This is the set-up for Rosewood Abbey: The play-to-find-out tabletop RPG of monastic mysteries. Published by The Rolistes, it is inspired primarily by The Name of the Rose, the 1981 novel by Umberto Eco, and its 1986 film, as well as the television mystery series, Cadfael, based on the books by Ellis Peters. The tone of the roleplaying game is one of mundanity, that is, there are no spiritual, folkloric, or horrifying explanations to events in and around the abbey and the village, though they are something that the brothers will have to refute and disprove. In fact, because Rosewood Abbey has roots in Walloon, Flemish, and European folklore, its attitude towards religion is irreverent. Thus, it engages with imagery of both the Catholic Church and God, as well as actions regarded as being sinful or virtuous. This includes acts of criminality, blasphemy, and intimacy and sexuality, as well as violence and murder. What this means is that Rosewood Abbey is a roleplaying game for mature players.
Rosewood Abbey is a Carved from Brindlewood roleplaying game, which means that it uses the same rules as Brindlewood Bay: A Dark & Cozy Mystery. This roleplaying game is notable because it changed how mystery scenarios in roleplaying are run and played. Traditionally, the Game Master starts the game knowing the answers to the mystery—the victim, the suspects, the culprit, the means, and the motive—and the players and their characters have to deduce which of these is correct. In Brindlewood Bay—and thus in a Carved from Brindlewood roleplaying game—there is no set solution to any mystery. Instead, the Game Master has a slew of suspects and motives, and it is up to the players and their characters to hypothesise who the culprit is and why he committed the heinous act, and put it to the test. If it passes, the mystery is solved. If not, the players and their characters must continue their sleuthing. In Brindlewood Bay: A Dark & Cozy Mystery (and Mavens of Mystery), this is as elderly female amateur detectives; in Cryptid Creeks, it is as young River Scouts; and in Rosewood Abbey, it is as monks, or Friars, of Fratres Herodoti.
However, what is noticeable about Rosewood Abbey: The play-to-find-out tabletop RPG of monastic mysteries is that half of its one-hundred-and eighty pages are not devoted to setting or rules as much as an example of a playthrough or ‘Replay’. This relates the complete transcript of the third playtest of the roleplaying game and in particular, its first scenario. Such lengthy presentations are extremely rare in roleplaying outside of the Japanese roleplaying hobby, and this at a time when not every roleplaying game includes useful or even any examples, whether of the rules or play. It gives the reader a good idea of how Rosewood Abbey is played, but it is as a whole rather than showcasing specific aspects of the roleplaying game. What this means is that if the reader wants to look up a specific example of a rule in play, he may have to flip through all eighty pages of the Replay.
A Friar is defined by his Name and Moniker, Place of Birth, a Monastic Purview, Abilities, a Friar Move, and several items that give him ‘Joy in Small Things’. The Monastic Purview is what his primary task is at the abbey, such as beekeeper, copyist, or illuminator and he has five Abilities—Vitality, Composure, Reason, Presence, and Community—each rated between ‘-3’ and ‘+3’. Of the Abilities, Community, used when a Friar attempts to sway a large group of people, replaces the standard Sensitivity of Brindlewood Bay, as obviously, the world of Rosewood Abbey is devoid of the supernatural. His Friar Move is a special benefit or action that can be brought into play, typically providing a bonus to an Ability, another item that gives him ‘Joy in Small Things’, a separate Move that only he can do, and so on. A Friar Move also indicates a saint that the Friar is devoted to or reveres. For example, the Friar Move of ‘St. Brendan the Voyager’ indicates that the Friar has travelled to the various courts across Europe and has given him a touch of charisma, represented by a bonus to his Presence Ability; ‘St. Agatha the Nursing’ means that the Friar has a medical background and thus a medical bag which grants him Advantage when used, but is never marked as used; and ‘St. Ralph the Liar’ which enables the Friar to potentially distract or deflect from the consequences of a failure by advancing a Rumour from the Rumour Mill by making a Move roll. The Friar has several ‘Joy in Small Things’ items, each of which can be used once to grant him Advantage on a Move roll.
To create a Friar, a player chooses his Name, Moniker, Place of Birth, Monastic Purview, assign a single point to an Ability, and chooses one Friar Move, whilst the items that give him ‘Joy in Small Things’ are selected by the other players and the Cantor (as the Game Master is called in Rosewood Abbey). The process is simple, but is hidden in the Cantor section of the rulebook and does feel underwritten.
Friar Mathias of Dorsetshire
Place of Birth: England
Monastic Purview: Bookbinder
Friar Move: St. Gabriel the Herald
ABILITIES
Vitality 0 Composure 0 Reason +1 Presence 0 Community 0
JOY IN SMALL THINGS
Needle and thread, quill, parchment, cross, knife
Mechanically, Rosewood Abbey uses the Carved from Brindlewood rules, a stripped down version of Powered by the Apocalypse, the mechanics first seen in Lumpley Games’ Apocalypse World. To undertake an action or ‘Move’, a player rolls two six-sided dice, adds one of his Friar’s Abilities and aims to roll high. The results are either a ‘Miss’, a failure on a roll of six or less or a ‘Hit’ and a success on seven or more. Some Moves provide a more granular ‘Hit’ with different results if the roll is seven or more, ten or more, or twelve or more. Under certain circumstances, the player may roll with Advantage or Disadvantage, meaning that he rolls three dice and counts the highest two if he has Advantage or or lowest two if he has Disadvantage. Advantage can be gained from a Move, use of an unused item from the Friar’s ‘Joy in Small Things’, or the situation, whilst Disadvantage can come from a Condition the Friar is suffering from or is appropriate for the situation.
Every Friar has access to the Basic Moves of Rosewood Abbey as well as his own Friar Move. Providence Moves are only triggered under certain circumstances. The Basic Moves include the ‘Pious Move’ for when a Friar does something risky or faces a fear when inside the walls of the abbey, whilst the ‘Profane Move’ does the same, but when outside the abbey. Searching for a Clue, conducting research, gathering information, and so on is covered by the ‘Meddling Monk Move’. The ‘In Horarium Move’ is a way of removing Conditions—which when suffered typically inflict Disadvantage to a Move—when two Friars directly interact with each other, whilst the ‘Every Work of the Lord Move’ enables the Friars to draw upon an inspirational passage that is relevant to a situation to introduce an element to the Mystery that the Friars are investigating. Lastly, the ‘Confabulation Move’ enables the Friars to conjecture a solution to the Mystery. The roll is modified by the total of Clues found so far and the Complexity of the Mystery. If the result is a ‘Hit’, the solution is correct, but if the roll is not high enough, it can result in complications, whereas a very good roll can have additional benefits.
Rosewood Abbey is more confrontational than most roleplaying games in terms of the Cantor exposing the Friars to adversity, even to the point of Friar death. However, a Friar has access to the ‘Prick of a Thorn Move’. This is an automatic Move that is used after the outcome of another Move has been narrated to change the outcome by shifting the result by one tier, so a ‘Miss’ becomes a ‘Hit’ and a ‘Hit’ can be improved. In this way, a Friar can change his fate, but it is not without its consequences. The ‘Prick of a Thorn Move’ will be tied to a Thorn of Virtue or a Thorn of Sin depending upon the circumstances. At a subsequent point in the Friar’s routine, the player narrates a memory associated with the virtue or the sin whether it applied to the Friar himself or someone else. When this happens, a rumour in and around the village or abbey will be designated as virtuous or sinful.
Much of the play of Rosewood Abbey revolves around the Rumour Mill which tracks the rumours flying around the village and the abbey over the course of a campaign. These rumours attribute mundane events to the work of God or malicious spirits, though underlying all the other rumours is the speculation that a deity known as the Ancient exists and maybe revealed soon, though the Friars very much doubt it. In the long term, at the end of a campaign, as more rumours are marked as either virtuous or sinful and they are associated with a particular individual, the reputation of that individual can arouse the adulation or the ire of the mob. If the individual is associated with virtuous rumours, then he attracts the attention of the Apostalic See which will investigate see if he deserves to be canonised, but attracts the attention of the Papal Inquisition, which will likely torture him and excommunicate him as heretic if the rumours are sinful. Effectively, the last scene of a campaign is likely to be the Friars going before the bishop to argue the case for or against the person under scrutiny. Depending upon the roll, this can end badly for any Friar involved!
In the short term, play focuses upon solving mysteries and refuting rumours. There is good advice for the Cantor on running and presenting a mystery, as well as structuring to set a campaign up, including creating Friars. There is relatively little advice on creating individual mysteries, but the Cantor can build them around the rumours that appear and spread and model them on the three included in Rosewood Abbey. They start with ‘The Rose in the Garden’ in which a rose that bloomed recently in the cemetery orchard despite the cold weather goes missing. This is intended as an introductory mystery and is used for the Replay earlier in the book. In ‘Mocking Grotesquery’, the Friars try and find out why one of the grotesques in the abbey has changed its appearance to a likeness of a local person, whilst in ‘Fugit Inreparabile Tempus’ the Friars are tasked with discovering why the abbey’s bell was not sounded at the appropriate time as this has dire consequences! All three mysteries come with clues, locations, and suspects that the Cantor can lay before the Friars and their players to investigate and deduce a solution to each mystery.
Physically, the small and compact Rosewood Abbey: The play-to-find-out tabletop RPG of monastic mysteries is well presented. It is lightly illustrated, but the writing is engaging and in the form of the Replay, also entertaining.
If the Cantor and her players have any experience with playing another Carved from Brindlewood roleplaying game, the likelihood is that they will have no issues adjusting to playing Rosewood Abbey. Even a Cantor with experience of other storytelling games should have no problem running the mysteries given in Rosewood Abbey, but the Game Master or players coming to the roleplaying game afresh may be daunted by its play style and certainly its campaign structure. The Replay at the front half of the book does show the Cantor how the roleplaying game is intended to be played, but as a learning tool it is imperfect. The problem is that it is not written to be consulted so much as read through from start to finish, so cannot be used as a workable reference. It does need more and clearer advice in terms of set-up for both the campaign framework and individual mysteries, but Rosewood Abbey: The play-to-find-out tabletop RPG of monastic mysteries is thematically accessible and lends itself first to one-shot mysteries, but second offers a depth to short campaigns that pull the Friars into a swirling morass of rumour and superstition that can escalate and put them onto a potentially dangerous stage at odds with their previously provincial existence.
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