Rokugan Local Governance:
Variations: The Scorpion Clan
Scorpion Clan Governance
- Families: Scorpion families are extremely tight knit. Children are spoiled and lavished with affection in comparison to most other clans. They are given a free-spirited run of the household, but all the while they are watched carefully to determine those traits that would make them excel.
- Families: It is considered unlucky for anyone to mention that a family member is away from home. Despite this, it is customary for Scorpion samurai to live and work far from their home, leading to much evasion on the part of those who remain. If both partners fill important duties for the clan, their whole household and all its tasks, including the rearing of very small children, will be done by servants, elderly parents, or lower-ranked samurai. While the Scorpion samurai are away, those that remain will deny their absence, claiming that they are just temporarily unavailable.
- Families: Scorpion bushi are called up each summer, just as those of other clans are. They may be sent either to drill, or to be sent on 'exercises' where small units are sent into enemy clan lands to scout, gather information, and fight if caught. Of course, if caught, they only got lost, and the Scorpion will arrange a suitable recompense. This keeps the Scorpion bushi sharp...and wary.
- Families: Marriages for Scorpion are always arranged for the benefit of the clan. With rare exceptions, Scorpion only marry once, and a failed marriage is a failure of duty to the clan.
- Families: Scorpion look forward to their retirement, and retired Scorpion are looked at with reverence and awe.
- Villages: Scorpion sonchou prefer to wait to allow a situation to develop to untenable levels before interceding. This serves two purposes: it makes the true perpetrators much more obvious, and it allows the sonchou to be able to determine who among his villagers would be tempted into a position that would endanger the clan. He may allow those villagers to live, but he will be able to use this knowledge to better control his village in the future.
- Villages: Scorpion villagers tend to be less well-treated than those of other clans, with high demands placed upon them. If they try to leave, they are treated harshly, and they are always afraid a spy within the village will report their departure. The Scorpion daimyo do have spies within many villages, however, who report local sonchou who abuse their power too egregiously. Fear serves as an effective motivator for heimin and samurai alike.
- Towns: The Scorpion know that all samurai have secret 'needs' that must be fulfilled, and there is power in being the ones who own the means of fulfilling them. Their towns serve as a hotbed of sin and vice, a drawing together of every pleasure money or power could acquire. Peace is only marginally kept, the goal of which is to prevent embarrassment to the city governors and leadership. However, this lack of discipline is a disguise. Spies for the governor pervade the city from top to bottom, and if any force gets out of control subtle methods are used to remove the threats.
- Towns: In times of war, Scorpion cities, due to their lack of discipline, struggle to rein themselves in. However, the absolute duty of the Scorpion ensure a quick and completely obedient, or necessarily lethal, resolution to internal chaos.
