them at the appropriate time.

>>47949757
But the glory mechanics suck. You either need to houserule them to not suck or just ignore them to make your game run smooth.

>>47949735
Didn't Gencon happen like two months ago? So...next gencon? No chance of anything in between?

>>47947730
Sounds more like you're conditioned to associate with 40k.

>>47948603
I say leave it to the players to write down their glory / honour changes. After a session, go over the notes, make changes, and then hand them back.

>>47950053
Gencon is in August.

last bump of the night

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Here guys, a full collection of L5R RPG books, inlcuidng 1st/2nd/3rd edition rulebooks and splatbooks, as well as some 4th edition fanmade stuff.
https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B_YUlI4RPylqTkloeWlIeWY5aVE
Copy the link for the /l5rg/s of the future.

>b...but it is Google Drive!

Suck it up. I hate Mega.

>>47954067
Does anyone hate Google Drive? Why?

>>47954096
I dunno, but I often get the hate on 4chan from sharing Google Drive links. Should be a /pol/ tinfoilhat/NWO thing.

>>47954067
>>47954146
I doubt anyone will give even half a shit. You made a big deal out of nothing, sempai.

>>47950276
They said Gencon 2017, not 2016 though. Or was that changed?

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Remember, broader profile is more attractive. Therefore your end goal is to be a very silky mobile piece of toast.

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>>47955153
We'll see in August. I think that RPG news is the year after, but we should get more info on how the card game is going to go in the future and possibly just setting info useful to the RPG or LCG.

>>47943719
Still looking for a few more for this.

>>47955772
I actually like smaller parties, but you do you.

>>47955772
Too big of a group and really I think I don't need any more games going on lest the ones I presently run/play in suffer. Try fishing up recruits on other game forums? The AEG forums are gone so I guess...rpg.net is the main L5R location now? Though really rpgnet is more shitty and toxic than 4chan so I'd avoid that.

Does L5R have fan run forums anywhere or something?

>>47955860
Only the clan forums themselves come to mind at this point.

>>47955772
I just posted in the Schedules thread, so you have at least 1 more willing to join.

So, who else here is terrified that FFG are gonna completely redo L5R mechanically and make it end up like their shitty Star Wars game?

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>>47956258
Not me. Roll and keep is such a popular part of the system, I highly doubt it's going anywhere.

>>47956258
If they remove R&K, they can keep those books. I will be perfectly fine with 4th edition.

>>47956324
I hope they keep roll and keep. The math with it is simple, but it also allows surprising depth to the system.

>>47956324
>>47956342
>>47956371
Hypothetical question, but how do you guys feel about Roll and Keep using d6s instead of d10s? I got a player in my group who always complains that l5r is d10 instead of d6, since most people have more d6s lying around than d10s.

>>47956411
I don't like it. Exploding would happen way too often.

Many people would have a lot of d10s anyway because WoD uses it.

>>47956411
Theoretically it could work, but it would screw with the probabilities and damage schema of the system. Exploding would happen too often, so it would probably be a mechanic when you role doubles.

>>47956411
poorfags who can't even afford a grip of D10s wont buy the books anyway.

>>47956451
You are vastly overestimating WoD's popularity, anon.

>>47956551
Dice roller apps are free, too.

>>47956576
I didn't say "most". And it's probably the second most popular system after D&D/Pathfinder.

>>47956597
>dice roller apps are free, too
Except for the Star Wars FFG dice roller. They want to charge you 7 bucks for that shit.

>>47956712
This argument was about d6 vs d10, not dFFG.
Pretty sure pirates have that app, too.

>>47956411
You'd have to completely rework the difficulty TNs for that, since it isn't like Shadowrun where you're aiming for hits or something. A lot more work with weird implications for dice resolution than you want to deal with, I think

>>47956841
>You'd have to completely rework the difficulty TNs
Multiply all DCs by 0.6. Raises are 3 instead of 5.
Done.

>>47956863
Does that account for greater ease of exploding dice?

>>47956863
Not done at all. Dice exploding happens 70% more often (10% to ~17%). And they can explode multiple times.

>>47956898
>>47956901
Exploding d6 vs exploding d10 only increase the effectiveness of a dice roll by about 4-6%, (depending largely on how many dice you roll vs how many dice you keep).
Personally, I don't think that this would affect balance to badly, but if it must be changed, simply make exploding dice become d3s instead of d6s (but still only explode again on another rolled 6, instead of on a rolled 5 or 6).

>>47957026
Ooooor we could just keep d10s, they aren't hurting anyone and there are neat multiples of five...

>>47957118
Obviously we're gonna keep d10s. I was just wondering if d6s would even work.

>>47956258
Just look at their 40k RPG. That shit uses a five-bazillion years old system randomly patched up to modern standards (kinda).

>>47957937
What does 40k use? Isn't it D% with degrees of success?

>>47956411
Bad idea. Just use an online dice roller and keep a phone or laptop on hand if you don't have d10's.

>>47957945
Yup. It has been since forever, even before FFG got the 40k RPG license.

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I don't care if FFG changes the dice system - as long as its still lethal, and not wuxia

So, first time GM for L5R.

What are some good ways to get everyone in a mixed-clan group of people together working towards similar goals while at a Winter Court?

Also, what are some good plot hooks that can introduce people to the setting?

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>>47958751

>mixed clan group

Oh, well thats pretty easy-

>Winter Court

Fuck.

Unfortunately I cant help you with modern metaplot (4th edition) because I haven't given a shit about the metaplot since 4 Winds.

Winter Court is basically a political super bowl - everyone is busy with intrigue and political duels in hopes of securing the best footing for next year. A mixed clan group will invariably be put to working aginst each other, UNLESS, they are members of the Emerald Magistrates or Emerald Legion - at which point, their overriding duty is to the peace, and the emperror.

Once you have a party of cops (basically), then plots become easy. Murders, intrigue, plots against the Emperor, whatever.

Point of advice though.
Don't look at L5R from the top down - the games major failing is that it focuses too much on metaplot and family\clan daimyos\rank 5 heroes, basically people you will never meet or have anything to do with.

Your best option is tofocus from the bottom up, and set games around minor land owning daimyo, from retainer families, etc. A lord with a castle, and a few villages - then fill that campaign with lots of colorful npc's. Once you do, its relatively easy to base a campaign around a place you've fleshed out yourself

>>47958751
>What are some good ways to get everyone in a mixed-clan group of people together working towards similar goals while at a Winter Court?

Have a common enemy or all the clans in question to work against. If you can't make up one, then use the Spider and its associated parts (Shadow Dragon, Bloodspeakers, you name it) or a "meta" enemy like the Obsidian Dragon or the Yodotai Empire/Yobanjin Tribes.

>Also, what are some good plot hooks that can introduce people to the setting?

A common enemy with super-sekrut evil plans is a good start. It allows the characters to explore all the Imperial factions with impunity and meet all the important people. It also helps avoid the 'L5R Standard' samurai drama that is pretty much the weakest point of the game and focus on heroic action that is a lot more enjoyable for beginners.

>>47958751
A first time gm really should not dive straight into court stuff from zero experience with the setting let alone winter court where the chances to break the game up with non court stuff is sharply limited. This going to be the imperial one too?

>>47958848
>everyone is busy with intrigue and political duels in hopes of securing the best footing for next year.
The rulebook has these vague words shoved all over the place, but I wish it was more specific than that.

>>47958751
First question: Magistrates is the go-to answer. Other options would be family favors that need to be repaid, ancestral connection to each other (cousin of Xth degree), allies of necessity or drinking buddies on holiday as the more light hearted option.
About WC, either go for magistrates or make their respective clans aim for a common goal.
A less obvious approach would be them getting invited as a group by the emperor /empress herself for their deeds.

As for Q2: Are they more fans of grand fantasy or low key subtle stuff. Each era had its own flavor. More info needed.

>>47959133
Also this. WC is NOT a place for beginners. The slightest misstep can lead to disgrace death and/or war. Start smaller, provincial or at best minor clan court.

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>>47958751

What have been said, also alliances/marriages. Some characters may have been married or bethroded to other Clan, or the PC could be in the entourage of NPC who marries into other PC Clan.

About plothooks, think about what do you wannat teach them and create a mission to show them how world works. For example, after a quick investigation they may easily spot the criminal, but he happens to be a man of standing, they would have trouble looking for witness able to testify. Or their daymio orders them to cover the whole affair.

>>47959250
Actually, WC might be the best for beginners as they can easily meld into the crowd and remain low-key while the big guys do their big guys stuff.

>>47959170

If you want some good examples of political intrigue, watch Deadwood or Game of Thrones

>>47959287
There is no low crowd. Being invited to the WC is a privilege most samurai would kill for just to be able to say they were there. The only low crowd are the servants. The entire palace is filled with the best the empire can muster.

>>47959287
>>47959344

WC has probably a glory requirement of 6 or more.

>>47959344

You are talking about the Emperors Winter Court, but pretty much every single irrelevant palace hosts a Winter Court. PCs could be invited to that of the local Lord.

Can someone please explain why Shosuro Actors are good? I've heard again and again that they're an OP school, but I just don't see it.

>>47959344
There's at least one low crowd in every Imperial Winter Court.
The Crab draw lots and send a random wall soldier to the Emperor's court along with their entourage. Hida Nobody can rub shoulders with Doji Bigwig and think about how his feet hurt and wish he had his tetsubo.

>>47959400
Speaking of Shosuro actors, why is it they don't get the Infiltrator thing of not suffering honor loss from using low skills?

Especially when they get Sincerity (Deceit) as a school skill.

>>47959133
No, Just a regular Hida Winter Court, Not Imperial.

Should have specified. That is an important distinction.

>>47959443
Most of the Actors aren't really infiltrators, even though they have the ninja tag. They're really actually just actors putting on plays and being artsy most of the time. Only some of them do sneaky stuff on the side. The Sincerity (Deceit) thing and normal honor loss is a little weird though.

>>47959317
I can't really think of anything from those settings that can be used as examples for L5R.

>>47959380
When people mention WC, its usually implied to be the emperors court, partially because of the pbp event that was held in the past.

>>47959472
Hida court is more laid back than most. The Yasuki put on the normal decorations and events, but they're really looking for secured trade deals and supply lines more than anything else.
The Kaiu like to talk about crafts and engineering, so anyone into that stuff can have fun at a Crab court.

>>47959482
I was wanting to play one as a ninja. Y'know, take the place of a servant in a court, gather up information on things and then get out. But the regular honor loss seems like it wouldn't take long before I was sitting at 0 honor.

>>47959544
Just take the perceived honor advantage at a few ranks and hope the gain from your moral successes outweigh the losses from your methods.

>>47959572
I guess that works. For some reason I thought that at honor 0 you were NPC'd, but after looking over the book that doesn't seem right.

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>>47959485

Watch how people talk - don't mimic the speech, but Deadwood is great for how everyone talks in circles, shows threats without being threatening, backstabs and blackmails within the veneer of polite conversation.

Game of Thrones does the same thing

>>47959538
Also expect a big sumai event, lors of drinking competitions and a-many paranoid Kunis.

>>47959818
That's still incredibly vague.

>>47959443
>>47959482
Because the negate honour loss thing isn't really necessary to maintain your (low) honour. IMO, it shouldn't exist, even on the infiltrator - perceived honour exists if you want to seem honourable, while student of shourido gives the effects of having 5.0 honour.

>>47955860
The size of the group will probably be only 3 or 4 in the end. Not everyone's schedules are gonna line up, and /tg/ usually has a high flake rate. I encourage you to apply anyway and see if works out for you.

>>47955772
I'd like to join but I have 0 experience with the system aside from looking at a pdf briefly. How bogged down would that makes things and should I bother writing up an application?

>>47961807
Not a ton, so long as you're willing to learn and don't mind typing like a weeb. I had a decent grip on the setting after about two weeks with my first group.

>>47961460
So should we start sending in character apps now or should we wait?

>>47962044
Cool. I'm gonna download the pdfs and figure out what I who I want to make. 4E right?

>>47962072
Send them in as soon as youre ready.

>>47962095
What time zone (GMT ref, please) are you running in?

>>47963197
USA East Coast. I think it's GMT-4 now? Because of daylight savings.

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So people who have run/played in longer games, what did you find a worse threat? Smart courtiers or horrible monsters?

>>47967251
Smart monsters that look like courtiers.

Small update to anyone part of Chinmoku no Chikai that is in the thread but hasn't updated the roll20 page. More information has been posted. Starting XP is 45, and more.

>>47967469
I absolutely hate how correct this statement is.

>>47967469
I'd say that's stupid but one of the most annoying frenemies the PCs had in a game I ran was a Kitsune who'd lived so long as a samurai she had school ranks in one of the more OP courtier schools.

So yes, that. I agree completely. Though Nothing Sharks and just really intelligent enemy conspirators also were up there

I'm looking for ways to approach playing a Togashi monk that avoids pitfalls of the standard 'lol 3insight5u?', or otherwise does something interesting.

What have you seen / done / thought of, /tg/?

>>47968367
An ex-Mirumoto bushi who was forced to retire due to a serious failure of duty. Being part of the party has made him ache for battle. He struggles with his bushi nature when he is expected to be 2insightful.

>>47943073
Contrary to the card art only one family does that.

I fucking hate the disparity between the CCG art (which has leaked into the RPG books since 3e) and the actual setting fluff, it's created so many people like you who just have this horribly wrong image of that Rokugan is SUPPOSED to look like.

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>>47968473
...No.

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>>47960915
Not the guy giving suggestions, but the entire point is that you need to experience it to get it. We're not going to just give you examples and you can go off that.

You need to get a feel for it and experience it. If you just sit here and complain about how vague the entire idea is, then you'll never understand and you'll never have fun in those games.

>>47968552
>Literally says "many"
>not "all"
>section specifically about the Daidoji family
Quit while you're ahead.

>>47968795
It's in the Daidoji Family section because it's in the story of the founder of the Daidoji Family. It is done in honor of the founder of the Daidoji Family, and it's clearly not specific to the Daidoji Family.

Also, "many" is much different than "only one family".

>>47968795
Not that guy, but...
>many Crane
>not many Daidoji

>>47968883
Also none of those guys, but he's not wrong that people do get the wrong idea about things from the art. Think about how people see clan colours. I've had people outright tell me it's an insult to wear other clans' colours.

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>>47969014
>Think about how people see clan colours. I've had people outright tell me it's an insult to wear other clans' colours.
This pisses me off to no end. It's specifically written that people don't just dress in JUST their clan colors 24/7, but because the art always shows everyone in their specific clan colors everyone just assumes that's the way it is.

Another thing I want to bitch about because it also pisses me off is the Scorpion lands. The CCG artists just went "sneaky and underhanded clan of secrets? Make everything dreary!" and now everyone thinks Scorpion lands look like the fucking Shadowlands (before the recent second pit bullshit) when they're supposed to be just as, if not more, lush and vibrant than the Crane lands.

I said it before and I'll say it again, 1e had the most accurate-to-the-fluff art of any L5R product ever printed.

>>47910760
Does someone have the 1st Edition PDF? The Mediafire only goes as far back as 2e.

>>47969151
>I said it before and I'll say it again, 1e had the most accurate-to-the-fluff art of any L5R product ever printed.

Actually, Oriental Adventures had much better art IMHO. 1st edition art was kinda silly and hard to take seriously.

>>47969282
Here >>47954067

>>47969475
OA had a certain toned down feeling from the rest of l5r. The anvil of despair producing red paste, versus the Lost kidnapping a guy and making him weave a tatami mat from his own skin.

>>47954067
Man that minor Clan Book is rocking, and seems pretty well balanced.

And since I'm running the Tournament of the Emperors Favored. So fucking useful, thanks Anon.

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>>47955366
I honestly don't expect RPG news for several years. They seriously from the announcement didn't seem to have a ton of interest or ideas on it.

I also fear they'll change it, and change it for the worse. Like making it more.... Not in a insulting way - but more "accessible" for the typical DnD/Pathfinder RPG player.

>>47969751
It's FFG, chances are if they're going to change it they'll write their own system that uses special dice and expensive peripherals. It'll be WHFB 3e all over again, alienating all the longtime fans, and they just won't care.

>>47969475
>>47969662
>acknowledging d20 rokugan as anything but an abomination

That's a seppuku level offense.

>>47956371
I like the fact that it allows you to choose what you roll. To fail on purpose, or barely succeed.

Had on of my players do very little damage to a person in a fight to save his life for further RP reasons and it was awesome.

Looking for a few odds and ends to complete my L5R collection. Anybody have any of these lying around?

1E:
3012 The Tomb of Iuchiban: Box Covers, History Book, The Tomb, Picture Guide, Map of the Tomb, and Room Squares and Grid of the Hidden Heart
3020 Otosan Uchi: Box Covers, Poster Maps
4500 Character Travelogue: Crab
4501 Character Travelogue: Crane
4502 Character Travelogue: Dragon
4503 Character Travelogue: Lion
4504 Character Travelogue: Phoenix
4505 Character Travelogue: Ronin
4506 Character Travelogue: Scorpion
4507 Character Travelogue: Unicorn

2E:
3040 Complete Exotic Arms Guide supplement (somehow different from 3046 CEAG)

3E:
3202 Creatures of Rokugan
3204 Emerald Empire
3210 Fealty and Freedom

4E:
3318 Atlas of Rokugan

>>47969822
>3318 Atlas of Rokugan
A PDF was never released and no one will ever scan this. Period.

>>47969836
>no one will ever scan this
Why not?

>>47969845
Because a proper scan would require effectively destroying the book. You have to take it apart in order to do a proper scan.

And since it was the last book published by AEG before the higher ups randomly decided to sell the IP, there was only one print run, there won't be more, and thus it's a considerably rarer book.

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>>47969784
It was an abomination, make no mistake. But it was an abomination with very nice art like pic related.

>>47969883
That wak is tiny.

>>47969883
That's no different than the 1e art.

1e had far more examples of that style than d20/2e, and if anything also had more of the sillier examples as well.

>>47969943
>and if anything also had more of the sillier examples as well.
"and if anything 2e also had more of the sillier examples as well." I mean.

Fuck.

>>47969883
Also, there's more than a few pieces from d20/2e that were recycled from 1e.

>>47969943
When it comes to 1st edition art, I mostly think about the art from the Roleplaying in the Emerald Empire rulebook. Oh boy, that art is all about samurai pulled through a filter of 80s hard rock and death metal. You can just hear the greatest hits of Judas Priest in your head while checking out those pictures.

>>47970068
Are we looking at the same book? Because I'm scrolling through it as I type this and all I see is samurai that look like something pulled out of a history book. The only thing at all in the entire book that looks like an 80s metal album art is the front cover.

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Speaking of art, does it annoy anyone else that like non of the weapons have any art of them. Having to google like every weapon short of a Katana to figure out what it is is fucking annoying as shit.

>>47970132
1e and 2e were pretty good about having art for everything. 3e and 4e really dropped the ball in that regard.

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>>47970107
Looking historically accurate and being vintage metal is not mutually exclusive.

>>47968746
That doesn't help.

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What is /tg/'s opinion on having an unarmed attack count as jade/crystal if the character had something like pic, of appropriate material, wrapped around their fist?

>>47970323
Sure, but it might break.

>>47970323
That'd probably work (Because jade harms tainted beings just from contact), but it would also be extremely expensive to have that much "real" jade made into a bead chain. However, making it so that every other bead is jade would work as well, and only be very expensive, rather than prohibitively expensive.

>>47970382
true

>>47970382
Well, you can make roughly three beads from a single finger of jade. For the 108 beads, you would thus need 36 fingers of jade. 1 finger of jade worth 1 koku, so the full-jade bead chain would cost 36 koku or roughly 1 and 1/2 tetsubo (or 1 no-dachi and 1 yari). I would hardly call that prohibitively expensive.

>>47970877
Aye, but you would also have to source that jade. Depending on the when of it, that may be harder than pulling enough koku out of your keister.

>>47969151
Scorpion lands that aren't Yogo lands are supposed to be pretty normal. Yogo live in a literal swamp so what can you do? I mean swamps are definitely pretty in their own way of course but still swamps.

>>47924508
There's very little preventing one from running an adventure or campaign from previous editions. The balance is off, but you can find r&k averages (either a list or app like the l5r toolbox) and tailor target numbers to your group.

Also, kaze no shiro has piles of material.

>>47971031
If you use the stipend rules from Imperial Archives (which you should, since that's finally a representation of that funding your lord is supposed to be giving you and shit) you can probably save up and order that much wholesale from the Scorpion who mine jade and sell to the Crab, and thus likely have some raw blocks on hand. Probably cheaper to get an unfinished block than a bunch of fingers and carve yourself some beads by hand.

>>47970268
What exactly are you trying to get out of this conversation, then? If you want people here to spell out l5r-specific intrigue plots in every detail, why don't you just use a module?

Bumpu

Where does one learn more on Shourido?

>>47976131
A dumpster. Where it belongs.

>>47976131
Imperial archives. Or /swg/ and ask about the sith

>>47980825
>How can my little Lion be this grizzled?

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Are there any more weapons in any of the other books, or all the weapons just in the core book?

>>47982138
Weren't kunai irl just dull ground breaking tools used for digging that got popularized by manga?

>>47982138
There's a lot of them scattered about, including various firearms (Historical gaijin ones and theoretical Rokugani ones), bokken and shinai, three-section-staves, crossbows, and a few whatsits and doodads aside.

>>47981630
Pick an advanced school that grants a free action attack (for three attacks per round), and take missing limb: arm.

>>47982138
I'm still hoping for a fifth edition from FFG that goes the way of Legends of the Wulin with weapons. Which is to say, rather than produce great honking lists of weapons, lotw gives twelve or so weapon traits that can represent weapons, or be combined for sacred/special weapons.

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>>47982251
Do you happen to now what book the firearms are located in?

>>47982350
Imperial Histories has dirty gaijin weapons under the Era of White Stag. Imperial Histories 2 has grorious alt-history Rokugani firearms under Iron Rokugan. There's also ninja firebombs and explosives somewhere, and those actually exist in generic Rokugan.

>>47982194
Yeah, it was a gardening shovel basically.
Shinobi supposedly used them for climbing purposes by thrusting them into masonry gaps in stone walls and strung ropes through them like climbing pitons, hence the little holes in the back of the grip.

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>>47982399
>grorious alt-history Rokugani firearms under Iron Rokugan

Rokugani Tanegashima? Sweet!

Are they any good?

>>47982767
Not great but that's just because SLOW FIRE GUN FIRE and for some reason small arms keys off intelligence. If you too find that stupid, slap it with Perception or Reflexes and save Intelligence for cannonade and whatnot.

Though yes just fucking someone up with a musket shot is totally a thing.

>>47983014
It's based on intelligence because there's a lot of rote memorization combined with zen mumbo jumbo and careful breathing.

Making maps for this game is extra hard for me. I mean i hate and suck at making maps in Western Medieval games, but this, this shit is seething new. I just wanna make a medium port town with a nice dojo and to do that it seems like i'll be reading and studying so much.

I do not have the time for all that AND drawing the fucking thing.

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>>47983070
I find it weird though because the best shots I know irl are kind of dumb. Or at least not exceptionally smart. I feel like loading a musket is rote, but being a good shot is a matter of other physical skills. L5R your way and all that, but that is one of those weird rule calls that I guess I'll always be a bit weird over. Isn't like it ruins the game for me or anything.

>>47983145
Another way to look at it.
The techniques taught to rokugani marksmen rely on intelligence.

>>47983145
The best shots you know irl aren't firing their guns as an exercise in meditation and spirituality.

Rokugani gunners use a similar philosophy as their archers do. You don't bother to aim in detail, you just point it in the right direction and *push the projectile* when it feels right.

>>47983203
Yeah, neither are the Marenrae and Thrane and their guns run on the same rules. Or do they not and I am just blanking?

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>>47983014

Huh

Im running a campaign currently where Rokugan (clan war era) has open trade with Theah (7th Sea), and firearms are now starting to become somewhat prolific in armies.

I modified an L5R version of the Rois et Reines school for one my players, whose playing a Musket Ronin.

Basically, a Musket takes 3 turns of uninterrupted action (which means your TN is 5 if your doing this in combat), does 4k4 damage (doesn't increase except with raises), and ignores Armor in every aspect, but not magical armor effects (oni invulnerability). Firearms as a skill keys off Agility, but theres multiple skills related with using a firearm, example: using a bayonet, using it as a gunstock club, etc

>>47983258
Their guns actually use slightly different rules, in that the Mastery Abilities of their skill sucks dick compared to the Rokugani ones.

>>47983268
That's close to the actual rules, but the official ruling is that they use Intelligence, and the damage is 4k3 and increases off of perception.

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>>47983268
>a Musket takes 3 turns of uninterrupted action

...takes 3 turns of uninterrupted action to Load

Rois et Reines helps that a bit though, heres my 1st Edition houserule of the school if anyones interested

Rois et Reines School
+1 Agility
Firearms, Polearms, Knife, Defense, Craft: Gunpowder, Any 1 Bugei Skill, Any 1 Low Skill

Outfit - Katana, Wakizashi, Gaijin Musket, Light Armor, Steed, Travelling Pack,
Gunsmith Kit, 20 Gunpowder Cartridges, 2 Koku

Rank 1 - Apprentice
+10 to Firearm Range. 1 Free Raise on Mounted Bayonet Attacks

Rank 2 - Journeyman
+25 to Firearm Range. Reduce Firearm Load Time by 1 Turn
Gain +1k0 to Init, when fighting with a Mounted Bayonet

Rank 3 - Master
+50 to Firearm Range. Spend a Void Point to negate all modifiers to
a targets TN to be hit, including cover, range, or any similar conditions.

Thean Musket - 4k4 Damage, Ignores All Effects of Armor, Requires 3 Rounds to Reload
With Bayonet - 3k2 Damage, Reach, and has Polearm Init Bonus
PommelStrike - 2k2 Damage, Increase TN by 5 for Light Armor, by 10 for Heavy Armor

>>47983281
Trait is the same though. Sucks for them though, looks like meditation and focus really does make you a better shot. Though you'd think the mastery abilities would be a fine differentiation. Isn't like bows use intelligence either, they use a trait that makes more sense.. To me, of course, I'm in the minority here I recognize.

>>47983339
The gaijin weapons use Intelligence because it's mostly just rote. "Load gun, point gun, fire gun, repeat".

>I must admit that Kakita Tamami’s Dawn of Fire is one of the finest puppet plays I have seen in some time. She has skillfully reflected a puppet’s lack of ability to express nuances of gesture by creating dialog that possesses no emotional depth at all. I am stunned by the magnitude of her achievement. One might have thought the actors of the Jeweled Garden troupe, who were performing the play, would have difficulty reproducing the wooden mannerisms the play requires, but no: they managed to faithfully embody the play’s complete absence of grace, energy, and mood. Truly a wonder.

Doji Barahime is my waifu

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Both of the magistrate schools presented in Emerald Empire seem cool. But which one is better? Any opinions?

>>47984185
She's Oscar Wilde in a kimono.

>>47985447
But she wasn't half as gay. She was a long term widow with no desire to remarry sure, but she was also in love with that one Kakita who she feuded with her whole life.

>>47984733
Doji Magistrate if you want to be a ponce, Soshi Magistrate if you want to be the Batman.

>>47985864
>make it to IR 10. Be both
After all, Bruce Wayne is important too.

>>47985544
>But she wasn't half as gay
What, are you some kind of queer faggot that don't like the gay?

>>47931781
To be fair, he did note that historical Japan is the nation that Bayushi would have built.

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Are there any chargen programs for this game? Any automatic charsheets?

>>47987361
Yeah.

>>47987388
Link?

>>47987415
http://lmgtfy.com/?q=l5r+character+builder

>>47987441
Yeah, sure, but which one is actually good?

>>47987457
They're all fine. It's not rocket surgery.

>>47984733
The Soshi Magistrate is superior.
>Versatile Rank 1 Technique
>Decent Rank 2 Technique
>Awesome Rank 3 Technique
>Maybe the best Rank 4 SAA period
>Good Rank 5 Technique
What else do you need?

>>47987504
>Maybe the best Rank 4 SAA period
I like the ones that work melee and range.

>>47987879
Is there a single on of those that doesn't suck in some way or form?

>>47988615
Hiruma Scout (Not Bushi) can make SAA with samurai weapons, knives, and bows, and can make SAA with literally anything against a shadowland creature or tainted nonhuman. Not bad.
Daidoji Scouts are almost as good, but are only have katanas and wakizashis, rather than the full trio of Samurai keyword weapons, and they're missing the shadowlands part. Otherwise identical with knives and bows.

While not realistic to even join, the Kenku Swordsman school allows you to SAA with literally anything, as long as you have an emphasis for it. I don't know if you count having to spend XP for each weapon as a sucky, but I don't.

>>47989236
And getting into schools that you can never realistically join or start in, the Dark Moto Cavalry gets attacks as a SAA at rank 3 with literally no strings attached whatsoever, and the Maho-bujin advanced school gets the same thing at rank 2.
Of course, you need to be Lost to go that route, which is generally game over for a PC.

>>47989236
Knives and samurai weapons aren't exactly at the top of your melee options, so to speak. Unless you can snatch the Moto Bushi Rank 1 for some Samurai Scimitar goodness.

With the Kenku Swordsman School, the 'Kenku' part sucks, so there is that.

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>>47989454
>Samurai Scimitar

Goddamn on the list of things I absolutely hate about L5R's metaplot, the changes to the Unicorn are right near the top

>1st edition
>introduce rich clan with foreign knowledge, horse culture, and a family with mongol heritage
>continually increase the division between this clan being rokugani until deciding "fuck it" they just arent
>kolat
>gut the clan, remove all the japanese out of it, replace it with mongol instead
>make the ujik-hai moto a bunch of gigantic not-rokugani assholes who think its perfectly ok to not be rokugani
>foreign influence into the unicorn is what infected them with kolat aids in the first place

Unicorn were fine in 1st edition. Kolat metaplot ruined them, and AEG just ran with it and made it continually worse.

I think the thing that bothers me the most though is that the Shinjo Bushi school was removed entirely. You can't be a SAMURAI CAVALRY MAN now without being a woman (Otaku fuck you, its Otaku) or a Mongol (Moto)

>>47990309
Shinjo Bushi still exists in 4e, it's just not in the core book. Emerald Empire, page 31

>>47990375
They're just not really good until they hit rank 4.
Rank 1 is okay, but it relies entirely on Void Points and has no other benefit. Rank 2 is okay for what it is, but what it is requires you to be in Full Defense stance, which means you're just sitting there like a lump. Rank 3 is fine for an SAA Technique.
Rank 4 is actually good because it turns your Rank 2 ability into a serious advantage. Sit like a lump, avoid the enemy's attack, and then counterattack. Rank 5 is also good because it lets you spam your Rank 1 with impunity as long as your Void rank is good, which it should be by this point.

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>>47990375

Im not as keen on 4th Edition as I should be. If you haven't guessed already, I'm somewhat stuck in the past.

But I'm reading it now...

>>47990440

Their 3rd Rank turns them into pretty good Horse Archers, so thats something. But the 1st and 2nd Rank techs are pretty terrible

>>47990440
If you really want the Kuwalree Shamurai feeling then replace Shinjo Bushi Rank 1 with Moto Bushi Rank 1 then take the Shinjo Scout and Yomanri Archer Alternate Paths at Rank 2 and 4. That will take you to the most archetypical mounted samurai you can get.

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>>47991006

Speaking from a 1st Edition mindset, it can accomplished pretty easy by playing a Lion, and taking "Different School: Shinjo Bushi School"

But your idea is pretty fab - probably gonna do that if I find myself in a 4th Ed game

>>47991170
Not to be antagonistic, but I have to wonder why you would want to be a mounted-focused character in a roleplaying game in the first place. The opportunities to fight from horseback seem like they would be so limited compared to any other kind of combat, and when that skillset is useful you run into the single-player session problem of being the only guy specced for a given scenario.

It's a great concept thematically, but practically it doesn't seem like it would ever be worth it-- like trying to play a courtier in a Shadowlands game.

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>>47991468

In my experience, L5R is best when characters are built as warrior poets, and a well balanced character should be able to fight in a battle, fight in the streets, fight indoors, all while composing haiku in his spare time, studying the mysteries of the Tao, and being eloquent and savvy enough to speak on his lords behalf should the need arise.

As a GM of L5R, I always tell my players this. I dicked myself a loooong time ago making a combat focused beatstick Crab in a campaign that turned out to be winter court - but it was fun as fuck, because I had to sink or swim as a little fish amongst the teeming sharks.

Problem is though, clans are built around theme, and schools are somewhat narrow. Just looking at the Moto school, a Moto character will have a helluva time in a winter court game, from the fact he has no one to hit with his oversized weapons\scimitars, and everyone hates the Moto for being mongols anyway.

Im just not familiar enough with 4th Edition to know if they've blurred the lines a bit so that schools are more useful in different situations. Speaking from 1st Edition experience, its fairly easy for me to build any kinda balanced character, and even the Shinjo Bushi School (1st Ed) had techniques that worked while on the ground or on horse

>>47991687
Skills and stats are more important than Techniques when you're trying to branch out and handle different situations. That Moto in court would have a better time if he just got some ranks in Courtier, Etiquette, and maybe Sincerity and an Artisan skill or two (Poetry always applies). It's extremely easy to justify a character getting skills that aren't strictly within their School, because most schools have the capacity to crash course just about everything, and the basic skills are not school secrets, so you can also sit in with a friendly school's class or get a pen pal to help you out.

>>47991687
>that pic
>crane modern art
>laughing_drunken_crabs.haiku

>>47991826
It occurs to me that tattooing pigs is probably a really convenient way to learn how to actually tattoo in the first place. It's not like you want to saddle a fellow samurai with your shitty student tattoos.

>>47991468
A mounted archer in a war themed campaign is a godsend. The party will most likely compose similar characters or even synergizing characters if the players are meta-savvy.

>>47991884
what about shaved goats, would they work as well?

>>47991826
>a deulist's focus
>see the grace of the crane's strokes
>as he paints his wife

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>>47991775
>It's extremely easy to justify a character getting skills that aren't strictly within their School,

I wouldnt say "exteremely easy"
The clans are setup on stereotype, and AEg has always preached to "play against type" with characters
>the crane battle tactician
>the crab poet and romantic
>the lion spiritual warrior
>the straightforward dragon
>the aggressive phoenix

etc etc

However, you do have to justify to the GM as to why "im a jock among my jock friends at mongol high school, but I want to read books, write poems, and romance the cute girl for reasons other then breeding heirs"

Playing against type is absolutely the best idea - but it still requires an explanation.

Unless of course your GM isn't slaved to the raw of the setting,and realizes that the stereotypes are bothersome

>>47991900
I don't know what goat skin is like, but maybe. Pigs are actually really close to humans in the texture and consistency of their flesh, so I think for learning they would be ideal. Goat's might be a bit tougher, making putting the needle in more work.

>>47991884
True, that.

>>47991931
Damn, son.

>>47991963
Unless you've got an edgy "my bloodline is deeeeeeaaaaaaad" backstory, you can always say that you've got cousins, uncles, aunts, and/or sibling in other schools who can get you an in for crash courses.
Also, in most clans, the courtiers will start pestering anyone slated for Imperial Court, trying to get them to take the courses so that they aren't a complete embarrassment to the entire delegation. I'm sure the Yasuki and Ide lament their positions every time a Hida or Moto are put on the court team.

>>47991963
>The clans are setup on stereotype, and AEg has always preached to "play against type" with characters

Yeah, L5R is supposed to be about special snowflakes doing special snowflake thing. There is literally a whole story about Lady Doji getting all wet when Shinsei shows her that snowflakes are indeed special.

>>47991931
Doji strokes with brush--
when I paint Crane wives, their hands
stroke a different tool.

How would you rate the schools from strongest to weakest?

>>47992087
On a numbered scale.

>>47992029
Lady Doji had a nature boner

>>47992087
>tier lists

A good question would be if any schools are broken or trash.

>>47992087
I wouldn't bother trying to rate them, since there's so many. I guess the ones that are less situational would be "better", since they have more applications.
Also, you'd need to separate them into at least 4 different groups, since there's really not a lot to compare between bushi, courtiers, shugenja, and monks (And ninja, artisans, and the dual role schools).

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>>47992029

1st Edition Way of the Crane

Every Kami has a tale where Shinsei said thing, and they learned something about themselves as well as the world

>Hida, strength is nothing without knowing weakness
>Doji, the lives of mortals actually matter
>Bayushi, let people assume your a shit
>Akodo, NO I HATE YOU GET AWAY
>Shiba, heroic deeds are the true power
>Shinjo, I don't know
>Togashi, this doesn't matter, none of this matters
>Hantei, I also don't know
>Fu Leng, gods suck, mortals are better

>>47992115
It's only natural.

>>47992121
Even picking the top and bottom tier of that is tough since schools only do so much in some situations.

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>>47992087

I can only do this for 1st Edition

>>47992072
beautiful surface
over a fat, squealing sow.
the Crane and pig, both.

>>47992115
Lady Doji was a nut job.

>>47992072
When the first snow falls
The Hida maiden tastes
My Akodo blade

>>47992199
I do get preferring an old edition, even if I don't agree, but how the shit have you managed to not read 20 years of material and still come to hang out with us faggots?

>>47992244
Just like her clan nobility. And I'm a huge cranefag saying that. The shitty crane are so terrible

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>>47992254

Got into L5R back in 2001 with 1st Edition\2nd Edition. My GM blended the two, but still used the mechanics values from 1st.

Played the CCG until the 4 Winds was over

Played 3rd Edition rather frequently

Stopped playing L5R, both CCG and RPG around 2008 (I think), and then got back into it around 2012 when I found a new group and started running my own L5R campaigns, considering I had previously been a player for my entire time.

Since then, I've stuck with 1st because the rules are simpler and easier to teach to new people. I personally prefer the metaplot of that era (Coup+Clan War) and its easier to explain to new players. New editions reflect the metaplot, so its harder to run a 4 Winds game using 1st Edition (although its something I've considered doing).

I just missed 4th Edition complexly, and I have no idea whats going on in it. I figure I should probably educate myself on the metaplot and the rules, but I'm set in my ways.

Likely I'll make the big edition jump when FFG unveils whatever it is that they've created. Assuming its not a complete abomination (d20 L5R).

I don't even dislike 4th Edition, I'm just completely ignorant on it. And its been so long since I've used 3rd Edition rules, I barely remember them. I have no idea what happened with the metaplot - last I heard kali or something was tearing the shadowlands into pieces and Hantei Naseru was dead and there was a new empress chosen by ??? and shes a dragon or something, I dont know.

I'm also currently running a 1st Edition campaign (coup going into CW), so all that info is fresh in my mind

>>47992360
There's a tournament, I think it's held by the celestial dragons, and Kitsuki Iweko wins and becomes Iweko I. Unlike Toturi, she actually has the mandate of heaven and becomes divine.

How good is the Tengu Swordsman School? I kind of wanted to do a story where a vengeful Ronin is going around challenging courtiers to duels so that when he kills the appointed duelist, the Courtier has to commit Seppuku, and Tengu Sensei has so much pride in his student that he doesn'the realize what is happening.

>>47992447
It's pretty good. The rank 1, 2, and 3 are decent, the rank 4 is meh, and the rank 5 is potentially one of the most broken Techniques in the game.

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>>47992426

Thats cool. A Kitsuki is kinda who I'd choose for an Empress.

I never really liked the Toturi Dynasty, but I think it never had a chance to shine. The Hidden Emperor saga was so...wierd.

4 Winds though is my favorite period post CW. I thought it was rather clever to create a four way succession crisis, and then introduce an absolute badass BBEG (Daigotsu) - plus, the different successors were all rather interesting.

Toturi Tsudao was my waifu

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>>47992447
>>47992485

Which school? What book?

>>47992585
>caw caw motherfucker

>>47992585
Kenku Swordsman, Enemies of the Empire, pg 180.
Their rank 5 Technique can become literally any other Technique from every other school (Including non-human ones) at the cost of a void point. The only stipulation is that you have to have seen the technique in action.

>>47992360
The metaplot has been retarded since the war of the spirits. 4e doesn't make you deal too much with it though, since they built the book to be fairly period agnostic. The history is there but things aren't hitting you over the head with it and Imperial Histories is the two big books of fully detailed alternate or historical timelines to play with. 4e is my favorite since I got into the game late 3e and then 4e hit and it was a general step up. But you do what flies for you.

>>47992618
Seen the technique in action at any point ever. Go to a dojo where someone is demonstrating? Bam, you've got their techniques. Watch two duelists from schools with dueling Techniques? Bam, you've got all of the techniques from both schools.

>>47992618
Magnificent. Does that work only for activated techniques, or for passive ones too?

>>47992519
Tsudao was the empress Rokugan needed but did not deserve. She was too good for that foul world, so she had to die.

>>47992707
It only works for bushi techniques, but there's no distinction between passive or active ones.

>>47992519
Iweko's rule has some neat stuff going on. Kali's evil cult depopulates the Ivory Kingdoms to a huge extent, and then she invades Rokugan. They finally kill her in Scorpion territory, where her death creates a second, smaller Festering Pit-- that's all kind of so-so for me.

However, with the Ivory Kingdoms nearly empty, the time is ripe for some imperialism, and everybody gets on that, establishing colonies there. There's a lot of really interesting conflict between traditionalists who want to export Rokugani culture to the colonies wholesale, and progressives who want adapt old traditions to a new environment, and the mix of Rokugani and local Ivory Kingdoms influences in the area is really cool.

Sadly the Spider are deeply ingrained into that story-line, but it is what it is.

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>>47992618

Thats pretty neat.

I ran a campaign a year ago that featured a Kenku sensei to the groups Kakita Duelist. Said crane had the classic flaw of "im beautiful, im a beast with a sword, don't give me a dirty look or ill cut you down" of typical crane duelist characters. Player wanted to learn Kenku sword techniques as his campaign goal, and I thought that was a neat idea, so I went with it

I dropped enough clues for him to wander around in the undeveloped wilds until he found himself a Kenku - at which point said Kenku (who I based off Pai Mei), essentially humiliated him while calling him out on his inferior mishmash of uninspired mediocre swordsmanship, citing a number of different "meme techniques" that had slowly polluted the true "Kakita" swordsmanship which the Kenku themselves taught to Kakita (in my lore anyway, not sure of the actual truth). I even implied heavily that said Kenku was also Kakita's original sensei, but it was all just implication that was never confirmed.

Eventually Crane gets mad, tries fighting for real, gets further humiliated as he gets blasts of dry leaves in the face, once rolls some ungodly number of exploding tens, and cuts down an illusion (all while being mocked), and then eventually begs the Kenku to allow him to be his student. Kenku tells him to stop acting like a retarded ponce as if his shit ass lazy swordsmanship is any better then the other characters, and to stop thinking he knows any goddamn thing at all.

Character started learning Kenku techniques, and became a whole lot more humble. He even went several sessions of game time forbidden to even use a sword, and had to find other means to solve his disputes - which defaulted a lot to relying on the other PC's.

Also, for flavor for what I thought was a neat Kenku way of fighting, the "duel amidst fallen leaves" scene from Hero was what I had him go through.

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>>47992727

>Imperial Rokugan

Wow, so thats whats going on? Thats pretty cool. I had seen some new maps listed as colonies, but had no idea what that was even about. IIRC, the Ivory Kingdoms was basically Africa right?

>Sadly the Spider are deeply ingrained into that story-line, but it is what it is

Eh, the Spider clan seemed like an interesting idea - but it smacks of "we need to have Daigotsu do something but were all out of villian plots"
As far as a character option of giving players the ability to play tainted characters but not be bad guys, that seems kinda iffy to me

>>47992914
The Ivory Kingdoms are pretty much India.

>>47992914
Basically India, not Africa.

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>>47993004
>>47993010

Not to sound racist, but that meshes better with Fantasy Japan, another fantasy asian country.

I had always assumed it was Africa, much like the Burning Sands is Arabia.

I kinda wish the Yobanjin were fleshed out A LOT more, so they had a flourishing culture\land\kingdom\multiple kingdoms so they could basically be Fantasy Koream instead of just saying "they didn't have gods lead them, so they just became a bunch of backwards hick barbarian versions of Rokugani"

Missed opportunity to have the Yobanjin Kingdoms and the Emerald Empire be on-again\off-again trade partners and enemies.

So here's a question I've heard some arguing about.
Is the Toritaka Bushi school available to the Crab after the Falcon clan is absorbed?
There is no official word, but keep in mind that the Toritaka have actually gained a shugenja Path (Toritaka Exorcist, as a Kuni Shuggie rank 2 alt) and explicitly retained the Falcon's Strike bushi path as well, which indicates that they are still capable of maintaining dojo with complex Techniques.
I personally think that they still have the School as part of the Crab. The Crab certainly wouldn't have gotten rid of it, given that its focus on supernatural threats meshes very well with the overall clan stance on such things.

So wait, the gempukku is supposed to be a coming of age test at around 14, right?
So if the Topaz Tournament is supposed to be the gempukku, all the PCs are teenagers?

>>47993096
The Crab (And the Kaiu in particular) are partially the Koreans of the setting, in the same way that the Unicorn are the mongols (But toned waaaay down).
The Yobanjin are actually somewhat mongolish.

>>47993153
Yes. The Topaz Tournament does have some older participants (Particularly ronin who manage to get invitations), but if you've gone through a formal gempukku, you're not eligible for the tournament, because it itself is a mass gempukku ceremony for all participants who don't completely fuck up.

>>47993152
I don't know why the crab would get rid of it. Even as a minor clan, the Falcon were spawned from the Crab specifically to watch out for ghosts, and they only got absorbed back into the Crab when a crisis in the Falcon's territory demanded the Crab take action. I can't imagine they would through out a perfectly good school developed by their own cousins to combat a different branch of the same threat they've always been focused on, that would just be crazy.

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>>47993182

I suppose. Thats something that wasn't as pronounced in 1st Edition, but became pretty obvious by 3rd. I've never much agreed with it though.

It's not hard to make Rokugan a varied mixed of idealized traits of the Samurai period over...what, 800 years? From the Heian to the Meiji?

But while thats obvious to me, thats because I'm a higher tier weeb then Wick and the gang.

It just seems like it would have been better for the setting as a whole, to make Rokugan purely fantasy japan in its themes and influences, and place fantasy analogues of other important asian cultures in the setting. Otherwise, it comes out a little compact and forced when you jam several asian cultures together into a rather small area of land with the justification that the gods of the setting only care about this small piece of land, and everyone else is just barbarians of some stripe or another

>>47993213
>>47993153
Your sensei has a lot of say in when you take your gempukku, too-- some promising students take it earlier than fourteen, and some who aren't quite there yet can have it a little further on. It's considered shameful for a sensei to throw a student into it if they aren't prepared to at least meet the challenges it presents, whether the student can find it within themselves to pass those challenges or not.

Speaking of the Topaz Championship, though, how does that interact with all of the weird idiosyncrasies the various clans practice during their gemppukku? Do they put their students through all of the unique traditional stuff before going to the tournament, or what?

>>47993300
Some have their students go through a less formal version of their normal gempukku test beforehand (Just to make sure they can), while others accept the tournament itself as the test. All of them have to demonstrate that they can use the first Technique of their school, or they wouldn't qualify for gempukku in the first place.
I imagine that most of them wait until after the tournament is over to go through their celebrations and rituals (Like the daidoji getting a crane tattoo).

>>47993298
Rokugan itself is not small. I forget the exact numbers, but it would actually be in the top 30 for largest nations on earth if it existed IRL.

>>47993367

I'd be curious to see those numbers. I've always run it as a lot bigger then the maps seem, so I can place tons of retainer families in provinces and stuff

>>47993403
http://archive.4plebs.org/tg/thread/44591887/#44618053
Basically, if those numbers are even roughly correct, Rokugan is bigger than any single country in Europe except for Russia (Which is cheating, since it's only partially in Europe).

>>47993440
It also makes it bigger than Texas and California combined.

Need a new thread, btw. Bump limit reached

>>47992360
>that pic
Man, I fucking love this game.

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>>47993852

I'm really looking forward to what FFG does. They need to hurry the fuck up and least start dropping some info at the very least.

I wan't to know if its going to be a new age for L5R, or if its going to be another dark time where the IP gets totally fucked by an outside company (WotC)