The Asako Library

Iaijutsu Duels

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My L5R Campaign

The rules for dueling given in the L5R rules are generally good, but poorly explained. The concepts of becoming harder to hit by staring at a person and then telling the other person to strike you are especially difficult to understand. So below is a slightly different explanation of the rules, as well as some alternate rules that are hopefully easier to understand, nearly as easy to use, and able to capture a more Kurosawa-esque feel.

Clarification: Iaijutsu Duels

Before the duel, each samurai can make an Iaijutsu/Awareness Roll with a TN of 10 to determine his opponent's Agility, Void, or Iaijutsu. If the player so desires, each raise will allow the duelist to discover one additional fact about his opponent. After this roll, both opponents have the opportunity to concede victory to the other, resulting in standard Glory gains for the participants. It is important to note here that if a series of events is important enough to provoke a duel to the death, the duelist that concedes will generally be required to commit seppuku afterwards.

This roll, however, does not represent knowledge the participants gained before the duel, but before the strike. During the duel, the participants are studying each other, changing stances, and contemplating the manner in which they can achieve victory. At any point during the duel before the strike, one samurai can concede victory to his opponent. That is what this roll represents.

Now, the duelists will make a contested Awareness roll. The winner has the first chance to act, with successive actions alternating between the duelists. If the winner of the roll so chooses, he can pass the first choice to his opponent instead. The TN for a duelist to strike his opponent begins at 5. The actions the character can take are listed below.

  • Focus Calm your nerves. Change your stance. Study your opponent. Plan your victory. Mechanically, this raises the TN for a successful strike by 5. A character cannot Focus more times than the rank of his Void ring. Spending a Void point will allow a character to Focus one more time.
  • Strike A bead of sweat runs down your brow. A cherry blossom falls. You have shown weakness, and your opponent is about to take advantage of it. Mechanically, the opponent rolls Iaijutsu/Agility to strike against the current TN. It is important to note that this is not "telling" your opponent to strike; it is losing your focus and allowing your opponent an opening to strike.

After the first duelist strikes, if he misses or if the duel is to the death and his opponent is still alive, the second duelist gets a chance to strike. If after that both duelists are still untouched or are both alive if the duel is to the death, the challenge can continue as a kenjustsu challenge, the opponents may resheathe their katana and begin a duel again, or they may agree to call the match a draw, depending on what the duelists and the circumstances will allow.

The following rules are listed separately because they are for more advanced and detailed duels. The above is an explanation of the existing rules, but the below are optional additions to them.

Optional Rule: Know the School

If the duelist's opponent's school is unknown to him, he may choose to make a Perception roll as well as the Iaijutsu/Awareness roll before the duel. If the duelist has any reason to recognize his opponent's style and if the Perception roll succeeds a TN of the GM's discretion, then the duelist also learns the school that his opponent is using.

Optional Rule: Kharmic Strike

When a duelist declares Strike as his action, the two duelists make a contested Reflexes roll. The duelist who declared Strike as his action must make two raises on this roll because of his loss of focus.

  • If only one duelist succeeds, he rolls to strike his opponent.
  • If both duelists succeed, both roll to strike, but the one with the higher Reflexes roll strikes first. In duels to touch or blood, this will count as a victory, given that the strike is successful.
  • If both duelists fail, both roll to strike with a -1 die penalty, and the one with the higher Reflexes roll strikes first. Again, if the strike is successful, this will count as a victory if the duel is to touch or blood.

Optional Rule: Lethality

Duels to the death are not for the faint of heart, and duelists are trained to make their strikes count. This rule is very simple: When a duelist strikes successfully in a duel to the death, his opponent is killed. In tests of skill, this translates to two free raises for a successful strike.