Agents of Smersh
Completed Funding on 3/19/2012 with $101,507 of $20,000 Goal
What did they offer: Agents of Smersh offered a new board game that followed the likes of Tales of the Arabian Nights, a game we reviewed positively some time ago. Backers were promised extra characters, a new travel die that added a spin on movement, and a poker chip expansion as exclusives.
When was the expected delivery date: August 2012
What did VG30 pledge for: VG30 pledged $70 for the game, encounter book, and KS exclusive character card.
Status of Project: As of December 8th, everything was shipped out with most people receiving it fairly quickly after that, and International shipping arriving sometime in January 2013.
What the Creator is Saying: The creator kept the community updated every few weeks with where everything was. They were still writing the Book of Encounters well into June, but had manufacturing working on the game at the same time. It's clearly a first endeavor for the creator, but the communication helped the community through it.
What the Community is Saying: The community is happy with the game, but very disappointed in the mish-mash of rules that were included in the box. They didn't flow very well, and didn't explain how situations work. The included rule cards helped guide game play, but wasn't enough. Since then, others have taken a shot at rewriting the rules over on Board Game Geek.
What We're Saying: The rule book is pretty bad and actually took a few games to figure out everything we were doing wrong. The game is a lot of fun, however, and the Book of Encounters feels so much better written than the Tales of the Arabian Nights game. We are a little disappointed that we paid $70 and could have snagged it just as quickly from Cool Stuff Inc for $52, meaning we paid $18 for a die, a poker chip, and a couple extra characters. Our last big disappointment with this one was at Gencon we had actually signed up for one of the demos, arrived 2 minutes early, waited 5 minutes after, and watched the creator perform a demo for a group of players who happened to sit down before the demo started. That one kind of rubbed us the wrong way, but the quality of the game is good enough to make us set it aside.
