Best products from r/rokugan

So, disclaimer: Shadow of the Cabal is recorded digitally over roll20, with each of us recording our own tracks independently in our own homes, and I stitch them together to make a show. We do not sit at the same table IRL, so some of my advice may or may not be applicable.

Also, I assume that your intent with your recording is to eventually release a story that is listenable for random internet people, and you're not just recording to log your own sessions. So here we go:

• As far as technical production, I highly recommend that each person has their own microphone. I'm no expert on in-person recording setups, and there are probably dozens of guides online, but I know that if you want to have multiple mics going on in-person, you'll need your microphones, a mixer, and then a computer to record the audio. Past that, I'm not your guy. I just recommend that you don't have a single mic in the middle of the table if you're going for something that intends to be high audio quality. Because if you're all talking into one channel, there's no way to mute certain people's mouth sounds, cross-talk can become an issue, and if anyone touches or bumps the table, it will be audible for everyone, and there's no fixing that in audacity. Having multiple mics and a mixer and a laptop can be expensive, but if you're looking for a few good quality cheaper mics, I recommend this one, it comes in USB and 3.5mm formats, so make sure you select the right one for your setup. If you HAVE to record with just one mic, I recommend getting a Blue Yeti mic, as the quality is good and it has a 360 degree mode if you want to put it at the middle of the table.
  
  
• As far as the actual gameplay goes, you need your whole group to understand that you're playing for radio. How is that different than playing normally? Your players need to announce the results of their rolls, they can't get bogged down in minutiae, the action needs to keep moving forward, and as the GM you need to paint a clear picture of the scene. Avoid using any battle mats, grids, or other visual aids at the table. If the audience can't see them, don't rely on them for your game. There's a lot more I could get into this topic, but those are the basics in my opinion. If you intend for your recording to be a story for an audience, rather than a raw log of your friends hanging out and playing an RPG, the intent for the finished product needs to be kept in mind while you play.
  
  
• When it comes to editing, if it doesn't serve the story, cut it. So if a scene ends up going nowhere and the audience doesn't learn anything new from it, err on the side of removing it. This includes everything from whole scenes or sentences, all the way down to pauses while people are thinking, removing uhm's and ah's, coughs, sniffles, breaths, etc. It's a lot of work for sure, but when in doubt, I select a piece of audio in Audacity. Then I listen through, and ask myself "Did the action of the story move forward in this section of audio, or did we learn anything important and new about a character?" If the answer is no, then cut it.
  
  These are what I consider to be the basics of playing L5R for a podcast, but just to reiterate, this is only MY methodology when it comes to these things. There are lots of other opinions and production styles out there, and lots of them from people who have more experience and are better than I am. This is just what has worked for me so far.

PDF Version (Google Drive)

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There seemed to be a lot of things to keep track of in 5th edition (technically, in any rpg, but anyway) and the constant erasing of variable values kept making holes in our character sheets so I decided to make a boardgame-like tracker, inspied by Scythe and other boardgames where recessed holes are a feature. It's a first draft and it's not perfect: I'm learning 5th ed and I might have not thought everything through perflectly. I'm also not a hammer-and-nail kind of guy so it took some trials and errors.

Now for the content:

• I compiled a list of words from all approaches of all skill groups to create a more detailed list of words for each ring. The hope is that it'll be easier to select the right approach on checks.
  
• I added and initiative scale, but I fear the space between the holes has weakened the board a bit, and I sincerely hope result over 12 are rare.
  
• The decision so add vigilance/composure and focus/endurance spots to write was made to simplify fatigue and strife tracking. Considering those values shouldn't change often, the idea seemed good.
  
• The honor and glory stake spot was kind of made to fill in an empty spot, but it'll also encourage players to use the feature. The void points spot is, in a way, the whole reason for this board idea: I hated filling and erasing little circles under the void ring stat on my character sheet!
  
• Stances are a must and were forgotten in the first iteration. We used to nearly always forget our stances in long skirmished in 4th ed.
  
• The armor and weapon-reading switch was added because, again in 4th ed, recalling whether we brought our armor with us, and whether we readied our weapons before or during the skirmish was a pain. One could argue it's not an important part of combat for every player, but a simple switch can help simplify the feature while encouraging players to think about it. I thought about adding a switch for having our travelling bag with us, but unless i'm mistaken, 5th ed seems to forgoe this feature.
  
• Fatigue and Strife are now a lot easier to keep track of with those big holes intended to be filled with little cubes.
  
  ​
  
  How I made it:
  
  
• A hammer
  
• A color printer
  
• Some parchment-looking printing paper
  
• 12 inches chipboard sheets
  
• Leather punch kit (which included the 1cm square and the 1inch by 3/4 inch rectangle I needed)
  
• cheap glue stick (bad idea, but it works)
  
• calm and non-violent upstairs neighbors
  
• an antique cabinet drawer I should not have hammered on
  
  ​
  
  Edit: I'm french canadian so half of the measuring stuff I see are in inches and the other half is in metric.

the best source are, of course, 1st ed L5R Rpg books, and an AMAZING resource on Tadaka (my favorite shuggie) is the phoenix novel...

http://www.amazon.com/The-Phoenix-Legend-Five-Rings/dp/0786917989/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1367929115&sr=8-1&keywords=clan+war+phoenix

Hey, it's actually stuff in my wheelhouse! (Most of the threads here are 5e, and I feel like I'm missing out cause of my stubbornness.)

>shugenja spells

Yes, a shugenja can start with mastery level 2 spells for the element they have an affinity for. This shugenja could start with three mastery level 1 water spells, three mastery level 2 water spells, or any combination thereof.

>wounds

You have it slightly backwards here, which is understandable because shorthand can be a little unclear at first glance.

0-17 wounds: Healthy. No TN penalty.
18-35 wounds: "Injured". Animals and monsters don't have named wound ranks like humans do, though. +10 TN penalty to all rolls the wolf makes.
36 wounds: Dead. Kaput. Fire up the BBQ.

>Yorei

Yorei do not inherently have a fear rating, by rules as written. You as GM can rule that any given yorei does have a fear rating; it's perfectly reasonable for them to. Checking the fear rules on page 90, you'll find that fear gets really punishing the stronger the effect is. Fear 1 is essentially negligible; fear 2 is enough to keep players on their toes, fear 3 is enough to incapacitate people with unlucky rolls, and fear 4 is going to incapacitate anyone without willpower 3+ and/or high honor or other bonuses. (Check out this tool for more detailed information.)

Yorei are not inherently tainted; they are on ningen-do (the mortal plane) because their spirits have something that prevents them from moving on, not because they were coerced by jigoku (hell) to return. So, I would rule that a yorei is only tainted if the living person was tainted. (Taint being a spiritual affliction, it would stick with the ghost after death.)

>maps

There is a book called The Atlas of Rokugan that covers all of the maps you'll ever need, with detailed information about the territory. I believe I purchased the digital map pack, and those maps do great things for me (though the one for all of Rokugan is pretty huge). Don't buy the map pack and then buy a version of the book that comes with the map pack for free. Also be aware that while the Atlas is the most complete version I can find, I'm not convinced it's thorough (i.e. there are more villages and towns dotting the map) or entirely accurate (i.e. it's difficult to tell exactly how many miles apart Kakita's Bog and Kyuden Hida are, but you can get it to within a day of travel).

>Spider Clan

Let's start by explaining their motivations. They're villainous, yes, but no one is the villain of their own story. Each of the Great Clans was founded by one of the Kami that were the children of the Sun and the Moon; if a Lion samurai traces their lineage back far enough, for example, they are almost certainly a descendant of Akodo, or perhaps Akodo's original supporters, and the Hantei dynasty traces its lineage back directly to the Kami Hantei. The Spider claim that same ancestry: their ancestor is Fu Leng, the Ninth Kami, who fell to earth so hard that he broke through and created a portal to Jigoku (hell), which created the Shadowlands. >!Fu Leng, upon returning to the mortal world, saw that his brothers had created an empire without even considering him; he has opposed them ever since, angry that his brothers would deliberately exclude him from this world. For their part, the other kami assumed he was dead.!<

The Spider's borders change over time, as does their relationship with the Empire. So, their situation will depend on when your campaign takes place, and what parts of the canon you throw out (I'm not about the Destroyer War, for example, it's silly to me and the way it changes the Taint doesn't appeal to me).

There's four particularly important events regarding the Spider:

• 1159: Daigotsu assembles an army in the Shadowlands, then uses unknown magic to teleport his forces to the other side of the Kaiu Wall and attacks. His campaign continues north to the capital at Otosan Uchi. Empress Toturi Kaede is forced to move the capital to Toshi Ranbo, and Otosan Uchi is reduced to ruins.
  
• 1169: Daigotsu officially founds the Spider Clan from the samurai (largely Lost, i.e. heavily tainted) that followed him in his conquest. This, naturally, is not recognized by the Rokugani, but they function similarly to many minor clans.
  
• 1170: Empress Iweko I ascends to divinity (by placing her hands in those of the Obsidian and Jade Dragons, in front of a large crowd), beginning a new dynasty. She names Daigotsu Susumu as her Imperial Advisor, in an attempt to keep her enemies closer.
  
• 1173: The Destroyer War ends (tl;dr: Kali, the Hindu Goddess of war, usurps Fu Leng as Champion of Jigoku, and comes in from the desert to wreck Rokugani shit). In the wake of this, Daigotsu negotiates with Iweko I: Iweko I will grant amnesty to all non-tainted members of the spider and officially recognize them as a minor clan, and Daigotsu commits seppuku.
  
  If any of these things don't happen, or haven't happened yet, the Spider's influence in the Empire can be small to nonexistent.
  
  >bows and arrows
  
  It's not very well clarified, but the classes that start with a bow and arrows (Hiruma Bushi and Tsuruchi Archer, off the top of my head) start with 20 arrows. I would argue that anyone who starts with a bow also gets a quiver with 20 arrows. The book describes the various arrows on page 199; most notably, the standard willow leaf arrow makes up "three quarters of all arrows carried by a typical archer", so I have my NPCs start with 15 willow leaf arrows and 5 special arrows. My group doesn't mind the bookkeeping, so I have them keep track of what special arrows they pick, and they'll be resupplied those specific arrows when they return to "town" and check in with their lord's quartermaster. If they want to buy additional special arrows, those get added to the pile they're resupplied with when they check in.
  
  Also make sure you carefully read the rules on bows (199-200) if you have any archer PCs, since bows come with a number of disadvantages to (try to) account for their massive range advantage.
  
  >traveling and fatigue
  
  First things first: if your rules lawyers want to quibble over how long it takes the party to travel from A to B, tell them that they're dragging the game down and there's bigger fish to fry. Ask them, "does anything interesting happen if you fail?" It really doesn't matter if the party arrives in whatever village in eight days or six.
  
  In the case that you actually need to arrive somewhere in a meaningful timeframe, I give my players a few options: travel fast, travel normal, or travel slow.
  
  
• Travel fast: 20ish miles per day. The party will arrive Fatigued.
  
• Travel normal: 15ish miles per day.
  
• Travel slow: 8ish miles per day. The party can travel stealthily or follow tracks.
  
  I do not give the party a bonus for riding ponies or even horses, because historically, horses were only faster over short distances (the Pony Express only worked cause they had waystations every couple hours).
  
  If the party wants to look into traveling faster, there are water spells for that. Similarly, there are spells and effects that allow communication over long distances with people they've already met. If the party needs to race someone to a destination, using those is far more interesting than rules lawyering "how far can we jog in a day before mechanical penalties kick in?".
  
  >clothing
  
  The differences in clothing are all flavorful. Basic clothing (kimono, sandals, hakama, etc.) provide no protection against temperature, combat, bugs, etc. I believe chapter 1 (Book of Air) mentions somewhere that it's typical to have a silk kimono for summer and a cotton one for winter, but summer's still hot and winter's still cold (imagine going out in the snow wearing jeans and a t-shirt -- that's about what you'll get with a cotton kimono, and obviously a silk one will do less). I would always argue that clothes have no mechanical effects you can screw someone out of. On the other hand, if someone wants to make it their focus, that's clearly a part of the game they're interested in, and they should be rewarded for investing in that. For example, if a courtier decides to spend double on fancy clothes, I would reward that by having NPCs notice them more and comment on it, and maybe even give them +1 to etiquette and courtier rolls.
  
  If you have any other questions, let me know!

Blank Playing Cards https://www.amazon.com/dp/1572814993/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_nn.6yb67RM4QF

Clear Sleeves: Standard American Board Game Pack (50 Sleeves) https://www.amazon.com/dp/1589945131/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_Un.6ybAG2MH9Z

You should look at the Rokugan book that came out in 2004. There were a few in that series and it's all d20 based.

You can get a copy for ~$4 on Amazon- https://www.amazon.com/Rokugan-Legend-Five-Rings-Adventures/dp/1887953388

http://www.amazon.com/Legend-Five-Rings-Winds-Edition/dp/1594720363/ref=sr_1_5?ie=UTF8&qid=1346063854&sr=8-5&keywords=l5r+four+winds

This is the book that details everything from Gold Edition to Lotus Edition. It's an okay read. Just ignore all of the game mechanics and you'll be fine.