Sleeper Agents
Sleepers are already inside your party. Expose them before they recruit everyone.
- Players
- 8 to 40+
- Length
- 2, 2.5, or 3 hours from the start. 3 is the party default.
- Features
- Activation cards, arrests, prisoners, briefings, and the Prison board.
The premise
Sleepermasters are hiding among your guests. Everyone else starts the night as an agent. Nobody knows who the Sleepermasters are, except the Sleepermasters.
Cards move from hand to hand all night. Scan one and it's usually a power. Sometimes it's a recruitment, and you quietly become a sleeper. You keep playing; you're just on the other side now.
When enough people report the same person, Mission Control arrests them, and the Prison board, on every phone and on the TV if there is one, shows what they really were.
The sides
Agents
Everyone starts here. Agents win by arresting all the Sleepermasters, or by arresting more sleepers than are still hiding, before the night ends.
Sleepers
The Sleepermasters, and everyone they recruit. They win if the agents run out of time. A wrong arrest helps them: it costs the agents a report and a teammate.
That's all you need before the night. Each phone explains the rest to its owner, and only to its owner.
On their phones
Joining
A name and a costume, so people can find them.
Their home
Their mission, the reports they have left, the Prison board.
Who they are
Their side and their powers, on their phone and nobody else's.
Prison
Every arrest, as it happens.
How a night runs
Guests scan the invitation
The QR on the invitation at the door opens the game. Each guest types a name, then scans the training card so they know how a card works.
Mission Control starts the game
The host is Mission Control. They pick the Sleepermasters in secret and press Start. From here every phone keeps its owner's secret.
Missions and cards
Phones send guests on missions: reach a pickup point, escort someone, carry a card. Finish one and Mission Control hands you a card. Cards get passed around; some of them recruit.
Reporting opens
A sixth of the way in (half an hour on a 3-hour night), everyone gets 3 reports. Enough reporters on one person and Mission Control arrests them. Arrested guests are prisoners: still talking, still arguing, out of the game.
Briefings
Three times in the night the briefing room opens. Guests who gather there piece together a cipher, and the intel hints at how many sleepers stand among them.
Declassified
When the time runs out, or the agents win early, the Prison board shows the network, everyone's role, the awards, and every report made all night.
What gets printed
Sleeper Agents
Your party's name
- 1Scan the big code with your phone's camera.
- 2Type your name and join.
- 3When your phone asks, scan the training card.
Training card
Scan it when your phone asks. It's only practice: this is how every card and spot works.
Invitation
Tape it by the door. The big code joins your party; the small one is the training card, so everyone learns how a scan works before it counts.
Training card
Scan this
Scan this
Scan this
Scan this
Scan this
Scan this
Scan this
Scan this
Scan this
Scan this
Scan this
Scan this
Scan this
Scan this
Scan this
Scan this
Scan this
Scan this
Scan this
Cards
20 to a page, with cut lines. Print on card stock, or tape each one to the back of a playing card. A new party has 120 unless you pick another number, and you can print any range or add more.
The Shed
Word FALCON
Scan this, or tell Mission Control the word.
Under the Stairs
Word COBALT
Scan this, or tell Mission Control the word.
The Garage
Word ORCHID
Scan this, or tell Mission Control the word.
The Fridge
Word MERIDIAN
Scan this, or tell Mission Control the word.
The Couch
Word NIGHTJAR
Scan this, or tell Mission Control the word.
Spot 6
Word CINDER
Scan this, or tell Mission Control the word.
Spot 7
Word BISHOP
Scan this, or tell Mission Control the word.
Spot 8
Word TANGO
Scan this, or tell Mission Control the word.
Spot 9
Word QUARTZ
Scan this, or tell Mission Control the word.
Spot 10
Word HARBOR
Scan this, or tell Mission Control the word.
Spot 11
Word SPARROW
Scan this, or tell Mission Control the word.
Spot 12
Word ZENITH
Scan this, or tell Mission Control the word.
Pickup points
12 to a sheet, with cut lines: one for each pickup point in your house. Name them after real places, give each a word, and tape them up where the hint says. A new party has 12.
The briefing room
When the briefing opens, scan this for your cipher fragment.
Use Scan a card in the game. Code ALTAR
Briefing room sign
Tape it in the room you pick for the briefings. While it's open, guests scan it for their cipher fragment.
Letter or A4. Print it all at once or one part at a time, or save it as a PDF for a print shop. These are the real pages with sample codes; your party's codes are made when you create it, and only you (or a co-host with the party's PIN) can print them.
How the host runs it
Make a party, pick Sleeper Agents, and print the kit. Rename the pickup points after the real places in your house.
On the night you run the console from your phone. Pick the Sleepermasters, scan in their activation cards, choose the game length, and press Start.
During the game guests come to you: you hand out a card when someone finishes a mission, and you make the arrests the console calls for. A co-host can help from their own phone with the party's PIN.
The host doesn't play. You know who the Sleepermasters are; your job is the operation.
What you need
Guests need only their phones. You need a phone to run the game from and a printer, or a print shop, for the kit. A TV or a laptop is optional, and either does the same job: a big shared screen for the Prison board and the console. Nobody needs one; it just helps.
Fair warning
It's a game about reporting your friends to their faces. People will lie to you, convincingly, and you'll be wrong about someone you trust. Lying is allowed. Showing your screen isn't.
Ready to open the file?
Every printable included.