1) Ronin are not "different kind of combatants". The point is that the Samurai were kings in the land of the blind. Sure, samurai had to fight against each other, but "samurai techniques" were not tested outside Japan as much. So while certainly experienced at what they did, there's no historical reason for samurai to be superior fighters, level by level.
2) I have a great deal of trouble taking that seriously. So, because I don't have anything to specifically disprove it: Source? Not arguing, but it'd be nice to look this sort of thing up.
Regardless, for some reason, everyone is well bathed in high fantasy, unless otherwise noted. Stupid, yes. Unofficial genre convention, yes. And all their teeth are intact.
3) : p Just don't make "Master of courtly arts" into a Great Power and we're good.
4) Hmmmm. I'll get back to you on that. It sounds fair enough, but I'd want to see how it compares.
5) I think that's reasonable. What I meant with awe is that knights would be seen as inspiring (buffs).
6) Then the question is "What makes a Samurai (as in the character class) as opposed to simply a member of the social class?" Having "Any (forget the term, but the aristocracy of this level) can be a Samurai (as in the character class" doesn't make sense if we're following other legends.
7) I'm not sure how Iaijutsu Focus translates as "what martial artists use to break stuff". I'm really not. I think WotC tried to combine two seperate ideas here.
So...assuming we want to represent this as a Samurai thing, how do we make it a viable idea?
What do samurai (in legend or history) have here that we can work with? Any fool can learn Quick Draw, so that's not enough to justify a new skill.
Hm.
Possibly bonuses to Initiative (+2 at 5th level, +3 at 15, +4 at 25...note, these don't stack.)
I'm not sure about what as a "Make an Iaijutsu Focus roll.".
It ought to be something that is at times very useful, but not so much so that you maniacally max out this skill.
Hmm.