Monolith, the Andre the Giant of the GWF (Galactic Wrestling Federation), has defeated Basilisk of The Horde in a brutal chain match to become the new GWF Champion.
In other breaking news, The Horde’s Shann-Ra has won a women’s battle royal to become the first ever GWF Women’s Champion.
You may be wondering to yourself… Hey! Why hasn’t this news been covered anywhere on Slam Wrestling? What does Slam Wrestling have against the GWF? They cover Impact Wrestling after all.
GWF is all part of the Champions of the Galaxy role-playing game.
For those who have missed the news over the last 34 years, Champions of the Galaxy is a desktop game allowing you to create, manage your own wrestling federation in every conceivable way. You book the matches, angles. You stage the matches. You can even create your own superstars, managers and matches. Like Dungeons and Dragons, Marvel Superheroes, etc., the only limit to the game is how much imagination you put into it.
The new commemorative starter set which came out a few months ago includes everything you need to start your own federation including two six-sided dice, character cards, game charts, and instructions on how to play a basic game or an advanced game.
The characters chosen for the commemorative set are the best of the last 50 game editions including Star Warrior, Wolf, Amazonia, Thrash, Chaos and Endgame.
The best thing about Champions of the Galaxy from someone who has played D&D and Marvel forever like myself is that you don’t need to keep track of hit points, health stats, magic or karma points as you conduct a match. There is no math to do. Each character has offense and defense charts that you roll on to determine the action. Eventually, someone will hit their finishing move and a pin or submission roll will determine if an opponent goes down to defeat or not. In the advanced game, you can increase a wrestler’s pin rating to add fatigue and even more realism to the game.
For actions such as using the ropes or taking things to the floor, there are charts you roll on to determine the various outcomes which range from a steel chair coming into play to putting your foe through a table with your finishing move.
The format of the game is so streamlined you can whip through an entire card in a short period of time without losing any of the fun and there is an online edition which expands the experience even further. You can also stage the matches, play the game by yourself or with someone else as I used to do with my son when he was younger and before he discovered what a PlayStation and Xbox were.
The only drawback that I have found is that the rules for cage and other specialty matches are not that well-developed. To improve the experience like I did you can create your own charts and matches.
Here is one I did in minutes for a Texas Street Fight. Click on the image for the PDF.
Expanding your federation is so easy as well. You can either create your own characters following the official rules laid out here or you can purchase game editions from Filsinger to expand your roster with even more superstars and managers.
Slam Wrestling may continue to blackball the GWF but like all of those independent promotions we will continue to fight the power like Retribution… only better.
RELATED LINKS
Champions of the Galaxy
Summary
COG may be easy to play but that simplicity doesn’t subtract at all from the overall game experience. The basic and advance set and rules are only the beginning. Like any other RPG you can make the game your own by adding or removing anything you wish to. COG may be 34 years old but it plays just as good now as it did back then.