I'm fairly sure if the original story had 11 pages dedicated to developing Hoturi's character pre coup he would have been depicted almost exactly like Hotaru is here, even being giddy and lovestruck over Kachiko.

She also obviously has issues with self worth, like Hoturi did, which probably means she could think of worse things to happen to the Crane than for her to die and Kuwannan to take over, so no big loss if she gets killed fighting a bandit.

Dressing up like a soldier to go galavanting around fighting bandits without a care in the world is pretty much exactly what young Hoturi would have enjoyed doing. Having flawed characters is a good thing because it humanizes them and also, you know, gives them room to grow and have these things called arcs. Having some one come minted out of the factory perfect not only makes them an unrelatable weirdo, but it doesn't leave any room for that character to grow unless they are going to fall from grace.

Yeah, that's why I went with "polearms", since sometimes you can't tell which one it actually is.

I'll also say as much as I loved old Hoturi, in any world where Kakita Toshimoko is alive, Hoturi is not the best duelist in Rokugan. (It could be argued he wasn't even as good as Dairya, in addition to Toshimoko). Hoturi was good, but he wasn't some golden god.

Doji Hoturi was a fan of polearms as well. Literally every Personality card he ever got (and his Ancestor card!) all depict him using a polearm, often instead of a katana.

The cat is obviously Master Tiger.

Somewhere, wherever it is that de-canoned characters go, Doji Natsuyo and Bayushi Fuyuko are looking down at this fiction and smiling.

The Barack Obama of L5R Podcasts!

I don't think you got the joke.

Where is the Otomo Courtier? Are they behind that Crane Clan person?

I'm desperately hoping this is true of the Kolat. As a pseudo-Yakuza they are fine, but some of the aspects of their story (sleeper agents, magic rock cellphones) are some of the dumbest things that existed in the history of L5R, and that's saying something.

This might be why the Feenix never managed to dominate the political arena.

Use of fear, treachery, and money is basically the definition of politics.

So far the next 20 Mantis cards have a combined strength of 0.

The best way to tell if AltTab is the same as Yokatsu is if everyone basically ignores her or forgets she exists for the entire arc. If they do, she's Yokatsu.

Missing a Naga template. Also, giving Yoritomo no Political strength is grossly underselling him. The man was far more shrewd than most give him credit for. You don't form an Alliance of Minor Clans and then forge them into a unified Great Clan and not understand politics a little.

Gold Edition foils were the best. You could blind your opponent if you caught the light just right!

That's pretty much exactly what it meant.

Reducing factions to 4 was only remotely seriously discussed in the brief period between when the DT thought we were making the LCG and when we learned it was actually being sold off. As stated, Onyx was designed with 9 factions intact, with the Naga replacing the absent Mantis.

So far cards in Nu5R don't kill, they discard. Also if you want your Kakita there to be a little less crazy, she can probably remove a fate token from the loser and go down to 2 cost.

Correct. Rolling Thunder Started with SCC and ran through Hidden Emperor. This was all under WotC. Not sure the origin of the idea, but the implementation was 100% during the WotC era.

I'm sure you don't take much comfort in knowing that FFG's own lead man on L5R is Steve Horvath, who was WotC' s L5R Brand Manager when they had it.

Rolling Thunder was under WotC. As far as I can remember, WotC dropped it because it was performing poorly.

Interesting that who looks like Bayushi Shoju is called Bayushi Shoyu here instead.