I dont really understand why this conversation continues on and on. Feels like "I go to forest to yell at trees" should just be a Honor hit, with maybe some fun side effect attached to it if there is something particularly fitting. Feeling like a failure of samurai and fleshing out a character is already worth narrative spotlight.

31 minutes ago, AtoMaki said:

I think we do, but I think you kinda raised the red flag at the very beginning. So let's settle with this: Unmasking should have narrative consequences but having spirits randomly cursing the player is generally not a consequence one should consider unironically.

No one has ever suggested that spirits should be randomly cursing people. You are arguing against something you made up to have something to argue against. If you want your idea to leave the conversation, all you have to do is stop talking about it.

5 minutes ago, WHW said:

I dont really understand why this conversation continues on and on. Feels like "I go to forest to yell at trees" should just be a Honor hit, with maybe some fun side effect attached to it if there is something particularly fitting. Feeling like a failure of samurai and fleshing out a character is already worth narrative spotlight.

this subject is definitely going into wild territories. it honestly just started with a way to cheese the system and evolved into a very serious discussion.

at this point, let it run its course

22 minutes ago, AtoMaki said:

I think we do, but I think you kinda raised the red flag at the very beginning. So let's settle with this: Unmasking should have narrative consequences but having spirits randomly cursing the player is generally not a consequence one should consider unironically.

You’re the one who jumped straight to curse, in the worst sense of the word. I’m picturing fun silly stuff like:

*Campires you light burn low and sputtering.

*Water you drink seems stale and does little for your thirst.

*You find yourself breathing heavier, and pausing mid sentence to take a breath.

*Roots seem to trip you up as you walk.

*Wind blows dirt in your face causing you to squint and clear dust from your eyes.

Little annoyances to illustrate that the kami are wary of your character after your outburst. Nothing that will dramatically hinder your character. Potentially worth a void point if the player volunteers some way this minor “curse” has a greater impact on a scene.

A quick visit to a local priest and you’re all set, but hey, the priest has a favor to ask in exchange or a dark secret that the sudden appearance of strangers has him or her nervous about?

Ask questions next time rather than get out your bad GM hunting torch or pitchfork.

11 minutes ago, WHW said:

I dont really understand why this conversation continues on and on. Feels like "I go to forest to yell at trees" should just be a Honor hit, with maybe some fun side effect attached to it if there is something particularly fitting. Feeling like a failure of samurai and fleshing out a character is already worth narrative spotlight.

Good thing there are other topics. For me, this one still has merit. I’ve continued to refine how I think about strife and how I will handle it in game. This type of pondering is fun for me.

I want more options, other than pay for your strife with some other currency and move on.

35 minutes ago, nameless ronin said:

I'm assuming the scene it occurs in has a purpose of its own, otherwise there's no point in even having that scene.

As far as I can understand the original scenario, the scene actually has no other purpose but to contain the Unmasking - it is essentially the Unmasking and nothing else.

And before you ask, no, I don't think that this is how it works in the game .

35 minutes ago, nameless ronin said:

If they are a dud in a given instance, then they're not an Unmasking in that instance.

How so? They check out literally everything required for an Unmasking, they just fail to have any real effect because that's what the scene dictates.

19 minutes ago, Mark It Zero said:

You’re the one who jumped straight to curse, in the worst sense of the word.

You actually implied something pretty serious, requires-a-Shugenja-tier serious:

On 10/31/2018 at 12:24 AM, Mark It Zero said:

If you unmask in a forest, to avoid loss of face, there are still kami watching. Perhaps they mark you with their disdain until a Shugenja can take care of you with a prayer? Which would expose your indiscretions in a roundabout way.

Like, man, kami in this setting are srs business. If they go so hard on you that a shuggie needs to advocate for you, then you are in gross trouble. Your examples are a lot milder than this, probably something the character can get rid of by appeasing the spirits when he leaves the forest.

24 minutes ago, JBento said:

'Eating up time' can certainly have consequences. Not in the cases we're positing, which are "when you have a couple of days of downtime", but mid-adventure "you spend a few hours going to a secluded spot in the woods and venting" is certainly putting you at a disadvantage versus the machinations of the adversaries, which continue apace. Interestingly, this should result in a further Honor (and possibly Glory) hit, because you're choosing yourself over your mission (breaching, AT LEAST, Duty).

Sure, but then you lost a couple of hours because you went to the woods - not because you blew of some steam when you got there. An Unmasking is a momentary thing, a slip of control, not a 2-hour mad rant yelling at a tree.

4 minutes ago, AtoMaki said:

How so? They check out literally everything required for an Unmasking, they just fail to have any real effect because that's what the scene dictates.

Narrative consequence, bro. If it has no real effect, what's the narrative consequence?

Just now, nameless ronin said:

Sure, but then you lost a couple of hours because you went to the woods - not because you blew of some steam when you got there. An Unmasking is a momentary thing, a slip of control, not a 2-hour mad rant yelling at a tree.

Well, you still need to go to the woods, find a solitary place in the woods (which isn't easy - at Rokugan's tech level, woods are pretty lively places), then come back. And though an Unmasking is GENERALLY a momentary lapse, that's just because there's generally people watching so the Samurai reins the emotions back in quickly, which isn't the case if they believe themselves alone in the woods.

In this theoretical scenario, Unmasking isn't JUST losing your temper - it's leaving everything you're doing behind (the tenet of Duty feels bad at you) to go to the woods and then losing your temper.

I'm not even sure what the issue is here: surely, if you have a couple of days of downtime you could just as easily Passion yourself enough times to eat up half your Composure-worth of Strife, anyway? At least this may-or-may-not-be-Unmasking-depending-on-your-GM gives you narrative opportunities over "I spend the day polishing my and my party's weapons for my Armament Passion."

2 minutes ago, JBento said:

Well, you still need to go to the woods, find a solitary place in the woods (which isn't easy - at Rokugan's tech level, woods are pretty lively places), then come back. And though an Unmasking is GENERALLY a momentary lapse, that's just because there's generally people watching so the Samurai reins the emotions back in quickly, which isn't the case if they believe themselves alone in the woods.

In this theoretical scenario, Unmasking isn't JUST losing your temper - it's leaving everything you're doing behind (the tenet of Duty feels bad at you) to go to the woods and then losing your temper.

I'm not even sure what the issue is here: surely, if you have a couple of days of downtime you could just as easily Passion yourself enough times to eat up half your Composure-worth of Strife, anyway? At least this may-or-may-not-be-Unmasking-depending-on-your-GM gives you narrative opportunities over "I spend the day polishing my and my party's weapons for my Armament Passion."

Then just do so? What's stopping you from saying 'I spend some time indulging in my passions to soothe my temper" and still having whatever narrative scene you want as well?

6 minutes ago, nameless ronin said:

Narrative consequence, bro. If it has no real effect, what's the narrative consequence?

The Scorpion tells the truth (this one is more about the Unmasking going topsy-turvy), it gets a little awkward when the Hida admits that he is afraid of water (but then he knocks it away by saying that he was just joking), the friendly sparring bout will come around, the oni takes offense at being quipped at, there is one of those scenes when the character flails around in a dark and empty corridor while the cameraman has a blast with causing spinning-induced nausea, and it is a battle.

No real effect =/= no effect at all.

11 minutes ago, JBento said:

I'm not even sure what the issue is here: surely, if you have a couple of days of downtime you could just as easily Passion yourself enough times to eat up half your Composure-worth of Strife, anyway? At least this may-or-may-not-be-Unmasking-depending-on-your-GM gives you narrative opportunities over "I spend the day polishing my and my party's weapons for my Armament Passion."

Okay, I'm gonna bust the real deal breaker here: you can't Unmask in a separate scene because to do it, you have to leave the ongoing scene and thus have your Strife drop back to Composure/2. At which point you are no longer Compromised thus you cannot Unmask. So as per the rules, you literally cannot go to the woods to Unmask.

im sorry for that guys;

"...and in theory, you could, when nobody see you, at midnight, go unmask in the wood and get back all your strife."

i hope you will have forgive me.

3 minutes ago, AtoMaki said:

Okay, I'm gonna bust the real deal breaker here: you can't Unmask in a separate scene because to do it, you have to leave the ongoing scene and thus have your Strife drop back to Composure/2. At which point you are no longer Compromised thus you cannot Unmask. So as per the rules, you literally cannot go to the woods to Unmask.

of course you cant LOL

the question before the "walk in the wood" ever happened was:

if you have extended downtime, and you do nothing (lets say 24h+downtime). can you lower your strife ? or the ONLY way is basically to do your passion? (because in the book it says you can "meditate" to reduce strife but there is no rule for it!! hence the title of this thread)

screw that walk in the wood

46 minutes ago, AtoMaki said:

The Scorpion tells the truth (this one is more about the Unmasking going topsy-turvy), it gets a little awkward when the Hida admits that he is afraid of water (but then he knocks it away by saying that he was just joking), the friendly sparring bout will come around, the oni takes offense at being quipped at, there is one of those scenes when the character flails around in a dark and empty corridor while the cameraman has a blast with causing spinning-induced nausea, and it is a battle.

No real effect =/= no effect at all.

Okay, I'm gonna bust the real deal breaker here: you can't Unmask in a separate scene because to do it, you have to leave the ongoing scene and thus have your Strife drop back to Composure/2. At which point you are no longer Compromised thus you cannot Unmask. So as per the rules, you literally cannot go to the woods to Unmask.

As long as you want to cheese it, just do something in the woods that causes you to accumulate Strife again. That's pretty easy.

And, you know, no real effect is no real effect.

1 hour ago, Avatar111 said:

screw that walk in the wood

Well no, not really, because while you cannot Unmask in the woods, you can pursue your ninjo there as a downtime activity/narrative scene and thus shed all your Strife anyway. I guess this might be what flies for "meditation": meditating on how to achieve your ninjo is pursuing it, so there, the Strife is gone.

But the big deal is not the walk in the woods but the GM invoking BS "consequences" for Unmasking. Consequences are fine, but there is a line when it is better to leave the drama department stranded rather than unnecessarily pick on the player.

23 minutes ago, nameless ronin said:

As long as you want to cheese it, just do something in the woods that causes you to accumulate Strife again. That's pretty easy.

It is actually pretty darn hard because to accumulate Strife in a meaningful way you have to make a Check but in order to be able to make a Check you have to do something big... but if you do something big then you are already undermining your own intent to go into the woods to Unmask without anything big happening. At this point you might as well stayed in the original scene and fired off a dud Unmask.

23 minutes ago, nameless ronin said:

And, you know, no real effect is no real effect.

Yeah, exactly. It resolves and the world moves on. Chances are high that nobody will remember it ten minutes later or it will only come up in a non-serious conversation. It is not the real deal and as the GM you can bet that the PC will be late from that sparring bout.

1 hour ago, AtoMaki said:

It is actually pretty darn hard because to accumulate Strife in a meaningful way you have to make a Check but in order to be able to make a Check you have to do something big... but if you do something big then you are already undermining your own intent to go into the woods to Unmask without anything big happening. At this point you might as well stayed in the original scene and fired off a dud Unmask.

I think I'll go out into the woods to reflect on my deplorable hankering for sake (+3 Strife and a VP after making a check to resist withdrawal symptoms thanks to my Addiction Axiety). While I'm there, I might as well Seize the Moment and write an epic poem about the dreadfulness of sobriety (Composition check with Fire Approach, spend VP to roll and keep extra Fire die; I don't care about success or failure, so I'll just keep the dice that give me Strife). If I was at half Composure already, I expect that will be plenty to be Compromised. If not, I'll just keep making checks.

You guys know you can just take ad hoc Strife, right? That's... a thing that the rules explicitly say that you can do. Just say you go to the woods to meditate on how your ninjo keeps assassinating your giri or something and take all the strife you need.

2 minutes ago, JBento said:

You guys know you can just take ad hoc Strife, right? That's... a thing that the rules explicitly say that you can do. Just say you go to the woods to meditate on how your ninjo keeps assassinating your giri or something and take all the strife you need.

I thought it was a GM fiat thing. Will check later.

Just now, nameless ronin said:

I thought it was a GM fiat thing. Will check later.

Well, you DO need your GM permission, but that's not different than anything else you can do.

Just now, JBento said:

Well, you DO need your GM permission, but that's not different than anything else you can do.

Ok, but that's not different from anything you can't do by the rules either. I'll look up the exact wording.

Dunno but this "I'm going to the woods to get Strife to Unmask" is scratching the same BS as the "some kami jump out of the bush and curse you" just from the player's side .

1 minute ago, nameless ronin said:

Ok, but that's not different from anything you can't do by the rules either. I'll look up the exact wording.

It's on page... 29, iirc.

On 10/30/2018 at 5:38 PM, sndwurks said:

However, I would suggest creating a Ritual (most access in the game), at Rank 1, allowing characters to roll Medita  tion (Void) at TN 2 as a downtime action to reduce their Strife by 3 + Bonus Successes (similar to indulging in a Passion, but risking gaining Strife from the dice roll), with the ability to spend 2 O  pportunities to gain a Void Point if you are currently at 0 or 1 Void Point.    

This seems like a very good idea.

8 minutes ago, JBento said:

It's on page... 29, iirc.

Correct. And you were correct that it can be done ad hoc, by the rules. No special dispensation needed.

12 minutes ago, Shosur0 said:

This seems like a very good idea.

We tested something like that in the Beta and it came out pretty poorly. Tying Strife removal to a Check (the most prevalent source of Strife) turned out to be somewhat counterproductive. In my experience, this would only work if the Check removed a bigger chunk of Strife (say, half of it) upon a success.