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Saturday, September 24, 2022
Mansions of Madness: Vol 1 - Call of Cthulhu 7th Ed - Review
Mansions of Madness - Volume 1: Behind Closed Doors (CoC 7e, 2020, 224 pages) is a collection of 5 scenarios set in the 1920s: Mister Corbitt, The Crack'd and Crook'd Manse, The Code, The House of Memphis, and The Nineteenth Hole.
The earlier 1990 version of Mansions of Madness included the following scenarios: Mr. Corbitt, The Plantation, Crack'd and Crook'd Manse, The Sanatorium, and Mansion of Madness.
Mister Corbitt and The Crack'd and Crook'd Manse are updated versions of the similarly titled scenarios published in 1990.
The connecting theme between all these scenarios are haunted houses, whether by ghosts or other entities. If you want to run a series of ghost hunter investigators, this would be the book to get. Most of the hooks are missing persons, but the action occurs in the houses the PCs enter.
I'd rank them in my order of preference: 1. Mister Corbitt 2. The Crack'd and Crook'd Manse 3. The House of Memphis 4. The Nineteenth Hole 5. The Code
Overall, all of these scenarios are enjoyable and quite solid. The newer scenarios are more complicated and harder to run.
Most of my sessions are 3 hours long. Different groups take different times, but my run times are here for comparison purposes. At conventions, I generally book a 6 hour time slot which includes time for explaining the system and a break for food.
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Mister Corbitt
Time Period: 1920s
Location: Boston, MA (can be moved to any city)
Pages: 30
Run Time: 1 session
Pre-Gens: None
Hook: Neighbor across the street is doing dodgy stuff.
Mr. Corbitt is not the same Corbitt from The Haunting scenario. They just coincidentally have the same last name.
The Plot: Mr. Corbitt accidentally drops the arm of a small child (amputated) while returning home at night. He uses these parts to build and feed the Child-Thing in his basement. PCs investigating his house will eventually run into the Child-Thing. The Bad Guys: The Child-Thing in the basement and Deadly plants in the Greenhouse.
I actually moved Mr. Corbitt's house to Arkham and made it part of my Miskatonic University series. The house across the street from Mr. Corbitt's is where the PCs reside, a boarding house for students run by a nice old lady. PCs rotate through the boarding house as they die due to mysterious circumstances on campus. Students must pay rent in advance because these irresponsible boarders sometimes just disappear without notice. Uncollected possessions are stored in labeled boxes in the basement.
So far, no one has followed Mr. Corbitt to the dump. PCs just observe and break into Mr. Corbitt's house when he's away. In the Greenhouse, the Purple Flower used to be a save or die poison, it has been toned down, allowing for a save throw each round. PCs have burned down the house several times. In my MU universe, the burned out hulk of Mr. Corbitt's house is a daily traumatic reminder when they leave the boarding house in the morning for classes.
One of the more disturbing things is the Scampering Woman-Thing reminiscent of A Christmas Story's leg-lamp prize, a woman's head attached to a leg.
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The Crack'd and Crook'd Manse
Time Period: 1920s (1925)
Location: Gamwell, MA (near Boston, but can be moved to any city)
Pages: 28
Run Time: 1 session
Pre-Gens: None
Hook: Investigate the disappearance of a home owner, determine if he's dead.
The Plot: Go into Mr Cornthwaite's house, discover something hungry is in the walls and is affected by salt. Try to destroy it and flee. The Bad Guys: Spawn of Shub-Niggurath oozing out of the walls.
The blob is in the basement, but it can also send tendrils between the walls and floors. Allow the PCs to find enough of the salt clues before doing a full press attack. In one run, the PCs ordered a dump truck full of salt and poured it into the basement.
The man with the axe is a great jump scare. Lots of opportunity for role playing and misunderstanding.
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The Code
Time Period: 1920s (1925)
Location: Hampton, NY (can be moved to a rural or suburban location)
Pages: 34
Run Time: 1 session
Pre-Gens: None
Hook: A friend has made an amazing scientific discovery and needs your help.
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The Plot: PCs are tricked into going to Wellington Manor. The servants are con artists trying to unlock a Time Suit with the help of the PCs. PCs can get their hands on it and unlock the suit first. The Bad Guys: Con artists posing as servants and Various things out of time: T'challix and Temporal Fractal Entity.
This is one of Jon Hook's favorites, but I'm more lukewarm on this scenario. I do like timey-wimey movies and stories, but a number of events seem very disjointed and fairly random. In my game, a PC unlocked the Time Suit and basically became a time god (or they thought they were at the end of the scenario). If the game continued past the end of the scenario, Hounds of Tindalos hunting PCs down would become a major issue.
I watched Seth Skorkowsky's YouTube video on this scenario, lots of great ideas. It requires lots of heavy lifting by the GM to make this a better scenario. Luckily Seth has done the work for you.
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The House of Memphis
Time Period: 1920s (1927)
Location: Boston, MA (can be moved to any city that can support a large entertainment industry such as Hollywood)
Pages: 40
Run Time: 2 sessions
Pre-Gens: None
Hook: Investigate the disappearance of Memphis the Great, a stage magician.
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The Plot: Memphis was murdered by his apprentice and is actually haunting his house and is looking for a body to possess. At some point, there is a battle royale between Memphis and his apprentice. PCs can aid in the banishment of Memphis. The Bad Guys: Memphis and his deadly versions of stage magician tricks.
I love the stage magician props and references to stage magic.
Room 15, the Theater Gallery. What's missing are stage magician trap doors. I'd add that to the stage platform and put in theater seating or at least a stack of foldable chairs. I'd also add mirrors on all the walls (covered by curtains), so the magician can watch himself perform while practicing.
In one run, the PCs helped Memphis possess his apprentice and they pledged their loyalty to him in exchange for money and power. This basically throws out all the SAN loss/award benefits at the end of the scenario and turned it on its head.
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The Nineteenth Hole
Time Period: 1920s (1928)
Location: Dundee, Scotland
Pages: 37
Run Time: 1 session
Pre-Gens: None
Hook: Investigate the disappearance of the owner of a golf club.
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The Plot: An etheric travel machine has trapped the inventors and the missing person in the ether, making them ghost-like. This also attracts multi-dimensional creatures. Find the machine and turn off its power without getting trapped yourself. The Bad Guys: Various etheric effects, Dimensional Shamblers, and Hounds of Tindalos.
The NPCs are fun to run. It'll be hard to relocate this scenario to a different golf course in the USA as various details are location specific. PCs went directly to the club house without doing other investigation which totally makes sense. Once they were in there, events happened, enough to make them leave and do some interviews and research before returning and exploring the club house more thoroughly.
Due to the etheric effects and various creatures this scenario could be very deadly.
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