To answer the OP on what is cool about L5R:

L5R is brand with roughly 9 fairly distinct factions jockeying for power in a fantasy Asian Empire where player and fan activities can influence how storylines and plotlines progress.

The 9 factions are roughly (but not completely):

The Lion: Honorable Traditional Samurai

The Crane: Cultured Samurai

The Phoenix: Spellcasters and their Samurai guardians

The Dragon: Mystical Monks

The Unicorn: Compassionate Horsemen

The Mantis: Samurai Pirates supported by other secondary groups

The Crab: Pragmatic Defending Samurai

The Scorpion: Scheming Samurai with Ninjas

The Spider: Evil and Nasty Samurai

^ All that . Just all of that. Among Sparrows, WCIV, such a HUGE time among the Spider fans. We really thought we were getting somewhere with what it was going to mean to be Spider. It was really crushing when not only did nothing come of Among Sparrows, which was canonical! but all the hard work our WCIV guys put in, and just nothing. super weak sauce.

I think we have Rob Vaux to blame for that. He seems to have forced everyone to drop a planned divided Empire under Iweko II plotline (With the Shibatsu/Seiken choices at WC4 determining the pro and anti Emperor factions) in order to make way for the Kanpeki conquers the Empire with the Shadowlands Onyx plotline.

Phoenix Clan. Clan theme is being arrogant and doing/saying interesting/magical things all the time; the pacifistic undercurrent goes with "peace through superior firepower" and "if you want peace then prepare for war" because true honest-to-goodness pacifism is reserved for the Asahina. The Shiba are full-on warrior-scholars who just can't shut up because they know better than everyone else in every topic period, and listening to them is a pain because they talk about all sorts of stuff you have never even heard about. The Isawa are shameless super-wizards who apply magic to literally every problem because they are the bestests of the best wizards, so why not, and it is not like they will listen to you anyway. The Asako are self-absorbed nerds, living in the shadow of the Shiba and the Isawa, but they are cool with it because all they want is to nerd in their libraries and contemplate over extra-nerdy stuff.

Man, you've read, like... one or two recent-vintage stories, haven't you? 'Cause this is like saying the Unicorn are about horses and could be replaced by anyone with horses.

Phoenix Clan. Clan theme is genuine, blinding idealism of a sort no other Great Clan really believes in shackled to intense hubris. Where the Crane are concerned with excellence and the Dragon are concerned with enlightenment, the Phoenix are concerned with right actions.

The Shiba are honorable warriors committed to dying for people pretty much everyone agrees are capable of being insufferable gits because their founding Kami swore an oath and they're not about to go back on it because "Choosing the lesser of two evils is still choosing evil." They're generally not the ones "who just can't shut up because they know better." In fact, if you'd take your blinders off and go looking through the main body of the fiction, I challenge you to find a Shiba who says much of anything most of the time.

The Isawa are the know-it-alls, and the thing is, they're generally right- just rude in recent stories because they were due for a war. So would you say they could just be swapped with the Crab and nobody would know? Or should we maybe put them in a boat with the Moto? The Isawa are as much about the responsibilities of power as they are about wielding it, and they're often about NOT using magic willy-nilly to the frustration of those around them who fail to understand that the kami are not toys. When an Isawa acts, humbly or with arrogance, they're keenly aware of the gravity of their actions- they just have an inflated conception of what they can take (see: The Clan War-era Elemental Council and treating Black Scrolls like candy from a Pez dispenser).

The Asako are the grab-bag family stapled to the other two to invisibly make the clan function while the other two families do their thing. Besides "nerding in their libraries," they also hunt down maho-tsukai, form the monastic order that does some insane unarmed combat junk with elemental flavor, and, oh yeah, handle the bulk of the court duties, which hardly seems to fit "hiding in their libraries." They're often the courtly face of the Phoenix, meaning they're frequently the most personable and charming of the Phoenix.

You left out the Agasha, but that's okay, so did the story for most of the time they were part of the clan... but their inclusion shows something else about the Phoenix that you glossed over in your haste to write them off. Who else would have taken in an entire family(not just one guy like Yogo or Asahina) fleeing from the insane actions of their own lord purely because of compassion? (The lack of fallout from this is one of the most grievous missteps in the canon, because holy crud, that's sort of a big deal).

^ All that . Just all of that. Among Sparrows, WCIV, such a HUGE time among the Spider fans. We really thought we were getting somewhere with what it was going to mean to be Spider. It was really crushing when not only did nothing come of Among Sparrows, which was canonical! but all the hard work our WCIV guys put in, and just nothing. super weak sauce.

I think we have Rob Vaux to blame for that. He seems to have forced everyone to drop a planned divided Empire under Iweko II plotline (With the Shibatsu/Seiken choices at WC4 determining the pro and anti Emperor factions) in order to make way for the Kanpeki conquers the Empire with the Shadowlands Onyx plotline.

i will refrain from putting on my "they rigged the heir vote" tinfoil hat, but if they didn't outright manipulate the outcome, they sure screwed up the presentation and handling of it.

The heir fallout did manage to seem spectacularly meaningless once it became clear Kanpeki was going to ragequit either way.

TheItsyBitsySpider, I loved that and will probably use your spider in my l5r campaign I am starting with newbies. Thanks. It is so thoughtful and organized. I love it.

the problem i have with that argument is that while the other clans have been around longer, in most cases they are in no way demonstrably better defined narratively. not to poke a sleeping giant here, but honestly the phoenix, crane, dragon and lion are all kind of interchangeable. duelists, shugenja, samurai, monks. honorable, imperial blah blah. which sure is rokugan's way, but theres no one element to any of those clans that isn't duplicated in one or two of the others. thats not even getting into the fact that they've all gone through basically the same historical events (the dragon are _slightly_ better off here, but only marginally). the scorpion and the unicorn and the mantis are the only clans that have significantly unique histories and mechanics besides the spider. if you were serious about streamlining the clans, the most narratively sensible thing to do would be to remove the overlapping portions by combining the "stock" rokugan clans.

The thing is, a lot of the sameness is the result of blurring the lines over 20 years of product. Because emphases change, positions swap, the wheel turns. The reason it matters that the other Great Clans have been around longer is that there is more material -- 20 years worth -- in which to find stuff to focus on. Because the new Crane (or Lion, or Unicorn, or whomever) aren't going to be a distillation of all 20 years. They're going to be a "best (and worst) of," the elements that most define each clan as unique, good and bad.

The other thing about a relaunch is that FFG has the opportunity, going forward, to sharpen the blurred lines between the different clans, both thematically and mechanically. Every clan is going to lose stuff, whether in terms of mechanics or theme. I mean, we're talking thousands and thousands of cards being boiled down to a couple hundred new cards. So the new cards should be the distilled, focused essence of the clans they represent. It's FFG's job to figure out what that is, and when faced with multiple options, which version of each clan from the past twenty years best serves what they're doing now. That's baked into the whole idea of a relaunch, no matter what approach they take to the story and the setting, reboot, continuation or what.

That aside, a steadfast clan that supports the emperor without question in year 2 might be the traitor clan in year 10. That's not who they are, definitionally or thematically. It's what they do. If the writing was good, and portrayed the clans well, both decisions versions are expressing different aspects of that Clan's essence. If a hypothetical clan's essence, for example, is to promote order, they might do so by being diplomats, or they might conquer all Rokugan and enforce a peace of the sword.

Likewise, Crane have duelists, Dragon have duelists. Some arcs its more crane, some arcs its more dragon, some arcs its about even. Some arcs even emphasize the difference in style (whether in flavor or mechanics). But that for crane it is an expression of their watchword, excellence, is important. Dragon are good duelists for different reasons important to the dragon, which I don't recall at the moment.

Which again, for me, is the core issue. Honor should be paramount to every clan, at least in virtue. Each clan's vice is a failure of that honor. Every Great Clan has been honorable or dishonorable at different times. Possibly excepting Spider, not because I don't recognize them as a Great Clan -- they were if AEG said they were, and whether they will be depends on FFG, not me -- but because I simply don't know enough about them to say they have been. Maybe they have.

From one standpoint you could say, "Well, they're all the same. They all talk about honor, but they all fall." But that's not what makes the Clans distinct. What makes them distinct is *how* they talk about honor. And *how* they fall. And that should be clear and distinct for each clan. The whole setting is about honor, in a way. The Great Clans each parse that out in different ways.

For Spider, I haven't seen that yet. Looking at the descriptions posted in this thread, and the quoted material from "About Sparrows," it seems to me that setting them up to be conquerors, and the strong internal threat to the empire that keeps everyone else strong, is crippling.

If being honorable means, "conquer the empire if it is weak," where is dishonor? There is no conflict between a personal ambition to power and service to your lord, because pursuing a personal ambition to power at every opportunity is defined as service to your lord. That's just not interesting to me, and is the dramatic equivalent of eating your cake and having it, too.

Now again, maybe there's something I'm not seeing. But that's up to FFG to figure out. If they do? Great. Happy to have the Spider in the game as a Great Clan. If they can't or don't? That's fine with me, too.

The difference with the other great clans is not that they've been consistent for 20 years. It's that buried in 20 years of stories of varying quality, and different approaches to the various great clans, it's likely to be a lot easier to find an approach that fits what FFG needs and focus on it than it is in the five years or whatever Spider's been a Great Clan. It's just math. If there are 20 books on topic A and 5 books on topic B, there's more likely to be a book in the group of 20 that's genuinely good than one in the group of 5. Whether a particular reader is more interested in one group or the other, and more likely to enjoy a book out of the group of 5 doesn't alter that likelihood.

Man, you've read, like... one or two recent-vintage stories, haven't you? 'Cause this is like saying the Unicorn are about horses and could be replaced by anyone with horses.

Worse, I've read the Phoenix Clan novel book. But yeah, those were just rough sketches, you've got the idea. You need strong and actually unique-feeling characterization first then you can get the rest. You can have all the things you listed too, just make sure that nobody else get them. So if you say the Shiba is about sacrifice, the Isawa is wielding power with responsibility, and the Asako are librarian-courtiers then these things should not show up anywhere else in Rokugan: only the Shiba will do sacrifice (this sounds rather silly, but doable), only the Isawa will wield power with responsibility (eh...), and only the Asako will be librarian-courtiers (this is OK). Once this is done, then you have a solid faction that is irreplaceable from the setting. Anything below this line is just various levels of being expandable.

i will refrain from putting on my "they rigged the heir vote" tinfoil hat, but if they didn't outright manipulate the outcome, they sure screwed up the presentation and handling of it.

That. And the announcement of the never-finished book (six months after it started). The GM mole in the Mantis WC4 delegation. All the amazing work of the Spider delegation and that wacky Monkey tossed in the dustbin....

^ All that . Just all of that. Among Sparrows, WCIV, such a HUGE time among the Spider fans. We really thought we were getting somewhere with what it was going to mean to be Spider. It was really crushing when not only did nothing come of Among Sparrows, which was canonical! but all the hard work our WCIV guys put in, and just nothing. super weak sauce.

I think we have Rob Vaux to blame for that. He seems to have forced everyone to drop a planned divided Empire under Iweko II plotline (With the Shibatsu/Seiken choices at WC4 determining the pro and anti Emperor factions) in order to make way for the Kanpeki conquers the Empire with the Shadowlands Onyx plotline.

i will refrain from putting on my "they rigged the heir vote" tinfoil hat, but if they didn't outright manipulate the outcome, they sure screwed up the presentation and handling of it.

WHAAAAAAT Silly, they didn't rig anything, they just had a hidden scoring metric no one knew about until they announced the winner but players were apparently voting for throughout the entire year that completely swung the losing heir, overcoming an entire year of progressive domination, but also the only heir written up unto that point as willing to cause onyx, onto the throne... It was all perfectly established and fair, nothing tricksy here...

Yep.... nothing funny there *continues to bury Doburu's accomplishments and his progressive alliance into the dirt*

For Spider, I haven't seen that yet. Looking at the descriptions posted in this thread, and the quoted material from "About Sparrows," it seems to me that setting them up to be conquerors, and the strong internal threat to the empire that keeps everyone else strong, is crippling.

If being honorable means, "conquer the empire if it is weak," where is dishonor? There is no conflict between a personal ambition to power and service to your lord, because pursuing a personal ambition to power at every opportunity is defined as service to your lord. That's just not interesting to me, and is the dramatic equivalent of eating your cake and having it, too.

Well, Spider don't have "Honor" in the sense of other charecters. Best way I can describe it is that if I had to make a motto of the Spider its that "Power bows to Power". Shourido is the way of individual power, making oneself as powerful as possible through will and determination. Those that are mighty rule over those that aren't. Kanpeki isn't just champion because he is the son of Daigotsu, its because he can kill anyone in the clan that DARES challenge him.

Spider, if I dare say, philosophically are about the concept of power structure and society. They desire to become the greatest they can be in whatever sphere of influence they are in. Michio sought to be the greatest warrior, seeking new challenges, Daigotsu sought to be the most faithful servant of his God, Kuroko sought to become the height of influence possible. The Spider aren't just backstabber but "throne seekers" each one a slave to their need to become greater then they were before.

Where another clan would fail bushido, the Spider fail though weakness and failiure. They strive to serve those stronger then them reverently, for indeed compared to other clans these guys are zealots. They don't just serve Kanpeki, they WORSHIP him, for he is strength incarnate in every aspect and sphere of influence he would be in. To fail those stronger then you is a complete failure for a spider and is treated severely. So in a sense, the Spider HAS that duty to ones lord, in a very weird sense... They are the ultimate meritocracy clan, the strong survive and find their thrones in their lives, the rest fall down and become slaves, seeking the scraps of the powerful lords above them.

Its a dark, sad world for the Spider clan as a grunt samurai for the risk/reward is greater then for any other clan.

I'll write more but I have a train to catch, I'll fill this out more later because... I actually always liked this topic when it comes to the spider.

Man, you've read, like... one or two recent-vintage stories, haven't you? 'Cause this is like saying the Unicorn are about horses and could be replaced by anyone with horses.

Worse, I've read the Phoenix Clan novel book. But yeah, those were just rough sketches, you've got the idea. You need strong and actually unique-feeling characterization first then you can get the rest. You can have all the things you listed too, just make sure that nobody else get them. So if you say the Shiba is about sacrifice, the Isawa is wielding power with responsibility, and the Asako are librarian-courtiers then these things should not show up anywhere else in Rokugan: only the Shiba will do sacrifice (this sounds rather silly, but doable), only the Isawa will wield power with responsibility (eh...), and only the Asako will be librarian-courtiers (this is OK). Once this is done, then you have a solid faction that is irreplaceable from the setting. Anything below this line is just various levels of being expandable.

this may permanently revoke my fan card as far as a some of you are concerned... but i like the clan war novels. the wind novels not so much, mostly cause i feel like there should have been one about daigotsu, but the clan war books were fun! they are terribly noncanon and not high prose but i feel like they really grab a lot of the core essence of l5r.

^ All that . Just all of that. Among Sparrows, WCIV, such a HUGE time among the Spider fans. We really thought we were getting somewhere with what it was going to mean to be Spider. It was really crushing when not only did nothing come of Among Sparrows, which was canonical! but all the hard work our WCIV guys put in, and just nothing. super weak sauce.

I think we have Rob Vaux to blame for that. He seems to have forced everyone to drop a planned divided Empire under Iweko II plotline (With the Shibatsu/Seiken choices at WC4 determining the pro and anti Emperor factions) in order to make way for the Kanpeki conquers the Empire with the Shadowlands Onyx plotline.

i will refrain from putting on my "they rigged the heir vote" tinfoil hat, but if they didn't outright manipulate the outcome, they sure screwed up the presentation and handling of it.

WHAAAAAAT Silly, they didn't rig anything, they just had a hidden scoring metric no one knew about until they announced the winner but players were apparently voting for throughout the entire year that completely swung the losing heir, overcoming an entire year of progressive domination, but also the only heir written up unto that point as willing to cause onyx, onto the throne... It was all perfectly established and fair, nothing tricksy here...

Yep.... nothing funny there *continues to bury Doburu's accomplishments and his progressive alliance into the dirt*

For Spider, I haven't seen that yet. Looking at the descriptions posted in this thread, and the quoted material from "About Sparrows," it seems to me that setting them up to be conquerors, and the strong internal threat to the empire that keeps everyone else strong, is crippling.

If being honorable means, "conquer the empire if it is weak," where is dishonor? There is no conflict between a personal ambition to power and service to your lord, because pursuing a personal ambition to power at every opportunity is defined as service to your lord. That's just not interesting to me, and is the dramatic equivalent of eating your cake and having it, too.

Well, Spider don't have "Honor" in the sense of other charecters. Best way I can describe it is that if I had to make a motto of the Spider its that "Power bows to Power". Shourido is the way of individual power, making oneself as powerful as possible through will and determination. Those that are mighty rule over those that aren't. Kanpeki isn't just champion because he is the son of Daigotsu, its because he can kill anyone in the clan that DARES challenge him.

Spider, if I dare say, philosophically are about the concept of power structure and society. They desire to become the greatest they can be in whatever sphere of influence they are in. Michio sought to be the greatest warrior, seeking new challenges, Daigotsu sought to be the most faithful servant of his God, Kuroko sought to become the height of influence possible. The Spider aren't just backstabber but "throne seekers" each one a slave to their need to become greater then they were before.

Where another clan would fail bushido, the Spider fail though weakness and failiure. They strive to serve those stronger then them reverently, for indeed compared to other clans these guys are zealots. They don't just serve Kanpeki, they WORSHIP him, for he is strength incarnate in every aspect and sphere of influence he would be in. To fail those stronger then you is a complete failure for a spider and is treated severely. So in a sense, the Spider HAS that duty to ones lord, in a very weird sense... They are the ultimate meritocracy clan, the strong survive and find their thrones in their lives, the rest fall down and become slaves, seeking the scraps of the powerful lords above them.

Its a dark, sad world for the Spider clan as a grunt samurai for the risk/reward is greater then for any other clan.

I'll write more but I have a train to catch, I'll fill this out more later because... I actually always liked this topic when it comes to the spider.

For a samurai and the Daigotsu portion of the clan, but what remember that is also a monk and courtier part of the clan as well. People just tend to either forget or ignore them. The fact that an Empress' son is part of the clan in the courtier family now is not something to dismiss.

Well, Spider don't have "Honor" in the sense of other charecters. Best way I can describe it is that if I had to make a motto of the Spider its that "Power bows to Power". Shourido is the way of individual power, making oneself as powerful as possible through will and determination. Those that are mighty rule over those that aren't. Kanpeki isn't just champion because he is the son of Daigotsu, its because he can kill anyone in the clan that DARES challenge him.

Spider, if I dare say, philosophically are about the concept of power structure and society. They desire to become the greatest they can be in whatever sphere of influence they are in. Michio sought to be the greatest warrior, seeking new challenges, Daigotsu sought to be the most faithful servant of his God, Kuroko sought to become the height of influence possible. The Spider aren't just backstabber but "throne seekers" each one a slave to their need to become greater then they were before.

See, to me, and given what's of interest to me in the setting -- what makes it "cool" per the subject line, and unique? Everything you wrote here is a reason to exclude Spider as a playable faction, and as a Great Clan. If the game is about honor, and they don't care about honor, they might make a useful antagonist or setting element, but they shouldn't be positioned as a (potential) protagonist via being a playable faction.

Naturally, others' mileage may vary.

But again, I'm perfectly fine with spider if they make sense in FFG's vision of the setting, which may or may not revolve around what's of the most interest to me. And I'm perfectly fine with excluding them (or any other clan) under that same premise.

You need strong and actually unique-feeling characterization first then you can get the rest. You can have all the things you listed too, just make sure that nobody else get them. So if you say the Shiba is about sacrifice, the Isawa is wielding power with responsibility, and the Asako are librarian-courtiers then these things should not show up anywhere else in Rokugan: only the Shiba will do sacrifice (this sounds rather silly, but doable), only the Isawa will wield power with responsibility (eh...), and only the Asako will be librarian-courtiers (this is OK). Once this is done, then you have a solid faction that is irreplaceable from the setting. Anything below this line is just various levels of being expandable.

I wouldn't say that each family needs to be completely unique, just strongly unified. Going off your examples with the Phoenix clan:

Shiba personalities should all have something that says that they are their to protect your other personalities and that them dying honorably is not a negative but more often a benefit to you.

Isawa personalities would have abilities and qualities that make them the primary source of the best spell platforms in the game.

Asako personalities would have qualities and abilities primarily tied to preserving/interacting with your hand/fate deck.

Scorpion might also have sacrifice mechanics, but they would be more built around the sacrificed personalities being "ammo" for the acting personality rather than meat shields like the Shiba.

The Shugenja/Spellcasters of other clans would have abilities tied to their theme rather than being primarily spell platforms.

Ikoma personalities might also be librarian-courtiers but focused more on (re)using from the discard.

Well, Spider don't have "Honor" in the sense of other charecters. Best way I can describe it is that if I had to make a motto of the Spider its that "Power bows to Power". Shourido is the way of individual power, making oneself as powerful as possible through will and determination. Those that are mighty rule over those that aren't. Kanpeki isn't just champion because he is the son of Daigotsu, its because he can kill anyone in the clan that DARES challenge him.

Spider, if I dare say, philosophically are about the concept of power structure and society. They desire to become the greatest they can be in whatever sphere of influence they are in. Michio sought to be the greatest warrior, seeking new challenges, Daigotsu sought to be the most faithful servant of his God, Kuroko sought to become the height of influence possible. The Spider aren't just backstabber but "throne seekers" each one a slave to their need to become greater then they were before.

See, to me, and given what's of interest to me in the setting -- what makes it "cool" per the subject line, and unique? Everything you wrote here is a reason to exclude Spider as a playable faction, and as a Great Clan. If the game is about honor, and they don't care about honor, they might make a useful antagonist or setting element, but they shouldn't be positioned as a (potential) protagonist via being a playable faction.

Naturally, others' mileage may vary.

But again, I'm perfectly fine with spider if they make sense in FFG's vision of the setting, which may or may not revolve around what's of the most interest to me.

i would hazard to guess you came to L5R in its early days. i've noticed that those who started right at the beginning view l5r as a game about honor and samurai drama, while those who came to it just a little bit later view it as magical samurai and supernatural high fantasy in which honor is a thing but not _the_ thing.

to me, rebuilding the whole game and all clan's identities around honor ignores huge swatches of L5R's history and is needlessly one dimensional. theres SO MUCH to this game's lore. why would you throw all that out, just to standardize all the clans on a single keyword that hasn't defined the game since its first year or two?

i would hazard to guess you came to L5R in its early days. i've noticed that those who started right at the beginning view l5r as a game about honor and samurai drama, while those who came to it just a little bit later view it as magical samurai and supernatural high fantasy in which honor is a thing but not _the_ thing.

I'm late to this game, but I do think Honor should be the thing. The thing for magical samurai in supernatural heroic fantasy.

I do despise the samurai drama L5R forces into every story tho.

Hmmmm... What does this make me ?

i would hazard to guess you came to L5R in its early days. i've noticed that those who started right at the beginning view l5r as a game about honor and samurai drama, while those who came to it just a little bit later view it as magical samurai and supernatural high fantasy in which honor is a thing but not _the_ thing.

to me, rebuilding the whole game and all clan's identities around honor ignores huge swatches of L5R's history and is needlessly one dimensional. theres SO MUCH to this game's lore. why would you throw all that out, just to standardize all the clans on a single keyword that hasn't defined the game since its first year or two?

This one is easier to resolve, simply make Spider also get caught up in the scorpion's games and leave the Spider as an imposing threat in the distance, and I mean distance. The scorpion exist to do the dirty work of distracting the clans from seeing opportunities to oppose the emperor. Spider are the apocalypse waiting in the dark for the clans to grow too weak and become vulnerable. If the scorpion succeed a clan or two gets wreaked for a bit, or a hero is brought down to ruin, or two or more clans are pitted into relatively pointless wars, look at how the scorpion were pushing the crab into war with the spider... perfect example right there. If Spider succeeds then clans all lose and the heir of darkness reigns over the land, a very different and FAR worst consequence.

At first I liked this, but now that I'm thinking about it more isn't this just a temporary solution? Sooner or later the Emperor will be weak, and the Spider will launch a coup. Then they'll either win (bringing in a 1000 Years of Darkness type scenario) or get crushed and disbanded (bringing us back to the Shadowlands horde days).

i would hazard to guess you came to L5R in its early days. i've noticed that those who started right at the beginning view l5r as a game about honor and samurai drama, while those who came to it just a little bit later view it as magical samurai and supernatural high fantasy in which honor is a thing but not _the_ thing.

I'm late to this game, but I do think Honor should be the thing. The thing for magical samurai in supernatural heroic fantasy.

I do despise the samurai drama L5R forces into every story tho.

Hmmmm... What does this make me ?

After reading a majority of your posts, I'm not sure what you actually like about L5R. You hate the clans, the mechanics, the story, samurai, and honor. If I read correctly.

i would hazard to guess you came to L5R in its early days. i've noticed that those who started right at the beginning view l5r as a game about honor and samurai drama, while those who came to it just a little bit later view it as magical samurai and supernatural high fantasy in which honor is a thing but not _the_ thing.

I'm late to this game, but I do think Honor should be the thing. The thing for magical samurai in supernatural heroic fantasy.

I do despise the samurai drama L5R forces into every story tho.

Hmmmm... What does this make me ?

After reading a majority of your posts, I'm not sure what you actually like about L5R. You hate the clans, the mechanics, the story, samurai, and honor. If I read correctly.

I love the mechanics (if FFG drops R&K I will rage so hard it will make the oceans boil), I just dislike the meta-canon, and once I'm there I can't pretend that I like parts of it... for whatever reason. The setting has excellent potential, but it feels kinda wasted. And there are no words how it triggers me when I see good potential getting wasted. What is even worse, sometimes I feel like they wasted all that potential intentionally, and it makes me even angrier .

^ All that . Just all of that. Among Sparrows, WCIV, such a HUGE time among the Spider fans. We really thought we were getting somewhere with what it was going to mean to be Spider. It was really crushing when not only did nothing come of Among Sparrows, which was canonical! but all the hard work our WCIV guys put in, and just nothing. super weak sauce.

I think we have Rob Vaux to blame for that. He seems to have forced everyone to drop a planned divided Empire under Iweko II plotline (With the Shibatsu/Seiken choices at WC4 determining the pro and anti Emperor factions) in order to make way for the Kanpeki conquers the Empire with the Shadowlands Onyx plotline.

i will refrain from putting on my "they rigged the heir vote" tinfoil hat, but if they didn't outright manipulate the outcome, they sure screwed up the presentation and handling of it.

WHAAAAAAT Silly, they didn't rig anything, they just had a hidden scoring metric no one knew about until they announced the winner but players were apparently voting for throughout the entire year that completely swung the losing heir, overcoming an entire year of progressive domination, but also the only heir written up unto that point as willing to cause onyx, onto the throne... It was all perfectly established and fair, nothing tricksy here...

Yep.... nothing funny there *continues to bury Doburu's accomplishments and his progressive alliance into the dirt*

For Spider, I haven't seen that yet. Looking at the descriptions posted in this thread, and the quoted material from "About Sparrows," it seems to me that setting them up to be conquerors, and the strong internal threat to the empire that keeps everyone else strong, is crippling.

If being honorable means, "conquer the empire if it is weak," where is dishonor? There is no conflict between a personal ambition to power and service to your lord, because pursuing a personal ambition to power at every opportunity is defined as service to your lord. That's just not interesting to me, and is the dramatic equivalent of eating your cake and having it, too.

Well, Spider don't have "Honor" in the sense of other charecters. Best way I can describe it is that if I had to make a motto of the Spider its that "Power bows to Power". Shourido is the way of individual power, making oneself as powerful as possible through will and determination. Those that are mighty rule over those that aren't. Kanpeki isn't just champion because he is the son of Daigotsu, its because he can kill anyone in the clan that DARES challenge him.

Spider, if I dare say, philosophically are about the concept of power structure and society. They desire to become the greatest they can be in whatever sphere of influence they are in. Michio sought to be the greatest warrior, seeking new challenges, Daigotsu sought to be the most faithful servant of his God, Kuroko sought to become the height of influence possible. The Spider aren't just backstabber but "throne seekers" each one a slave to their need to become greater then they were before.

Where another clan would fail bushido, the Spider fail though weakness and failiure. They strive to serve those stronger then them reverently, for indeed compared to other clans these guys are zealots. They don't just serve Kanpeki, they WORSHIP him, for he is strength incarnate in every aspect and sphere of influence he would be in. To fail those stronger then you is a complete failure for a spider and is treated severely. So in a sense, the Spider HAS that duty to ones lord, in a very weird sense... They are the ultimate meritocracy clan, the strong survive and find their thrones in their lives, the rest fall down and become slaves, seeking the scraps of the powerful lords above them.

Its a dark, sad world for the Spider clan as a grunt samurai for the risk/reward is greater then for any other clan.

I'll write more but I have a train to catch, I'll fill this out more later because... I actually always liked this topic when it comes to the spider.

For a samurai and the Daigotsu portion of the clan, but what remember that is also a monk and courtier part of the clan as well. People just tend to either forget or ignore them. The fact that an Empress' son is part of the clan in the courtier family now is not something to dismiss.

Sorry for the quote chain ;_;.

Anyway, stuff. The issue with the spider..... and perhaps issue is to strong a word. Thematic space. When designing a game you want each part to be thematic and feel unique. The spider exist to threaten the empire.... but they want to be included as part of it? The spider are there to be the foil to the more honorable clans.... but that's the scorpion. The spider is there to threaten the clans that are weak? But the lion is there specifically to knock down the clans that grow too powerful and ambitious.

They are a neat idea, and if the scorpion never came back they might even have a really good place for them to fit... but there are a lot of people who feel that having one clan of dishonorable bastards who do what they want for sketchy reasons is more than enough.

Shourido is kind of a neat idea, academically, but giving it the same mechanical weight as bushido is a mistake. Let people believe this new philosophy, but the get low honor scores, not something new in its place

i would hazard to guess you came to L5R in its early days. i've noticed that those who started right at the beginning view l5r as a game about honor and samurai drama, while those who came to it just a little bit later view it as magical samurai and supernatural high fantasy in which honor is a thing but not _the_ thing.

I'm late to this game, but I do think Honor should be the thing. The thing for magical samurai in supernatural heroic fantasy.

I do despise the samurai drama L5R forces into every story tho.

Hmmmm... What does this make me ?

After reading a majority of your posts, I'm not sure what you actually like about L5R. You hate the clans, the mechanics, the story, samurai, and honor. If I read correctly.

I love the mechanics (if FFG drops R&K I will rage so hard it will make the oceans boil), I just dislike the meta-canon, and once I'm there I can't pretend that I like parts of it... for whatever reason. The setting has excellent potential, but it feels kinda wasted. And there are no words how it triggers me when I see good potential getting wasted. What is even worse, sometimes I feel like they wasted all that potential intentionally, and it makes me even angrier .

While FFG bought the Rokugan IP, the roll and keep mechanic was actually developed by John Zinser for some home games they ran in the early days of AEG, and it was used in other game lines besides L5R (and not just the first Seventh Sea, either). I'd be surprised if what is basically AEG's house mechanic rights went with the Rokugan IP.

I'd be surprised if what is basically AEG's house mechanic rights went with the Rokugan IP.

It did, that's one of the reasons Wick had to drop R&K from 7th Sea 2nd Edition.

Phoenix Clan. Clan theme is genuine, blinding idealism of a sort no other Great Clan really believes in shackled to intense hubris. Where the Crane are concerned with excellence and the Dragon are concerned with enlightenment, the Phoenix are concerned with right actions.

I don't really buy that because both the Lion and Crane are incredibly idealistic and, yes, the Dragon's pursuit of enlightenment is simply another form of idealism. Enlightenment is not something truly obtainable by rote.

I think it's more accurate to say the Phoenix devotion is to knowledge, not right actions. They value all knowledge--good, bad, or otherwise--and that has always been their driving force and occasionally their downfall. If all they wanted was "right action," then they would not have hidden an entire city and filled part of it with items deemed dangerous, inappropriate, or outright evil by the rest of the Empire and their own public voice. Right action would have said to follow the Dragon example and toss those things into the nearest volcano.

They want peace because it's really hard to pursue knowledge when you're fighting for your life or your clan or your empire.

The Shiba? Yes, they are the quiet ones, and usually the only part of the clan that actually almost fits your idealistic interpretation.

The Isawa? Idealistic? I don't think so--don't forget the disadvantage jealousy originated in Way of The Phoenix.

The Asako? Sometimes idealistic, but . . . the whole keeping secrets from the Isawa just because does not reflect well on them from an idealistic "do the right thing" perspective.

The Agasha? True, we hardly saw them before or after their defection, but . . .their core identity came from their time in the Dragon. I can't remember much other than the one seer daimyo and what? Two magistrates? Doing much of anything after they become Phoenix.

Oh, and no, the Phoenix are not the only clan who would have welcomed an entire group who left their previous clan. I'm pretty certain the Mantis would have welcomed any family who needed a place to call home and could add to the firepower/future of the clan. Shoot as powerful as the Agasha must have been to produce Shaitung, I feel quite certain the Mantis would have welcomed them.

The Lion are concerned with correct actions.

The Crane are concerned with excellent actions.

Neither really worries about "right." Nor, for that matter, have the Dragon in quite the same sense I mean.

And to say the Phoenix value knowledge purely for its own sake is to overlook why they do what they do- yes, they cracked open Black Scrolls (incidentally making Fu Leng's defeat possible), but only because literally no one but Togashi knew what was up. Likewise, their curiosity about certain knowledge (such as gaijin pepper, horse breeding, and Crab culinary traditions ) is all but nonexistent.

Amusing that you think I over-idealize the Isawa, since I actually think they produce he most compelling villains the Phoenix produce: they honestly are in tune with the cosmos, and this leads to insane levels of hubris, arrogance, and dismissive behavior.

You clearly have a higher opinion of the Isawa than I do if you think the Asako should blindly share secrets with them- particularly since Lady Asako swore her fealty to Shiba, not Isawa.

Re: the Mantis and the Agasha. The Mantis might have taken them in, but their reasons would have been far more mercenary

in both intent and execution.

Whereas the Phoenix are arrogant enough to regard another shugenja family as just another arm of the family tree, naive enough to assume that sheltering fugitives who have forsaken their oaths of fealty is in some way correct, and Ivory Tower enough to largely sweep all that they might have gained from taking that risk under the rug.

You can't tell me the Mantis would have done the same.

I'd be surprised if what is basically AEG's house mechanic rights went with the Rokugan IP.

It did, that's one of the reasons Wick had to drop R&K from 7th Sea 2nd Edition.

Ah, thank you for the correction!