The Owl Clan
The Owl Clan The Hantei Family (+1 Void) The Hantei were created from whole cloth when Raniya and Juzo, the new sun and moon, gave the Lying Darkness a name. In an instant, every true ninja in Rokugan was transformed into a very confused Hantei samurai, with no real history or memory. By imperial order, these Hantei were gathered and formed into the Owl clan, with the Otomo and Seppun families watching over them in addition to serving the house of Iwane.
The Hantei family is intimately tied to the void, possibly because of the strongly anti-void nature of the Lying Darkness from which they came. They also still bear some trace of the mandate of heaven, much to the discomfort of Iwane the First and his heirs. This is not entirely surprising, given the assimilation of the last Hantei emperor, but it bodes poorly in the long term for the stability of the empire.
As a family, the Hantei began as a blank slate, and were tutored slowly into competence by the Otomo and Seppun who came to serve them. One hundred years later, though they are not the imperial family, they have poise and bearing second only to the Iwane line itself, and comport themselves as ideal samurai in every way, in hopes of washing away the stain of their origins. Now if only the Unicorn and Scorpion would let them forget that origin.
The Otomo Family When the Owl clan was formed, Iwane knew that the newborn Hantei would require a great deal of training and guidance. He began by reinstating the Otomo family (except for their murdering daimyo) and tasking them with teaching the new Hantei their place in the empire. To aid them, he sent a branch of the Seppun, and between the two families, they began to whip these newborn samurai into shape.
In the end, serving two masters proved too much for both families, and by imperial order, the branches split. All of the Seppun serving the Owl took the Otomo name, and all the Otomo serving the Iwane took the Seppun name. Faced with new duties as teachers of the Hantei and the Owl duty of maintaining relations with the nonhumans of the worlds, the Otomo abandoned their original courtier school to the Seppun and developed a new one, better suited for their new tasks. They largely remain the arrogant samurai that they once were, but now they conceal it somewhat better, since they have little political clout with which to back it up.
The Tsi Family The imperial blacksmiths since the time of Hantei Genji, the Tsi were granted the right to continue serving the Hantei in the fledgling Owl clan. They had little status before, and noticed very little change.
The Toritaka Family (L5R RPG) The Toritaka family is an Owl clan family, but remains otherwise unchanged.
The Hantei Bushi (Imperial Histories 2 page 27) The Tsi Smith (Core rules) The Otomo Shugenja (Seppun Shugenja, Imperial Histories 2 page 28) The Otomo Diplomat (Imperial Histories 2 page 28) Toritaka Exorcist This path now replaces Seppun Shugenja 2 Falcon’s Strike This path now replaces Toritaka Bushi 2 or Hantei Bushi 2. Owl Doomseeker [Shugenja] (Second City, Unicorn Doomseeker) Replaces: Otomo Shugenja 4 Requires: Willpower 5. Must find a personal teacher who will share the secrets of the Doomseeker tradition. Technique: Path of the Doomseeker - The Owl Doomseekers learn to root out immortal evils, primarily khadi but also other such immortal and demonic entities who cannot be readily identified. Any time you are in the presence of a hidden demon, monster, khadi, or similar entity, you may roll Willpower at TN 25 to sense the presence and location of the creature. (Some GMs may wish to make this roll secretly in order to avoid tipping off the players.) With a success, you are able to pick up subtle clues that give away the entity’s true nature to you. If you have become aware of the presence of such a creature (either through this Technique or in some other way), you may spend a spell slot as a Complex Action to make a Contested Willpower roll against the creature – with a success, you gain a spiritual insight into the entity’s true nature and learn one key piece of information (GM’s choice) about how it can be unmasked and/or defeated. The second part of this technique cannot be used against the same target more often than once per month.
