[L5R] The White Flowers of Spring

[EGG Fu Young]

This is the first session of our new Legend of the Five Rings campaign. Its entitled "The White Flowers of Spring". The characters are all starting characters, with the only exception that they started with 4 Glory to reflect their station of Emerald Magistrate.

After discussing with the players what kind of game we were all looking for, we came up with the idea of them playing Emerald Magistrates that have been sent out to BFE Rokugan due to their shameful situations.

Each of the characters needed to have something in the recent past that was distasteful, embarrassing, or irresponsible. Their families/clan have pulled strings to get them out of view, hopefully forever.

The campaign takes place three years (1126) after Hentai XXXIX has taken the thrown. They are stationed in Shutai in the Scorpion land, which now that the Scorpion are disbanded, has become and even bigger hideout for scum and ronin. The daimyo of the area is Seppun Tsumemoto, a very distant cousin to the Emperor who was made daimyo for the same reason that the PCs are there, people just want him gone.

Here are the characters, the session the next post.

Ikoma Ryosuke
Ryosuke was a prodigy. A skilled tactician, it was thought that he was going to be the next Toturi, one of the greatest tactical minds Rokugan had ever seen. He amazed his teachers at the war college with his natural talent and received his ancestral daisho to carry with honor. Shortly after that he married a young Phoenix woman whom he learned to love very much.

In addition he was given the gift of becoming an Emerald Magistrate. His first mission took him into a small farming village where he met a beautiful peasant girl. In a guilt ridden slip of conscious he had a quick fling with her and put it out of his mind. A year later, she showed up on his doorstep with his son. Panicked and enraged, he drew his sword and struck the peasant down for "lies", but it was too late, his wife knew that it was true and rushed in to pull the infant away before he finished him too. Saddened and heartbroken by not only the fact that her husband could do such a shameful thing but that he struck down the girl and would have killed the child, Ryosuke's wife returned to the Phoenix lands where she gave the infant to monks to raise and killed herself soon afterwards.

Now racked with guilt and still morning, Ryosuke feels nothing but for pain for the girl, his bastard child and his wife. While his family pulled strings to get him quietly shipped away, Ryosuke hopes that he can at least die a good death, because only death can clear his soul.

Kakita Tsume
Tsume was practically raised to be a magistrate. His father's pull got him into the Doji's famous magistrate school and from there a successful position under the Emerald Magistrate. While successful however, he made his fair share of enemies. Tsume loved only one, a geisha that had blossomed from a close confidant to a lover. She was the only one that he could turn to and she loved him regardless, true love. Eventually, his enemies caught up with him and one night when he went to his lovers arms, he found her dead from a Scorpion's blade. From that point on he vowed revenge.

The next night at dinner the arrogant Scorpion sat across from Tsume and couldn't quite make out the small smile on his face...that was until he started gagging and dying from the poison that Tsume put in his food. The Scorpion died a horrific and painful death and Tsume just sat their sipping sake while shugenja tried to save the bushi.

Word spread quickly that it was suspected that Tsume murdered the bushi, but no proof could be had, he was after all a very competent magistrate so he knew how to hide it. Alas, the heat was too great and his master didn't want the reputation of training poisoners and people that work outside of the law, so he was given a position as an Emerald Magistrate and shuffled of to Shutai in hopes that he would be forgotten and the "unpleasantness" would blow over.

Matsu Kojiro
Born with different colored eyes, Kojiro was already looked down upon from birth. His father considered him a runt compared to himself and his siblings and because of this, had him sent off to become, which Kojiro accomplished very successfully, although his father was still not impressed. After the death of his mother, the only person that ever encouraged him and treated him with respect, Kojiro turned to the bottle. The night after his completion of school, he and his companions decided to celebrate. The next morning Kojiro awoke to find that his daisho was missing, his grandfather's daisho. He passed it of as a robbery and an investigation was launched, but he knows deep inside that he forgot it at one of the drinking houses he was at that night.

Upon coming home, he finds his father dying from a lung condition. As one of his last acts, he wishes 'his failure and disappointment' out of his sight and has him sent away as an Emerald Magistrate, hopefully to die away from his land so that his disgraceful sprit may never be back.

[EGG Fu Young]

The first session opens with the characters waiting to be summoned into court to receive their papers to go to Shutai.

Its a long three week journey to Shutai and along the way they get to know each other a little bit, but there is definitely tension between the two Lion and the Crane.

Finally they arrive in Shutai. As they pass along the streets to make their way to the daimyo's shiro, they notice a band of ruffians and thugs that are gathered out side of the counting house. Of course they get stares from the thugs and only as they get near do they realize that they all have a jitte, the sign of a policeman, in their belts.

Moving on, they eventually make it to the shiro to meet with the daimyo. They are greeted by Seppun Nichi, the advisor to the daimyo and lead into the shiro's main house, where they notice that there are boxes of goods all over the place. Once in the court room they meet with Tsubemoto, a giant of a man easily weighing in at over 500 lbs. They attempt to be formal and pleasant to the daimyo, but he angrily blows them off and tells them that Nichi will show them to their house.

Obviously they realize that they aren't welcome here and are shown to their house, which looks to have been abandoned for the last 3 years. They quickly make it into the manor and meet up with their new servants.

The next morning they meet up with Nichi and the Doshin of the town, Uruku. After a quick tour of the counting house, which is packed to the celling with "taxes", they get blown off by Uruku. Still willing to try to play it straight, they decide that they will try to whip the police force into something useable to curb the rampant crime in the city. For the rest of the day, they visit the local temple and meet Doho, the head priest and his adopted son, Ben'ichi. Doho, makes it very clear that he is thankful that the Magistrates are there, but doesn't want to anger anyone that might make the weary people of Shutai and the three surrounding hub villages sense they have been through so much already. They go home with more information and discuss the next plan of action over dinner.

The next morning, they raise a few hours before sunrise and head over to the temple. They wake Doho and request that they borrow the temple gong. Still not wanting to get involved personally, he has Ben'ichi and some monks accompany the PCs "to keep them out of trouble". Fortunately for them Ben'ichi happens to find a gong laying around the temple *wink*. They take it over to the front of the counting house and proceed to wake up the "police". They angrily come out and Uruku lays it all out that they should leave or they will end up dead. Ryosuke relieves Uruku of duty (knowing that he never had it anyway, trying to goad him into a fight) and Uruku laughs it off and goes back inside, thus causing great anger on Ryosuke's part. Ryosuke challenges him to a duel, but the ronin just walks back in and sics 4 of his men on the magistrates. After a quick and bloody combat, Nichi comes with guards from the daimyo's shiro trying to defuse the situation. After talking it over, they agree to meet with Tsubemoto. That night, they make the plan to go out to the hub villages, regardless, and try recruiting some deputies.

The next day, the daimyo shows up at their manor and offers them a simple choice, accept the very large bribe and forget yesterdays and all future "incidents" or face the consequences. They remind the daimyo that they are Magistrates and he reminds them that he's the cousin of the Emperor. He leaves with the warning that this is going to be a war if they want it. That afternoon they set out for the first of the three hub villages. Here they find that there is an Herbalist and 4 young men that are willing to join up and train as deputies.

The next day they set of for the second village, which they find out is almost barren from war. The people are starving and only the food that is bought by an Agasha Calligrapher and the wicker maker, which isn't much. They find two people strong enough to recruit and make a deal with the calligrapher that they will send food and supplies to the remaining people in the village if he teaches their deputies basic reading and writing.

On the road to the final village, they hardly get into the village when 6 hostile ronin, obviously Scorpion, confront them and demand that they leave before there is trouble, for the people of the village have suffered enough from the Empire and armies of the Lion and Crane. They ask the ronin if they could spare aid to the people in the last village and leave them there for another day.

Now with their new recruits, they start training them and have them start building a hose for them to live in on their manor grounds. While that is going on, Ryosuke heads to the clothier in town to order some uniforms and clothing for the men. The clothier, the very beautiful Onari, flirts a bit with Ryosuke, so there might be some future sparks, but for now he simply gets his order done.

At the same time, Tsume and Kojiro try to find a weapon smith to get jitte for the men with no luck. Failing that, and acting on a tip about smuggling, Tsume heads back to the Scorpion village. Once again they give a threat to leave, but Tsume refuses, saying that he is here to find some jitte to arm his men to fight Tsubemoto's thugs. The Scorpion jump him to test his word after he said that he would die for the people of Shutai if need be. The leader of the Scorpion Ronin band says that he'll think about it.

The next day they have two crates of jitte on the manor door step.

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At this point the session was over.  I think that next session is going to be very interesting as the hero's will have some yoriki (deptuties) to start patroling the town.  Of course that will severly upset the current "law enforcement" and local Lord who has much to lose.

Hope that was clear.  Post any questions or comments.

EFY

[rafial]

Sounds like you've got a very rich situation to explore there!

Can you comment on how the mechanics of L5R helped or hindered the sort of play you were looking for?  In the session you describe above, were there any awkward moments, and if so, what did you do to get around them.  And were there any moments that "just clicked" perfectly?

[EGG Fu Young]

So far nothing in the system has really hindered anything and there really hasn't been anything that was awkward yet.  

For the most part the group of players was put together specifically because our other groups expectations clashed.  Because of this, I think the whole first session clicked really well.

Something I really would like to explore is the relationship of Ryosuke and Onari and how the characters are going to work around the issue of the corrupt daimyo.  Dealing with Uruku and his band is going to be "easier".  The fact that they cant just rat out the daimyo makes it very interesting.  I mean, they can't just blame him because that would be very dishonorable on their parts due to his higher station, but really, he's in Shutai for a reason and even if they make contacts back in "civilization" its going to rough getting anyone that wants him back there.

EFY