Does it seem odd to others that the setting/geography part of the book seems largely absent?

I'm new to the setting as are most of my players... I can't even get a sense of where or how to set an adventure.

its coming in a few months in the book Emerald Empire. probably with a 25 pages errata PDF for the core book also.

1 minute ago, Avatar111 said:

its coming in a few months in the book Emerald Empire. probably with a 25 pages errata PDF for the core book also.

So, we can't play for months or we play and just make up stuff that could be contradicted? This is frustrating.

The L5R wiki could fill in a gap for the time being. The other options are

1) Start your game with a Winter Court. Winter Court a group will spend the winter months in one of the keeps and it surrounding villages. It will need to be a courtly intrigue or mystery adventure but those are fun, and the hostile winter gives a reason why they can’t venture far.

2) Carpenter Wall adventure. The players are representing their clan at the wall. They can venture in the shadowlands, wheel and deal with the crab and the Yasuki family. This will be more of a combat style game, but you don’t have to worry about the Shadowlands geography changing. It’s a land twisted by Oni and evil.

There IS the L5R Atlas that you can get from 4th Edition, but that came at the end of the last timeline, so your mileage may vary.

The advantage to play meanwhile on winter court or on the Bad side or the wall IS that when emerald will be published Ur current PCs would probably be died?

In the old AEG books there was at least a good chapter dedicated to the geography of the land in the core book. It served as a good fluff point considering you can think of where your character was from. Not every character is from the capital or a no-name town. It's at least nice to be able to colour each clan. The Wall doesn't take up the entire Crab lands.

There's also 3 official adventures currently out for this edition that you can use.

Beginner box has one that focuses on the players' gempuku.

Then there's a free pdf called "In the Palace of the Emerald Champion" on FFG's website for the L5R rpg under "player resources"

And if you get the Game Master's kit, it comes with an adventure too.

20 hours ago, General Zod said:

The L5R wiki could fill in a gap for the time being. The other options are

1) Start your game with a Winter Court. Winter Court a group will spend the winter months in one of the keeps and it surrounding villages. It will need to be a courtly intrigue or mystery adventure but those are fun, and the hostile winter gives a reason why they can’t venture far.

2) Carpenter Wall adventure. The players are representing their clan at the wall. They can venture in the shadowlands, wheel and deal with the crab and the Yasuki family. This will be more of a combat style game, but you don’t have to worry about the Shadowlands geography changing. It’s a land twisted by Oni and evil.

You can also confine the campaign to a single city and 1-2 days’ ride away.

6 hours ago, Hordeoverseer said:

In the old AEG books there was at least a good chapter dedicated to the geography of the land in the core book. It served as a good fluff point considering you can think of where your character was from. Not every character is from the capital or a no-name town. It's at least nice to be able to colour each clan. The Wall doesn't take up the entire Crab lands.

Yup. Loved the “places” chapter of 4e.

54 minutes ago, sidescroller said:

You can also confine the campaign to a single city and 1-2 days’ ride away.

A variation on "Start Small"...

54 minutes ago, sidescroller said:

You can also confine the campaign to a single city and 1-2 days’ ride away.

A variation on "Start Small"...

On 10/16/2018 at 6:10 PM, Avatar111 said:

its coming in a few months in the book Emerald Empire. probably with a 25 pages errata PDF for the core book also.

Are the mistakes that bad?!

25 pages is an exageration.

But it needs a lot of corrections and clarifications.

2 hours ago, Alderaan Crumbs said:

Are the mistakes that bad?!

No, Avatar is just being a hyperbolic complainer as normal. Best to just ignore all that he says.

6 minutes ago, Ultimatecalibur said:

No, Avatar is just being a hyperbolic complainer as normal. Best to just ignore all that he says.

To be honest he might be into something now.

2 hours ago, AtoMaki said:

To be honest he might be into something now.

So far, it's about a page of typos, and two problematic NPC templates (one of which is badly buggered).

It's nothing compared to 1st printing D&D5E at about the same week after release.

A page of typos

2 pages of erratas

A page of clarifications and added rules.

5-6 pages of school revisions.

Maybe i'm being too negative and most pen and paper rpgs have this issue! Anyway, as long as ffg reacts relatively quickly on it i'm cool.

20 hours ago, Avatar111 said:

Maybe i'm being too negative and most pen and paper rpgs have this issue!

Yes, you are.

Really, as errata goes, this is perfectly normal! There are some games out there where the first set of errata totally changed the way they played.

Pursuant to the main topic, though, the level of detail in the book is also fairly normal. Games like Exalted, which devote half the text to a gazetteer, are kind of in the minority. It could probably use a few of the old sidebar ready-focus-strike hooks, mind - and we should start a thread on that!

47 minutes ago, Lindhrive said:

Really, as errata goes, this is perfectly normal! There are some games out there where the first set of errata totally changed the way they played.

Pursuant to the main topic, though, the level of detail in the book is also fairly normal. Games like Exalted, which devote half the text to a gazetteer, are kind of in the minority. It could probably use a few of the old sidebar ready-focus-strike hooks, mind - and we should start a thread on that!

Plus, the setting book is on the way; this is not a monolithic core game, but a 2 book core.

5 minutes ago, AK_Aramis said:

Plus, the setting book is on the way; this is not a monolithic core game, but a 2 book core.

Which also isn't that weird. Heck, D&D is traditionally a 3-book core.

1 minute ago, UnitOmega said:

Which also isn't that weird. Heck, D&D is traditionally a 3-book core.

several games even go to 5, like 3rd ed Deluxe Runequest. Unlike most, however, the organization here isn't Player book + GM Book, but Rules Book & Setting Book, with some elements of each in the other. (we've been told more schools are in the setting book.)

All recent FFG cores, excepting End of the World, are "every supplement is both rules and setting material, plus adventure seeds" and "every adventure adds some useful rules." It's worth noting that even the F&D adventure I playtested adds a minor race, and a few useful new NPC templates.

1 hour ago, Lindhrive said:

Really, as errata goes, this is perfectly normal! There are some games out there where the first set of errata totally changed the way they played.

Pursuant to the main topic, though, the level of detail in the book is also fairly normal. Games like Exalted, which devote half the text to a gazetteer, are kind of in the minority. It could probably use a few of the old sidebar ready-focus-strike hooks, mind - and we should start a thread on that!

some typos are understandable, a few erratas also. but this is the first product (pen&paper rpg) that I read that almost every few pages i'm either confused by the rule, it doesn't make sense, or it is totally broken/abusable.

I still think the base of the game shows great potential though. But it does feel like a beta, rulewise.

So, waiting for a second printing with fixes might be the way to go.

On 10/17/2018 at 10:13 AM, TheBoulder said:

So, we can't play for months or we play and just make up stuff that could be contradicted? This is frustrating.

Legend of the Five Rings has been in existence for over 20 years, the current FFG edition may have "reset" the timeline, but there is still 23 years and 4 editions worth of world information and resources out there, and they're not particularly hard to find.