For those of you who haven't been following the LCG or the new storyline, i thought i'd provide some quick links and notes.

tl;dr - FFG has completely rebooted the l5r storyline to before the clan wars. nothing that you knew from the old game can be counted on. There have been many changes, some small, some big. We expect bigger ones to come as we approach some of the pivotal events of the old story.

if you followed the story in the old game, you'll recognize some of the names on these fictions. Dave Laderoute, Robert "Spooky" Denton, and Ree Soesbee are among the people writing fiction for FFG who you may recall.

Links

The L5R Product Page contains links to all the fictions.

you can also find the fictions on Kaze no Shiro , L5R's long time fiction archive

For your convenience, however, i'll link the existing fictions below.

Clan Fictions (recommended read in order)

Her Father's Daughter (crane clan)

The Price of War (lion clan)

The Rising Wave (dragon clan)

Dark Hands of Heaven (crab clan)

Risen from the Flames (phoenix clan)

Curved Blades (unicorn clan)

The World, a Stage (scorpion clan)

Imperial Cycle Fictions

In the Garden of Lies (part 1)

In the Garden of Lies (part 2)

Kiku Matsuri (GenCon 2017 Tournament)

Prelude: Smokeless Fire

Result: A Most Suitable Teacher

If you are completely new, where would be a good place to start?

What happened to the Many is clan? Did they somehow go away, or is FFG rewinding the timeline?

So the rebbot happened and the Mantis dont exist anymore? Same with the Spider?

11 minutes ago, HappyDaze said:

What happened to the Many is clan? Did they somehow go away, or is FFG rewinding the timeline?

You mean the Mantis? They rewound the timeline back to the first edition of the card game, so that clan does not exist as a major force (i.e. Great Clan) in the reboot.

26 minutes ago, kaosoe said:

If you are completely new, where would be a good place to start?

Unfortunately, if you are completely new and thus know nothing of L5R beyond that it's "samurai fantasy", the best place to start would be the L5R RPG's Fourth Edition set of basic rulebooks: the 4th Edition Core Rulebook , Emerald Empire , and the Great Clans as those contain all the basics of the world and its history. The 4th edition was made with timeline neutrality in mind, so the background of the Empire and the personality of the Clans would hold even with the reboot. All are available in digital PDF on DriveThruRPG.

I don't believe the Mantis have appeared yet, but I have no doubt they'll show up in some capacity. I'm really hoping that the mechanical aspects of the clans are toned down a lot, so that nonstandard concepts are easier to build. I dropped 3rd edition and made my own conversion for Savage Worlds largely because of overspecialization. Getting drawn into a duel with a Kakita should make you nervous, but shouldn't have you rolling up your new character while the old one is still preparing for the fight.

Less reliance on school techniques also makes schools easier to build from scratch. It may be that the schools offer discounts or access to special talents. If you're trying to create a new Mantis school, that makes it pretty easy to cherry-pick talents to use. "Well, they should be decent at two-weapon fighting, but not as good as the Dragon, so I'll add just a couple of those talents, but also a few related to balance and fighting in any environment."

Of course, such simplicity ain't great if you're trying to sell splatbooks, so if they're going that route, I'm expecting talent trees.

9 minutes ago, Radon Antila said:

You mean the Mantis? They rewound the timeline back to the first edition of the card game, so that clan does not exist as a major force (i.e. Great Clan) in the reboot.

Unfortunately, if you are completely new and thus know nothing of L5R beyond that it's "samurai fantasy", the best place to start would be the L5R RPG's Fourth Edition set of basic rulebooks: the 4th Edition Core Rulebook , Emerald Empire , and the Great Clans as those contain all the basics of the world and its history. The 4th edition was made with timeline neutrality in mind, so the background of the Empire and the personality of the Clans would hold even with the reboot. All are available in digital PDF on DriveThruRPG.

I disagree, I think that the best place to start would be the Clan descriptions on the LCG page followed by the fiction piece in the LCG Learn to Play document.

https://www.fantasyflightgames.com/en/products/legend-of-the-five-rings-the-card-game/

https://images-cdn.fantasyflightgames.com/filer_public/74/46/7446c964-613e-4c01-8902-199257c5d4af/l5c01_learntoplay_web.pdf

34 minutes ago, Tonbo Karasu said:

I disagree, I think that the best place to start would be the Clan descriptions on the LCG page followed by the fiction piece in the LCG Learn to Play document.

https://www.fantasyflightgames.com/en/products/legend-of-the-five-rings-the-card-game/

https://images-cdn.fantasyflightgames.com/filer_public/74/46/7446c964-613e-4c01-8902-199257c5d4af/l5c01_learntoplay_web.pdf

Very much so, yes.

FFG has started us all off anew; digging back through AEG's creation (lovely as it was) is unnecessary.

re: mantis

there's already been a namedrop of Yoritomo in i want to say the crane fiction? so they haven't changed the story so much that he's gone entirely. i'll be curious to see how closely to the old story w/r/t him coming back and founding the clan. personally, i'm hoping for a Wasp Clan. Tsuruchi was always my personal favorite family in the mantis.

On the Mantis question:

Probably safe to assume that the Mantis was still founded by Kaimetsu-Uo at the dawn of the empire, so they should still dwell in the Islands of Spice and Silk. And are currently leaded by Yoritomo.

Now regarding their status as Great Clan, depends on the happening of Yoritomo's Gambit by the end of the Clan War. So depends on the happening of a new day of Thunders... And so on.

I think its safe to assume no major changes in old history happened and the situation is like the setting of 1st edition. Except Hoturi is now a woman.

The good stuff is that all the adventure modules of 1st Ed can be used with minor adaptations.

I wish for a reedition of the boxed set Tomb of Iuchiban.

5 hours ago, kaosoe said:

If you are completely new, where would be a good place to start?

Personally, I'm hoping they do a total reset and start things off around the time of the Clan War, if not a little before that point.

There was a lot of screwiness in the canon timeline under AEG, which was the result of letting the CCG tournaments dictate the metaplot, especially with regards to events after the Second Day of Thunder aka conclusion of the Clan War story arc.

5 minutes ago, Donovan Morningfire said:

Personally, I'm hoping they do a total reset and start things off around the time of the Clan War, if not a little before that point.

There was a lot of screwiness in the canon timeline under AEG, which was the result of letting the CCG tournaments dictate the metaplot, especially with regards to events after the Second Day of Thunder aka conclusion of the Clan War story arc.

That seems very likely, since (with a few changes in clan champion lineup and plot points) that's exactly what they've done for the LCG timeline.

1 minute ago, Zesu Shadaban said:

That seems very likely, since (with a few changes in clan champion lineup and plot points) that's exactly what they've done for the LCG timeline.

Okay, cool.

I've admittedly not paid that much attention to the LCG since I'm not big on card games. But if they're going with Clan War for what will undoubtedly be the more profitable product between the two, then it's as good an indicator as any about where the RPG is going to start off.

Though I will admit that I'll miss the Minor Clans (save perhaps the Mantis, who I feel benefited too much from fanboyism by the writers, with the Monkey being nearly as bad), in particular the Hare Clan. Played some (literal) kick-*** Hare bushi over the years (including in 1e where being a Hare was practically a death sentence), and would love to do so again in this version. Though I can understand the reasons why if none of the minor clans are present in the core rules. Hopefully a Ronin option exists, and that Ronin don't get shafted nearly as hard as they did under AEG's supervision under the notion of "realism!" in a game where magic is real, people commune with spirits, and one's ancestors can have an impact on one's fortunes.

The LCG timeline is before the Clan Wars. Scorpion is still a great clan and given how they are in the LCG it seems unlikely that they will get disbanded meaning that should the Clan Wars happen it won't go down like it did with AEG. No Scorpion Clan Coup could also mean no Toturi's Army or no Yoritomo's Alliance. It's a brave new world out there!

Found this as well, for cross-comparison.

Prrrreeeeetty sure if we do get a Clan War, it won;t play out like the first version.

Which makes me the happiest of campers.

Honestly I'm really enjoying the name drops, and I'm wondering how certain characters will be used. I just read the fiction that came out of the GenCon tournament, where we learn that the daughter of the Iuchi daimyo will be an "honored guest" (read: hostage) at the Imperial Palace. I read the name and thought, "I know I've heard of Iuchi Shahai before... Oh! Bloodspeaker, student of Yogo Junzo, and consort of Daigotsu? Who knows how this will turn out (perhaps not even the writers), but this is a person of destiny!"

21 hours ago, Doji Satevis said:

Very much so, yes.

FFG has started us all off anew; digging back through AEG's creation (lovely as it was) is unnecessary.

If it were just about the storyline, I'd agree.

But we're talking about the RPG. People who are veterans of RPing but absolutely new to Rokugan will start asking "how do I samurai?" and none of the fictions will answer that question as well as the old rulebooks - yet.

I expect FFG to one day print their own version of Emerald Empire for example, as that's the book that explains what it means to be born, to live and to die as a samurai.

17 hours ago, The Grand Falloon said:

Honestly I'm really enjoying the name drops, and I'm wondering how certain characters will be used. I just read the fiction that came out of the GenCon tournament, where we learn that the daughter of the Iuchi daimyo will be an "honored guest" (read: hostage) at the Imperial Palace. I read the name and thought, "I know I've heard of Iuchi Shahai before... Oh! Bloodspeaker, student of Yogo Junzo, and consort of Daigotsu? Who knows how this will turn out (perhaps not even the writers), but this is a person of destiny!"

Really? Do you have the link to share?

2 hours ago, Senimaru said:

Really? Do you have the link to share?

top of the page has links to all the stories

3 hours ago, Senimaru said:

Really? Do you have the link to share?

the story being referenced is "A Most Suitable Teacher". it makes more sense if you read the one before it first.

15 hours ago, Radon Antila said:

If it were just about the storyline, I'd agree.

But we're talking about the RPG. People who are veterans of RPing but absolutely new to Rokugan will start asking "how do I samurai?" and none of the fictions will answer that question as well as the old rulebooks - yet.

I expect FFG to one day print their own version of Emerald Empire for example, as that's the book that explains what it means to be born, to live and to die as a samurai.

I think they were talking about story line, given the title of the thread.

If we're talking about the RPG, I would suggest waiting until next week when the Beta comes out. The new RPG will probably have a different focus on what it means to be a samurai in Rokugan, and that is what you will want to focus on. I don't know if it's necessarily worth it to go back, read up on how AEG interpreted samurai and then come back to the FFG game and have to relearn everything a second time.

If you are looking for general information on samurai outside the Emerald Empire, you can start with Wikipedia articles on Bushido and Samurai and follow those rabbit holes and look at their cited sources for books. Maybe stay away from some of Stephen Turnbull's stuff (or at least take it with a grain of salt until you see it confirmed elsewhere) but books are your friend.

On 27/09/2017 at 9:55 PM, Donovan Morningfire said:

Though I will admit that I'll miss the Minor Clans (save perhaps the Mantis, who I feel benefited too much from fanboyism by the writers, with the Monkey being nearly as bad), in particular the Hare Clan. Played some (literal) kick-*** Hare bushi over the years (including in 1e where being a Hare was practically a death sentence), and would love to do so again in this version. Though I can understand the reasons why if none of the minor clans are present in the core rules. Hopefully a Ronin option exists, and that Ronin don't get shafted nearly as hard as they did under AEG's supervision under the notion of "realism!" in a game where magic is real, people commune with spirits, and one's ancestors can have an impact on one's fortunes.

Has dare you, stinking Hare! The Monkey are a modest, just, ascetic clan! ? I’m hoping for Ronin from the start too, though. So I can become a Monkey in the end...

On 27/09/2017 at 4:34 PM, Senimaru said:

So the rebbot happened and the Mantis dont exist anymore? Same with the Spider?

I note that Spider clan appears in the profile photos who can pick from. Read into that what you will...

On 01/10/2017 at 1:18 PM, Toku said:

I note that Spider clan appears in the profile photos who can pick from. Read into that what you will...

It means that they created the profile picks immediately after they bought the property, when those were the 9 clans in existence.