Pandemic Legacy: June Debrief

Warning: The rest of this post will reveal many of the twists introduced in the first six months. Come back after you play through June.

Rose and I received Pandemic Legacy: Season 1 as a Christmas gift from one of our board gaming friends. We dove in and played the first six months in a single sitting; ended by a universal desire for sleep. The purpose of this post is to document our progress, our plan going forward, and tactics we have employed before continuing to the second half of the game.

Current Status

We are undefeated through June¹.
Our medic and operations expert each have one scar.
All other characters are unharmed.
All red territories are now faded².
All faded territories are isolated with road blocks from the rest of the world.
Panic Level 1: Chicago, Lima, Madrid, Algiers, Lagos, Khartoum, Moscow, Tehran, Delhi, Shanghai, Hong Kong, Osaka, and Sydney
Panic Level 2: St. Petersburg and Ho Chi Minh City
Panic Level 3: Kinsasha
No collapsing or fallen cities.
Three positive mutations on black³.
Permanent Research Stations: Atlanta, Karachi, and Taipei
Permanent Military Bases: Lagos and Taipei

Tactics

We have heavily invested in infrastructure, with five permanent buildings, to reduce travel time and contain the disease⁴. April-June we stuck with the same character load out: Medic with Veteran upgrade, Operations Expert, and Quarantine Specialist. We have no intention of changing this unless a new character or mechanic appears.

Summary

I’m feeling optimistic about our chances in the second half of the year. And this is a fantastic Christmas present.

June was a nail-biter ending with five neighboring cities in Faded territories with three Faded figures each and seven outbreaks. The main cause of this tension was the player deck. Eight of the last ten cards were black cities which made it nearly impossible to cure black despite our positive mutations from previously eradicating black.
In a stroke of luck, the red cubes mutated into COdA-403. Lucky because red has the least connections to other colors which limits the ability of COdA-403 to spread.
One accidental eradication since we never drew a black city card in March.
Heavily influenced by my real-life career building computing infrastructure.