System Primer

We’re using the 4th edition of the L5R system, originally published by Alderac, but now owned by Fantasy Flight Games. FFG is doing their own version with its own system that’s in beta now. I don’t like it. Thankfully they continue to sell PDFs of the 4th edition L5R books on drivethrurpg if you don’t have one and want to pick one up.
L5R uses pools of 10-sided dice. Basic task resolution is to take a number of dice equal to a trait, add a number of dice equal to a skill, roll all of those dice, then pick out a number of dice from the roll equal to your trait and add them up. It’s known as Roll + Keep, or Stat + Skill, Keep Stat, and rolls are often abbreviated like 6k3 (roll 6 dice, keep 3 of them). In nearly all cases, your dice are open-ended or exploding, if you roll a 10, you reroll that die and add it to the 10, if you roll another 10, you keep re-rolling and adding.
Target numbers typically increase by 5’s with a TN 5 being ‘Very Easy’ up to a TN 60 being ranked ‘Impossible’.
The 5 rings in Legend of the 5 Rings are: Air, Earth, Water, Fire, and Void. Each of the 4 elemental rings have 2 traits associated with them, while Void doesn’t have any trait associated with it:
Air Awareness – Intuition and ability to understand someone’s feelings/motivations. Think of it as social/emotional perception Reflexes – Your physical reactions Earth Willpower – Mental fortitude Stamina – Physical fortitude Fire Intelligence – Your smarts Agility – Your hand-eye coordination and general athleticism Water Perception – Your attention to the world and events around you Strength – Pure physical power Void – Your mystical connection to the Celestial Heavens
Each of the 8 traits has a number value, from 1 to 10. The elemental rings have a corresponding value equal to the lowest trait belonging to that ring (So if you have Willpower 3 and Stamina 4, your Earth Ring is a 3). When you gain XP, you can spend it to raise a trait. Since Void does not have any traits, you can spend XP to raise your Void Ring directly (something you cannot do to the other Rings).
Sometimes instead of a Stat + Skill, Keep Stat roll, you’ll be asked to make a Ring roll, in that case you Roll a number of dice equal to the Ring and you Keep all of them.