The great and forgotten Kami have returned from the underworld, displeased with the
affairs of the Empire’s present Shōgun. At the start of spring in the Great New Year, the
Kami have gathered their sacred clans with one quest: reclaim the lands of Nippon and return
them to their honorable, spiritual traditions. However, each clan is bound by their own proud traditions
to a unique vision for this great return and must wage a powerful diplomatic war across eight provinces.
Alliances must be forged, betrayal is inevitable, honorable standing rises and falls. Political mandates
must be navigated and devastating war must be fought, each won by expert skill and cunning negotiation.
And only one may stand victorious at the coming of winter.
You, honorable Shōgun, lead one of these great clans. Do you have the strength of honor,
virtue, and spirit, as well as the mastery of steel necessary to deliver on this ancient promise?
Here are our six clans and players:
@Thraeg takes the Koi, who flow like water and wield great flexibility on the battlefield. @Juan_Raigada takes the Lotus, who subtly control the political agenda. @Ex-SWoo commands the Turtle, who build mighty mobile fortresses. @RothdaTheTruculent leads the Dragonfly, who move freely anywhere in the land. @Mike_Cathcart rules the Fox, who appear unexpectedly to the ruin of others. @ironwulf takes the Bonsai, whose patience and thrift can become great power.
Here are the tags for each clan. My request is that you copy these into each of your forum posts here so it is easier to keep track of who is saying what (and why…).
Players, discuss as long as you like. Phase ends when each player publicly states an Alliance (confirmed by both) or PASSing with no Alliance this Season.
We want to have all the discussions publicly in the forum, without private messages. The intent is to expose the thinking and concerns to everyone, and allow other players to interject, cross-bid, etc. My apologies for not clarifying in this post, but please let us do that going forward.
Turtle: do you agree that you and Bonsai are allied?
This is bringing back uncomfortable memories of picking teams for flag football in elementary school. Quick, someone pair with me!
Koi, I admire the smoothness and bright colors of your namesake, as well as the fact that you get the first mandate. If you would ally with me, and give strong thought to picking the Marshall mandate so that we can get some quick strongholds, I would throw a shiny coin into your pond!
Fox, we are next to each other in the turn order, which as I understand it makes us natural allies as we can setup combos together. I would also happily ally with you.
Turtle, you were the one that got away. I would have loved to build strongholds with you.
For any ally, I look forward to working together and am a happy and cooperative fellow, as my name indicates.
It’s dangerous to go alone, Dragonfly. Take Fox Clan with you! Act now and I’ll put a star next to your name on the play-along setup on my table because I want to get some use out of this thing 😂
Just need confirmation from @Ex-SWoo about the Turtle-Bonsai alliance.
Next up will be Koi’s first mandate choice, so please begin publicly negotiating about that assuming that the T-B alliance will be confirmed. I am sending Koi a private message containing the Mandate choices.
For our audience, Rising Sun uses an interestingly modified role selection mechanic. Each player in fixed order selects one of the five Mandates to execute. All players in order then take that action, with the selector and their ally gaining a selection advantage. This means that the ally is keenly interested in the action, and that the players must be careful not to select Mandates that benefit others more than themselves, especially the ally.
The other fun factor is that all Mandate choices are not always available. There are ten chits (each Mandate x2) and a player draws four at random, decides which to play, and puts the other three back in order. This is private information and provides wide scope of action: which Mandates are very likely to come next? Can the most desired action even be done? Or can this and should this be lied about? :)
The another excellent wrinkle is Lotus’ clan power, which we’ll get to soon.
But while we are waiting for @Thraeg, the rest of you have much to talk about. Lotus, what do you want to suggest to your ally, especially with your ability to set the next Mandate to anything? Others, what do you want to suggest to Koi-- threaten, bribe, cajole, or just start discussing strategy with each other.
If Koi plays a Recruit, where do you want your new troops to go? Should who wants what Kami be discussed now to avoid brutal disappointment later?
In case of Train, who wants to pick up Righteousness, and how do you keep a player from stacking both of them? Who has an eye on a monster? With Oni of Souls in the game, one of the lower-Honor clans may dive straight for the Oni strategy.
In case of Marshall, where should the troops and new strongholds be placed?
Rising Sun is meant to be a boisterous game of planning, ruining some plans, ruing other plans, and accomplishing VPs by helping others do their thing-- just not quite so well as you do yours.
