Editing Samurai (section)

== Tabletop RPGs ==
[[File:Samurai S&F 3e.jpg|right|200px]]
Samurai are a prominent fixture in just about any fantasy setting with an "ancient Japan" derivative somewhere in the world, which is to say that they're a prominent fixture in just about any fantasy setting.  

In [[Dungeons and Dragons]], the samurai was introduced as a class in the ''[[Oriental Adventures]]'' supplement of [[Advanced Dungeons & Dragons]] 1st edition.  It never really caught on.  

=== Third Edition ===
Third Edition has two "samurai" classes, and an unrelated "Master Samurai" [[Prestige Class]].

The Master Samurai prestige class debuted in ''Sword & Fist''. It's a horribly designed (as most things in that book are) class that requires '''six''' feats for entry. Of these six, two (Improved Initiative, Power Attack) are good, two could be good in a build dedicated to them that this class isn't (Mounted Combat, Mounted Archery) and two are meh at best (Cleave and Weapon Focus). It also requires three skills trained to enter, but only gives two at each level. There was no way to enter the class in anything approaching a normal build since no class had Knowledge (Nobility), Ride ''and'' Intimidate when ''Sword & Fist'' came out, and six feats on a fifth level character is every feat they have including the Human bonus feat. Only a [[Human]] [[Fighter]] of above average intelligence could enter at minimum level, and that took all their skill points. What did you gain for this horrible entry? A lot of terrible abilities that have no synergy with each other or the entry requirements (like a small bonus to a skill you couldn't possibly be trained in and meet the entry requirements), and the ability to add double strength mod to damage when using a katana. Double strength mod to damage is actually a good ability, but even with the cheesy interpretation that this is on-top of (instead of a replacement for) the 1.5x strength mod to damage of using a two handed weapon, it's still not worth the entry cost.

[[File:Samurai OA 3e.jpg|right|400px|thumb|We need megazord power!]]
The first base class, presented in the book titled ''Oriental Adventures'', is essentially a variant fighter. They trade their first bonus feat and delay their feats at level 6+ for an "Ancestral Daisho" feature which is actually pretty decent. Ancestral Daisho gives a character a pair of free masterwork weapons and allows them to sacrifice treasure to make enchant them for the normal magic item price. What makes this good is that they can sacrifice treasure directly for its full value, instead of selling it for half value first. Samurai also trades heavy armor proficiency for more skills and skill points. In exchange for a will save that doesn't suck, their bonus feat options are limited based on clan, and they have to follow an honor code that's pure fluff and has no mechanical effect. They also have the rare (and potent if used right) Iaijutsu Focus skill as a class skill. Since Ancestral Daisho is based on ''character'' level instead of ''class'' level, it's a blatant [[Dip Class]], with only the skills and RP being a reason to stay in class. Like Fighter, it's [[Tier System|Tier 5]]: Focused on one thing (weapon combat) and not even that good at it (Easily outclassed by [[Barbarian]]).

[[File:Samurai 3e CF.jpg|left|200px|thumb|While you were out drinking ale and fucking wenches, I was studying the blade]]
The second Third Edition Samurai came shortly after the transition to 3.5 in ''[[Complete Book Series|Complete Warrior]]''. It's considered the worst class in the game that wasn't intended for NPCs (and is actually [[Adept|worse than]] [[Expert|half]] [[Magewright|of those]]). See, ''Complete Warrior'' was one of the first supplement books published for 3.5 and Wizards of the Coast didn't understand how weak martial characters were compared to casting classes, even though they ''literally'' just flushed half an edition away due to including a spell that made casters even more stupidly OP, and designed most things in that book with the idea that [[Fighter]] was a perfectly fine base class. CW Samurai has only one good save, and the minimum possible skill points per level. Their first level feature is proficiency with the katana and wakizashi, something that literally could have just been included in their proficiency list. At level 2 they gain the Two Weapon Fighting feat (a sub-optimal choice in 3E without a source of bonus damage that applies to every attack) for free. At level three they gain a weak smite that just adds their charisma to attack and damage a few times a day. At fifth level he gets the Quick Draw feat anyone can take, except worse. At sixth level he gets a +4 to intimidate and the ability to do something anyone can do anyways, outright giving the page number for intimidate that says anyone can do it. Everything after this is improvements on these poor excuses for class features. To top it off, you need to follow a code of conduct or lose some of these features. CW Samurai are [[Tier System|Tier 6]]: The weakest PC class (<s>except maybe Truenamer</s> even the [[Truenamer]] can do things when min maxed to all hell) with abilities that make it only barely better than the [[Warrior]] NPC class. It's actually better to fall as a CW Samurai and take their [[Blackguard]] equivalent [[Prestige Class]] than to stay in the class, since Ronin is actually acceptable. Ronin isn't a particularly ''great'' class, but a full base attack bonus class with sneak attack progression, the ability to trade armor class for extra damage on a charge and some bonus feats is at least ''playable''.

=== Pathfinder ===
[[File:Hayato.jpg|right|300px]]
Later, under the quasi-D&D system of [[Pathfinder]], the samurai class became a tweaked variant of the [[Cavalier]] class, which, in addition to making sense (the cavalier class is basically a mounted [[knight]], and samurai were basically the Japanese equivalent) also makes them mechanically playable. Samurai shares the Cavalier's bizzare lack of Knowledge (Nobility) as a class skill. Like their parent class, Samurai are [[Tier System|Tier 5]] (Tier 4 with some archetypes) since they're really not that good at anything but mounted combat, which terrain often prevents. Despite this, the pregen was actually one of the best, and easily the strongest melee one till [[Bloodrager]] and [[Warpriest]] came out, since he used a two-handed weapon with power attack (compared to using [[Barbarian|an oversized weapon with penalty to hit]], [[Fighter|two weapon fighting]], [[Paladin|sword and board]] or [[Cavalier|forgetting to take Power Attack]]) and came with three of the most useful skills in the game (Perception, Diplomacy, Sense Motive).

Cavalier was already fairly weak on support, and Samurai got less than that. It has a grand total of seven archetypes (four of which were released in 2018, the system's final full year of support), and none of the Cavalier ones are compatible. This is the fewest of any class since while [[Ninja]] technically gets less, it can use good number of [[Rogue]] archetypes.
*Sword Saint: More in line with the traditional fantasy samurai, who forgoes his mounted class features for lightning-quick draw-fighting and other melee powers that let him [[awesome|cause a sonic boom every time he quick-draws someone to death]], but this comes too late to be useful.
*Yojimbo: A very minor and trades some offensive abilities for defensive ones, without doing anything to really make that defense viable.
*Sovereign Blade: Trade your mount for a +2 to saves, your rare challenge uses for some energy resistance, and your bonus feats for a lame SLA. It came in Legacy of Dragons, which is considered one of the worst books ever published crunch-wise.
*Brawling Blademaster: An archetype that tries to accomplish many things at once and accomplishes none of them, a lot like the CW Samurai. Non-light armor is traded for a ''very'' small bonus to AC that doesn't make up for it, a feature that would help two-weapon fighting is traded for two-weapon fighting as a bonus feat. Mount is traded for a monk's unarmed fighting.
*Ironbound Sword: Trades quick draw for the ability to make non-lethal attacks without penalty. Banner for the ability to make a few attacks a day that force the enemy to save or be instantly knocked out and (much later) improved disarming that fixes the main problem with disarming by letting you disarm natural attacks (you dislocate their joints and force them to give up attacking for a turn to fix that). Overall the trades are perfectly acceptable, but nothing more. Would be awesome if the disarm ability came before 14th level.
*Ward Speaker: In exchange for the limited resolve ability and a 1-minute ritual between uses the Samurai can pick from one of five sets of bonuses, some of which are pretty good and one of which does most of what you'd spend resolve on anyways. Compatible with Warrior Poet.
*Warrior Poet: Actually pretty decent. In exchange for medium and heavy armor, they gain charisma (to a max of samurai level) to AC when unarmored. In exchange for mount, weapon expertise, banner and mounted archery they get free weapon finesse (that can be applied to extra weapon types), one from a list of bonus abilities (many of which are actually decent), and always on half level to damage on attacks made with weapon finesse. What makes this archetype particularly well executed is it was printed with the Order of the Songbird, which supports these abilities.

=== Fifth Edition ===
[[Dungeons & Dragons 5th Edition]] gave D&D its most competent samurai ever in the form of a [[Fighter]] subclass in November 2016. It's essentially a super-tank, as it can give itself temporary hitpoints and advantage on all of it attacks as a bonus action for a turn three times per short rest, proficiency on Wisdom saving throws (which changes to your choice of Int or Cha saves if you've already got that power), can trade advantage on a combat strike to instead strike that target twice once per turn, and can delay taking damage that would reduce it to zero hitpoints until the end of an immediately gained bonus turn once per long rest. Oh, and it also gets to add its Wisdom modifier to its Charisma modifier when making Charisma checks to please or persuade those of high social rank along with either a bonus language or free proficiency in either History, Insight or Persuasion. Appropriate, given that the samurai were courtiers and nobility as well as warriors.

=== Other Systems ===
Outside the gigantic D&D juggernaut, most of the player characters in [[Legend of the Five Rings]] are going to be samurai of one stripe or another, though unlike D&D it refers to the entire social class, including courtiers and [[Shugenja|sorcerer-priests]] along with the warriors.

[[Shadowrun]] uses the term "street samurai" to refer to runners who tend to be of a violent persuasion, though the term no longer explicitly refers to melee-focused characters.  One of the megacorps, Renraku, has got an elite hit-team called the Red Samurai, who ''do'' rock the futuristic samurai armor look, though they use guns and explosives along with their katanas.

Appropriately enough, the Japanese RPG [[Log Horizon]] has Samurai as one of its eleven base classes.

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