51 minutes ago, ExplodingJoe said:

Still, they are strictly outlawed in my Rokugan and unseen outside the Kaiu. I still occasionally add them in though if I'm going for that Kurasawa's Yojimbo feel of "he's only scary because he has a gun." Any bandit/pirate wielding such a weapon is probly famed enough to be pals with Yoritomo himself, however.

Easiest way of doing that, honestly, is to make the "gun" a weapon which uses Martial Arts (Ranged) and automatically causes a critical strike upon a successful hit, with a deadliness of at least 14.

I would think Crit strike 7 + bonus successes would be fine. I'm hesitant to have a matchlock be that much more dangerous than a solid strike from a razor edged weapon. Both are probly going to kill you unless you manage to get hit somewhere non-vital, and I'd rule that these firearms aren't rifle barreled and aren't accurate enough to go all FPS Doug on a group of samurai.

46 minutes ago, ExplodingJoe said:

I would think Crit strike 7 + bonus successes would be fine. I'm hesitant to have a matchlock be that much more dangerous than a solid strike from a razor edged weapon. Both are probly going to kill you unless you manage to get hit somewhere non-vital, and I'd rule that these firearms aren't rifle barreled and aren't accurate enough to go all FPS Doug on a group of samurai.

I disagree with part of this...
While I, too, understand that these are not rifled and in real life, one is as likely to kill as the other, to make them scarier and more impressive in Rokugan, and to give it that feel of danger and cinema, I would make them incredibly more powerful. Also rare, and make the secrets of powder strict and scary enough to have it's own campaign.

But that would be for my own cinematic purposes.

I think it still carries its own level of fear, since you don't have to whittle down the character's fatigue and Earth Stance doesn't save them, but I totally get where you're coming from.

19 hours ago, DGLaderoute said:

There's actually another, intriguing aspect to this--that of technological advancement. Rokugan is, by the standards of a real-world society, weirdly stagnant in its development of new and innovative technologies. Now, to be fair, we've never had the chance to see just what effect an objective certainty that there are divine beings, they live in a Celestial Heaven and other spirit realms, they can intervene in mortal affairs, there is an afterlife, etc. would have on a society. The result might actually be long-term stagnation in terms of societal development; after all, if there actually IS a Celestial Order and, by divine decree, it is declared to be perfect as it is, what incentive is there to rock that particular boat? There might be individual or small-scale attempts at change, but it's quite possible that the society as a whole is quite content to remain "as is" because, well, it's perfect "as is".

Introducing gunpowder technology is, then, a degree of innovation that would fly in the face of that "perfect as-is" way of thinking. It not only stands to empower anyone to be able to deliver potentially lethal effects at a distance that makes swords and armor obsolete (generally only if employed en mass, in the case of early gunpowder weapons, but that still makes it a thing), it threatens to provoke further societal changes. On top of that, in this setting, gunpowder is generally considered a gaijin technology, so it originates from outside the Celestial Order, making it even more reprehensible.

All that said, disallowing gunpowder becomes another way of reinforcing (and rationalizing) the strange "frozen in time" nature of Rokugani society--1123 years of no meaningful technological or societal advancement at all!

You say that, but there is evidence for technological advancement. Ofushikai is described as an old straight sword and looks like a chokuto, which is a style of sword dating back to pre 10th Century. The katana, as used by modern Rokugani samurai, dates from the 15th - 16th century. This still means that sword advancement went at about half the speed of the real world, which is unusually slow, but not quite "frozen in time".

9 minutes ago, Tonbo Karasu said:

You say that, but there is evidence for technological advancement. Ofushikai is described as an old straight sword and looks like a chokuto, which is a style of sword dating back to pre 10th Century. The katana, as used by modern Rokugani samurai, dates from the 15th - 16th century. This still means that sword advancement went at about half the speed of the real world, which is unusually slow, but not quite "frozen in time".

Meanwhile the Agasha are over here studying chemistry and discovering that energy and matter are all interchangeable enough that they can transmute any element into another, but no one wants to listen to them.

2 minutes ago, Waywardpaladin said:

Meanwhile the Agasha are over here studying chemistry and discovering that energy and matter are all interchangeable enough that they can transmute any element into another, but no one wants to listen to them.

I'm sorry, I didn't quite catch that. If you'd actually come down from your mountain and visit, maybe we could discuss something

16 minutes ago, Tonbo Karasu said:

You say that, but there is evidence for technological advancement. Ofushikai is described as an old straight sword and looks like a chokuto, which is a style of sword dating back to pre 10th Century. The katana, as used by modern Rokugani samurai, dates from the 15th - 16th century. This still means that sword advancement went at about half the speed of the real world, which is unusually slow, but not quite "frozen in time".

Kakita invented the katana himself, though, so it's also been around about 1100 years.

2 hours ago, Tonbo Karasu said:

I'm sorry, I didn't quite catch that. If you'd actually come down from your mountain and visit, maybe we could discuss something

If you stopped making your homes in such flammable environs maybe we could...

3 hours ago, Hida Jitenno said:

Kakita invented the katana himself, though, so it's also been around about 1100 years.

I think the first Phoenix fiction of the new timeline referenced the katana as a creation of the Agasha.

4 minutes ago, deraforia said:

I think the first Phoenix fiction of the new timeline referenced the katana as a creation of the Agasha.

Interesting.

4 hours ago, Hida Jitenno said:

Kakita invented the katana himself, though, so it's also been around about 1100 years.

47 minutes ago, deraforia said:

I think the first Phoenix fiction of the new timeline referenced the katana as a creation of the Agasha.

Those aren't completely incompatible. Kakita was a legendary smith as well as a duellist. It's possible that he (with the help of a tengu?) did in fact make the first katana, which became the ancestral sword of the Crane. And then, various smiths spent centuries trying to repeat the feat, learning the different techniques to evolve from chokuto to tachi to katana. Real world historically, asian swords were nearly all straight until they met the Mongol scimitar, which inspired the tachi amongst other things, but I don't think that Rokugan stuck with straight swords until the Unicorn returned.

Unless they did, and that's what the whole Curved Blades thing was about...

4 hours ago, Tonbo Karasu said:

You say that, but there is evidence for technological advancement. Ofushikai is described as an old straight sword and looks like a chokuto, which is a style of sword dating back to pre 10th Century. The katana, as used by modern Rokugani samurai, dates from the 15th - 16th century. This still means that sword advancement went at about half the speed of the real world, which is unusually slow, but not quite "frozen in time".

That's only technological advancement in the most technical of senses, though--especially if we're considering over 1000 years of opportunity for such development. Something has kept Rokugan essentially "frozen in time"...and yes, for all practical purposes and small increments of improvement in sword-making notwithstanding, by any meaningful measure, the Empire has been "frozen" in developmental terms. I'd add I'm not saying this is necessarily a bad thing; just that it's a thing. And, again, if we had an opportunity to study a society in which divine and spiritual presences actually exist--and are KNOWN by the members of that society to exist--we might find that such stagnation makes perfect sense. Again, if literal gods are telling you that the world, as it is, is perfect, then only heretics and blasphemers would try to change or improve things (by, for instance, promoting the adoption of gunpowder technology). Moreover, they'd probably meet enormous resistance from the society as a whole in the process, consigning them forever to being considered madmen, fringe groups and cults. So, perhaps this "frozen in time" nature to Rokugan makes perfect sociological sense given the circumstances.

Indeed. And because magic (well, 'the blessings of the kami') cover most of the things you'd want technological development to drive.

The major issue with the setting is more the "world outside" - if White Stag was in 442, and the Gaijin had muskets and cannonry at that point, they should have several centuries of improvement. We don't yet know any reason for them to experience technological stasis.

12 hours ago, DGLaderoute said:

That's only technological advancement in the most technical of senses, though--especially if we're considering over 1000 years of opportunity for such development. Something has kept Rokugan essentially "frozen in time"...

This is a detail often overlooked, but Rokugan did not become the thing as it is now until the early/mid 900's. There were tons of development in the first 300-400 years and even then there was something big in each century, with the last happening being the return of the Unicorn.

2 hours ago, Magnus Grendel said:

The major issue with the setting is more the "world outside" - if White Stag was in 442, and the Gaijin had muskets and cannonry at that point, they should have several centuries of improvement. We don't yet know any reason for them to experience technological stasis.

Yeap. That's the big winner. Long term stasis is terrible worldbuilding.

19 minutes ago, Suzume Chikahisa said:

Yeap. That's the big winner. Long term stasis is terrible worldbuilding.

Not without someone or something enforcing it, anyway. Which you can argue that the culture and social structure of Rokugan does, but that argument holds no water for anyone else in the 'world'.

To be honest, the only problem with that detail is how far back in time White Stag is set. It wouldn't really affect the basic principles (Gaijin Exist, Gaijin Bad, Gaijin Pepper Really Bad, Tortoise Deal With Gaijin Under The Counter) if it had occurred only a century or so ago.

4 hours ago, AtoMaki said:

This is a detail often overlooked, but Rokugan did not become the thing as it is now until the early/mid 900's. There were tons of development in the first 300-400 years and even then there was something big in each century, with the last happening being the return of the Unicorn.

Interestingly, when I wrote the Scorpion chapter for "The Great Clans", I did my best to capture this very thing--that there was a period of development, during which the clan transformed from semi-nomadic tribes to what it eventually became i.e. the Kami didn't fall on a Monday and, by Wednesday, Rokugan was an Empire full of cities surrounded by farms. However, it's not really at all clear (by design, in fact) how long this all took. But even if we're generous, and say it took 500 years, that still leaves almost 700 years since of what amounts to no meaningful change. If you look at nearly any society in our world, there was pretty significant change between the 15th and 21st centuries (yes, I know there are some isolated groups for whom this isn't really true, but they're the extreme exceptions).

Again, though, I go back to the idea that this might make perfect sense, in a society with objectively true and demonstrable divine beings, afterlife and so on. By extension, this helps explain why something like gunpowder is forbidden--it threatens the stability of a society that has been declared essentially perfect as it is by divine powers, so that makes it sacrilegious to even contemplate its use outside of very narrow circumstances, which have been declared "okay" e.g. fireworks...and, possibly, blowing apart Shadowlands monstrosities threatening the Wall, because I suspect the always-pragmatic Crab wouldn't be averse to using something potentially so effective. And they ARE just Shadowlands monstrosities...

19 minutes ago, DGLaderoute said:

By extension, this helps explain why something like gunpowder is forbidden--it threatens the stability of a society that has been declared essentially perfect as it is by divine powers, so that makes it sacrilegious to even contemplate its use outside of very narrow circumstances, which have been declared "okay" e.g. fireworks...and, possibly, blowing apart Shadowlands monstrosities threatening the Wall, because I suspect the always-pragmatic Crab wouldn't be averse to using something potentially so effective. And they ARE just Shadowlands monstrosities...

Calling it canon now.

...

And yes, pun intended.

18 minutes ago, DGLaderoute said:

If you look at nearly any society in our world, there was pretty significant change between the 15th and 21st centuries (yes, I know there are some isolated groups for whom this isn't really true, but they're the extreme exceptions).

Yet, between the Fall of the Western Roman Empire (5th century) and the Age of Discovery (15th century) the same world was in a rollercoaster of stagnation and regression with little to no advancements made.

7 minutes ago, AtoMaki said:

Yet, between the Fall of the Western Roman Empire (5th century) and the Age of Discovery (15th century) the same world was in a rollercoaster of stagnation and regression with little to no advancements made.

While true, the Battle of the White Stag throws a wrench in that comparison.

3 minutes ago, Hida Jitenno said:

While true, the Battle of the White Stag throws a wrench in that comparison.

The general accepted "answer" to the Battle of the White Stag is that the Merenae and Thrane kingdoms both contracted a very pernicious, destructive plague shortly after contact with Rokugan, the Senpet, and the like, which basically caused both societies to completely melt down, and by the time the 12th Century Isawa's Calendar rolls around, they are just beginning to get their feet underneath them again.

Mind you, none of this answers how an early Roman Empire analogue (Yodotai) exists alongside 19th Dynasty Egypt analogue (Senpet) alongside pre-Islamic Persia circa 8th century CE (Medinaat-al-Salam) alongside simultaneously Edo & Heian Japan (Rokugan) alongside Age of Exploration Europe (Merenae and Thrane), other than a heavy invocation of the fantasy trope of Insanely Stable Medieval World.

Honestly, the idea that no significant advancements have happened in Rokugan in 1000 years is literally as laughably silly as no significant advances happened in Europe between 5th century CE and 15th century CE (ignoring that the rest of the world kept on trucking onward, laying the groundwork for the preservation of mathematics, education, culture, etc). The only way it is remotely feasible is because Rokugan is a medieval, feudal fantasy world, and you really do need to throw consistent logic out of the window in the favor of escapism and Rule of Cool. Rokugan is as realistic as fighter-jet flying space wizards with laser swords in a galactic empire long long ago, and that's okay.

20 minutes ago, Hida Jitenno said:

While true, the Battle of the White Stag throws a wrench in that comparison.

Europe had its own Battle of the White Stag with the Mongol Invasion that almost shook up the scene if not for the mongols unexpectedly leaving just as quickly as they showed up.

13 minutes ago, AtoMaki said:

Yet, between the Fall of the Western Roman Empire (5th century) and the Age of Discovery (15th century) the same world was in a rollercoaster of stagnation and regression with little to no advancements made.

I think this comes down to what can be considered "development". For example, here's a quick excerpt from theinventors.org from part of that period:

Circa 1050 - Crossbow invented in France.
1182 - Magnetic compass invented.
1202 - The Hindu-Arabic numbering system introduced to the west by Italian mathematician, Fibonacci.
1249 - Rodger Bacon invented his gunpowder formula.
Circa 1268 - 1289 -Invention of eyeglasses.
Circa 1280 - Mechanical clocks invented.
Circa 1285 - 1290 - Windmills invented.
1295 - Modern glassmaking begins in Italy.
1328 - First sawmill.
1326 - First mention of a handgun.
1366 - Scales for weighing invented.

I've omitted things not related to Europe, since the way you specified that time period was clearly Euro-centric. These are technological innovations, some of which are quite profound (the crossbow was a precursor to gunpowder's "revolution in military affairs"; the Hindu-Arabic numbering system had a major effect on mathematics; reliable mechanical clocks became the basis for accurate global navigation).

A particularly striking example of social change in Europe during this period was the Magna Carta, a 1215(ish) agreement that represented a fundamental change in the relationship between a monarch and his/her subjects. The Magna Carta itself wasn't a "one and done", as it evolved, was scrapped, readopted, etc. over time, but it was a major shift in the nature of governance.

Now, is this a "lot" of change? That's probably a debate that really falls outside the scope of this forum. But it IS change--at worst, incremental and slowly progressive, but it was there, and a lot of it formed the basis for much of the far more rapid development that occurred after the period you mention. By contrast, there's really nothing comparable between (say) 500 on the Isawa calendar, and the current year of 1123. A samurai from the 6th century suddenly transported to the 12th century wouldn't find much of significance has changed. The level of technology is much the same, the society is structured much as it was...the names have changed, in some cases, and there have been some changes in the Minor Clans, but that's about it. I'd argue that, as slow and incremental as change appeared to be in Europe during that time period you specified, it was still revolutionary compared to our beloved Emerald Empire!

A bit of value-added...for a REALLY good analysis of the effects even small and apparently unrelated changes had through human history--including the period you specify--check out the TV series "The Day the Universe Changed", and "Connections", both by James Burke. They're older series now ("The Day the Universe Changed" is from the 80s) but they both hold up extremely well. If James Burke tried to make a similar series about Rokugan, I suspect he'd find himself pretty much stuck.

15 minutes ago, DGLaderoute said:

But it IS change--at worst, incremental and slowly progressive, but it was there, and a lot of it formed the basis for much of the far more rapid development that occurred after the period you mention.

Rokugan had these too in tis history: the Articles of the Heavens from post-Steel Chrysanthemum, the invention of the Abacus from the Invasion of the Maw, the Bloodspeaker Cult from the Rise of Iuchiban, etc.

18 minutes ago, DGLaderoute said:

A samurai from the 6th century suddenly transported to the 12th century wouldn't find much of significance has changed.

This sentence makes the Hiruma inside of me very-very sad .