Speculation time; assuming that Aramoro botches the assassination attempt, Toturi will most likely assume that this is a blatant powergrab by the Scorpion (not much else it could be interpreted as without OOC-knowledge, to be honest). So Toturi either tries to arrest Shoju and/or Kachiko, or tries to flee the city with Daisetsu and rally support to reclaim the throne from the Scorpion and their puppet emperor.

What are the odds that Shoju, being a clever guy in general, tries to play both sides of the conflict by sending Dairu to join Toturi and Daisetsu in exile? Or maybe even joins them himself , denouncing Kachiko in the process?

13 hours ago, AtoMaki said:

Not sure if it would be a real waste.

It would be. Because this:

13 hours ago, AtoMaki said:

Kaede currently is only involved in the Toturi plotline

Is wrong. Incredibly, incredibly wrong.

She's involved in the concerns about the talisman in the Imperial City (who personally mentioned concerns to the Seppun? She did.), she's the one who has actually mentioned the elemental imbalance to someone outside of the Phoenix Clan, her father has just mysteriously vanished into Shadow, her brother is somewhere in the Crab lands up to Shady Stuff.

Kaede, far more than Tadaka, is the load-bearing "good" Isawa for Phoenix perspectives (even if she's technically an Akodo now). Throwing that away for what a wrestling booker calls "cheap heat" between Toturi and the Scorpion would be downright idiotic- especially since they'd have to go to the work of establishing a new load-bearing "good" Isawa.

Toturi and Kaede are two intertwining storylines.

And they are each the lead of those storylines.

Aramoro outright killing or leading to the death of Kaede would be a cheap kick the dog on scorpion, losing them a lot of sympathy.

I don't see Toturi and Aramoro ending the fight for good the first time. There would be only one to survive and I have the feeling we are not done with both.

What if Aramoro ended up as the scorpion thunder?

19 minutes ago, Nitenman said:

Toturi and Kaede are two intertwining storylines.

And they are each the lead of those storylines.

Aramoro outright killing or leading to the death of Kaede would be a cheap kick the dog on scorpion, losing them a lot of sympathy.

I don't see Toturi and Aramoro ending the fight for good the first time. There would be only one to survive and I have the feeling we are not done with both.

What if Aramoro ended up as the scorpion thunder?

I've had this silly idea that the cover characters on the Clan Packs will be the Thunders this go-around. How exactly FFG'd fit Aramoro, Chagatai and Uji into those roles would be interesting to say the least.

That would be so awesome.

7 hours ago, Kani Kantai said:

so for a pragmatist that doesn’t buy in to the spiritual morality of the setting I still am not sure that Sotorii being emperor would be an issue for many people.

Most people don't know him, because you don't "just meet" the crown prince. Everyone who's had meaningful interaction with him, though....

59 minutes ago, Nitenman said:

I don't see Toturi and Aramoro ending the fight for good the first time. There would be only one to survive and I have the feeling we are not done with both.

This is effectively 'round two' after the Emerald Championship, though.

I don't insist only one of them survive, but it can't be a Clone-Wars-Obiwan-And-Grievous no-score draw again or it starts to feel cheap. I'm not a fan of killing kaede either, though.

I do think blood will be drawn this time around between Toturi and Aramoro...and as much as I'd like to see Aramoro die, I have a feeling we won't be so lucky. I also speculate that whatever happens in this story arc, we'll likely see it sending Kaede home to Phoenix lands, possibly even persuaded by Tsukune and circumstance to grudgingly take up the role of Master of Void. It's a desperately needed fix to the Phoenix situation, and hopefully enough of one to bring the Phoenix in support of Toturi regardless of who else might end up supporting Toturi/Daisetsu. A grudging "enemy of my enemy" alliance with Unicorn could be interesting. And it sets up the potential split among the Phoenix and the elemental council because not everyone will be on board with that decision.

11 hours ago, Shiba Gunichi said:

She's involved in the concerns about the talisman in the Imperial City (who personally mentioned concerns to the Seppun? She did.), she's the one who has actually mentioned the elemental imbalance to someone outside of the Phoenix Clan, her father has just mysteriously vanished into Shadow, her brother is somewhere in the Crab lands up to Shady Stuff.

I dunno if Kaede's death would affect any of these in any substantial way. Maybe Tadaka, his reaction would be very interesting. Heck, now that I think about it, Kaede can be more of a catalyst in death than alive .

By the way, now that you guys defend her so much, I can see another reason to feed Kaede into the grinder: the shockwave among the fans would be unreal and generate enough noise to be heard in the Andromeda galaxy. That's something.

But yeah, killing off Kaede is the "ballsy option". I actually can't see it happening ever (the story team is free to surprise me here tho ). She will probably just leave for the Phoenix Lands to do Phoenix Stuff but there will be some small twist to make the act less tedious like how we had Kachiko messing around the Emperor's death.

27 minutes ago, AtoMaki said:

But yeah, killing off Kaede is the "ballsy option".

No, it really isn't. Fridging a guy's pregant love interest just to motivate him is an incredibly tired and overused trope seen in a thousand novels, movies, and TV series, and in this case it would require Kaede inexplicably forgetting how to shugenja and just lying there passively while Aramoro murders her. It's bad storytelling all around.

If you want a ballsy option that isn't falling face-first into utter stereotype, have Aramoro butcher Toturi with an ambush attack while Kaede watches helplessly through a Void vision. Turn him into the "sacrificial lamb" to propel her into motion. Players would lose their minds even more.

1 minute ago, Kinzen said:

Fridging a guy's pregant love interest just to motivate him is an incredibly tired and overused trope seen in a thousand novels, movies, and TV series

Having the Emperor killed by his Angry Son just as he would peacefully abdicate to Better Son so that we can have a Fight For The Throne(tm) where Better Son is starting from the worse end of the stick is an even more tired and overused trope IMO. Yet here we are.

7 minutes ago, Kinzen said:

If you want a ballsy option that isn't falling face-first into utter stereotype, have Aramoro butcher Toturi with an ambush attack while Kaede watches helplessly through a Void vision. Turn him into the "sacrificial lamb" to propel her into motion. Players would lose their minds even more.

That train left the station in the Lion opening fic. Toturi dying there would have been the quintessential ballsy option, Toturi dying any time after that would just retroactively justify Arasou's opinion on him.

Also, we already have the Dark Wizard Girl and the story is just about to trigger her Berserk Button, so running the same circle with another character would be a bit too much I reckon. Tho a Kaede/Shahai tag-team Roaring Rampage of Revenge would be kinda awesome (if ironic), I give you that.

Am I the only one who finds referencing tvtropes incredibly annoying?

”I baked you a chocolate cake”

”Wait, you used Cocoa powder? How tired and overused.”

Just enjoy the cake, Bud. There are only a finite number of possible stories.

The problem with tropes is that you end up realizing everything has already been written anyway.

Problems of tropes isn't that they are overused, of course, they became tropes this way. It's more some are outdated/archaic or a mark of creative laziness.

A war for power/succession crisis is overarching a story, it's a classic framework, it's been used indeed but it works well with faction based story developpment. History has proven it can makes compelling stories. Is it lazy to follow this trope? Only if the writing that follows is lazy.

Fridging a wife is a rather gratuitous heinous act, leftover from when women were barely more than faire-valoir for the heroic men. It's an archaic trope that has its uses but is better left in the Charles Bronson revenge flicks domain. Is it lazy to follow this trope? Most probably, as it make a vilain being vilain by sheer vilainy, yet a good writer might work something different out of it.

Let's not be too quick to denounce tropes, else nothing is worth giving a read anymore.

Kaede isn't a disposable woman trope, she doesn't exist as a Toturi faire-valoir and so isn't needed to set him in motion.

Killing her just to make Aramoro more detestable would be a waste and a lazy move, unnecessary.

Kind a like GOT laziness in having Stannis Baratheon kill his beloved daughter for fallacious reasons that book Stannis would'nt even consider. Lazy, unjustified, and only aimed at serving one dimension people who didn't like Stannis feel even more righteous to now hate him and make of a complexely written character a poor base tv show vilain.

tropes are bad only in the hands of bad writers.

1 hour ago, Nitenman said:

Kaede isn't a disposable woman trope, she doesn't exist as a Toturi faire-valoir and so isn't needed to set him in motion.

Killing her just to make Aramoro more detestable would be a waste and a lazy move, unnecessary.

Let's be honest here, the only justification for killing Kaede is that it would "make it personal" for Toturi.

Because trying to assassinate him, framing him for trying to usurp the Imperial Succession, covering up the Emperor's violent murder and abetting the patricidal, regicidal usurper Prince that did it isn't enough to make it personal, apparently. Killing Kaede at that point, with that justification is something I would expect from a terrible DC Crisis Crossover, probably penned by Rob Liefeld.

The thing about having Aramoro randomly kill off Kaede is, it basically assumes her to be weak and helpless. Since we're to assume lore prior to 1123 is still canon until proven otherwise, Kaede completed her gempukku when she was ambushed by a bear in the woods and literally killed it with her mind. She's arguably a greater danger to Aramoro than Toturi because there's a chance she could kill him with the Void accidentally out of sheer reflex/instinctual self-preservation.

If we're looking to kill off an "unneeded" character, why not Aramoro? He's pretty much one-dimensional and his death would be more meaningful in how it affects Kachiko...I'm pretty sure Toturi will be plenty motivated from the assassination attempt itself.

22 minutes ago, Nitenman said:

A war for power/succession crisis is overarching a story, it's a classic framework, it's been used indeed but it works well with faction based story development. History has proven it can makes compelling stories. Is it lazy to follow this trope?

It really is.

1 minute ago, Mangod said:

Let's be honest here, the only justification for killing Kaede is that it would "make it personal" for Toturi.

The justification for killing Kaede is its sheer shock value. It would change the entire narrative in a fundamental way. If Kaede can die in a brutal and unexpected way then so can anyone , ever, in any future story. That's kinda big.

11 minutes ago, Kaito Kikaze said:

If we're looking to kill off an "unneeded" character, why not Aramoro? He's pretty much one-dimensional and his death would be more meaningful in how it affects Kachiko...I'm pretty sure Toturi will be plenty motivated from the assassination attempt itself.

Aramoro dying is a good idea too, but it wouldn't be TRAGIC enough.

39 minutes ago, AtoMaki said:

The justification for killing Kaede is its sheer shock value. It would change the entire narrative in a fundamental way. If Kaede can die in a brutal and unexpected way then so can anyone , ever, in any future story. That's kinda big.

And lazy too.

No more originality in a Anyone can die gruesomely since ASOIAF became mainstream.

11 minutes ago, Nitenman said:

And lazy too.

No more originality in a Anyone can die gruesomely since ASOIAF became mainstream.

If there's one thing I will never forgive the Benioff & Weiss Game of Thrones show for, it is its part in the fetishizing of killing off major characters for "shock value". Everyone was actually shocked when Ned was killed in season 1, but that was because people weren't expecting the main character of the series to die in the first season. But then they kept repeating it, reducing it from "shocking turn of events" to "M. Night Shayamalan movie twist" - something that would be more shocking if it didn't happen.

It's on par with the WCW "swerving" its audience every night until the audience just stopped caring about the product, and switched the channel.

22 minutes ago, Nitenman said:

And lazy too.

No more originality in a Anyone can die gruesomely since ASOIAF became mainstream.

I think we are past of lack of originality being an issue.

11 minutes ago, Mangod said:

Everyone was actually shocked when Ned was killed in season 1, but that was because people weren't expecting the main character of the series to die in the first season.

That's it. Kaede would be the Ned of L5R. Kinda. By the way, didn't you guys want some big tragedy for Kaeturi in a previous thread because "they are too happy so tragedy must happen" ?

24 minutes ago, Mangod said:

If there's one thing I will never forgive the Benioff & Weiss Game of Thrones show for...

What I can't forgive is how they took complex writing and characters and made it mass entertainment using weak characterization. And being indirectly responsible for folks who wouldn't have touched a dnd book with a stick years ago now popping everywhere claiming they always loved dragons...

Oh and of course they can't be forgiven for effing up Stannis character and having sacrificed his integrity to pander the masses.

But indeed, since their GOT, feels death is cheap, and cheap death becomes meaningless.

2 hours ago, AtoMaki said:

I think we are past of lack of originality being an issue.

That's it. Kaede would be the Ned of L5R. Kinda. By the way, didn't you guys want some big tragedy for Kaeturi in a previous thread because "they are too happy so tragedy must happen" ?

Tragedy doesn't mean necessarily killing a useful character though. There is still lots of story to tell with Kaede so why waste her potential. The fact that she's pregnant and we've had indications from previous stories that she is having some difficulty with it (that may admittedly just be a first time father Toturi overreacting to normal morning sickness and other normal pregnancy discomfort) but imagine we have Aramoro gets the drop on Toturi and injures him early in the fight, as he's about to strike the killing blow Kaede unleashes a blast of energy that knocks him away giving Toturi and her the chance to escape but ends up losing the baby form the stress of the situation. There you have it tragedy. Even worse is if while she is coping with this her husband gets exiled by Sotorii so she has to go through this without the support of him or the rest of her family who have either vanished (Ujina) or are somewhere wandering around the South (Tadaka).

If they /really/ want to make it personal/tragic for Toturi, if it isn't already, then they only need to have Kaede lose a pregancy, either through the attack or through her use of void magic because of it.

That said, I think it's already more than personal enough for Toturi. He wrote the edict. He follows bushido as a Lion must. He will feel responsible one way or another for it.

44 minutes ago, Schmoozies said:

imagine we have Aramoro gets the drop on Toturi and injures him early in the fight, as he's about to strike the killing blow Kaede unleashes a blast of energy that knocks him away giving Toturi and her the chance to escape but ends up losing the baby form the stress of the situation.

This is a much more likely scenario than her death, but to be honest I'm not a fan of this kind of tragedy. Too much trying to eat the cookie and still have it too.

Guess it's an "agree to disagree" point then, because honestly I'm not a fan at all of killing off characters for shock value. 😉

13 minutes ago, Kaito Kikaze said:

Guess it's an "agree to disagree" point then, because honestly I'm not a fan at all of killing off characters for shock value. 😉

Especially not in a lore-heavy Card game where you are even more likely to value a character on multiple levels and grow attached to using them.

My wife would rage quit if someone fridged Utaku Yumino and then removed her from the cardgame.

I land on the Toturi killing Aramoro side. It’s the apex of Aramoro’s storyline, that he’s become Kachiko’s tool rather than the Scorpion’s, and EC round two is the assassin vs the duelist, and I see Toturi proving that his first win wasn’t an accident.