How it plays
Each player has a role with a special ability. Take four actions to move, treat disease, build research stations, share specific city cards, or discover a cure. Then draw player cards and infect more cities.
Cures require sets of matching-colour city cards at a research station. You win by discovering all four cures; clearing every cube is unnecessary. Excess outbreaks, an exhausted cube supply, or too few player cards when drawing can end the game first.
Decisions you’ll make
Use a city card for fast travel, or keep it toward a cure. Transfers normally require meeting in the city named on that card, so assembling a set is a logistical problem rather than a free exchange.
Decide which infections need attention now and which can wait. Epidemics return previously drawn infection cards to the top of the deck, so already troubled cities can become dangerous again.
Learning the game
Moderate: actions are straightforward, but epidemic sequencing, outbreaks, transfers, and role exceptions need a careful first explanation.