So, If I am reading the quest right, only master monsters and the Baron can carry the Rune Key. Am I correct in understanding this?

I'll have to double check my quest guide, but that sounds right.

Yeah. I was thinking at first heroes could carry it.... but it doesn't say they can. So that makes a pretty difficult quest even harder.

So er.... anyone know what the formal answer is?

"As an action, a master monster or Baron Zachareth may pick up the shadow key. A figure may place the shadow key in an adjacent space by spending an action"

So the heroes/minion monsters do not have an action to pick the key up, so they can't carry it. Reading it like this I do find the second part a bit weird though.

Shouldn't it at least be 'A figure carrying the Shadow key ..', because now it seems like any figure can spend an action to place the shadow key in an adjacent empty space to him

Couldn't it be that any figure can spend an action to move the shadow key by "placing the shadow key in an adjacent space"?

A non master monster would be able to move it slightly (max 2 spaces) but could not carry it for 2 move actions.

Same goes for the heroes.

I originally played it where the heroes couldn't interact with the key at all, but looking at it now, given is specifically says figure as opposed to lieutenant/master it sounds like heroes could shimmy it around without picking it up.

This would even the playing field a bit allowing the heroes to backtrack the key a bit, but without the OL needing to kill a hero get the key back, as they just pick it up off the floor.

Seems a little unintuitive, but I can just picture the heroes kicking the key back along the floor :-)

It is worth asking. Exactly as written, it seems any figure can move the key. However, the proximity of that sentence to the last one suggests that MAYBE, they just didn't want to write "a master monster or baron zachareth" again.

IDK... maybe this quest deserves a little improvisation. I don't know why the key shouldn't be able to be carried by the heroes. One thing that leads me to believe this is the Search token that is behind one of the doors... that only be unlocked by someone holding the key.