How often do you get critical strikes on this system? On newbies samurais and on rank 5 samurais?

Because a funny thing is that "Striking as fire increase your severity!!!" except that it only last one turn, meaning that it only works if you increase severity on the first attack and then get a critical on the second. i dont think that a player has this kind of knowledge (Im gonna roll a critical on the next strike, so i will use this turn to buff it!). And i mean, if you strike as fire and get 2 opportunities, why would you increase your severity by 2 and risk losing it in the next turn instead of hurting your opponent? Seems better to just hit a critical strike and make your opponent roll for it, put pressure on him.

I should point out, that while striking as fire is not consistent. The others striking as are pretty much it. You can plan when to use it and how to use it.

You don't need to hit in order to use Striking As katas. Sometimes it might be beneficial to make an attack not in order to hit, but to farm Opportunities.

10 minutes ago, WHW said:

You don't need to hit in order to use Striking As katas. Sometimes it might be beneficial to make an attack not in order to hit, but to farm Opportunities.

True!. Havent noticed that. Also you dont increase your severity, you increase the severity that the target suffers.

Honestly, might be decent if you are on top of someone with two or three allies. Otherwise is a risk investment. Certainly is not a lethality answer... to me anyway.

I probably wouldn't allow a target who was unaware of an attack to make a Fitness test to reduce severity either. That increases the danger of surprise attacks and illustrates picking a vital target.

Having an Outburst in a Duel is deadly.

Does any of this just seem like it's to much for combat. Nothing about this feels like it flows well or clean. Also feel's as though they deliberately made it hard to kill a player in combat, which yeah I know it sucks when you get killed in a game. But some of the accomplishment of combat is surviving. I have way more fun beating enemies with a risk of death or a near death experience.

22 minutes ago, Mirumoto Seiichiro said:

Also feel's as though they deliberately made it hard to kill a player in combat, which yeah I know it sucks when you get killed in a game. But some of the accomplishment of combat is surviving. I have way more fun beating enemies with a risk of death or a near death experience.

Old timers (I've been playing RPGs for 30 years, so I use the term lovingly) seem to LOVE this complaint about newer systems. "Its too hard to kill PCs!"

The new 7th Sea explicitly requires the GM to spend from his Doom Pool (or whatever its called) to kill a downed PC. Short of that, I think its silly to be upset about PCs being difficult to kill unless its not in keeping with the way the rest of the system works. Yes, previous editions of L5R were incredibly lethal. This isn't those editions.

Trust me, players have NO trouble feeling accomplished in a system where, instead of outright dead, they're simply knocked unconscious or otherwise out of the fight from time to time. The only people who "can't" have fun in such a system are GMs who get their giggles killing PCs

I disagree, i also hate when players die if im GM. i hate losing my characters and hate see people losing theirs. But i still think its part of the game. So i prefer having the chance of players characters dying rather easy than making everyone else hard to kill. right now, swords arent looking that dangerous to courtiers. much less some bushi.

NPC's with a way to hand out Strife will be devastating in Duels. If you can trigger your opponent to have an Outburst then that Finishing Blow will cause serious problems for a PC.

The way i see it. You want to make your enemy have a outburst specifically because the combat is not lethal. Its easier to piss him off than to damage him.

Specially if they kept the fact that duels use Katanas and some Crabs appear on duel day with heavy armor.

1 hour ago, Mobiusllls said:

I disagree, i also hate when players die if im GM. i hate losing my characters and hate see people losing theirs. But i still think its part of the game. So i prefer having the chance of players characters dying rather easy than making everyone else hard to kill. right now, swords arent looking that dangerous to courtiers. much less some bushi.

Hyperbolic.

There is most definitely "a chance' that players will die in this game. In fact, I'd wager to say that most of the people sitting here waxing poetic about how unkillable PCs are haven't actually considered all of the various possibilities.

"Harder to kill than they used to be" and "impossible to kill" are not the same thing.

Its Harder, that is pretty much a fact. Not having penaltys to go with your health/wounds also make goes a long way. you can take some fluke hit and fight back, instead of taking a +10 or +15 TN due to your injury.

How much less lethal we will discover with actual play test. and then we can give our feedback and see if changes are necessary or not.

Until we start playing. we are all theory.

You get penalties for Injuries. Most of the Injuried XYZ come with a +2 TN penalty to Martial Arts associated with the Ring of the stance that you were in, and being critted again in the same body part upgrades the Injury (basically adding a bunch of Severity to it) and also puts Bleeding on you. So being Critted for 5 Severity (which is pretty achievable with double handed Katan grip) means it's time for you to shift out of the Stance, as your basic roll to hit someone just got upgraded from "pretty easy TN 2" to "how do I keep so many successes TN4", while your Fitness roll to not-die also just got bumped up to TN3. Also remember that if you get Critted again in this stance for anything more than 4 will instantly jump to Devastating Strike, scarring you and putting Bleed on you, and Bleed kills.

This btw makes being ganged upon a nightmare.

I meant through wounds. But yeah, you are pretty much right.

To more skilled characters, it seems that critical strikes can happen literally every turn. Making injuries more common(and then penalties), Striking as Fire becomes reliable(since i doubted it before) and Kakita and Hida rank 1 becomes impressive (since it comes in play really often).

My doubts are more going to specific things right now, as seen in other threads, Earth Stance and Air Stance + Guard or center spam.

Fire Stance works better with Guard Spam. Consider - Air Stance gives you +1 ATN. That's like one extra success on your Guard roll.

Fire Stance will give you extra success for every Strife you keep, as Guard is TN 1, you just need 1 Success to trigger the Strife=Success ability of Fire. At 1 Strife you are equal with Air Stance, any more and Fire will make you more efficient at Guarding.

7 hours ago, Mobiusllls said:

Its Harder, that is pretty much a fact. Not having penaltys to go with your health/wounds also make goes a long way. you can take some fluke hit and fight back, instead of taking a +10 or +15 TN due to your injury.

Actually, in my experience with previous editions of L5R, it was those penalties that slowed combat down and made it tedious, because in round 1 you'd get a bunch of Alpha Strike from characters who knew quite well how deadly the game was, so they'd lay it all on the line in the first attack. As a result, you'd have several severely wounded combatants, now all suffering massive penalties. From then on, there would be a consistent *SWING AND A MISS!* theme to the battle, which got old very quickly.

8 hours ago, WHW said:

Fire Stance works better with Guard Spam. Consider - Air Stance gives you +1 ATN. That's like one extra success on your Guard roll.

Fire Stance will give you extra success for every Strife you keep, as Guard is TN 1, you just need 1 Success to trigger the Strife=Success ability of Fire. At 1 Strife you are equal with Air Stance, any more and Fire will make you more efficient at Guarding.

True, Fire is just as good and possibly better. Unless we are talking about a complete rng luck. I think center and guard tn will get really high (Which would be okay, if you couldnt attack. but... Crescent Moon Style).

5 hours ago, WildKnight said:

Actually, in my experience with previous editions of L5R, it was those penalties that slowed combat down and made it tedious, because in round 1 you'd get a bunch of Alpha Strike from characters who knew quite well how deadly the game was, so they'd lay it all on the line in the first attack. As a result, you'd have several severely wounded combatants, now all suffering massive penalties. From then on, there would be a consistent *SWING AND A MISS!* theme to the battle, which got old very quickly.

I Liked. Due to the penaltys, Bushis could resolve a battle in one strike, even if he was far from dead, his TN were just so high that he wouldnt be as dangerous. But your actions were dependent on who you are facing and everything, it was not. Start First > Attack first and win. This is coming from someone that played a lot of Bayushi Bushi and Kakita Bushi (going first as usual to me). Stance Dancing was a bit cheesy but i loved how often i would be able to get the center stance bonus on my Kakita. Any way on 4th ed, i was more focused on not getting stabbed, so missing attacks wasnt something usual to me. (Later with Earth 3 you can become a bit more bold, but with Earth 2, not really.)

I was disappointed to see how hard it is to kill PCs too. I used to play the last edition and one of the things the PCs liked the most was that it was so easy to die. It made you really feel like you were "three feet from death" as they say and made duels terrifying. It also makes you be extremely careful in how you act and who you offend because you knew you could not go into combat lightly.

Given my PCs proclivity to kill anything that moves in front of them in other game systems this actually made them role play much more because their normal tool of attacking whatever bothered them was no longer available.

As a PC I don't like PC death, I really don't. BUT the fear of losing my character made the thrill of having your character being alive and navigating the complexities of Rokugani society that much more exciting.

The candle that burns twice as bright burns half as long.

Honestly, if we play this game much we will probably house rule so that combat is extremely lethal again.

On 06/10/2017 at 7:42 PM, WildKnight said:

Old timers (I've been playing RPGs for 30 years, so I use the term lovingly) seem to LOVE this complaint about newer systems. "Its too hard to kill PCs!"

The new 7th Sea explicitly requires the GM to spend from his Doom Pool (or whatever its called) to kill a downed PC. Short of that, I think its silly to be upset about PCs being difficult to kill unless its not in keeping with the way the rest of the system works. Yes, previous editions of L5R were incredibly lethal. This isn't those editions.

Trust me, players have NO trouble feeling accomplished in a system where, instead of outright dead, they're simply knocked unconscious or otherwise out of the fight from time to time. The only people who "can't" have fun in such a system are GMs who get their giggles killing PCs

Speaking as an old-timer (35+ years of gaming), as a player , I want that threat. I don't want the GM holding back and 'sparing' me, I don't want the GM altering dice rolls to make sure I survive. And if I want to play a game where the mechanics will make me hard to kill, there's dozens out there to do it. L5R wasn't one of those. It's why L5R is perhaps my favourite game. Because I can and will see my character explode messily if I'm not careful - and even then I might not make it. It's why it's one of the few games I've run steadily for 5+ years when it first came out.

If I get 'knocked out' when I should be dead , I feel cheated.

For me, it was back with 1e and 2e. Watching a Rank 1 character drop 40+ damage on someone was nice. Ambushes, pack tactics, the whole nine yards made the game interesting. Seeing someone barely squeak by taking down someone much bigger than him in a 1-on-1 was amazing. And yeah, my campaign had the highest kill-count for PCs I've ever had in any RPG, and when it happened the player would sit back, come up with a new concept, fill out the 40 questions, and just keep going.

L5R was a very unique experience, and I'm hoping 5e captures that feel. That at any time, out of the blue, someone can go from healthy to dead - regardless of what their rank is in comparison to their opponent. And with consistency.

I didn't like the sudden, meaningless lethality, because, as a GM, it was the first game where I was really focused on the story, and I really wanted to mess with my players. It's hard to get that tragic duel between long-lost brothers if you die to Bandit #3.

I haven't gotten to test it yet, but I like the intent of Skirmish=Dangerous, Duel=Deadly.

2 hours ago, The Grand Falloon said:

I didn't like the sudden, meaningless lethality, because, as a GM, it was the first game where I was really focused on the story, and I really wanted to mess with my players. It's hard to get that tragic duel between long-lost brothers if you die to Bandit #3.

I haven't gotten to test it yet, but I like the intent of Skirmish=Dangerous, Duel=Deadly.

I think it's the difference between Eastern and Western storytelling - and it shows up even more in Eastern horror. If you check some of the older stories told in Japan - the life, goals, and aspirations of the main characters means nothing in the face of the world. So yeah, while everyone might expect the 'tragic duel' - life might have other plans for the character, and cares nothing about the backstory. That's also kind of how the philosophy of Shinto works as well - the universe doesn't care if you're good or evil, doesn't care about your desires and goals. It will function with or without you - and there's really nothing to be done about it.

It's a refreshing change, a way to look at the world from a completely different perspective to what we're used to in the West. I like that difference. So yeah, my character might have a background I want to put into play - it might not happen. That's how storytelling goes there.

2 hours ago, Tashiro said:

I think it's the difference between Eastern and Western storytelling - and it shows up even more in Eastern horror. If you check some of the older stories told in Japan - the life, goals, and aspirations of the main characters means nothing in the face of the world. So yeah, while everyone might expect the 'tragic duel' - life might have other plans for the character, and cares nothing about the backstory. That's also kind of how the philosophy of Shinto works as well - the universe doesn't care if you're good or evil, doesn't care about your desires and goals. It will function with or without you - and there's really nothing to be done about it.

It's a refreshing change, a way to look at the world from a completely different perspective to what we're used to in the West. I like that difference. So yeah, my character might have a background I want to put into play - it might not happen. That's how storytelling goes there.

Quick, find me exactly which story this actually happens in. Show me the beloved tale in which the protagonist dies in a drama-less way, completely unrelated to the story that has been established for them.

While its true that their plans are often meaningless in the grand scheme, their deaths are not. They die doing something heroic that they didn't expect, or they die learning some greater lesson. Their deaths are not meaningless. If they were, there wouldn't be a story.

That's a biased question there. The story doesn't have to be 'beloved'. I'm also not going for a 'beloved' tale. I'm going for a setting where the samurai life is extremely dangerous, where every combat is incredibly tense, and each one has the player wondering if this is the one where his character gets killed off. And no, dying heroically isn't necessary. Or learning anything. A samurai's life is cheap in the service of his lord. There doesn't have to be a "story" - again, there are games for that.

I mean, seriously, this is the game that gave us Tomb of Iuchiban , which had a hard cap on how many people could, in theory, survive. (At the very last room, where the PCs can teleport to safety, there is a hard limit on how many can go. Too many samurai in the party, and some get left behind. Presuming, of course, anyone actually survived to get to the last room.)

https://thrythlind.deviantart.com/journal/Western-vs-Asian-Storytelling-L5R-s-Perspective-504281077