Having just read over the book with my friend, I have to say, it's a really awesome take on the 5e rules, I like how Inspiration is built into the game a little bit (with even an Inspiration based class). The Pilgrim is a little wonky, but seems playable. The Bushi, Courtier, and Shinobi are pretty much all stars. Race design is cool, and even the "boring" Human has some Clan Feats they can take.
I'm excited to try this out, to say the least. But uh....the Ritualist. What? Like what?
If you were trying to make a game with a very conservative magic system because powerful magicians don't fit the feel of the setting, and you instead buffed the non-magicians, I guess?
But that's not really the flavor of Rokugan, where powerful magic can be invoked with some measure of commonality.
However even then, why anyone would want to be a Ritualist escapes me. They don't seem to have any niche that's unique except maybe the very expensive summoning.
Healing? Several classes can do this, and more efficiently. Ditto with removing status effects, or buffing allies and debuffing enemies. Instead you have this class that really doesn't contribute anything particularly cool more than a few times per day, since they have very limited favor, and limited ways to recharge it- abilities that can replenish it are once per long rest, replenishing it is long rest (or possibly meditating for 4 hours). Even the superior Artisan needs 3 hours and some gold to make their creations, some of which are better than others.
Your best deals really, other than the occasional free favor for casting under optimal conditions (or things like the Elementalist) give you free favor for spending favor, which results in giving you one big powerful spell....and then leaving you with an empty gas tank for the rest of the day.
It's a headscratcher, and I'm not even sure how to fix it without either finding some arbitrary multiplier for favor, or houseruling it to be a short rest class, which might have unforeseen consequences.
It's like taking the Sorcerer, removing their spell slots, and telling them to use their Sorcery points for everything.
And sure, you could maybe use and existing spellcasting class instead of the Ritualist, but it doesn't really have the Rokugan feel.
Overall, I love this book, but it really could use some more editing, subclasses for the PHB classes would have been nice to help them "fit" the setting better, and some of the balance is uneven, with great abilities coexisting with more "meh" abilities, really forcing you to think carefully before you take them (YMMV if that's a problem or not), but I'd still give it an A- if not for the Ritualist.
Our consensus, at least, is that you'd have to optimize the heck out of the class just to reach some kind of baseline competence, and that's strange.
Sure, some classes have low level issues (Pilgrims before they start getting bonus Hit Dice), but starting at level 3 seems to iron most of that out. I'm not sure that helps the Ritualist very much.
I'm hoping the game becomes popular enough to spark discussion, and maybe somewhere we'll get a little developer insight into why things are the way they are.
