I read in a review that one of the scenarios was broken and was wondering if that is a first printing issue or in both. The errata pdf doesn't seem to mention it so I figured I'd check with you guys.

PS: Going to introduce my wife to this game this weekend. She liked Elder Signs so I figure Ill give MoM a try.

Thanks in advance for helping.

As far as I understand, there was no second printing of Mansions of Madness. Also, I would need to know who the reviewer was and what scenario is broken to answer fully. Because Mansions is a first edition right now, there was a common amount of typos and some mechanics issues on release.

What comes to mind is Unnatural Urges may be the Action Card the reviewers were stating. The errata of that card is use once per investigator per Keeper turn. Otherwise, I have no idea what the broken scenario is. In general, the Keeper is difficult to defeat. The game rewards persistence in playing the game over and over as an investigator to achieve greatness in the game. In the "2 players" topic of this forum, you can find further advice about the game in general. Highly recommended that players take turns being Keeper (and it's just fun being the bad guy).

Regardless, Mansions of Madness is my favorite board game. I hope you pick yourself up a copy.

what was the broken scenario ? after playing all of them, I don't see any. Some are more difficult for the investigators than others, sure ; but broken ?

The broken story is the third. But only if you play the objective 1B, the others are a lot of fun!In the 1b the investigators can't win. If you put a 'spoiler' advice in the title, I'll explain you the bug!

*Spoiler

Yes, I discovered something personally but never really looked into it about Blood-Lines 1B.

If you summon the zombies in the Crypt right away as Keeper, and shamble them over to the altar's location, then it becomes a difficult race. Depending on how much threat the Keeper ascertains a round (pending on player amount as investigators), then the story may very well be impossible. Although you would be led to believe the more help you get, the easier it will be to win, truth be far from it: only one investigator can truly go clue hunting, because each key he gets leads him to another, and only through him, and clue hunting is the only way you can manage to find the hidden path the zombies shamble through. The more players, the more zombies appear to reach the same peramiters. The logical solution would be to intercept and destroy the zombies, but as I detail this fully, I realize in a one player situation, you'll be too busy guarding the passage (with hopefully a starting weapon or one you manage to find in the area). The question then becomes: does the Event deck when it has met its end uncover a win or tie for the investigator for this tactic? ... it doesn't.

Furthermore, the game becomes much harder depending which room requires the final key: the Crypt or Cave 1 with the altar. The only advantage to the Crypt having Clue 1 and the skull would be its closer proximity to the ladder for rushing to the Graveyard. There is also nothing to stop the zombies from spawning in the Crypt; whether it is locked or not for this purpose is irrelevant. Ideally, you would want the Cave with the Altar NOT to require a key, so if any zombies get past, the door won't obstruct you from destroying them. However, this is not mandatory.

The question again is, "Is Blood-Lines 1B solvable or impossible?"

The objective simply is one player to get to each clue as fast as possible. The other investigators need to be ready to jump down the ladder when it becomes revealed (and the clue-finder should be the first player taking his turns for this purpose). For each investigator, the Keeper should have a zombie shambling down the hall. If the Investigators have done it right, they should be dropping down the ladder with all Investigators attacking but the clue-finding Investigator. Depending on those rolls, at least one zombie should perish. The others will then shamble ONE move forward normally, and if there are any zombies left in Investigator spaces, they will attack investigators (who should be pretty fresh right now). Then it again is the job of the Investigators to pick off the lead zombies while clue-finder searches frantically for the other clues (or helps a turn or two smashing in zombie brains).

Can it be done? Yes, I strongly believe so. After taking out the player set-up map and using markers and threat tokens, the objective is more like "Mission: Impossible", but not mission: impossible (you get it?). One screw up by any one Investigator can hurt the chances of winning severely. Two screw ups will probably fail the mission. Three will cause an outright loss. This scenario is for experienced players only or a Keeper playing the game his or her first time. I even took the longest clue route to test my hypothesis. There are also some other things the Investigators can do to strengthen their odds, but this is not a walk through, so I am omitting these ideas. I also omitted a few other things (clue layout, for one) so the experience is still new if you play it.

Any more questions, let me know.

Oops, Raffo, thought you were asking how to beat it. If you have a "bug", I'd like to hear it though.

John C, let me know if this was the unwinnable scenario you were speaking of. If it's not, I will do an inquiry on that scenario too.

Regardless of the number of players, If the keeper spawns zombies in the crypt, the invenstigators haven't enough turns to win.

Thanks all for the responces.

There were 2 printings, one in October of 2010 and one in March of 2011. I think they just fixed some of the typos from the release in the second version. More info here: http://www.fantasyflightgames.com/ffg_content/mansions-of-madness/support/mansions-faq-v-2.pdf

That does sound like the scenario I hear about in the review. I forgot where I originally saw or read it.

How do you put spoilers in the title?