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During a play-through this weekend, we stumbled on the odd happenstance of the Collapsed Room falling into the Mystic Elevator when drawn from the pile.

Is there any rules related to this situation that would somehow invalidate this? I'm of the opinion that it would be fine and you could magically fall through the floor up into the roof where the elevator could currently be placed.

Matthew Rodgers
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    Why do you think there might be an issue? – ikegami Feb 21 '18 at 21:21
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    If I understand right, the issue is that Collapsed Room asks for a basement tile, and you're unsure whether the Mystic Elevator counts as a basement tile if it could not actually currently be placed as one? – Cascabel Feb 21 '18 at 23:28
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    To answer my own question: Because one normally marks into which room the Collapsed Room drops characters, and the elevator could move away from the basement. – ikegami Feb 22 '18 at 00:31
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    This actually happened in the very first game I played. It led to an epic Haunt where people wound up fighting in the elevator, periodically getting kicked out of it, and then running back to the Collapsed Room to jump back into the fight. – The Spooniest Feb 22 '18 at 13:59
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    It's completely acceptable, in a haunted house, to go through a secret tunnel into a moving elevator, to step out of that elevator and fall through a pit in front of you, and to fall back into the elevator. It's a haunted house! – Samthere Feb 22 '18 at 15:03

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From my copy of the rulebook:

If an effect of another tile or card leads to the Mystic Elevator (such as the Collapsed Room or Secret Passage), the token placed by that effect stays on the Mystic Elevator tile even if it moves.

Emphasis mine.

It doesn't explicitly say that the token remains functional, but that clearly seems to be the intent.

I've also been able to find a reference to an FAQ clarification that says much the same thing, although I have been unable to find the FAQ itself.

Mystic Elevator -- If the Collapsed Room, Secret Passage, Secret Stairs, or Revolving Wall lead to the Mystic Elevator, does the counter stay there even when the elevator moves?
Yes. It's Mystic, after all.

Arcanist Lupus
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    First edition FAQ that includes that rule can be found on BGG: https://boardgamegeek.com/filepage/12137/betrayal-faq-bookletpdf – Ken Herbert Feb 22 '18 at 03:46
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There are no special rules regarding the Mystic Elevator as a newly discovered room. So yes, Mystic Elevator is just like any other room and can be discovered from the Collapsed Room (or any other rooms that require you to draw new rooms).

If the issue is that thematically, an elevator isn't something you should be able to fall into from above; remember that the elevator doesn't really work thematically at all... it is treated like a room as opposed to a tunnel between multiple rooms. So don't think of the elevator as an elevator at all. Think of it as a regular room that happens to teleport around.

GendoIkari
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  • So... in the future, whenever someone falls through the floor in the collapsed room, the elevator teleports underneath to catch them, then immediately teleports back to wherever it was? – Cascabel Feb 21 '18 at 23:40
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    I've always described Betrayal as "Scooby Doo - The Board Game." Think of the Mystic Elevator as the "Door Gag," where everyone runs in one door, then out an entirely different one, sometimes on the opposite side of the hallway. In that case, the house, by design, does not make geometric sense. To support this actual answer though, the FAQ for the game on WOTC's website does not call out any problem with the scenario described here, so Rules As Written, it still works, even if the Mystic Elevator ends up above the Collapsed Room. It's still the same room, regardless where it ends up. – MirrorImage Feb 22 '18 at 01:40
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    @Cascabel: Exactly! That's what makes it Mystic! – Arcanist Lupus Feb 22 '18 at 02:11
  • @Cascabel The elevator is already underneath the collapsed room. As the elevator teleports around, the geometry of the house adjusts to keep it so. – Acccumulation Feb 22 '18 at 22:12
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Betrayal at House on the Hill is kind of notorious for the rules not quite covering every situation clearly.

I think a strict reading of the rules says that you can fall in, and it gets marked as "beneath" the Collapsed Room so you can fall in later too, simply because there are no special rules for this situation.

That said, there are several non-game-breaking options for if/how you can fall into the elevator, and I think you can honestly just pick what you think is the most fun:

  1. Allow falling into it, and place it somewhere it can actually connect. (Pretend you fell in, then the elevator activated and moved.)

  2. Allow falling into it, and if there's not already a basement, find an actual basement tile to connect it to.

  3. Allow falling into it, but if it can't connect, the player has to actually activate and move the elevator to get out.

  4. Ignore all this and find a "real" basement room.

And then you have options for what happens after the elevator moves, and someone falls through the Collapsed Room again:

  1. They still somehow end up in the elevator, even if it means falling up.

  2. They draw a new basement tile, and that one is under the Collapsed Room now. (This is consistent with how the elevator works with doors: if you go through a door and the elevator is there, then it moves away, then someone goes through that same door later, they find a new room to put there, they don't magically end up in the elevator.)

The two first options are the strict rule reading mentioned above.

But it could also be more fun and flavorful to pick a different option, like 2 or 3 for the first choice (either connect to a new basement tile, or have to move the elevator) and 2 for the second (find a new room to put beneath once the elevator moves).

Given the frequent vagueness of the rules, and the fact that none of this is really going to break the game, I'd say go with whatever suits you.

Cascabel
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