So, in the interest of divorcing flavor or theme preferences for monoclan decks or not from the discussion, as there's no accounting for taste, I'm interested in hearing what the actual design advantages of monoclan (excluding out of clan cards) are. What does it achieve in a game design sense?

From where I sit:

1) It funnels decks down specific channels, within which a subset of options may be available. So you have factions A, B, C, D, E, F, G, H, etc. within which there might be two or three "themes" (as they were called by AEG), so decks effectively look like A1, A2, A3, B1, B2, B3, etc. This can be desirable for manageable testing, and/or simplifying meta and card pool analysis.

2) It allows a wide variety of cards within a faction to have abilities that would be potentially abusive when mixed liberally with another faction, as it can be made impractical or impossible to mix them. So, as a simplistic example, a faction might benefit when its own cards die as a reaction, while another faction makes its cards die as a cost for some ability. Combining them would result in double dipping off the death benefit. Obviously, many such synergies can be more complex and less obvious, but the point is that separating such synergies by faction provides a way to include abilities in a game that, if combined in play, would be detrimental to balance.

Now, my thinking is that in the case of point 1) A1, A2, A3, B1, B2, B3, etc. is a less interesting meta than Aa, Ac, Ad, Ba, Bb, Bc, etc. And that's not even considering you can still have sub-themes within clans, so it's A1a, A1b, A1c, A2a, A2b, A2c, B1a, B1b, etc. etc. Available decks are multiplied. Testing becomes a little bit more difficult, as there's a wider variety of options to take, but at least in FFG's case, there's plenty of established infrastructure that have tested games with similar approach. This, to me, produces a much more interesting and variable meta than a more restrictive "faction with subthemes" setup.

To point 2: This is easily solved by "Loyal" mechanics which exist in various FFG games, that prohibit specific cards from being played out of faction.

So...

What else?

Again, please leave preferences for monoclan or not out of this. Obviously, design is incentive, so it's a given if you want monoclan incentivized, privileging monoclan achieves that. Likewise the reverse.

Okay in my perfect little world.

I would want one Stronghold per Clan and one All Clan Sensei per Theme.

Basically I want to play Phoenix Clan and Magistrates or Mantis and Nezumi or Lion and Ninja.

Obviously you have some better working combinations then other, but there is no reason to restrict them except when the combination absolutely would break the game, then you can still write "This Sensei will not join Spider Player" or whatever.

So that we have this out of the way.

Clan Loyalty could be a theme on a Sensei.

Loyal Sensei

+0/+0/+0

You may only recruit personalities with your clan alignment or unaligned personalities.

Every personality with your clan alignments has the ability: "Open/Battle, Bow: Straighten a target personality with you Clan Alignment."

This could basically serve as the benchmark sensei for power level and could serve as a control for the clan unrestricted more theme oriented senseis.

Part of design has to do with the flavor of the game: the world itself and its universe. L5R has been very invested in its story, its universe, and its clans. It's one of the reasons why some factions grew, changed, and died.

From that perspective, the great clans are at the very core of the game and its main identity. From other threads, many players associate themselves with clans and their personalities rather than just the cards themselves. There's a reason why there are clan specific forums and AEG supported them with their own previews. The idea of "mono" clans is a direct result of the game's core mindset.

Part of design has to do with the flavor of the game: the world itself and its universe. L5R has been very invested in its story, its universe, and its clans. It's one of the reasons why some factions grew, changed, and died.

From that perspective, the great clans are at the very core of the game and its main identity. From other threads, many players associate themselves with clans and their personalities rather than just the cards themselves. There's a reason why there are clan specific forums and AEG supported them with their own previews. The idea of "mono" clans is a direct result of the game's core mindset.

As noted in the OP, " Again, please leave preferences for monoclan or not out of this. Obviously, design is incentive, so it's a given if you want monoclan incentivized, privileging monoclan achieves that. Likewise the reverse." T he purpose of this thread is not to discuss preferences for clan loyalty or not. There are plenty of threads for that, or you could start a new one.

Cluttering another thread with this will make it impossible to discuss game design advantages without considering the theme, setting or story.

Thanks!

Game design advantages to monoclan? Depends on the system.

It could, as you note, let monoclan cards have abilities that would be game-breaking if allowed to synergize with out of clan.
It could provide some economic benefit (Flying Purple Hippo Clan holdings produce more resources when paying for Flying Purple Hippo Clan stuff)
It could open up design space to allow your Flying Purple Hippo Army Commander to grant greater buffs to his Flying Purple Hippo troops, as their long years of mutual training pay off (since we're in nebulous"wait and see" space, time to just start inventing mechanics wholesale)

Thing is, all of this existed in AEG's model. Building multiclan decks was almost always possible-it was just sub-optimal. You had the odd Mantis Magistrate with a handy ability who "will not join a Scorpion player," there were Loyal personalities galore, but really, only cost-benefit analysis actually limited people mechanically.

What you appear to be after was actually done with the Draft format for Ivory and 20F- "Everybody pick two Clans played out of the generic Draft stronghold. Have fun."

I think what Kubernes is saying is that a key reason to incentivize monoclan builds is theme, that you cannot fully divorce theme from gameplay and expect an accurate read on what builds are good for the game, because for many players there is a natural pull towards playing cards that "go together," particularly in a game like L5R in which so much emphasis is placed on theme (citing the use of flavor text appearing in card abilities here).

All that said however, I agree that as you say, presenting a limiting factor for deckbuilding options, is the strongest mechanical reason for the game to favor clan-specific deckbuilding. To play Jigoku's advocate though, one of the few issues I always had with L5R was that, as an innovator who enjoys building off-the-wall archetypes that surprise and delight (or just as often annoy) opponents, the near-absolute emphasis on sticking to a single clan made it difficult for me to find playstyles that were not explicitly built into the environment; that there were fewer hidden avenues to explore. That's one thing that makes me eager to see an Alliance System appear in the LCG version.

It could provide some economic benefit (Flying Purple Hippo Clan holdings produce more resources when paying for Flying Purple Hippo Clan stuff)

It could open up design space to allow your Flying Purple Hippo Army Commander to grant greater buffs to his Flying Purple Hippo troops, as their long years of mutual training pay off (since we're in nebulous"wait and see" space, time to just start inventing mechanics wholesale)

Both of these are achievable in games with multifactioning though. It's deckbuilder's call, right? Do I stick with Flying Purple Hippo Clan cards only, and maximize my synergy? Or do I mix in some Angry Rhesus Monkey Clan cards to achieve XX game effect that Flying Purple Hippos are't good at, and in so doing, reduce my deck's synergy? To me, having both routes be a practical option makes the game more interesting by opening up available decks.

Is it wise to consider mechanics without any reference to theme, setting, or story? This seems especially counterintuitive when it comes to L5R.

But I'll give it a shot:

Every card should be playable. This is not just a matter of a card being useful in itself but also a matter of avoiding redundancy. Seeing as how there can only be so many core mechanics driving cards, and there need to be many cards, redundancy tends to creep in. FFG has already adopted the CCG tactic of cycling out sets for its LCG OP, which helps with this. But monoclan design could also help: even if more than one card does X, monoclan privileges could help make such cards more distinct.

In other words, while one concern is that a single card should be usable in multiple ways, there is also the countervailing concern that a single card should first of all be playable. A card that could be used in many ways but sees little to no play is not as worthwhile as a card that always sees play even if it is always played in the same way.

The trouble with card games is that deck building is inherently a matter of game mastery. Game mastery in turn forces developers to make bad design decisions precisely because the best cards have to be hidden among the not-so-good and mediocre cards. As I understand it, the LCG concept was invented to help counteract this kind of wasteful product development.

Is it wise to consider mechanics without any reference to theme, setting, or story? This seems especially counterintuitive when it comes to L5R.

In the bigger picture? No, I agree. To cite another game that FFG makes, I don't like Call of Cthulhu because, while it's a decent design, I don't think it's very reflective of the Mythos or its themes (which I do like). But I think you have to figure out, "What are the advantages to monoclan vs. multclan?" and "Do we want to incentivize monoclan for theme and story purposes?" separately, take those determinations, and if they conflict, figure out the pros and cons of each. Trying to figure out both at once is a recipe for confusion and sloppy thinking, IMO.

Is it wise to consider mechanics without any reference to theme, setting, or story? This seems especially counterintuitive when it comes to L5R.

This is also worth mentioning-much as the OP ardently states his desire for theme and setting to stay out of design considerations, when the IP sells itself as much (okay,more) with the considerations he wishes to ignore than with mechanics, the two do not fishbone apart neatly.

They should, but they don't.

And that's the rub-most of the "cons"inherent in NOT privileging monoclan come from there, rather than from a mechanical nuts and bolts perspective. It's why, say, Magic is mechanically sound but downright vanilla unless one is passionately devoted to following its story.

Cross-referencing a good point made in another thread, the monoclan v multiclan design question is subordinate to the larger marketing issue of how FFG frames the product. For example, FFG could decide the first box needs to introduce prospective players to the IP. The obvious choice is to use (some subset of) the Clans as an entry point. In this case, monoclan design makes more sense. I could even imagine the box set being called Clan War. But we are talking about FFG, a shop that designs today's releases to work with releases down the road. I doubt FFG will design a LCG that exclusively support monoclan play in the long run.

I think you have to figure out, "What are the advantages to monoclan vs. multclan?" and "Do we want to incentivize monoclan for theme and story purposes?" separately, take those determinations, and if they conflict, figure out the pros and cons of each. Trying to figure out both at once is a recipe for confusion and sloppy thinking, IMO.

Cross-referencing a good point made in another thread, the monoclan v multiclan design question is subordinate to the larger marketing issue of how FFG frames the product. For example, FFG could decide the first box needs to introduce prospective players to the IP. The obvious choice is to use (some subset of) the Clans as an entry point. In this case, monoclan design makes more sense. I could even imagine the box set being called Clan War. But we are talking about FFG, a shop that designs today's releases to work with releases down the road. I doubt FFG will design a LCG that exclusively support monoclan play in the long run.

Guys, this really isn't as difficult as you're making it out to be. I'm not talking about what's going to sell well. I'm not talking about what's going to be the best launch for L5R. I'm not talking about how FFG will frame their product. Going monoclan could make the game completely fail. So could going multiclan. Don't know, don't care. That's not what this thread is intended to be about.

And that's the rub-most of the "cons"inherent in NOT privileging monoclan come from there, rather than from a mechanical nuts and bolts perspective. It's why, say, Magic is mechanically sound but downright vanilla unless one is passionately devoted to following its story.

That's fine. That obviously should be weighed in making the decision whether or not to go monoclan only for the L5R brand. I'm not talking about the brand, and I'm not really even talking about whether or not L5R "should" go monoclan or multiclan, because that's a much bigger discussion of which mechanics is part, but not whole.

Saying that you can't break out elements to discuss is like saying, you can't discuss a specific piece of card art without bringing in the whole universe of whether it reflects the card's stats and abilities, how it fits into the brand image, whether it's consistent with other cards in the set, etc. Yes, those are all discussions that can be had, but it's also very possible to judge and discuss a specific piece of art on its own merit. They're two different discussions, but both quite possible.

So here, let's discuss the mechanics, and mechanics alone. PLEASE.

It seems like you have an answer in mind (multiclan is more interesting because it entails more options) and you are limiting the scope of discussion so that others must reach the same conclusion.

But why is this even a choice? FFG will almost certainly support both multi- and monoclan deckbuilding in the long run.

I mean, even considering I disagree with the premise of your thread, I went along with it -- and you ignored that part of my post.

Well-argued. I'll admit, I get rather passionate when these two topics conflate, simply because I place so much value on theme, and the success of its carryover into gameplay; e.g when I play Dragon, do I feel like a kung fu master? And is that a different experience from playing Mantis, and having control of the seas and rivers and reaping the strategic benefits?

It seems like this could be achieved without compulsory monoclanning, though right? Let's say for the sake of argument, no cards were restricted by clan alignment. Could you not still put together a deck full of Dragon personalities that felt like you were playing a kung fu master? I would say yes.

I will say that monoclan can be useful as a teaching tool, because it shows you (in your example) which cards to look at first in order to match the feel you're going for. But again, I don't think that's necessary as a game rule/restriction to produce that effect. Many games use, "For your first game," introductory scenarios that use monofaction setups, but then open things up for custom deck construction.

It seems like you have an answer in mind (multiclan is more interesting because it entails more options) and you are limiting the scope of discussion so that others must reach the same conclusion.

But why is this even a choice? FFG will almost certainly support both multi- and monoclan deckbuilding in the long run.

I hope they do, but that aside...

I do think multiclan is more interesting, mechanically. That's why I'm asking people to tell me what I'm missing. If there's some huge design theory that I'm unaware of, I'd love to hear about it. That's why I specifically framed the thread as looking for the advantages of a monoclan approach.

If you think monoclan doesn't need to provide more options or more interesting options because story and setting and theme is more important, that's *fine.* I don't agree with the premise that dual clan decks necessarily conflict with those things, or even clan loyalty. That's also fine. I'm not interested in that discussion in this thread.

What I'm trying to avoid is, "Monoclan is important to the brand, so why bother even talking about the differences between mono and multiclan?" Because I want to talk about those differences from a design standpoint, and how they impact games in general, and how they would impact L5R in specific. Whether or not that's something that would be good for the brand is something that's been and is being discussed in other threads ad nauseum.

I mean, even considering I disagree with the premise of your thread, I went along with it -- and you ignored that part of my post.

I didn't want to respond to the separate questions of "What's the point of this thread?" and actual discussion per the purpose of the thread in the same post. I'll get to it.

I guess we can kind of summarize this discussion as:

- monoclan results in fewer decks with more distinctiveness

- multiclan results in more decks with less distinctiveness

To put it another way, I get that multiclan design results in more combo potential. Are there any other advantages? Can you point out anything else (and no you can't talk about "more options")?

Those are loaded questions of course, kind of like the one you pose in your OP. Can't blame folks for objecting.

Every card should be playable. This is not just a matter of a card being useful in itself but also a matter of avoiding redundancy. Seeing as how there can only be so many core mechanics driving cards, and there need to be many cards, redundancy tends to creep in. FFG has already adopted the CCG tactic of cycling out sets for its LCG OP, which helps with this. But monoclan design could also help: even if more than one card does X, monoclan privileges could help make such cards more distinct.

In other words, while one concern is that a single card should be usable in multiple ways, there is also the countervailing concern that a single card should first of all be playable. A card that could be used in many ways but sees little to no play is not as worthwhile as a card that always sees play even if it is always played in the same way.

The trouble with card games is that deck building is inherently a matter of game mastery. Game mastery in turn forces developers to make bad design decisions precisely because the best cards have to be hidden among the not-so-good and mediocre cards. As I understand it, the LCG concept was invented to help counteract this kind of wasteful product development.

So, if I'm understanding correctly, primarily monoclan design makes otherwise identical cards distinct by placing them in different clans? That seems like a reason to just design a card that both (all?) clans can access.

For example, if they make a 2F/2C bushi for 4g with no ability, I would expect that card to be a ronin if they want every clan to have access. Producing a 2F/2C bushi for each clan would be a complete waste of card slots, IMO.

If the card isn't truly identical -- let's say our 2F/2C guy gets a different ability for each "version" of him in different clans. Like the Scorp guy can bow to bow, the crane guy can bow to gain a family honor, the dragon guy can carry 2 weapons, the unicorn guy is cavalry, the lion guy is a tactician, etc. (And for the sake of discussion, let's say they would all be balanced.)

Those abilities will make those characters synergize better with their respective clans, than they would across clan lines, right? So naturally, they'll gravitate into decks primarily composed of their clans, because if I want to build a deck that bows as many people as I can, that's going to tend to push me toward a Scorpion deck.

That doesn't strike me as something that has to be mutually exclusive with the option to go multiclan, though. You could produce those same characters, one for each clan, and allow multiclan decks. People might still go for maximum bow in a scorpion deck, in which case they take the scorpion guy. If they want to multifaction, say, they want to take a few scorpion guys to bow out opposing cavalry so their main unicorn deck can ride in, then maybe they grab up this guy.

Now, I will concede that monofaction allows you to stop people from taking all 7 of these guys and just going weenie rush. But I don't know if that's actually a desirable goal in and of itself.

The trouble with card games is that deck building is inherently a matter of game mastery. Game mastery in turn forces developers to make bad design decisions precisely because the best cards have to be hidden among the not-so-good and mediocre cards. As I understand it, the LCG concept was invented to help counteract this kind of wasteful product development.

I'm breaking this part out separately, because, "We can't balance cards!" isn't really an argument. Every card can and should be designed such that it's good in the right deck, of course. That doesn't always happen, but that failure is going to crop up regardless of whether you have monoclan or multiclan.

We should probably drop all the CCG jargon as it's just baggage. We don't have any specific mechanics to talk about and there is no use substituting irrelevant ones for ones we don't know about. We just have to keep it conceptual.

With that in mind, I wasn't thinking of two cards that only differ in terms of Clan. I was thinking of cards that do similar things. If such cards are not faction-specific then players just use whichever is more efficient, invalidating the other one. But if each card is faction-specific, FFG can validly produce both and the overlap has a mechanical purpose: to simulate how factions relate to one another and are distinct from one another.

Hold up, I did not argue that "we can't balance cards." My point was, redundancy feeds into the wastefulness of game mastery design, which in turn ties back to my argument that monclan design can help reduce redundancy.

Mantis Stronghold

7PS 4GP 2SFH

Limited Action , 3GC: Draw a card.

Clan Pride - As long as your recruited personalities are only of the Mantis Clan or Neutral, your Ranged Attacks get +1 Strength.

(There is NO second side)

By focusing on a clan you "activate" a benefit tied to their stronghold. If you don't focus on a clan, you get all the variety from playing with other clans (Perhaps a small penalty like not being able to proclaim them?) . The cost is you will make it harder to keep your stronghold's passive ability online.

Each of the nine strongholds should have a unique "Clan Pride" benefit that is related to a larger theme of their clans that makes the clan fairly renown for it. Sure the Mantis are merchants and spiritualists but they are fairly renown for their archery.

Then what the Sensei can do is overwrite the "Clan Pride" with a variation of its own.

Example:

Satoko Sensei

+0 -1 +2

Your Clan Pride ability on your stronghold is replaced with the following:

Clan Pride - All of your Shugenja have "Home Battle: Bow this Shugenja. Send Home a Spirit in your Army. You may only activate this ability as long as your recruited personalities are only of the Mantis Clan or Neutral."

Hold up, I did not argue that "we can't balance cards." My point was, redundancy feeds into the wastefulness of game mastery design, which in turn ties back to my argument that monclan design can help reduce redundancy.

You said:

" Game mastery in turn forces developers to make bad design decisions precisely because the best cards have to be hidden among the not-so-good and mediocre cards. "

A lot of this is resolved by the somewhat rock/paper/scissors meta of any card game, where certain decks are better against certain other decks, but not always best, so the same goes for cards in those decks. Board play also has an impact, including how board play and R/P/S interact.

I think it's achievable to design a set of cards where no card is clearly better than any other card in all situations, even choosing between cards with similar effects.

So let's take a basic card game function: card draw. Card advantage is a pretty big deal in all games, and probably something every clan should have access to. But if the cards exist in the pool, then what's to stop an alliance from playing more than 1? Could be something inherent to the card design (An opportunity cost like, you must have at least XX Clan personalities to play this card; or an outright restriction on those specific cards, like a Loyalty marker that excludes specific cards from being taken as part of alliances). More interestingly, I think you design them each such that they "trigger" off a specific thing that each clan is good at, which makes them more difficult for other clans to benefit from. Each clan would gravitate toward its own card of this type, and without some serious deck engineering, have a hard time utilizing these cards across clan because the synergies just aren't there.

So it should go with any similar card separated by faction alignment, IMO.