Legend of the Five Rings (often abbreviated L5R) is a fictional setting created by John Zinser, Dave Seay, Ryan Dancey, Dave Williams, DJ Trindle, Matt Wilson and John Wick and first published by a joint venture between Alderac Entertainment Group and ISOMEDIA in 1995.

Rokugan is based roughly on feudal Japan with influences from other East Asian cultures such as China, Mongolia and Korea.

Legend of the Five Rings was also the "featured campaign setting" of the Oriental Adventures expansion to the third edition of Dungeons & Dragons, though this book is now out of print.

The Kotei Season runs generally February through June of each year, where regional tournaments occur around the world.

Kotei winners are pre-qualified into major events such as Gen Con and the European Championships, allowing them to skip the qualifying rounds.

In September 2017, after Legend of the Five Rings was purchased by Fantasy Flight, they announced a fifth edition of the RPG, which was released on October 11, 2018.

[citation needed] Clan War was a miniature based model strategy game produced by AEG, whose story line is derived from the Legend of the Five Rings setting.

[13] In May 2009, Death at Koten was published, a graphic novel written by Shawn Carman which takes place in the Legend of the Five Rings setting.

[19] Legend of the Five Rings is set primarily in the fictional land of Rokugan (also known as the Emerald Empire), based on feudal Japan with influences from other East Asian cultures,[20] where samurai, shugenja, and trained courtiers vie for control of the noble courts.

They are regularly threatened by evil plots from within, but the main threat still lies to the southwest of Rokugan: the deadly wastes of the Shadowlands, where demonic hordes roam.

A few foreign visitors from these lands have been featured in Legend of the Five Rings, but have not played a major role in the storyline.

Much is unknown of these lands, mostly due to the extreme xenophobia of the Rokugani, shown in the story by an Imperial mandate of non-interaction with gaijin.

Alderac Entertainment Group (AEG), in partnership with Isomedia, first designed and published the L5R collectible card game in 1995.

Eventually, it became obvious that L5R would greatly benefit from the sort of promotion, marketing, and production that costs a lot of money.

Some of the original AEG and Isomedia folks found interested investors and formed the Five Rings Publishing Group (FRPG), which purchased the intellectual property (IP) that is L5R.

The fans liked it enough to vote it the Best RPG of 1997 at the Origins Awards, and the core book went through four printings while spawning two dozen sourcebooks and add-on products.In 1997, FRPG was purchased by Wizards of the Coast.

In late 2000, however, speculation about the future of Legend of the Five Rings – especially the RPG – began to run rampant after Hasbro, during a string of decisions that greatly upset the leadership at Wizards, decided to sell Legend of the Five Rings two years before AEG's long-standing license was due to expire.

Any fears turned out to be unfounded when, less than half a year later, AEG won the bidding war for Legend of the Five Rings.

AEG released Lotus Edition for the CCG in late 2005, beginning the Age of Enlightenment story arc.

While the property was controlled by Wizards of the Coast, the creation of the Four Winds arc (starting with Gold Edition) was helmed by Paul Allen Timm and Rob Heinsoo with contributions from Andy Heckt and Frank Chafe.