No really, guys, it's not what you think!

It's still plenty scandalous though.

I think Dojio Hotaru is a man. Leaps and bounds of logic there, right? Go back and read "Her Father's Daughter" and tell me what you think. What I mean is Hotaru's characterization isn't really feminine at all, even for a bushi samurai-ko. I guess she uses the Naginata in her fight but other than that she just strikes me as acting so much like she would have if she were still Hoturi. It's hard to really describe what's going on there, but it just feels weird. The whole time in my head while I was reading I had to keep reminding myself that it was a girl I was reading about. (and when you keep thinking of a Crane as being masculine something is certainly wrong. :p) I think probably my biggest points that I can concretely cite are:

-The way she thinks about her father/ the way she is treated by her father.

-The fact that she was still paired up with Toshimoko as a sensei (because that's just asking for trouble from that old man, for sure)

-The idea that Kachiko invites her over to get wasted on sake. (That's not really something you would expect from the two highest ranked ladies in the empire. Where are my Sadane games?)

I get the impression that when the piece was originally written, it probably was Hoturi and then when he/she/it got genderswapped for whatever reason, they just flipped pronouns and inserted lesbian love interest, which also reads as very much traditional Hoturi/Kachiko action except for the fact that they're both women. Am I completely wrong here? Is it just my pre-5E prejudices about Hoturi leaking in? I was really trying to be accepting of the new Hotaru identity but I don't get any feeling for anything that zeroes her out as a lady, not even from physical description.

Please remember to give your reasons for your arguments why I am wrong. Also, all first responses are required to say who would win in a Naginata fight (but not a full duel): Doji Hotaru, or Shiba Tetsu.

P.S.: Seriously, Shizue? A Cat? Don't you know those things lick up lamp oil and eat people? Cats are bad juju, yo. Don't you have a BIRD somewhere you could be taking care of? There's a crane RIGHT THERE ON YOUR KIMONO! How could you dishonor Lady Doji like that? (I can only imagine that she has the cat as some sort of cruel joke-gift from a particularly harsh but clever Ikoma.)

Well, first Hotori also used a Naginata, I mean just look at most of his old card images, you will find quite a few with him holding such a weapon.

Second, I think your notion on how you look at female characters are somewhat sexist. Sure, Hotaru might not behave like you imagine a proper lady to behave, but I think her behavour is not totally outlandish either.

Shizue also had a cat already in the canon under AEG. Also, cats have been pets in feudal japan, so I see nothing wrong why she should not have a cat.

Are you suggesting girls don't get wasted? Remember that alcohol traditionally relaxes the conduct and moves the situation from formal spaced into informal one.

Only Clan that dislikes cats is Scorpion, because they eat rats and mouses, which are pets of one of the Fortunes, and thus by Scorpion logic, you like cats = you piss that Fortune off.

Getting a Versailles No Bara feeling?

Maybe Satsume being the pr*ck we know he always was decided to completely raise his first born heir like a boy, like the Chevalier De Gargeais raised Oscar. Even Hotaru isn't a really girly name.

(warning, old anime reference...)

Not sure what's the stance now on gender equality, but in older lore, bushi samurai ko were sort of expected (so raised as ) to behave in a non overly feminine way.

I cannot believe I have just read a post in which someone is in all seriousness attempting to argue that if a character is not acting in a (stereotypically) (to that person's biased point of view) "feminine" manner, then that character must actually really be male despite what we've been told and shown.

This is already getting old.

I want to make a rule 34 joke here so bad, but I probably shouldn't.

<.<

>.>

<.<

29 minutes ago, Doji Satevis said:

I cannot believe I have just read a post in which someone is in all seriousness attempting to argue that if a character is not acting in a (stereotypically) (to that person's biased point of view) "feminine" manner, then that character must actually really be male despite what we've been told and shown.

This is already getting old.

THANKS!

7 hours ago, Doji Satevis said:

I cannot believe I have just read a post in which someone is in all seriousness attempting to argue that if a character is not acting in a (stereotypically) (to that person's biased point of view) "feminine" manner, then that character must actually really be male despite what we've been told and shown.

This is already getting old.

I already hit "like" on this post, but that really doesn't feel like enough, so I give it another thumbs-up here.

Seriously, is this that hard to accept?

On 10/6/2017 at 0:08 AM, Aedo said:

No really, guys, it's not what you think!

It's still plenty scandalous though.

I think Dojio Hotaru is a man. Leaps and bounds of logic there, right? Go back and read "Her Father's Daughter" and tell me what you think. What I mean is Hotaru's characterization isn't really feminine at all, even for a bushi samurai-ko. I guess she uses the Naginata in her fight but other than that she just strikes me as acting so much like she would have if she were still Hoturi. It's hard to really describe what's going on there, but it just feels weird. The whole time in my head while I was reading I had to keep reminding myself that it was a girl I was reading about. (and when you keep thinking of a Crane as being masculine something is certainly wrong. :p) I think probably my biggest points that I can concretely cite are:

-The way she thinks about her father/ the way she is treated by her father.

-The fact that she was still paired up with Toshimoko as a sensei (because that's just asking for trouble from that old man, for sure)

-The idea that Kachiko invites her over to get wasted on sake. (That's not really something you would expect from the two highest ranked ladies in the empire. Where are my Sadane games?)

I get the impression that when the piece was originally written, it probably was Hoturi and then when he/she/it got genderswapped for whatever reason, they just flipped pronouns and inserted lesbian love interest, which also reads as very much traditional Hoturi/Kachiko action except for the fact that they're both women. Am I completely wrong here? Is it just my pre-5E prejudices about Hoturi leaking in? I was really trying to be accepting of the new Hotaru identity but I don't get any feeling for anything that zeroes her out as a lady, not even from physical description.

Please remember to give your reasons for your arguments why I am wrong. Also, all first responses are required to say who would win in a Naginata fight (but not a full duel): Doji Hotaru, or Shiba Tetsu.

P.S.: Seriously, Shizue? A Cat? Don't you know those things lick up lamp oil and eat people? Cats are bad juju, yo. Don't you have a BIRD somewhere you could be taking care of? There's a crane RIGHT THERE ON YOUR KIMONO! How could you dishonor Lady Doji like that? (I can only imagine that she has the cat as some sort of cruel joke-gift from a particularly harsh but clever Ikoma.)

Bending over backwards to try and justify why a ***** person isn't REALLY *****, or why a person isn't REALLY the gender they present as, is astonishingly offensive.

Also, FFG: q-u-e-e-r isn't necessarily a slur; there's a reason it's been appended to LGBTQA+.

On ‎10‎/‎21‎/‎2017 at 0:41 PM, Doji Meshou said:

Also, FFG: q-u-e-e-r isn't necessarily a slur; there's a reason it's been appended to LGBTQA+.

It's still used as a slur often enough, sadly... I can understand why they still have I censored.

Just now, Talandar said:

It's still used as a slur often enough, sadly... I can understand why they still have I censored.

I do too, but still: it bums me out, because it's how I self-identify.

More on topic, Hotaru is awesome. She is, from what I can tell, basically just a female Hoturi, which is just wonderful in every way. And I'd count the fact that she isn't stereotypically feminine as a good thing, though she is also plenty feminine just by virtue of being a female Crane (let's not kid ourselves, the manliest crane is still a more feminine than the least masculine Lion or Crab - which isn't an insult, I like me some Crane)

I dunno, Broturi was part of one of the best events in the original lore (the Lion and Crane finalists in Day of Thunder choosing to "split" the narrative ending no matter who won). Now we have Hotaru killing Toturi's brother directly? Nuking the Bayushi Dairu storyline? Eh. I'd have been fine with any number of gender swaps, despite the fact that in a story with so many female characters already it seems almost unnecessary, but Hoturi's place in the storyline was really important and some of it actually hinged on him being a man.

Dairu's heritage may still be a plotline, and it may still involve Hotaru. But even if we lose that plot, who knows what new one's we'll gain.

I find the topic of Doji Hotaru vs Doji Hoturi to be very interesting. In my experience, since the beginning of the game, myself and friends have always thought the crane clan was at least somewhat gender fluid. Look at their artwork over the course of the game, their personalities have been on a blurry gender line since I can remember, and when people role played a Crane Clan character, there was usually always an inference of this characterization about the clan. Not sure why it is even a thing right now, because it seems like the same old Crane clan to me.

We are trying to integrate Doji Hotaru into our homebrew setting because we think she has potential.

So, in our setting, Satsume is the Opal Champion, the head of the Jewelled Office tasked to oversee the other Jewelled Offices. They are kinda like a secret police of sorts, a little similar to the Steel Magistrates if you know those guys. He is not a prick either, just workaholic and hard on his relationships - the latter is understandable, because if you are the head of the secret police then you can't have people playing around you. In this setting, his wife died in an accident/assassination, and he was the one who groomed Doji Shizue into a spy. Really, he is a cool guy if you can get to his good side. The differences between him and Hoturi were multi-layered, and there was definitely some envy from Satsume as well as a lot of Hoturi factually being insufferable.

There was, however, one person who landed between the two chairs and right under the table when it came to Satsume: Hotaru, Hoturi's twin sister . She was always second to Hoturi when it came to being awesome: she was a good fighter, but leagues below her twin brother; she was an acceptable courtier, but nowhere even close to what her brother eventually became; she was a fine artist and actress, but her talent was clearly inferior when compared to Hoturi. This festered some pretty low self-esteem in her, always questioning and doubting her own abilities, but on the surface, she remained strong to live up to her father's admiration. And oh boy, Satsume loved her dearly... and had a hard time to express it! So there she was, our poor Hotaru, caught between her father's specks of tough love and her superior twin brother, tossed around emotionally with her poor self-image but kept afloat by the rest of her family. A truly dramatic heroine for a truly dramatic age.

She would Big Sister Kuwanan like a pro, have strange adventures while working for her father (some even having her tag-team the bad guys with spy!Shizue), occasionally confronting her twin brother over various matters, finally work her way through many of her issues by fighting the False Hoturi, help Hoturi fulfill his destiny as the Second Crane Thunder, then spearhead the family effort to destroy Hoturi the Heartless and die to cripple the Dark Thunder, allowing Kuwanan, Toturi One-Eye and the repentant Daidoji Uji to finish the job for good.

On 10/6/2017 at 1:08 AM, Aedo said:

No really, guys, it's not what you think!

It's still plenty scandalous though.

I think Dojio Hotaru is a man. Leaps and bounds of logic there, right? Go back and read "Her Father's Daughter" and tell me what you think. What I mean is Hotaru's characterization isn't really feminine at all, even for a bushi samurai-ko. I guess she uses the Naginata in her fight but other than that she just strikes me as acting so much like she would have if she were still Hoturi. It's hard to really describe what's going on there, but it just feels weird. The whole time in my head while I was reading I had to keep reminding myself that it was a girl I was reading about. (and when you keep thinking of a Crane as being masculine something is certainly wrong. :p) I think probably my biggest points that I can concretely cite are:

-The way she thinks about her father/ the way she is treated by her father.

-The fact that she was still paired up with Toshimoko as a sensei (because that's just asking for trouble from that old man, for sure)

-The idea that Kachiko invites her over to get wasted on sake. (That's not really something you would expect from the two highest ranked ladies in the empire. Where are my Sadane games?)

I get the impression that when the piece was originally written, it probably was Hoturi and then when he/she/it got genderswapped for whatever reason, they just flipped pronouns and inserted lesbian love interest, which also reads as very much traditional Hoturi/Kachiko action except for the fact that they're both women. Am I completely wrong here? Is it just my pre-5E prejudices about Hoturi leaking in? I was really trying to be accepting of the new Hotaru identity but I don't get any feeling for anything that zeroes her out as a lady, not even from physical description.

Please remember to give your reasons for your arguments why I am wrong. Also, all first responses are required to say who would win in a Naginata fight (but not a full duel): Doji Hotaru, or Shiba Tetsu.

P.S.: Seriously, Shizue? A Cat? Don't you know those things lick up lamp oil and eat people? Cats are bad juju, yo. Don't you have a BIRD somewhere you could be taking care of? There's a crane RIGHT THERE ON YOUR KIMONO! How could you dishonor Lady Doji like that? (I can only imagine that she has the cat as some sort of cruel joke-gift from a particularly harsh but clever Ikoma.)

Hotaru is not a man, but a Lesbian. Her lover is Kachiko, and back in historic Japan, gay and lesbian couples took the traditional gender roles for a couple. As Kachiko was feminine, Hotaru was masculine. Hence japan giving us Futanari and Traps in Anime/Doujins. Also, it hints that her father was a cruel man (at least by her memories of him), and depending on the types of cruelties he showed her it could easily explain both the Lesbianism and the Masculinity she shows. How many Tomboy-type masculine/lesbian females were mentally forced into that role/mindset from an early age because her father was cruel to her because he was wanting a boy instead of a girl? Especially in SE Asia, where there was(/still is in regions) such an extreme bias towards having the first son be a boy?

As far as the lecherous sensei idea, that letch Toshimoko is her uncle. Sure, that didn't (and to some extent still doesn't) stop incestual sexual practices in SE asian cultures, but he's always been attracted to feminine females... plus her father would have had him assassinated for deflowering/trying anything sexual her. He'd be more interested in her younger (adopted) sister as she was feminine and there would be less of a social impact with him having an incestual affair with her. In every canon i've seen involving him, he let the brain in his head control the one in his pants. Yes, he was one of the letchiest Rokugani letchers, but he letched smartly... abusing his role/position to enjoy the fruits of young, innocent females only when the political blowouts from them, if any, could be squashed using his power/role as master sensei of one of the schools pretty much dedicated to dealing with Monomancy (god-judged trial by combat).

where is said fiction ?

2 hours ago, okuma said:

where is said fiction ?

On the LCG's pages.

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

Down at the bottom, pick one of the "fiction" lines, click it, and it will populate with links to PDFs.

There's a bunch, it's decent reading.

On 2/1/2018 at 12:36 AM, Daigotsu Naraku said:

Hotaru is not a man, but a Lesbian. Her lover is Kachiko, and back in historic Japan, gay and lesbian couples took the traditional gender roles for a couple. As Kachiko was feminine, Hotaru was masculine.

From what I've read of history, generally, the rule was "marry hetero, but take a lover on the side"... with the exceptions being (like many pre-industrial non-abrahamic societies) "One cross-dresses and lives as the opposite gender"... but there are also cases in many such cultures where hetero couples gender-swapped in various societies (especially the pre-christian Saxons, Norse, and Danes).

The important takeaway, tho', is that a Transgender individual was not a shocker in many such cultures - but it was still rather rare. (Typically documented as under 1 per 1000; probably closer to 4-5 per 1000.)

People started talking about this again, so I thought a new fiction was up