Winter at the City of the Rich Frog
A Legend of the Five Rings (L5R) Campaign
(Winter 2009)
Sequel to Fall at the Razor of the Dawn
Background and Characters
The year is 1166, month of the Rat, and the City of the Rich Frog is in turmoil. The War of the Rich Frog finished early this fall but the wounds of the war still remain, inflamed further by the buildup of Lion forces on the border and recent assassinations of Clan hostages. These assassinations, but more clearly the Rain of Blood, brings doubt upon the emporer and whether he has the blessing of heaven. Even though the emporer stays relatively far away in Toshi Ranbo, the presence of Unicorn courtiers in the city occupied by Lion soliders makes the city a powder keg ready to explode.
But winter is a time in which very little obvious warfare occurs, by both Imperial decree and physical limitations. It is instead the best time to shore up support - with the Dragon clan still annoyed by the result of their involvement in the war and the other clans wary, both Lion and Unicorn seek alliances (both overt and undercover) with other clans. The City of the Rich Frog will certainly be one location humming with this activity.
Important Characters in the City (in order of rough importance):
- Kaeru Shioko - city governor (manages supplies), tall, thin, walks as a warrior but in formal robes, 5'8", mid-40s, makes pottery
- Ikoma Kosaku - chief shireikan, Ikoma 2nd Army, in charge of military in City; Tall (6'), muscular but thin fellow, carries no-dachi everywhere
- Ikoma Mito - head of Ikoma wardens, medium height (5'6"), muscular, quiet, suspicious of Scorpions, friend of Doji Tetsuya
- Otomo Mikito - head of Otomo operations in the city and hostage situation, older gentleman, 5'2", gray beard, distinguished, 350 lbs
- Otomo Ume - assistant to Mikito, dangerous beauty, 5', large-ish lady, 27, pointed in conversation
- Tamori Jo - father of Tamori Jishin, head of small Dragon delegation
- Ide Isoruko - Head of small Unicorn delegation (small), 5'2", thin
Other Characters in the City (met by PCs, alphabetically):
- Asahina Kinmochi - Wears a Crane mon prominently despite Emerald magistrate status, medium height (5'2"), normal build, black beard, hair, intense green eyes, in his 40s
- Bayushi Tara - Attractive, not too thin or fat, 30-ish, 5', head of Scorpion in the city
- Bayushi Goro - Former Scorpion special agent; 5'6", medium build, "guards" embassy
- Doji (ne Akodo) Hisato - former Lion special forces, married into the Doji family
- Doji Na - Short, squat, falls for "bad boys"
- Doji Nami - new wife of Doji Hisato
- Doji Tamafune - wife of Doji Tamafune, 4'10", lightweight but assertive
- Doji ? - beautiful judge of cultural events, has tatoo by Tagashi, 5'8", thin, will not reveal name to acquaintances
- Hida Kudi - Slight , 5", beautiful, dressed in Yasuki robes, interested in learning from Doji-san
- Ikoma Aya - fellow hostage, 5'2", thin, strong woman with a stern reputation
- Kakita Kinmochi - master duelist, harsh taskmaster (taisa rank); 5'8", medium-muscular build
- Seppun Keneaboro - gunso of the Seppun guard in Otomo palace, accusor of Tagashi-san, 5'6", sickly and thin but competent
- Seppun Ya - guardsman, 5'8", in heavy armor
- Taitau Michio - Ronin bushi assigned by Otomo to assist/keep an eye on hostages, tall (6'), dark complexion and hair
- Taitau Sorai - Ronin shukenja assisting Michio, short-ish (5'), dark complexion but fire red hair, long beard, scowling most of the time
Visitors to the City:
- Tagashi Tabito - presence strong in the Void, seeking Tagashi-san, looks like fletcher-san? (bland)
- Bayushi Sunetra - current Scorpion champion, 5'2", athletic, dangerous beauty, in her 40s (unmet)
The city itself has an odd setup, with a central fortress but also fortifications outside of the city walls. The number of Lion troops does not fit within the city bounds so upwards of 20,000 Lion troops are situated between the old city walls and a set of new fortifications. In all, 1/3 of the Ikoma army (16 legions), 4 legions of Akodo, 4 legions of Matsu, Trace Scorpion and Crane forces, and the Ikoma Wardens form the bulk of the forces in the city. It can be assumed that, at any time, about 1/4 of the samurai above are given leave in the winter to visit their families and fulfill other obligations.
Important Locations and populations:
- Main Keep - lightly fortified (walls 1 story tall) around place for leading members of the defense team, Kaeru family
- Main Court - Set aside area for samurai to congregate and hold events during the Winter. It includes several sub-areas:
- Main area - for Lion samurai and guests only
- Special guest area - where the PCs will likely spend a lot of time
- Visitor receiving - by invitation only
- Several Lion encampments - even in the Winter, the Lion worry about an unconventional attack
- Many artisans - swarmed to this city to sell their wares in the winter
- Many Lion peasant weapon and armor-makers
Character Creation
Because of the number of activities in the Fall (8 weeks) and early Winter (8 weeks), new characters will start with the standard character setup then spend 45 experience points and set the character at Status 2.0 (unless you have advantages to further improve this). This is less experience points than others but you can spend them however you want (probably providing more focus). Note that there is an example character (with only 30 XP) below.
The standard introduction for new characters will be being sent by their clan to experience a winter court at war. Each will have personal reasons for being there as well, of course.
Clans:
Recommended: Lion, Scorpion, Dragon, Unicorn
OK: Crab, Crane, Mantis, Phoenix, Ronin
Not Recommended: Imperial family
Disallowed: Spider
(any family is fine)
"Class":
Recommended: Courtier, Bushi, Shugenja
OK: Monk, Shinobi
Below are some skill, advantage, and disadvantage suggestions (although many are just fine and thus omitted). For the highly recommended ones, there's no need for everyone to take those skills - as long as someone has it, it should be fine. Not recommended just means that most of the situations I usually come up with do not involve this and/or it would be a pain to deal with.
I just draw them to your attention. For rings, having at least 3 Air (for Reflexes (defense and ranged attack) and Awareness (almost all social rolls)) is a good idea but the rest is up to you.
Skills:
Highly Recommended: Etiquette, Investigation, Courtier
Recommended: Games (any), Meditation, Spellcraft, Theology, Kyujutsu, Kenjutsu, Jiujutsu
Not Recommended: Engineering, Locksmith
Advantages: (do not take granted advantages)
Highly Recommended: Kharmatic Tie (with other PC), Leadership
Recommended: Crafty
Disadvantages: (do not take granted disadvantages, as usual only up to 10 pts)
Highly Recommended: Bitter Betrothal, Driven, Overconfident
Recommended: Can't Lie, Brash, Doubt, Forsaken, Gullible, Lost Love, Shadowlands Taint, Unlucky
Not Recommended: Antisocial, Bad Fortune, Bad Health, Coward, Cruel, Dark Fate, Dependent, Insensitive, Low Pain Threshold, Momoku, Reduced Status or Honor, Wrath of the Kami
A general note: Glory and Honor will be very fluid - it will be granted and lost with some frequency. Sometimes these will be conditional e.g. "gain one pip/point of Glory but only if your Glory rank is less than 3." Status is fairly static but changes once in a while.
House Rules
All updates from Fall at the Razor of the Dawn's list plus:
- Characters killed during play will use the Kharma special rule. Characters dropped may be subject to this (see GM).
- Getting a Divination emphasis on Omens means that you get unlimited use of the skill (according to when you see Omens) in addition to your normal once/day (plus additional for Void points).
- Glory is lost through idleness at a rate of 1/week if you gain glory, 3/week if you do not (your memory fades less quickly if you do something). The only exception is that your Glory cannot fall below your Insight Rank in this way.
- As per page 202, Monks have both Honor and Glory. Their Status is equal to their Glory but it is always as if the monk is not in anyone's chain of command. The advantage, "Ascetic" for a monk just adds to the confusion but lets go with this: An ascetic monk has only Honor, Status is equal to his Honor and Glory is capped at his Insight Rank (but earned normally until then).
- Clarification on Group Skill rolls (from Revised) - there are two types and I'll be more careful about which type is applicable:
- Cooperative Skill Roll - Roll once using the average of the groups skill and trait levels. Examples: group Stealth roll, trying to climb together, etc. Basically, whenever one person's lack of expertise drags down others (or, more positively, one person's skill helps others). Note group members can spend Void to avoid forcing the group to make the roll unskilled.
- Cumulative Skill Rolls - Used when the efforts of other party member is solely beneficial. The "leader" announces the number of raises the *group* will make then all roll - the leader rolls last, all other group members roll at the raised TN - 5 without making raises, giving the leader a free raise for each success. Examples: Investigating a scene, crafting a large project.
Example roll: Let's say that the party is investigating a crime scene. I would call that Perception/Investigation(Search) but, unlike the book, typically would not say a TN. Just for sake of argument, say Doji-san takes the lead and, knowing he has 5 others assisting him, calls 4 raises; also, for the same sake, lets say I set the TN to 15 to notice some footprints leading away and 3 raises to notice a dropped coin of some importance, embedded in the snow outside (with additional raises going over as free raises to later action, such as a Hunting roll). So the TN for the main part of the group is now 15 + 20 - 5 = 30. Say 2 succeed (that's a pretty high TN). Then Doji-san has to only make a TN 15 + 10 = 25 roll (which he easily does) and the party gets full information. If no other party member had been able to assist, Doji would have had to try a TN 35 roll alone and get all or nothing.
Note for Fall folks: Note that the TN to assist in dependent on the TN of the leader's roll. It is not always 15.
- Battle was clarified in Revised - You can spend 3 complex actions scounting an area for advantages and then must make a Perception/Battle(Skirmish) vs TN 20 to get a Free Raise during any skirmish in that area. The size of this area is 100' square + 25'/raise. The base size for Mass Battle is a mile (+.25mi/raise) but you have to spend 3 hours doing it. Also, cool bonus: You can make Perception/Battle roll (vs enemy Agility/Stealth(Ambush)) to avoid being surprised. The Rank 5 mastery ability would make Scorpions happy.
- Defense is just a mess in Revised (see below errors). For simplicity, we will:
- Defense does not modify your TNtbH when in Full Attack (except if you're Rank 7).
- Add twice your defense to your TNtbH when in attack posture.
- Replace your Reflexes x 5 with the result of an Agility/Defense roll if you are in Full Defense. You also get the usual twice your Defense to your TNtbH.
Other
A short reference sheet for L5R in PDF. Last updated: 1/2/09
I found a computer-completable character sheet for L5R for PDF (thanks to the Evansville Gaming Guild). As always for editable PDFs, make sure your program records your writes! (OS X's Preview does not). Also, I used the above form to write an example character given the above, Mirumoto Musashi, with other notes included to help.
What is the average roll and keep result? Check out this web site or this.
A really nice, detailed map of Rokugan can be found here. Cut it up with Posterazor and you're good to go!
Status Suffixes (page 33):
- Use family mon most of the time. Using a personal name indicates an alliance while clan name is an insult to family (if family is clear).
- -san - friend or more-or-less equal.
- -sama - to superior
- -chan - female loved one
- -kun - male loved one (by female) or siblings, relatives, etc.; or as insult (finding someone adorable).
- O- - show of respect
- -sensei - teacher, superior in same line of work (my addition)
Revised Gibberish - So, apparantly the Revised edition was pushed out the door a bit fast. Some fun gibberish from it:
- "You add twice your Defense skill to your TNtbH at all times (except against opponents whose presence you are unaware of) whlie [sic] you are in Full Attack Posture." So, plus twice defense all the time or just while full attack? Rank 7's ability is, "You may now add twice your Defense skill to your TNtbH, even in Full Attack Posture," which is completely useless as written!
- "While in Full Defense Posture, you may make an Agility/Defense roll and may use this result instead of your Reflexes times 5. While in the Full Defense Posture, you make an Agility/Defense roll and add this number to your TN to Be Hit." OK, these two sentences either repeat themselves or say contradictory things.
- "A monk's Status never changes, but they may gain Glory normally never changes, although they may gain Status normally."
