4 hours ago, Shiba Gunichi said:

Given the Void shenanigans involved, and the... situation of Kaede's birth?

I think there might be absolutely Nothing wrong here.

Yeah rereading it I get the same feeling. She even sees her father's eyes, which can't be good Very interesting.

Reading these new FFG fictions reminds me of reading 80's era X-Men comics. Lots of pots on the burner left to boil. Every now and then they reminds us yeah the emperor was murdered and all but we also have these 20 other big threats lurking in the background.

Ishikawa was too busy creepin' on Kaede to watch the emperor this night it seems. I can't imagine Ishikawa will consider seppuku considering his closing remark here. I can see the argument for desiring release from the shame of failure here, but if I was in his shoes I would consider my duty unfulfilled. He wants justice for the Emerald Champion, and soon he'll realize the emperor is dead in the same night. I doubt he'll consider that just a coincidence no matter what Miya Satoshi and the other conspirators tell him. If Toturi starts talking about the encounter I'm sure Ishikawa will be targeting the Scorpion considering Toturi locked eyes with Aramoro. I got the impression Toturi knows who his attacker was though I guess there was never clear confirmation of that.

4 hours ago, Magnus Grendel said:

Maybe? Asami wouldn't know what's happened, though, so would she have any reason to be looking at Kaede in particular?

Though there is no way a Body Double would know what happened, Asami could be looking at Kaede in particular because she knows how much Aramoro hates Toturi and is eager to kill him. Alternatively, she could have been told via a message that she was to watch for Kaede, so that they would know Kaede wasn't there when the assassination attempt occurred, or that she needed to stay longer than she would have otherwise.

3 hours ago, DGLaderoute said:

But I doubt that they'd generally be seen, from the perspective of a outside observer, as having actually failed, as much as taken completely off-guard by a situation so unique and extreme their plans hadn't even considered it...right up with a, what do we do if an Elemental Dragon descends from Tengoku and wants to kill the Emperor ? That goes WAY beyond any reasonable contingency planning.

(Also me just musing)

I'm not as sanguine as you are. Yeah, taken off-guard by an unexpected and extreme situation -- but when your duty is that important, failure kind of becomes unacceptable. If an Elemental Dragon comes down to kill the Emperor, you can rightfully say a higher power was at work, but in this case it was a teenaged boy. Right now nobody will call for the seppuku of the Emperor's guards because he tragically died of natural causes, but once the fact of the assassination becomes known? Yeah, I'd expect it.

I hear you...but it wasn't JUST a teenaged boy. It was the Crown Prince of Rokugan who, by his very nature, is a scion of Tengoku and a semi-divine figure. Now, I realize that he really still IS just a teenaged boy with anger management issues, but I'd be awfully surprised if Ishikawa et al. are expected to commit seppuku. It IS a failure of duty, yes, but I still think the facts of the matter...well, matter. To even suggest that the Emperor would need protection from his own son and heir would, I think, be pretty much unthinkable. And I definitely expect seppuku to be offered in any case.

I guess it comes down to who writes the story and what FFG decides, though, of course!

Well he is the captain and therefore he is responsible for the shortcomings of his subordinates if it comes to capital punishment. Whether there is a call for capital punishment I would think depends on who the new emperor ends up being if Sotorii is removed from the throne. With Sotorii on the throne there can be no call for punishment obviously since that would admit guilt.

If it's a question of Ishikawa feeling compelled to commit seppuku I'd think he would not feel compelled at least initially. He clearly has a trajectory now and if he connects Toturi's attack with the emperor's death (which I assume he will) then he'd be compelled to see this to the end until justice is served for his former lord. After that is all done maybe he'd ask his new lord for permission. I'd suspect if he's successful in thwarting Kachiko and Aramoro and the new lord benefited from that success then the request would be declined considering he'd be a hero and a valuable vassal to the new lord.

You know, if your plans keep getting derailed like this you should maybe stop and ask yourself if the kami may not be against you.

I do wonder how Aramoro will react when Toturi's body doesn't surface. That feels like a fun moment to capture.

13 minutes ago, phillos said:

I do wonder how Aramoro will react when Toturi's body doesn't surface. That feels like a fun moment to capture.

*Record scratch* *freeze frame* "Yep, that's me. You're probably wondering how I ended up in this situation."

6 hours ago, DGLaderoute said:

I hear you...but it wasn't JUST a teenaged boy. It was the Crown Prince of Rokugan who, by his very nature, is a scion of Tengoku and a semi-divine figure. Now, I realize that he really still IS just a teenaged boy with anger management issues, but I'd be awfully surprised if Ishikawa et al. are expected to commit seppuku. It IS a failure of duty, yes, but I still think the facts of the matter...well, matter. To even suggest that the Emperor would need protection from his own son and heir would, I think, be pretty much unthinkable.

Forget shugenja; this is where I think Rokugan is clearly a fantasy land. There have been plenty of times in history where the ruler's own son and heir is EXACTLY who he needs to be protected from. 😛

Would would Ishikawa offer his seppuku to though? Seppuku is not "I have failed, time to kill myself", it is a lord giving a retainer permission to cleanse his honour through death. In this case, Ishikawa would have to offer his seppuku to Sotorii for failing to prevent Sotorii from killing his father. Something tells me Sotorii would not want this to be public information.

34 minutes ago, DarkHorse said:

Would would Ishikawa offer his seppuku to though? Seppuku is not "I have failed, time to kill myself", it is a lord giving a retainer permission to cleanse his honour through death. In this case, Ishikawa would have to offer his seppuku to Sotorii for failing to prevent Sotorii from killing his father. Something tells me Sotorii would not want this to be public information.

That's an interesting thought - does Ishikawa even know/get to find out that the Emperor was murdered? I was under the impression that the 'official' line was that the Emperor simply passed due to old age - would anyone tell him any different?

2 hours ago, player3906560 said:

That's an interesting thought - does Ishikawa even know/get to find out that the Emperor was murdered? I was under the impression that the 'official' line was that the Emperor simply passed due to old age - would anyone tell him any different?

Well, if he does find out the Emperor was murdered, the next obvious question is "by who?" And that is going to raise further questions that Kachiko, Satoshi, Sotorii and anyone else in on this little conspiracy don't want getting raised.

But the Emperor dying of natural causes literally the same night that the Emerald Champion is assassinated in his own chambers? That is probably too convenient for Ishikawa not to suspect foul play, regardless of what he's told by his peers.

I suspect Satoshi will be happy for it to get out that the Emperor was murdered by the prince given Satoshi's true allegiance. He will just want to control how that information gets out.

1 hour ago, Mangod said:

Well, if he does find out the Emperor was murdered, the next obvious question is "by who?"

But then, he should know that it was Sotorii, shouldn't he? From 'Last stone played' we learn, that there are wards but they didn't alarm the Hidden Guard, because it was Sotorii who killed the Emperor. He should know this, so at the moment he knows, it was no natural cause, he must know, it was either Sotorii or Daisetsu.

8 hours ago, player3906560 said:

That's an interesting thought - does Ishikawa even know/get to find out that the Emperor was murdered? I was under the impression that the 'official' line was that the Emperor simply passed due to old age - would anyone tell him any different?

I don't think at this point Ishikawa even knows the Emperor is dead, much less murdered. The timeline is fuzzy but Aramoro was immediately sent to kill Toturi and there is the part of the Emperor not being able to attend O-Tsukimi and that "Kachiko" would convey news from the party, so I think this is the very same night Jodan is murdered, maybe within hours.

1 hour ago, Suzume Chikahisa said:

I don't think at this point Ishikawa even knows the Emperor is dead, much less murdered. The timeline is fuzzy but Aramoro was immediately sent to kill Toturi and there is the part of the Emperor not being able to attend O-Tsukimi and that "Kachiko" would convey news from the party, so I think this is the very same night Jodan is murdered, maybe within hours.

But aramoro had tiem to assemble a team, including infiltrating and replacing a guard assigned to toturi. I would guess that takes some time, specially since toturi probably knows the faces of his bodyguards. Also there were many shinobi acting in concert and all that, already infiltrated in the rooftops of one of the most important places of the empire. That kind of operation cant be done improvised or hastily planned

2 minutes ago, RafaelNN said:

But aramoro had tiem to assemble a team, including infiltrating and replacing a guard assigned to toturi. I would guess that takes some time, specially since toturi probably knows the faces of his bodyguards. Also there were many shinobi acting in concert and all that, already infiltrated in the rooftops of one of the most important places of the empire. That kind of operation cant be done improvised or hastily planned

Time line we have has him having about 2-4 hours (and its probably closer to the 2 mark) between the death of the Emperor and the events of this story. I would guess the Scorpion infiltrator that was acting as one of Toturi's guards has been in place for a while (likely with at least 1 or 2 others) for the express purpose of observing what he does and reporting back to the clan and so was pressed into service when the need for the assassination came up.

As to assembling the team we have ample evidence that the Scorpion like to prepare for most eventualities as seen by how quick the clean up team was in position at the palace, so Aramoro having a few lackeys prepped to go at the drop of a hat seems very likely as well. And as Ninja's their whole job is going places they shouldn't so yeah them getting onto the palace grounds is not that outlandish to expect.

Actually, these are all very good points, and will probably be heavily influenced by the next four stories anyway. I guess we'll just have to see where all this goes!

6 minutes ago, Schmoozies said:

Time line we have has him having about 2-4 hours (and its probably closer to the 2 mark) between the death of the Emperor and the events of this story. I would guess the Scorpion infiltrator that was acting as one of Toturi's guards has been in place for a while (likely with at least 1 or 2 others) for the express purpose of observing what he does and reporting back to the clan and so was pressed into service when the need for the assassination came up.

As to assembling the team we have ample evidence that the Scorpion like to prepare for most eventualities as seen by how quick the clean up team was in position at the palace, so Aramoro having a few lackeys prepped to go at the drop of a hat seems very likely as well. And as Ninja's their whole job is going places they shouldn't so yeah them getting onto the palace grounds is not that outlandish to expect.

I agree with the first paragprah 100%. The second makes sense but theres so much you can plan that way. Some particulars must still be taken into consoderstion anf that takes time. Also, based entirely on my hollywood movie watching experience, you have to be a pro AND carefully plan, rehearse, prepare etc a plan for it to succeed. But I understand for narrative reasons your point makes sense.

I think the main evidence everythings happening hours after the emperors death is that noone has commented on the event and are doing their stuff as normal

Delete please.

4 minutes ago, RafaelNN said:

I agree with the first paragprah 100%. The second makes sense but theres so much you can plan that way. Some particulars must still be taken into consoderstion anf that takes time. Also, based entirely on my hollywood movie watching experience, you have to be a pro AND carefully plan, rehearse, prepare etc a plan for it to succeed. But I understand for narrative reasons your point makes sense

We are talking about Aramoro here. Everything we've seen shows he's the type of guy who hold s grudges and Toturi did take the position of Emerald Champion from him when he wanted to impress Kachiko by securing it on her orders. I would be shocked if he hadn't been planning ways to assassinate Toturi from the moment the tournament ended just in case he was told that Toturi was becoming a hindrance to the Scorpion. As to your Hollywood movie experience yes it takes time to properly plan assassinations, but real world experience is that plans don't always fall into place where you want them and sometimes you just need to go when an opportunity dictates (and the opportunity to put a puppet Emperor on the throne was too good for Kachiko to feel she could pass up) so you fall back on contingencies and they don't always work out as well as you would hope (as we saw here as it was really luck that Toturi didn't win the actual fight even at a 4 on 1 disadvantage) and thanks to Kaede they still botched the job up.

In the military, we recognize two types of operations--deliberate and hasty. Deliberate ops are carefully planned and rehearsed before being executed. Think the invasion of Normandy in WW2. Hasty ops are just that--hasty. They are undertaken in response to a sudden opportunity or to react to an unexpected situation. They are done with minimal planning or rehearsals, or even none...in which case, you rely on the training and discipline of those involved, and the standard operating procedures they normally use, to maintain as much order as possible.

Aramoro's op in this story was very much a hasty one. Kachiko sensed an opportunity and decided to go for it, making a risky play that was balanced out by a potentially tremendous reward.

We can almost picture an Aramoro snapping his fingers saying: let's go, and shadowy figures shows up and follow him. They didn't suddenly prepare, they were at his ready the whole time.

let's not forget he isn't just any scorpion assassin, he is the Daimyo's brother and previous Daimyo's son, so high nobility. We can expect he has a cadre of goons at his beak and call.

I realise that the old canon is not a reliable source here, but I'm sure I remember Ishikawa going ronin for a while last time round. That is after he helped Kaede get the heir out from the Coup.

I think this story was ok, but IMO the overdramatization was kinda killing the tone. This was especially jarring at the assasssination scene when after some very nice shinobi action we had this moment when Toturi was about to win but then Aramoro's main theme started playing and the dead assassin girl stopped being dead (Aramoro should give her a raise, btw) and Toturi went full "NANI?!" and died and Aramoro YareYareDaze'd him. That was... a bit overt.

Another thing I can't wrap my head around is Kaede's power level. She feels pretty hapless with her Void powers but then resurrecting the dead is appearently something she can just do. I thought Void magic is supposed to be pretty darn powerful and eerie but Kaede is barely getting one half at best: her eerie stuff is not very powerful and her very powerful stuff is not very eerie. I'm confused and the story is not helping me at all.