Factions

Factions and Paths

Characters in NewEdo all have a Path, which loosely defines their role in the game. Most Paths are part of a Faction, which gives context to the politics and perspectives of those characters who adhere to it.

The Factions

the Tekun Alliance
The Tekun embody NewEdo’s growing embrace of technology and the future. They’re a variegated group of soldiers, spies, ambassadors, and scholars who seek to push the Empire into what they see as a better tomorrow. Adaptive and collaborative, the Tekun find it easy to attract members from younger generations, but the Land of Balance and Change holds tightly to its traditions, and change comes slowly. Alliance members can often be identified by their heavy use of cybernetic augmentation, but socially they’re a diverse group of rebels with a cause.
Paths
Envoys: the cunning face of the Alliance
Operatives: heavily-armed and -armoured defenders of the future
Seibishi: gearheads and gunsmiths with no patience for pleasantries
Eiko
The Eiko are a powerful coalition of clans who seek to preserve the traditions of the Empire. They garner strength from the country’s respect for its past and seek to slow her headlong rush into an uncharted future that may weaken citizens’ commitment to honour and duty. Many Eiko wear traditional clothing, typically kimonos or uniforms from the previous eras, and it’s not uncommon to see samurai and Imperial soldiers roaming the streets of NewEdo.
Paths
Boar Clan: wild fighters with fire in their soul
Earth Dragons: commanders who lead from the front
Musashika: smooth-talking duelists with an edge
the Orange Umbrella
The Orange Umbrella is a secret cabal whose agents seek to balance power in the Empire, never letting the pendulum swing too far from the centre. The two Paths that make up the Umbrella – the Oiran and Rooster Clan – are only loosely identified as organizations by most of NewEdo, and only highly informed individuals would suspect that these two work together towards a common end. For centuries, the Umbrella has worked one side against the other, or offered their services to the underdog, in an effort to prevent madmen, megalomaniacs and idealogues from asserting too much power over the common people of the Empire.
Paths
Oiran: courtesans and spies to whom no doors are closed
Rooster Clan: ghosts, and a nightmare to those who threaten balance in the Empire

the Seven Swords
The Seven Swords used to be holy warriors – monks, devotees, and ascetics who fought for the protection and primacy of their beliefs. They went through periods of political ascendancy, battled with foreign religions and domestic competition. Then the religion of the land became codified under the Courts, and the Seven Swords were no longer necessary. After centuries of spiritual attrition, what was left of the Swords were those whose hearts were filled not with faith but with anger. Having lost none of their martial potency, modern Seven Swords now only bow to one god: money.
Paths
the Guild of Tears: mercenaries who are highly effective in a team
Soul Eaters: dark monks trying to uncover a long buried secret
Speakers
While the Seven Swords gave up their faith, the Speakers have built a religion around nature (including the body) as the true embodiment of the Way of Balance and Change. The Speakers have a connection to the natural order that grants them power that exceeds or confounds most modern marvels. Speakers don’t seek to hinder change and understand that technology in the modern world is just another phase in an endless cycle, one that inevitably returns to balance.
Paths
Shugonshi: wizards with a strong connection to the spirit world
the Way of Five: healers who perfect their knowledge of the body
the M.R.D.
The Metro Response Directorate is a support branch of NewEdo's law enforcement network. Providing intelligence, investigative, and first-response services, MRD officers do not have arresting authority. Since MRD officers aren’t authorized to use force except in self-defence or in the defence of innocent civilians, they’re far less likely to engage in the type of violence that makes the evening news, and as such tend to be popular with the common citizens of the city... unlike the tactical NEOSAMA unit.
Paths
Hitokage: spies and covert intelligence agents
Inspectors: sleuths and detectives
Responders: heroes who run toward trouble

the Orderly Beneficent Association
The Orderly Beneficent Association (OBA) is a dichotomy in NewEdo. They don’t shy away from the criminal nature of their endeavours, but they also uphold themselves as the staunchest of the city’s defenders, particularly of the downtrodden. By day, they participate in community groups, teach martial arts to youth for free, and volunteer at museums and cultural centres. Their detractors say that the community efforts of the OBA are no more than a spin campaign designed to provide a social buffer for their criminal activities… but in the communities they help, they’re viewed as heroes.
Paths
Architects: spiders who build webs in every corner of the Empire
Kyodai: the front line of the OBA, soldiers who see each other as kin
Unaligned Paths
Not every Legend is suited to the type of cause that the Factions identify with. Those on these four Paths are iconoclasts, rebels, individualists, and eccentrics, who may or may not even acknowledge that they're part of a greater whole.
Paths
the Bozu: anarchists and road warriors with panache
Ghost Talkers: technomancers with only one foot in the door of reality
Clan Onikiri: monster hunters who see themselves above the politics of NewEdo
Onmyoji: esoteric magic users with a connection to an older way of doing things