One good thing about the Akodo School is that it actually uses mechanics to tell a story about the Akodo. The Akodo family are stoic, putting aside emotions and channeling that into pure efficiency. Converting Strife to tactical or combat prowess is a very fitting ability to represent them. I think other schools should aspire to have the harmony between mechanics and storytelling that the writers achieved with the Akodo School. 

One good thing about the Akodo School is that it actually uses mechanics to tell a story about the Akodo. The Akodo family are stoic, putting aside emotions and channeling that into pure efficiency. Converting Strife to tactical or combat prowess is a very fitting ability to represent them. I think other schools should aspire to have the harmony between mechanics and storytelling that the writers achieved with the Akodo School. 

The old Air Stance gave +1 to TN. 
The new Air Stance gives +1-3 to TN based on School Rank. 
While at low levels, where most people might playtest the Beta, this might not seem like a problem, at high levels Air Stance combined with Striking as Air isn't just optimal, it's a One True Path. Air Stance becomes better at avoiding Earth Stance at avoiding crits. While Earth Stance prevents Opportunities from being spent on crits, Air Stance does essentially the same thing by making your opponent keep all their successes to even land a hit, thus usually lacking the necessary Opportunities, if they even hit at all. Further, Air Stance stops crits from Heartpiercing Strike or Iaijutsu: Rising Slash, which Earth Stance does nothing to avoid. 
At high school ranks, Air Stance and Striking as Air allow someone to average a TN of 8-9 while still maintaining offense. This high of a TN often leaves someone untouchable. 
Worse, Air Stance makes combat BORING. Imagine two people who use it fighting each other. It creates a boring D&D-esque scenario of two high Armor Class characters swinging at each other uselessly forever. You can't even disable someone using Air Stance with crits that inflict a status because Air Stance usually disables getting hit. 
The counter argument I saw was that at high school ranks, Air Stance was bad because it was only a +1 and this didn't matter. That is mathematically not true. While explosions and Void Points can raise kept dice, even at the highest ranks characters generally keep only around 5 dice. Air Stance at high ranks reduced damage suffered by lowering average successes, and made it harder to be crit by making opponents have to keep more successes as opposed to Opportunities. Combined with Striking as Air, the old Air Stance was effective at all ranks. 
The change of wounds to fatigue helps answer complaints of the Fantasy that "I don't want to get hit in a fight" by stopping damage from meaning your character is sliced open. However, the new Air Stance goes too far and is 1) a One True Path and 2) makes combat boring and uneventful. 
I have seen complaints about Earth Stance being too strong, but while that could be true as well, the new Air Stance is a huge balance problem at higher ranks.
Is this game only intended to be balanced at low school ranks? 

The old Air Stance gave +1 to TN. 
The new Air Stance gives +1-3 to TN based on School Rank. 
While at low levels, where most people might playtest the Beta, this might not seem like a problem, at high levels Air Stance combined with Striking as Air isn't just optimal, it's a One True Path. Air Stance becomes better at avoiding Earth Stance at avoiding crits. While Earth Stance prevents Opportunities from being spent on crits, Air Stance does essentially the same thing by making your opponent keep all their successes to even land a hit, thus usually lacking the necessary Opportunities, if they even hit at all. Further, Air Stance stops crits from Heartpiercing Strike or Iaijutsu: Rising Slash, which Earth Stance does nothing to avoid. 
At high school ranks, Air Stance and Striking as Air allow someone to average a TN of 8-9 while still maintaining offense. This high of a TN often leaves someone untouchable. 
Worse, Air Stance makes combat BORING. Imagine two people who use it fighting each other. It creates a boring D&D-esque scenario of two high Armor Class characters swinging at each other uselessly forever. You can't even disable someone using Air Stance with crits that inflict a status because Air Stance usually disables getting hit. 
The counter argument I saw was that at high school ranks, Air Stance was bad because it was only a +1 and this didn't matter. That is mathematically not true. While explosions and Void Points can raise kept dice, even at the highest ranks characters generally keep only around 5 dice. Air Stance at high ranks reduced damage suffered by lowering average successes, and made it harder to be crit by making opponents have to keep more successes as opposed to Opportunities. Combined with Striking as Air, the old Air Stance was effective at all ranks. 
The change of wounds to fatigue helps answer complaints of the Fantasy that "I don't want to get hit in a fight" by stopping damage from meaning your character is sliced open. However, the new Air Stance goes too far and is 1) a One True Path and 2) makes combat boring and uneventful. 
I have seen complaints about Earth Stance being too strong, but while that could be true as well, the new Air Stance is a huge balance problem at higher ranks.
Is this game only intended to be balanced at low school ranks? 

You do realize this proves my point right?
Its movie fighting for entertainment.

Except what we see is that the Crane are practically the only clan that cares, with Dragon thrown in - as the spiteful counter-meta Niten duelists* - meaning the only other clan that actually cares for Iaijutsu doesn't even use the Crane's established method of Iaijutsu in the duels.  The other clans have few, if any techniques for it, and no schools centered around it.  Whether its "in the laws" or not, its rarely bothered with beyond the Crane lands once we step outside of fiction and look at actual mechanics.
I do believe this is mostly a flaw in the mechanics side - where Iaijutsu is constantly put in as its own system with its own mechanics, and surprise surprise CRANE have a technique for it, and no one else is going to care.
Its not likely to change because of the Iaijutsu cult embedded deep within the culture of players of L5R.  Even people who don't play Crane are certain Iaijutsu is the way its supposed to be yet no one else gets a dueling school or ranks in Iaijutsu...
You would think - if it was really intrinsic to the law - that every clan would have a school dedicated to the practice, since it would obviously be a very important advantage to have if you wanted to do anything legally...
What I propose is that we simply require a player forfeit honor to use any weapon other than a katana in a duel, unless their opponent also uses a weapon other than a katana.  This can respect the Iaijutsu "legality" while preventing every clan from needing a dueling school to enjoy the dueling system.  It also means the Crane can have some dueling advantage, but that it may be mitigated by using unorthodox styles - as the primary advantage of Iaijutsu is that you are drawing and cutting at once, where dueling with a Naginata would not require me to even draw.
*While the fiction recently depicted a Niten duelist actually drawing both weapons... this is highly unrealistic.  You typically use 2 hands to draw a weapon into a strike as you need to both clear the sword from the saya as early as possible to transition from a drawing motion to a cutting motion, and to lend enough power to the strike to cut.  It is called Sayabiki and is one of the more important skills in Iai.  Niten should start with both weapons drawn.

The old Air Stance gave +1 to TN. 
The new Air Stance gives +1-3 to TN based on School Rank. 
While at low levels, where most people might playtest the Beta, this might not seem like a problem, at high levels Air Stance combined with Striking as Air isn't just optimal, it's a One True Path. Air Stance becomes better at avoiding Earth Stance at avoiding crits. While Earth Stance prevents Opportunities from being spent on crits, Air Stance does essentially the same thing by making your opponent keep all their successes to even land a hit, thus usually lacking the necessary Opportunities, if they even hit at all. Further, Air Stance stops crits from Heartpiercing Strike or Iaijutsu: Rising Slash, which Earth Stance does nothing to avoid. 
At high school ranks, Air Stance and Striking as Air allow someone to average a TN of 8-9 while still maintaining offense. This high of a TN often leaves someone untouchable. 
Worse, Air Stance makes combat BORING. Imagine two people who use it fighting each other. It creates a boring D&D-esque scenario of two high Armor Class characters swinging at each other uselessly forever. You can't even disable someone using Air Stance with crits that inflict a status because Air Stance usually disables getting hit. 
The counter argument I saw was that at high school ranks, Air Stance was bad because it was only a +1 and this didn't matter. That is mathematically not true. While explosions and Void Points can raise kept dice, even at the highest ranks characters generally keep only around 5 dice. Air Stance at high ranks reduced damage suffered by lowering average successes, and made it harder to be crit by making opponents have to keep more successes as opposed to Opportunities. Combined with Striking as Air, the old Air Stance was effective at all ranks. 
The change of wounds to fatigue helps answer complaints of the Fantasy that "I don't want to get hit in a fight" by stopping damage from meaning your character is sliced open. However, the new Air Stance goes too far and is 1) a One True Path and 2) makes combat boring and uneventful. 
I have seen complaints about Earth Stance being too strong, but while that could be true as well, the new Air Stance is a huge balance problem at higher ranks.
Is this game only intended to be balanced at low school ranks?