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There is a slight disconnect between what western languages and what the Japanese associate sincerity with. This article about decoding asian business codewords explains the difference. being Makoto (mah-koe-toe) means to properly discharge all of one's obligations so that every thing will flow smoothly and harmony will be maintained. It also means ...

Rank 1 techniques generally add rolled dice in certain circumstances (The Way of the Clan techniques in particular) and have a defensive bonus. Rank 3 techniques usually convert your attack from a Complex action to a Simple, allowing you to make two attacks a round. Some combinations of these rank 1 techniques are more powerful than 2 or 3 ranks in one ...

The default is the Magistrate campaign. This mode can be applied to non-magistrate activities, too, where a group of clans each send an Imperial officer some people to use for a joint goal. Magistrates are the most common, but expeditions into the shadowlands, the Burning Sands, or Naga turf are also good candidates. One must, however, keep in mind that ...

There are a couple approaches. First option - don't. Make real sure your group is on board with this, because many people find scenes like that at the table unacceptable (and it's not just binary, there's also the depth to which you go into it). There's a lot of related topics (loss of control, permanent effects on a character, squeamishness, other psych ...

How I'd do it- less simulation, not too much detail.. but enough that it makes sense in context. The point is, make the scene serve the game. For example, I might say as the GM "You get captured..imprisoned for a while, and then one day they torture you. Terrible things happen.. you are permanently scarred (both mentally and physically) by the twisted and ...

b is the correct answer - if the enemy attacker hit, and then rolled 5k3 for damage, and the results were 1,2,3,8,12 (from an exploding ten), then they could only keep the 8 and 12 for a total of 20 damage - the rest are ignored. Without the spell effect, the damage would be 8+12+3 = 23. If, on the other hand, the attacker rolled all 4 or less, there would ...

In 4th Edition, under Spell Casting Rolls & Target Numbers, there is text devoted to interruptions. A shugenja who is interrupted must succeed at a Willpower Trait Roll (TN 10) to overcome distraction. If the shugenja suffers damage, the TN for the Willpower roll is 5 plus the amount of damage suffered. A spell that is disrupted in this manner cannot ...

The Role of Honor: How it's used, how it's gained, how I should treat it. It's a measure of doing what is right. If you're losing it, you're being a villain. If you're gaining it, a righteous samurai. As a player, you don't use it, per se. As a GM, you inform players of whether they are living up to samurai morals with it. The Role of Courtiers: Both ...

No. Under the standard rules, each dice keeps exploding until you stop rolling 10s. Remember that each dice explodes seperately. If you have 3k2 and roll 10, 10, 6 then you get to reroll the 10s. Say they come up 10 and 7, you'd have 20, 17 and 6. Assume the next roll comes up 3, you'd have 23, 17 and 6. Keep 2 means you'd choose two dice and the best two ...

There is a third option, other than pure roleplaying and rolling dice, which is to offer a choice. For example, here's a difficult choice. Either the character gives up the information or suffers a random amount of damage. Make it clear that, if the damage dice roll high enough to kill the character, the character will die. So, then, the player chooses ...

Rationale should influence approach I guess this all depends on the narrative purpose of the torture scene. Does it need to be played through? If not, go with some of the other suggestions here. Say 'you were tortured and move on.' It's good advice. If you feel that there is some important reason that you play through the scene proceed with caution. I've ...

You will have two very important choices during character creation - what clan do you belong to? Do you use magic? As a new L5R player, these will shape the rest of your experience. It will be simpler if you make a character who doesn't use magic. This magic system involves a certain learning curve; it's not hideously complicated, but it's more than ...

What we did in my previous campaign was the following : each of the different clans our characters were from were sent to the same big event, each one for a different reason (some had goals that were the same that other characters, but didn't know about it). Then, some random event happened, forcing us to cooperate because we were the only one witnessing it, ...

Mechanical 1st: Roll Stat+Skill, Keep Trait.Trait and Ring Cap=5Insight= 10x∑(Rings) + ∑(skills)All skills narrow. Purchase of skills with skill points is 1:1. 2nd: Roll Skill keep Trait.Trait and Ring Cap=10Insight= 10x∑(Rings) + ∑(skill level-1)All skills broad as default. Purchase of skills with skill points is New Level SP for +1 level. Narrow skills ...

As I recall, all weapon skills except for Kyujutsu are based on Agility (Kyujutsu is Reflexes). I don't have rulebooks with me to give you a page number, but it should be spelled out in the skill section. (edit) had a chance to look at the 2e Player's Book, and found your answers. It's a bit scattered about, but... Easy answer right up front - a Naginata ...

That was a friendly debate at the tables I've been at/run. We wondered if you had to fill a rank to get the bonus, or merely have any tics within it. For 1st-3rd editions, we said that a character would have to fill the rank to get its penalty with an obvious launch point of +0 (although we had a one-shot where you would get a +3 to your rolls and not TNs ...

Assuming we're talking about the L5R Roll and Keep system, about the closest you will get is the summary on p160 of the 2nd ed Player's Guide - it's not very detailed, but tells you what to do at a very high level. About the only other help is the Example of Play on p186, which runs through some combat among other things.

I can't give you much rules advice, having not played L5R specifically. However, here's a bit of advice that should be generally applicable (especially if L5R is somewhat like it's cousin, 7th Sea): Familiarize yourself with the setting enough that you can come up with one or two top-down character concepts that sound interesting. By top-down, I mean create ...

(I know this thread is fairly old but just in case...) A personal favorite of mine is the "Great Master" approach. The players are all characters invited to be part of the same dojo "class" under a widely renowned master. An example that sort of ties prior ones together is something like the Emperor's guards, who come from a variety of clans but train ...

With the nature of the honour based system orders from the Emperor, Daimyo or other authority figure can be used as they have to be obeyed as can some other form of honour based binding such as a personal debt for saving someone's life. If your group can deal with this it can be a particularly rewarding situation as players have to balance their conflicting ...

Mechanically, I would say that either it is not an opposed roll (since there is no opposition, just the person trying to put their viewpoint across - this could be rolled with the Sincerity skill, or with some form of Persuasion), or else it is a contested roll to persuade the other person of the truth-telling (which will not involve sincerity at all).

This may come as a reiteration of prior answers/comments, but a weapon skill "varies" only depending on its use. Most commonly they use Agility as the trait when attacking, with the lone exception of bows (kyujutsu) and even then it can be changed. I believe my reference book is 1st edition but there are few differences except for the game logo between 1st ...

Clans The main reason for clans — and other subgroups like them you'll find — is to give an idea of what kinds of characters are likely to be found in a typical game, and give you some inspiration for what kind of character you'd like to make. They offer some easy-entry stereotypes, some starting conflicts (Lion are rivals with Crane; Crab think the ...