2 hours ago, RandomJC said:

I feel I'm one of the few people who actually liked Matsu Tsuko

I feel some things were a bit over the top, 'as if thinking works' being the most egregious, but overall I don't really dislike the character. Particularly Arasou's death, for all people say it wasn't meaningful enough, was a high point for me. The shift she has, from a vision of glory and with the victory whiting their grasp, to seeing him dying won quite a bit of my sympathy (we'll see how long it lasts if she goes full lunatic on the Crane). I think it's worth noting that, while the fact that she values glory over strategy makes her seem foolish, that is the way rokugani are taught to act, to a certain degree, and more so the Matsu.

2 minutes ago, Doji Tori said:

I feel some things were a bit over the top, 'as if thinking works' being the most egregious, but overall I don't really dislike the character. Particularly Arasou's death, for all people say it wasn't meaningful enough, was a high point for me. The shift she has, from a vision of glory and with the victory whiting their grasp, to seeing him dying won quite a bit of my sympathy (we'll see how long it lasts if she goes full lunatic on the Crane). I think it's worth noting that, while the fact that she values glory over strategy makes her seem foolish, that is the way rokugani are taught to act, to a certain degree, and more so the Matsu.

I was just hoping to see different sides to her Its early yet, so there still a chance

5 minutes ago, Doji Tori said:

I feel some things were a bit over the top, 'as if thinking works' being the most egregious, but overall I don't really dislike the character. Particularly Arasou's death, for all people say it wasn't meaningful enough, was a high point for me. The shift she has, from a vision of glory and with the victory whiting their grasp, to seeing him dying won quite a bit of my sympathy (we'll see how long it lasts if she goes full lunatic on the Crane). I think it's worth noting that, while the fact that she values glory over strategy makes her seem foolish, that is the way rokugani are taught to act, to a certain degree, and more so the Matsu.

What's kind of strange is in a society of arranged marriages and true love being a taboo kind of things, Tsuko does seem to be deeply in love with Arasou, judging by her reaction. It's why I can see her actions after the battle being natural, especially for someone whose a bit angry naturally.

2 minutes ago, Kuni Katsuyoshi said:

I was just hoping to see different sides to her Its early yet, so there still a chance

Well new player here, the only things I remember hearing about Tsuko is that she hated Toturi and was kind of a counterpart to him.

9 minutes ago, RandomJC said:

What's kind of strange is in a society of arranged marriages and true love being a taboo kind of things, Tsuko does seem to be deeply in love with Arasou, judging by her reaction. It's why I can see her actions after the battle being natural, especially for someone whose a bit angry naturally.

I know love and marriage are different things in rokugan, but I like seeing someone in an arranged marriage who do love each other, like Ned and Cate in Game of Thrones. While that wasn't developed (due largely to space), it's clear that was the case here.

2 minutes ago, Doji Tori said:

Well new player here, the only things I remember hearing about Tsuko is that she hated Toturi and was kind of a counterpart to him.

absolutely correct.

They both represent their 'traditional Family roles' to an extreme level. Akodo being 'gifted stategists and tactions', and the Matsu 'fierce and honorable warriors'

2 minutes ago, profparm said:

I know love and marriage are different things in rokugan, but I like seeing someone in an arranged marriage who do love each other, like Ned and Cate in Game of Thrones. While that wasn't developed (due largely to space), it's clear that was the case here.

I'm a sucker for characters being in love. why I like it, but it's clearly a rarity.

6 hours ago, AtoMaki said:

Ah, this could be pretty fun, actually, if you wrap a good story around it. Like Hotaru getting a "who-is-who-and-why" class from Shizue with Kachiko sitting on the side. basically, the story is about Shizue giving EXPOSITION with Kachiko's witty remarks coming from the sideline and Hotaru commenting all the stuff in herself. This way, you can build up Hotaru's character through her thoughts about the Empire, and show some Shizue and Kachiko too. Bonus points if Hotaru's thoughts are hilarious and completely off the mark. Unlock the secret achievement if Kachiko constantly interrupts Shizue with real history/state of affairs, and the story ends with the two almost getting into a fight.

In practice, that would come across as "a story where nothing happens." Just three characters sitting around infodumping. A good enough writer can make the characters so engaging that you might still enjoy it, but in the end . . . it would be the equivalent of all the fluff bits I skip in White Wolf's RPG books, where you get things being explained IC, and it's usually so boring and so much longer than straight explanatory text would be that I just don't even bother reading it. And you would get lots of reactions saying that the readers don't care about all this political background, because nothing happened and they have no reason to engage with the characters.

4 hours ago, Zetsubou said:

Don't get me wrong, I would love there to be more fiction tear into, but to argue that they just needed to add a scene here or a scene there to somehow increase payoff seems inherently cyclical. By adding another scene you add more questions, which in turn might warrant more scenes. Next thing you know, the entire character's life could well be written out, if these desires aren't tempered.

Yep. And this -- speaking from personal experience, since writing is my actual full-time job -- is how you write a short story and wind up sending your editor a proposal for a novel trilogy. :-P

4 hours ago, Doji Namika said:

It's a difficult balance to strike at this moment for the writers.

They have to give an impression what the Clan in question is about, introduce a number of characters, develop the main POV character of that clan a bit deeper, give some exposition about the state of the Empire AND give the main characters a relationship with each other.

It all needs more wordcount to properly develop more depth, but we've gotten plenty of elements already.

On top of that, it can't be paced like a stand-alone short story, because it isn't *meant* to stand alone. It shouldn't wrap everything up in a neat bow at the end; it interfaces with other stories in the set (as we've already seen with the two we have) and is, above all, a launching platform for more stories to come. The overall result is going to be more like a mosaic novel, the kind of thing David Mitchell has written, than more conventional modes of fiction.

3 hours ago, Eugene Earnshaw said:

Narratively, Arasou is the guy whose death starts this part of the story. Those guys do not usually get a whole let of character development before they go down. A little establishing stuff to show what they were good at and how much people like them and then, bam, curtains, cue the vows of vengeance.

Let me put it this way: Arasou got fridged. Everyone complaining about how he wasn't developed enough and got killed just to make room for Toturi and set up a conflict with Hotaru, bear that in mind the next time you see a movie where the hero's hot blonde wife gets summarily gunned down in order to start him on his bloody path of vengeance or whatever.

1 minute ago, RandomJC said:

I'm a sucker for characters being in love. why I like it, but it's clearly a rarity.

I realize there was no way to get it in but i missed the tie back to Akodo-no-kami and lady Matsu. It added a 'doomed' quality i liked.

Btw, since we were posting photoshopped Hotaru, here is my creation.
CSI: Otosan Uchi

2 hours ago, RandomJC said:

I'm a sucker for characters being in love. why I like it, but it's clearly a rarity.

I liked it too. I looked at their character descriptions and It turns out Arasou had blissful betrothal and Tsuko had Lost love: Arasou.

Was part of the reason I hopped Arasou would get to live. Since what I know about Tsuko, also supported by some of the comments here, is that she is a really angry person I guess it could have been cool seeing happy Tsuko. Bonus points because it seems that Arasou and her had things in common (could be the reason they seem to be in love within their arranged marriage).

Just picturing it:

A: 'Hey dear, this year, for your birthday, I'm punching the Kakita daimyo in the face, so we get to kill more birdies'

T: 'It's what I always wanted'

Now I really want to have Togashi roll up on Otosan Uchi in a tank so we can have a literal deus ex machina.

Again, my biggest problem with Tsuko is that

a) she is basically all the negative stereotypes about Matsu rolled into a walking, yelling caricature

b) the fact that Bakudou Katsuki from Boku no Hero Academia exists and is a better at being Matsu than any Matsu character in L5R ficiton I ever saw :P. But I generally never liked what Matsu were reduced to.

1 hour ago, WHW said:

Again, my biggest problem with Tsuko is that

a) she is basically all the negative stereotypes about Matsu rolled into a walking, yelling caricature

b) the fact that Bakudou Katsuki from Boku no Hero Academia exists and is a better at being Matsu than any Matsu character in L5R ficiton I ever saw :P. But I generally never liked what Matsu were reduced to.

Matsu Kenji and Matsu Benika were alright imo

1 hour ago, Kuni Katsuyoshi said:

Matsu Kenji and Matsu Benika were alright imo

Matsu Nimuro was too, until he had a brain fart and decided to use the egg of Pan K'u on himself. Could still have been good if the writers had known what to do with his story. Instead, they stuffed him with a group of ronin with which they never did anything. What a waste of a good character...

17 minutes ago, KerenRhys said:

Matsu Nimuro was too, until he had a brain fart and decided to use the egg of Pan K'u on himself. Could still have been good if the writers had known what to do with his story. Instead, they stuffed him with a group of ronin with which they never did anything. What a waste of a good character...

Agreed,

I always thought the egg of pan k'u bit was some kind of story prize that went off the rails.

If it wasnt then 'brain fart' may be too generous.

On 6/10/2017 at 8:25 PM, Samurai Fox said:

Clearly, his father's going to be Toturi. Or Aramoro. Possibly Yojiro.

My money is on Arasou....

38 minutes ago, Willisbatman said:

My money is on Arasou....

How about a 'left field' option

Hantei XXXVIII

14 hours ago, Willisbatman said:

So it has been said that the lion clan and the scorpion Clan have an alliance I hope the backer of that on the scorpion side is a certain Yogo who has been known to resurrect Clan Champions into Undead Horrors then........

Ooooooh... Undead Arasou... Now how would Tsuko feel about that?

22 minutes ago, Ser Nakata said:

Ooooooh... Undead Arasou... Now how would Tsuko feel about that?

Travking down her undead fiaance would certainly give her something to do besides screeching at Toturi.

Reading about Junzo getting squished by a horse was amusing.

Him getting bisected by Matsu Tsuko could be just as fun.

OR Tsuko could decide dead love is better than no love...eww

13 hours ago, Kuni Katsuyoshi said:

I always thought the egg of pan k'u bit was some kind of story prize that went off the rails.

Tamago, the False Nimuro, was the result of a story prize from early diamond.

What they did, or didn't do, with it was purely the writers.

19 hours ago, RandomJC said:

I'm a sucker for characters being in love. why I like it, but it's clearly a rarity.

Pretty sure they made it clear in the books, that they did not start out in love, but over the years fell in love. minor difference maybe but still

5 minutes ago, Akodo_Metuki said:

Pretty sure they made it clear in the books, that they did not start out in love, but over the years fell in love. minor difference maybe but still

Have not read any of the AEG fiction to know.

17 minutes ago, RandomJC said:

Have not read any of the AEG fiction to know.

Oops my bad I meant Ned and Catelyn Stark not Tsuko and Arasou

5 minutes ago, Akodo_Metuki said:

Oops my bad I meant Ned and Catelyn Stark not Tsuko and Arasou

Oh, didn't read those books either.