Is restoring an insane character during the refresh phase an option or must you do it if you can? Also, what happens if you restore a second copy of a unique character. Can you? Does one of them get destroyed, discarded, removed? Which one?

The rule book tells us that the player "chooses and restores one of his insane characters (if any)". Note it does not say "may choose". This is further clarified by the FAQ (2.1), "Definition and Terms", 2.2: Insanity: ... "One insane character must be restored during your refresh phase if you are able to do so."

So, yes, you MUST restore one insane character during your refresh phase if you have any.

Regarding your question on unique characters, you can never be in that position. An insane character never loses its name. It loses just about everything else, but not its name.

I don't have the rule book in front of me right now but the situation I'm pulling this scenario from involves Things in the ground. So, when Things in the ground puts characters into play insane you have to first check all insane characters under your control to make sure there are no copies of....already in play?

If you have a unique character in play, be it insane, exhausted, or ready, Things in the Ground can not bring another copy of that card into play. As The Professor said, insane characters never lose their name or unique-ness.

Thanks. I did not understand that insane characters retained their name. I pretty much thought that they only qualified as "a character" or "an insane character"

Hopefully it is understood I was not trying to be scolding... I didn't mean to come off like "If you had read the rule book, you would know...!" I just meant that we can find the answer in the rulebook and FAQ combined. It is not always obvious where things are or how they work together, but I like to support my interpretations of the rules with written documentation - just my style. It decreases the likelihood (but doesn't eliminate it!) of me making an error.

You can get a PDF file of the rules and the FAQ and the Tournament rules from the official support page, which is located at: http://www.fantasyflightgames.com/edge_minisite_sec.asp?eidm=11&esem=4 or perhaps through this link: javascript:void(0);/*1332438583117*/