11 hours ago, FunTimeTeddy said:

Hey y'all. What if we agree to disagree? Doesn't our belief in magical samurai supersede partisan politics?

okay well first of all my beef has zero to do with partisan politics an everything to do with storytelling, which i think is a valid hill to die on. that said... i mean... have you hung out on l5r forums for long? cause while i don't disagree with you in theory... in practice nothing in the like 8 years i've spend on l5r forums would suggest that the fact that we all like l5r is sufficient to supersede clan partisanship.

9 hours ago, cielago said:

okay well first of all my beef has zero to do with partisan politics an everything to do with storytelling, which i think is a valid hill to die on. that said... i mean... have you hung out on l5r forums for long? cause while i don't disagree with you in theory... in practice nothing in the like 8 years i've spend on l5r forums would suggest that the fact that we all like l5r is sufficient to supersede clan partisanship.

Yeah, I know. It is mostly wishful thinking on my part. It just bothers me so that we can get caught up in petty squabbles even though we are all here for the same reason. By and large.

But there is more: overwhelmingly, my direct experience with the l5r community has been positive, respectful, and...honorable. I'd like that to be reflected on official forums, to whatever degree possible.

6 hours ago, FunTimeTeddy said:

It just bothers me so that we can get caught up in petty squabbles even though we are all here for the same reason.

Petty squabbles like this are the bread-and-butter parts of any L5R discussion. You know you are among the L5R community if the third page of the "The back of my card has a brown spot on it.... what to do?" topic starts a "Spider is best/worst / Hida Kisada dindu dun nuffin / etc" discussion for the rest of the thirty-or-so pages. With half of the posts being about blaming the Spider for the brown spot on OP's card.

8 hours ago, AtoMaki said:

With half of the posts being about blaming the Spider for the brown spot on OP's card.

9 hours ago, AtoMaki said:

Petty squabbles like this are the bread-and-butter parts of any L5R discussion. You know you are among the L5R community if the third page of the "The back of my card has a brown spot on it.... what to do?" topic starts a "Spider is best/worst / Hida Kisada dindu dun nuffin / etc" discussion for the rest of the thirty-or-so pages. With half of the posts being about blaming the Spider for the brown spot on OP's card.

good feels and solidarity is (usually) for clan forums. general forums is where you hash it out with all the other partisans and make sure they all know how wrong they are!

honestly, i think that was one of the story team's greatest sins, and one i never forgave that group of them for. the whole "vote for the direction of your clan" thing proved SO ACRIMONIOUS that it divided almost every clan i know and created lasting divisions everywhere. i can't speak with the other clans, but for the spider, it wasn't until the last community manager/story team came through, C Thomas Hand in particular, and really talked openly with us that things kind of felt whole again.

17 minutes ago, cielago said:

the whole "vote for the direction of your clan" thing proved SO ACRIMONIOUS that it divided almost every clan i know and created lasting divisions everywhere.

I dunno... the Dragon and Phoenix sort of bonded over how lame the initial offerings were... The Phoenix Mahohead/Purist schism was always there, and it was the only real stress we went through...

The Crab and Lion, likewise, seemed to roll right along. Spider and Mantis were the only ones I saw causing mass anguish.

I loved my choices as a Scorpion. I wanted to ally with Kanpeki and then stab him in the back.

But I was also excited for a Scorpion civil war.

i just went back to the spider boards to look at the threads from this time. its nearly every single post for about 4-5 pages. only the leaks and the sales threads pushed them off the first 2 pages.

so maybe my view of that time was colored by the ferocity of the debate on the spider forums.

On 2017-02-23 at 2:20 AM, SirEuain said:

I am saying that it's a good idea to offer fans what they weren't getting before. FFG needs to entice people back to the game and to get new blood. That you think it's a good idea to have Dragon react to the biggest failure in the setting's history by running away and sitting on their hands is something I find baffling. I think it'd be a better idea for the Dragon to be directly involved -- it'd make for better story presence, it'd be more consistent with a Dragon Clan that feels responsibility for their actions and, yes, it'd also be a show of good will from FFG.

You're assuming that the dragon sealing up the mountain is them not doing anything. The rest of the clans are leaving as well, the dragon are staying, at least in part, to watch the spider/kanpeki. They are being more protective in the conflict then the clan leaving for the colonies

and the most consistent thing for the dragon to do is separate themselves, somehow figure out the answer everyone will need and show up at just the right time.

18 hours ago, AtoMaki said:

Petty squabbles like this are the bread-and-butter parts of any L5R discussion. You know you are among the L5R community if the third page of the "The back of my card has a brown spot on it.... what to do?" topic starts a "Spider is best/worst / Hida Kisada dindu dun nuffin / etc" discussion for the rest of the thirty-or-so pages. With half of the posts being about blaming the Spider for the brown spot on OP's card.

Fair enough. Just know that it can be alienating for a certain contingent. Maybe I'm in the minority but my urge to contribute is, in part, due to the fact that I feel a perpetual lack of representation. Which is mainly a macroscopic point of view: a love of world, mechanics, and community. Petty squabbles be damned.

49 minutes ago, FunTimeTeddy said:

Fair enough. Just know that it can be alienating for a certain contingent. Maybe I'm in the minority but my urge to contribute is, in part, due to the fact that I feel a perpetual lack of representation. Which is mainly a macroscopic point of view: a love of world, mechanics, and community. Petty squabbles be damned.

I play too many games and have created/help create too many communities (I move a lot), to not also share this view point.

When I first got Into l5r, I had a supportive and great play group. There was always one or two people who were sometimes bothersome, but not bad. When I moved to college I helped start a small community that was friendly but with a competitive focus.

Got several of my friends to go to our first legit koteis, since up to that point none of them had never competed and I had only ever played in small store tournaments.

There were a lot of really great people. I met Sparks, and as I mentioned before he likely doesn't remember me. A few others, mostly folks out of the Ann Arbor play group.

But what really stuck out to me was how the vets talked down to the newer players, especially my players. Not everyone, and honestly only a few people (no names). But I was just flabbergasted. I played magic (who hasnt) for a decade before this and the toxicity in there that I experienced was at least focused on feelings of superiority. But in the l5r community it was weird. It wasn't about, "oh you play this card instead of that card. You're doing it wrong."

It was "oh you're a [Clan Here] and have only been playing for x years. You don't know. You couldn't know about [thing that happened in story] let me tell you why your identity is wrong"

People get way more invested in clans than they do in colors as in magic. And to an extent some ribbing about clan loyalties is a lot of fun and can help build the community. But not at the expense of new players.

Personally, I will be bending over backwards for new players because without other players, I can't play either.

And to some extent, my greatest fear has been realized. Most of the people who frequent these boards, right now, are the die hards. Ffg doesn't have to sell l5r to us. We are going to get it anyway. So when you reduce the l5r community down to the (seemingly) most active vocal minority, it's a lot of people bitching.

And there are good reasons to. No one agrees fully with anyone else with how the story should have gone, yet everyone agrees something went wrong. Every person I've talked to has said the game needed a reboot of some kind mechanically. Everyone agrees on some level that this had to happen in some form, and yet while it's happening, I still see vets looking down on others, especially when it comes to story and setting.

And again, the people here, generally, can hold their own because they are part of the invested, vocal minority. They know their stuff. But so help me, when the game re-releases, I will do the same as I did with my playgroup and all the newbies I got into the game by defending them at every single opportunity and recommending they completely ignoring certain people.

Whether they are knowledgeable and well versed and/or amazing at the game, their attitude is a disservice to the growth of the community. Especially when it is those exact same people who can be most excited for the new players when they discover something about the lore or game.

In the end I'm just a hype guy. I took top of Clan only once at a recognized kotei and never made the cut. But dammit if this entire IP ain't fuelled on hype.

I wish more people recognized that and got hype WITH people and not try to bring someone elses hype down since it ain't their hype

8 hours ago, BayushiCroy said:

And there are good reasons to. No one agrees fully with anyone else with how the story should have gone, yet everyone agrees something went wrong. Every person I've talked to has said the game needed a reboot of some kind mechanically. Everyone agrees on some level that this had to happen in some form, and yet while it's happening, I still see vets looking down on others, especially when it comes to story and setting.

And again, the people here, generally, can hold their own because they are part of the invested, vocal minority. They know their stuff. But so help me, when the game re-releases, I will do the same as I did with my playgroup and all the newbies I got into the game by defending them at every single opportunity and recommending they completely ignoring certain people.

Whether they are knowledgeable and well versed and/or amazing at the game, their attitude is a disservice to the growth of the community. Especially when it is those exact same people who can be most excited for the new players when they discover something about the lore or game.

In the end I'm just a hype guy. I took top of Clan only once at a recognized kotei and never made the cut. But dammit if this entire IP ain't fuelled on hype.

I wish more people recognized that and got hype WITH people and not try to bring someone elses hype down since it ain't their hype

It looks you're overhyped. Most people like you are just pretty sure game will be superb to attract neverending numbers of new players. I think it will be opposite. Of course lot of FFG LCG fanboys will check it out for their curiosity but i think that majority of customer base will be built about old CCG players. And they are pretty sure how online community of THIS game works.

Also noticed ther're plenty of people who don't give a s...t about what game will look/play. All they need is a "living" gaming platform to have excuses to meet again in one place, because all CCG competetive community is now scattered in many various games. Too many .

So everything is in hands of FFG engineers to make this game EXCELLENT from the start. Otherwise it won't be worth to invest a penny. If it will be very similiar to original, with such limited card pool, all ex-CCG "pros" will find all holes in a minute and their experience from AEG version will be crucial to expose its all weakness. So that's why i'm not hyped about it and i wait patiently.

And if it will be mediocre/weak/boring i will just say it loud to keep people at bay. Ther're hundreds of other games to play nowadays (like incoming ressurection of Doomtown: Reloaded).

I was absolutely sure you would be one of the people to reply to me and be snarky.

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It looks you're overhyped.

You have no real way to measure my excitement, and certainly not an authority on how excited I should or should not be, nor anyone else. Piss off.

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Most people like you are just pretty sure game will be superb to attract neverending numbers of new players.

I did not say that, I encourage you quote my post where I did. Also most of my post was about the work that went into building my small communities. No, obviously it will not be the game to end all games, but you misrepresent me, again, and as you do with everyone you talk to.

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I think it will be opposite

You are free to.

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Of course lot of FFG LCG fanboys will check it out for their curiosity but i think that majority of customer base will be built about old CCG players.

I agree. However I don't think it's impossible for people to stick with the game and be new players in either case.

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And they are pretty sure how online community of THIS game works.

I don't know what you are saying here.

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Also noticed ther're plenty of people who don't give a s...t about what game will look/play. All they need is a "living" gaming platform to have excuses to meet again in one place, because all CCG competetive community is now scattered in many various games. Too many .

Are you saying that there are too many games to choose from, and that is why competitive scenes are small? Or are you saying that the need the game to centralized in a currently published game so that the old CCGers can come back together. This is ambiguous.

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So everything is in hands of FFG engineers to make this game EXCELLENT from the start.

Yes. They intend to, mostly because no business (with exceptions) intends to fail.

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Otherwise it won't be worth to invest a penny.

Again, I agree. Presumably they are spending resources on this game. Hope they do good.

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If it will be very similiar to original, with such limited card pool, all ex-CCG "pros" will find all holes in a minute and their experience from AEG version will be crucial to expose its all weakness.

Experience makes people better at things, yes. But that is if it is similar. And we have no idea if it will be or not. We know it will be dissimilar enough that old cards will not be compatible, but that's it.

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So that's why i'm not hyped about it and i wait patiently.

And this where I must fundamentally disagree. You seem to think that you shouldn't get hype/excited for something if you don't know how its going to turn out. You are invalidating peoples feeling of excitement for a surprise, because that's what it will be. With absolutely no news, all people can do is be excited for the surprise of how L5R will look when there is an announcement.

I am not sitting here frothing at the mouth with hype over how good the game is going to be. I did not even imply that in my post. At best, I am sitting here cautiously excited and ready to get real hype for the surprise of how L5R is going to turn out. People connect to different things, and I love games. No game connected with me like L5R did between its story, game play, and community. I make no apologies for being touchy feely about it because I loved the game and it was(is) a big part of my life, much to the chagrin of my girlfriend.

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And if it will be mediocre/weak/boring i will just say it loud to keep people at bay. Ther're hundreds of other games to play nowadays (like incoming ressurection incoming ressurection of Doomtown: Reloaded).

Yes, it would be a disservice to people to have people buy into and play a bad game. But we don't know the game is bad yet. We don't know the game is good yet either. That's why currently, I am really f*****g hype about the reveal and getting to try it all new again. Hopefully, it will be like watching a movie I love for the first time again. You don't get to that often. So you misunderstand me, mostly because you want to misunderstand me. NOWHERE did I talk about how good the game is. Only that people who are excited should be allowed to be excited. You constantly **** on people's excitement and are quite rude when you do it because you project what you THINK they are saying onto them.

Do better.

Also DT:R is great.

i think theres a distinction between the blind "this game will be good, i know this despite having no information" hype and "its l5r, i'm hyped because i love l5r, and i can't wait to see what the game will be". i think you'd be hard pressed to find a lot of people in the former camp, but there seem to be quite a few in the latter.its been a long two years, and frankly the years prior to that were rough going for a lot of people, so something new, REALLY REALLY new, in l5r is worth being hyped about JUST BECAUSE ITS NEW. once we know more, then you can start to temper your hype, and then when its out and we finally actually know what the game looks like, if you think its bad, then its fine to piss in everyone's cornflakes. people will, undoubtably, do so right back when they disagree, but thats how it works, but i agree that its kind of petty to wanna kick over the hype train at this point. all we know is its new l5r. i think we can all agree thats good, and worth being excited about, especially since the alternative is what? none?

On 2/22/2017 at 8:56 PM, cielago said:

kanpeki's star wars equivalent is another thread, as is his worthiness in general as a villain and Daigotsu's son. its not the point. you're so focused on killing him you continually ignore the point i'm making. its not about kanpeki, its about the fact that you cannot give the clans a win at that stage in that particular story. he's the champion of the spider, and no matter how crummy a villain you think he is, he's the architect of their destruction. killing him would be a PROFOUND blow, a magnificent victory. onyx is about the clans being beaten, and then finding their way back. you can't START that story with them killing the person who destroyed rokugan. i mean, c'mon dude. SURELY you can see why that makes no sense. this is storycraft 101. if you wanna tell AN ENTIRELY DIFFERENT STORY then fine, start a thread about the onyx AU you wish FFG would do. but you can't agitate for them to do Onyx, except for this one thing that doesn't make any dang hell sense.

I'd argue you're missing the point I'm trying to make -- I'm not agitating for Onyx. I'm of a mind that to fix the story problems AEG handed FFG, you'd have to do years of retcons, which I don't think is reasonable. I'm pushing for, at best, broad strokes similarity. AEG tried to recreate a Clan Wars-like playing environment, but made an error that's pretty much fatal IMO: they have provided the rallying leader for the "good guys" and the clear villain for the bad guys. Unlike Clan Wars, or even Hidden Emperor or Four Winds, the lines are clearly drawn before players even see the cards. Hell, logistically Spider should start on the ropes just from being outnumbered, as they've got at best half the Scorpion working with them, and everyone else standing against them.

This, in turn, pretty much prevents any Spider cooperation. The Spider are plainly and clearly in the wrong, were already bordering on cartoonish supervillainy, and general player inclination is almost always going to be against them whether it makes for good story or no.

I'm not saying removing Kanpeki is a good idea because players hate him, though I'd agree with the statement. I'm saying killing Kanpeki changes the environment so that the Spider no longer necessarily have Daigotsu's blessing. I'm saying that it prevents easy rallying against the Spider when a significant contingent is just trying to survive, just like the rest of the clans. I'm saying it forces the other clans to revise their position on whether it's better to go down in flames in revenge than it is to ensure they can somehow reverse the damage Kanpeki caused.

5 minutes ago, SirEuain said:

I'd argue you're missing the point I'm trying to make -- I'm not agitating for Onyx. I'm of a mind that to fix the story problems AEG handed FFG, you'd have to do years of retcons, which I don't think is reasonable. I'm pushing for, at best, broad strokes similarity. AEG tried to recreate a Clan Wars-like playing environment, but made an error that's pretty much fatal IMO: they have provided the rallying leader for the "good guys" and the clear villain for the bad guys. Unlike Clan Wars, or even Hidden Emperor or Four Winds, the lines are clearly drawn before players even see the cards. Hell, logistically Spider should start on the ropes just from being outnumbered, as they've got at best half the Scorpion working with them, and everyone else standing against them.

This, in turn, pretty much prevents any Spider cooperation. The Spider are plainly and clearly in the wrong, were already bordering on cartoonish supervillainy, and general player inclination is almost always going to be against them whether it makes for good story or no.

I'm not saying removing Kanpeki is a good idea because players hate him, though I'd agree with the statement. I'm saying killing Kanpeki changes the environment so that the Spider no longer necessarily have Daigotsu's blessing. I'm saying that it prevents easy rallying against the Spider when a significant contingent is just trying to survive, just like the rest of the clans. I'm saying it forces the other clans to revise their position on whether it's better to go down in flames in revenge than it is to ensure they can somehow reverse the damage Kanpeki caused.

yeah, okay, if you don't want to do onyx, thats a different thing. i disagree with like, half of your assessment above, but i think at this point we've established that you and i have different opinion here, and we're just kind of going in circles. additionally, and i think more usefully, going through this conversation has actually raised an interesting train of logic for me re: onyx. I don't think we're gonna get onyx, or even anything like it, i think they're gonna throw out the end of ivory too. i think they're gonna reboot to ivory status quo. my reasoning is thus:

as i mentioned a couple times before, onyx is empire strikes back, that is to say its the 2nd act. it works if you know what Rokugan looks like, who Daigotsu is and why he's worked so hard to put his son on the throne, and thus why Kanpeki's conquest is a HUGE payoff. after generations in control, the clans suddenly being defeated and having to work to take back Rokugan is meaninful. HOWEVER, if you are a new player, its a terrible jumping on point for rokugan and a terrible introduction to the setting. i mean, GODAWFUL. i think thats a pretty compelling, verging on airtight honestly, argument for why we won't see it as the starting point.

in their promotional materials, they mention the colonies. i'm truthfully not convinced we should take that as gospel, but i think its encouraging when combined with the knowledge that the people making the game are big fans and respect the game's lore. despite what so many have said about the necessity of a reboot, and what you're saying re: retcons, L5R's biggest value is not its mechanics, which are great but not exceptional like the story. i don't see them tossing that away.

lastly, when the game was sold, the AEG guys wanted to release the in design sets, even without art. FFG put the kibosh on it, and when they leaked, as soon as FFG got wind they nuked the leaks. at the time i didn't give too much thought to why they'd care about old card mechanics being in the world, but it occurs to me now that if the cards reflect a story they intend to abandon, that might be a reason for them to not want them out there.

anyway, tl;dr the more we talk about onyx, the less convinced i am that FFG is gonna use it. i think they'll plunder the onyx stuff for non-spider (and likely non-mantis) art, and possibly for the stray idea, but go their own way forward, likely starting at the ascension of Douchweko The Second, if i had to guess.

Eh...the art assets they purchased almost certainly include a time of dark unspeakable nastiness with Spider-mon wearing guys doing terrible things...

13 minutes ago, Shiba Gunichi said:

Eh...the art assets they purchased almost certainly include a time of dark unspeakable nastiness with Spider-mon wearing guys doing terrible things...

i'm confident that they aren't going to let a handful of art they bought dictate what kind of story they use, especially if that story makes a terrible jumping on point for new fans.

Well, there is an interview where the FFG guys talk about being huge fans of the Second Day of Thunder arc, and the Onyx Empire story (including its prelude) ain't that far from the SDoT, so there is that.

However, I think the fluff-baggage would be still too big, so I fully expect some sort of shortcut retcon, like the Race for the Throne being dumped (and thus the Toturi surviving).

22 minutes ago, AtoMaki said:

Well, there is an interview where the FFG guys talk about being huge fans of the Second Day of Thunder arc, and the Onyx Empire story (including its prelude) ain't that far from the SDoT, so there is that.

However, I think the fluff-baggage would be still too big, so I fully expect some sort of shortcut retcon, like the Race for the Throne being dumped (and thus the Toturi surviving).

presuming this quote from the product page is accurate: "Throughout the development of the LCG, our developers will ensure that the game maintains its connection to Rokugan and the Colonies, as well as the game’s pervasive themes of honor, nobility, magic, intrigue, duty, and warfare. " i can't see that being particularly likely.

and even if that single reference to the colonies is a red herring, if you think that they're gonna dump half of the game's history... why even buy l5r at that point? why not just make your own magically samurai game if you're just gonna throw away half of what you just bought?

4 hours ago, cielago said:

i'm confident that they aren't going to let a handful of art they bought dictate what kind of story they use, especially if that story makes a terrible jumping on point for new fans.

Eh,if they paid for it, it's unlikely they're going to throw it out completely...

And in point of fact, Onyx is very Clan Wars-esque- when the world met Rokugan, the place was being invaded by a demonic army allied with the Crab while everybody else uselessly squabbled amongst themselves... They may not keep "Kanpeki wins everything," but they can easily use a great deal of the Onyx set-up without it being a terrible place to jump aboard.

"It is a period of civil war. Rebel samurai, striking from the Dragon mountains, have won their first victory against the evil Onyx Empire. During the battle, agents of the usurped Iweko dynasty managed to steal the infant daughter of the Dark Emperor, Hantei Kanpeki. Pursued by agents of the Hantei, a small band of samurai bear their precious hostage toward the lands of the mysterious Dragon Clan, hoping against hope to be allowed entry..."

Or they could do something with a shred of originality and not ripoff Star Wars. Either way, Onyx is not INHERENTLY a bad place to start.

I'd be very surprised if they continued with Onyx as-is given how unpopular the lead-in was, particularly that Kotei season and the way they handled Mantis and Spider -- were any of those clans' players happy with that situation?

10 hours ago, cielago said:

presuming this quote from the product page is accurate: "Throughout the development of the LCG, our developers will ensure that the game maintains its connection to Rokugan and the Colonies, as well as the game’s pervasive themes of honor, nobility, magic, intrigue, duty, and warfare. " i can't see that being particularly likely.

and even if that single reference to the colonies is a red herring, if you think that they're gonna dump half of the game's history... why even buy l5r at that point? why not just make your own magically samurai game if you're just gonna throw away half of what you just bought?

Hmmm... I was just referring to the Race for the Throne to be dumped, that's, like, the Khan's Defiance and the Celestial Tournament. Far from "half of the game's history" to be honest. The rest (the Destroyer War and the Age of Exploration) can happen under Toturi III/IV. The rise of the Spider would fit Naseru better anyway (IMHO).

18 minutes ago, AtoMaki said:

Hmmm... I was just referring to the Race for the Throne to be dumped, that's, like, the Khan's Defiance and the Celestial Tournament. Far from "half of the game's history" to be honest. The rest (the Destroyer War and the Age of Exploration) can happen under Toturi III/IV. The rise of the Spider would fit Naseru better anyway (IMHO).

i was just rereading the writeup of the Four Winds stuff in Imperial Histories, and Naseru's Yasuki Shenanigans would definitely support your contention.

What if they just dumped everything post-Goddess IV? We'd restart with Iweko I and the Age of Exploration.