1 minute ago, Himoto said:

Shiba Tsukune is a person. Shiba Yojimbo is nobody. Someone who's so unimportant they don't deserve a name. A trivial pawn on a chessboard, cannon fodder, red shirts. They'll never amount to anything.

Which means I have zero interest in them, and frankly fairly low interest in actually buying the game. It's not a bad design, it sounds fun to play, but a large part of why I bought Old 5R is for the storytelling aspect of the cards, which mostly came down to personality and a few other cards. That's entirely gone (though in fairness, it was already vanishing beforehand), so I just don't see myself spending my money here.

All that so you don't have to pronounce foreign names.

We'll get plenty of named cards, just not in an 'evergreen' core.

Once the dynasties start coming, we may drown in named cards (again)

Perhaps. Hopefully. And certainly, if and when we do, I may change my view on buying the sets or not. But right now?

I'd like to try the game, and to play it with friends if they buy it. But right now, the base set isn't worth my money (and that makes it rather hard to get into the game later).

2 minutes ago, Himoto said:

Perhaps. Hopefully. And certainly, if and when we do, I may change my view on buying the sets or not. But right now?

I'd like to try the game, and to play it with friends if they buy it. But right now, the base set isn't worth my money (and that makes it rather hard to get into the game later).

Truth

Since I have no idea when the dynasty cycles begin, I have to exact dates to offer, but I think you'll have ample time to ruminate on yea or nay without getting too far behind.

22 minutes ago, Himoto said:

Shiba Tsukune is a person. Shiba Yojimbo is nobody. Someone who's so unimportant they don't deserve a name. A trivial pawn on a chessboard, cannon fodder, red shirts. They'll never amount to anything.

Which means I have zero interest in them, and frankly fairly low interest in actually buying the game. It's not a bad design, it sounds fun to play, but a large part of why I bought Old 5R is for the storytelling aspect of the cards, which mostly came down to personality and a few other cards. That's entirely gone (though in fairness, it was already vanishing beforehand), so I just don't see myself spending my money here.

All that so you don't have to pronounce foreign names.

I think you're throwing a bit of a tantrum here. Is it really entirely gone? We're in the first set of an LCG, which is arguably the BEST way to release a story + game theme as we can receive monthly installments to expand the card pool with both cards and fiction. Don't you think you're harping a bit harsh on this one fact, without considering that this is 1 set that the world will build on?

If you don't want to spend your money on it - sure, go ahead. I work in sales, and there are some sales I gladly turn down because demanding customers can cost more than they're worth. Old5R had both named and generic cast. We had Ninja Mystic, Ninja Shapeshifter, Goblin Warmonger, Kolat Servant, Naga Shugenja, Naga Warlord, Ninja Spy, Ogre Bushi, all personalities right beside the named characters. Add in all of the nameless followers it came with, and we're in about the same situation. The only big difference I can see is card pool. We have 1 set which gives every clan about dozen characters, with about 40% of them being named. Kakita Kaezin isn't in the story, neither is Ikoma Eiji and others so we have a good mix of characters with names BEFORE they are in fiction as well to help build the cast, and we don't have all of the cards yet even of the spoiled clans, so there may be more hiding away, let alone what future expansions will bring.

I'm sorry that doesn't satisfy you, but if that alone makes you pass on the game - I feel a lot less compassionate with your demanding position. It really appears you're holding this new game to bar only your nostalgia and imagination can reach because even the old game doesn't hold up...

8 minutes ago, Himoto said:

Shiba Tsukune is a person. Shiba Yojimbo is nobody. Someone who's so unimportant they don't deserve a name. A trivial pawn on a chessboard, cannon fodder, red shirts. Nothing .

Which means I have zero interest in them, and frankly fairly low interest in actually buying the game. It's not a bad design, it sounds fun to play, but a large part of why I bought Old 5R is for the storytelling aspect of the cards, which mostly came down to personality and a few other cards. That's down to a handful of unique personality each set now, which frankly doesn't begin to be worth the money. So yes, while it's a good game and I'll be happy to play it with friends if they happen to buy the set and have decks, it does mean FFG is not getting my money.

And meanwhile you're thinking it's good because you don't have to worry about how to pronounce foreign names anymore. Excuse me if I'm not impressed.

Yes, but that largely comes down to the brand team deciding "We should let players decide which characters get what story prize when they win!" (instead of sticking to the old "the winner's clan determines which clan gets the story prize and THAT'S IT"), and the playerbase running with it in the most idiotic way possible.

Oh, come now! You're making it sound like they're doing away with named characters altogether, when nothing could be further from the truth! There are still plenty of named characters, and future sets will only add more. If you prefer having multiple copies of the same character out, fine, but there's no need to be so melodramatic about it.

26 minutes ago, llamaman88 said:

Those are still words in my native tongue, unlike names. You can only imagine how butchered those names can get at times. Heck my card shop couldn't agree how to pronounce Hida and Shugenja, let alone some of the longer names.

I don't get very hung up about it if my opponent can't pronounce card names, and as far as I know no one ever complained about the way I pronounced things either. This is a silly thing to worry about, especially since Shugenja, Bushi, and even Courtier are not native English words, yet the card names feature these job descriptions frequently.

L5R would be an occasional game for me (at most). I don't have the playgroup or people interested in card game to look at a more regular playing aspect - my friends tend not to be into card games, period (rightly, for that matter : LCGs and CCGs are just too inherently random compared with the elegance modern board games are capable of).

So it comes down to whether there are enough cards I actually care to own in the set to be worth the purchase. With Old5R, that remained the case for a long time into the game history (hell, I still have a complete set of Crane personalities from Imperial to Stronger than Steel, and close to complete collection for a few of the later eras). These cards represented people, who, even if they never appeared in fiction, had stories. But I never collected follower cards, with very rare exceptions (ie, unique followers who had stories of their own). Because followers were nobodies, people without stories, without faces. Unimportant.

So what it comes down for me is this. I have only a small handful of cards in the base set that I actually have any reason to get at all. They're nowhere near enough to make the price tag a rational buying decision. So it's gonna be a pass.

Perhaps later there'll; be enough uniques floating around to make a core set (to complement my uniques collection) a rational buying decision. But that's later, not now.

9 minutes ago, Himoto said:

L5R would be an occasional game for me (at most). I don't have the playgroup or people interested in card game to look at a more regular playing aspect - my friends tend not to be into card games, period (rightly, for that matter : LCGs and CCGs are just too inherently random compared with the elegance modern board games are capable of).

So it comes down to whether there are enough cards I actually care to own in the set to be worth the purchase. With Old5R, that remained the case for a long time into the game history (hell, I still have a complete set of Crane personalities from Imperial to Stronger than Steel). That would be worth me buying the game. But with only a handful of named uniques and the rest being boring nobodies, that incentive is not there.

It would just be a poor spending decision for me.

Well, if you don't like the game type, don't have anyone else to play it with, and are only interested in collecting characters with no background if they have a name, then you may be right about that. However, I suggest that getting upset at FFG simply because they're designing the game for players rather than for collectors may be a little unreasonable.

18 minutes ago, Mercuric said:

I don't get very hung up about it if my opponent can't pronounce card names, and as far as I know no one ever complained about the way I pronounced things either. This is a silly thing to worry about, especially since Shugenja, Bushi, and even Courtier are not native English words, yet the card names feature these job descriptions frequently.

I'm not worried about being teased about how I say Horiuchi Xian-Ping. I'm a grown man who plays card games, that's the least of my worries socially

But I can name way, way fewer cards than I can describe by stats or art because there were just so many throw away names in the old game. Besides like clan champions I probably remember more followers than personalities after about Lotus edition. So what good were all those names? I'm no more invested in them than "he's a 3/4 for 8, a crane, and he's like crouching with a yellow background".

You can change Dani and Mitsu all you want, but their soul of were still just Dani and Mitsu to me. Gohei and Toku too. I'm sure I could find more.

I don't want to be overloaded with meaningless names while playing 7 clans.

Shugenja and Yojimbo are jobs, ones I've been familiar with for like 15 years. Same with the family names. Personal names are unique and incredibly varied.

Yes, because "I don,t like the game type" and "Never have anyone else to play with" is exactly what I said. Oh, wait, except it's not. I said there are better game types, and that the game would be occasional for me. But hey, don't let that get in the way of twisting what I say into a parody.

And just to be clear, "No background, no story" is your perception of those characters. Not an objective, uncontroversial fact that should color everyone's perception of those characters. So it would be nice if you stopped rephrasing our argument just so you can add "with no background" at the end. To me, art (especially if that art then reappears on other cards), flavor text (which many of these personalities had) and a name together do form a background.

But hey, yes, obviously. It's FFG I'm annoyed with. We'll go with that.

llamaman - the problem is, one man's meaningless name (yours) is another man's meaningful name (mine). And vice-versa.
I don't think I could even name you a single follower past...oh, Gold or so. And even then it's only a handful I actually remember.

I can, however, tell you that soul of Gohei was Matsu Aoiko. Soul of Daini,...wasn,t that Mirumoto Gonkuro? I don't remember every card, obviously (then again, I don't even remember what every Crab preview does, and we saw those two days ago), but I do remember a lot more of them than followers :-p

As a new player, I find the idea of having multiple named character in play at the same time really bad for immersion (I would even add a mechanic that prevents it completely, across different players). Therefore I find the added fate rule plus non-named characters a good solution. Also, at least for me, the number of characters that had a role in the current fiction is more than enough, and there is already lot to learn.

In a few cycles, I think that the number of named characters should be more than enough to satisfy anybody with interest in the game...

8 minutes ago, Himoto said:

Yes, because "I don,t like the game type" and "Never have anyone else to play with" is exactly what I said. Oh, wait, except it's not. I said there are better game types, and that the game would be occasional for me. But hey, don't let that get in the way of twisting what I say into a parody.

Twisting what you said? You're the one who stated outright that your friends aren't into card games, and then added "rightly so", indicating some amount of agreement with them. And while we're on the subject of twisting phrases, my actual statement was " don't have anyone else to play it with", not never . Again, you yourself stated that this was the normal state of things (your normal playgroup not being interested, so any games you do play would be the exception, not the rule). These may not have been what you intended , but they are certainly in line with what you actually said .

13 minutes ago, Himoto said:

And just to be clear, "No background, no story" is your perception of those characters. Not an objective, uncontroversial fact that should color everyone's perception of those characters.

No. If the characters have no information beyond the card, then they also have no background or story beyond the card. If you wish to imagine backstory for the character, that's fine, but realize that's you adding something; not a feature inherent in the character.

18 minutes ago, Himoto said:

But hey, yes, obviously. It's FFG I'm annoyed with. Sure. Let's go with that.

Then I guess I'm a little confused, because you certainly seem annoyed, but with whom, then? At people who are fine with FFG's design decision?

I'll totally agree with the one man's trash argument. I did play an awful lot of follower decks.

But maybe you've just got things twisted because the words they're using. To me it is such a great point that these generic personalities are basically filling a similar role to followers. It also helps keep immersion. There are always more eager scouts than Hida Tomanatsu's and Akodo Tutor's.

How you can have such obvious love for L5R and not be willing to spend a one time $40 to support it is beyond me. Especially for such a small gripe.

I don't have an income, and at best knkw 2 casual players, and am frothing at the mouth to do my part to support FFG's investment in Rokugan. The LCG will be what keeps the fictions, future rpg materials and any other minigames they come up with afloat.

This is the most important set to buy imho. And it's clan wars era. There are so many larger than life heroes of Rokugan who'll need cards there's no way you won't be able to make an all unique deck eventually.

2 hours ago, shosuko said:

I think it's smart to always have a card for any character in the fiction.

Dear god, no. That puts the writers in a straitjacket where the only people who can show up in a story are the ones with cards. Trust me, it won't lead anywhere good.

14 minutes ago, Kinzen said:

Dear god, no. That puts the writers in a straitjacket where the only people who can show up in a story are the ones with cards. Trust me, it won't lead anywhere good.

Yeah I didn't put much thought into it, but you're right. A character doesn't have to exist in both fiction and card game. There can be unique cards like Kakita Kaezin who is not in the fiction, and there can be fictional characters like Doji Shizue who don't yet have a card.

I think the naming conventions are a petty point to gripe about. The old5R game had plenty of nameless personalities, and the new5R doesn't have the follower card type to channel the nameless power that makes up the bulk of the armies and magistrates of the empire. Considering those two points, I think having a decent mix of 30-40% named and the rest generic is fitting. Some are saying it breaks immersion to have nameless soldiers on the battlefield, but I think it's equally bad for immersion to have 3 Bayushi Aramoro. Neither system is "better" but that means neither is "worse," and it's up to our own subjective opinions.

Sometimes nameless faces are good. I don't see anyone clamoring to know the name of the nimble samurai that Arasou dispatched as the ambush collapsed on the crane soldiers...

3 hours ago, shosuko said:

Old5R had both named and generic cast. We had Ninja Mystic, Ninja Shapeshifter, Goblin Warmonger, Kolat Servant, Naga Shugenja, Naga Warlord, Ninja Spy, Ogre Bushi, all personalities right beside the named characters.

Yes, but those generic personalities were, as a percentage of the total number of personalities, very few in number. I would consider a non-named personality to be an exception in Old5r.

1 hour ago, shosuko said:

Neither system is "better" but that means neither is "worse," and it's up to our own subjective opinions.

I wish there was a way to like single phrases in posts, but this basically sums up this entire thread. I.e. objectively it's hard to say one system is "better" than the other.

Let's stick with the spirit of the thread and stump for our favorite system in a good-natured manner, but allow that other people might like it the other way, and that's fine.

1 hour ago, llamaman88 said:

And it's clan wars era.

We don't know what this era will end up being called yet, but I understand what you're staying. However, it's possible there won't be any Clan Wars (though I kind of hope there are.)

It's a brave new world.

11 minutes ago, Suzume Tomonori said:

We don't know what this era will end up being called yet, but I understand what you're staying. However, it's possible there won't be any Clan Wars (though I kind of hope there are.)

It's a brave new world.

That could lead to an awfully boring game. "Ok, so I'm playing Crab and you're playing Dragon. Our clans have no grievances with each other, so good game!"

10 minutes ago, JJ48 said:

That could lead to an awfully boring game. "Ok, so I'm playing Crab and you're playing Dragon. Our clans have no grievances with each other, so good game!"

Well I'm sure they'll find some sort of conflict for us to play out, it just may not be the Clan Wars we know and love.

Personally, I'm not bothered by the generic names, considering that the core set is an evergreen legality-wise., meaning there will always be "Eager Scouts", "Asahina Artisans", "Doomed Shugenjas" and "Obstinate Recruits" around. The same for deluxe sets. However I expect that, for rotating cycles there is a way more significant ratio of named vs generic personalities, considering that these characters will be expected to run out of fate sooner or later.

Also, I'm hoping the "experienced" mechanics survives in some manner (even if I'm not holding my breath), which might interact or not with the generic dudes. Maybe some Eager Scout will survive some time on the Wall beating all odds and we will learn his name! Who knows! Maybe, sooner or later, we will have two different characters that were once Eager Scout 1 & Eager Scout 2 heavily drinking together, celebrating they both survived long enough to get an actual name!

2 minutes ago, Mon no Oni said:

Personally, I'm not bothered by the generic names, considering that the core set is an evergreen legality-wise., meaning there will always be "Eager Scouts", "Asahina Artisans", "Doomed Shugenjas" and "Obstinate Recruits" around. The same for deluxe sets. However I expect that, for rotating cycles there is a way more significant ratio of named vs generic personalities, considering that these characters will be expected to run out of fate sooner or later.

Also, I'm hoping the "experienced" mechanics survives in some manner (even if I'm not holding my breath), which might interact or not with the generic dudes. Maybe some Eager Scout will survive some time on the Wall beating all odds and we will learn his name! Who knows! Maybe, sooner or later, we will have two different characters that were once Eager Scout 1 & Eager Scout 2 heavily drinking together, celebrating they both survived long enough to get an actual name!

I don't know that I anticipate Experienced characters as much as I do characters with the same name but different (sub)titles. (So, for instance, you could have the current Akodo Toturi, and also Akodo Toturi, Emerald Champion. They'd have different abilities, but count as each other for the purposes of deck-building and uniqueness.)

2 minutes ago, JJ48 said:

I don't know that I anticipate Experienced characters as much as I do characters with the same name but different (sub)titles. (So, for instance, you could have the current Akodo Toturi, and also Akodo Toturi, Emerald Champion. They'd have different abilities, but count as each other for the purposes of deck-building and uniqueness.)

I don't play any other LCGs, but it sounds like that's how it works in those games: as long as the cards have the same title they count as the same for deck-building and uniqueness (though correct me if I'm wrong.) And it seems like an eloquent way to handle it. You would be able to run three of the version you like, or two of one and one of the other, or one of three different versions if you'd like.

Now what becomes tricky is a situation like in L5R where characters change names as the story progresses. What happens if Akodo Toturi becomes the ronin Toturi again? I guess some "Counts as Akodo Toturi for uniqueness" text, but it's a bit less eloquent.

2 minutes ago, JJ48 said:

I don't know that I anticipate Experienced characters as much as I do characters with the same name but different (sub)titles. (So, for instance, you could have the current Akodo Toturi, and also Akodo Toturi, Emerald Champion. They'd have different abilities, but count as each other for the purposes of deck-building and uniqueness.)

Yep, that's more likely. I'll admit, given the precedent of their other games. Still I wish they'd manage this differently for L5R. One of the things that hooked me to L5R was getting a Kakita Toshimoko XP from a booster. Upon reading that "Experienced" trait I immediately surmised that was an... advanced version of the character, a version of him later in the story, without having ever seen it. That gives you a sense of a story being told over time, somethign that is just missing when you simply get a character with different stats and abilities.

3 hours ago, Suzume Tomonori said:

Yes, but those generic personalities were, as a percentage of the total number of personalities, very few in number. I would consider a non-named personality to be an exception in Old5r.

Not if you count follower cards - if you consider that new L5R doesn't have followers, so the generic cards that would be followers are included in the personality card pool instead, then we're at about the same mix. Some personality cards do come from the conflict deck, which is where followers originally came from - so it's not even a stretch to count that.

Other elements of the new system give a stronger thematic feel as well. Conflict cards are now also clan specific so the actions you take can better suit your clan and playstyle than the previous method which had to give everyone the same cards. While we lose some thematic ground with generic personalities we gain a lot of ground in themed action cards.

I think that is a relevant point when we are considering elements that support or detract from the thematic representation of the game and fiction.