Legend of the 5 Rings, compare and contrast.

[Dwight]

One of the players of a group I'm in expressed interest in Blossoms Are Falling. Another player has recently been 'hinting' he wants to play Legend of the Five Rings (he did this by bringing the 3e book to a game session twice in a row). Considering Blossoms even though direct order is a PITA/expensive for us and there is no PDF option available. *cuts that rant short*

So your mission, if you choose to take it, is to compare and contrast these games. Preference is that you've played or ran Lot5R 3e although I'm willing to try extrapolate from experiences with previous editions.

Thanks in advance, now over to you....

[CosmicCowboy]

Well, my experience is with L5R 1st, but that's not really that far off from 3rd. I've also run Blossoms.

First off, Blossoms and L5R are very different settings. In Blossoms magic is a lot more low key, plus, no ninja. L5R can have shugenja tossing around some pretty potent and flashy spells. I prefer the way that L5R handles duels, but would lean toward Blossoms for Honor and Shame. Time to sit down with the players and see what your players really want. If they're wanting specifically L5R, I would personally stick with the L5R rules. If they're itching to simply play Japanese warriors and monks and such, and you're already comfortable with Burning Wheel rules, I think Blossoms with worth tracking down.

[zabieru]

Deadlands vs Delta Green: Compare and contrast.

You're looking at several hundred years' difference in setting, plus a radically different approach to realism vs. cheese factor. I mean, hell, one guy in my group wants to play Unknown Armies and the other wants to play 7th Sea, can someone tell me which is better?

Pretend they're both set in France. Okay, got it? Now, one of them is a highly cinematic game set during the Hundred Year's War, with rules for shooting three arrows out of your bow at once and cutting through tanks with your magic sword, and this whole deal where Englishmen are demons* and they are shifting France over into this alternate demon dimension. The other is set shortly before the Revolution, with rules for all that Versailles shit, for conflicts of power in the provinces, for games about religious feuds, or for playing out the Wars of the Revolution.

So if your dudes would be headed for the Perilous Adventure Burner anyway and are more comfortable with L5R, just do that. If you'd be looking at the Wars of Religion, the Clan Burner, any of the Court stuff, or the big Tale of the Heike game, L5R can't do most of those things and doesn't do any of them well (unless you weren't looking for a Clan Burner game so much as a Perilous Adventure with another clan instead of goblins).

*Actually this is historical fact.

[Dwight]

Thanks guys. That's helpful.

[Thor Olavsrud]

Dwight, I'm not really familiar with L5R, but to expand on what Devin said, Blossoms is set in a period of Japan's history that hasn't really been covered before in an RPG (so far as I'm aware).

There are some familiar elements, but some things are very different. For instance, samurai are still part of the gentry, but they are low on the totem pole -- considered uncouth country bumpkins by the people with real power. They are not lords of all they survey.

Blossoms is heavily inspired by the Tale of the Heike (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tale_of_the_Heike), which is the story of how the military (the samurai clans) seized power, established their dictatorship and ended the Heian period, considered the peak of the Japanese imperial court, noted for its art, poetry and literature.

[CosmicCowboy]

There are some familiar elements, but some things are very different. For instance, samurai are still part of the gentry, but they are low on the totem pole -- considered uncouth country bumpkins by the people with real power. They are not lords of all they survey.

It's probably important to note that with L5R it's pretty well assumed that your character is of samurai class, even if he's a monk or something similar. Blossoms pretty well leaves it open for a character of any social status. Personally, I think that Blossoms gives you far more interesting characters to play, rather than sticking to the defined schools of L5R. Unfortunately, my group wanted to head south of the Carpenter's Wall and bash some oni.

Blossoms could be made to do a L5R game, particularly if you wanted to set one around the winter court, or imperial magistrates in City of Lies. Honestly, it woud run that type of game better than L5R. However, you are not going to have tattooed Dragon monks with a poison touch or shugenja entombing their enemies in jade without some modification. Better at that point to just play L5R.

[pants10]

I've actually incorperated many features of burning wheel into my L5R game. We mostly custom created the life paths because I have not been able to get my hands on the "Blossoms are falling" book and we keep the honor system similar to L5R (though I think much scaled back). I enjoy the L5R setting with familar characters and names, so I bend the burning wheel system to match the way L5R system.

as far as ninja's go, I think its the player, not the title, that defines a ninja. Our party actually has a Crab ninja with them. He isn't officially a ninja, but really he is. He does the sneaking, wearing black, and poisoning... he's a ninja.