The Wikipedia article talks briefly about the practical effects of making sure the different parts of the blade cool at different rates. If I recall correctly, the different cooling rates make the blade side harder and the "core" back side of the blade softer. The softer core gives the blade more ability to bend and resist breaking (which katana did a lot) and the harder blade is better for sharpening and keeping an edge, but it's been a while since I've really read about this stuff. The hamon is a visual side-effect of the process, which smiths began using at some point to add an artistic flair to their blades. Hamon styles vary wildly based on smithing school and period, though, I believe.

So I guess Scorpion are the clan that will get their previews and fiction in the same week? I thought it was implied we'd get a fiction and cards for the unicorn this week, but perhaps I was just assuming the combined Unicorn/Phoenix L5R Live to mean that we'd have cards from both to look at. As for the fiction, I think it was actually one of the weakest, for the same reasons that other posters have already posted about. I felt there was a lot of clunky exposition and the whole Ikoma marriage thing did not make sense (seriously, nobody realized she'd take the Ikoma name until just now? That had to have come up at some point already.)

Are you thinking of the "hamon?" Here's a Wikipedia article about it, which is woefully inadequate in the amount of information about hamon, but seems to imply hamon were in use at least by the 8th century (though maybe not in wave patterns.) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hamon_(swordsmithing) I have a book somewhere with more information about hamon but can't be bothered to dig it out right now. A katana nerd thread might be worth starting some time in the future, though.

I hope not. I would like to see political and military conflicts with some asymmetry.

Yeah, it's good meta, especially since you can sacrifice him after he's bowed near the end of the conflict phase if he doesn't have fate to hang around.

I believe @LordBlunt is referring to the possible newer text to Miya Mystic that now appears at certain places on the product page, showcase page, or one of the first new articles. (Edit: the poster above confirmed the showcase page.) The newer text is something to the effect of sacrifice the Mystic to destroy an attachment. As far as I know, we don't know exactly which text is official yet, but the "sacrifice" one was discovered more recently. I believe gamepedia doesn't have a number of text updates (last I checked Kuroi Mori was still Mori Kuroi, etc.)

For a casual player, choosing seeker and keeper cards every time you play may be a bit fun. Being forced to use a role for competitive play is irksome. If they end up releasing role specific cards that are clearly above the curve, then the whole thing become problematic for competitive play. These role assignments will affect the options available to players to some extent. No sir, I don't like it. As an aside, you can sort of see what one of the "Seeker only" cards does here. Let's get some wild speculation going!

But the Hatamoto stuff sounds cool.

I am less than enthused about tournament placings affecting the deck construction rules for every player of a clan.

I was to the understanding that the tournament participants only get one core box with their ticket, but I might be mistaken. If you click the link above and read the replies, FFG says "There will be a ton more than 700 copies," but we'll just have to wait and see how many that means.

Another great video. I always find Kiramode's commentary on the board state and decision making to be enlightening. Keep up the good work! It feels like the Crab deck was on the whole better tuned and the Phoenix deck was more just "every card they have," which admittedly at this point is probably the best we can hope for with Phoenix (as people haven't had as much time to tinker with their card pool.)

Looks like we're getting L5R Organized Play news "tomorrow," (August 1st in America?) according to Twitter: Also, replies to the original post state there will be a "ton" of core sets available for purchase at Gencon.

7:00 - Mori means forest or woods, so "kuroi mori" means "(a) black forest." If it were an actual place name in Japanese, it would probably be "Kuromori" "(The) Black Forest." Interestingly, the Japanese governmental agency in charge of trees and forest and woods and what-not makes a distinction with "mori" in that specifically it is a forest with multiple kinds of trees. If the forest only has one (or mainly one) kind of tree, that area is designated a "hayashi." Everyday folk may not make this distinction, however. Swamp would be "numa." (And on a Phoenix-related note, the "sawa" of "Isawa" could possibly also mean "swamp" or "marsh.")

So... no Phoenix air spell?

As far as I know, they have not brought up Kuroi Mori or any other "change conflict type" cards and the specific way they interact with the declaration rules yet. Brad talked in general about how declaring conflicts works (you get to declare one of each) in an L5R Live, and people have extrapolated from that information that a conflict that has had its type changed still counts against your declaration limit. Given only the information we have at the moment that interpretation seems correct, but until we have the full text in the rule book we can't say for 100%. (We don't know that there isn't an exception to the declaration rules if the conflict type changes. There may well not be, but we don't know.) I was hoping they'd bring it up in L5R Live to put this to rest, but it looks like they are putting L5R live off for a week.

As you may know, the Japanese name for Winnie the Pooh is "Kuma no Puu-san" or basically "Pooh the Bear." If we wanted to make a children's story about an oni and the kind Isawa boy that gave that oni a name, we could call it "Oni no Akuma" to mean "Akuma the Oni."

Now that I've had some time to reflect on it, the glory focus for Phoenix makes sense in an Old5R sort of way. I would say Crane and Phoenix both have a long tradition of honor running decks. While I don't expect either to honor run at the moment, it looks like Crane is (in New5R) the "political conflict" clan, which actually leaves Phoenix in a natural position to be the "high glory" clan. These are both two sides of the old honor-deck coin, in a thematic sort of way (naturally, Old5R had no political conflicts as such.)

Good call. The other elemental spells have all been Phoenix cards, which makes me wonder if we might see another air spell as a Phoenix card.

So have we seen an air spell and I've just missed it? Or are we still waiting for one?

Also, Tsukune's flavor text is "Ganbarimasu."

Holy crap. Everything I could want for the Phoenix is there; a solid yojimbo, decent bushi, bonuses for having shugenja. Then they top it off with a political/high glory focus to make it even sweeter. I am a happy Phoenix.

During the first L5R Live (at around the 32:40 mark) the moderator picked up a question about multiplayer and said something to the effect of "I don't think we can talk about that quite yet," and the head designer confirmed that they couldn't talk about it before moving on. It sounded to me like the moderator had accidentally brought up something that they aren't supposed to talk about but that is in consideration or development. Coupled with the fact that, as mentioned, some cards have some phrasing that implies being used with multiple players, I get the feeling we'll probably be see multiplayer at some point. But it's also possible that the multiple player phrasing may just be there in case they decide to make multiplayer eventually i.e. not necessarily that they have a plan at the moment. As to why FFG seems to be avoiding commenting on it, I only have wild speculation.

It was the time we lived in. Modern CCG/RPG art is, on the whole, phenomenal.

A lot of early RPG art clearly showed Shiba Ujimitsu with a silly-looking winged cloak/cape thing draped from his arms because phoenix=bird, amirite? Sadly, it even got referenced in the newest fiction.

At the moment we're still in the set-up phase with all the fictions, so I don't know that we can say definitively where the plot is or is not going yet. At the moment I think they could still basically do the old plot almost story for story (with some character changes), though I doubt that they will do so. I have a feeling FFG wants to surprise us with the plot, at any rate, so I expect things to veer away from the old plot.