1 hour ago, Shiba Gunichi said:

the Great Clans are super-intelligent cockroaches

KILL THEM WITH FIRE

1 hour ago, Kinzen said:

KILL THEM WITH FIRE

"You bring fire? Against the Phoenix? Is this some manner of joke?"

15 minutes ago, Shiba Gunichi said:

"You bring fire? Against the Phoenix? Is this some manner of joke?"

KILL THEM WITH POISON

OR HAMMERS

OR WHATEVER REALLY AS LONG AS THE ROACHES DIE

(I may have grown up in Texas and had some deeply traumatic experiences with cockroaches.)

Clan wars or pre-coup

11 hours ago, Shiba Gunichi said:

"You bring fire? Against the Phoenix? Is this some manner of joke?"

Why? Fire is pretty effective against maho-tsukai and other tainted creatures as far as I can remember .

1 hour ago, AtoMaki said:

Why? Fire is pretty effective against maho-tsukai and other tainted creatures as far as I can remember .

Tsk tsk tsk, for shame...

1 hour ago, AtoMaki said:

Why? Fire is pretty effective against maho-tsukai and other tainted creatures as far as I can remember .

1. I seriously do not appreciate the Phoenix = maho thing. One, it's not any more true of them than anyone else. Two, it's about as tired as jokes about Crane gender. Three, it sorely tests my ability to be nice to people. Get some new material.

2. That quote is a direct flavor text from one Shiba Ikokawa and was not intended to be taken seriously. I'm sure your "witty" comeback isn't either, but it's... just tired.

3 minutes ago, Shiba Gunichi said:

I seriously do not appreciate the Phoenix = maho thing.

Well, I don't like the whole Phoenix = magic thing, so we might be on the same page here.

I rather doubt it.

Just saying, if you wanna mock the Phoenix...mock their almost-perpetual irrelevance to the story, mock their hysterically awful track record in inter-clan conflicts despite supposedly having all this unbeatable magic, mock the fact that for a Clan of supposedly staunch traditionalists, their women seem to have invented the miniskirt, mock the hypocrisy of the fact that the guys who ran Yobanjin Mura somehow object to other Clans' foreign influences, mock Isawa's hubris,mock the fact that every time there's a new Clan Champ they claim THEY won't be a doormat to the Council only for them to immediately become precisely that, mock them for every flavor text which claims they've moved past their old arrogance.... the maho thing was good for a chortle when Kinuye decks were a going concern. That was a very long time ago.

Talking about eras we'd like to see,how about one where someone other than a Crab, Crane, or sometimes Lion or Dragon gets to play hero?

Being irrelevant, arrogant, ignorant, and hypocrite is boring in Rokugan. Everyone is at least two of these things in varying combinations. So in the end, the only thing that sticks out for the Phoenix is maho.

And yet the most prominent shadowlands figures of the clan wars came from the unicorn - Moto Tsume, scorpion - Yogo Junzo, and the Crab - Kuni Yori.

Only one of the council fall to the taint and the force that was corrupted was pretty small, compared to the Crab where the whole clan marched with a shadowland army.

So the idea that when you think of Maho you think of the Phoenix is very short sighted.

To me the #1 thing that needs to happen is the LCG needs to be divorced from the RPG.

I'm tired of some guys trying to build a competitive deck to dictate the storyline for the whole licence.

4 hours ago, AtoMaki said:

Why? Fire is pretty effective against maho-tsukai and other tainted creatures as far as I can remember .

Too soon, bro.?

6 hours ago, AtoMaki said:

So in the end, the only thing that sticks out for the Phoenix is maho.

That's like saying the only thing that sticks out about the Unicorn is Kolat infiltration, or that the only thing that sticks out about the Crab is working alongside of armies of Oni.

Which is to say, incorrect, snotty, and fixated upon a specific shameful era because you just plain don't like what the Clan is built around.

I mean, I HATE the Crane. HATE them. But their fans have things about them they like, and when one of those fans says I'm being a jerk, I don't go, "nuh-uh!"
I just stop talking about the Crane for a bit.

Yeah, this is why I said we are on the same page. You don't like the Phoenix = maho thing for the same reason I don't like the Phoenix = magic thing. It is just a very focused ("snotty") take on the clan that disregards... pretty much everything sans a specific aspect that isn't even supposed to be that dominating all things considered. But this is simply how things have been set up. If I could help it, I would, but no such luck .

8 hours ago, Shiba Gunichi said:

I rather doubt it.

Just saying, if you wanna mock the Phoenix...mock their almost-perpetual irrelevance to the story, mock their hysterically awful track record in inter-clan conflicts despite supposedly having all this unbeatable magic, mock the fact that for a Clan of supposedly staunch traditionalists, their women seem to have invented the miniskirt, mock the hypocrisy of the fact that the guys who ran Yobanjin Mura somehow object to other Clans' foreign influences, mock Isawa's hubris,mock the fact that every time there's a new Clan Champ they claim THEY won't be a doormat to the Council only for them to immediately become precisely that, mock them for every flavor text which claims they've moved past their old arrogance.... the maho thing was good for a chortle when Kinuye decks were a going concern. That was a very long time ago.

Talking about eras we'd like to see,how about one where someone other than a Crab, Crane, or sometimes Lion or Dragon gets to play hero?

Actually, the problems regarding the inter-clan conflict actually follow from them being primarily shugenja focused. Even among the Phoenix, shugenja are ultra rare. Even if a shugenja is worth 100 bushi, they are going to lose every inter-clan conflict because the enemy will have at least 101 bushi for every shugenja.

The issue regarding women's clothing is more or less true of all clans and has everything to do with art direction in order to make the game profitable and popular. Its neither uniquely Phoenix nor particularly humorously mockable.

Every Clan is hypocritical about trade with foreigners-- everyone does it (yes, even the Imperials, that's what the Tortoise Clan is for) and yet everyone decries everyone else doing it. At a certain point you just got to chalk it up to different people in different clans not quite understanding that the "official stance" is not meant to be taken so strictly and lashing out at it in other clans not knowing their cousins in their clan are doing the same thing... or just inconsistent writers for the setting.

And being run by the council is sort of central to the whole concept of the Phoenix Clan-- I just don't really get what this whole thing is about people who want to play as clans and then root for every unique element to be removed from them and make them like everyone else.

Honestly-- the only thing anyone has on the Phoenix is not necessarily "maho" per se, but rather...

Let's say there is this scroll, and if anyone opens up and reads the scroll it will blow up the world. The Phoenix will instant upon coming into possession of it, open it up and read it. No hesitation and on the flimsiest of rationalizations.

Let's say there is a item of great and terrible magical powers that would put the cosmos entirely out of whack and in return gives you some very minor benefit that could be achieved easily enough through other means... the Phoenix clan will just grab ahold of that item and use it right away without a second thought or concern.

Its not so much "maho" exactly... it is true that basically none of the powerful mahotsukai have ever come from the Phoenix Clan. Weirdly enough, they seem to be at the very bottom of the list an actually powerful and capable maho-tsukai can arise from. (Well, unless you say that minor clans they spawn still count as 'Phoenix' on some level)

That being said, Phoenix's primary weakness appears to be their insatiable curiosity/power lust coupled with a complete reckless disregard for the safety of themselves and others. Then again, even then-- that is generally only the fault of single individuals (or the Isawa council in general) while say.... the Scorpion Clan as an entire organization repeatedly betray and doom the empire "because it is in their nature".

And, well... that's at least something you can reasonably make humor of. The fact that the Phoenix will ALWAYS press the big flashing red button with the "do not touch" sign. Even if they have to break the glass to get at it.

11 minutes ago, TheHobgoblyn said:

Actually, the problems regarding the inter-clan conflict actually follow from them being primarily shugenja focused. Even among the Phoenix, shugenja are ultra rare. Even if a shugenja is worth 100 bushi, they are going to lose every inter-clan conflict because the enemy will have at least 101 bushi for every shugenja.

Incorrect- they lose because until the VERY end, no one on the AEG end really looked at them and went, "wait, these guys we keep saying are awe-inspiring* never ever win on their own."

They've never beaten the Mantis (who, to use the logic you seem to be applying, are an even SMALLER clan, almost as reliant upon shugenja in mass battle, especially on land)- one forced draw called on account of Oblivion's Gate, one outright loss. Tamori Shaitung one-shotted the entire Elemental Council "because she wanted it more." The War of the Twins (against the equally not-exactly-a-military-powerhouse Scorpion) was a grinding bloody stalemate forcing it to culminate in a duel.

Much like the Lion, their area of supposed supremacy seems to exist so others can look tough by beating them at it or ignoring it. Like all fictional conflicts, they could easily win if a writer decided they had to-rumor and post-sale writing by the former story team has it something along those lines was planned for their fight with the Unicorn, which is a war the Phoenix should have been utterly crushed in.

*Fun fact: The first time the Phoenix lost to the Mantis was claimed to be a big deal because "nobody had ever beaten the Phoenix outright before." Subsequent retcons changed that, of course.

11 minutes ago, TheHobgoblyn said:

And being run by the council is sort of central to the whole concept of the Phoenix Clan-- I just don't really get what this whole thing is about people who want to play as clans and then root for every unique element to be removed from them and make them like everyone else.

It's not that we want it gone, it's that every new Shiba Champion says they're going to be different, then utterly fails to follow through on their words. If you're not gonna have 'em do it, don't have them say it over and over and over again. Which is why it's something that can be pointed at and mocked.

11 minutes ago, TheHobgoblyn said:

Its not so much "maho" exactly... it is true that basically none of the powerful mahotsukai have ever come from the Phoenix Clan. Weirdly enough, they seem to be at the very bottom of the list an actually powerful and capable maho-tsukai can arise from. (Well, unless you say that minor clans they spawn still count as 'Phoenix' on some level)

Not so weird, really- in-setting, anyone can use maho, while only very special people(*cough*HarryPotterXmenPercyJacksonAvatar*cough*) can be actual shugenja (apart from that weird period in 2nd edition, but moving on).

Now, the CCG has almost never reflected this-nor has the RPG (Kuni Yori, Yogo Junzo, Daigotsu, Iuchi Shahai, Iuchi Yue, all shugenja) but organizationally the Phoenix should be opposed to ANYTHING that lets some random farmer perform magic since that's their only meaningful edge- their military is described as small (and philosophically inclined to inaction anyway) and their courtly acumen is... supposed to be all right, but in practice has been portrayed as utter trash for quite a while now.

11 minutes ago, TheHobgoblyn said:

That being said, Phoenix's primary weakness appears to be their insatiable curiosity/power lust coupled with a complete reckless disregard for the safety of themselves and others. Then again, even then-- that is generally only the fault of single individuals (or the Isawa council in general) while say.... the Scorpion Clan as an entire organization repeatedly betray and doom the empire "because it is in their nature".

And, well... that's at least something you can reasonably make humor of. The fact that the Phoenix will ALWAYS press the big flashing red button with the "do not touch" sign. Even if they have to break the glass to get at it.

And this is legit.

Don't go "maho." Go "Imma push the button!"

5 hours ago, Shiba Gunichi said:

Not so weird, really- in-setting, anyone can use maho, while only very special people(*cough*HarryPotterXmenPercyJacksonAvatar*cough*) can be actual shugenja (apart from that weird period in 2nd edition, but moving on).

Buh? I wasn't around for 2e; what was going on there?

39 minutes ago, Kinzen said:

Buh? I wasn't around for 2e; what was going on there?

For a brief and hilarious period, anyone could learn to be a shugenja.

Anyone.

2 hours ago, Shiba Gunichi said:

For a brief and hilarious period, anyone could learn to be a shugenja.

Anyone.

. . . just by studying? Or did it require more than that?

My memory is hazy, but I believe that study was all that was required...

19 hours ago, Shiba Gunichi said:

Incorrect- they lose because until the VERY end, no one on the AEG end really looked at them and went, "wait, these guys we keep saying are awe-inspiring* never ever win on their own."

I think that was the result of the Pheonix focus characters tending to be Shugenja* with a single passive Shiba yojimbo following rather than multiple active Shiba Yojimbos guarding one very valuable and very powerful shugenja. This tended to lead into situations where the Story team needed to suppressed magic as it is an easy way to solve any problem.

*I hate that all legal spell casters are called this. The Tamori and Agasha are Shugenja. The Isawa are more Onmyōji in style.

1 hour ago, Ultimatecalibur said:

The Isawa are more Onmyōji in style.

What's onmyōji about them? I'd love to see that kind of thing incorporated into L5R more, but it comes across as almost completely absent to me.

50 minutes ago, Kinzen said:

What's onmyōji about them? I'd love to see that kind of thing incorporated into L5R more, but it comes across as almost completely absent to me.

Onmyōji in the Imperial court mystics that have mastery over the 5 elements sense rather than the uses Shikigami sense.

I believe Isawa was originally a name changed Abe no Seimei.

I suspect that John Wick replaced the Wu Xing elemental forces of Chinese/Japenese mysticism (Water, Fire, Earth, Metal and Wood) with the 5 elemental rings (Earth, Water, Fire, Wind/Air and Void) of the Book of Five Rings. This along with the Vancian wizards elements in the RPG hides a lot of their origin.

Back to the topic, it would probably be presumptuous to say I would like to see Tomorrow's Prophets as the official setting (I can always dream, right?)

My real point is whatever the choice they make, I hope they will at least acknowledged all the history that happened during the AEG era. It doesn't have to be much, and as many people pointed, there are a lot of ways to revisit older periods without jsut pushing the reset button)

Want to use KYD? Perfect, it is an established alternate reality inside the Realm of Dreams anyway. If you want, you can always say the AEG universe was the dream version all along and KYD is real. Back at the early days of the Empire? All of AEG fictions are the dying prophecy of Hantei Genji, written in excruciating details by an army of scribe during his last week. Scorpion Clan Coup? See Tomorrow's Prophets. Etc.