First off, TFA rocks.

15 hours ago, BD Flory said:

Until you've worked under the conditions under which those things were created, you have no idea what it's like.

This is a profound statement. Many fans assume that authors and storytellers exist for the sole purpose of feeding them a steady stream of content manufactured precisely to their tastes. Making a story is a JOB, people. It's what these people do to be able to eat, the same as how you get up every morning to do whatever you do to survive. Sometimes these people have to make decisions that die-hard fans will hate, because it's what will keep the game alive. If they followed what the die-hard fans of the story or game wanted instead, it would cease to provide them with enough money to survive on and the story or game would die.

8 hours ago, Doji Namika said:

Well, as a woman, and one with with a marked preference for women I applaud the Hotaru x Kachiko relationship! Hopefully we get a nice one between two men too, so kudo's to FFG. Why AEG was so wary of depicting same-gender love stories was always a bit puzzling, so this is a step in the right direction.

I'm really glad to hear this! As nerds, (and since we're all posting on a forum about a fantasy Samurai card game, I think it's safe to assume we're all at least a little nerdy) we all share many interests that are fairly uncommon among the general population. We should be trying to come together as a community, not alienate each other by excluding people or making people feel unwelcome. I'm hopeful that FFG's attention to diversity will help the community to grow, and will help fans to feel more comfortable in our community.

2 hours ago, Teslacrashed said:

I think it's best that FFG remain unburdened by the weight of Old5R's lore and story, and it gives new players a chance to get in on the ground floor.

We already know all the clans are remaining quintessentially the same, but this time we get to see new developments happen.

win/win.

I never got to experience the old L5R, and missed the opportunity to feel like I'd left my mark on its history. I'm excited about the new timeline for the same reason you are--it's an opportunity for me and other n00bs like me to shape history.

6 hours ago, Huitzil37 said:

It will never end. Entropy cannot be reversed. Everyone will look at someone saying "this is a lie, it is not true, it is a lie" and conclude "He must believe it is true and hate how good and true it is!" because the lie is so much more important than the truth it obliterates everything in its path. The damage is already irreversible. All is lost.

You've built a box for yourself where your views can never be disproven, because you've decided that anyone who disagrees with you is a liar. That's always sad to see, but there's no point in humoring you. This argument is pointless.

53 minutes ago, Himoto said:

Would you rather have the Crab providing the Empire's art, Gunichi?

Yes.

Or the Phoenix (Shiba Artisans are a thing).

Or the Dragon (Tattoos for all!)

Or the Lion (Matsu Kasei was my favorite Turquoise Champion)

Or the Scorpion (say what you like, they've got style to burn)

Or...

The Crab excel at 'splatter art' - like Pollock we are just ahead of our time....

30 minutes ago, YasukiKaito said:

The Crab excel at 'splatter art' - like Pollock we are just ahead of our time....

...the Crab invented modern art in Rokugan?

...

I suddenly hate the guts of the Crab Clan.

(I kid, I kid )

43 minutes ago, Mirumoto Saito said:

I suddenly hate the guts of the Crab Clan.

To be fair, it's probably not a picture of Crab Clan guts.

4 hours ago, Teslacrashed said:

What is wrong with the Crane as revealed so far?

The crane itself are the same. Rich courtesans , who favor elegance and perfection, masters of trade, and some of the finest duelest in Rokugan. None of their core traits have been changed. Story wise they are a little different (Falling into weakness because of the famine) but that doesn't change the Crane, and neither does having a gender swapped champion.

I'm not sure if have everything about the Clan as of yet. We've only see a few glimpses of the clan in general and as we know from the various source books, each family has an interesting twist on the what clan is supposed to mean. I'm interested on seeing how the Harriers are going to turn out, if they still even exist.

Is that Crab art in the sense of art made BY a Crab, or art made WITH a Crab?

Are there Oni artisans?

5 hours ago, Mandalore525 said:

First off, TFA rocks.

TFA is an example of the type of storytelling they need to avoided IMHO.

Don't make the story so close that all it looks like is a ripoff of the original story with new characters.

P.S. I liked it to but it was a ripoff.

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This is a profound statement. Many fans assume that authors and storytellers exist for the sole purpose of feeding them a steady stream of content manufactured precisely to their tastes. Making a story is a JOB, people. It's what these people do to be able to eat, the same as how you get up every morning to do whatever you do to survive. Sometimes these people have to make decisions that die-hard fans will hate, because it's what will keep the game alive. If they followed what the die-hard fans of the story or game wanted instead, it would cease to provide them with enough money to survive on and the story or game would die.

This statement is both true and false.

You do need to keep the story and world interesting and if that means changing Hoturi to a female character then so be it. New blood is needed in all games.

But you have to also remember that the Die-hard fans are what has keep this franchise alive all these years, you can't just ignore them and try to build a new fan base without them.

The story has to both keep (most) old fans and bring in new fans.

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I'm really glad to hear this! As nerds, (and since we're all posting on a forum about a fantasy Samurai card game, I think it's safe to assume we're all at least a little nerdy) we all share many interests that are fairly uncommon among the general population. We should be trying to come together as a community, not alienate each other by excluding people or making people feel unwelcome. I'm hopeful that FFG's attention to diversity will help the community to grow, and will help fans to feel more comfortable in our community.

First on the AEG side, I never got the feeling that L5R excluding people or made people feel unwelcome. The stories to me always seemed to have the right balance of female and male protagonist. While it was not always equal, it always seemed to be balanced.

On the player side, I don't know about anyone else's games but I have seem more female L5R (From the RPG side) Players then I have with any other game.

Now I'm going to have to say that the statements"We have equal numbers of female employees/protagonist" is not good to me. A statement like this IMHO show more concern for political correctness than story. That said have a good mix of female employees/protagonist is a good thing, But putting it out there like a badge of honor is not.

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I never got to experience the old L5R, and missed the opportunity to feel like I'd left my mark on its history. I'm excited about the new timeline for the same reason you are--it's an opportunity for me and other n00bs like me to shape history.

You are in some ways lucky as you don't have all the baggage that comes from the AEG years.

While I would not change my experience with L5R, We old-timers had to put up with a lot of bad storytelling and retcons over the years.

4 hours ago, Himoto said:

Are there Oni artisans?

I would play this deck type.

"Now I'm going to have to say that the statements"We have equal numbers of female employees/protagonist" is not good to me. A statement like this IMHO show more concern for political correctness than story. That said have a good mix of female employees/protagonist is a good thing, But putting it out there like a badge of honor is not."

Well, I think I can explain where a statement like this is coming from. It is not about indicating honor or virtue, or it shouldn't be anyway. And it is not about political correctness either. It is about representation. If you want to represent everybody, you need to include everybody. And a good way of including everybody is to have a good amount of representation and diversity in your content creators. So it is just good practices to have a pretty equal mix of people in a creative team if you want the team to have a variety of perspectives, approaches, interests and so forth. If you want to represent men and women equally in your stories -- and why wouldn't you? -- then it helps to have an equal mix of genders in your creative team. This idea is often misunderstood: the point isn't the optics of what your team looks like; it has to do with how your team functions.

45 minutes ago, tenchi2a said:

you can't just ignore them and try to build a new fan base without them.

Well, they can. FFG bought the property, they didn't buy the fan base as per say. I am not saying it is wise to ignore the previous version fans but FFG can do whatever they like.

5 minutes ago, DarkHorse said:

Well, they can. FFG bought the property, they didn't buy the fan base as per say. I am not saying it is wise to ignore the previous version fans but FFG can do whatever they like.

I'm not saying they can like it's against the law lol.

I'm saying its not a good idea if you want to succeed.

10 minutes ago, Eugene Earnshaw said:

"Now I'm going to have to say that the statements"We have equal numbers of female employees/protagonist" is not good to me. A statement like this IMHO show more concern for political correctness than story. That said have a good mix of female employees/protagonist is a good thing, But putting it out there like a badge of honor is not."

Well, I think I can explain where a statement like this is coming from. It is not about indicating honor or virtue, or it shouldn't be anyway. And it is not about political correctness either. It is about representation. If you want to represent everybody, you need to include everybody. And a good way of including everybody is to have a good amount of representation and diversity in your content creators. So it is just good practices to have a pretty equal mix of people in a creative team if you want the team to have a variety of perspectives, approaches, interests and so forth. If you want to represent men and women equally in your stories -- and why wouldn't you? -- then it helps to have an equal mix of genders in your creative team. This idea is often misunderstood: the point isn't the optics of what your team looks like; it has to do with how your team functions.

While I totally agree with almost all of what you are saying here. It has been my experience that when a company makes an effort to promote the fact that they have x number of some group, it is more a like us more because we are political correct then wanting to tell a good story. I'm not saying that this is what FFG is doing but its just been my experience.

21 minutes ago, tenchi2a said:

I'm not saying they can like it's against the law lol.

I'm saying its not a good idea if you want to succeed.

I disagree. Changing the story of the characters we know, and introducing new characters is exactly what they need to do to attract new players and attract old players back. And I think attracting new players is what you need to succeed, not pulling back the old crowd.

43 minutes ago, Ser Nakata said:

I disagree. Changing the story of the characters we know, and introducing new characters is exactly what they need to do to attract new players and attract old players back. And I think attracting new players is what you need to succeed, not pulling back the old crowd.

There is a subset of the old crowd whose return and presence would in fact be an active hindrance to the success of the game

Well, in every game crowd, there are morons. And there will always be. Luckily, in L5R, I've found (in my personal experience) that kind of crowd to be relatively small.

4 hours ago, tenchi2a said:

First on the AEG side, I never got the feeling that L5R excluding people or made people feel unwelcome. The stories to me always seemed to have the right balance of female and male protagonist. While it was not always equal, it always seemed to be balanced.

On the player side, I don't know about anyone else's games but I have seem more female L5R (From the RPG side) Players then I have with any other game.

Well, showing my age here, but at least in my little neck of the woods, and returning to when the RPG was first released in the second half of the nineties it certainly did not appeal to women. The first edition setting came across as decidedly, well, sexist, even with the existence of families such as the Matsu and the Otaku. It was the White Wolf games mainly that really started to draw in women to the hobby.

Yes, the setting had strong women, but imho, they also had... issues and you had to get past a rather unfavorable first impression. Mind you, I learned to love the likes of Matsu Tsuko, Bayushi Kachiko, Mirumoto Hitomi, Otaku Kamoko and Hida O-Ushi, but it was not a given and you had to really dig into the fictions to get to know them and move past the sometimes problematic stereotypes which were aimed to appeal to men so much more than women.

Ironically Kachiko, despite starting out as the worst offender turned out to be the most interesting of the bunch. But trust me that my first look at her induced an eyeroll. Her art really, really did not help. The same really with the slew of shugenja bikini witches. Being properly dressed apparently interferes with calling on the kami? If you want me to identify, than give me more than sexy pin-ups please, or characters which are solely defined or motivated by their relationship to men.

Anyway, that said, in the end L5R really did much better than a lot of the competition, and though after Clan Wars I payed more attention to the RPG than the CCG, I did notice the art and role they play in the story improving, even if I did not like the story itself becoming an endless procession of apocalypses.

As in all things, there's always room to grow even further and this really has little to do with political correctness but simply common sense. After all you see more women in the hobby nowadays because a more balanced representation makes it more appealing to them. I don't see how anyone could consider that a bad thing!

Anyway, so far, what I have seen of the reboot is top notch. I love the art, the mechanics look solid and we're just starting a new, fresh story arc. It's an exciting time to be part of the l5r fandom!

42 minutes ago, Doji Namika said:

Well, showing my age here, but at least in my little neck of the woods, and returning to when the RPG was first released in the second half of the nineties it certainly did not appeal to women. The first edition setting came across as decidedly, well, sexist, even with the existence of families such as the Matsu and the Otaku. It was the White Wolf games mainly that really started to draw in women to the hobby.

Well it was an age when game was male dominated.

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Yes, the setting had strong women, but imho, they also had... issues and you had to get past a rather unfavorable first impression. Mind you, I learned to love the likes of Matsu Tsuko, Bayushi Kachiko, Mirumoto Hitomi, Otaku Kamoko and Hida O-Ushi, but it was not a given and you had to really dig into the fictions to get to know them and move past the sometimes problematic stereotypes which were aimed to appeal to men so much more than women.

That was the time, there just happen to be more young men playing then

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Ironically Kachiko, despite starting out as the worst offender turned out to be the most interesting of the bunch. But trust me that my first look at her induced an eyeroll. Her art really, really did not help. The same really with the slew of shugenja bikini witches. Being properly dressed apparently interferes with calling on the kami? If you want me to identify, than give me more than sexy pin-ups please, or characters which are solely defined or motivated by their relationship to men.

That's more of the above

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Anyway, that said, in the end L5R really did much better than a lot of the competition, and though after Clan Wars I payed more attention to the RPG than the CCG, I did notice the art and role they play in the story improving, even if I did not like the story itself becoming an endless procession of apocalypses.

Same, quit playing the card game a few expansions after CW and have played the RPG ever since.

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As in all things, there's always room to grow even further and this really has little to do with political correctness but simply common sense. After all you see more women in the hobby nowadays because a more balanced representation makes it more appealing to them. I don't see how anyone could consider that a bad thing!

Never said it was. I just don't want to see them retell the same story, changing out him for her as they go. If this is an attempt to tell a new story, then tell a new story.

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Anyway, so far, what I have seen of the reboot is top notch. I love the art, the mechanics look solid and we're just starting a new, fresh story arc. It's an exciting time to be part of the l5r fandom!

Going to come right out and say it. I have little to no interest in the LCG. I'm here to see what they do with the story and RPG. So if the story ist there for me I'm just going back to the old one.

13 hours ago, Teslacrashed said:

What is wrong with the Crane as revealed so far?

The crane itself are the same. Rich courtesans , who favor elegance and perfection, masters of trade, and some of the finest duelest in Rokugan. None of their core traits have been changed. Story wise they are a little different (Falling into weakness because of the famine) but that doesn't change the Crane, and neither does having a gender swapped champion.

They are rich Courtiers. Courtesans are a different thing!! (Kinda like Geisha, really)

4 hours ago, Ser Nakata said:

Well, in every game crowd, there are morons. And there will always be. Luckily, in L5R, I've found (in my personal experience) that kind of crowd to be relatively small.

Sometimes reading your posts i think it's opposite to be small.

21 hours ago, Oliveira said:

Female Thor is great and The Force Awakens is better then A New Hope. Also, Hotaru has the potential to be way better then Hoturi, cause he was boring as Hell. Anyone who believes these are not facts is living a lie.

Eh...I read four issues of the female Thor comic, and it really was ridiculously sexist. Every single man was a disgusting, bigoted piece of crap. I say this as someone who constantly defends feminism.

As for The Force Awakens, I liked it quite a bit, but better than A New Hope? In some ways, sure, but TFA's retreading of ANH was annoying and detracted from a generally fun movie.

In any case, I get that you were mostly parodying Huitzil's incredibly hyperbolic "it's a lie. It's a LIE! IT's. A. LIE!!!! (x100)" silliness.

21 hours ago, RandomJC said:

New Hope is a flawed film. (Love it)

Plus, Jedi is still the best.

The Force Awakens is very much a flawed film as well, though mostly in different ways.

I actually love Jedi. The whole throne-room duel between Luke and Vader is by far the best of the SW films, at least form a dramatic and cinematography perspective. I don't even mind the Ewoks, really.

That said, Empire is easily the best-made film of the series. It has better writing, better acting, and mostly better pacing and plot than any of the rest. That's probably because Lucas didn't write the final script, or direct it (yes, there would be no Star Wars without Lucas, but he was far better for broad ideas than the particulars, especially when it comes to dialogue and directing actors)

17 hours ago, RandomJC said:

Yeah...and just imagine their are worse places on the internet, and reddit.

Sadly that place is one of the reasons I don't use reddit much.

Eh, it's easy to avoid the vast majority of that crap on Reddit. There are many genuinely great subreddits, like /r/science.

12 hours ago, YasukiKaito said:

The Crab excel at 'splatter art' - like Pollock we are just ahead of our time....

"Hmm..blunt force weapon, swung with both hands from an upward right to downward left motion. The killer had - ah, screw it. I'm going to go be a lumberjack!"