This is a playthrough of my new game, Blaydon Grange Solo Edition (available at Itch or DriveThruRpg, free or pay what you want). This is a solo RPG based in the genre of girls boarding school fiction, similar to the Malory Towers books (and TV series), the St Clares books, the Trebizon novels and others.
In previous posts I’ve created a player character, a couple of NPC pupils, the headmistress and matron. I then randomly determined the four main story arcs of this term. I’ve summarised things graphically as follows:
(I used Roll20 to keep track of things and have ported all the Oracle tables from the game into that system, but all the rules are exactly as per the pen and paper rules. The icons underneath Verity show Popularity – the hearts, Resources – the treasure chest and Authority – the crown)
Let’s get underway –
Opening Scene
It’s the first day of the new term – Verity and her friends are third formers now and feeling very grown up compared to the noisy, tiny-seeming first and second formers (but still in awe of the older pupils). As they pour out of the buses drawn up outside Blaydon Grange there are many excited yells, greetings and happy reunions.
No real challenge for this first scene, it’s just setting the stage. Scenes like this are there to show characters and how they interact with each other, and can be as short or long as you like. I’ll skip over the details but suffice to say Verity and Evelyn (her shy best friend) keep out of the way of Penelope who is as usual trying to boss everyone around. In fact I’ll make that the first challenge of the new Term! Trying to sneak around or stay unobserved uses the Mischief Trait (Evelyn has no score in this) and will be a Routine (difficulty 8) challenge.
I draw a 6 of Diamonds. A score of 6… with no Mischief Trait to add means a failure. Verity takes 1 Distress point and gains the Condition “Irritated” which will give her a -2 to any relevant challenges until she gets rid of it.
As Verity and Evelyn, clutching their bags, dodge around the bus in the hope of making it inside the school without being spotted, Penelope’s shrill voice rings out.
“Verity Mason! Stop leading poor Evelyn astray! Come here at once!” Verity is allocated a dull task of Penelope’s devising, counting the trunks as they’re unloaded from the buses. Penelope, never one to hide her light under a bushel sees a nearby teacher and dashes over.
Here’s a chance to introduce the first Story Arc – the New Teacher – The teacher that Penelope is sucking up to is the new arrival, Miss Penrose, a stylishly dressed woman with neat auburn hair and a bored expression.
“Good morning Miss,” Penelope simpers, “I’m Penelope Jessop. I’ve organised things as you can see, all running smoothly.”
We learned in the last post that Miss Penrose is a world-weary cynic. Time to get that on the page…
Miss Penrose fixes Penelope with a baleful gaze and sighs, then turning her eyes to the horizon. “A girl in the flush of youth and so concerned with busy work. What a world this is, what a world. Have you read Hamlet, Miss Jessop?”
Taken aback Penelope stammers out a “No.” Miss Penrose echoes “No” sadly and walks away.
Next Scene
At this point I’d normally just choose what type of scene to play next – and probably go for a Downtime scene to clear Verity’s “Irritated” Condition but in the spirit of leaving everything to chance, I’ll use the Scene oracle to determine what happens next.
The card is a Seven of Hearts – a Downtime scene after all, and 7 suggests “With a Friend” Perfect.
It’s later that evening and the girls are in their Dorm chattering happily. Across the way, Penelope is complaining about the stand-offish Miss Penrose to anyone who will listen. Verity is talking quietly with Evelyn, discussing their plans for the term and what they are hoping will happen. Evelyn, practical as ever, is content to let things just happen and deal with them, but Verity intends to be the top of the class in as many subjects as possible
With her Brains of 2 this is possible though probably hard to achieve! We’ll see. Since Verity’s “Irritated” Condition came about as a consequence of a relatively minor issue, I’m happy to say that this simple moment of fellowship is enough to cheer Verity up and remove the Condition. She keeps the Distress point though and would need another Downtime scene to try to clear that.
Since we have a background detail of Penelope trying to muster sympathy about Miss Penrose’s dismissive response I’ll use a random Oracle to see how that is going down. The question (which must be a Yes/No question) is “Does Penelope get the sympathy she hopes for?” and I’ll make the likelihood Evens – and the card drawn is 7 of Spades. No.
“Do be quiet Penny,” says one of the other girls
I’ll generate this new girl randomly and make her the head of the form – She is Stella Langley and her traits are Quiet Artiste, Loyal Defender and Unconditional Friend.
“It’s PENELOPE,” says Penelope automatically.
“Well, Penelope,” Stella goes on, “I was introduced to Miss Penrose after dinner this evening and we talked about her hopes for her classes. She’s very sophisticated, and I think she’ll be wonderful.”
We’d already learned that Miss Penrose was going to be a perhaps unhealthy influence as part of this story arc and here we see the first hints of that. Stella, the artiste (shall we make her a poet?) is already falling under Miss Penrose’s spell after learning in her meeting that Miss Penrose has a profound love of similar poets to those that Stella adores.
Penelope pouts and settles down grumpily for the night as Matron comes in and turns out the lights.
We end tonight’s session here
(I’ve added Stella Langley as an NPC. The red symbol next to Verity is her one remaining Distress point)
Otherworlds 