Okay, be honest . . . .

[Ringsyde]

. . . . Is COTG Online as great an experience as the original table top game?

I'm an old school, table top, soda & pretzels type of gamer, and I was really bugged about COTG Online because I felt it was the beginning of the end of the greatest card game I've ever played. To my mind, playing this game any other way would be a different/diminished experience.

But . . . .

I just ordered up a bunch of old editions of the game a few nights ago, and I found myself coming dangerously close to ordering the Online game. Call it curiosity or a need to try everything Filsinger Games offers.

Please understand, I still play Halo and Madden against other human beings in my livingroom, I play RISK and Heroscape on the couch, and I have almost a nicotine-like addiction to rolling dice and shuffling cards while playing GWF. I just worry something will be lost in the (online) translation.

So, true believers, what am I missing out on, and am I wrong for preferring the old school way?

[maddog1981]

I love Online. It says me a lot of time. Really I just have to focus on booking and playing out matches online. I don't have to worry about tracking records or developing a contenders list. Online does all of that for me. It's also much easier to reference as you can tag matches and you don't have to shuffle through notebooks to find a single match. It's also nicer space wise and the cards look really nice in color.

[shaka808]

I love online without it I prob would have never gotten really back into things. I still use the cards as help in organizing and visualizing matches for cards better. Online really helps me keep track of cards and rankings more than anything. Also I love the simulators sometimes you just have to book matches that you really don't feel to much for and a quick sim sure helps that out instead of trying to slog through a match between your two least favorite wrestlers Also having the gametable online helps me keep all those charts nice and handy and lets me play from bed or somewhere without much table room on my laptop .

[BDS]

In all honesty, I wouldn't play COTG by myself without it. I've got three children all under the age of seven, and busting out the cards and dice without them either demanding to play with me or rampaging through my play area and destroying my quasi-arena. With COTGonline, though, most of those concerns aren't a problem.

I still love the cards and dice, though, don't get me wrong. One of my favorite things to do with the kids is to play COTG. It's just that to play as my own pastiime in the way that I'd like, I've got to use the PC.

If you think you might be interested, I recommend that you go to the site and sign up for a demo account. It's totally free, and you'll have unlimited use of the Game Table and PBP Sim (with Bloodline and Encubus circa 2119) and the ability to look through others' shared feds to get a feel for what the Stat Tracker can do.

[Thunder]

If it wasn't for cotgonline I sadly wouldn't play at all. It's just too much to haul out all the cards, charts and dice and then to organize everything. I still own a ton of cards and love them but I do 100% of my playing online at cotgonline.com. I've put my legends fed on hold until they get that online as well for the same reason. I'm /really/ looking forward to that.

[toasterboy]

I love (L O V E) the stat tracker. Yes there's a few adjustments that could be made to make me love it even more, but it's really AWESOME!

As for the Game Table, I like it, but it's just not exactly where I need it to be to make it a useful tool and replacement for breaking out the cards and dice. And I'm not talking about the Multiplayer/Mac Compatibility thing (I can't wait for that corner to be turned).

My main issue is that I'd love to be able to bring the managers (Vin Strutter/Omen) out onto the table. Yes you can open their charts, but only one at a time and 99.9% of the time I forget about them completely until after the match. I wish you could summon them onto the table and click on them to roll their charts. Part of the fun of the 'cards' version is seeing the art.

Being able to send even the most minimum of results from the Game Table back to the Stat Tracker would be awesome too. I don't need play by play, but simple win loss would rock (and cut down on how many windows I need open). I'd also love to see the update charts as an option as that's what I use in my dice feds.

I also wish there was one smaller size screen. The normal size is just a hair too big for my laptop screen.

I will probably let my game table subscription lapse until I get a new Intel Based Mac (so I can run windows and use Multiplayer) or more tweaks are made to the Game Table with respect to managers.

That all being said, I do think the game table is slick and once it's tweaked a little more it will be a huge blessing to us road warriors who have to while away the hours in hotels! CotGOnline is awesome, please don't consider my above 'issues' with it as me saying I don't like it. I'm just being honest.

[Justin Case]

I'd recommend online, because for trips (such as making GCon) it's handy. Just find a portable laptop with internet connection, etc... and you'll have all you need. Sure beats hauling boxes of cards and charts all over. Man, if I had to haul my collection around, I'd need a U-Haul! haha