by El_Tonio
I don't play a ton, but agree it can be hard for new or returning players to win even on the easy level. A lot will depend on the random board setup (which you can't do much about). Having certain event cards or roles can really help (while others are underwhelming).I agree with what others have said about not over-treating diseases. We were losing this and traditional Pandemic because we were wasting actions curing cubes in an area with just a single cube. We rarely do this now and it helps.
Until you get used to everything, why don't you try one or both of the following:
(1) Pick your roles -- we were randomly assigned the scientist and sailor, and found it to be a very powerful combo. You might try it some time... and use the scientists ability just about every turn... especially early in the game. The scientist can help you delay an epidemic one turn (which can be huge as it waters down the infection deck for one more turn), and is very helpful at helping players get cards of a certain color. I'm sure there are other good combos as well.
(2) Pick your event cards -- or at least certain types of event cards. I break them down into a few categories (each with 2-3 cards): (1) movement, (2) removing cubes, (3) trading/getting cards, (4) misc. -- build hospital, add tracks, add purification tokens, etc.
Instead of randomly picking from the 15, maybe randomly pick one from each category. That way you get a little help with everything at some point in the game.
Once you try this, you can go back to the official random selection of cards. But, we have found doing this a couple of times or every now and then can help you figure out how to optimize all the options in the game.