Mansions of Madness

Mansions of Madness is a tabletop strategy game de-signed by Corey Konieczka and published by FantasyFlight Games in 2011. The players explore a locale filledwith Lovecraftian horrors and solve a mystery.

1 Gameplay

Mansions of Madness requires two to five players. Oneplayer takes the role of the “Keeper” and is responsiblefor the monsters and happenings of the game, while theother players take on the roles of investigators trying tosolve themystery. At the beginning of the game, the play-ers pick a scenario to play and set up the map accord-ingly. The Keeper consults his rule book to make deci-sions about the story and to place clues and traps acrossthe board. After setting up, the players begin at the start-ing point and take turns exploring. Each investigator maymove two spaces and carry out one action. Each investi-gator has a Health and Sanity value that depletes as theyare wounded or scared. Each time an investigator suffersdamage, the keeper may play trauma cards that inflict fur-ther penalties. For instance, after being hit, an investiga-tor might receive a broken leg and be unable to move asquickly as before, or they could develop nyctophobia afterhaving an encounter with an eldritch horror. During theinvestigators’ turns, the Keeper may play Mythos cards,attempting to injure them physically or mentally, degradeor destroy their items, or otherwise set them back.After the investigators complete their turn, the Keeperthen gets to react. He accumulates “threat” each turn,a resource required to use most of the Keeper’s abilities.Playing these cards is a large part of the keeper’s abilities,and they often cost threat to use.The goal is hidden from the investigators until near theend of the game, while the Keeper knows the objectivefrom the beginning.

2 The Investigators

Each of the investigators originates from Arkham Horror,another of Fantasy Flight’s board games.

• “Ashcan” Pete

• Gloria Goldberg

• Harvey Walters

• Jenny Barnes

• Joe Diamond

• Kate Winthrop

• Michael McGlen

• Sister Mary

Included in the Forbidden Alchemy expansion:[1]

• Carolyn Fern

• Dexter Drake

• Darrell Simmons

• Vincent Lee

Included in the Call of the Wild expansion:

• Amanda Sharpe

• Bob Jenkins

• Mandy Thompson

• Monterey Jack

3 Expansions

A number of expansions have been published:

1. Forbidden Alchemy

2. Season of the Witch

3. The Silver Tablet

4. Til Death Do Us Part

5. House of Fears

6. The Yellow Sign

7. Call of the Wild

8. The Laboratory

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2 6 EXTERNAL LINKS

Forbidden Alchemy included three new scenarios, andnew monsters, items, map tiles, and investigators. Fan-tasy Flight Games released six print-on-demand scenar-ios separately.[1]

Call of the Wild shifted the game’s focus to outdoor set-tings, and included five new scenarios, which were de-signed to be less linear in order to give the players morechoice into how to explore and investigate. Ally and NPCcharacters were introduced, and occasionally the Keeperhas to find clues and solve puzzles.[2]

4 Reception

Mansions of Madness received favourable reviews atEurogamer,[3] Penny Arcade,[4] and the Dice Towerpodcast.[5] Criticisms include the complexity of the game,and the amount of time it takes to set up and play.[6][5]Praise is often directed at the amount of replay value, theLovecraftian theme, and the uniqueness of the game.[7]

In the 2011 The Dice Tower Awards, Mansions of Mad-ness won the “Best Production Values” class and was therunner-up for the “Best Game Artwork” award.[8]

Watch it played, a YouTube series, started out as a re-source for Mansions of Madness.[9]

5 References

[1] Mansions of Madness: Forbidden Alchemy expansion,Forbidden Flight Games, retrieved 31 October 2013

[2] Mansions of Madness: Call of the Wild expansion, For-bidden Flight Games, retrieved 31 October 2013

[3] Smith, Quintin (2 April 2013). “Mansions of Madnessreview”. Eurogamer. Retrieved 30 October 2013.

[4] Groen, Andrew (1 July 2013). “Mansions of Madness is aboard game where one player is out to royally screw you”.The Penny Arcade Report. Archived from the original onDecember 11, 2013. Retrieved 30 October 2013.

[5] Vasel, Tom (2 June 2011). “A Review of Mansions OfMadness”. Dice Tower. Retrieved 31 October 2013.

[6] Nardini, Enrico (29 March 2011). “Table Top Tuesday:Mansions of Madness”. Pikigeek.com. Retrieved 31 Oc-tober 2013.

[7] Sadowski, Kaja (31 December 2012). “Starlit Citadel re-views Mansions of Madness”. Starlit Citadel. Retrieved31 October 2013.

[8] “2011 Awards”. The Dice Tower. 2011. Retrieved 31October 2013.

[9] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WJ_fNdICfiA#t=21

6 External links• Official website at Fantasy Flight Games

• Mansions of Madness at BoardGameGeek

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7 Text and image sources, contributors, and licenses

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