[RELEASE] Territory Daze

[Mammoth]

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Territory Daze is a modification which starts in January, 1970. I began this modification over a year ago (December, 2013) and I assure you, I've worked on it almost every day in that year and more whether it's been a full dedicated day - of which there has been a lot - or just an hour or two fiddling with statistics or something equally trivial. There are three reasons I began this modification: 1.) because no one has ever gone this far back in history for Total Extreme Wrestling 2.) because I've always enjoyed history modifications because you get to follow the entire careers of the legends of today and therefore loved the idea of following the careers of absolute icons like Ric Flair, Hulk Hogan, Andre the Giant and Jerry Lawler amongst many others, and 3.) because there hasn't been a modification where you can sign people like Verne Gagne, Freddie Blassie and Ray Stevens where they're still wrestling, or at least still wrestling with a degree of physical stability. Almost everything - bar the things that I’ve credited people for towards the bottom of this post - have been made from scratch, which includes every single worker, every picture, every ager, every chemistry, every relationship, every title and every title history, amongst many other things. This was done partly because I didn’t want other peoples mistakes but mainly because I wanted this modification to feel like something new rather than one of those modifications that are simply made up of a whole host of other modifications. The aim was always to make a modification that people will hopefully enjoy but I also hope that people may learn something about what made professional wrestling what it is today, which is why everyones ‘Biography’ and their ‘Employment History’ has been filled out as much as possible to give you, the player, an insight; whether you've heard of them before or otherwise. Overall? I just hope people give this a chance, and it's a modification that'll not only be played now but in versions of TEW to come. Thanks for reading and more importantly, enjoy.

 

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With the territorial system in full flow, the National Wrestling Alliance (NWA) continues to expand and enhance it’s grip on professional wrestling right across the world but more importantly in the United States of America. All this despite the challenge of Vincent J. McMahon’s World Wide Wrestling Federation (WWWF) and Verne Gagne’s American Wrestling Association (AWA) who both left the NWA due to disputes involving the NWA World Heavyweight Championship. With professional wrestling becoming more and more a viable option for television with various shows becoming some stations biggest hits, almost every promotion in the USA is recognised regionally with only the territorial system confining them to their respective regions. With some of the finest athletes and most charismatic figures in sports, professional wrestling in the United States of America continues to grow with more than one promoter setting their sights on bigger and better things.

 

http://i.imgur.com/TudwTv7.png

 

Like the United States of America, the territorial system is still very much evident in Canada. Despite the "big three" of All Star Wrestling (ASW), Maple Leaf Wrestling (MLW) and Stampede Wrestling all being huge members of the National Wrestling Alliance, it's clear to everyone that they're all trying to outdo each other to establish themselves as the force in Canadian professional wrestling. Although Frank Tunney and Stu Hart offer the best product, Sandor Kovacs ASW continues to grow due to their incredible television deal. Meanwhile, in the Maritimes and Northern Ontario, Atlantic Grand Prix Wrestling (AGPW) and Northland Wrestling Enterprises (NWE) continue to tour in the summertime without much fanfare but with great respect.

 

http://i.imgur.com/y9sjMTZ.png

 

In comparison with the National Wrestling Alliance in the rest of the world, Joint Promotions - made up of Dale Martin Promotions, Morrell Beresford Promotions, Relwyskow Promotions and Wryton Promotions - continues to be the true force in British wrestling. Controlling almost all the true superstars on British shores and the only television deal in the United Kingdom, the British audience don't have much choice in what they watch if they're professional wrestling fans but fortunately Joint Promotions offer an exquisite product. Despite some of their biggest stars - most notably Billy Robinson - leaving for North America, Joint Promotions continues to make new superstars, with a certain amount of intrigue surrounding a young, masked man by the name of Kendo Nagasaki. Although they don't have any challengers to their throne, a young entrepreneur by the name of Brian Dixon is reportedly looking into doing just that.

 

http://i.imgur.com/J5Mb9C8.png

 

Empresa Mexicana de la Lucha Libre (EMLL) is considered one of the oldest professional wrestling promotions in the world and for many, this is no more evident than when you look at their aging roster. It's believed that some people are becoming disenchanted with the way things are run in EMLL with many of the younger luchadores being continually looked over despite being the future of Mexican wrestling. Despite this, it’s thought it would take a lot for anyone to challenge their might so for now, EMLL continues to be the driving force in lucha libre, supported by the National Wrestling Alliance.

 

http://i.imgur.com/xmSoaG5.png

 

Still reeling from the death of Rikidozan in 1963, the Japan Pro Wrestling Alliance (JWA) was continued by a board of four executives: Toyonobori, Yoshinosato, Michiaki Yoshimura and Kokichi Endo but despite a good start, turning Giant Baba into an icon almost over night, JWA hit the skids when Toyonobori was expelled from the organisation for using the promotions money to cover his gambling debts. On his way out, Toyonobori convinced Antonio Inoki - jealous with Baba’s push - to leave with him and together they formed the short lived Tokyo Pro-Wrestling. Inoki eventually returned to JWA in 1967 and he became equally important as Giant Baba. Remaining the forefront of puroresu, JWA are now challenged again by International Wrestling Enterprise (IWE) who’re turning out to be a huge threat to their ranking as the number one promotion in Japan while JWA are also imploding from the inside. Meanwhile, in joshi puroresu (women’s wrestling), All Japan Women’s Pro-Wrestling (AJW) run by the Matsunaga brothers continues to be the shining light in not just Japan, but right around the globe in terms of women’s wrestling.

 

http://i.imgur.com/vIwtTak.png

 

Proving to be a real golden era for professional wrestling in Australia, Jim Barnett's World Championship Wrestling (WCW) - a member of the National Wrestling Alliance - continues to grow with a huge fan following. Relying heavily on foreign imports, a lot of the lesser known talent from North America have made themselves superstars in Australia while the local Australian talent have been limited somewhat.

 

http://i.imgur.com/JIGfYd7.png

 

Mistakes

- I expect there to be a lot of mistakes whether they’re tiny and insignificant like a spelling mistake, something more severe like a wrong picture given to the wrong person/title or a wrong date on a title history, or something trivial like a statistic way out of whack. That said, I’m more than happy to fix any issues/mistakes so please inform me of them when/if you find them, I will not be offended because like I say, I’m expecting people to find them. The way I see it, the more mistakes that you inform me of, the better the modification will be in the long run because I can fix them and then re-release the modification into the world. Just please bare in mind that this is my first modification so although I appreciate criticism, I will not appreciate unhelpful condemnation with no helpful tips.

 

Further Information

- If you have any further/more accurate information on this time period, then I’d still love to hear about it. For example, if you know of a storyline which was unfolding in January, 1970 in any given promotion that I can add to ‘Starting Storylines’ then I’d love to hear about them. Or, if there is someone I’ve mentioned in a biography or someone just in general who isn’t deceased/retired who you believe was still wrestling in this time period that I haven’t yet added to the database, please inform me of them so I can add them to the database as soon as possible, providing there is enough information out there about them.

 

The NWA/Joint Belts

- The St. Louis Wrestling Club (SLWC) have the NWA World Heavyweight Championship because Sam Muchnick was the NWA President at the time. Obviously, if you want it in another promotion, simply change it in the database. Rather than give SLWC

all

the NWA belts though, making the modification unbalanced, the others can be found in numerous promotions, depending a lot on who carries them at the start of the modification (January, 1970) and where the belts are now (in real life) in terms of ownership. If you really want to use an NWA belt, I think the best way to simulate it would be to create a new belt and name it as applicable (so the "NWA World Heavyweight Championship" if that’s what you want), bring the champion in on loan, give it to them and then have them "lose" it to the person you want to hold it or if you want the original champion to keep the belt, simply retire the championship when the loan expires. It’s not ideal, but it’s the best I can offer you right now. It’s pretty much exactly the same for Joint as I’ve basically tried to do what I can in a difficult situation.

 

Other Championships

- It was ridiculous trying to piece together some titles histories, with various incarnations of the same title appearing in more than one territory amongst many other hurdles I had to bypass. Therefore, I don’t expect the titles to be perfect. Firstly, the ‘NWA Americas Tag Team Championship’ in Hollywood Wrestling is vacant despite me knowing they’re in the hands of El Médico and Pepe López at this time and that’s because there is literally no guaranteed information on the man under the hood of El Médico so I couldn’t possibly add him to the database. Unfortunately, we can’t have partial tag team champions neither as I would have just gave one title to Pepe and leave the other half vacant. The same can be applied to the ‘Pacific Coast Brass Knuckles Championship’ as El Médico was also the holder of that. Then there’s Northland Wrestling Enterprises; hammerglenn informed me of the titles they had but it was just impossible to name the current champions or even attempt the title history. The St. Louis Wrestling Club doesn’t have any other championship belts apart from the "NWA World Heavyweight Championship" because they literally shared their titles with Central States Wrestling and I felt they needed them more. As for the pictures, you may notice that some of them are identical and that’s either because they were more or less the same championship - a separate incarnation as I alluded to earlier - and therefore looked identical or they were literally the same title at one point before being passed around, like a lot of the Southern territories did back then. Also, some pictures may be the newer versions of said championship because I couldn’t find an older version, but I figure "a picture is better than no picture". You might agree with this view in which case, enjoy. Or you may feel it ruins the illusion and if that’s the case, simply remove the picture. Finally on the pictures, if you’re looking for a later version of a championship (a WWE title for example) it’ll either be named under "WWE World Heavyweight" for example or it’ll use the original promotion name like "WWWF World Tag Team 3" depending on if the championship is already part of the promotion and is just a later version or a new championship in it’s own right. If you need more clarification, please just ask. As for the title lineages? I’ve tried to include dates as best I can but obviously, there is bound to be some holes here and there.

 

Company Relationships

- You may or may not notice excessive "Company Relationships" and that's because I've added "Working Agreements" between each and every member of the National Wrestling Alliance to stop them from signing workers to written contracts from other members of the NWA. They've been added with a "*" at the start of them in the database though because it's really up to you, the player, whether you want to play like this because although there is a huge positive in this (as explained) there are a couple of negatives in that companies outside of the NWA will have something of an upper-hand if they were to start signing people to written contracts and even if a company leaves the alliance, the "Company Relationship" will remain (although that is easily removable in-game). That said, members of the NWA can still sign workers who work outside of the NWA to written contracts so in true territory days, all is fair in love and war. So if you'd prefer to play without these relationships, then simply mass delete every "Company Relationship" with a "*" in the record name. "Company Relationships" without a "*" in the title are included because that's how it was in real life, it has nothing to do with the NWA or alliance of any kind so I'd suggest you

don't

delete them.

 

Tag Teams

- I have included "Yet to Debut" tag teams, but they obviously haven’t got any experience and their "Formed" date (as far as I can remember, every team has been given a "Formed" date and they may not be completely exact, but they’re the earliest date of said team teaming that I can find) is obviously later than January, 1970. Fortunately, it’s a changeable value in the game so it’s up to you whether you wait for said date to come around or bump them up a bit.

 

Employment Histories

- I referred to it earlier in the "Information" part but I just wanted to expand on this: every single worker in the modification has an "Employment History" of some kind unless they’re ‘yet to debut’ and this is done to give you, the player, an idea of the persons background and where he/she has spent most of their time. As you’ll no doubt see, I’ve neglected to include any past promotions which I’ve not included in the modification and this is to increase the playability of it. The way I see it, you want popularity and things of that nature to be limited to what is playable in the game so although many of these guys have varying degrees of popularity in Puerto Rico for example, you’ll notice that no one actually has any popularity there because I haven’t included a Puerto Rican promotion (at the start of the game, anyway). So yes, you may find a worker who should have an "Employment History" with many different promotions and therefore popularity in various regions, but unless the territory/promotion is a part of the game, I’ve neglected to include them. Finally on "Employment Histories", you’ll notice that anybody with a history in Britain won’t be directly linked to a British promotion but rather they’re simply labelled as "Joint". That’s because there is just no way of knowing which promotion they were technically working with at this time so it was just easier for me to generalise it. Again, it’s just to give you an idea of where they’ve worked so hopefully it works for you.

 

Agers

- Agers and pictures in general are in no way exact to the year I add to them. Rather than changing a workers picture every couple of years to reflect the ageing process, I add an ager every ten years so it's more generic and as I say, the picture choice may not be perfect (it may be from a later/earlier decade in real life) but they're chosen on how old the person looks in the picture, not how old they actually are. It took a lot of time to find some pictures so to try and make that time shorter, it was much easier for me to do it this way rather than being exact. After all, that's what agers are for, right? To simulate the experience of them getting older, not to be exact in any way.

 

Known Holes

- There are a couple of holes in the modification, most notably the Northland Wrestling Enterprise (NWE) and the East Coast Wrestling Association (ECWA) roster’s. NWE was just a severe struggle to put anything together because of their lack of history at this exact time period and because of a lot of the wrestler’s they used were local men and women who have literally no records or information to be found. And as for ECWA, there are a lot of people who don’t believe the promotion was founded in 1967 - myself included - but state Jim Kettner uses the fake provenance to enhance the independent promotion. I can’t find a single record or show that dates back that far but as nobody can prove him wrong, I’ve decided to leave it in there and almost offer it up as a challenge to anyone who wants to take this small promotion with not much money and an empty roster on and attempt the impossible. There may also be some holes involving Gulf Coast Championship Wrestling (GCCW) as their records were a little thin on the ground so I used their title history to piece together a lot of workers ‘Employment History’. If you happen to notice that a worker has held a championship in GCCW in a certain year but I haven’t added it to their ‘Employment History’, please inform me and I’ll fix it as soon as possible.

 

Additions

- I’d love to hear about anything else you’d like included in the next update, whenever that’ll come. Obviously there is a lot that could be expanded on, so I don’t want to hear "more television networks" because I realise that we’re probably going to need more, I want to hear actual lists. So try not to be generic and actually list things that you’d like included so using the previous example, give me a list of television networks that you think would aid the modification and I’ll add them. You can list absolutely anything and I’ll take a look at it so that can be database things or even pictures you’d like to see in future updates like event pictures, logos or banners. Whatever it is, I just want to hear about it. Yes, I want critiquing on what I’ve already done but I also want to hear what will make the modification better in the weeks, months or years to come.

 

Credits

- Thanks go to...

fullMETAL

for his "Worker Names Database"

Idolized

for his "iNSPIRED Angle Pack"

sockpuppet

for both his "Injury Mod" & his "Venue Mod"

Matt Shannon

for the Match Types from his "The Main Event" mod

lovegun77

for his help with Japan, some testing and general enthusiasm for Territory Daze

Derek B

for his mod making guide

Jaysin

for naming the modification

olympia

for testing the modification and helping me in many ways

wrestling-titles.com

for their title histories

wrestlingdata.com

for their amazing website

SLAM! Sports

for their equally amazing website

wrestlingheritage.co.uk

for their quality website on British wrestling

hammerglenn

for information on Northland Wrestling Enterprises

BamaNationFan123

for a couple of locations

Genadi

for his "The Golden Age: 1987" mod from which I took a couple of things and, finally,

the GDS community

for their help and encouragement.

 

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This modification is completely freeware; mod-makers are free to use whatever they want in their mods and people are free to edit the database however they please. Unlike my gimmick file, I do ask that you credit me on this however because unlike the gimmick file which took me a week or two, this has took me a really long time and I feel like a little credit wouldn't be the worst thing in the world.

 

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Direct Link:

Click Me

 

http://i.imgur.com/NQnl9Yy.png

Direct Link:

Click Me

[haloed]

Thanks for this! Downloading now and will give it a look. Should be awesome to start from that far back in history.

[Idolized]

Mid if I upload this to EWWAREHOUSE?

[Oyaji]

This is going to be fun! Thanks for all of your hard work!

[Mammoth]

Thanks for this! Downloading now and will give it a look. Should be awesome to start from that far back in history.

I sure hope so. xD I look forward to hearing some feedback.

Mid if I upload this to EWWAREHOUSE?

I don't see why not.

This is going to be fun! Thanks for all of your hard work!

I hope you enjoy.

[DanMTheMan]

OH HELL YEAH! :D :D Time to start-up a playthrough as the WWWF!!!! :D :D Thanks Mammoth!

[jsnypade33]

wow this is awesome, congratulations on a great job

[shipshirt]

Oh excellent! Very excited for this. Thanks for all the hard work.

 

A note: The NWA World Tag Championship wasn't really a recognized, touring NWA championship. Only the World and World Junior Hvwt Titles were. IIRC, the tag titles were a creation in the Mid Atlantic (or a promotion in that region). St. Louis didn't really like tag teams and I don't believe they even had a tag title at all.

[franticloser]

Having this and Risky Business out at the same time, it's like I died and went to wrestling heaven!

[Hulkamaniac85]

This is just too awesome. Kind of overwhelming since I don't know much about this time period haha. It's like a super awesome history lesson, thank you so much for this!!!

[smartman]

Downloaded and thought I'd give AWA a spin. Here's a couple of notes after running a show.

 

1) I've never started a game with so many wretched gimmick ratings. I know why too. That Realism at Medium just kills them. When I dropped it down, I ended up being able to change the gimmicks to ones that worked. The problem being that I couldn't change all of them as the randomizer said a bunch were too early to change leading to a ton of dings.

 

2) That roster is massive especially when they only have one 1 hour TV show and nothing else to do. Not to mention their starting match lengths (looks like you did most everyone that way) so 3 matches is pretty much the max. The AI doesn't have to worry about the locker room ticked off though like the player does. I ended up cutting a lot of people and signed only Gene Anderson (tag team), Snuka, Colon, and Volkoff to get down to 37 (one got switched to Road Agent because Carbo isn't going to cut it) which is still too many.

 

3) Back to #1, it kind of stinks that there is no way to do an equal fed without having either Realism or Modern at Medium. The former has gimmick problems, and the latter seems just horribly wrong for the era. Pure doesn't work at all in the US (No mainstream TV which I didn't check but most of the networks in the game should be that). And oh boy do you have to have equal. I had the pop>perf that I had run in the 83 mod game (minus the Heavy Mainstream), and I popped a terrible 64 (with 2 tag team matches with all 4 having tag experience and 2 having tag chemistry with it being ME/UMC vs MID2 and ME2 vs UMC/ME).

 

4) That leads us to the biggest problem. I honestly have no idea if the selling ratings you gave the upper mids and main eventers are correct or not, but they don't work in the game. They need to be 66 or better for the game not to crap all over the match, and I saw a lot of C's and D's. I'm not saying no one was a bad seller back then, and maybe AWA is the outlier here, but that needs to be addressed.

 

5) There seems to be a dearth of out of the ring workers in the US, anyway. My CC guy ended up with like 12 offers in that first week alone, and unless I put Heenan there, he's irreplaceable as in there is literally no one available without stealing one from another fed. The only manager that could be a face got stolen from me days after signing with me by an Exclusive PPA too. So did Bockwinkel though that was my mistake not realizing that not everyone else is in the NWA.

 

All in all a fun mod. Oh, and there are several missing promotion logos and TV logos though you probably knew that already. They're the dead promotions so you might not have any to pull from. I'd suggest just putting their name, just anything is better than a blank space.

[Oyaji]

Ah, man, this is amazing! After reading several of the Crowbar Press books and, in particular, Gary Hart's autobiography, I was tempted to make a January 1975 mod because of how amazing the world of wrestling was back then. January of '75 because it was a month before the awful plane crash that took Bobby Shane's life. Looking at the data, it would seem you're a fellow big fan of Shane! Anyway, after spending a good month on an era specific location file and cutting pictures, I lost all of my work. It may have been for the best, as it's doubtful I would've seen it through. And if I ever did, it most certainly would pale in comparison to this data! I'm just glad you put in the hard work. I cannot thank you enough!

 

So many awesome territories thriving, all fairly unique in style and roster make-up... It's very hard to decide to eventually pick. Maybe I'll play as Gary Hart booking for Fritz. They've got Johnny Valentine, Wahoo, Jardine, and Kox. Heck of a group to work with when you add in Fritz, Shane, and Kiniski. Booking Mil Mascaras will be a pain in the ass.

 

P.S. I didn't know Bob Caudle was ever young... He looks so strange!

[Mammoth]

OH HELL YEAH! :D :D Time to start-up a playthrough as the WWWF!!!! :D :D Thanks Mammoth!

You're very welcome. Thank you as a main contributor (if not with information, with general enthusiasm) to the help topic

wow this is awesome, congratulations on a great job

Thank you.

Oh excellent! Very excited for this. Thanks for all the hard work.

 

A note: The NWA World Tag Championship wasn't really a recognized, touring NWA championship. Only the World and World Junior Hvwt Titles were. IIRC, the tag titles were a creation in the Mid Atlantic (or a promotion in that region). St. Louis didn't really like tag teams and I don't believe they even had a tag title at all.

You're welcome. Yeah, I don't have an "NWA World Tag Team Championship" in the database (one that was toured around, anyway) but many territories obviously had their own version whether it's something along the lines of "NWA Texas Tag Team Championship" or whatever. So what you described is exactly what you'll find. I believe St. Louis did have a Tag Team Championship (they shared all of their titles with Central States Wrestling and vice versa) but you're right, Sam Muchnick wasn't a big fan of tag team matches and hopefully I've reflected this with his product because his tag team match booking is considerably lower compared to some of the other territories.

 

Having this and Risky Business out at the same time, it's like I died and went to wrestling heaven!

Tell Bobby Shane we miss him while you're there.

 

This is just too awesome. Kind of overwhelming since I don't know much about this time period haha. It's like a super awesome history lesson, thank you so much for this!!!

That's exactly what I hoped so I can't tell you how much that pleases me. xD Hopefully it's still playable even though you don't know a whole lot about this time period? It was hard at times finding that line but I hope I've found it and created something that any fan - whether you're a historian or modern day enthusiast - can play and enjoy.

 

Downloaded and thought I'd give AWA a spin. Here's a couple of notes after running a show.

 

1) I've never started a game with so many wretched gimmick ratings. I know why too. That Realism at Medium just kills them. When I dropped it down, I ended up being able to change the gimmicks to ones that worked. The problem being that I couldn't change all of them as the randomizer said a bunch were too early to change leading to a ton of dings.

 

2) That roster is massive especially when they only have one 1 hour TV show and nothing else to do. Not to mention their starting match lengths (looks like you did most everyone that way) so 3 matches is pretty much the max. The AI doesn't have to worry about the locker room ticked off though like the player does. I ended up cutting a lot of people and signed only Gene Anderson (tag team), Snuka, Colon, and Volkoff to get down to 37 (one got switched to Road Agent because Carbo isn't going to cut it) which is still too many.

 

3) Back to #1, it kind of stinks that there is no way to do an equal fed without having either Realism or Modern at Medium. The former has gimmick problems, and the latter seems just horribly wrong for the era. Pure doesn't work at all in the US (No mainstream TV which I didn't check but most of the networks in the game should be that). And oh boy do you have to have equal. I had the pop>perf that I had run in the 83 mod game (minus the Heavy Mainstream), and I popped a terrible 64 (with 2 tag team matches with all 4 having tag experience and 2 having tag chemistry with it being ME/UMC vs MID2 and ME2 vs UMC/ME).

 

4) That leads us to the biggest problem. I honestly have no idea if the selling ratings you gave the upper mids and main eventers are correct or not, but they don't work in the game. They need to be 66 or better for the game not to crap all over the match, and I saw a lot of C's and D's. I'm not saying no one was a bad seller back then, and maybe AWA is the outlier here, but that needs to be addressed.

 

5) There seems to be a dearth of out of the ring workers in the US, anyway. My CC guy ended up with like 12 offers in that first week alone, and unless I put Heenan there, he's irreplaceable as in there is literally no one available without stealing one from another fed. The only manager that could be a face got stolen from me days after signing with me by an Exclusive PPA too. So did Bockwinkel though that was my mistake not realizing that not everyone else is in the NWA.

 

All in all a fun mod. Oh, and there are several missing promotion logos and TV logos though you probably knew that already. They're the dead promotions so you might not have any to pull from. I'd suggest just putting their name, just anything is better than a blank space.

1.) Yeah, I'm probably a little more strict on gimmick ratings than a lot of other people. It was partly down to the time period when the emphasis really wasn't on character portrayal for 95% of the wrestling population but it's probably more down to my own preferences. I really don't believe in bumping people up unnecessarily so whereas some people may have given them a percentage in "Comedy" for example just because they don't want to give them a 0%, I won't give 'em it unless they actually deserve it. xD Almost everyone has at least one 80% or higher in one field or another though, it's just finding out what they're good at which is more realistic in my opinion. I understand your pain with the product too; trust me, I've had my difficulties. The AWA product really was based on both popularity and performance as Verne Gagne obviously loved his amateur wrestling. Lowering Realism unfortunately drops us out of that range, and they're based more on popularity. Maybe it's a sacrifice I should make though if it's as tough as you say? As I've said many times, I want to be as realistic as possible but I also have to make it playable.

 

2.) Yeah, unfortunately their roster was massive at this time because AWA was more of an alliance at this time, made up of a whole lot of different towns and areas. With no real way of simulating this in the game, I kinda had to just roll with it. Again, this is one of those lines I had to tread trying to find the balance between realism and game playability because there really wasn't many matches on a televised show (and three was more or less common practise as far as I'm aware) but that unfortunately probably won't be much fun for the player. Their locker room is also pretty bad because as I explained, their roster is made up of what would have been three, four or five locker rooms in reality as they were all in different towns so you have some bad personalities that wouldn't have made much difference on their own but together, they kind of multiply the problem. Without cutting the roster considerably (but then how do you choose who stays and who goes?) I'm not sure how I can fix this issue. Does anyone have any suggestions?

 

3.) Yeah, I really touched on this with number one. Keeping both "Realism" and "Mainstream" on 'Medium' leaves us with a product that is rated equally on performance and popularity but the crowd won't be keen on gimmicks which leaves us with the problem you noted in number one. Lowering both "Realism" and "Mainstream" to 'Low' means the product will be rated equally on performance and popularity but the crowd won't care about the wrestlers character or gimmick, would this be a better alternative? So they still won't like gimmicks, but it should give the player a bit more leeway in what they choose as their gimmicks because as least they're not actively disliking 'em. It's either that or sacrifice either popularity or performance, and I'm not sure which'll be better for AWA in the long run.

 

4.) Looking at the AWA roster, I think you're right; some of the selling statistics are far too mean. AWA was obviously one of the first rosters I filled out and therefore some of their workers are some of the earliest people I added to the database and I really didn't find my flow at this point. This is why I went back through it a couple of times to try and fix these issues that I had with it myself because the workers I had done earlier in this whole operation to finish this moderation were slightly different to those I did a couple of weeks ago for example. Selling is obviously one statistic that I completely missed on my multiple retraces. I think my thinking at the time was that not a lot of people were good sellers back then but as I know now, that simply wasn't the case; in fact, they were probably better at it than people are today because people genuinely thought it was a real sport back then. I'll be sure to check selling ratings not just for AWA, but a lot of the earlier promotions so thanks for bringing it to my attention. Has anyone done a comprehensive run-through of WWWF (or any of the promotions higher up the alphabet basically, as I did them in alphabetical order) and are they better evaluated or am I wrong and it's a consistent problem?

 

5.) Yeah, unfortunately there is. There are some workers who can work as managers but don't show up when you're actively looking for them because they're only "Sometimes" a manager (Bronko Lubich, George "Two Ton" Harris, George "Crybaby" Cannon and Beauregarde to name just a few off the top of my head) so there are some out there. You're probably best off looking for people with average or good microphone skills rather than looking for actual managers, if that makes sense? But yeah, announcers were awfully thin on the ground back then, it's why most promoters turned to news readers or college football commentators. Without making a whole host of made-up announcers though, I'm not sure how I can combat this? If you wait long enough, people like Jim Ross begin to show up but obviously, that's only an answer for the long run.

 

Thank you for all the feedback and I'm glad you're enjoying it so far, even with these difficulties. Yeah, I know about the missing logos. I assure you, if they don't have a logo it's because there isn't a picture out there of said logo because I searched high and low for 'em. I'll take a look at generic logos and see what I can do.

 

Ah, man, this is amazing! After reading several of the Crowbar Press books and, in particular, Gary Hart's autobiography, I was tempted to make a January 1975 mod because of how amazing the world of wrestling was back then. January of '75 because it was a month before the awful plane crash that took Bobby Shane's life. Looking at the data, it would seem you're a fellow big fan of Shane! Anyway, after spending a good month on an era specific location file and cutting pictures, I lost all of my work. It may have been for the best, as it's doubtful I would've seen it through. And if I ever did, it most certainly would pale in comparison to this data! I'm just glad you put in the hard work. I cannot thank you enough!

 

So many awesome territories thriving, all fairly unique in style and roster make-up... It's very hard to decide to eventually pick. Maybe I'll play as Gary Hart booking for Fritz. They've got Johnny Valentine, Wahoo, Jardine, and Kox. Heck of a group to work with when you add in Fritz, Shane, and Kiniski. Booking Mil Mascaras will be a pain in the ass.

 

P.S. I didn't know Bob Caudle was ever young... He looks so strange!

I'm unashamedly a fan of Bobby Shane. xD In my humble opinion, he would have been one of if not the best wrestler ever if he hadn't been taken from us. Only he and El Solitario - who also died at a very young age - have set potential and that's because I want them to have the careers that they should have had. Anyway, thank you for all your kind words. What I love about the moderation is exactly what you pointed out, that there is no one who has a clear advantage over the others because they all have a star of some kind. Obviously some have more than others, but it's not like current day moderations where you can take over WWE and expect to stay number one because you can simply snatch the independent stars.

 

Yeah, the starting picture for Bob Caudle is probably a bit too early but I found that picture and just had to use it. xD

[smartman]

Oh the gimmicks are fine. I never worry about people's gimmick ratings, though there were a few at 60 difficulty that I don't think they would be that difficult to pull off, but again, that doesn't really matter. You've got like 1,000 in there to pick from so that isn't the issue.

 

I honestly don't know what to do with the Product. If you go with what used to be my favorite product, that introduces some problems. Modern at Medium spits out a 40/40 Danger/Intensity that is not a good idea when everyone is working for multiple feds. Realism just kills gimmicks of all kinds, and you can't run a US fed that doesn't do gimmicks because of how TV is at this time. Mainstream does absolutely nothing but determine if you run storylines or not.

 

With the starting pop of all the feds, you have to be an equal fed or you're killing your home area as no one has the pop to pull that off (which the worker pop settings are good btw). I wonder if you might want to lower them to around 60-65 there just keep the spillover in there.

 

If that's the roster, then that's the roster. Let the user cut the people. It isn't like there are a bunch of positive relationships you are messing up. Just odd to see a pre-set roster for a Regional fed that huge. I do suggest putting in a weekly "House" show unless it really unbalances the game with everyone making a ton of money. A)That's very historic. TV was basically there to sell the tickets to the weekly show. B)It's hard to accomplish anything with just 1 hour of TV (and yeah, 1 hour is what everyone got with 3 matches but the game really can't simulate the TV of that era as they were basically B shows).

 

Oh, and the backstage rating was never that bad. After hiring the 2nd Anderson, it was 87 (84 without him) so no problems there either.

[dcxbox]

so how long does this data base go? do we get to 2014 for example? or atleast 2001

[shipshirt]

One weird thing I noticed...I ran a year on Watcher mode using Multi-Day Advance (I do NOT recommend doing this unless you've got something else to do...this mod is HUGE and took about 2 hours, if not a little more, to run a year) and I noticed that the AWA created an Arena Championship, BTW created a BTW National Championship, GCW created a Universal and Big Gold Belt, EMLL created a TV, etc. It's strange because there certainly isn't a lack of titles in any of those promotions, at all levels and for singles and tag teams. Not sure why this would happen.

 

Also you may want to create events in the database or limit the names of the events to stuff like "End of the Month Show" just to avoid modern sounding event names like Subbacultcha or Creeping Death

[BamaNationFan123]

You're very welcome. Thank you as a main contributor (if not with information, with general enthusiasm) to the help topic

 

Thank you.

 

You're welcome. Yeah, I don't have an "NWA World Tag Team Championship" in the database (one that was toured around, anyway) but many territories obviously had their own version whether it's something along the lines of "NWA Texas Tag Team Championship" or whatever. So what you described is exactly what you'll find. I believe St. Louis did have a Tag Team Championship (they shared all of their titles with Central States Wrestling and vice versa) but you're right, Sam Muchnick wasn't a big fan of tag team matches and hopefully I've reflected this with his product because his tag team match booking is considerably lower compared to some of the other territories.

 

 

Tell Bobby Shane we miss him while you're there.

 

 

That's exactly what I hoped so I can't tell you how much that pleases me. xD Hopefully it's still playable even though you don't know a whole lot about this time period? It was hard at times finding that line but I hope I've found it and created something that any fan - whether you're a historian or modern day enthusiast - can play and enjoy.

 

 

1.) Yeah, I'm probably a little more strict on gimmick ratings than a lot of other people. It was partly down to the time period when the emphasis really wasn't on character portrayal for 95% of the wrestling population but it's probably more down to my own preferences. I really don't believe in bumping people up unnecessarily so whereas some people may have given them a percentage in "Comedy" for example just because they don't want to give them a 0%, I won't give 'em it unless they actually deserve it. xD Almost everyone has at least one 80% or higher in one field or another though, it's just finding out what they're good at which is more realistic in my opinion. I understand your pain with the product too; trust me, I've had my difficulties. The AWA product really was based on both popularity and performance as Verne Gagne obviously loved his amateur wrestling. Lowering Realism unfortunately drops us out of that range, and they're based more on popularity. Maybe it's a sacrifice I should make though if it's as tough as you say? As I've said many times, I want to be as realistic as possible but I also have to make it playable.

 

2.) Yeah, unfortunately their roster was massive at this time because AWA was more of an alliance at this time, made up of a whole lot of different towns and areas. With no real way of simulating this in the game, I kinda had to just roll with it. Again, this is one of those lines I had to tread trying to find the balance between realism and game playability because there really wasn't many matches on a televised show (and three was more or less common practise as far as I'm aware) but that unfortunately probably won't be much fun for the player. Their locker room is also pretty bad because as I explained, their roster is made up of what would have been three, four or five locker rooms in reality as they were all in different towns so you have some bad personalities that wouldn't have made much difference on their own but together, they kind of multiply the problem. Without cutting the roster considerably (but then how do you choose who stays and who goes?) I'm not sure how I can fix this issue. Does anyone have any suggestions?

 

3.) Yeah, I really touched on this with number one. Keeping both "Realism" and "Mainstream" on 'Medium' leaves us with a product that is rated equally on performance and popularity but the crowd won't be keen on gimmicks which leaves us with the problem you noted in number one. Lowering both "Realism" and "Mainstream" to 'Low' means the product will be rated equally on performance and popularity but the crowd won't care about the wrestlers character or gimmick, would this be a better alternative? So they still won't like gimmicks, but it should give the player a bit more leeway in what they choose as their gimmicks because as least they're not actively disliking 'em. It's either that or sacrifice either popularity or performance, and I'm not sure which'll be better for AWA in the long run.

 

4.) Looking at the AWA roster, I think you're right; some of the selling statistics are far too mean. AWA was obviously one of the first rosters I filled out and therefore some of their workers are some of the earliest people I added to the database and I really didn't find my flow at this point. This is why I went back through it a couple of times to try and fix these issues that I had with it myself because the workers I had done earlier in this whole operation to finish this moderation were slightly different to those I did a couple of weeks ago for example. Selling is obviously one statistic that I completely missed on my multiple retraces. I think my thinking at the time was that not a lot of people were good sellers back then but as I know now, that simply wasn't the case; in fact, they were probably better at it than people are today because people genuinely thought it was a real sport back then. I'll be sure to check selling ratings not just for AWA, but a lot of the earlier promotions so thanks for bringing it to my attention. Has anyone done a comprehensive run-through of WWWF (or any of the promotions higher up the alphabet basically, as I did them in alphabetical order) and are they better evaluated or am I wrong and it's a consistent problem?

 

5.) Yeah, unfortunately there is. There are some workers who can work as managers but don't show up when you're actively looking for them because they're only "Sometimes" a manager (Bronko Lubich, George "Two Ton" Harris, George "Crybaby" Cannon and Beauregarde to name just a few off the top of my head) so there are some out there. You're probably best off looking for people with average or good microphone skills rather than looking for actual managers, if that makes sense? But yeah, announcers were awfully thin on the ground back then, it's why most promoters turned to news readers or college football commentators. Without making a whole host of made-up announcers though, I'm not sure how I can combat this? If you wait long enough, people like Jim Ross begin to show up but obviously, that's only an answer for the long run.

 

Thank you for all the feedback and I'm glad you're enjoying it so far, even with these difficulties. Yeah, I know about the missing logos. I assure you, if they don't have a logo it's because there isn't a picture out there of said logo because I searched high and low for 'em. I'll take a look at generic logos and see what I can do.

 

 

I'm unashamedly a fan of Bobby Shane. xD In my humble opinion, he would have been one of if not the best wrestler ever if he hadn't been taken from us. Only he and El Solitario - who also died at a very young age - have set potential and that's because I want them to have the careers that they should have had. Anyway, thank you for all your kind words. What I love about the moderation is exactly what you pointed out, that there is no one who has a clear advantage over the others because they all have a star of some kind. Obviously some have more than others, but it's not like current day moderations where you can take over WWE and expect to stay number one because you can simply snatch the independent stars.

 

Yeah, the starting picture for Bob Caudle is probably a bit too early but I found that picture and just had to use it. xD

 

I was also a Bobby Shane fan, as I was in the 5th (or 6th) grade at that time. I also remember that that crash was the end of Buddy Colt's wrestling career as far as in ring is concerned. I guess you could call Mike McCord the "Ric Flair" of that crash as he went on to a pretty successful career as Austin Idol, after loosing 100lbs and bleach-blond hair. There was a fairly good rivalry going on between Idol and Flair in the 80s, and was at the Boutwell Auditorium when they had a match for the NWA World title. I am glad you left Shane's career setting as you have it. I too will be interested in what could have been!

[Teh_Showtime]

I've never had problems with gimmicks in any company with medium or higher realism, they even tend to work in Japanese companies. Even TCW in the default data has no problems whatsoever with gimmicks with medium realism. The product doesn't outright reject gimmicks at all, it just favors legit/realistic/etc type gimmicks.

[BHK1978]

One thing you might consider taking out is the last line in Grizzly Smith's bio. I know it is the truth and I personally have no problem with it being in there. With that being said, you never know who is downloading your mod as a lot of younger folks do play this game (Though I am not sure if many would be interested in a historical mod, but you never know.).

[franticloser]

The only thing I have a question on, is it does seem you put selling low for everyone, guys like Terry and Dusty are under 60 even, was there a reason for this?

[Mammoth]

so how long does this data base go? do we get to 2014 for example? or atleast 2001

It'll go on as long as you take it. If you mean will workers continue to début up until 2014, right now no but I'm still working on 'yet to début' workers. At the moment, I have a lot of the main players who'll début between the start of the moderation and 1975 (Ric Flair, Jesse Ventura, Roddy Piper, Jimmy Snuka, Randy Savage, Hulk Hogan etcetera) which makes the game playable well into the 80s and beyond but I hope to go as far as possible, only adding those of interest as not to beef up the database. So yes, workers may go right up to 2014 (the likes of CM Punk, John Cena, Bryan Danielson etcetera) more likely going to be added but don't expect to see a lot of the independent guys as I'll leave that to the mechanics of the game. Promotions are also set to début, the likes of Pro-Wrestling Guerilla, All Japan Pro Wrestling, New Japan Pro Wrestling etcetera.

 

One weird thing I noticed...I ran a year on Watcher mode using Multi-Day Advance (I do NOT recommend doing this unless you've got something else to do...this mod is HUGE and took about 2 hours, if not a little more, to run a year) and I noticed that the AWA created an Arena Championship, BTW created a BTW National Championship, GCW created a Universal and Big Gold Belt, EMLL created a TV, etc. It's strange because there certainly isn't a lack of titles in any of those promotions, at all levels and for singles and tag teams. Not sure why this would happen.

 

Also you may want to create events in the database or limit the names of the events to stuff like "End of the Month Show" just to avoid modern sounding event names like Subbacultcha or Creeping Death

That is a bit of a strange one. Did you happen to notice if they had retired any of their default titles or were they created as well as? I don't think it's necessarily an issue I have to fix because it's not necessarily a problem, but I'll take a look into it and see if there's a reason they're adding more titles.

 

Yeah, I was thinking of adding a small weekly event to almost every promotion that'll act almost like a house show to combat the lack of television time and to give the player more time to use everyone on their roster. At least then you'll stop getting the message that you have no events planned, and it should stop the AI creating their own events and using the more modern sounding names.

 

Can I ask if there was anything else notable in your watcher? Obviously I don't need to know who signed who or anything like that (the beauty of this moderation is that it'll be different every time because everyone is on a PPA deal) but if promotions close or something similar, I'd be interested to know.

 

I've never had problems with gimmicks in any company with medium or higher realism, they even tend to work in Japanese companies. Even TCW in the default data has no problems whatsoever with gimmicks with medium realism. The product doesn't outright reject gimmicks at all, it just favors legit/realistic/etc type gimmicks.

Okay, thank you. I'll leave it as it is for now and if anyone else has any issues with gimmicks, then please inform me because it's just my luck that my moderation would be the one that has difficulties. xD

 

One thing you might consider taking out is the last line in Grizzly Smith's bio. I know it is the truth and I personally have no problem with it being in there. With that being said, you never know who is downloading your mod as a lot of younger folks do play this game (Though I am not sure if many would be interested in a historical mod, but you never know.).

Yeah, I try to be as brutally honest as I can be. In Grizzly Smith's case, I wanted to include that last line because most of his biography is talking about how he's loved by the crowd for his "down-to-earth, simple folk appeal" but when you look at his personality, he's nothing like that so I felt I had to explain why. I don't think it's too graphic and I certainly wouldn't go into detail about these abhorrent things so I think I'll leave it in there unless I get any real complaints because I certainly don't want to upset or offend anyone.

 

The only thing I have a question on, is it does seem you put selling low for everyone, guys like Terry and Dusty are under 60 even, was there a reason for this?

Yeah, this has been brought to my attention and seems to be an issue with my moderation. My thinking at the time was that not a lot of people were good sellers back then but as I know now, that simply isn't the case. Towards the finish line of my moderation I began to be less strict on this statistic but obviously some of the earlier workers I had created still have low numbers in this value. Trust me, it's on my to-do list and will be sorted when I next release an update; I've already gone through AGPW, AJW, ASW, AWA and BTW to update their selling statistics and now there is more of a steady number of people with grades from C - B, with obviously some exceptions higher or lower.

[Coop]

Thank you for some very hard work here. Some of these guys I had forgotten over the years. Some I don't have a clue about. But man oh man, have you done a nice job here.

[Mammoth]

Thank you for some very hard work here. Some of these guys I had forgotten over the years. Some I don't have a clue about. But man oh man, have you done a nice job here.

Thank you. If I can introduce people to guys they've never even heard of, then I'll be happy with the work I've done.

 

I've just finished the CWF roster (in terms of going through everyone and fiddling with their stamina) and I'm still finding some people are really out of whack like people have suggested. As it seems to be a bigger problem than I thought, I'll continue going through the rest of the rosters. I've also added a small/medium event entitled "[Promotion Name] House Show" to every promotion except those with two television shows to simulate how it was in real life because unfortunately, we can't do proper house shows because there wasn't any written contracts back then. I've done a little test and there doesn't seem to be any issues created by doing this. The only real issue is workers schedules because there are only so many days in the week (obviously) but I'm kinda happy with that because people were working their asses off back then and it makes it a little more difficult for the player. For example, even though everyone is on a PPA deal, you're going to have to look at their schedule before signing them otherwise you may just come unstuck and as I say, I really like that. I'll repackage it all up and release something of a "Version 1.1" in the coming weeks and hopefully that'll solve some of the early problems (selling and lack of booking time) so I can concentrate on the yet to début workers that I've yet to add.

 

Thank you all for your feedback so far and I'm truly happy you all seem to be enjoying it, not to mention I'm thoroughly amazed that they're the only problems people seem to have with it so far. xD

[shipshirt]

 

That is a bit of a strange one. Did you happen to notice if they had retired any of their default titles or were they created as well as? I don't think it's necessarily an issue I have to fix because it's not necessarily a problem, but I'll take a look into it and see if there's a reason they're adding more titles.

 

I think I may have figured this out. For AWA you have all of the titles set at a minimum weight of Light Heavyweight, so Middleweights and Lightweights have no titles. The created title had no weight restrictions. You may want to edit some of the midcard titles to include lighter wrestlers.

 

You actually have a lot of titles (including the WWWF Junior Heavyweight title) set to a minimum of Light Heavyweight wrestlers. Maybe this was an error and you thought you were setting it to Lightweight? Some of the wrestlers I've seen have a weird weight setting, like Andre only at Big Heavyweight and Bruno at Light Heavyweight.

 

Yeah, I was thinking of adding a small weekly event to almost every promotion that'll act almost like a house show to combat the lack of television time and to give the player more time to use everyone on their roster. At least then you'll stop getting the message that you have no events planned, and it should stop the AI creating their own events and using the more modern sounding names.

 

I tried this with Memphis back in the DOTT mod and it will still create a monthly event regardless if you have a weekly one scheduled. I don't understand why it does that. So you do need to either create a monthly event or just edit the names available for events.

 

Can I ask if there was anything else notable in your watcher? Obviously I don't need to know who signed who or anything like that (the beauty of this moderation is that it'll be different every time because everyone is on a PPA deal) but if promotions close or something similar, I'd be interested to know.

 

Nothing out of the ordinary other than what I posted above. All Star Wrestling went out of business in August but otherwise, everyone else is still in the game. WWWF, Central States (?!), Florida and JPW all went to Cult. Central States might need a cap on how big they get as that was always a really small territory.

[Mammoth]

I think I may have figured this out. For AWA you have all of the titles set at a minimum weight of Light Heavyweight, so Middleweights and Lightweights have no titles. The created title had no weight restrictions. You may want to edit some of the midcard titles to include lighter wrestlers.

 

You actually have a lot of titles (including the WWWF Junior Heavyweight title) set to a minimum of Light Heavyweight wrestlers. Maybe this was an error and you thought you were setting it to Lightweight? Some of the wrestlers I've seen have a weird weight setting, like Andre only at Big Heavyweight and Bruno at Light Heavyweight.

Yeah, I hated adding weight limitations to the titles but yet again, it's one of those "Realism versus Game" things and as people were being stripped of titles because they weren't in the weight limit back then, I felt I had to include them. As I've said many times though, I'm willing to sacrifice realism for playability so I'll look into it and if it stops promotions creating their own titles, I think it's probably best to either lower the weight limit or get rid of 'em entirely.

 

Again, setting the "Junior" championships were equally infuriating because I - like everyone else here - associate "Junior" with lighter wrestlers but every single "Junior" championship I came across still had champions who as fas as I'm aware were never that light. That's why you'll find all "Junior" championships don't have the weight limits you'd expect. Trust me, I hate it just as much as you but I just said, I'm going to go through the weight limits again and either lower them or remove them completely as I think it's one of those things that's slightly unnecessary. As for André the Giant and Bruno Sammartino? I believe they're right at this time. André was still growing at this point and he certainly wasn't as wide as he was in the 80s; he was still more of a technical wrestler and still performing dropkicks. And the same with Sammartino, he wasn't as beefed up as he was towards the late 70s, going into the 80s. I'm not saying all sizes are perfect, but as far as I'm aware they're all correct[ish] for the time-frame.

 

I tried this with Memphis back in the DOTT mod and it will still create a monthly event regardless if you have a weekly one scheduled. I don't understand why it does that. So you do need to either create a monthly event or just edit the names available for events.

Well I've done a tester with the weekly events included and they haven't sprung anything up although I've only progressed a month or two. Maybe there's something in the mechanics of TEW that has changed between then and now, presuming you played D.O.T.T on an earlier version of TEW and haven't converted it to 2013? I'm reluctant to edit the event names because although it'll fix the problem, it doesn't give the player much leeway after a couple of years when event names come into play.

 

Nothing out of the ordinary other than what I posted above. All Star Wrestling went out of business in August but otherwise, everyone else is still in the game. WWWF, Central States (?!), Florida and JPW all went to Cult. Central States might need a cap on how big they get as that was always a really small territory.

Okay, thanks. I'm not too happy about All Star Wrestling closing, but that's probably because I didn't give them as much money as some of the others despite their popularity. Central States Wrestling probably rises to cult because they have almost equal popularity in both Mid South and Mid West because their real life territory was basically on the border of both those regions in TEW terms. I'm not too worried about it though and I'm definitely not easy with putting a cap on them because the way I see history moderations is that you want to change history, not relive it so I'm okay with them raising to cult to be honest. Anyway, thanks again for all the information, especially as it took so long for the watcher to complete. xD Trust me, I feel your pain...