Overview
At a glance
Is this game right for my group?
ABG editorial scores on a 1–5 scale.
Harder to teach
High replayability
Highly interactive
Scales well
Deep strategy
How it plays
How does it play?
A STORYTELLING BOARD GAME SET IN THE 1970s COLD WAR ERA. SMERSH is a portmanteau of two Russian words that translates to "Death to Spies." It operated as a counter-intelligence agency by the Red Army during the 1940s.
Core mechanisms
Key systems that shape the decisions players make.
Area Movement
Move pieces between connected regions rather than along individual spaces.
Narrative Choices
Choose between story options that lead to different passages and consequences.
Cooperative Game
Players coordinate their actions toward a shared objective and win or lose together.
Dice Rolling
Roll dice to introduce uncertainty into actions, production, movement, or resolution.
Point-to-Point Movement
Move along explicit connections between named locations or nodes.
Read the full game description
A STORYTELLING BOARD GAME SET IN THE 1970s COLD WAR ERA. SMERSH is a portmanteau of two Russian words that translates to "Death to Spies." It operated as a counter-intelligence agency by the Red Army during the 1940s. Despite having had a large number of paid employees, little was known about the agency until recently when Russia opened their archives. Agents of SMERSH is a cooperative Storytelling game that pits players as UN Secret Service Spies set in an alternate 1970s timeline against a newly formed and independent SMERSH. Agents of SMERSH includes custom dice to determine success or failure of encounters, and more strategic play from what is typically expected of a Storytelling board game. There are plenty of James Bond gadgets, guns, cars, pop references and detailed artwork - not to mention a touch of humor. The game features the artwork of George Patsouras (The Resistance & Flash Point). The game is able to accommodate play with either The Encounter Book, which contains over 1500 written encounters with a similar reaction matrix to Tales of the Arabian Nights - or played more simply with only encounter cards with shorter encounters and no matrix. The First Edition (2012) of the game came with the Encounter Cards as standard, and the Encounter Book as an optional add-on (although many copies did actually include the book). The Second Edition (2015) includes the Encounter Book as standard, with the Encounter Cards available to purchase from the publisher.