Thanksgiving 2020

Cole started it.

Shane was happy to send a goofy picture back!

I texted many people a "Happy Thanksgiving" and that picture!

Our day was a quiet one. Shane wanted to build a city out of Legos to get hit by natural disasters. Whether he was trying to play survival or destroy it is anyone's guess!

He had a radio tower to start, so I started building some townhouses, quads, apartment buildings, and a gas station as seen from an airplane. That led to Shane building an airport and some airplanes to fly overhead.

Carrie joined us after a shower.

Shane's radio tower became an air traffic control tower and Carrie built a radio tower that Shane later souped up to be a power plant.

With all the  natural disasters Shane was ready to inflict (including a blanket sized tsunami) it seemed prudent to give the town a hospital.

We managed to play without electronics for the entire first half of the day!

Carrie went non-traditional for our Thanksgiving meal. She mean a soup involving bacon, potatoes, and pumpkin. 

For our evening entertainment: American Ninja Warrior! We watched some The Floor is Lava the other night, so we were on an obstacle course kick. 

Shane was willing to bounce on the couches, but he had no interest in building our own course and getting some exercise!

It was a much quieter Thanksgiving than years prior. Grandma and Grandpa opted to go to NOVA rather than host, because Rachel and Chris had some concerns about Shane coming back from SC without much time in between. Sophia was just in the hospital from a ruptured appendix, so germs and health were in the forefront of their minds.

On one hand, we would have liked to have seen them. On the other, it was really nice to have a day with no expectations. I've been enjoying the break from work and time with family immensely. 

Thanksgiving 2020 was the holiday we needed. We can have a busier Thanksgiving with more people next year. 

Pandemic...but not the one in the news!

I've been looking forward to Pandemic.

Pandemic Legacy Season 0!

It's a board game. It's the first board game I've ever preordered and it arrived a couple of weeks back.

Pandemic Legacy Season 1 and Season 2 have been my favorite game experiences with Carrie up to this point. I've been waiting ever so patiently to start.

So when Carrie asked, "Do you want to play?" I ran and grabbed the game before she could change her mind. 

Season 0 had more options for building our characters than the other seasons.

Carrie, ever the creative one, really got into making her character's passport. However, when she couldn't find the options she wanted to make a realistic character, she said, "Screw it. I'm going full silly!"

Thus, Raspberry Tartlett was born!

Each character has multiple aliases. We were only supposed to create our first alias, but Carrie went all in up front!

The game eventually reveals/unlocks more stickers that you have access to at first, but it was too late for us!

I went a slightly different direction with my character. I wanted my first alias to be plain and boring. I was having trouble coming up with a name and put down Milton (inspired from Office Space). Carrie came up with the inspiration for the last name. "Are you playing games with me son!?" 

When you can laugh before the game even begins, you know you're going to have a good time!

I went a bit crazy on my aliases, but I didn't finish naming them until multiple games in.

Vanya's last name was a play off Novosibirsk.....a city name Carrie and I mispronounced horribly many, many times until it became it's own joke.

We didn't play every day. We managed to play 8 games including the prologue. We're currently up to August (There are 12 months in the campaign). Shane was at Nana and Pop's for 17 days, so that's roughly a game every other day. 

I'm not going to give any spoilers here just in case someone reads this who will care.

I will say the first turn of the prologue and January started with this! 

It didn't matter in the prologue, but we had an incident before I got to make a move in the campaign! Carrie protested, but I insisted we play on! For better and worse, it's the permanent nature of the campaign that makes the experience!

So far, things have gone really well. Carrie and I have played a lot of Pandemics, so we know the ruleset very well. We've done well, but many of the games have been close. A few we've ended right before the board would've exploded in our faces. Our bad luck spells haven't been 'the worst luck' and we were fortunate with how our upgrades interacted with a mission we otherwise would have lost! The game has catch-up mechanics, so that even losses are supposed to become part of the story.

Shane wasn't around to mess up the board, but he's not the only creature in the house who likes to interfere with board games.

Aria found enemy agents to be delicious!

Max and Tsuki both made appearances on the global stage, too. 

My opinion so far: I love Season 0 and recommend it, but it's my least favorite of the seasons. 

That's not a knock against the game, either. It's very well designed and the art fits the Cold War theme perfectly. It might have been my favorite if it was the first one we played, but I can't say for sure.

Season 1 is still my favorite. It was such an unexpected, awesome experience. None of the future season could replicate that magical feeling of discovery of what a legacy game was. Carrie loved it and we played it while on a vacation that led us through NC, TN, and WV that included whitewater rafting and staying at airbnbs. That nostalgia is going to be nearly impossible for anything to beat. Plus, I really liked the bright colors. The bright, colored translucent cubes delighted my ADHD.

Season 2 was very different. The core mechanic was inverted (placing cubes for protection rather than removing cubes to protect) and I didn't like the gray cubes, but the story and sense of discovery were really neat. It was so different from Season 1 that it was fascinating in a new way. No spoilers: There was a big twist on the December mission that killed Carrie's character and almost left a sour taste, but we had a grand time. We played while we were at Roy's place and I was working for the city schools and we'd park Shane on the TV to unwind.

Season 0 is much closer to Season 1 in how it's played than Season 2. It's less out there, but still introduces new mechanics that fit very well with the theme. It's immersive, polished, and fun! The muted colors fit the theme well, but I like Season 1's bright colors better and, again, it would have to overcome a ton of nostalgia to unseat Season 1 as my favorite.

We've still got 5 months to go, though. There's time to see if it will rise to the top. I don't regret preordering it regardless!

UPDATE: We've played all the way up to November now. It's been great! The designers definitely improved some aspects compared to Season 1, but nostalgia is still keeping Season 1 in the lead for now.

Shane saw Carrie and I playing on Thanksgiving and was really interested. I said I'd happily play through a Season with him when he was older. I woke up on Friday to Carrie and him using the remaining stickers to build funny aliases!

That's a bonus point for Season 0!