You can hop into Rokugan at just about any level – with a bit of tweaking – from bandits and peasants all the way up to imperial court level intrigue. It is threatened to the north by barbarians and internally by blood magicians, secret societies and intrigue and war between the various samurai clans. Rokugan is threatened – to the south – by a despoiled land called The Shadowlands, where evil oni, ogres and dark sorcerors plot the downfall and overthrow of Rokugan. For me Rokugan is preferable to playing in an historical Japanese setting as, while the complexities to the social order are still there, one can be a bit more forgiving (allowing women to take stronger roles for example). Rokugan is an alternative Japan, attached to land – apparently on the south-east of an alternative Chinese continent, where magic, demons and intrigue intermingle with samurai swordplay, complex oriental manners and courtiers. Otherwise I have no complaints, clear, explanatory – especially in the rules – but also concise and to the point. This does mean you get a hell of a lot of bang for your buck, but it does make it a difficult read and a lot to take in at once, especially if you’re unfamiliar with the setting. The writing is dense, which can be intimidating, and it has been ‘crunched’ together somewhat, meaning you flow from information on one clan to another on the same page without necessarily having a really clear distinction where one part ends and another begins.
There is very little frivolous fiction (a plus for me!) but this has also impacted – it seems – on the art allocation and it feels as though the budget has also been tightened a notch. If I hadn’t already known Rokugan forward and back I think I would have felt a little more disappointed than I did.Ī huge amount has been sacrificed in this edition for the sake of content. The layout itself is nice, the simple, graphic style cover (another re-emerging trend that I like) is striking but it just, somehow, lacks the flair of the earlier editions. Instead I’m sort of tightening my lips and thinking of the less good art (and less of it) in this edition.
There are a few standout pieces but when I come away from the book I’m not remembering the iconic pictures of the first or second edition so much. While the overall presentation is pretty good there is something lacking in this version when it comes to visuals. All things considered its a pretty damn amazing feat and I was very, very surprised. Somehow they’ve managed to squeeze in most of the additional material from the sourcebooks of the previous editions, give you a comprehensive overview of the history, cover magic, the Shadowlands and everything else all in the one, slimmer, book. It is, however, crammed to the fucking gills with information. It is thinner than the first edition and, I think, slightly thinner than the second edition corebooks. This is a solid, but slim feeling (for the price) hardback book and forms the corebook of the new edition, back to a single hardcover rather than a player’s guide and GM’s guide seperate as with the last edition. Still, I have very fond memories of the game and this was a great way to catch up. Thus some of the updates in 3rd edition came as combinations of delight and shock. I do not follow the card game, or the war game and while our campaign (by chance) tied in with some of the events of the ongoing metaplot it was by no means all. I ran a very successful and very fun (if a little unconventional) L5R game across first and second edition, diverging from the official plotline because I allowed the characters in my game to determine the course of some of the events, skipped over the whole d20 version mess and have now picked this version up largely for reasons of nostalgia and curiosity.