Can you set-up without the charts?

Doesn’t matter too much lol.  After playing 6 games or so of Triple A, I could set up the 1941 50th edition about 60% off of memory.

I could come pretty close.  The units in Europe (not England), N. Africa, China, Japan and the US would be doable.  Australia, India and Russia would be harder for me to remember off the top of my head. (Germany is easy since I have two standard opens, if I find I am missing or have an extra piece than I normally have, I know something wasn’t set up correctly!)

@Young:

I think it would be cool to walk into a room with a set-up board and tell the Italian player that he is missing an artillery in Ethiopia.

If by cool you mean over obsessive and too good lol

I could set up Revised from memory… before it began gathering dust in my closet after Global came out…

Wow you played Revised until Global?  That’s pretty hardcore.  Revised is the version I never got to play, went from original to Spring 42 to Anniversary to Global.

If you haven’t had a chance to play either 42 or Anniversary, I strongly suggest it, Spring 42 is everything the original should have been, and Anniversary is a nice game, about half as big as Global so a nice between size.  Plus it has 2 versions…just make sure you don’t pay for it, I hear its over 500 bucks!!!

I could probably do all of UK, US, Italy, Russia, China, and ANZAC

I could setup basically everything on the board, but I never do that. The cool thing is that I notice when a piece is missing during the setup.

I saw this thread earlier and we just finished a game today so I decided to try out and see if I could set it up without the charts.
China, France and ANZAC were really easy.  Italy was just slightly harder to remember – I actually forgot the artillery on Tobruk but the rest was right.
Germany, Japan and Russia I got right.  I technically got the United States set up right, but I kept thinking I was wrong.  I thought there should be more guys somewhere.  The US only starts with 8 infantry!
The UK is where I got messed up.  They have a lot of stuff but it is all spread out so thin over so many territories and sea zones.  I missed a few guys here and there, mainly territories that had 2 infantry I only put 1.  I messed up on artillery – forgot one on Egypt and put one on Burma (which doesn’t have one).  I also forgot the destroyer in SZ 71 and the cruiser in SZ 98.
Well, our group has played 9 games of Global, 4 with the Alpha+2 setup, so maybe after a few more games I will have it all memorized.  Of course, by then Alpha+3 will be here.

@Young:

Anniversary was a great evolution for the map and rules. However, I thought 42 was a shameless money grab because it was released just before Pacific 1940 and I feel like they knew it would be overshadowed by Global. Spring 42 was good if you missed out on the anniversary sales, but thats about all. As for the topic of this thread, I can set up about 35% but I’m getting faster at it (about 40 min). I am trying to get better with the setting up blind skill.

It may have been a shameless money grab, but its only 25 bucks, so not too much money.  I like 42 for its simplicity, but it keeps many of the same rules that are in Global.  Plus, for those of us who waited to buy both games after the Europe map came out it helped bide the time. :)

I have gotten most of the initial placement down, it took a while, like remembering which sz had the dd and which the CA off England, the rest isn’t so bad.  I do sometimes find a missing unit or two during the first turn.

@Young:

By doing what you did, I bet you gained more experience in one setup than if you conducted 5 setups using charts. I really need to do an exercise like that. The next question is how fast can you set up blind. The more I think about this the more I want to get good at it.

A lot of times, I will end up setting up more than half of each country before looking at the setup charts to make sure I am right.  I usually am but occasionally forget a piece or even put one in the wrong place.  Again, UK gives me the most fits.
Another thing that can be tricky is re-setting up a game.  Occasionally, we will finish a game early in the day and decide to start on a new one. (I have a game room where I can leave it set up when we can’t play for a while).  The tricky part is the facilities.  Some countries get invaded so their majors get cut down to minors.  Some times players build an IC in some remote locations, or place air and naval bases.  I don’t always remember that and we will start to play and someone will say, “Hey, how come my IC is a minor?” or “Where is my AA Gun?” or “I don’t remember putting an air base there.”

When playing these games, you study the board SO MUCH, that the starting placement really starts to become second nature!  I have probably played 7 global games at this point, and I bet that I could put about 60% of the pieces on the board correctly without looking at the setup chart  :)

I could get damn near close…