Legend of the Five Rings is a fantasy and fictional game set in a fictional world. However, the game uses the names of real deities that are still in use in modern Japan and East Asia. This can naturally be problematic for audiences who follow the East Asian religions who venerate these deities. This can make practitioners of those religions uncomfortable and feel disrespected. In addition, due to the history of East Asia and the experience of people of East Asian descent who have migrated to other countries, some other terms found in Asian-based Role Playing Games can be problematic, and certain images or tropes that can come into your games may be hurtful.
This section provides some alternate terms to embrace when you have players who are uncomfortable with the original terms, as well as hurtful tropes that should be avoided, with suggestions as to how to be more respectful.
This section provides some alternate terms to embrace when you have players who are uncomfortable with the original terms, as well as hurtful tropes that should be avoided, with suggestions as to how to be more respectful.
Renaming the Gods
In consultation with Nix Kempin, student of East Asian Religion, and a Shinto priestess in Japan, and others, here is a list of alternate deity names you can use in your campaign to replace those used by L5R in order to avoid this.
Major Kami
Original Name |
Suggested Name |
Notes |
Amaterasu (Lady Sun) |
Ohisama no Omikami |
One of the literal terms for the sun, so in essence the divine sun |
Onnetengu (Lord Moon) |
Onnotangu no Mikoto |
Fictional kami name, so modified to give the correct equivalent title. |
Hantei |
Hantei no Kami |
Fictional kami name |
Akodo |
Akodo no Kami |
Fictional kami name |
Doji |
Douji no Kami |
Fictional kami name, modified to a proper family name like the others rather than the word 'Clumsy' in Japanese |
Shiba |
Shiba no Kami |
Fictional kami name |
Bayushi |
Bayushi no Kami |
Fictional kami name |
Shinjo |
Shinjo no Kami |
Fictional kami name |
Hida |
Hida no Kami |
Fictional kami name |
Togashi |
Togashi no Kami |
Fictional kami name |
Fu Leng (The Dark Brother) |
Akugawa-Sama |
Evil River, the current form through which evil flows into the world |
Ryoshun |
Ryoshun-Sama |
Fictional kami name |
The Great Fortunes
Original Name |
Suggested Name |
Notes |
Benten (Fortune of Romantic Love) |
Waseiten-Sama |
An alternate reading for Benten |
Bishamon (Fortune of Strength) |
Sawakiten-Sama |
An alternate kanji reading for "listening to many teachings", another name for Bishamonten |
Daikoku (Fortune of Wealth) |
Ankoku-Sama |
He was named Daikokuten (大黒天) because "Maha" means big (大) (or great) and "kala" means time or black (黒) (darkness (暗黒)). It is also translated into Chinese characters as 大暗黒天 (Daiankokuten), shortened to Ankoku |
Ebisu (Fortune of Honest Work) |
Webisu-Sama |
Old Hiragana reading of Ebisu |
Fukurokujin (Fortune of Wisdom and Mercy) |
Fukurokushi-Sama |
Alternative reading of the Kanji |
Hotei (Fortune of Contentment) |
Kaishi-Sama |
An old no longer used alternative name for Hotei |
Jurojin (Fortune of Longevity) |
Kotobuki-Sama |
Kotobuki 寿 (long life) |
Kisshoten (Fortune of Fertility and the Home) |
Tennyo-Sama |
Tennyo (heavenly woman) from her name auspicious heavens |
Other Fortunes
Original |
Suggested Name |
Notes |
Inari (Fortune of Rice and Good Grain) |
Inahou Okami |
稲穂 Inahou, rice ear |
Jizo (Fortune of Mercy) |
Usori Sama |
From: "the priest Ennin alleged to have established the place of worship for the Jizō at Mt. Osore (in olden times styled "Mount Usori") |
Hachiman (Fortune of Battle) |
Yawata Okami |
Alternative reading of the kanji |
Emma-O (Fortune of Death) |
Yenma Okami |
Alternative reading |
Goemon (Fortune of Heroes) |
Goemon-Sama |
Fictional kami name |
Misubi-no-Kami (Fortune of Marriage) |
Misubi-no-Kami |
Fictional kami name |
Osano-Wo (Fortune of Fire and Thunder) |
Osano-wo no Mikoto |
Fictional kami name, given a title/suffix equivilent to his Japanese counterpart |
Tenjin (Fortune of Writing and Literature) |
Tobiume-Sama |
Tobiume (flying plum, his sacred plum tree) |
Suitengu (Fortune of the Sea) |
Mizutori-Sama |
Water bird, alternative reading of first Kanji, and second is a play on the term Tengu which is often used to represent a crow person yokai |
Jotei (Fortune of the Morning Dew) |
Jotei-Sama |
Fictional kami name |
The problems with Samurai
A secondary problem occurs in Legend of the Five Rings when presenting to a Japanese or broader East Asian audience. The image of the samurai, with its distinctive armor, curved katana, and legendary warrior's code, is core to the dramas of Kurosawa and other Chanbara films that Legend of the Five Rings was created to emulate. The samurai were a fascinating part of the history of Japan, and many people from around the world are drawn to learning more about East Asian cultures through that iconography.
But Japanese history , like the history of most major cultures of the world, Eastern and Western, has extremely problematic elements. And those elements are not something that can be simply ignored within a role playing game, especially when playing that game with people from cultures directly impacted by those problematic elements.
The Samurai of Japan did not encompass all of Japanese nobility; prior to the early Edo solidification of the caste structure, a Samurai was generally an officer class military position originating in the Japanese nobility but open to others with sufficient training during the Sengoku period (1467-1615). Their leadership were warlords, enforcing their power by their military might. During the late Sengoku, they were responsible for multiple invasions of Korea. With the Edo period (1603-1868), the caste structure became locked down and large military units were discouraged, so Samurai fell into a more advisor, enforcer, or civil servant role with no chance of elevation from the lower castes, and still perpetuated a rigid class and social structure that continued up to the Meiji Period (1868-1912). During and after the Meiji period, propaganda drawing on the iconography and legendary ethos of the samurai, including the Code of Bushido, was used to build Japan up as a world power, a power that took center stage with repeated invasions of China, Korea, and other smaller countries across Asia during World War 2, during which time Japanese troops inspired by this samurai iconography committed many war crimes.
History does this to us. It creates powerful stories of the past, and holds within it valuable insights to help us understand ourselves and the world. But it also has ripples that effect real people today. The pain of discrimination and oppression doesn't just disappear when we wish it to. Westerners, in the United States and Europe, have acted the oppressor over foreign countries and on disenfranchised people within their own country. China and Korea had extremely problematic parts of their history as well. Ill treatment of women is virtually an accepted universal for most of human history; in this regard, early Japan, with its matriarchal society, was actually an outlier. Any game, even Dungeons and Dragons, that draws from any sort of real historical culture or group of cultures is going to run into these sorts of problems.
But complex periods of conflict and questioning also give room for Role Playing games to happen.
Fantasy Flight Games cannot remove Samurai completely from Legend of the Five Rings.. For many Westerners, that is the only thing they know about historic Japanese culture, and they know even less about historic Chinese or Korean culture. Chanbara film and story is what the game was created to emulate.
However, Samurai in Legend of the Five Rings does not mean the same thing as it did in historical Japan. In Rokugan, Samurai are descendants of humans chosen by and intermarried with a group of now-human gods, selected to protect and serve humanity in various roles as appointed by a divine Emperor at the beginning of the world. Whether they live up to their original purpose or not depends on the nature of your own campaign, but the world itself defines them as bearers of that legacy. Bushido within Legend of the Five Rings is the code of right living, unrelated to the way of the warrior, created by those gods to govern the behavior of their descendants in order that they may lead a virtuous life. It does not require military skill or oppression, but is primarily focused on having a deep responsibility to your family and your broader community, deeper than we commonly encounter in moral codes found in Western culture such as the code of chivalry.
These terms for Samurai and for Bushido are used in the fantasy world of Rokugan and the real world of Japan. But they have different meanings. They are shared because the designers of L5R wanted to draw on the familiar Japanese iconography and culture to build out and support their game.
This is something worth discussing at your table. Of course, most groups will understand that "This is not historical Japan." But that does not mean that these elements cannot potentially be problematic or confusing.
If you choose, in response to these discussions, to back away from the terminology of historical Japan, we can offer the following terms.
But Japanese history , like the history of most major cultures of the world, Eastern and Western, has extremely problematic elements. And those elements are not something that can be simply ignored within a role playing game, especially when playing that game with people from cultures directly impacted by those problematic elements.
The Samurai of Japan did not encompass all of Japanese nobility; prior to the early Edo solidification of the caste structure, a Samurai was generally an officer class military position originating in the Japanese nobility but open to others with sufficient training during the Sengoku period (1467-1615). Their leadership were warlords, enforcing their power by their military might. During the late Sengoku, they were responsible for multiple invasions of Korea. With the Edo period (1603-1868), the caste structure became locked down and large military units were discouraged, so Samurai fell into a more advisor, enforcer, or civil servant role with no chance of elevation from the lower castes, and still perpetuated a rigid class and social structure that continued up to the Meiji Period (1868-1912). During and after the Meiji period, propaganda drawing on the iconography and legendary ethos of the samurai, including the Code of Bushido, was used to build Japan up as a world power, a power that took center stage with repeated invasions of China, Korea, and other smaller countries across Asia during World War 2, during which time Japanese troops inspired by this samurai iconography committed many war crimes.
History does this to us. It creates powerful stories of the past, and holds within it valuable insights to help us understand ourselves and the world. But it also has ripples that effect real people today. The pain of discrimination and oppression doesn't just disappear when we wish it to. Westerners, in the United States and Europe, have acted the oppressor over foreign countries and on disenfranchised people within their own country. China and Korea had extremely problematic parts of their history as well. Ill treatment of women is virtually an accepted universal for most of human history; in this regard, early Japan, with its matriarchal society, was actually an outlier. Any game, even Dungeons and Dragons, that draws from any sort of real historical culture or group of cultures is going to run into these sorts of problems.
But complex periods of conflict and questioning also give room for Role Playing games to happen.
Fantasy Flight Games cannot remove Samurai completely from Legend of the Five Rings.. For many Westerners, that is the only thing they know about historic Japanese culture, and they know even less about historic Chinese or Korean culture. Chanbara film and story is what the game was created to emulate.
However, Samurai in Legend of the Five Rings does not mean the same thing as it did in historical Japan. In Rokugan, Samurai are descendants of humans chosen by and intermarried with a group of now-human gods, selected to protect and serve humanity in various roles as appointed by a divine Emperor at the beginning of the world. Whether they live up to their original purpose or not depends on the nature of your own campaign, but the world itself defines them as bearers of that legacy. Bushido within Legend of the Five Rings is the code of right living, unrelated to the way of the warrior, created by those gods to govern the behavior of their descendants in order that they may lead a virtuous life. It does not require military skill or oppression, but is primarily focused on having a deep responsibility to your family and your broader community, deeper than we commonly encounter in moral codes found in Western culture such as the code of chivalry.
These terms for Samurai and for Bushido are used in the fantasy world of Rokugan and the real world of Japan. But they have different meanings. They are shared because the designers of L5R wanted to draw on the familiar Japanese iconography and culture to build out and support their game.
This is something worth discussing at your table. Of course, most groups will understand that "This is not historical Japan." But that does not mean that these elements cannot potentially be problematic or confusing.
If you choose, in response to these discussions, to back away from the terminology of historical Japan, we can offer the following terms.
Alternate Terms
Samurai = Saburai
Saburai is the older term used for this warrior nobility prior to the Sengoku period. As an older term, it sounds similar to the later term 'Samurai' but predates the term that was used for propaganda, and predates the Japanese invasions of Korea.
Samurai = Sābanto or Kashin
If you want to separate even further from the term Samurai, the term Sābanto 'Servant' can be used and carries the focus on the service of the Samurai to the Emperor and the Empire. Another term, Kashin 'Retainer', is used for a Daimyo's vassal or retainer. This would not necessarily encompass Ronin, but it captures the relationship between a Samurai and their Daimyo.
Alternatively, you can simply use the English term Nobles instead of Samurai for your storytelling.
Bushido = Shidou (士道)
Shidou would describe the 'Way of the Scholar/Gentleman' or the moral code of the children of Lady Sun. Although not every samurai will be a warrior, every samurai should aspire to being a person of refinement and learning. This term in real Japan harks back to the Chinese philosophies of Confucious brought over during the Heian period, and has a spiritual connotation that works well with Legend of the Five Rings.
Eta or Hinin = Burakumin or Hisabetsu-burakumin (Highlight for hidden text)
In 4th Edition, the term Eta was used for the lowest level of working class, beggars, criminals, and others with jobs that are socially disdained or considered dealing with unclean things. This term should NEVER be used. It is considered incredibly offensive and objectionable. Hinin is also a term used to describe the outcasts of society. The term Burakumin is used in 5th Edition and is socially acceptable for both of these groups. Hisabetsu-burakumin means 'Discriminated minority Burakumin' and is more polite as a modern term, acknowledging the history of discrimination against this social group. These terms can be used in your Rokugan.
Rokugan is no utopia, and the caste system is intended to be an area of injustice and a challenge for your player characters. But if this is not a challenge that your players want to confront, you can rule that in your table's version of Rokugan there is no separate caste for Burakumin and Heimin. The most common use for the term when playing L5R is for a person whose job it is to collect and prepare the dead for their funeral. In this circumstance, feel free to use the English term Undertaker.
Note: Some of the fiction on these pages was written before I knew that it was objectionable. I have been trying to clean it up, but if you find any places where the older term is used, please let me know.
Gaijin = Gaikokujin
Rokugan is generally portrayed as a xenophobic society, with prejudice against foreigners. Gaijin, or Outsider, has that pejorative connotation and is considered by many to be a slur today. The non-pejorative word to use is Gaikokujin, or Person from a Foreign Country.
Saburai is the older term used for this warrior nobility prior to the Sengoku period. As an older term, it sounds similar to the later term 'Samurai' but predates the term that was used for propaganda, and predates the Japanese invasions of Korea.
Samurai = Sābanto or Kashin
If you want to separate even further from the term Samurai, the term Sābanto 'Servant' can be used and carries the focus on the service of the Samurai to the Emperor and the Empire. Another term, Kashin 'Retainer', is used for a Daimyo's vassal or retainer. This would not necessarily encompass Ronin, but it captures the relationship between a Samurai and their Daimyo.
Alternatively, you can simply use the English term Nobles instead of Samurai for your storytelling.
Bushido = Shidou (士道)
Shidou would describe the 'Way of the Scholar/Gentleman' or the moral code of the children of Lady Sun. Although not every samurai will be a warrior, every samurai should aspire to being a person of refinement and learning. This term in real Japan harks back to the Chinese philosophies of Confucious brought over during the Heian period, and has a spiritual connotation that works well with Legend of the Five Rings.
Eta or Hinin = Burakumin or Hisabetsu-burakumin (Highlight for hidden text)
In 4th Edition, the term Eta was used for the lowest level of working class, beggars, criminals, and others with jobs that are socially disdained or considered dealing with unclean things. This term should NEVER be used. It is considered incredibly offensive and objectionable. Hinin is also a term used to describe the outcasts of society. The term Burakumin is used in 5th Edition and is socially acceptable for both of these groups. Hisabetsu-burakumin means 'Discriminated minority Burakumin' and is more polite as a modern term, acknowledging the history of discrimination against this social group. These terms can be used in your Rokugan.
Rokugan is no utopia, and the caste system is intended to be an area of injustice and a challenge for your player characters. But if this is not a challenge that your players want to confront, you can rule that in your table's version of Rokugan there is no separate caste for Burakumin and Heimin. The most common use for the term when playing L5R is for a person whose job it is to collect and prepare the dead for their funeral. In this circumstance, feel free to use the English term Undertaker.
Note: Some of the fiction on these pages was written before I knew that it was objectionable. I have been trying to clean it up, but if you find any places where the older term is used, please let me know.
Gaijin = Gaikokujin
Rokugan is generally portrayed as a xenophobic society, with prejudice against foreigners. Gaijin, or Outsider, has that pejorative connotation and is considered by many to be a slur today. The non-pejorative word to use is Gaikokujin, or Person from a Foreign Country.
Problem Tropes
When playing a game based on East Asian Cultures, even fantasy cultures, there are certain images or iconography that should be avoided or at least considered very carefully and with forethought before bringing it into a campaign. I have included below some of these tropes that Asian players, either from the Asian diaspora or from Japan, have found problematic based on their own experiences with discrimination and racism within their societies.
- Dragon Lady - Full Description An Asian woman, usually heavily made up in makeup, jewelry, and revealing clothing, whose intent is to seduce and/or physically harm the hero, often both. The trope plays off the exoticism of the minority, and is intentionally created as both alluring and alien. If you wish to incorporate a female seductress in your L5R campaigns, remember that seduction works best when the person being seduced is unaware of their entrapment, so approaching with a less overt, more subtle female antagonist who seems to be initially very helpful to the heroes will improve your storytelling significantly. As a visual trope, an image can convey the Dragon Lady negative stereotype even if the personality of the character is not intended to match the trope.
- Fu Manchu - Full Description An Asian man, almost universally portrayed in ornate courtier's robes and with a long, narrow mustache that dangles to either side of his mouth. He is a villainous Mastermind behind every evil plot. This was the quintessential 'Yellow Peril' stereotype of the Asian in Western movies, used to discriminate against Asians in cinema and, consequentially, in real life for over 50 years. Any villains exhibiting this mustache should just be avoided out of hand. As a visual trope, an image can convey the Fu Manchu negative stereotype even if the personality of the character is not intended to match the trope.
- White Savior - Full Description A foreigner, specifically a well-educated white foreigner, comes from outside a community and saves the members of that community from the evils that beset them. This is fortunately rare in Legend of the Five Rings, since generally all PCs and characters within the narrative are native to Rokugan. However, Rokugani can act as White Saviors to other cultural groups, and this should likewise be avoided. As a visual trope, an image can convey the White Savior stereotype even if the personality of the character is not intended to match the trope.
- Meaningless Suicide / Seppuku for Honor - When Western Explorers reached Japan, they were eager to report on the areas of Japanese society that seemed the most strange and alien compared to their own society. In turn, these observations became the initial impressions of Japanese society to the West. One of the things those early observers latched onto was the rare occasion when a noble would take responsibility for an offense, either voluntarily or because they were compelled to, by performing the act of seppuku. This, and a community that placed greater emphasis on the good of the community over the good of the individual, led to Westerners lingering on the macabre details of these suicides and inflating the frequency that this act was offered or performed. It also led to a misinterpretation by Westerners of Asian honor that was overly rigid and tied to an expectation of ritual suicide for any minor offense. This depiction makes members of such a society, and, by projection, all Asians, seem inhuman, without fears or personal desires, even a desire to live, and pushes an impossible standard. While seppuku can be part of your stories, it should be the culmination of an entire story arc, fully grounded in reason, in a situation where the death penalty would likely be applied. It should serve as the last acknowledgement of responsibility by a person who has done, or caused, terrible things, and should be depicted with seriousness and gravity.
Suicide in general is a weighty topic for an RPG, and different cultural pressures regarding suicide mean that the topic should be handled with great care. Additional Reading. - Model Minority - Full Description The idea that a certain ethnic, religious, or racial minority group whose members are believed to achieve extremely high success in integrating with their encompassing majority culture, usually portrayed by extreme success economically and, especially, in their schooling. This is extended to a belief that all members of this minority must have excelled, through a combination of natural ability and extremely strict parenting, and is often used to deny institutional racism or that other forms of prejudice exist. You can have stories in your games of parents who use high-pressure tactics on their children; this is a universal for many individual households. But avoid extending these tactics to a broader clan and make sure that members of that clan can embrace the wide diversity of human experience and ability.
