Oracle of the Void #l5r

in chrome, there is an extension called webp to png

you right click on the webp, and it will say 'save as png'

Thanks for that! That extension is going to be very useful. I had to use it to convert a Naga mon that I dug up. Man, the L5R CCG really disrespected the Naga after I quit playing/collecting. Back in the early days, they were actually a popular deck to play amongst my friends.

L5R in its history had 16 playable factions/clans + those provided by specific Stronghold (like Hare or Imperial). Supporting them together could be a design nightmare. And nobody would like to gain only 1-2 Personalities or faction/theme specific cards per 3 months becasue of expansion's size restriction.

PS. Naga/Akasha was going to replace Mantis in Onyx. And that was an excellent decision. Sadly it didn't happen because of IP sale.

That actually worked well with the clan war arc, remarkably. Ironically, it saves on bloat. Each core edition set has the available factions, then expansions 'expand' on that arc's core. Super business model that would work as a hyrbid to an lcg and ccg. which, funny enough, clan war arc was.

You identify a certain set of cards as fixed for each faction, and then the rest are random.

"shrugs"

Expansions are for customization and expansion of the arc

the issue is the wash and repeat of the story design, and the horrible story choices that were made

It still doesnt change a fact that too many factions at same point makes less options for every clan and what FFG LCG model proved meta is slowly progressing and boring. With low influx of new cards in internet era everything is solved too fast.

In my opinon, the clan war arc went over the bloat line as far as the number of factions were concerned. I liked the original 6 clans, plus Scorpion for the power houses. I think the Naga and Shadowlands factions were needed. I really didn't have much enthusiasm for Toturi and Yoritomo armies, and wish that some of the things they did with the monks would have been used to make the original clans more interesting.

It feels to me that ninja as a clan was unnecessary and thematically inappropriate, since they were supposed to be hidden inside the clans. Support cards would have been more interesting.

Ratlings, although my favorite, didn't need it, either. Again, support cards for a side story would be fantastic.

Mantis would have been much more impressive if Yoritomo had actually saved the country and then got wiped out to a soldier. That would've absolutely proven the necessity of man in an unarguable way, and made the Kolat / Gozoku much stronger. Instead, they really needed to make Yoritomo himself a mary sue in power and skill.

Spirits... bwahahahaha.

I think for side characters, creating a clan makes them much more dilute. Like, the Ox clan was handled almost perfectly. A Ronin from the Unicorn was impressive enough to go back, then left, then became Kolat, then got a clan. And all of that with only temporary clan alignment that didn't interfere with the rest of the Unicorn. Morito didn't need a clan stronghold.

Same thing for The Daini. Removing the Naga clan would've had no negative, but it showed a singular evolution, and could've encouraged Dragon or Toturi players to include more Naga, if he had been written to be the personality version of a mini stronghold.

The crab were so desperate for allies, they did have ratlings as scouts, so a stronghold for the crab that gave some discount to nonhumans makes sense. Or for the Dragon and zokujin and wyrm riders. Kind of like what they did with the Lion and kitsu.

Although let me also say this is all with the benefit of hindsight, and also ignores the zeitgeist of design at the time. You have to forget that you constantly had to bring in new-shinies to keep people attracted. It was the card game version of roleplaying power creep.

It was the same era where MtG started taking a six magic color seriously to maintain interest, and according to rumor, that was only stopped because it was pointed out the card backs would need changed, and they had decided in Arabian Nights that wouldn't work. If card sleeves were more commonplace and weren't banned from tournaments back then, there's probably be purple magic.

VTES has 30.

Wait, more. I forgot about the Bloodlines and Hunter Fsctions.

VtES doesn't require that you declare an allegience at the beginning of the game, unless you are playing advanced rules, which aren't even demanded at tournaments. Even then, you can have two.

Fair

By which I mean, there's no inherent benefit or penalty to playing all Tzimisce or Tremere, the only real clans.

Until I send you a Letter from Vienna.

That's the kind of thing that gets your flesh rewritten.

Also VTES had no rotation so cardpool was still increasing. L5R had blocks and resets every 2 years. So early edition divided into 15+ factions could lead to really, really limited choices (if any).

FFG LCG died due to game length over anything else. Not nearly proof that the meta was boring and slowly progressing and honestly if they had stuck to the original release schedule it would have been approx the same number of new cards introduced over the same relative period (~150/3months). The model would have worked if the gameplay was ~20 - 30 minutes faster

FFG's president resigning during its early stages didn't help either as it killed supply chain management, ect as Asmodee tried to cut costs.

LCG cycle is 120 cards per 6 packs (so 7-9 months). Whole FFG L5R LCG got less than 2000 unique cards through its lifetime (2017-2021). It's at least twice slower than in CCG standards.

Also let's not forget that LCGs had such color restriction while deckbuilding that really limits some options.

I wouldve liked to have seen how the game wouldve went if you could use whatever cards you wanted without the influence limit. Same with the elemental roles. Probably tweak it so you pay more fate for out of clan cards. then the other tweak would be to the honor dial/draw cards stuff. I don't know what.

Yeah, it was initially supposed to end after the Second Day of Thunder, so after Time of the Void.

Time of the Void was like two years in.

so in essence, l5r was supposed to be part LCG, part CCG, and part TCG

(before any of those terms had been invented)

well, ccg was a thing with mtg.

lcg definitely wasn't. i don't know about tcg

L5R was a CCG from the beginning, because it had rarities, and you had to buy boxes of it to get playsets, and usually shit sorting for rares. 😄

TCG was an attempt to find a way to lock down other games with a copyright, and they got only a partial injunction on some IP concepts, I believe. You can't copyright the rules of any game.

You can see this too in Legend of the Burning Sands, especially in the way the game took the concept of Provinces and turned them into City Sections.

Too bad LBS was beaten up pretty badly by Rolling Thunder.

The original deployment strategy was to go to a biweekly release after the first 3 cycles to make for a ~150 card pool (6 packs + 1 Clan Pack) every 3 months, in line with the CCG experience with the added 1 - 2 big boxes a year. This was trashed for a number of reasons but had things gone according to plan I think it would have been a lot more familiar.

By all means they did everything to keep the feel but make something new. I think had the game been faster it would have been MUCH better received. The role locking stuff kind of sucked but I liked everything else about deck contruction. Limited Clans made balance a LOT easier

Color locking was bullshit because even with it, there was no such like balance. And first 1,5 year was a total joke in term of any balance. This game was disaster that reached dead spiral really fast. One mediocre guy left to design if after two years passed was a peak of incompetence.

I really dont know what you are talking about those biweekly releases. Never heard anything about this. Its easy to check on FFG website how slow everything was released including pauses between cycles and delayed clan packs.

I was friends with their production manager for a time. When the CEO left FFG things went sideways quickly and plans that were made were quickly abandoned. And I wouldn't call Tyler mediocre, a bit inexperienced but far from mediocre.

I think they had some excellent ideas, and tried to respect the original design. It was just so long. so so long. Role locking was suppose to be to help encourage storyline involvement and it was a unique thing to do but I think really fell flat overall. It was an admirable attempt. But if L5R had been released today I doubt it would be well received. The CCG is a longer game as well, its why only the top cuts went best of 3

Try to keep in mind this team was working desperately to keep the IP truly alive after it floundered for years at AEG. Tried to breath new life into it because they too loved it

Look at the tournament numbers alone and it tells how poorly L5R was being received at the end. Those kotei numbers were Jade/Gold/Diamond edition casual tournament numbers. and Ivory/20F was about as well received as FFG's L5R towards its end

I don't care. FFG was stupid enough to buy this IP with hope to get easy money. They totally fucked up.

Today, as as a fan of L5R CCG as a game i think that could be even better if AEG would shut down game in 2015 than selling it to other party. It could open some fan projects in 2015 - but this 2 years long hiatus followed by LCG hype killed whole momentum of interest in CCG version.

That was problem with AEG. If ("if") Zinser was sincere with his stories about what happened in 2015, it's just clear that they completely screwed with 20F launch.

Yeah, definitely agree on that one. Better to kill it, than try to Reboot it like it's a Hollywood movie.

"I think they had some excellent ideas, and tried to respect the original design. " - sorry, but i can't take this statement seriously. They killed everything what was fun in CCG (or everything that was told to them is a "problem") and fit it together into modified AGOT'ish frame.

We all know that there were many ideas how to make LCG in early days but when FFG was put to the wall they decided to rush up improvised "agot'ish" system that would mimic CCG (two deck, lol) with hope that launch advertising money will cover all those holes. They were wrong.

I am so burned out with this LCG stuff. Wrote thousand of words about my expectations, feelings and disappointments in the past (ffg forums, ccg forums, bgg, fb etc.).

I actually feel that an LCG needs more factions, not less. Have your core, then add to it 1 or 2 at a time. If your game mechanics are balanced, then you don't need to do more than add 1 or 2 cards that favor the older factions with each realease.

I could design l5r as an lcg with my eyes closed.

During core release, you treat it like the core book of a novel series. 4 expansions, each symbolic of a ring. 2 new factions/clans intro'd. a couple of cards for each of the already existent core factions. Fifth expansion symbolizes void ring is there to update personalities and push along core story in a major way. 4 more expansions that update the previous 4 expansions. Fifth expansion pushes story as a whole forward again.

And I really feel the reasoning for L5R CCG floundering for years, was that aeg&wotc didn't buy into the Age of Man completely. They jumped the shark too quickly by shoving the already existing BBEGs (Kolat and Lying Darkness/Nothing) into the forefront, while making a couple of other story choices that made absolutely no sense.

like literally, a bunch of ronin and minor clans just saved the empire. Age of man should have focused on the rise of power of the unaligned and minor clans/unaligned factions.

The Kolat were the architects of the age of man... And Yoritomo was a mistake narratively. The entire alliance being wiped out while letting the Thunders win would've been more impacting to the society view of ronin, something Toturi couldn't do. "Literally all these people we shunned were killed to save us and can still see Sickle Boy's body surrounded by oni we should stop being dicks to them" would be much much better than: "I'm going to prove men are as good as the Kami clans even though the majority of those clans were also powerful men, and I'm going to prove my point by forcing myself into being the very thing I think sucks, and then take it even further by literally becoming the thing I said sucks, and screwing the entirety of the universe in the process"

I know I'm on record of not liking the Mantis, but Yoritomo himself is a lot of my issue. He's such a Gary sue and doesn't really seem to fit well. And even for his noble "as an alliance we can prove we're just as good as them" is immediately hamstrung by his willingness to bully and murder people into following his ideas. It turns into "we don't need the kami to bully us when I can do just of good a job!"

I like Yoritomo as a concept, but yes. He should have had a glorious death or been taken off screen by some unknown event. After he and Ryosei got married and had a kid (rather than Moshi Wakiza). That would have tied two of the oldest canon Minor Clans together into a major clan, and given them more legitimacy in my mind.

Another bad choice was the Exile of the Scorpion. It seemed like an executive decision to push a new product tie-in, moreso than anything else, rather than letting said product stand on its own. The whole "blame scorpion" thing for the hidden emperor seems just too... shallow. You'd literally have to be mentally deficient to think that the Scorpion would be so sloppy and messy, and that it wasn't a frame up.

from there, the dominos fall

This though, along with the whole Lying Darkness steal the emperor thing immediately after the fall of Fu Leng seems to be calling alot of Canon into question.

The trends tell a different story. Kotei participation was dwindling, stores were dropping the product left and right. I remember in ~2012-2013 taking a road trip and hitting dozens of gaming stores. 90% had all their l5r in their discount bins included newly released product. Look at the kotei participation numbers, gencon numbers, fan sites still running at that time. Ivory edition was the first nail in the coffin as it alienated a LOT of their core audience. Hell AEG was basically giving away 20F at the end at their GenCon booth because they couldn't sell it at MSRP.

Additionally the claim that the 2 year hiatus killed the whole momentum, did you see the launch numbers? Tournament numbers? Crushed the numbers that AEG got, so that's a tough pill to swallow for me as there is no data to support it. Just sounds like an angry fan doing angry assumptions.

And where did you get the information FFG acquired the IP for easy money and not in good faith. Some big claims you make.

If FFG had been the monster you claim they are, the Onyx Lives project would have been killed years ago. They definitely would have the legal grounds to shut it down. But the fan projects continues.

Also did you play the GOT LCG... You'd be just as accurate saying that they cloned the Star Wars LCG for L5R. There are some keywords they reused but VERY VERY different games

and Im curious in your opinion what mechanics that were fun that they killed?

One of the things I miss most about l5r was the ridiculous bounties and backroom deals

reading up on some of the old ones, we all got wild back in the day. Mantis and their gallons and gallons of booze, handmade custom pieces, signed pop culture items. I have a DVD of Shaolin Soccer signed by Eric Devlin (Brand manager at the time) that was part of some bounty. Thats when the community really rallied I feel like.

"Additionally the claim that the 2 year hiatus killed the whole momentum"

I am talking about interest in CCG version. People didnt continue any fan CCG activity because of IP sale and hope there's new good game incoming.

" I remember in ~2012-2013 taking a road trip and hitting dozens of gaming stores. 90% had all their l5r in their discount bins included newly released product. Look at the kotei participation numbers, gencon numbers, fan sites still running at that time. Ivory edition was the first nail in the coffin as it alienated a LOT of their core audience. Hell AEG was basically giving away 20F at the end at their GenCon booth because they couldn't sell it at MSRP. "

Have you read Zinser's explanation what happened with Twenty Festivals distribution chain and promotion?

Anyway, even if weak, 20F Kotei season numbers were bigger than year later, in Ivory Arc environment.

Thank you for that clarification. That makes more sense to me now

"and Im curious in your opinion what mechanics that were fun that they killed?"

- winner takes it all (battles) - tempo of losing provinces (reducing resources) that forces to (re)action - maximum hand size that makes game more tactical as you may count all options in reasonable range - big final battles with plenty of stuff in play - 75% of card pool is "neutral" and everyone may use it and experiment - military and honor (sometimes also dishonor) are 100% viable mechanics since day 1 of every edition. it also includes multiple combinations like honor/dishonor/military switches that are much easier to build and play.

Whole game was built on different ideas (tempo is crucial) and that was "complete" game that could be modified from time to time (slight changes in some mechanics) while core game is same since 1995.

I have not, after Celestial (basically start of Emperor) the player base died so much on most of the East Coast of the US it became hard to find playgroups. The distribution numbers show a sharp decrease starting with Emperor and by Ivory it was a bargain bin game. There's a reason so many distributors at the start of COVID had mountains of product from Later Celestial Edition on. Any promotion and distro chain issues that were had were just the icing on the cake honestly. The massive rules overhaul of Ivory is what stopped my playgroup from restarting (oddly enough in 20F). While I believe Distro and promo issues happened, the company as a whole wasn't doing amazing and was already shifting its priorities heavily to board games and much less on to l5r. Im sure Zinser blames promo and distro but the reality is they changed priorities as a company

I appreciate you taking the time to type this all out though. Its nice to see opposing and different view points.

Do you have that explanation handy somewhere?

that might be some of it

https://kolatinformant.wordpress.com/2023/02/19/how-the-end-of-the-l5r-ccg-came-to-be/

you may know about most of that tho

who was Brand Manager before Dave Laderoute

I hadn't read that yet but I had seen a few of the bits and pieces, nice to see it all in one place. Appreciate the clarity throughout that Zinser did the right thing at the end for his company (and de facto his employees).

(and AEG has continued to be a quality brand.)

Where do you think the IP goes from here?

Rumors of a rebooted CCG are abound. So if there is a CCG reboot, using the AEG L5R ruleset (Likely Ivory core rules but my personal preference would be something earlier.) but using their new timeline: would you play it?

That summary is essentially correct. Some of those newer employees weren't acting as a team, communication was horrid. The IA lapsed because there were at least 3 different visions for an online version of it, and nobody could give me a straight answer on what they wanted (they expected me to code it). From what I could see there was clearly infighting/disagreements going on in some of those folk, which caused some deadlock.

(I did produce at least one version of an online herald... which immediately got: "That's not what I wanted... it should be like this MTG site over here!" from an employee who hitherto hadn't participated in any of the discussion, so it got scrapped.)

It was.. very frustrating.

Then they hired the greek guys to do it.. but clearly didn't give them anything better... as those guys were trying to rewrite the oracle...

And when they did get something... it was an emergency and I had to pull back-to-back all-nighters to hammer what they had into something deployable.. since they apparently hadn't been passed the stuff I produced about integrating with the oracle.

that's a shame. some of stuff i did see online seemed basic but ok from an informational stand point for imperial assembly.

i never went to gencon. so most of the info i saw was from what I could find online/facebook or what people would share with me during local koteis. Ivory and 20f was kind of blah for me as a player. I liked that you could draft l5r, but the player base by me was more into constructed than draft as they could showcase their love for their clan better that way.

If it was a full reboot and there were local players, I'd definitely give it a try. I'm friends with the developers for VTES 5E and I really wish it had a stronger Modern format because whoever owns VTM these days has made so many changes to the setting, I don't want to even attempt to reconcile the two at a table.

probably it was well known that their version of doomtown had a limited lifespan but ill be honest that I just opted to never buy another aeg game after i got the news about reloaded ending. I probably wasnt their target market anyway.

I bought a bunch of 20F from Hills for funsies and it was enjoyable, but did not grab my friends.

(somehow I never got into L5R when it was in print)

No.

L5R should be in hand of 100% L5R focused company, like Legend Studio is for Flesh and Blood.

https://legendstory.com/about

No. CCGs are a massive waste of paper and ink. For a playset in L5R, you had to buy one or two boxes of boosters and ended up with literally hundreds of useless common cards. Rares were not very difficult to get (except exceptions obviously). I never understood why it didn't turn into a LCG earlier

FFG LCG is also crap system. Theres also plenty of useless cards you must pay for as theres no secondary market. Clan/Factions loyalists in FFGish LCGs are bored to dead with low number of new cards. FLGS hate LCGs as they must be superb specific during ordering as theres no way to sell older packs (no sense for redraft as prizes like in CCG).

Doomtown LCG makes thing better as you may play every card everywhere and experiment with many deck types out of various factions/outfits.

But as vibrant competetive game LCGs are hard to maintain. Doomtown is an example of niche card game with slow release system that fits to its specific kitchen table audience.

I know nothing about new 7th Sea game but i think its also niche casual stuff.

Who the hell buys playsets in CCGs except collectors? Most people i know were sharing boxes for clans specific stuff. Tribalism was strong in L5R and it helped a lot for deckbuilding in healthy local environment.

In my local environment (around 20 players in Samurai era peak) nobody cared about playsets except Personalities and some clan specific/helpful cards. Personally i was trying to get playsets of C/UC and my clan(s) rares. After so many years i dont have any booster expansion in playset.

btw here's quote from Zinser dated 2021. There was his vision for AEG L5R LCG hybrid version.

"John Zinser Eric Steiger the biggest hurdle with the LCG model from the business side is selling enough cards to make it profitable. There is a world where you can charge a premium but not ridiculous price to avoid booster packs. If you sell faction packs for a 8 faction game it means you are likely selling 1/8 of what you would sell of a normal LCG release. In my hybrid idea you would charge a premium for the faction packs and then in boosters you could go back to having multiple levels of rarity and super rare super valuable cards that would drive pack sales but not be detrimental to being able to play the game competitively. For boosters to work you would need to put some new cards in them just doing shiny versions of cards they can get in the LCG style packs is a non starter."

Wouldn't suprise me if CoM was testing out that busines model

This is actually the correct answer. Hell, iirc, the first L5R CCG store was fan created.

L5R was LCG enough to maintain a story, but ccg enough to not restrict alot of cards outside of limited tournaments

as for how decks & packs should be distributed: Every Clan/Faction deck sold should have a limited number of fixed cards, with the rest being gated random (gated random meaning random selection from a pool of useful cards for said/faction clan). Booster packs should be tied to each one of the elements, weighted for that element, but still random: Earth Boosters would be weighted toward holdings and regions, fire would be weighted toward items, air would be spells and strategies, water would be personalities and followers. each of these would also be randomized, with leanings toward the stated type. Void would be complete lottery, but a set distribution type like 1 rare, 3 uncommons, 6 commons.

I also still feel like alot of the reason the ccg died had to do with stupid story decisions and mechanics. the story went off the rail so many times, with some of the mechanics being cool, and others doing nothing more than adding bookkeeping for no reason.

I completely agree with you. The LCG took over the external appearances of the CCG (the two decks, the four provinces...), but in a totally artificial way. All the game mechanics that gave L5R its so particular epic breath have completely disappeared in the LCG.

In short, despite appearances, the LCG and the CCG had strictly nothing to do with each other.

And not only did the LCG no longer have anything to do with the CCG, but it was also a very bad game (sluggish, slow, unnecessarily complicated in its implementation without having any real strategic depth) distributed in a very bad format (few cards available, including very few really useful ones, so an environment that changes very slowly - too slowly -, impossibility for new players to integrate the game unless they bought everything from the beginning - while it was much easier to take a CCG on the way...).

I loved L5R CCG (at least until Twenty Festival and Ivory) for 15 years, then tried to convince myself that L5R LCG was still good (since it was L5R!) for a year, before finally realizing that L5R LCG is to L5R CCG what The Rings of Power is to The Lord of the Rings.

I'll also argue that the original CCG took away a ton of what made the CCG fun over time, in trying to simplify the rules to draw in new players. Comparing the first 2-3 years of the game's rules with the last 2-3 years' worth, it's vastly different. And a watered down, bland experience trying to copy MtG in every way.

Yeah. Like, I get it. Much bigger market, different demographics, it's no longer the Wild 90s CCG Days®, but... it just ended up feeling cheap and unimaginative.

It really did get treated like that. The art direction became fantastic, and the simplified gameplay made it sound better/more enjoyable, but... it kinda lost its soul.

There is a weird balance to be struck between easily digestible rules and deep meaningful gameplay. Not every game can be Go.

True. That being said, the CCG _was_ sometimes very clumpy on time. You could have ten minute games most of the time, and then against specific opponents, it'll go to time, every time.

I've had SO many.

Some of the best L5R games I've had were under five minutes.

We'd be able to tell who was going to win by turn three, and then either call it, or decide to play out the next turn or two to see if one can magically eek out a win.

Nah.

A good Open Honour deck would win T4 or T5 like 90% of the time if it was going to win.

Made for really efficient games.

Right. That's what I mean, though. I can go have five games where they're <10 minutes long, and then two games against control/dishonour that would each take 70 minutes, so the average gets way skewed.

This also doesn't include the games where you or your opponent would gold-screw, and without G&F or related, you'd just get stomped in four turns.

Like, 20 years ago.

I'm a big fan of the OG Rage CCG (not the AEG Rolling Thunder, Rage Across Last Vegas flavour).

It is not dead atleast in EU...there was EClast month in Poland havin 150 players or something and last year Barcelona EC there was 260 players

V:TES has been back in print for a few years. New releases haven't been as fast paced as they used to be, but the current design team understands the assignment really well.

Https://www.blackchantry.com

If you're looking for something that's mechanically deep like L5R used to be, it might be worth checking out.

https://discord.gg/vampire-the-eternal-struggle-official-887471681277399091

I was big into VTES for a while. With all the changes to Fifth Edition, I'm not sure I want to play an all-sets game anymore.

2 licensed games for the same IP that fill the same niche. And this is why VtM's ownership keeps changing hands 😂

It does seem like Paradox hands that license out like candy

It's too bad White wolf couldn't keep it going. I completely understand why they sold but man did they make a great product originally.

All of the old stuff is still legal, outside of a short ban list. Much of the new stuff is worth getting too.

Yeah. I know. It's trying to use Setites and Ministers (for example) at the same time that I find jarring.

That'd be challenging to do, given how the grouping rule works, but I don't want to drag this channel further off topic.

Just wanted to shill for a game I love