This has got to stop. Every time flaws in the setting are pointed out, defenders hop from one foot to the other, going from "Rokugan is not Japan! It's heavily Western!" to "Rokugan is a heavily Asian fantasy, you can't judge it by the standards of Western fantasy!" and back. It's tedious and unproductive.

Why must it stop?

It's true.

Rokugan is not Japan. Rokugan is not Lord of the Rings with katanas. It's Rokugan, an East-Asia flavored magical fantasy setting with plenty of its own headaches arising from its erratic twenty-year history.

This has got to stop. Every time flaws in the setting are pointed out, defenders hop from one foot to the other, going from "Rokugan is not Japan! It's heavily Western!" to "Rokugan is a heavily Asian fantasy, you can't judge it by the standards of Western fantasy!" and back. It's tedious and unproductive.

Why must it stop?

It's true.

Rokugan is not Japan. Rokugan is not Lord of the Rings with katanas. It's Rokugan, an East-Asia flavored magical fantasy setting with plenty of its own headaches arising from its erratic twenty-year history.

Has to stop, in the sense that it's been mostly (only?) used to block discussion on certain situations/themes/events. I for one would rather have discussion focusing on the merits of said situations, instead of derailing on "It's Japan! It's not, it's Korea! You're all wrong, it's Will Smith in 'Wild Wild West' with katanas!" kind of discussions

This has got to stop. Every time flaws in the setting are pointed out, defenders hop from one foot to the other, going from "Rokugan is not Japan! It's heavily Western!" to "Rokugan is a heavily Asian fantasy, you can't judge it by the standards of Western fantasy!" and back. It's tedious and unproductive.

Why must it stop?

It's true.

Rokugan is not Japan. Rokugan is not Lord of the Rings with katanas. It's Rokugan, an East-Asia flavored magical fantasy setting with plenty of its own headaches arising from its erratic twenty-year history.

Has to stop, in the sense that it's been mostly (only?) used to block discussion on certain situations/themes/events. I for one would rather have discussion focusing on the merits of said situations, instead of derailing on "It's Japan! It's not, it's Korea! You're all wrong, it's Will Smith in 'Wild Wild West' with katanas!" kind of discussions

Well to be fair. It's Rokugan.

It has the freedom to draw upon whatever influence it wants, without having to be be bound by that influence.

Any presumptions of what the game "should" be are pointless. It is it's own story and own setting. Bringing in expectations from real life paralells doesn't really make sense.

What perplexes me in these conversations is the contention that, to the extent L5R's setting does have some internal contradictions*, the solution to any significant percentage of them is to be found in restricting its real-world source base to the mythology of one (very large, roughly defined, and diverse!) part of the world.

If you're looking to mythology and folklore for consistency, you're shopping in the wrong store.

*"internal" meaning "the practical implications of this bit directly contradict this other bit," rather than "this bit comes from a source I recognize from a particular culture, so I expected this other bit would as well, but it didn't."

What perplexes me in these conversations is the contention that, to the extent L5R's setting does have some internal contradictions*, the solution to any significant percentage of them is to be found in restricting its real-world source base to the mythology of one (very large, roughly defined, and diverse!) part of the world.

If you're looking to mythology and folklore for consistency, you're shopping in the wrong store.

*"internal" meaning "the practical implications of this bit directly contradict this other bit," rather than "this bit comes from a source I recognize from a particular culture, so I expected this other bit would as well, but it didn't."

I don't think it matters where it grabs it's inspiration from as long as what it is turned into for the setting we are presented all works together cohesively. I mean name stealing monsters work alongside skaven for gods sakes, but shifted around enough to mesh well.

What perplexes me in these conversations is the contention that, to the extent L5R's setting does have some internal contradictions*, the solution to any significant percentage of them is to be found in restricting its real-world source base to the mythology of one (very large, roughly defined, and diverse!) part of the world.

If you're looking to mythology and folklore for consistency, you're shopping in the wrong store.

*"internal" meaning "the practical implications of this bit directly contradict this other bit," rather than "this bit comes from a source I recognize from a particular culture, so I expected this other bit would as well, but it didn't."

What are the internal contradictions?

What are the internal contradictions?

Well, this entire thread (minus the derails) is basically about one of them--are shugenja largely noncombatant priests whose job is to help the rest of Rokugan interface with the spiritual world(s), or do they also commonly function as weapons of mass destruction (that somehow don't change the overall state of military strategy all that much)? Some fluff (and some RPG crunch) says one thing, some fluff and crunch says other things. You can point to the contradictions without making reference to any outside (non-L5R) sources.

Some of the more serious ones, in terms of how integral they are to the setting, are only obvious when you take the reasoning a couple of steps further, like: if Rokugan had been largely isolated from external foes for hundreds of years, what exactly are the Imperial Legions for, with all the powerful centralized bureaucracy and taxation apparatus they imply? (And that's a pretty mild and neutral example; other subjects on which you can find conflicting implications in the source material are a lot more contentious, to judge from past threads on the AEG forums.) Some are little but very obvious, like the teleporting lands of the Centipede Clan or conflicting dates that pop up for various historical figures and events.

You can make up IC explanations to try to rationalize many such contradictions, or else just choose for your own purposes to keep one set of information that seems most logical and discard what doesn't fit (the authors of the Atlas of Rokugan chose Option 2 with respect to the Centipede lands, for example), but figuring out how to deal with a contradiction in the source material doesn't mean it wasn't there in the first place. It's a huge, multi-author fictional world aggregated over two decades; this stuff happens! It would be much weirder if there were none at all.

What are the internal contradictions?

Well, this entire thread (minus the derails) is basically about one of them--are shugenja largely noncombatant priests whose job is to help the rest of Rokugan interface with the spiritual world(s), or do they also commonly function as weapons of mass destruction (that somehow don't change the overall state of military strategy all that much)? Some fluff (and some RPG crunch) says one thing, some fluff and crunch says other things. You can point to the contradictions without making reference to any outside (non-L5R) sources.

Some of the more serious ones, in terms of how integral they are to the setting, are only obvious when you take the reasoning a couple of steps further, like: if Rokugan had been largely isolated from external foes for hundreds of years, what exactly are the Imperial Legions for, with all the powerful centralized bureaucracy and taxation apparatus they imply? (And that's a pretty mild and neutral example; other subjects on which you can find conflicting implications in the source material are a lot more contentious, to judge from past threads on the AEG forums.) Some are little but very obvious, like the teleporting lands of the Centipede Clan or conflicting dates that pop up for various historical figures and events.

You can make up IC explanations to try to rationalize many such contradictions, or else just choose for your own purposes to keep one set of information that seems most logical and discard what doesn't fit (the authors of the Atlas of Rokugan chose Option 2 with respect to the Centipede lands, for example), but figuring out how to deal with a contradiction in the source material doesn't mean it wasn't there in the first place. It's a huge, multi-author fictional world aggregated over two decades; this stuff happens! It would be much weirder if there were none at all.

So people should be careful when they declare things as contradictions, or just taking their opinion as a fact.

With regards to your first paragraph, Shugenja. Why have you decided shugenja, no matter their elemental alignment, clan, or position should all function as the same thing? They are all different. The only thing all Shugenja have in common is that they can commune and summon kami, that is all. Anything beyond that is entirely down to how their clan needs them.

As some examples. The scorpion Ward shugenja's purpose is not to set armies on fire, but more to do with the secrecy of the clan and fulfilling missions of intrigue. Unicorn use their shugs a lot of the time to move mass armies around the place quickly, whereas the Mantis use theirs for naval warfare.

Why have you decided, that shugenja should only have one function, and anything beyond that function is a contradiction? The fact that they function in numerous ways depending on how the clan wants to utilise them is not even close to contradiction. Literally...the ONLY commonality that shugenja share is that they can all commune with and control the kami, that is it. Even what you say above about shugenja, doesn't even display a contradicition. It is like saying Bushi cause internal contradictions because some use archery, and some use katana as their primary weapon. Not everything has to be the exact same in order for it to make sense.

The reason why Shugenja are then put into the role of "priestly" affairs is because they basically have a direct line to the gods. it is as simple as that really. Nothing glamorous, and their role does not start and begin with being a priest.

The argument about the imperial legions really doesn't hold water at all. While yes, Rokugan was Isolated, there were still 7 clans, and an imperial family in the empire. If you don't have a massive standing army, what is to stop one of, or a few of the clans to take power? Samurai in Rokugan, by nature are all warriors, and raised as so, however they do function other more mundane duties. Having an imperial legion, which was just the Hantei familiy's standing army really, does not cause much of a conflict considering all of the clans needed an army.

With regards to the timeline, it does happen, and there is no real explanation for them other than someone done goofed . But when you start nitpicking about dates, you enter into the realm of comic book guy from the simpsons, as they largely don't have much of an effect on the game.

The serious ones aren't the stuff like it says X here and Y there, but the stuff like the Legions, where the setting says something but didn't put in the work to make it make sense, or when it contradicts human nature.

Like, how can so many Crab die on the wall, knowing how many Crab there are, and have there still be a Crab clan?

Or how can the Unicorn spend centuries out as nomads meeting other cultures in the world, then come back to Rokugan and not change their culture at all, barely change themselves from Rokugani culture, and not bring back any information about those other cultures they met?

Why did the people of proto-Rokugan accept the system of honor and social class handed down by the kami when, given the information provided to us, it doesn't actually give them any benefit? If the kami just conquered humanity to oppress them, why are we supposed to like them?

How are the Yogo still a thing if every single one of them has the Yogo Curse, and marriages are arranged by lords in order to maximize benefit to the Clan? Who is marrying these betrayal bombs?

Shinsei is obviously supposed to be Buddha, and Dragon and Brotherhood monks are obviously supposed to be Buddhist monks, and the setting says they follow the "Path to Purification" he laid out for them... but there's nothing anywhere ELSE in Shinseism about asceticism and foregoing worldly desires, so this Path is a hastily stapled on addendum about "Oh yeah, even though I'm not Buddha, and didn't tell people to do things the Buddha did, you guys and you guys alone should act like I was so we can have Buddhist monks."

And most relevant to this thread, the setting tells us shugenja are priests, but they don't meet the needs of people that priests do. It says spirits are everywhere and in everything but nobody aside from shugenja acts like this is true. The contradiction isn't between two things the setting tells us -- the contradiction is between what the setting TELLS us is true, and what the setting SHOWS us is true.

So people should be careful when they declare things as contradictions, or just taking their opinion as a fact.

With regards to your first paragraph, Shugenja. Why have you decided shugenja, no matter their elemental alignment, clan, or position should all function as the same thing? They are all different. The only thing all Shugenja have in common is that they can commune and summon kami, that is all. Anything beyond that is entirely down to how their clan needs them.

As some examples. The scorpion Ward shugenja's purpose is not to set armies on fire, but more to do with the secrecy of the clan and fulfilling missions of intrigue. Unicorn use their shugs a lot of the time to move mass armies around the place quickly, whereas the Mantis use theirs for naval warfare.

Why have you decided, that shugenja should only have one function, and anything beyond that function is a contradiction? The fact that they function in numerous ways depending on how the clan wants to utilise them is not even close to contradiction. Literally...the ONLY commonality that shugenja share is that they can all commune with and control the kami, that is it. Even what you say above about shugenja, doesn't even display a contradicition. It is like saying Bushi cause internal contradictions because some use archery, and some use katana as their primary weapon. Not everything has to be the exact same in order for it to make sense.

The reason why Shugenja are then put into the role of "priestly" affairs is because they basically have a direct line to the gods. it is as simple as that really. Nothing glamorous, and their role does not start and begin with being a priest.

At least in 4th edition, the RPG books make it a point to harp constantly on the priestly role of the shugenja... and then proceed to not really treat them like priests half the time.

That's true. Why not just take a page from the recent Star Wars force books and simply present the Shugenja player enough viable options so they could make a 'wizard' like spellcaster, a more priestly type, or any other type?

A couple of things to consider.

Every Shugenja school I'm looking at here in the books lists Lore: Theology as a school skill.

Second, in Emerald Empire , the glossary entry for Shugenja (pg 272) starts as follows: "A priest of the kami, a religious official in the ranks of the samurai caste..."

Moto Subodei, I'll point out that I did write,

You can make up IC explanations to try to rationalize many such contradictions, or else just choose for your own purposes to keep one set of information that seems most logical and discard what doesn't fit[...]

...and that is, from my perspective, exactly what you're doing. You can choose to overlook certain aspects of fluff and crunch in favor of what seems most essential to you--for example, drop out certain bits of fluff about shugenja, like the ones that MaxKilljoy points out in the post above this one, in favor of boiling their role down to:

The only thing all Shugenja have in common is that they can commune and summon kami, that is all.

Or you can come up with IC rationalizations, like conjecturing a Rokugan in which the Imperial Legions are maintained, as a multi-clan organization, at the scale described because sheer military force is constantly necessary to deter the various Great Clans from seizing the throne at any time . (That's not necessarily wrong, per se, but it's also nowhere mentioned or particularly implied in the description of the Imperial Legions in Emerald Empire, either--it'd be fanon, basically. I'm not sure I personally find it convincing, but that's for another thread.)

As for the little stuff, it's true that most of the time, most of it doesn't matter--but tell that to the person who wants to play a Centipede character or the GM who wants to set their campaign around the time of that misdated event.

I'm not sure where some of the vehemence on this subject comes from, though, really. Pointing out that the setting has some inconsistencies doesn't mean disliking it or wanting to burn it down or anything like that. Quite the contrary!

Moto Subodei, I'll point out that I did write,

You can make up IC explanations to try to rationalize many such contradictions, or else just choose for your own purposes to keep one set of information that seems most logical and discard what doesn't fit[...]

...and that is, from my perspective, exactly what you're doing. You can choose to overlook certain aspects of fluff and crunch in favor of what seems most essential to you--for example, drop out certain bits of fluff about shugenja, like the ones that MaxKilljoy points out in the post above this one, in favor of boiling their role down to:

The only thing all Shugenja have in common is that they can commune and summon kami, that is all.

Or you can come up with IC rationalizations, like conjecturing a Rokugan in which the Imperial Legions are maintained, as a multi-clan organization, at the scale described because sheer military force is constantly necessary to deter the various Great Clans from seizing the throne at any time . (That's not necessarily wrong, per se, but it's also nowhere mentioned or particularly implied in the description of the Imperial Legions in Emerald Empire, either--it'd be fanon, basically. I'm not sure I personally find it convincing, but that's for another thread.)

As for the little stuff, it's true that most of the time, most of it doesn't matter--but tell that to the person who wants to play a Centipede character or the GM who wants to set their campaign around the time of that misdated event.

I'm not sure where some of the vehemence on this subject comes from, though, really. Pointing out that the setting has some inconsistencies doesn't mean disliking it or wanting to burn it down or anything like that. Quite the contrary!

Edit: though I do feel moved to add that I don't personally see internal contradictions in all of the points on Huitzil37's list a few posts up, either. Some definitely so; others seem clear enough, and/or more like matters of diverging expectations, to me.

The vehemence is coming from the presumption of fact from some people in this thread.

People are really hung up on this priest thing, which fair enough, if the 4th ed books goes to great lengths to keep pushing, I guess it all comes from perspective and experience over the years. If 4th ed was your starting point of the game I can see how your perspective may be different. Much like if you started in 3rd ed, 2nd ed or 1st ed.

The thing with the priest argument is Rokugan doesn't seem like the kind of culture where samurai go to church every sunday, and there is a priest there pontificating to them about what bad people are. There are some important rituals that are observed, and Shugs get roped into this. If you have a question about theology in general, then shugenja are the go to guys, basically because they have a direct line.

Is it at all a possibility that we are projecting our real life intuition of what a priest is and should be, from our culture onto what a Rokugani "priest" does and how they function? Shugenja need to learn about the spiritual side of Rokugan because it ties in with their work on the Kami. They however don't hand out holy communion ever sunday, baptise people and give confession!

Again i will draw a comparison to bushi. Bushi's main role is for war. If there is a fight going on somewhere, between their lord and another lord, he is required to show up and break some necks. Some bushi may only see this once or twice in their life time. Just because their duty is not called upon every single day, does not mean there is a contradiction in their function. It is the same for shugs. They perform special ceremonies, but as I said, they aren't meant to be like catholic priests.

With the timeline thing, I've had personal experience from the difficulty from it. I was running a game that was in per-imperial, and trying to consolidate and reason with some fo the timelines, history about the emperors, clan champs etc. was incredibly difficult to navigate. So much so I eventually just had to be flexible with it, and go with what made sense. It didn't really detract away from the campaign for the players in the end, I think it was more annoying for me really. On the other side of this, it is pretty difficult to flesh out 2 thousand or so years of history!

With the Yogo, is it general public knowledge about the curse btw? I've always thought it was a clan secret. I've certainly never seen any other clan mention it (apart from the phoenix who are somewhat affected by it too).

Why did the people of proto-Rokugan accept the system of honor and social class handed down by the kami when, given the information provided to us, it doesn't actually give them any benefit? If the kami just conquered humanity to oppress them, why are we supposed to like them?

Okay, while this is off-topic, I will explain this: the Kami were not exactly the finest empire-building material, so to speak. They were either dense like a neutron star (Hantei, Akodo, Hida), ignorant (Shinjo, Togashi, Bayushi), or just simply dumb (Doji) - Shiba was pretty much the hero Rokugan needed but did not deserve . The last one is especially painful, as Doji was the one who invented this nonsensical caste system. You an see how they had no idea what they were doing by considering that they chose a leader based entirely on combat prowess - an ability that is probably the least important for a good leader.

I wonder if we all have the definition of what is a priest, not the Priest Class of D&D, but the word "Priest" in the dictionary, because I feel like that's the real intention of the word used in the definition of a Shugenja...

Definition: one authorized to perform the sacred rites of a religion especially as a mediatory agent between humans and God.

That's the definition. Now, let's just adapt it to L5R to make it clearer:

Definition: one authorized to perform the sacred rites of a religion especially as a mediatory agent between humans and the Kami.

Now, what is a sacred rites? Is spell casting a sacred rites? Of course it is, since spell casting is a prayer to the Kami to be able to create an effet in the world. What else? Is simply spreading the lore about the religion a sacred rite? Yes, because it's part of it. Anything else? Is creating shrines (which doesn't have to be huge shrine by the way) a sacred rite? Of course, since you want the place to be filled with the Kami you're honoring. Now, is he the mediatory agent between humans and the Kami. Of course, he is, like I've said, one of his duty is spreading the lore about the religion, which is, in fact a duty of a mediatory agent. Is there any kind of inquisition? Asako Inquisitors and Kuni Witch Hunters are both the answer, both are lead by the religion and both hunt down those who crossed the line, so yes there is.

I don't see why there's contradiction, in fact, it's pretty much all there. I really want to see proof of this contradiction, because from the definition of "What is a priest" as writen in a dictionary, it's pretty much cover everything that a Shugenja can do. Does he need to be like a Christian Priest, like a Rabbi, etc. in order to be a priest? Not at all, because a Shugenja isn't any of this. At best, it's more a tribal shaman, in term of comparaison. And when we take the definition of a priest that I've wrote in the start of this message, it's also fitting to a shaman. Let's see.

A shaman leads shamanic rituals, which are sacred rites and he acts as the mediator agent between the tribe and the spirits. Which is exactly the definition of a priest.

I really don't understand this all discussion about "A Shugenja is a priest and he's also not" thingy... From the definition, a Shugenja is a priest, but not the D&D definition of Priest, the real definition.

I've been working from the broad definition of "priest" as a cultural and social role... not from the D&D "carries blunt weapons and casts healing spells" definition.

The vehemence is coming from the presumption of fact from some people in this thread.

People are really hung up on this priest thing, which fair enough, if the 4th ed books goes to great lengths to keep pushing, I guess it all comes from perspective and experience over the years. If 4th ed was your starting point of the game I can see how your perspective may be different. Much like if you started in 3rd ed, 2nd ed or 1st ed.

The thing with the priest argument is Rokugan doesn't seem like the kind of culture where samurai go to church every sunday, and there is a priest there pontificating to them about what bad people are. There are some important rituals that are observed, and Shugs get roped into this. If you have a question about theology in general, then shugenja are the go to guys, basically because they have a direct line.

Is it at all a possibility that we are projecting our real life intuition of what a priest is and should be, from our culture onto what a Rokugani "priest" does and how they function? Shugenja need to learn about the spiritual side of Rokugan because it ties in with their work on the Kami. They however don't hand out holy communion ever sunday, baptise people and give confession!

Again i will draw a comparison to bushi. Bushi's main role is for war. If there is a fight going on somewhere, between their lord and another lord, he is required to show up and break some necks. Some bushi may only see this once or twice in their life time. Just because their duty is not called upon every single day, does not mean there is a contradiction in their function. It is the same for shugs. They perform special ceremonies, but as I said, they aren't meant to be like catholic priests.

" Priest " has a far broader meaning across the cultures and religions of the world than "every Sunday it is his job to pontificate to the congregation about their moral and character failings" -- if anything, thinking of "priest" as meaning destinctly and specifically the local Christian clergyman might be the presumption.

When we say "the game is telling us shugenja are priests but not doing much to show us that they are", we aren't in any way saying that they're meant to be quasi-Shinto clones of stereotypical Catholic priests.

Start here and look around, the role of "priest" is far, far older than Christianity, or really anything like any of the Abrahamic religions.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Priest#Ancient_priests_and_priestesses

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Priest#Eastern_religions

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Priest#Indigenous_and_ethnic_religions

That's true. Why not just take a page from the recent Star Wars force books and simply present the Shugenja player enough viable options so they could make a 'wizard' like spellcaster, a more priestly type, or any other type?

Does that fit what Rokugan is, or what a significant number of players want Rokugan to be? Does it fit within the framework of coherent worldbuilding?

If the answer is "yes" to both questions, then it's something to consider . One would still need to consider how many players would be firmly against such a change.

Why did the people of proto-Rokugan accept the system of honor and social class handed down by the kami when, given the information provided to us, it doesn't actually give them any benefit? If the kami just conquered humanity to oppress them, why are we supposed to like them?

Okay, while this is off-topic, I will explain this: the Kami were not exactly the finest empire-building material, so to speak. They were either dense like a neutron star (Hantei, Akodo, Hida), ignorant (Shinjo, Togashi, Bayushi), or just simply dumb (Doji) - Shiba was pretty much the hero Rokugan needed but did not deserve . The last one is especially painful, as Doji was the one who invented this nonsensical caste system. You an see how they had no idea what they were doing by considering that they chose a leader based entirely on combat prowess - an ability that is probably the least important for a good leader.

Oh, I agree they did the whole "empire-building" thing badly. (but Shinjo would have turned out all right, because she is Usagi Tsukino, and we all know she gets to be queen of Earth and that goes pretty well).

But we're supposed to believe that they did it right, that the order the kami imposed is awesome. And it's not diametrically opposite from good, the way the Imperium of Man is, so it's not like the setting is telling us "yes, these people are all wrong, it's okay to laugh at them." It's unclear what we're SUPPOSED to think of it, and if the setting is even aware of its own flaws.

The "example reboot" I have been tossing about in my head addresses this, and is almost entirely about how and why the kami created the Empire, in the process explaining why people hold on to the ideas they introduced, because it's better than what came before. In it, proto-Rokugan was an awful place run by dozens upon dozens of warlords constantly killing each other's soldiers and enslaving or terrorizing civilians, where the strong visited limitless depredation on the weak. Instead of saying "and then the Kami dropped in, therefore, Empire", I wanted to track how they spread outward and everything about the Empire and its customs developed in response to the environment it was slowly replacing. The code of honor replacing blind vengeance, the feudal system replacing "the strong take from the weak", lay out how each kami's Great Clan develops its identity as a function of what they do for the Empire as it grows.

But I haven't put it all down in text because I've always had at least one other thing to work on that's much higher priority. Would people be interested in seeing that?

The vehemence is coming from the presumption of fact from some people in this thread.

People are really hung up on this priest thing, which fair enough, if the 4th ed books goes to great lengths to keep pushing, I guess it all comes from perspective and experience over the years. If 4th ed was your starting point of the game I can see how your perspective may be different. Much like if you started in 3rd ed, 2nd ed or 1st ed.

The thing with the priest argument is Rokugan doesn't seem like the kind of culture where samurai go to church every sunday, and there is a priest there pontificating to them about what bad people are. There are some important rituals that are observed, and Shugs get roped into this. If you have a question about theology in general, then shugenja are the go to guys, basically because they have a direct line.

Is it at all a possibility that we are projecting our real life intuition of what a priest is and should be, from our culture onto what a Rokugani "priest" does and how they function? Shugenja need to learn about the spiritual side of Rokugan because it ties in with their work on the Kami. They however don't hand out holy communion ever sunday, baptise people and give confession!

Again i will draw a comparison to bushi. Bushi's main role is for war. If there is a fight going on somewhere, between their lord and another lord, he is required to show up and break some necks. Some bushi may only see this once or twice in their life time. Just because their duty is not called upon every single day, does not mean there is a contradiction in their function. It is the same for shugs. They perform special ceremonies, but as I said, they aren't meant to be like catholic priests.

" Priest " has a far broader meaning across the cultures and religions of the world than "every Sunday it is his job to pontificate to the congregation about their moral and character failings" -- if anything, thinking of "priest" as meaning destinctly and specifically the local Christian clergyman might be the presumption.

When we say "the game is telling us shugenja are priests but not doing much to show us that they are", we aren't in any way saying that they're meant to be quasi-Shinto clones of stereotypical Catholic priests.

Start here and look around, the role of "priest" is far, far older than Christianity, or really anything like any of the Abrahamic religions.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Priest#Ancient_priests_and_priestesses

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Priest#Eastern_religions

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Priest#Indigenous_and_ethnic_religions

That's true. Why not just take a page from the recent Star Wars force books and simply present the Shugenja player enough viable options so they could make a 'wizard' like spellcaster, a more priestly type, or any other type?

Does that fit what Rokugan is, or what a significant number of players want Rokugan to be? Does it fit within the framework of coherent worldbuilding?

If the answer is "yes" to both questions, then it's something to consider . One would still need to consider how many players would be firmly against such a change.

Whether intentionally, or unintentionally you are entirely missing the point I am making.

What I am saying is, every religion, theology or whatever have their own unique duties of what a "priest" is and does. Trying to make any of these fit, or direct how a Shugenja in Rokugan operates is pretty pointless. They fulfill the roles they need for Rokugan. Any presumptions from extraneous sources, be it real life, or your own interpretation or presumption as to what a priest "should" be don't have any bearing whatsoever on Shugenja in Rokugan.

They are what they are. They perform ceremonies like marriages and funerals. They can commune with the kami and they help guide people spiritiually. They do all this in the lore, these are the duties they perform, so I really fail to see where the contradiction is. If the contradiction is based on the presumption that they should do more then I would ask to point where they have failed to fulfill their duties as outlined by the lore.

The vehemence is coming from the presumption of fact from some people in this thread.

People are really hung up on this priest thing, which fair enough, if the 4th ed books goes to great lengths to keep pushing, I guess it all comes from perspective and experience over the years. If 4th ed was your starting point of the game I can see how your perspective may be different. Much like if you started in 3rd ed, 2nd ed or 1st ed.

The thing with the priest argument is Rokugan doesn't seem like the kind of culture where samurai go to church every sunday, and there is a priest there pontificating to them about what bad people are. There are some important rituals that are observed, and Shugs get roped into this. If you have a question about theology in general, then shugenja are the go to guys, basically because they have a direct line.

Is it at all a possibility that we are projecting our real life intuition of what a priest is and should be, from our culture onto what a Rokugani "priest" does and how they function? Shugenja need to learn about the spiritual side of Rokugan because it ties in with their work on the Kami. They however don't hand out holy communion ever sunday, baptise people and give confession!

Again i will draw a comparison to bushi. Bushi's main role is for war. If there is a fight going on somewhere, between their lord and another lord, he is required to show up and break some necks. Some bushi may only see this once or twice in their life time. Just because their duty is not called upon every single day, does not mean there is a contradiction in their function. It is the same for shugs. They perform special ceremonies, but as I said, they aren't meant to be like catholic priests.

" Priest " has a far broader meaning across the cultures and religions of the world than "every Sunday it is his job to pontificate to the congregation about their moral and character failings" -- if anything, thinking of "priest" as meaning destinctly and specifically the local Christian clergyman might be the presumption.

When we say "the game is telling us shugenja are priests but not doing much to show us that they are", we aren't in any way saying that they're meant to be quasi-Shinto clones of stereotypical Catholic priests.

Start here and look around, the role of "priest" is far, far older than Christianity, or really anything like any of the Abrahamic religions.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Priest#Ancient_priests_and_priestesses

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Priest#Eastern_religions

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Priest#Indigenous_and_ethnic_religions

That's true. Why not just take a page from the recent Star Wars force books and simply present the Shugenja player enough viable options so they could make a 'wizard' like spellcaster, a more priestly type, or any other type?

Does that fit what Rokugan is, or what a significant number of players want Rokugan to be? Does it fit within the framework of coherent worldbuilding?

If the answer is "yes" to both questions, then it's something to consider . One would still need to consider how many players would be firmly against such a change.

Whether intentionally, or unintentionally you are entirely missing the point I am making.

What I am saying is, every religion, theology or whatever have their own unique duties of what a "priest" is and does. Trying to make any of these fit, or direct how a Shugenja in Rokugan operates is pretty pointless. They fulfill the roles they need for Rokugan. Any presumptions from extraneous sources, be it real life, or your own interpretation or presumption as to what a priest "should" be don't have any bearing whatsoever on Shugenja in Rokugan.

They are what they are. They perform ceremonies like marriages and funerals. They can commune with the kami and they help guide people spiritiually. They do all this in the lore, these are the duties they perform, so I really fail to see where the contradiction is. If the contradiction is based on the presumption that they should do more then I would ask to point where they have failed to fulfill their duties as outlined by the lore.

I'm trying to find a way to point out the irony of your first sentence without being a jerk about it... you've been fairly consistantly arguing against things that people haven't really been saying.

And, I'm not sure how to constructively respond when it looks like first you're telling us that we shouldn't be looking at them as "priests" based on an image of Catholic priests preaching on Sundays, and then when it's pointed out that we're not thinking of that narrow sort of priest, you proceed to tell us that there are all sorts of priests ( in response to a post full of links to a broad range of priests).

That said, the word "priest" does mean something , and "can talk to kami, and use that ability to invoke effects" isn't really it.

A couple of things to consider.

Every Shugenja school I'm looking at here in the books lists Lore: Theology as a school skill.

Second, in Emerald Empire , the glossary entry for Shugenja (pg 272) starts as follows: "A priest of the kami, a religious official in the ranks of the samurai caste..."

We'll have to see if that actually holds up in the lcg and the new rpg. I also remember that some catholic priests or monks (or even priests of other faiths) didn't mind accompanying warriors in history. Of course we're talking about different religions and universes but there's enough leeway there to do many different things. I'd also imagine that shugenja in the lcg will probably remain primarily spell flingers which would only reinforce the notion of a battle wizard and eat away at the whole priest angle.

I think it is important to point out that Monks fill the vast majority of priestly roles, that of course being the ritual deffinition. They fill it almost exclusively for the lower classes and regularly for the samurai class. The Kuge is likely the only group that is exclusively serviced by Clan or imperial Shugenja's. That allows there to exist a number of other roles as suggested that we would not often consider priestly areas where spellcasting is more neccissary, such places are of course inquisitors, craftspersons, warriors, and such. We have no correlation, the spellcasting part, to this in our real world today. Thus us thinking that the spellcasting portion of the priesthood should be limitied is taken entirely from a limited perspective.

Though this is not entirely the case. The Vatican does have an Observatory filled with Priest astronomers who do Astronomy.

But I haven't put it all down in text because I've always had at least one other thing to work on that's much higher priority. Would people be interested in seeing that?

Do it, at least we won't take up off-topic space here. If you make a new topic for it, then I will share my view on the matter there .

I'd like at this juncture to gently point out that we've gone from

the ONLY commonality that shugenja share is that they can all commune with and control the kami, that is it.

They are what they are. They perform ceremonies like marriages and funerals. They can commune with the kami and they help guide people spiritiually. They do all this in the lore, these are the duties they perform...

This thread (digressions aside) has basically been about ways the new edition might provide more support for the many senses of "commune with the kami and they help guide people spiritually" that have always been in the lore but, given the way the RPG is constructed, don't tend to come out much in play (where shugenja by and large become 'magical support for the areas the other classes are good at'). If you don't have a problem with that premise, what are we arguing about?

People are really hung up on this priest thing, which fair enough, if the 4th ed books goes to great lengths to keep pushing, I guess it all comes from perspective and experience over the years. If 4th ed was your starting point of the game I can see how your perspective may be different. Much like if you started in 3rd ed, 2nd ed or 1st ed.

RE: the status system, this is getting OT, but unlike many things about Rokugan, that's never seemed like something requiring a long and detailed explanation to me. If your suspension of disbelief balks at the idea of people accepting life in a social system that disadvantages them in hopes of a better life after death (in the afterlife, through reincarnation, whatever), then I'm not sure what to say to you about... well, the last few thousand years of human history? Maybe take it up with Rousseau , or Marx and Weber? Requiring a coherent explanation of the origins of human inequality seems like a lot to ask of RPG writers when historians and sociologists still haven't really cracked it (and a bad one would be worse for my suspension of disbelief than none at all). That it's a common part of human history (whether I like that or not) is plausibility enough for me.

FWIW, the dawn of the empire chapter in Imperial Histories suggests the social system took about a hundred years to get to its present shape after the fall of the Kami. Some sort of status distinctions obviously existed before that, since there were tribes with chiefs, priests, etc. It wouldn't be at all farfetched (mild fanon here, though) to imagine that the status system as we know it grew from the merging of the ethics of the Kami with whatever chiefs/warriors/peasants stratification already existed when they landed. (What's much harder to get my head around is not that it came into existence, but that it lasted a thousand years or so without substantial change. Dealing with an implausible degree of historical stasis is the mental tax I, personally, pay for enjoying Rokugan as a setting)

Also, I don't think the RPG books ever suggest, to use Huitzl's phrase, that,

we're supposed to believe that they did it right, that the order the kami imposed is awesome.