Great stuff Flynn.  I found three things to be of absolute necessity:

1.  The map from gitzman (scribbled out the secret stuff). I enlarged it and put it on the table to represent where people were.  I was just going to draw it on the battlemat, but the Gtizman map was quicker and easier.

2.  A list of NPCs and their jobs that I gave to the players.  Again, this gives players a chance to focus and make notes.

3.  A MAP of what's OUTSIDE the mansion was scribbled on the battlemat.  Nothing complicated.  I just drew an exterior wall, and boxes or circles with the names of the external locations. .Pplus, I ALWAYS tell them that NOT EVERYTHING IS DRAWN ON THE MAP.  When players aren't told that, they forget to think outside the box.  They forget to look for secret doors, bookshelves, ladders covered over in vines, etc.

.  My players spent most of their time outside checking out each of the kennels, etc.   One lone player who thought he'd sneak around the inside of the house was driven insane by You-Know-What, and then later beastmen cornered him in a room and "skrinded' his bones."

Some of the things that I embellished on:

*  The NPCs moved the You-Know-WHat after the first viewing by the PC (who was driven insane) and replaced with a picture of an old woman (but there was still a dust stain on the wall that the other PCs could see later

*  I had the kennelmaster feeding beastmen to the dogs (because there wasn't any meat around otherwise and he saw no harm in it), which made the PCs paranoid about it all.

I think I only killed off one PC in that finale.

jh