Those of you who have read my other post on this forum know my opinion on the 4th ED rule.

But for the one who have not. I feel that despite its problems the 4th ED is probably the best of the rule set.

That said there are areas that need work. or are just plan missing from the rule such as:

1. "The Tides of Battle" rules from 3rd ED. I think this rule adds a little flexibility to the initiative order and portrays the ability of a skilled fighter to battle back form a bad start.

2. The ability for shujenga to memorize spells.(Innate Abilities) Just fits the setting better to me.

3. Weapon special abilities. the weapons in 4th are for the most part just damage numbers.

I have reinstated most of these missing parts in my game. with how close the mechanics of 3rd and 4th are it was not much of a change.

The tides of battle was straightforward and fit the rules fine so no changes where needed (3rd ed rev. pg 169)

The same was true for Innate Abilities. (3rd ed rev. pg 236)

Now with weapons I'm using the fan created rules from Little Truths by SEAN C. RILEY, but I feel they don't quite go far enough.

What I was wondering was, what House rule has everyone else added or brought back and if you can post them here.

In no particular order

1: Initiative is now Insight/Air instead of Insight/Reflexes. I got this from a Reddit user who had the idea; they believed that Initiative should not only be based off Reflexes, but by someone's Intuition (part of the Awareness Trait) as well. After some back and forth, I also agree; reminds me of Shadowrun's Initiative using Reaction and Intuition.

2: Both Healthy and Out Wound Ranks are now Earth x5 instead of one or the other. This acts like a buffer for better survivability. Additionally, this can lead to a few 'left for dead' scenarios.

3: You can now roll Sincerity (Deceit) / Awareness vs an opponent's Investigation (Notice) / Perception to catch him/her by surprise while they are aware of you; you take an Honor hit if you win as normal.

4: Artisan: Poetry is now Perform: Poetry; The Voice Adventure includes that skill as well.

5: Unless a Courtier Technique says otherwise, if someone wants to make a Social Skill Roll to effect multiple people, then they have to call one Raise per person they wish to effect.

For the weapons, we did something like this:
We ditched ALL of the weapons stats in the books, and we ditched ALL of different weapon skills. There is now only a single fighting skill, "Budo". As for weapons, you create stats for each individual weapon using following rules:

1. First, you pick weapons size. This decides how many damage dice you keep. Small weapons keep 1 dice, medium weapons keep 2 dice, and large weapons keep 3 dice.
2. Then, you pick it's quality. Quality decides how many damage dice you roll, and determines rules of Weapon Traits. Peasant Weapons roll no extra dice, Soldier Weapons roll extra dice equal to their kept dice, and Samurai Weapons roll 2 more dice than they keep. You still add Strength to the number of dice you roll.

3. Each Weapon has Weapon Traits. They can be Positive or Negative. Peasant Weapons require you to take a Negative Trait for each Positive Trait. Soldier Weapons don't require Negative Traits, and you can gain 1 (and only 1) free Positive Trait by adding 2 Negative Traits to it. Samurai Weapons start with no Negative Traits, can take up to 2 Negative Traits in exchange for free 1 Positive, but they are also only Weapons that can eventually gain Master and Nemuranai Traits.

4. What do I mean by "free" Positive Trait? Each Positive Trait increases Strength Requirements of your Weapon. For each point of Strength you lack to wield a weapon, TN of using it increases by 5.

5. What Traits do? They provide small bonuses. A lot of them come in form of "Specific Manuever costs 3 TN instead of 5 TN per Raise", but there are others, like 1,5 Handed "You can swing this medium weapon using two hands in order to keep extra dice of damage". I'm not going to post the list here, because I don't want to translate all of it into English.

6. Samurai Weapons can have their traits modified by visiting a master smith.

7. Samurai can procure potentially unlimited number of Soldier Weapons, but they usually only start with their Daisho and maybe one extra weapon as Samurai Weapons. Anything extra is probably a plot reward.

8. And that's it. After composing your weapon, you can freely describe it. Want a large, two handed katana? Sure. Want to use a polearm with the same stats? Sure.


I have so many house rules that it would be probably better to post them in my own thread...but I doubt that anyone would be interested, as it's pretty clear our playstyle is very far away from classical L5R people enjoy here.

Some house rules

A Note on Samurai Women: Stephen Turnbull's Samurai Women does note that Bugeisha (Armed Female Gentry) typically tended to carry a naginata in lieu of a daisho, along with a tanto/waskazashi to make up for the differences in upper body strength. Given that most naginata were crafted by swordsmiths with as much attention to detail and craft as the katana, this is not considered an insult or a diminution of the Bugeisha. Given the level of force that can be brought to bear from a properly trained wielder with the naginata and the weapons reach, a properly trained bugeisha with a naginata will not be taken lightly by any samurai with the slightest bit of sense. To represent this, the naginata should get the Keyword: Samurai if the school does not already have it.

Invoking the Name of Ones Lord

When dealing with functionaries and others of technically higher station than the Samurai in question, it can become rather difficultto get people to take you seriously. Medieval Japan recognized this and the invocation of a lords name to indicate that you were there on their behalf tended to make things bit easier for lower ranking functionaries. And this was a socially acceptable form of intimidation within the Samurai caste. Annoying a lower ranked bushi was one thing. Angering a Shomyo or a Daimyo was another kettle of fish.

When invoking the name of ones lord during official business, the bushi is treated as having Glory and Status of one rank lower than their lord. Standard rules apply for such rolls at the adjusted levels

Testimony with multiple samurai against a single higher ranking samurai:

This is one that’s a bit of a grey area, but I’ll try to give a rough guide. Generally, if you have bushi within the same rank (Bonge, Buke, or Kuge) it usually takes multiple samurai of Rank equaling or exceeding the target samurai’s rank before anyone will take them seriously. This is modified if the Target Bushi has a title of some form or position, and general reputation of credibility vs the accusing samurai. If one has a reputation that is upstanding, then the accusers had best have very good Sincerity skills, cold hard 'proof', or the ability to convince another bushi of higher caste to back them.

If accusing a bushi of much higher rank, without damning testimony and backing, other more radical actions may need to be taken (see the 47 Ronin) or the accusers will be doomed.

I am putting this here only because I do not believe there is sufficient interest in a separate 3E thread.

Because 4E physical rulebooks are very difficult to obtain without paying a premium, we are still using 3Er. I really like this rules set well enough. The only thing we have house-ruled thus far is to use the 4E dueling rules. I get that the 3Er rules try to simulate the tension of a duel (while giving the rules a feel similar to dueling in the CCG), but they are cumbersome.

A few house rules that have evolved out of my group.

All Characters are granted the skill Lore: Clan/Affiliation/Order equal to Half their IR rounding up. This is to represent that they were raised among their clansmen and have some semblance of knowledge of their clan's ins and outs. Different School could make this a bit tricky as the character would've have spent more time with a different clan than their own, I suggest having it refer to the clan they spent the most time with overall.

Number of Kata active equal to your Insight Rank. Haven't had a problem with doing things like this, I just didn't like how kata required to be activated.

As for Lore Skill, we condensed all different Lores into a single Lore skill. Ditto for Artisan, Craft and other Macroskills. Individual specializations are now Emphases, and they allow you to switch out a generic Mastery Ability for Emphase-specific one.

5 hours ago, WHW said:

As for Lore Skill, we condensed all different Lores into a single Lore skill. Ditto for Artisan, Craft and other Macroskills. Individual specializations are now Emphases, and they allow you to switch out a generic Mastery Ability for Emphase-specific one.

That has advantages and disadvantages.

I can totally see a valid concern that "just because someone knows a lot about one area, doesn't mean they would be knowledgeable about another", then again-- the mechanical effect that any given lore or artisan or craft skill is ever going to have on the game compared to Courtier, Sincerity, Etiquette, Defense, Kenjutsu, etc. makes it absolutely ludicrous that such things are requiring the same amount of point investment.

Your solution is pretty good. The other work around would be to make those pretty useless fluff skills steeply discounted and essential skills that are used constantly more expensive. But that wouldn't really fix where they appear in schools.

We observed that if you wanted to be a Loremaster, your best bet was to pump Intelligence and instead of taking Lore skills, grab Sage Advantage. And if you had good Awareness, you grabbed Soul of Aristry. And so on, to the point where we just assumed that Samurai education is so awesome that the difference we are interested in is not between "I'm ok at Art A" and "I'm good at painting!", but "I'm good at all kinds of things, but Really Magnificiently Awesome at Painting". It also digs into the idea that in order to become truly good at something, you need to be a factotum who finds wisdom in caring for the garden and fighting alike.
Couple this with 3rd ED style emphases (+Skill to roll, not reroll 1'es) and difference between Artisan 5 (Painting) and Artisan 5 (Whatever) is real.

Over here, we have the following changes for Macro Skills:

- Their Rank 3 and 7 Mastery Abilities are universally +3 and +7 Insight, respectively.

- Not Macro Skill specific, but all Skills cost 1 point less experience.

So bumping a Macro Skill to Rank 3 will award 6 points of Insight (3 from the Skill Rank and 3 from the Mastery Ability) for 4 experience points - a pretty darn good deal if someone wants to gun for a higher Insight Rank.

Wait, so you also houseruled that each skill rank is worth more Insight in general? Because by RAW, that would only be worth 4 Insight - 1 for an extra skill rank and the +3 from your mastery. Unless you mean bumping to 3 from 0.

Oh, yes, it is bumping to 3 from 0 .

On 2/10/2017 at 1:20 PM, Madcap said:

I am putting this here only because I do not believe there is sufficient interest in a separate 3E thread.

Because 4E physical rulebooks are very difficult to obtain without paying a premium, we are still using 3Er. I really like this rules set well enough. The only thing we have house-ruled thus far is to use the 4E dueling rules. I get that the 3Er rules try to simulate the tension of a duel (while giving the rules a feel similar to dueling in the CCG), but they are cumbersome.

This would be a good reason for FFG to make some money reprinting the 4th ED books:)

Add in some of the erata and some minor changes like the "The Tides of Battle" rules and weapons specials. and I would even buy the new book (my reader copy is falling apart) that way I would not have to bring out my collectors ed

if we are going to go for a 5th edition, they could take the R&K system and clean it up a bit (no star wars dice system. Just. No.) organize the presentation a bit better (I have complete faith in this), and perhaps add a few things. As to the time line....hmmm. Not sure on that. They'd make a killing on clan dice

17 minutes ago, TheWanderingJewels said:

if we are going to go for a 5th edition, they could take the R&K system and clean it up a bit (no star wars dice system. Just. No.) organize the presentation a bit better (I have complete faith in this), and perhaps add a few things. As to the time line....hmmm. Not sure on that. They'd make a killing on clan dice

AEG made the best choice IMHO of going timeline neutral in 4th. It allows GM's to have the game in any timeline and does not hamper you with having to play in a current time or mod to fit your time.

agreed. I've not been running the standard setting since 1st ed. Shoju II is currently on the throne

Some basic House-Rules.

+All Clans (Great or Minor), Imperial Families and possibly Ronin Groups (if desired) gain 1 Free Rank in Lore: (Insert Origins), to represent a small amount of education in your in your Clan/Family/Hood.’s history and nuisances.

+All Schools gain 1 Free Rank in Lore: (School Name) as well to represent your characters knowledge about its aspects (history, important individuals, etc.).

+All Phantom Skill Advantages (Crab Hands, Sage, etc) are changed to reduce the cost of increasing Skills, purchasing Emphasis (and in my Skill Revisions Mastery Abilities) for all Skills to which they apply by 1 Experience point (to the minimal of 1 Exp); the cost of the Advantage is adjusted to 12 Experience Points.

+Skills are divided by Trained and Untrained categories. Untrained Skills are useable by anybody regardless of whether they have any ranks in the skill or not (albeit at a penalty). While Trained Skill require at least one Rank in order to be used, these skill are under the categories of the rare Exotic Skills (those that are not normally available to the average Rokugani) and Forbidden Skills (those that are outright punished for showing knowledge or expertise in).

+Characters that do not posse at least 1 Skill Rank in a Skill in addition to suffering a -2k0 penalty to the Skill Roll; cannot call Raises or apply Free Raises to the roll. In addition the GM may determine that Skill TN’s above 10 are simply beyond the ability/knowledge of the Unskilled and simply count as failing.

+Characters in the Defense Stance add their Air Ring plus their Defense Skill Rank to their Armor TN and may attack or cast spells in that Stance but at a -2k1 penalty.

+Wealth is changed to be measured in 100 point increments with Zeni being the foundation of the Empires wealth and with Ryo being the highest unit of wealth. Bu being the average measure of wealth generally available to Samurai (and the unit used to purchase most weapons and armor). This lets the Wealthy Advantage to actually do something useful and make you FEEL Wealthy.

Set up:
Zeni= Base of Wealth
100 Zeni=1 Bu
100 Bu= 1 Koku
100 Koku= 1 Ryo

+In addition to the above rule all Schools and Techniques change their Koku units to Bu.

That’s it so far.

2 hours ago, Magus Black said:

Some basic House-Rules.

+All Clans (Great or Minor), Imperial Families and possibly Ronin Groups (if desired) gain 1 Free Rank in Lore: (Insert Origins), to represent a small amount of education in your in your Clan/Family/Hood.’s history and nuisances.

Like this.

2 hours ago, Magus Black said:

+All Schools gain 1 Free Rank in Lore: (School Name) as well to represent your characters knowledge about its aspects (history, important individuals, etc.).

I agree with this as long as there are not mechanical benefits.

2 hours ago, Magus Black said:

+All Phantom Skill Advantages (Crab Hands, Sage, etc) are changed to reduce the cost of increasing Skills, purchasing Emphasis (and in my Skill Revisions Mastery Abilities) for all Skills to which they apply by 1 Experience point (to the minimal of 1 Exp); the cost of the Advantage is adjusted to 12 Experience Points.

not sure this is needed, but each to their own.

2 hours ago, Magus Black said:

+Skills are divided by Trained and Untrained categories. Untrained Skills are useable by anybody regardless of whether they have any ranks in the skill or not (albeit at a penalty). While Trained Skill require at least one Rank in order to be used, these skill are under the categories of the rare Exotic Skills (those that are not normally available to the average Rokugani) and Forbidden Skills (those that are outright punished for showing knowledge or expertise in).

Would love to see the breakdown on this as I have thought about doing this myself

2 hours ago, Magus Black said:

+Characters that do not posse at least 1 Skill Rank in a Skill in addition to suffering a -2k0 penalty to the Skill Roll; cannot call Raises or apply Free Raises to the roll. In addition the GM may determine that Skill TN’s above 10 are simply beyond the ability/knowledge of the Unskilled and simply count as failing.

-2k0 seems kind of high ?

2 hours ago, Magus Black said:

+Characters in the Defense Stance add their Air Ring plus their Defense Skill Rank to their Armor TN and may attack or cast spells in that Stance but at a -2k1 penalty.

I personally have never found defense that under-power, and I'm hesitate to punish spell casting due to all the limiters on it in 4th.

2 hours ago, Magus Black said:

+Wealth is changed to be measured in 100 point increments with Zeni being the foundation of the Empires wealth and with Ryo being the highest unit of wealth. Bu being the average measure of wealth generally available to Samurai (and the unit used to purchase most weapons and armor). This lets the Wealthy Advantage to actually do something useful and make you FEEL Wealthy.

Set up:
Zeni= Base of Wealth
100 Zeni=1 Bu
100 Bu= 1 Koku
100 Koku= 1 Ryo

+In addition to the above rule all Schools and Techniques change their Koku units to Bu.

like the breakdown of a Schools Koku to Bu, but it seems like a lot of work to rebalance all items for a new conversion rate.

2 hours ago, Magus Black said:

That’s it so far.

some nice stuff here.

3 hours ago, tenchi2a said:

AEG made the best choice IMHO of going timeline neutral in 4th. It allows GM's to have the game in any timeline and does not hamper you with having to play in a current time or mod to fit your time.

I like keeping it timeline neutral, but certain schools are more prevalent in certain time frames. Ex. 3E & 4E don't have the Shinjo bushi school in the core book, which was more prevalent than the Moto school prior to the return of Shinjo and the rise of the Moto family during the Lying Darkness timeline.

I, too, tend to run games during the 1st Ed timeline (i.e. 1118 Topaz Championship forward), as it is the timeline with which I am the most familiar. It also lets the characters make history during the eventual Clan War. The players get to mold history by making story decisions, a la CCG tournament winners. (Ex. The Scorpion Clan Coup is successful. How does your clan react? Stay with the canon history, or something else?)

For one's own Clan, Family, School lore, heraldry, etc., I could just see making a skilled (Insight+Intelligence)k(Intelligence) test if they don't have the requisite skill. I would assume that every samurai is taught about his own Clan, Family, and School at a very basic level.

1 minute ago, Madcap said:

I like keeping it timeline neutral, but certain schools are more prevalent in certain time frames. Ex. 3E & 4E don't have the Shinjo bushi school in the core book, which was more prevalent than the Moto school prior to the return of Shinjo and the rise of the Moto family during the Lying Darkness timeline.

this can be a pain when the books are still coming out, but if 4th rev/5th are just fixes to the existing system and not brand new mechanics then it should not be an issues

1 minute ago, Madcap said:

I, too, tend to run games during the 1st Ed timeline (i.e. 1118 Topaz Championship forward), as it is the timeline with which I am the most familiar. It also lets the characters make history during the eventual Clan War. The players get to mold history by making story decisions, a la CCG tournament winners. (Ex. The Scorpion Clan Coup is successful. How does your clan react? Stay with the canon history, or something else?)

I tend to run from the same starting point with a generational game structure. I also tend to stay away from canon altering stories till the PCs are in the rank 4-5 area. I just feel, and I could be wrong, that rank 1-3 PCs are just small fish in a big pond. To me their Daimyo would not send a low ranking Buke on missions of that high of importance. Thats not saying that a group of magistrates can't unintentionally walk into a larger plot line, but not to the point that they would have to major of an effect on the meta-plot.

On 2/8/2017 at 4:19 PM, BlindSamurai13 said:

In no particular order

1: Initiative is now Insight/Air instead of Insight/Reflexes. I got this from a Reddit user who had the idea; they believed that Initiative should not only be based off Reflexes, but by someone's Intuition (part of the Awareness Trait) as well. After some back and forth, I also agree; reminds me of Shadowrun's Initiative using Reaction and Intuition.

I tend to avoid changes like this just because I did not create the system so I'm not sure how it will effect the overall balance.

On 2/8/2017 at 4:19 PM, BlindSamurai13 said:

2: Both Healthy and Out Wound Ranks are now Earth x5 instead of one or the other. This acts like a buffer for better survivability. Additionally, this can lead to a few 'left for dead' scenarios.

I use the Karma Rules from 1st ed here. Have to tried this, but have you found that this promotes combat or reckless behavior?

On 2/8/2017 at 4:19 PM, BlindSamurai13 said:

4: Artisan: Poetry is now Perform: Poetry; The Voice Adventure includes that skill as well.

Now is this an complete change over or another ave. for its uses?

I can see these as two separate skills. one for the creating Poetry and one for the performance of said poetry.

On 2/8/2017 at 4:19 PM, BlindSamurai13 said:

5: Unless a Courtier Technique says otherwise, if someone wants to make a Social Skill Roll to effect multiple people, then they have to call one Raise per person they wish to effect.

I would change this to "can effect # x school rank people per raise"

4 hours ago, tenchi2a said:

I tend to run from the same starting point with a generational game structure. I also tend to stay away from canon altering stories till the PCs are in the rank 4-5 area. I just feel, and I could be wrong, that rank 1-3 PCs are just small fish in a big pond. To me their Daimyo would not send a low ranking Buke on missions of that high of importance. Thats not saying that a group of magistrates can't unintentionally walk into a larger plot line, but not to the point that they would have to major of an effect on the meta-plot.

Why? Particularly in Rokugan it takes little to have an outsized effect. Say the PCs uncover someone's shame. That changes who that person can influence or be influenced by. Unfortunately, that person was instrumental to someone's much larger plot.

Or they reveal a Kolat cell and suddenly everyone's on the lookout for infiltrators and another, unrelated cell goes bust - which has a profound effect.

I mean, you're perfectly free to the way you run things, but I don't quite understand why you'd think that way

I have tons of homebrew materials but, in order to make compatibility easier, I tend not to delete existing rules but rather to add stuff.

Here are a few

1) When one rolls for restiting Fear he can add either his Honor or Insight Rank, whatever is higher. This rule has been introduced to help low honor but tough and experienced characters (e.g. many Hida bushi) to resist Fear as better as weaker but more honorable characters (e.g. Doji Courtiers).

2)Yumi, Han-kyu and Yari all get the Samurai weapon keyword. I know it change A LOT in many techniques but, in general terms, it helps representing the realities of Samurai warfare.

Furthermore one thing that really bothers me is the lack of reach rules. If proper reach rules are present some reach weapons and very small ones have their use.

So I paste here are my two reach rules from a word document I wrote a few years ago..

An attack of opportunity (“AoO”) is an attack which you perform outside your turn in a round.

Everyone can perform a maximum number of AoO per round equal to his Air Ring / 2 (rounded down).

You can make an AoO against a target if that target makes an action which triggers an AoO. The target’s triggering action does not happen if not after the AoO is resolved. Only the following two actions trigger an AoO.

· The target moves out of a space that you threaten.

· The target is trying to start a Grapple with you while you are armed.

Note that, unlike other games (i.e. d20), an AoO does not happen in any other condition and 5ft movements provoke AoO.

These are the most common kinds of Reach with the related threatened spaces.

· Normal Reach: with most weapons usually the wielder threatens only the adjacent spaces around him (all the adjacent squares if you use a 5ft grid).

· Reach Weapons: A wielder of a Reach weapon (Polearms, Spears and Chain Weapons) threatens the spaces which are 1 space away (10 ft in a 5ft-grid), but not those around him. Furthermore if he wants to attack those adjacent to him he must suffer a 1 Forced Raise.

· Huge Creatures: Most Huge creatures threaten both adjacent and one-space-away spaces. They can also make attacks in both ranges. The Huge creature must be humanoid or have some kind of attacking appendage. Horses and other similar quadrupeds do not threaten spaces one space away.

Threatening spaces works differently according to the stance one is in.

· Full Attack, Attack and Defense. You threaten all the spaces as described in the previous paragraph.

· Full Defense and Center. You do not threaten any space with these stances.

Note that in any stance (even in Center) you always have the possibility to make AoO versus the unarmed enemies who want to grapple you while you are armed.

Usagi Bushi Rank 1

This school focuses on "Hit & Run" maneuver, so the introduction of an AoO system can especially hinders them. To balance this fact the following rule is introduced to Usagu Bushi Rank 1.

If you move out of a threatened space and you have an Athletics Skill Rank higher than the threatener's Weapon Skill you will not suffer any AoO.

Jujutsu Skill Rank 5.

This is a new Mastery Ability which applies to Jujutsu Skill Rank 5. When you attempt a grapple against an armed opponent you do not suffer AoO if your Jujutsu Skill Rank is higher than your's opponent Weapon Skill.

The basic premise of this system is that longer weapons are good for an "onset attack" which means an attack which starts a fight while shorter weapons are good for "close range attacks" which mean attacks performed when the melee is already started.

To represent this it is essential to identify a scale of relative sizes among weapons. The following table shows the different sizes with the keywords which will put a weapon in a specific general category. New keywords are explained in the equipment section of this document.

Before making an attack consider the difference in general size of your weapon compared to the one of your target. If both are of the same size there is no effect, but if there is a size difference you can get a bonus at certain conditions.

For every difference in general size you receive a bonus to your attack roll equal to your Fire rings x the size difference.

Remember that this bonus applies only at the following conditions:

Example

Matsu Ukio (Fire 2) is armed with a Nodachi (Large Weapon) and he charges Yoritomo Kobayashi (Fire 3) which is armed with a Kama (Small Weapon).

The Matsu has the longer weapon and the Yoritomo has the shorter weapon.

The Matsu acts first, the Yoritomo acts second.

Round 1.

The Matsu charges the Yoritomo: he moves and then attack. His attack roll benefits from a bonus equal to Fire 2 x 2 size differences: +4 bonus to the attack roll.

The Yoritomo survives the attack and, since the Matsu is adjacent to him at the beginning of the Yoritomo's turn, the Mantis gets a bonus of +6 (Fire 3 x 2 size differences) to his attack.

Round 2.

The Matsu is now at close range, so he cannot benefit from any bonus for longer weapon.

He decide to spend a Move action to move 5ft back from the Yoritomo (suffering an AoO if you use that rule) and then going newly against the Yoritomo with another 5ft. Only now he will receive his bonus for a longer weapon.

On the other hand the Yoritomo will keep on benefiting from the bonus since the Matsu is still adjacent.

NOTE: if your enemy wield two weapons (e.g. a Niten pratictioner), you will compare your weapon with the enemy's weapon which is less advantegeous for you. Therefore you get no bonus if one of the two weapons is of the same size of the weapon you are using for making an attack. This also means, for example, that two niten pratictioners get no bonus at all when facing each other!

Example

Yoritomo Kenshin (Fire 3) is armed with two Kama (Small weapons) and he fights against Mirumoto Takeshi, armed with a Katana (Medium Weapon) and a Wakizashi (Medium S Weapon = to be considered as a Small Weapon)

Yoritomo Kenshin attacks will receive no "shorter weapon" bonus since his Small Kama are compared with the Dragon's Wakizashi (Medium S weapon, considered a Small weapon).

On the other hand Mirumoto Takeshi's attacks will be considered as happening with a longer weapon if he uses the Katana. If he uses the Wakizashi he will receive no bonus.

Furthermore my two reach rules above help defining the role of 2 rings in combat.

We all know the role of Void (points + raises!), Earth (Wounds) and Water (Movement) but my rule 1 above give a role to Air and tule 2 gives a role to Fire.

Moreover the above Reach Rule 2 received an "addendum" during gameplay.

We created two new weapon Keyword "Medium S" and "Medium L"

Regarding my Reach rule 2 the "Medium S" weapon are treated like small and "Medium L" are treated like Large.

• "Medium S" is added as a keyword to Wakizashi and to a few other homebrew weapons of mine (kodachi, Kogarasy Maru)
• "Medium L" is for a few other homebrew weapons of mine (Tachi, O-Katana) which I'll maybe post here (I've posted in the old AEG forums...when they worked).

Here is another couple of rules that I paste here from by word document:

A few weapons can be used in grapple. Note that to start a Grapple you must always have at least one hand free and you can trigger AoO from your target if you use AoO in you game (see above), even if you have a weapon in the other hand.

You must always use the Jiujutsu skill for starting a Grapple even if you have a weapon in the other hand.

The Weapon Skill can be used only for controlling grappling in the subsequent rounds and only for performing the “Hit” option with the related weapon.

The following weapons can be used during a Grapple:

· All Small weapons (mainly Knives and War Fans).

· Weapon with the "Medium S" keyword (e.g. Wakizashi, Medium Staves), although suffering 1 forced raise.

In L5R4 the number of raises is limited only by the Void (provided that any advantage or technique does not interfer). However, this is pretty limiting for characters that have high Skill ranks but low Void.

The present writer believes in enhancing the use of raises, especially in combat (and therefore regarding maneuvers) but also in social and artisan skills.

For this sake a new rule is here introduced: the number of raises per roll is limited by either your Void Rank or your Skill Rank - 2.