Intrigue Scenes | How to Play Legend of the Five Rings RPG

Want to know how to play Legend of the Five Rings Role-Playing Game? Today lesson is about how to create social encounters.
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[@derexcelsior7662]

Ok this is already pretty old, but I still need to comment on it. I think you dont understand when to use Intrigue. You dont use intrigue, when you want to talk with every single NPC. Intrigue is big. For the trial before the daimio. Or the court of the local lord. This leads directly to the next point. Talking out the intrigue. You said, that player should talk out everything and not talk out in third person. But Intrigue scenes can go on for days. One Round has no specific time frame. One Round can be a whole week. Good luck trying to RP that out without talking in person. Or I can say as an action for a round "I wil go to my room and write a poem about the importance of the security of the common people and how it benefits the ruling caste". Something that takes a few houres and then do a performance check on it. Its not just talking. And this is where the "calming breath" comes in. Sure the text says, that you do a deep breath. But like come on. Are we that uncreative that we cant say "between this and the next meeting I go to the kabuki theatre and watch a play. Relax a bit and clawm down"? As for the reason why there is initiative. It directly tells you in the text. "For an intrigue, the Initiative check is a TN 1 Sentiment check not just to listen, but to politely probe other characters’ strengths, weaknesses, and perhaps most importantly, objectives." This is SO important. With the right opportunity you can directly in the initiative get information on others objectives, their advantages and disadvantages. The stuff that makes an itrigue interesting in the first place. Also the whole "mind control" thing is so rediculus I dont even know where to start. You simply convince a person. Thats what you do. Why do you call it mindcontrol? When someone comes to you and says "Yo. DnD is a bad designed game." and you two discuss it and at the end of it, you think he is right. Did he mind control you? No of course not. He just convinced you. The thing that happens when your objective is "Appeal to a person or group". Also the rules never said that the NPC just does what you want. It says RAW "the target is persuaded to adopt their perspective". So if you want to convince a local lord that he should sponsor you, you can maybe impress him, but after that you cant just say "ok now give me all your koku because I won intrigue". No he now thinks you are worthy and will pay you. But still as much as he wants and he will expect certain things from you in return. Personally, and this is just what I think no offence here, I think you didnt really understand the intrigue rules and then got frustrated over it and tries to show now how bad designed they are. Because almost every point that you have to critique is nullified if you think, that a round can have eany amount of time and that intrigue is used in big occasions and not in eany simple conversation.

[@Leocmatias]

Agree 100% with your take.

[@semtregua]

Now I see someone I really care about the opinion. That guy right there did understand the mechanics, and more important, the narrative stakes

[@alderaancrumbs6260]

Intrigue is a fantastic system to curate complex social moments with high stakes, not a rule set to control small talk. I look at it as “social skirmishing”, which…as with physical combat…is better served by structure. It’s also great to elide lengthy debates and, as an added benefit, allows an otherwise shy/inexperienced role-player to really shine through mechanics guidance. As an aside, I loathe the idea that combat is mechanical but in-game social moments are all role-play. If you have the aforementioned shy/inexperienced player, demanding they act at the table is in poor taste. Nobody has to sling spells or do roundhouse kicks at the table to model combat, so why demand someone act out talking or lessen their social impact with little to no mechanics? Intrigue scenes solves this and engages a social character well past “Roll Persuasion”, which is a good thing. Edit: All that said, your videos are fantastically helpful, regardless of any disagreements.

[@wargriz8213]

This is why I like L5R’s approach to intrigue. Usually it’s just simplified to one roll. And there aren’t specific actions or ways to augment your actions. It’s nice that care was given to make social play more interesting.

[@andersonneil2293]

You have a major misunderstanding of when to use an intrigue scene and it's probably part of the reason you dislike it and it makes not a ton of sense. Intrigue scenes are intended to be used for large gatherings and over a decent period of time. They are montages of whispering to groups of people and gaining favor in a room. You might have only 1 opponent in it, but your weapon is everyone else. Examples of these sorta scenes would be balls, parties, festivals, that sort of thing. Thats while spreading roomers makes sense, because it does take time, because intrigue scenes take place over hours, not seconds You could have an entire scene and never directly confront your opponent, yet still win. That's why they are separate from narrative, because if you are just directly trying to have a conversation with a single person or a small group then you are not in an intrigue scene. Your initial criticism in the later part, that to convince an individual to take your side, is bogged down by intrigue is invalid because that is not the intention of the rules. It is a criticism of a misinterpretation. If you are RPing the PCs trying to convince a small amount of named PCs, then you should just stick with a narrative scene. If you are playing the characters are going to the court of some local lord during a feast, there are plenty of unnamed NPCs to schmooze with, then you are using intrigue. An example. Your characters know of a pending attack of a village by Bandits and they go to try and convince the local lord to send a stronger force to reinforce the local garrison. He doesnt want to, he has other ideas of where to send the troops. If your status is too low to grant a one on one audience, you fail in that encounter, or its just not possible for your band of outsiders to convince him. As a GM I would set up an intrigue encounter. The lord denies your request but finds in necessary to invite you to a hunt they are going on the next day. The party agrees and on the hunt they spend their time convincing the Lord's advisors, telling tales of the brutality of the approaching band of baddies, gaining the lord's trust ect. At the end of the hunt the lord is convinced of your way of things, not because of mind control, but because the PCs convinced people the Lord trusts and became more trustworthy in the eyes of the lord as well. Your opponent was the Lord in this instance, but you use his hunting party as the weapon to get your way. The encounter takes all day in game, and there might be narrative scene breaks within the time, but its one encounter and you do not want to roleplay hours of the court intrigue that the game wants you to do.

[@andersonneil2293]

Another thing, I think that if you do use intrigue for individuals, EVERTHING, is part of the intrigue scene. All teh small talk ect that you "already hashed out" should be a portion of the encounter . This seems like the book did not explain when to do this well. They tried by saying "use when lots of people are there" but it was easily missunderstood, either because the official modules actually fuck it up, or they do not properly describe the setting making something like a tea ceremony, instead of simply the one NPC with the PCs, having 20 other people there as well that you can play off of.

[@mattj1871]

The problem Corey pointed out is that numerous intrigue scenes in published FFG scenarios are indeed vs 1 person. So there's several disconnects between Rules As Written and Rules As IMPLEMENTED. I'd prefer a contested series of rolls until one side achieves their goal. Or like Savage Worlds where complicated tasks require a number of successes from various specific skill checks performed by several/all party members. Seems like Intrigue as written and intended does work for large groups. So its the "1 on 1" that falls through the cracks?

[@andersonneil2293]

@@mattj1871 The important distriction is if they are vs 1 person or if there is only one person the npcs talk to. Like I said in my follow up, I'm not sure if its just miss written in the books or if its just assuming you know there is a crowd. It's perfectly possible for the tea ceremony in the example he gave to have a group of courtiers involved

[@xiuyoalli]

Wow , i waste time watching this lame video, but your comment make it all worth it , thx ,

[@SquirrelGamez]

Someone been rolling WAY too many strifes... :P What's important to remember is the thing about Intrigue Scenes is the same as with every single rule in every single RPG: not every action requires dice, not every scene requires a ruleset. There is obviously very specific high-risk/high-reward situations where Intrigue Scenes are appropriate.

[@seithenarciss6842]

Old video, but came here to try and learn a little bit more about intrigues (which I've always found a perfect way to balance social characters with combat characters). I'm not going to go through a point by point, but I disagree with pretty much everything you said about the negatives of intrigues. Ah well.

[@DeadUnicornClub]

Many people have expressed how they disagree with me. I'm not afraid to give my opinions in this, and I hope you won't either. I'm never set in stone on what I believe makes a good game and not afraid to hear a dissenting opinion.

[@Fizban0101]

Intrigues have been the hardest for me to figure out how to run effectively. :p

[@mariodosantos]

Really loving this series! Keep it up!

[@ianhoulihan4649]

An Intrigue is very similar in nature to a Skill Challenge in D&D. The differece with Intrigues is that you can team up (making separate rolls for each character to reach one social objective) or the PCs can each have their own objective that they work towards. This means that unlike Social Encounters in Genesys, for example, where if a target exceeds either half of their Strain Threshold they compromise or where they exceed their Strain Threshold they capitulate, L5R allows multiple objectives to be occurring against the one character all at the same time. And lets not forget Opportunities and how they can be used to get additional information to help speed things up and providing non related information that might help the RP along - and there are a lot of those. Of course, as I mentioned, the PCs can also team up against a target to reach an objective more efficiently, whether thans as an assist action or their own role. I allow both because not ever character (or player for that matter) is a social juggernaut. Just remember that this is social combat, and the target character can always withdraw if they feel overwhelmed. Its not social combat until they spill blood after all.

[@Iraski]

I think taking a few things from Burning Wheel's social combat system might help make intrigue work better. Burning Wheel's Duel of Wits is explicitly not mind control. It's only appropriate in situations where your opponent would face some kind of consequences if you won they argument and they didn't comply, which requires an audience. So royal/legal courts and other formal meetings, debating in front of an audience, a shadowy meeting with NPC co-conspirators, etc. You can always invalidate the results of a Duel of Wits, or just force the DoW to end immediately, by resorting to violence, which generally means starting a physical fight. It's also got a brilliant mechanic where the loser of a DoW gets to force compromises proportionate to the amount of "damage" the winning side took.

[@DeadUnicornClub]

That does sound like a great mechanic. I hope a DoW itself isn’t overly complicated as well, or so dramatic in it’s implementation that it don’t matter.

[@Iraski]

@@DeadUnicornClub Burning Wheel in its actual implementation can be a bit hit or miss. People tend to either really connect with the rules or bounce off of them entirely. Like L5R 5e and FFG's Star Wars line, it has a more narrative/drama based mindset while still having a heavy rules crunch. Duel of Wits is still complicated enough you might balk at it, but I'd like to think it's better thought out and more internally consistent than L5R's Intrigue. The game does only want you to use the full combat systems if it's something that matters, too. It even recommends doing a single roll for combat instead of the full Fight rules if the stakes don't justify bogging things down with a full combat encounter. The design philosophy of Burning Wheel is what I find really valuable, and it's probably The Most Influential RPG You've Never Heard Of. Particularly how the game looks at failure (which should always be interesting) and the Let It Ride rule (you should never be rolling for the same thing twice). For example, no rolling Disable Device until you get the lock open - failure has to have a consequence that moves the story forward, or result in you succeeding with a complication (eg: you get the lock open just in time for the guards to catch up). Otherwise you shouldn't have rolled in the first place.

[@DeadUnicornClub]

@@Iraski Those are some of the design ethics I do cherish. Picking up Burning Wheel. Thanks.

[@Hades13]

I love intrigue. And I don't think they are unneccesary. That's the best part of almost all my game. So sad you don't like them.

[@bananaquark1164]

This Videos are so good. It's a shame this game is so niche. So im Extra grateful they exist.

[@MrEllahrairah]

Love this educational type vid. Production value has greatly improved too!

[@DeadUnicornClub]

I have to say it's a lot of information and it's hard to make it entertaining. Don't think I really succeeded but I tried my best.

[@davidlogue4659]

I've been thinking about intrigue scenes for a long time since playing RPGs and I was glad L5R made it a conflict, but realise how they did it is super unneccesary. This video got me thinking of a new way to do it: Intrigues are conflicts in the sense that you put the player and NPC tokens on a map, however, no initiative and no strict movement. Players are each free to have a goal each round, and in order to fulfill the goal they must roll for a check. Instead of just a single roll of Persuasion, or having to get 6 momentum from 6 or more rolls, a social check it two back-to-back rolls. The TN is the momentum originally needed, so say TN 6. You have two rolls to get 6 total successes. You can stake honor and/or glory on these rolls (like you bring up in this video) to reduce the TN by 1 for every 10 honor/glory staked. These are staked on your relationship with that person, so if you ever go against that person, and they know you have, then you have lost your staked honor/glory. I never liked a single roll social check because a failure would just instantly stop the idea, or it would be hard for the GM to come up with reasons to continue it. L5R provides ways to add to your successes by staking honor and using dice with strife, so if you have one bad roll you still have a chance to go all in and make it up in the second roll. And roleplay won't get bogged down by so many rolls, players can still roleplay their character after a good or bad roll before their second roll.

[@Xenovent]

Thank you for your comment - I recent bought the L5R core book and have been learning the system. Originally I will admit I thought it was a cool idea to have Initiative for these "social battles of wit" but the video comes down pretty heavy against them. Coming from DnD5e, the single social roll idea was always something I disliked (which often acted like mind control anyway). Your comment provides a decent middle ground that I will consider as I'm trying to introduce my table to the system.

[@sebastianmarkow6822]

I love angry Corey. Love the series.

[@isgaarda]

Hello! New subscriber here. I just found the channel and I am loving all videos so far. I would like to know the name of the song (the one with the string instrument or violin solo) at the middle of the video. It sooooo evoking... Thank you!

[@DeadUnicornClub]

BilambitAlap by SurajNepal on Artlist.io. Hope that's the one you're looking for.

[@isgaarda]

@@DeadUnicornClub Thank you again!!

[@HandOvDoom]

Awesome video once again! I would have thought casual jazz background music would be incongruous with a L5R video...but somehow here we are and it works.

[@DeadUnicornClub]

Never underestimate jazz

[@alderaancrumbs6260]

After mulling over and listening to this again, I have to say this is a bad take on this topic. The idea that Intrigue equates to “mind control” isn’t correct. People have their minds and hearts changed all the time, so having that done is perfectly fine. It’s not taking away player agency any more than decapitating them is. If I were at your table and a Skirmish started that resulted in my character being injured, would you accept me saying, “My character wouldn’t accept that!”? No, you wouldn’t. Even though combat is one of the most cinematic moments in an RPG, it often has intricate rules to adjudicate it, any that’s acceptable. The same applies social “combat”, especially since just talking in-character all too often results in a quagmire of chatter, where the best/most clever actors shine. As far as the adventures go, the scope is based on those involved and the stakes, not the number of people involved. 4 PCs fighting an oni warlord is still a Skirmish, regardless of it being only one enemy. The same is true for an Intrigue against one NPC of importance.

[@the_markoman]

I appreciate what they tried to do. By including intrigue rules as an integral part of the game, one would think this would encourage roleplay, since it's no longer just an optional thing tacked on to the game. But as I look at more game systems that try to do this, the more I feel as though it's just gamefying social interactions, which just doesn't feel immersive or natural at all. Having characters accomplish things based on the actual words and arguments they use, and how well they roleplay, seems like the more intuitive and fun way to play - including only the most basic of rolls in case a situation is hard to call with social cues alone.

[@patrickfitzpatrick2945]

WTF is this game? A real life simulator? I can see the appeal, but waaaay to complex for my taste.

[@Leocmatias]

I've been playing in an l5R game this year, we are 20+ sessions in, and it is the most fun I've ever had with roleplaying games. Very refreshing style and more "realistic" means npcs and your bonds, flaws and virtues, matter more. Each katana duel can be your last, each dinner can mean disgrace, each tea ceremony a chance to change the course of history.