Besides Sins of Regret, Cresting Waves and Highwayman, which other published adventures can be tweaked for a band of rōnin? Is there one that the players can start at Rank 1?

I have an idea of starting one but really need to do more research on how to write one. That’s why I like to work first with pre-written ones and then when feeling more comfortable move to my own.

You could tweak Dark Tides from the GM pack a bit. It assumes that the Otomo calls in a favour to get a Magistrate to search for a missing samurai, but he could equally decide to use money to hire a band of ronin as a deniable asset to go and do the search instead. He has a certain motive to do that, since the task exposes the dishonourable behaviour of kin. Magistrates who decide to go public with the info would be more believable than ronin.

From there, a direct link is possible to Mask of the Oni (and DLC) but there's a little bit of "why wouldn't the PCs just tell the authorities about this?" to that one. You could get past that with "and why should I believe you?", especially if you set up the expectation that the party wouldn't be believable at the start of Dark Tides.

Winter's Embrace, on the other hand, really isn't available to a ronin band at all.

Obvioulsy, Wheel of Judgement is suitable for anyone, you just need a TPK first.

Thank you very much for the tips Tonbo Karasu. May I ask what it is the Rank Required to play Wheel of Judgement?

2 hours ago, FelixFenix said:

Thank you very much for the tips Tonbo Karasu. May I ask what it is the Rank Required to play Wheel of Judgement?

It's got guidance for varying the challenge level. I've seen someone suggest doing a campaign by starting with Wheel of Judgement and then going to reincarnation.

I like that idea a lot. And if I may ask, does the timeline have a set era? I’m sorry for the questions but I am waiting for the pdf version.

9 hours ago, FelixFenix said:

I like that idea a lot. And if I may ask, does the timeline have a set era? I’m sorry for the questions but I am waiting for the pdf version.

Nope. Everything that happens in the module is in the underworld with merely vague hints of things that are happening in the real world. A couple of them could be used in future interactions. There's a dead Reju who's worried about his young pupil (that family name could be used as a hook into Sins of Regret), and the DLC has a disguised female maho-tsukai who's up to no good that the module suggests could be Sokori, the Mask of the Oni villain.

Thinking about things, I could imagine going:

• Dark Tides (from GM screen) foiling that plot and seeing Sokori in the distance at the end as suggested
• Wheel of Judgement, without running the players' TPK, getting your plot hook in for Sins of Regret and meeting Sokori again (to her surprise - "I killed you!")
• Come back to part way through the prologue of Mask of the Oni, where the PC group got ambushed by Sokori and killed since they were chasing her down the east coast . Now they have even more reason to pursue their evil murderer.
• If you still have more campaign after that, have a ghostly reminder of Reju Tabito send them back north to Sins of Regret.

Wedding at Kyotei could work, but you're unlikely to be proper 'guests'- you could be someone's Yojimbo or - if you don't mind spoiling the plot a bit - some fellow ronin Itto has hired.

Quite a few emerald empire challenge/focus/strike adventure seeds could work fine for ronin, too. A big portion of the armies around Toshi Ranbo are mercenaries rather than clan samurai because the lion and crane are totally not at war.

Honest.

it’s a border skirmish 😂