Just started a L5R game and looking for some clarification.... asked about this on rpg.net and they suggested I ask here....

OK read up on the Dragon Monks and WOW and then read up on the Asako Henshin Monks (Great Clans)(everyone in the group is playing a Phoenix) and OK. I could really get behind it if it weren't for p 201 (The Limits of Mysteries and Riddles). So I've got no problem with riddles only being able to be used a number of times a day equal to ring rating.... most of them last a long time, but if you are going to do that why are you going to say that you cant use a Mystery to raise stats at the same time. This means my hours long immunity to conditions is fubarred by my raising my TN to be hit (by raising my Reflex) which at Insight Rank 3 I'm able to do 15x a day. So my major advantage of having this majorly re-usable ability is nixed because everytime I use it I end any of the Riddles.

Add to that that I'm not supposed to be able to use Kiho at the same time because of some power paradox and I find myself mouth agape looking at the Dragon Monks wondering HUH? Are Kiho + Mystery really so good? Must go through Kiho again and see if I can find some really broken pairings.

Has anyone had experience with Henshin or does anyone have a good enough grip on the system to explain why any of this is overpowered? I'm not looking to argue with anyones PoV, rather it is my intention to take this to my group, and discuss it, and I want to have thought through some of what may come up. Are Henshin good as is?

Thanks

Ok did some Core Rules reading and the only kiho I could find that might make for a power pairing with Mysteries are Death Touch ... which requires three hits. .more likely if you've a boosted agility ... and Earthen Fist which makes it more likely you will be missed to get the disarm next round if you raise your reflexes.

Now Death Touch is apparently likely to get you kicked out of your order... so probably not using it anyway, and Earthen Fists Full Defense buff well hell you gave up your attack for the full defense and activated a kilo... give it to him.

The rest of the kiho all use ring ratings and henshin monks don't impact those.

Am I missing the overpowered here?

Hmmm just thought about it and I suppose if you combine the rank 5 Riddle that lets you take 3 simple actions with the Air Mastery 6 Kiho that lets you attack as a simple action... that could be powerful... but of course you have to be Rank 6 to take that Kiho and by then you may be in a party that has three attack Bushi ... and Gah at that point I say give it to them... but that's just me. Opinions?

There is a lot of kihos available. I seem to remember the dance of flames let you have simple attacks so with boosted agilty or strength it could be powerful. They had also to plan ahead and avoid writing on half the kihos that henshin couldn't use them.

I haven't played a henshin or been in a campaign where one was a PC, so this is all speculation. But my guess is that the major point of game-breaking power is that you can jack up your Agility and then fling around atemi strikes like they ain't no thang. The difficulty of hitting a target with one of those is supposed to limit their utility -- anybody in armor gets double the ATN bonus from it, which for lower IR is a big deal -- but if you're sitting pretty with Agility 6, you don't much care what they've got on.

But if you run the sort of campaign with the sort of people where that won't get in the way of people enjoying themselves, then have at it. My GM ran with the (erroneous) rule where clan monks get to add their School Rank to their Ring in qualifying for kiho, plus he let my ise zumi PC earn extra tattoos; stack those things together and I was pretty broken. But it worked for our campaign, and that's all that really matters.

Henshin, properly broken, are absurdly powerful.

In the official Winter Court game in 2014, the Phoenix sent one of our Henshin into the Bowman's Wager.

Without any kiho use at all, the performance was so mathematically consistent that the character was politely invited to recuse themselves from further archery shenanigans-and this was not a character built by a player to excel at archery,but a GM-staff pre-built canon PC.

Our other Henshin (a homebrew player-built for Sumo) could routinely hit Strength 10 whenever it mattered. He charged an Oni barehanded and lived to brag about it.

Neither was higher than Insight Rank 3.

Henshin are friggin' silly.