Looking for Interest - L5R 4e Campaign!!

[BegrudginglyGood]

Good evening everyone!

I know I don't have the best track record for games running beyond a few months, but I'm making sure that this is the only game I am GMing. And I hope it can be a bit of fun, especially for the resident L5R GM Rain Yupa!

Since I only really have 4th Edition books, either in .pdf version or as hardcopy I would rather use it over 3eR. Sorry if this messes you up.

I've been playing L5R on and off for a while, and still consider myself a noob, however I hope that won't get in the way of us having fun. If you can ignore my lack of knowledge and occasional screw ups, I would love to run this game.

Let me know if you are interested.

Background to give you some inclination for characters...a snippet only.

The first RP day is the 20th day of the month of the Tiger (March), and the New Year approaches rapidly. The last days of winter are passing you by, and so far Rokugan has reached a sort of peace again, even if it feels rather uneasy considering the chaos that ensured during the Race for the Throne towards the end of 1200IC, only a year or two ago. Currently Empress Iweko the First sits on the throne.

Each of your characters is currently serving a clan/family (sorry, this means no ronin), and has been doing so for many years to the point that your opinion is considered very highly by the Lord. Your quick and well formed words in court might have earned your Lord great honor and propelled your Clan forward. Your sword has probably slain his enemies, you may even be of higher rank within his Armies. Or you may have even stopped an assassination attempt on his life. You are a close friend, someone they trust. Perhaps (depending on if your Family's leader is currently the Clan Daimyo) the Daimyo calls upon you often for council, or simply enjoys partaking in a tea ceremony or game of chance.

This is all you know currently...but tomorrow the winds bring bad news.

Right, as for the rules...

1. As long as a Clan still exists (1202 IC), you can use it, however I'm only allowing two magic users (first in best dressed), and no maho.
2. You have 120 XP to spend, however I don't want to see any Traits (eg Stamina, Agility etc) above 4. And no more than two skills at rank 7, and three at rank 5. Be reasonable with the rest...if I see twenty skills at rank 1 I might ask you to curb your wide knowledge base.
3. Maximum of 10 XP gained from Disadvantages. Maximum of 10XP spent on Advantages.
4. You can have starting Koku + 4 to resemble your time gathering status/koku (Advantages that give you more koku add onto this). And add 1 to your starting Status. People kinda know you based on your past deeds.
5. You can use Kata, but only pick 1.
6. Everyone gets a travelling pack, and the usual choice of items.


This should help keep it somewhat simple for me! Let's hope.

If I can get five people, I'll ask Rain if I can get a subforum (eg clean out and refurbish one of the ones I failed to get off the ground previously).

Let Rain have a quick chance to reply to this, and if he's cool with it then I'd love if we could continue using his premade Character sheet layout. It's perfection after all.

Rain Yupa

Rain, oh gracious and wonderful god of Rokugan, will you allow thy simple mortals use of thy wonderous scripture?!

--------------------

The heavens themselves seem to part, and from high above, a ray of divine light shines down upon the opening post of this thread. With a voice of equal omniscience and conviction, a response bellows to the mortals bearing witness:

"VERILY."

 

[Rain Yupa]

1.) What kinds of characters should we be aiming for, as a party? Is this social-heavy? Combat-heavy? Adventure-heavy? Same-Clan? All-From-Different-Clans?

2.) Is this 120 XP in addition to the starting 40 CP? Or is it a combined total (40+80=120)? EDIT: Apparently 4e calls them all XP now. Still, it's a clarification of 120XP total or 120 MORE.

3.) How closely are you following the metaplot for recent events of the past few years?  

[Plainsfox]

*is interested*

I'll come up with a character soon. smile  

[BegrudginglyGood]

Rain Yupa

1.) What kinds of characters should we be aiming for, as a party? Is this social-heavy? Combat-heavy? Adventure-heavy? Same-Clan? All-From-Different-Clans?

2.) Is this 120 XP in addition to the starting 40 CP? Or is it a combined total (40+80=120)?

3.) How closely are you following the metaplot for recent events of the past few years?

1) Adventure Heavy would be what I'm aiming for, with a decent splattering of combat and social.

And Clan depends on who you prefer to play, as long as you believe that someone would trust your leader (Daimyo, Lord, Sensei etc) or perhaps a parent or sibling of yours who is in a more powerful position enough to call on their aid.

Of course I'd prefer Major Clans for simplicity sake, however any of the Minor Clans who still exist after 1200 IC is fine. No Ronin (unless they have been granted a years leave and this is their last official duty before setting off, and I'll only allow one of these sorts of characters).

2) After rethinking, I'll make it 120 on top of the 40 CP. Imagine characters who are rather well formed within their Clan, and are capable of acting by proxy I suppose for their family/lord etc. So 160 XP all up.

3) Overall I'm hoping to call on a few past events to shape the background story, however since I don't have much literature for 1200 IC, I'll mainly be keeping away from the specifics. So if anything this will be a 'isolated' campaign that takes a page from the rest of the country but ultimately I can have some freedom to mess with. If that makes any sense.

4) Yay! It's Rain!  

[Rain Yupa]

BegrudginglyGood

Rain Yupa

1.) What kinds of characters should we be aiming for, as a party? Is this social-heavy? Combat-heavy? Adventure-heavy? Same-Clan? All-From-Different-Clans?

2.) Is this 120 XP in addition to the starting 40 CP? Or is it a combined total (40+80=120)?

3.) How closely are you following the metaplot for recent events of the past few years?

1) Adventure Heavy would be what I'm aiming for, with a decent splattering of combat and social.

And Clan depends on who you prefer to play, as long as you believe that someone would trust your leader (Daimyo, Lord, Sensei etc) or perhaps a parent or sibling of yours who is in a more powerful position enough to call on their aid.

Of course I'd prefer Major Clans for simplicity sake, however any of the Minor Clans who still exist after 1200 IC is fine. No Ronin (unless they have been granted a years leave and this is their last official duty before setting off, and I'll only allow one of these sorts of characters).

2) After rethinking, I'll make it 120 on top of the 40 CP. Imagine characters who are rather well formed within their Clan, and are capable of acting by proxy I suppose for their family/lord etc. So 160 XP all up.

3) Overall I'm hoping to call on a few past events to shape the background story, however since I don't have much literature for 1200 IC, I'll mainly be keeping away from the specifics. So if anything this will be a 'isolated' campaign that takes a page from the rest of the country but ultimately I can have some freedom to mess with. If that makes any sense.

4) Yay! It's Rain!

I had meant, do you want all of us to make characters from the same Clan, all from different clans, or it really doesn't matter?

Also if it helps, Iweko I became Empress in 1170. smile A few wars happened between then and now, with some of the biggest things of note is Daigotsu replaced Fu Leng as Dark Lord of Jigoku and the Spider Clan became a Major Clan because of it, and that the old Ivory Kingdoms where the Destroyer army of Kali-Ma had come from are now the Imperial Colonies, with two types of Rokugani citizens occupying them: Those looking for fame fortune treasure and adventure, and those who are members of Great Clans that they wouldn't mind sweeping under the rug, in this case they get the honor of helping colonize!

But you can easily have it with Iweko becoming Divine Empress and handwaiving the rest as never happened.  

[BegrudginglyGood]

Oh! Feel free to make a character from any clan, basically you'll come from all walks of life. So it's very open as to what sort of person you want to be...obviously though you would need to be trustworthy in the eyes of your superiors. But that doesn't mean you have to be Lawful Good (sorry, I couldn't help myself).

Hmmm, well I'd initially planned on Iweko I still being Empress, and the turmoil of the last 30 years having settled down a bit. Just like after the Destroyer War people were hesitant to jump back into battle with each other, but with the boom in the Colonies, it was seen more as an age of discovery.

That won't be of concern so much for you guys, but knowing what's currently happening can simply be background info.  

[Rain Yupa]

Okay cool. Then I'm totally good to play my Yasuki without worry! COURTIER AWAY!  

[BegrudginglyGood]

Very much so!

I hope you enjoy this, a change from always having to GM the L5R games, hehe.

blaugh

Also, could you clean out 'The Hunt' subforum, so that if I get enough players I can start this in there. Saves creating another subforum since that has been dead for AGES!  

[Rain Yupa]

Cleaned it out, renamed that same subforum.

Also, a snippet of my character concept from Trillian:

Quote:

rainyupa: A Yasuki who has like, a million pairs of sandals.
rainyupa: A girl can never have enough sandals.
rainyupa: I mean, you can't just wear any old pair of sandals to an occasion, let alone wearing the same pair to EVERY occasion like many bushi are apt to do.
rainyupa: Each occasion calls for a particular, special pair if you wish to make a positive impression.

 

[BegrudginglyGood]

Sounds great! I'll definitely have fun working that in at some point.  

[BegrudginglyGood]

I have the basic threads set up here, once you have a basic character worked out, please post it here, not in this thread.  

[The Shade of Casin]

How did you get a thread without 4 character sheets?  

[BegrudginglyGood]

Technically its just reusing an old subforum of mine that died...I think that's one reason I was allowed.

It's possibly also because this game is so Rain himself can RP in the L5R setting, so even if its just him, I'd do the campaign.  

[Rain Yupa]

@ Roilvn: Because since I'm a player and if it doesn't kick off as promised, I'll just shut it down *shrugs* The minimum is for games that I don't follow closely to make sure people are yanking my chain or something. Also, set-up by the previous Captain.

@ Ms. Good: The sheet you linked to is set for 3rd edition, btw. Health levels should be switched for Healthy and Out, and Defense is 5 + (5x Reflexes) + Armor.  

[Rain Yupa]

Since I've never had a 4e heritage before, Imma chance it and roll it!

Crab heritage table, p293 of Great Clans:

7 - Illustrious Past
4 - Your ancestor single-handedly turned back an enemy during a siege. His deeds still bring fame to your family today. Gain 1.0 Glory.

Okay, I posted the nitty-gritty mechanical bits of the character sheet. I need to crash, so the flavorful stuff happens probably tomorrow!