L5R FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions)

L5R CCG Rulebook - Lotus Edition (2 MB PDF)

Enemy of My Enemy Rules Sheet (226KB PDF) updating the Diamond Edition rules.

L5R Accumulated Rulings
Collected by Zen Faulkes, the L5R Deputy Rules Guy.
To have a text-version of the rulings emailed to you, simply send a blank email to l5rrulings@alderac.com

AEG Tournament Floor Rules (2.3 MB PDF)

L5R Floor Rules (2.7 MB PDF)

• Lotus Checklist

Errata

Immediate Errata
Errata to the cards Shokushu no Oni and Ikuei. The errata to Shokushu no Oni will be in effect at the Kotei next weekend, and the errata on Ikuei will be in effect as of the release of Drums of War.

Shokushu no Oni
This card's text box now reads:

Oni * Nonhuman * Shadowlands
After this card enters play, permanently give this Personality the Shadowlands trait.
Reaction: When paying for a Spell attaching to this Personality, lose honor equal to its printed Gold cost: You need not pay its Gold cost.

Ikuei
This card's text box now reads:
Unaligned Samurai * Ronin
After each time Ikuei bows or is destroyed, no player may put cards into his hand from his own card effects for the rest of that phase.
Open: Bow Ikuei: Give target Personality +2F.

Warrens of the One Tribe (Enemy of My Enemy)

Effective June 30th, the Warrens will play according to the following text:

You begin the game with three Provinces. Once per phase, you may play a Fate card in any discard pile as if it were in your hand. Fate cards you have played are removed from the game if they are ever in a discard pile.
Limited: Target and bow a Ratling Personality you control: Once per turn, lose 1 Honor. Discard the top card of each Fate deck.

The Warrens forms the basis of a number of powerful decks that are dominating at all levels of play by virtue of unprecedented access to large quantities of their own Fate cards. This errata addresses this advantage by restricting how many cards the player may play from locations other than his hand.

The Khol Wall (Web of Lies)

Regions do not count towards your minimum deck size. Your Provinces may have two Regions attached. After each of your Events Phases, turn face-up all Dynasty cards in all your Provinces that have a Region attached.
Battle: Bow a Region you control: Once per battle, target two unbowed Personalities with the same controller. Switch their locations.

The Khol Wall is dominating all play environments. It forms a strong deck on its capacity to simultaneously play Regions and quickly play into its Dynasty deck for key Personalities. It capacity to move units multiple times per battle also gives it supreme control over both armies. This errata weakens it in these key areas.

This errata will be effective as of May 18th, to coincide with the legality date of Enemy of My Enemy, so it will be in effect for as many Kotei as possible as well as avoid creating a single weekend with a different environment than the remainder of the tournament season.

Shinjo Fuyuko (Enemy of My Enemy)
The ability she grants should read as follows:

Battle: Target a Personality you control. Attach an Item to him from your hand, reducing its Gold cost by 2 to a minimum of one and paying all remaining costs. If this attached an Item, draw a card.

This addresses difficulties interpreting the card as well as multiple real and perceived abuses that encouraged degenerate play.

This is an update to the errata issued April 13th, which is already in effect.

The Shadow Dragon (promo)
Ordinarily, our policy is to rule that cards play as worded unless there is sufficient ambiguity or a real power issue. With the Shadow Dragon, there is both. As a strict reading of this card is both unintuitive to most players and is proving problematic, we are REVERSING the ruling that the change in control from the Shadow Dragon's ability is permanent.

This reversal is effective immediately

Shinjo Fuyuko (Enemy of My Enemy)
The "Draw a card." effect occurs only if an Item was actually attached from hand.

The following errata are all effective immediately, as they all address mechanical problems and not environmental issues.

Tamori Shiki Exp. (Enemy of My Enemy)
His Reaction is usable once per phase.

Moto Akikazu (Enemy of My Enemy)
His Limited ability is usable once per turn.

Togashi Shunsen (1,000 Years of Darkness)
He is now Loyal.

Shiki and Akikazu form the basis of abusive combos in their printed form.

The errata to Shunsen is to remove the encouragement to bring unmanageable yet legal decks containing hundreds of cards to formal events.

Effective April 1st, the ability on Utaku Tarako (Web of Lies) should be played by the following text. This is ERRATA:

"Battle: Destroy a Region you control: Once per turn, target an opposing Follower, Item, or Personality with no Followers or Items. Destroy it."

First-hand experience by PDT members and collected tournament reports show a continuing dominating influence of decks utilizing Tarako at all competitive levels of play despite earlier predictions. Her ability is powerful for its cost and can be used from a position of little risk to Tarako herself, as well as without sacrificing her strength as an attacking unit. Additionally, she is particularly strong if she appears early and produces a position from which it is difficult for the opponent to recover, resulting in game outcomes determined too much by luck. Finally, it appears highly unlikely at this point that the environment will change significantly prior to the Kotei season, which would suffer for all participants with one Faction in such a dominating position.

For this reason, we have decided to issue rapid errata to this card without the usual 60 day analysis and warning delay.

Effective April 1st, the ability on Doji Saori (Web of Lies) should be played by the following text. This is ERRATA:

Open: Bow Saori: Once per turn, target Saori or an unbowed Duelist you control, and a Personality another player controls. Your Personality issues the other an unrefusable challenge. The loser bows and may not straighten until his controller takes an Open action to pay 4 Gold.

L5R CCG Errata: Agasha Miyoshi (Web of Lies) Effective immediately, her last sentence should read, "Fill the Province with that Dragon, face-up."

Web of Lies Rulesheet Errata

Glossary:
conditional [errata, p. 98]: An effect is conditional if, at the time the action, Event, or trait producing that effect begins resolving, it has not yet been determined whether the effect will occur.

Diamond Edition Errata
Kuni Tansho's ability should be as follows

Battle: Bow Tansho and discard a Fate card to force an opposing player to discard a random card from his hand.

The card Overconfidence is Diamond-legal.

L5R Booster Draft Rules
This new L5R variant can be offered to players who want to play L5R in an alternative format to the standard Sealed Deck style.

Errata
Effective immediately, Rend the Soul's Battle action is to be played by the following wording:

Battle: Give one of your Personalities in this battle +5F. If that Personality is in your army when it wins this battle, this battle is tied instead. Your army cannot destroy Provinces this battle.

Effective Thursday, July 1st, Strategic Crossroad will be played as
follows:

Immediate Terrain
Battle: Other players' Personalities who were moved into your army with an action gain +2F while at this battle. While Strategic Crossroad is in play, all players may take the action, "Battle: Move one of your units into this battle from any other location."

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Effective this Saturday, March 1st, the following errata will go into place regarding the card Vengeful Dead from The Fall of Otosan Uchi:

The phrase "another player's card effect" in the first sentence should instead read, "another player's Ninja, Kolat, or Assassin action".

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Effective immediately, Tsuruchi Hiro still has a printed Chi of 3, not 4. The version appearing in Fall of Otosan Uchi Mantis Clan decks is to be considered a misprint, not a Most-Recent Printing.