A topic from AEG's L5R CCG Rules forum, copied for Oracle of the Void from a copy of the forum saved in October 2015, so pages it didn't save are missing. Players' names are left out; the rules officials are named. Rulings are as they stood on these dates; later rulings, the rulebooks and the Rules Archive may differ.
A player, 6 March 2009
I have Shosuro Jimen in play. My opponent declares an attack on my last 3 provinces with one personality per province. Having only Jimen and Bayushi Kaukatsu in play, I defend only 2 provinces. My opponent resolves the undefended province and used Rapid Deployment(or any action that would move the personalities out) and moves the other 2 personalities to his location and ,thus, successfully destroying the province.
Can Shosuro Jimen dishonor one of the personality that moved to the undefended province? Were the two personalities considered opposed?
Relevant text:
Shosuro Jimen
Political Reaction: After a battle or duel ends: Dishonor a target Personality who opposed one of your Personalities in the battle or duel.
Brook Cunningham (rules official), 6 March 2009
I have Shosuro Jimen in play. My opponent declares an attack on my last 3 provinces with one personality per province. Having only Jimen and Bayushi Kaukatsu in play, I defend only 2 provinces. My opponent resolves the undefended province and used Rapid Deployment(or any action that would move the personalities out) and moves the other 2 personalities to his location and ,thus, successfully destroying the province.
Can Shosuro Jimen dishonor one of the personality that moved to the undefended province?
No.
After the first battle, those Personalities did not oppose your Personalities "in the battle", so there is no trigger for Jimen after it resolves.
After Jimen and Kaukatsu's battles, though the Personalities opposed them at some time between Maneuvers and their leaving during the first battle, they never opposed them IN THOSE BATTLES (which start when the attacker chooses to resolve them, after he resolved the first), so there is no legal trigger for Jimen then either.
EDIT: This ruling is (Fixed) from how it first appeared.
A player, 6 March 2009
To clarify for my understanding, in this topic, MacBeth states:
"Yes. But the trigger for his Reaction will be the ending of his or Kaukatsu's battle, not the first battle."
1) Does this mean that units assigned to a battlefield (with an opposing army) aren't considered to be opposing that army until the battle at that province is resolved?
2) And, if the units at an unresolved battlefield are not considered opposed until the battle is resolved at that battlefield, are the units considered to be at that battlefield for checking location?
Brook Cunningham (rules official), 6 March 2009
To clarify for my understanding, in this topic, MacBeth states:
"Yes. But the trigger for his Reaction will be the ending of his or Kaukatsu's battle, not the first battle."
Well, upon closer inspection, I messed that question up on my first try. Nobody's perfect; see above.
But I believe I can answer your questions without directly taking the previous one into account...
1) Does this mean that units assigned to a battlefield (with an opposing army) aren't considered to be opposing that army until the battle at that province is resolved?
No. As soon as the units are at a battlefield, this definition applies.
Your second question was "if Yes" to the first, so I hope this clears up both.