Modérateurs : Magistrats de Jade, Historiens de la Shinri
Si c'est le même imprimeur qui fait les deux, ça peut être une question de prix lié au volume d'impression (l'éditeur français et espagnol ont pu s'entendre pour faire une commande groupée).Kakita Tsu a écrit :Sur le forum d'Edge , ils parlent du retard qu'il y a a partir de l'édition espagnol qui je crois est lié a l'édition francaise mais pour le pourquoi, je sais pas trop
Une réponse eue sur le sujet sur le site d'edge:Kocho a écrit :Au fait quelqu'un sait pourquoi la Légendes des Terres Brulées toujours annoncé au printemps 2009 sur le site d'Edge et disponible en précommande depuis avril (au moins) n'est toujours pas sorti en VF ? (Je sais, ça ne le fera pas sortir plus vite de savoir).
Intéressant non ? Pour ceux qui ont tout lu jusqu'au boût ? ;-)Hello, everyone! I hope that you're excited, or at least curious, about the new edition of our RPG that we will be releasing in the second quarter of 2010. I know a lot of people have questions about what has changed and how the new edition is going to be different in presentation and execution than our previous editions. Well, I hope to share with you some of the things we've been keeping to ourselves for quite some time, in hopes of sharing our enthusiasm and excitement with you.
First, let's talk about the timetable and the team responsible for the new edition. I started working on the basics for this edition in April of 2008. I'm effectively the Lead Designer on the project, and although I've been working on the RPG line since about 1999 I honestly can't think of anything particularly important to say about myself so let's just leave it at that! Once the project was underway, I knew exactly who I wanted to recruit to help me go back to the very basics and rebuild the entire system from the ground up.
One of my two fellow cohorts is Rob Hobart, who is not only the mastermind behind the wildly successful Heroes of Rokugan living campaign, but also our current and continuing RPG Editor. I think anyone who has looked at his work thus far would agree that he's brought our level of quality to a new level and I think you will be astonished to see what we've accomplished in that regard with 4th Edition.
And of course, I would undertake no RPG project without my right hand man, Brian Yoon. I can't think of a cool title like "Lead Designer" or "RPG Editor" that encompasses everything Brian does, but he's so good at his job that he absolutely deserves a superior title, so for him I have arbitrarily selected Master Killer Iron Flower of Doom. The business cards will be in next week. Brian has done an amazing job on the balancing and themes of the bushi schools throughout the entirety of 4th Edition, and I think you'll agree when you see them that he's raised the bar for the foreseeable future.
With regard to the timetable, I contacted Brian and Rob within a few weeks or so of getting the green light for the project (or I think, I have trouble remembering that far back). They both signed on at once and we started discussions of exactly what we wanted to accomplish with our new edition. We were all on the same page, pretty much, and by the time GenCon rolled around we had ironed out the basic mechanics of the new system (or the first draft, anyway). I got together with Brian Bates, whom we christened the Head Playtester, and hand-selected a few teams of playtesters for Alpha Stage Playtesting. We recruited some new teams as well, and for the first six months, the system underwent intensive testing with a limited pool of people involved. This was in order to make sure that we were getting good data that wasn't lost in the pile. Six months later, in February of 2009, we went overt with the remainder of the playtesters and began Beta Stage, which involved a tremendous amount of stress-testing and very specific assignments that covered the entirety of the book. It's been a real chore, but I think it's been worth it. Also I think it bears mentioning that I believe, although I cannot concretely back this up, that this is the single most heavily-playtested RPG that AEG has ever released. I'm pretty proud of that.
As for what we had in mind when we began the process, I'd like to share with you a passage from the Design Document that I originally wrote and sent out to all involved parties when the project was just beginning.
The core philosophy of this book is that the rules do not need to explain in minute detail for every single little thing that happens at the table. Some of that is the GMs call, and there's no reason to go hunting for five minutes to see exactly how many feet a character can see at night with a regular lantern (for example).Objectives
The RPG market has changed dramatically over the past few years. A combination of factors, the most significant of which is likely online gaming, has dramatically reduced sales across the board for the industry. In order to survive in this environment, a fourth edition of L5R is going to have to expand its customer base beyond the loyal following we have developed over the years. New customers are essential to the game’s ongoing success, and in order to gain them, we must follow several clear mandates:
1. Divorcing the Story from the Mechanics – The story is what sells L5R, but there are just as many people out there who want to tell their own story. We must serve both. Fourth edition must have everything a fan would require to run a campaign in the current storyline, but the information must not be so ingrained into the mechanics that it prevents others from creating non-canon stories and campaigns.
2. Simplification and Streamlining of Mechanics – Third Edition is an excellent game, but over several years the mechanics have become too complex and intricate. This cannot be allowed to continue. Players must have the same robust character options as in Third Edition, but once a character is created, minimal page-flipping should be required. Effects must be simple and easy to note on a character sheet. A completed character should have everything, absolutely everything, he needs on the character sheet. "Play from the sheet!" is our battle cry.
3. Intuitive Organization – Third Edition is scattered all over the board, with an organization that makes little to no sense. Fourth Edition must not suffer from this malady, which is mentioned with great frequency by critics of the game.
4. Unified Voice – Fourth Edition as a whole must have a consistent tone and voice, and must maintain that throughout all sourcebooks and supplements. Editing notwithstanding, there cannot be unnecessary padding or repetition of material.
4th Edition is meant to empower GMs and groups to find what works for them. We establish default rules in the core text and give endless examples of how they can and should be modified depending upon what kind of atmosphere the campaign is trying to evoke. Basically we're giving folks who buy the game everything they need to build a game, while at the same time providing extra parts and strongly encouraging them to trick that sucker out any way they like.
It's been written over the course of a year and a half, and playtested for a year. In addition to the constant proofing that has taken place during that time period, it will get an editing period and a proofreading period, in this instance we are distributing PDFs to the playtesters (who number about 80 at this point, I think) to help locate any and all oversights, typographical errors, etc.
I long to destroy the errors that have plagued us in previous releases.
Free Raises will be vastly less common. The exception will be Shugenja Schools, each of which gets a Free Raise on a specific type of spell. We used keywords for this, so for example the Kuni get a FR on any spell with the Jade keyword, the Mantis any spell with the Thunder keyword, etc.
Bushi, though, are going to see a lot less FR. Those Maneuvers aren't supposed to be automatic!
Dueling was streamlined. I know streamlined is a bad word in man rpg circles but in this case it works. Duels are fast. Duels are awesome. The dueling rules are so great that I read them once and understood what I was doing and was able to recall the information with out having to return to my files.
Given the proper skills anyone, and I mean anyone, can be a good duelist. It truly does come down to skill in many situations. Two duelist of equal skill are just as likely to karmic strike as they are to win. The Kakita bushi is the best duelist in the game. That's their niche after all. But that doesn't stop anyone from being a good duelist either.
There was an effort to balance the various schools. However we also made sure each school was good at what it says it is. So while the Bayushi bushi and Kakita bushi schools are balanced in regards to one another the Bayushi bushi also will be better at some aspects than the Kakita and vice versa.
We worked really hard to make sure that nothing like the Mirumoto Bushi occurred again (e.g., the 3E Mirumoto Bushi is vastly superior to 90% of other bushi schools).
Static bonuses are virtually eradicated from Schools. They still appear in Advantages (although there are suggested guidelines for GMs to avoid allowing multiple instances of bonuses to the same kind of rolls in order to avoid "stacking"), and in a handful of Skill Mastery Levels (which have also been dramatically pared down).
On the whole, the static bonus is a thing of the past, survived only by a handful of living fossils.
The game has a default Earth modifier for Wound Levels, and a sidebar explaining how you should increase that multiplier depending upon how many strikes you would prefer a character to be able to sustain and survive. There's also a section in the Book of Void concerning a more Cinematic Style for that kind of pervasive feel to the game, should you be interested in such a thing.
We chose to very carefully define what constitutes a School versus an Alternate Path or an Advanced School. In our way of thinking, the following definitions apply across all clans and families:
* Basic Schools represent large, well-established and well-funded institutions that have dozens of dojo devoted to their teaching throughout a family or clan's holdings, and have thousands of students.
* Advanced Schools are much more exclusive, with only a handful of dojo (possibly as few as one), and represent elite units within a family or clan. They are difficult to get into and typically represent a more focused, specified facet of a particular Basic School's training.
* Alternate Paths represent small subsets of an existing Basic School that teach an alternate or specialized version of an existing Technique that fits into the theme of the Basic School. These are typically reserved for one or two dojo at the most, and although some are more elite than others (the Akodo Elite Guard versus the Moshi Navigators, for instance), they are generally much more accessible than an Advanced School.
With those parameters in mind, there were several existing School that just didn't make sense, and thus were reduced to Alternate Paths. The previously mentioned Shinjo Scouts and Shiba Yojimbo, for instance, made vastly more sense as specialized versions of particular Techniques in the Shinjo Bushi and Shiba Bushi School progressions, and so were changed to reflect that.
* Minor Clans and ronin are both in the core book. Minor Clans get full Basic Schools, and were carefully playtested to make sure they don't overpower Great Clan Schools while remaining fun to play. Ronin get individual Techniques that they can piece together as they progress to create unique combinations worthy of epic player character wave men.
* In 4th Edition, Schools have tags that are most commonly Bushi, Courtier, or Shugenja. Some are tagless for a very specific reason. In the instances when a School or a type of School are so unique that they warrant distinction from other School types, we use a handful of others, including: Artisan, Monk, and Ninja. These have no base purpose other than to serve as flags for discounts on certain Advantages and Disadvantages.
The Advanced Mechanics chapter offers optional abilities that one may wish to use with Artisan, Monk, and Ninja in order to differentiate them from their core types (Courtier, Shugenja, and Bushi, respectively), but they are not mandatory, nor are they included in the core system chapters. Mostly these abilities affect these Schools' access to secondary systems like Kata and Kiho, should you choose to include those in your campaign.
Again, all completely optional and totally outside the basic rules presented in the Book of Earth and the Book of Fire.
* [Full 5 ranks for each School]
Done. The exception would be the new system for ronin Schools, but I think you'll find them more in keeping with the feel of ronin in Rokugan, and conducive to building bigger, more epic ronin characters that do not necessarily overshadow their Great Clan teammates.
* Every clan gets four Schools. Then, in the Advanced Mechanics chapter, they also have access to two Alternate Paths and one Advanced School, should you choose to include those optional mechanics.
* [More options for multi clan parties than the traditional Emerald Magistrate set-up]
Discussed in some detail in the Book of the Void. This particular section was penned by Jim Pinto, author of the 1E GM's Survival Guide (which I adore).
* [How about Brotherhood monks, then? Martial arts? Schools? Kiho? Anything?]
Brotherhood Schools, complete with Kiho, are found in the Book of Water: Advanced mechancis, as an optional mechanic for inclusion in campaigns.
* Raises are still used as a means of determining whether or not additional effects are possible, both in the form of Maneuvers (for bushi) and amping up spells (for shugenja). This is a toolkit approach, however, so we encourage GMs to find additional uses for them in whatever way suits their personal style.
* [rules for smacking "mobs" of enemy mooks, like we saw in 7th Sea's "brute squads"]
This has been discussed, yes. I can't go into details at the moment, regrettably.
* [Mass Combat]
The mass combat system draws more from 1E, where it was quicker and simpler to run a battle, than in 3E. I adore Brian's more narrative approach, but we wanted something a little faster on the hoof, so to speak, so we took it old school.
C'est revenir en mode 2e.* Every clan gets four Schools. Then, in the Advanced Mechanics chapter, they also have access to two Alternate Paths and one Advanced School, should you choose to include those optional mechanics.
En même temps comment dire ... tant qu'on ne casse pas le mythe du groupe de PJ alliés, le multi-clan, ça ne tient pas dans l'univers.* [More options for multi clan parties than the traditional Emerald Magistrate set-up]
Discussed in some detail in the Book of the Void. This particular section was penned by Jim Pinto, author of the 1E GM's Survival Guide (which I adore).
Shawn Carman a écrit :Okuma's PDF is indeed frought with awesome.
Désolé, mais ça tient parfaitement, à condition que tu remplaces le prétexte des magistrats impériaux par une alternative extérieure crédible. Sauf que ça implique un axe de campagne possiblement plus serré et planifié que "ils se promènent et la semaine prochaine, je les ferais enquéter sur...".En même temps comment dire ... tant qu'on ne casse pas le mythe du groupe de PJ alliés, le multi-clan, ça ne tient pas dans l'univers.
Shawn Carman a écrit :Okuma's PDF is indeed frought with awesome.
Pour moi l'idée que les Clans Mineurs aient des écoles de bases avec 3 Techniques n'a jamais fait sens (un peu comme les écoles avancées). Le rythme pédagogique et symbolique de Rokugan est basé sur le chiffre 5. Donc je ne vois pas pourquoi les Clans Majeurs n'y obéiraient pas… Ah oui, les techniques se créent les unes après les autres, nous dit-on… mais on voit bien que c'est absurde puisque par ailleurs, on nous démontre que chaque école est censé représenter un enseignement cohérent ou chaque technique mène logiquement à la suivante. J'aurais plus tendance à voir le chiffre de 5 étapes comme une obligation pour qu'un sensei puisse enseigner les Techniques qu'il a créé.Pénombre a écrit : J'ai vu pas mal d'idées intéressantes en tous cas. A part les écoles de clans mineurs en 5 rangs, mais ça dépend surtout de leur puissance (actuellement, n'importe quel clan mineur né la semaine dernière peut avoir son école en 5 rangs qui massacre comme les plus réputées des clans majeurs).