I'm sorry, I don't mean to derail your thread, but... since it is here, I'd like to make a short commentary.
There was a point, years ago, when I was a fan of L5R. In that I bought all the RPG books, I spent hundreds of dollars on cards and played at least twice a month, buying cards online to make thematic decks. I read all the stories that AEG wrote and released.
Thing is, certainly aspects of this whole fictional world started to feel quite wrong to me. And as time went on, I studied Japanese language, culture, history-- I've read the Tales of Heike and I've studied the various periods of history with more than a passing familiarity on the Sengoku period and the Edo period in particular-- the time at which L5R is generally mostly based. I have lived in Japan for four years and been to many historical sites across the country.
At this point I can hardly stand this setting. The fundamental... well... I'm not sure what sort of ignorance it is. Racist? Orientalism? Just... the outsiders perspective, removing the humanity from the foreign culture and turning them into caricatures, removing the elements that are similar to the European culture and exaggerating the otherness and basically positing a number of negative things about Japanese in general.. it is kind of impossible to ignore and very irritating.
I know the knee-jerk reaction of someone who has decided to be a fanatic of the setting, as I am sure any person attempting to convert it to a new RPG system almost certainly is, would be to try to deny any of this and stalwartly defend it whether right or wrong, but... before you spend any more energy on this project, I'd like you to consider a few things.
The first is the easiest. Consider the brutally strict feudalism and class structure, the forced marriages and the sexism. None of this was any different in Japan than in any European country. All European countries were precisely the same. So why is it that when one goes to create a fantastical European setting, these truths are buried and forgotten but when one goes to approach a world based on a foreign culture these aspects are heavily exaggerated and made central thematic elements? These elements are clearly seen as negative traits or we would find them as heavily enforced in European settings. But they aren't. Ever. AEG made a European setting and didn't include them as part of it at all. There seems to be an agenda to say that THOSE people are inhuman like that, but WE are far more enlightened than them.
It is worth noting that the man who united Japan at the end of the Sengoku period was a man who was born a peasant, and changed his name three times. There was no serious strict class system until he took control of the country. And, also worth noting, Japan has an unbroken imperial line that stretches back a thousand years. One did not conquer the country by killing the "demon-infested" Emperor, sitting upon his throne and declaring yourself Emperor with the heavens blessing this and erasing the imperial name from history. You conquered the country by taking control of the Imperial palace and turning the Emperor into your puppet.
It is a major theme in Rokugan that Japanese resolve absolutely everything with personal direct violence and hold such personal direct violence in higher regard than anything else. A person's worth is measured purely by their ability to do personal direct violence with a sword better than any other person. One becomes a good duelist and they can waltz around the country, demanding a duel with anyone who so much as irks them and the person must respond by either accepting the duel and getting killed or immediately killing themself. And this is posited as the was Japanese people handle their political affairs. Which cannot help but paint them as lowly, stupid brutes who care only about one's ability to chop people apart with swords.
Of course, this could not be further from the truth. Duelists existed in history, but nothing of much worth or note was ever resolved through dueling. Japanese are just as intelligent, thoughtful, aware people as any other. And they know that one is not simply right and never determined the "truth" based on the outcome of a sword fight. Such things did not prove one's ability to lead or manage the land. The only thing it proved was that one's sword fighting style was better. Duels were generally done between heads of fighting academies (and not all sword fighting! Japanese used other weapons!!). If you won the duel, then you'd gain prestige and maybe more students would flock to your school. It was like a sporting competition, only sometimes with life and death on the line.
But NEVER was any governor or magistrate challenged by a renowned sword fighter and had to choose between accepting and being killed or ritualistic suicide. One's "honor" was not harmed in the least by recognizing that someone else was a fiercer warrior and just walking away with nothing more to say about it. Particularly if fighting wasn't your primary role.
And the ritualistic suicide? Happened only ever when one was forced into it after being defeated by an enemy since there were more painful and horrifying ways to die and you wouldn't have your corpse desecrated or your relatives slaughtered or it was done as a very extreme form of political protest. Japanese warriors were never at any point greatly eager to cut themselves open at the first time they ever made any mistake or failed at anything or lost a battle. There were many samurai who lost many, many battles and ultimately gave up and JOINED the people they were fighting against. Yeah-- samurai could do that. You didn't wear a color-coded uniform and forced to stick to one clan for your entire life. Samurai regularly jumped ship to other clans. In fact, part of the spoils of victory was to steal your enemy's best surviving generals and warriors.
The setting posits that Japanese people are incapable of advancement or change in any way, shape or form. Not culturally, not technologically, not artistically. A major point in the setting that Japanese people never change, that they are all style and no awareness of substance. That they will continue to do things in an ineffective, costly, bad way simply because it is "traditional" and the "way it has always been done". Of course, this is wildly off-base. Japanese have almost always been very ready and willing to both adopt and then advance anything that they see. Even in the period where they were supposedly steady (the Tokugawa period) they made really amazing leaps forward artistically and culturally. They even had the first mass-producing color print method.
Instead, in Rokugan-- it is said that absolutely nothing in the nation ever changed one iota in over 1,000 years and that everyone would rather die than to do anything in a creative, interesting or new way-- and that anyone who suggests or tries anything new is quickly turned on and put to death. It is suggested that at a time when the land is under constant assault with demons, undead and monsters that the samurai INSISTED on disarming nearly their entire populace leaving them completely vulnerable and then simultaneously stubbornly refused to use the most advanced or effective weapons, insisting on using the old methods no matter how many lives it cost.
Again, how can this be seen as anything other than slander against Japanese people? Was there a point at which Japan disarmed its peasants and outlawed gun powder? Yes, but ONLY after the entire land was completely united under a single leader and they were confident that there were no more outside threats. In fact, they actually shipped most of their samurai out of the country to go conquer Korea so that they wouldn't fight among themselves. At the time they were primarily concerned about uprisings-- either by the peasants or by governors who might try to restart the mass war that the country had just recovered from. There is no justification or excuse for it in Rokugan beyond "Japanese aren't intelligent people like us, they will stubbornly insist on doing things wrong. We are so much more enlightened than them."
Samurai are posited to constantly charge the enemy head-on without any attempt to resort to tactics of any sort. They would never do anything remotely sneaky or break the etiquette of battle (unless they are in a clan with an insect icon). They will just stubbornly attack the enemy recklessly and foolishly, but they gain great bonuses from doing so because they are supreme fighters when doing this!! And.... the truth?...
Two of the most iconic and famous samurai, samurai that all others ought to be measured on, are Minamoto Yoshitsune and Sanada Yukimura. Minamoto Yoshitsune won many battles against superior forces by doing such underhanded tactics such as attacking enemies in the city during the dead of night, leading his troops on horseback down a steep mountainside to assault the enemy rank from the rear and shooting the unarmored peasant oarsmen in the enemy boats instead of at the enemy warriors. Sanda Yukimura famously had female assassins working for him who would seduce and then murder his enemies when they let their guard down. And that is nothing compared to the treachery and cunning of some famous samurai, particularly Oda Nobunaga.
If no actual samurai, much less the most iconic and famous, would be capable of living up to the samurai code you want to posit all samurai live by, then there is something seriously messed up about your samurai code and your general idea of what you want to label a "samurai". Once your definition has precluded the finest examples of something, it is no longer usable as a definition.
And those are probably the big slanders against Japan. There are minor irksome things....
The idea that Japanese people run around in color-coded uniforms.
The idea that Japanese people name themselves after animals or aspire to be like animals and base their personalities, behaviors and fighting styles after the animal their clan's iconic spirit animal.
Names were not neatly divided by clan nor did everyone in a particular clan all look alike. People who were relatives (even brothers!) could easily end up fighting on opposites sides of a war. It did not require special Imperial decree for someone to change their name or start a new family-- many samurai changed their name a few times. And Samurai names were generally 4-syllable names made up of two kanji, one of which was usually taken from the father.
Granted, perhaps these things were done simply to make the setting easier for those unfamiliar with Japanese things to get into it. But... really... what would you think if you had a setting that was based in Europe but insisted that everyone wore kilts and sashes. And there was this warrior named "Bugsy Bunny" who was a member of the "Bunny Clan" and his fighting style with his bastard sword (because ALL warriors use bastard swords all the time! Don't you know it is the ultimate super weapon that puts all weapons to shame?! The bastard sword has been passed down through his family for generations!) is totally based on a bunny's speed and ferocity and you can easily identify Bugsy as a member of the Bunny Clan because he is always tearing his white and pink tartan kilt and scarf and his half-plate armor is also painted bright white and pink. Oh, and it is written by Chinese people who've never even been to Europe for longer than maybe a month and don't know the first two things about European history.
And.... finally... the katana. Oh, the katana. Oh god... the katana. Do I even need to?... Ugh...
The katana was not the be all, end all symbol of the samurai. At least not until samurai stopped functionally being a thing and were more just a ceremonial position. It is not a super weapon. It is not flat out, hands down THE perfect weapon to use in every single situation and anyone who uses anything else is just asking to lose. Samurai never used them to the exclusion of all other weapons. Samurai used bows, polearms, and guns as often or more often than katanas. There were people famous for all sorts of other weapons.
Were katana good? Well, sure. As good as any other sword. But the best thing about them compared to other swords was simply that they didn't break. The swords they used prior to them broke all the time.
But, perhaps more importantly... katana do not cut through armor as though it were paper mache. And whatever work and craftsmen ship and expense goes into a katana?... It's nothing compared to the lacquered scalemail of a Japanese traditional suit of armor. It is the armor that saves a samurai in battle, not the sword. The reason swords ever became the ceremonial symbol was because the armor was just so unbelievably expensive to own, maintain and keep. But while samurai still had a real chance of seeing battle, it should be the armor they treasure well above the sword, the armor that is passed down through the generations-- katana may not be cheap, but for a samurai getting a new one is not THAT big of a deal. In fact, if a samurai was going to use a sword (probably against untrained and badly armed bandits or peasants), they would probably keep a few extra around for when the first one got bent out of shape.
Now, maybe one wants to say "well... well.... they say Rokugan ISN'T Japan, so.. nyeh!"
But, come on. Really?
They use Japanese names ONLY Japanese names. They use Japanese words for things there are perfectly fine English words for. They call their warriors "samurai" and have something called "ninja" though it couldn't be further removed from the real thing. They have things remotely resembling Buddhist and Shinto religions. They use Japanese art style, they try to make their weapons and armor look as close to Japanese as possible. In other words, that is a poor excuse. The thing they are saying about the people of their land are things they are heavily implying are true about Japanese because whereever a gap is, it is filled with whatever is true of Japanese-- at least from a total fetishistic foreigner's perspective.
Look, this ended up being way longer than I needed it to be, but I hope that some of this allowed you to see another perspective and hopefully reconsider things. I don't need to see a big rebuttal. I know you want to immediately reject everything I said right away without actually considering it... but if you read it, maybe at least internally once you stop attributing these thoughts to an "outsider" to an "enemy" then you'll maybeLook, this ended up being way longer than I needed it to be, but I hope that some of this allowed you to see another perspective and hopefully reconsider things. I don't need to see a big rebuttal. I know you want to immediately reject everything I said right away without actually considering it... but if you read it, maybe at least internally once you stop attributing these thoughts to an "outsider" to an "enemy" and maybe have them spontaneously occur to yourself, you might find them easier to relate with or something.
My main purpose in writing this was to say.... it's all good and fine to have a fantasy setting inspired by Japan. In fact, I kind of want to create a Japanese/Korean/Chinese inspired fantasy world myself. But... you know... if you are going to go through all the effort of converting something then... you know... why use Rokugan? Why use a setting so fundamentally based on slanderous and untrue orientalisms? You are practically exerting about the same amount of dedicated effort necessary to create your own world anyway... so why not do so? Why not try to make a Japanese-inspired fantasy world of your own that could... at least attempt not to be so offensive? I swear, you could do better than Rokugan!
In fact, anyone who set out to make the world first and foremost to be used for a RPG rather than first and foremost to be the setting of a cardgame and war game would probably do better. Because some of the things I listed are probably directly derived from trying to create the aspects of the world in a way to justify the mechanical oddities inherent in a card game rather than being what would naturally arise and grow if you were designing it to match the mechanics of an RPG or just creating it in a more organic and natural way.
A good example is the duels. For the purposes of the card game, duels needed to be a "accept death or the whole family loses honor points" kind of thing. That was the mechanic decided for the "duel" card in the card game. Issue being that taking that mechanic and throwing it into an RPG world or a literary world and suddenly it is ludicrous and can only come across as anti-Japanese when one attempts to justify it.
