I would be extremely surprised to see any loaded keywords in the FFG iteration of L5R. I suspect those will all be on their way out, Naval and Cavalry included.

Pretty much every FFG game has several loaded keywords, or the equivalent. I'd be shocked if they stripped them *all* out of L5R. They certainly need a serious culling, though.

I expect Naval to get the axe, personally. Cavalry probably depends on what the game mechanics actually look like; if it's similar to where it is now, with an assignment phase and such, I'd be a little surprised if it got cut. In fact, I think if it stays, it'll be spread around a little, though unicorn will still have the most.

Actually, I generally expect that keywords that stay will rarely be the primary province of only one clan, nor should they be. I know AEG occasionally threw in ronin or even other clan personalities with keywords mainly associated with one clan, but I expect FFG to make it a bit more frequent (across a similar number of cards, anyway).

I think it was mentioned earlier, but I am sure there will be keywords, but I'd think they would probably go more to referential ones. You can have Cavalry cards, but they don't 'do' anything internally, it's all dependent on external factors (ie other cards that affect Cavalry).

Simplification is the name of the game here.

Actually referencial keywords are a waste of space. Loaded keywords are a simplification cause they simplify effects for which you normaly would need the whole card to one word and leave room for addtional and situarational effects.

For example it is better to have the cavalary keyword instead of prinitng what it makes on each card.

Yes it is possible to get away from keywords but this would only make the thing more complicated than simlpler in my opinion. I mean at least if you want to keep multiple effect personalities and cards and not make the game as bland as it became in Ivory Edition. You know sometimes simplification is not a good way to go.

To be clear, I am talking about cards that say "Target a Cavalry card to do X" or "If you have a Cavalry card, X happens". This is a bit different than printing what Cavalry does on every card. Cavalry wouldn't actually 'do' anything.

Just wanted to clarify what I am talking about.

The cavalry keyword at it is atm as a rulebook effect so it does something. The cards you mentioned I think I want to keep since it is good for the Clan Identity. Look if there is a chance to restart the game I would prefer to make each clan unique. Having keywords doing this not a bad way to go.

So I would not mind if the Unciron get their cavalry keyword and than cards which are using this keyword as restriction to prevent them from being played.

The Cavalry keyword as a rulebook effect is one of the examples of the complexity that made L5R extremely hard to teach to new people. Magic might also do the keyword bloat shuffle, but they also cycle most of those keywords out every couple years on top of keeping the effects simple enough to print as reminder text on cards with low word-count for a set or two.

As for what makes X clan unique if their problematic keyword is removed: Not much. What important rulebook effects made Spirit, Naga, Nezumi, Toturi's Army, or Brotherhood unique? Nothing. As a Lion, half the time I can't tell you what was supposed to make my clan mechanically unique for the last decade. Mechanical uniqueness reflected in a keyword is not required for clan identity. Mantis existed for a while without Naval being a thing. Toturi's Army never actually had a serious niche.

Actually I can give you a trait for each clan besides the Spider. Lets see

Dragon = Monk

Phoenix= Shugenja

Mantis= Naval

Unicorn = Cavalry

Lion = Tactician

Scropion = Ninja

Crane = Duelist

Crab = Siege

Spider= Conqueror

Also Spirts Toturis Army, Naga etc are faction I ever saw as side kicks but not a the main forc in the game therefore they need nothing to make them unique cause they vanish after the Arc the Clans are there to stay and having something that helps to make them unique and different in appraoch to the game is something which is good cause it makes the game fun if you can differ in tactics based on different mechnics from Clan to Clan

So actually each clan has a key word which at least partly gives them some identity cause it refelcts what their clan normaly excels in. I never had a problem with keyword learning actually I find it better to give new people a list with keywords to learn and even if it is as long as the magic keyword list it is still shorter than a list with all cards of the game.

Again keywords are good cause they shorten the work for rules emchnics and streamlining abilities you want for a larger part of the cards.

Also if you are going to play modern or Legacy in Magic you have a Ton of Keywords which are not cycling out of the Game at any point

Actually referencial keywords are a waste of space. Loaded keywords are a simplification cause they simplify effects for which you normaly would need the whole card to one word and leave room for addtional and situarational effects.

You and I have opposite opinions on this matter. In my opinion, loaded keywords greatly add to the complexity of the game, and unloaded keywords provide a good 'hook' for the designers without complicating the game.

When I first started learning L5R, I found loaded keywords one of the most frustrating parts of the game*. I had no idea what my opponent's cards did, and worse yet I had no idea what my own cards did. I started asking my opponents about everything which might do something, which of course meant I asked about a lot of unloaded keywords as well as loaded keywords. Thankfully Ivory Edition helped by bolding the keywords which actually did anything, but it's still frustrating to have cards not tell you what they do.

Unloaded (or referential) keywords can help reduce the complexity of the game, while also adding flavor. Let's take Tetsuro's Cavalry example, and assume cards which move personalities to or from (or between) battlefields have the "Movement" keyword. Those cards could largely target personalities with the "Cavalry" keyword, and "Cavalry" itself can represent mobile troops without relying on a rulebook action. Then another card, designed to combat Cavalry decks, could prevent "Movement" cards, rather than having to wordsmith a way to prevent all the different movement possibilities. Unicorns could still be the ones with the vast majority of Cavalry personalities, regardless of whether the keyword does anything by itself or not.

*Perhaps second to established players insisting I pick a Clan when I really wanted to try them all. I understand now how expensive it would be to try to play all the Clans, which is one of the big reasons I look forward to the LCG format.

I think it was mentioned earlier, but I am sure there will be keywords, but I'd think they would probably go more to referential ones. You can have Cavalry cards, but they don't 'do' anything internally, it's all dependent on external factors (ie other cards that affect Cavalry).

Every FFG game except Netrunner has several loaded keywords (as in loaded with mechanics; the opposite of referential or unloaded). I don't think there's much reason to expect that to change in the L5R LCG. I think Netrunner's an outlier in a variety of ways.

As for what makes X clan unique if their problematic keyword is removed: Not much. What important rulebook effects made Spirit, Naga, Nezumi, Toturi's Army, or Brotherhood unique? Nothing. As a Lion, half the time I can't tell you what was supposed to make my clan mechanically unique for the last decade. Mechanical uniqueness reflected in a keyword is not required for clan identity. Mantis existed for a while without Naval being a thing. Toturi's Army never actually had a serious niche.

If you have to rely on loaded keywords for clan flavor, you're a lazy designer. Clan play style is influenced by their relative stats and the kinds of abilities they generally receive, of which loaded keywords should be a small part, or even nonexistent.

Honestly, dueling should be a simple mechanic that works universally for all Personalities, with the only modifications being from exterior card sources, such as abilities on Personalities, attachments, or other card effects. When you start making exceptions to this, or that, or the other thing, especially if you intend those exceptions to be things that cannot be easily referenced without going to a rulebook and breaking the flow of a game, you start to have issues.

I like this. One of the problems I've always had with dueling, was that since only dueling decks are any challenge for other dueling decks when it comes to dueling, it ends up being a wasted mechanic that does nothing so much as restrict a player to only running cards with high Focus Values. I say, let's make dueling a theme that every Clan can run as its theme, but then just represent the Crane and the Dragon's dominance in dueling by giving them the coolest effects that are dependent on dueling.

I don't know if I like the Courage keyword itself, but I do like the ability to avoid dead hands in battle if they retain the two deck system.