City of Lies [L5R]
-
So, I'm in the very early stages of development here (literally still working out all the setting information and everything), but I was thinking about opening an L5R 4e game set in Ryoko Owari AKA the City of Lies sometime in the 12th century after the Second Day of Thunder. Potentially The Four Winds Era but also potentially not. Nothing is necessarily set in stone yet.
I'm thinking Ryoko Owari should offer a good mix of political shenanigans for high and low honor characters alike, an outlet for all those dishonorable criminals looking to get into the opium trade, and relative proximity to The Shinomen Forest for the adventurous types. I'm going to be honest here, I'm probably going to be looking at Arx as a very loose inspiration. I think the various systems are a little bit too complex for me personally, but I think they've done an excellent job in general at making a game that feels responsive to player actions.
Primarily, I just want to get some feedback for interest in the setting and system -- I welcome suggestions and critiques! I also want to potentially put out some feelers for people who might want to get in on development. This is kind of a pet project of mine, so I'm going to chug along with it anyway even if I have to learn Ruby or Python myself and do horrible, terrible things to Ares or Evennia, but having help would definitely speed things along and make it less likely to implode in a stiff breeze.
-
Having attempted L5R before, some thoughts/pitfalls:
- the system isn't as widely known as WoD, nor as straightforward, so teaching is a big requirement
- per the above, you'll want an almost entirely automated CG (I had this, still had to hand-hold many people)
- running inside the established storyline can mean a lot of lore clutter, you may be better picking a 'clean' period (whether one of those in Imperial Histories, the reboot timeline for the FFG LCG/RPG, etc)
- Ryoko Owari is good, but any location in Rokugan will create some pressure on what sort of character concepts work long-term (this may be why the traveling magistrate game archetype is so prevalent in tabletop)
Good luck!
-
@bored Yes! I've poked around here looking for some insight on running L5R because I personally haven't actually played on any MU running it. I saw the Kishi Kaisei thread so I've actually considered some of these already based on what you mentioned having trouble with. I'll likely write up a cheat sheet for the game -- a quick reference for various rolls and commonly used rules. I'll make sure to do one for CGen, too.
running inside the established storyline can mean a lot of lore clutter, you may be better picking a 'clean' period (whether one of those in Imperial Histories, the reboot timeline for the FFG LCG/RPG, etc)
Yeah, that was definitely one of the reasons I wasn't entirely sure about the Four Winds Era. I'll look through the Imperial Histories, but I didn't want to exclude the Mantis as a Great Clan option. I might just have to do an alt history where they were elevated a bit earlier. Though I didn't realize 5E rebooted the timeline. I'll check that out as well.
Thanks for the feedback!
-
I am upset that I missed this until now. Doubly so as I am at work and connot reference the book for the location specifics.
But... I am 100% down for an L5R game. As much of a FFG fangirl as I am, I'd prefer it, buuuuut do not require it so much that I would avoid the previous edition the way that I dodge Saga Star Wars games.
-
Thanks to Ares being so thoroughly idiot-proof, development is going a lot faster and smoother than anticipated. I'll be posting a full ad in a day or two with more concrete info, so stay posted!
-
Obligatory query as to how we feel about playable things from EotE.
-
So I haven't looked at Enemies in a good while. I remember there being Ronin stuff and more antagonistic options for characters but no specifics. Personally, I'm a big proponent of allowing players to make antagonistic PCs (depending on the game it might have to be handled differently of course, a comic game can let full on Super Villain PCs run around, but certain games might need to reign that in a bit more). However, as Bored mentioned, L5R isn't as well known, so I sort of want to avoid bombarding new people with too many options right off the bat. I'll give it another look and see what can be implemented at the start, but probably not a lot of it will be.
However, I am all for introducing more options for players as we go along -- and as I get more help in the Staff department -- so I won't rule it out just yet.
-
I'd say that nailing down rules for ronin is a good idea, as they're always popular with players. While traditional L5R sort of discourages them, they're decent on a MU, esp for players who might be familiar with general samurai fiction (Kurosawa movies, Lone Wolf and Cub, etc) but not with L5R. The rules for them are always a little hodgepodge (4e being no exception) so you want to tackle how you're treating them ahead of time (1-rank techniques vs. the generic school from SotE).
I agree that things like Nezumi or Naga would be a bit theme-diluting and difficult. Others, like Kolat and the Lying Darkness are more metaplot dependent. You wouldn't want to include them just to include them but if your game's metaplot included one or more of those elements, they might have some value as player choices (esp Lying Darkness/Scorpion via Shadow Brands, Soshi Tejina etc).
-
@bored Honestly, I'll look forward to playing a Lion samurai or a Phoenix sorcerer.
So baiscally rehashes of my Kishi Kaisei characters? Fuck if I know.
