Legend of the Five Rings Roleplaying Game


The Legend of the Five Rings Roleplaying Game is a role-playing game originally written by John Wick and published by Alderac Entertainment Group, under license from Five Rings Publishing Group, in 1997. The game uses the Legend of the Five Rings setting, primarily the nation of Rokugan, which is based on feudal Japan with influences from other East Asian cultures.
Like most role-playing games, Legend of the Five Rings is played by one or more players and a game master, who controls the events that happen during the game as well as the non-player characters. Legend of the Five Rings features many courtiers and other non-combatant character types as valid player characters.
In September 2015, AEG and Fantasy Flight Games jointly announced that the intellectual property had been sold to FFG. Fantasy Flight Games released a new role-playing game based on the Legend of the Five Rings setting in October, 2018. In 2020, FFG's parent company Asmodee transferred FFG's RPG lines, including Legend of the Five Rings, to another subsidiary, Edge Studio.

Setting

The fictional setting of Legend of the Five Rings is similar to feudal Japan, though it also includes aspects of other Asian cultures, as well as magic and mythical beasts. There is no given name for the entire world which the setting describes, so "Rokugan" is used alternately to refer to the specific nation within the setting or to refer to the entire world.
Rokugani society is based on a clan structure, with seven so-called "Great Clans", as well as a number of minor clans. Great Clans are made up of several family lines, each with their own general purpose within the clan. Minor clans generally only have one family. Each clan also has areas of land bequeathed by the emperor under their control. The emperor retains ownership of all lands, however, and the clans essentially rent the lands by paying annual taxes.

System

The game system of Legend of the Five Rings uses 10-sided dice exclusively. Usually, when a die is rolled and the result is 10, the die is said to "explode". In this situation, the player rolls again and the new result is added to the original result. If this second result is a 10, the player rolls a third time, totaling all three results. This process is repeated until the player rolls something other than 10. The second edition and most books made for it were written to work both with this system and with D20 rules as presented in the Oriental Adventures D&D setting; this was discontinued after third edition was published.

Roll & Keep

The mechanic for which the game is most widely known is the "Roll & Keep" system, designed by Dave Williams and John Wick. When dice are rolled, there are two quantities given: a number of dice to be rolled and a number of dice to be "kept". The totals of the kept dice are added together, giving the player the total sum for his or her roll. For example, if a roll called for five dice to be rolled and three kept, five dice would be rolled. Out of those five, the player would choose three whose values would be added together for the total value of the roll.

Rings

Legend of the Five Rings uses eight traits: Stamina, Willpower, Strength, Perception, Agility, Intelligence, Reflexes, and Awareness. The Traits are grouped into pairs associated with four elemental "Rings" : Earth, Water, Fire and Air. The four Rings represent a limitation in character development, because in order for a character to advance, the level of his Rings must increase, and to increase a character's Rings, both of the Ring's associated Traits must increase.
There is a fifth Ring, called Void. This ring, like the other four, is taken from Miyamoto Musashi's The Book of Five Rings. In the game, Void represents a character's inner strength, and its use allows a character to perform extraordinary actions, or to perform normal actions more efficiently.

Character creation

There are primarily two methods of creating characters in role-playing games: to roll dice to randomly generate attributes or to begin with a set number of points and a formula by which attributes can be purchased with these points. Legend of the Five Rings uses the latter method. Each new character begins with 40 "Character Points" to spend to create the character. These points are spent to raise the level of the character's [|Traits and Void Ring], to raise the level of the character's skills, and to purchase new skills. In previous versions of the game, characters started with 30 points, or 45 for ronin.
These points may also be used to purchase Advantages, which give the character some extra bonus or ability that is designed to help in certain situations. Conversely, if a player so chooses, he can select a number of Disadvantages for his character, which give extra Character Points to spend in other areas, but imposes some penalty on the character during play.
As of fifth edition, characters are created using a 20 question system, with each question determining skill, social, and ring stats.

Lethality

The Legend of the Five Rings Role-Playing Game is renowned for its lethality. Players who charge into combat unaware will often find their characters killed in the first session. Proper role-playing is encouraged to avoid combat when unnecessary, but the characters do have requisite abilities to survive if combat is forced in the early stages.

''Oriental Adventures''

Oriental Adventures was published originally in 1985 by TSR, Inc. as an expansion for Advanced Dungeons & Dragons and was set in a land called Kara-Tur. In 2001, Wizards of the Coast released a new edition of Oriental Adventures as an expansion for the third edition of Dungeons & Dragons. It was decided to make this new version of Oriental Adventures a showcase for their recently acquired Legend of the Five Rings property. An official update of Oriental Adventures to the v.3.5 rules can be found in Dragon Magazine #318, pp. 32–48.
For the entirety of its Second Edition, with the exception of the Player's Guide, Game Master's Guide, Way of the Shadowlands, Winter Court: Kyuden Asako, and Time of the Void, books published for the Legend of the Five Rings RPG had two different sets of game mechanics: the mechanics from the Legend of the Five Rings Second Edition Player's Guide and corresponding mechanics for d20 System, such as those presented in Oriental Adventures. Beginning with the Third Edition of the Legend of the Five Rings Role-Playing Game, and because of the lack of availability of the now out of print Oriental Adventures, the d20 System rules have been dropped from current Legend of the Five Rings Role-Playing Game books.

Books

Listed by AEG reference number in parentheses followed by title

First Edition (AEG)

  • Legend of the Five Rings – Roleplaying in the Emerald Empire
  • Game Master's Pack: The Hare Clan
  • Way of the Dragon, June 1997
  • City of Lies box set
  • Way of the Unicorn
  • Book of the Shadowlands
  • Way of the Crab
  • The Way of the Scorpion
  • Way of the Crane
  • Way of the Lion
  • Walking the Way: The Lost Spells of Rokugan
  • The Tomb of Iuchiban box set, January 1999
  • Way of Shadow
  • Way of the Naga
  • Game Master's Survival Guide
  • Winter Court: Kyuden Seppun
  • The Way of the Phoenix
  • Unexpected Allies
  • Bearers of Jade: The Second Book of the Shadowlands
  • Otosan Uchi: The Imperial City box set
  • Way of the Minor Clans
  • Game Master's Pack : The Silence Within Sound
  • Merchant's Guide to Rokugan
  • Winter Court: Kyuden Kakita
  • Way of the Wolf
  • Way of Shinsei
  • Honor's Veil
  • Night of a Thousand Screams
  • Code of Bushido
  • Twilight Honor
  • Midnight's Blood
  • Legacy of the Forge
  • Void in the Heavens
  • Lesser of Two Evils
  • Character Travelogue: Crab
  • Character Travelogue: Crane
  • Character Travelogue: Dragon
  • Character Travelogue: Lion
  • Character Travelogue: Phoenix
  • Character Travelogue: Ronin
  • Character Travelogue: Scorpion
  • Character Travelogue: Unicorn

    Second Edition (AEG)

  • Legend of the Five Rings – Player's Guide
  • Legend of the Five Rings – Game Master's Guide
  • Way of the Shadowlands *
  • Winter Court: Kyuden Asako *
  • Way of the Ratling
  • Time of the Void
  • Bells of the Dead
  • Mimura: The Village of Promises

  • Rokugan – Oriental Adventures Campaign Setting
  • Creatures of Rokugan
  • Magic of Rokugan
  • Way of the Samurai
  • Way of the Ninja
  • Way of the Shugenja
  • Fortunes & Winds
  • Secrets of the Lion
  • Secrets of the Scorpion
  • Secrets of the Unicorn
  • Secrets of the Mantis
  • Secrets of the Phoenix
  • Secrets of the Crab
  • Secrets of the Crane
  • Secrets of the Dragon
  • Secrets of the Shadowlands
  • Legend of the Five Rings Live-Action Roleplaying
  • Way of the Open Hand
  • Way of the Daimyo
  • Way of the Thief
  • Complete Exotic Arms Guide
  • The Hidden Emperor

    Non-AEG second edition compatible books

  • Oriental Adventures
  • Bloodspeakers

    Third Edition (AEG)

  • Legend of the Five Rings Roleplaying Game Third Edition
  • Legend of the Five Rings Roleplaying Game Third Edition Revised
  • The Four Winds: The Toturi Dynasty from Gold to Lotus
  • Creatures of Rokugan
  • Art of the Duel
  • Emerald Empire: The Legend of the Five Rings Companion
  • Masters of War
  • Prayers and Treasures
  • Masters of Court
  • Legend of the Burning Sands Roleplaying Game
  • Masters of Magic
  • Fealty and Freedom
  • The Vacant Throne

    Fourth Edition (AEG)

  • Legend of the Five Rings – fourth edition
  • Legacy of Disaster
  • Game Master's Screen and Adventure
  • Strongholds of the Empire
  • Enemies of the Empire
  • Emerald Empire
  • The Great Clans
  • Imperial Histories
  • The Book of Air
  • Second City box set
  • The Book of Earth
  • Imperial Histories 2
  • The Book of Fire
  • Naishou Province
  • Secrets of the Empire
  • The Book of Water
  • Sword and Fan
  • The Book of Void
  • Atlas of Rokugan
  • Unexpected Allies 2
  • The Imperial Archives