WWF 1987: Women's and Cruiserweight Roster Suggestions

[Tigermask69]

I'm running a save as WWF in 1987 and want to make both women's and cruiserweight wrestling important parts of the company. Who would you suggest to make up these parts of the roster, or is it better to wait for a later point in time? Thanks

[St. Templar]

<p>I would say that as an historical save, if you want to have cruiserweights and a strong women's division in 1987, you need to have the ability to sign workers from Mexico and Japan, since they had both solid women's and what we would refer to as cruiserweight divisions in those countries going back to the 70's and 80's. What WCW did was to grab the luchadores and junior guys that were already a big deal back home and push them.</p><p> </p><p>

Now, starting in 1987, you'll have to push people who have little to no popularity in the US, and that's going to take time. You can't stop pushing them them just because the matches don't get great ratings due to low popularity. On the other hand, you need to make sure that your midcard and main event matches are solid to balance that out.</p><p> </p><p>

St.T</p>

[Zero]

SL. T hit it right on the head. It is hard to build a cruiserweight division but if you want to build a light-heavyweight division/X-Division it is do-able. You might have more technical guys compared to high flying.

[Tigermask69]

Thanks both. Any specific names you would recommend? I'm thinking Wendi Richter (depending on if I can get her to agree to sign due to her issues with the WWF) and Liger would make good faces for the respective divisions.

[BHK1978]

You could also use some of the workers who are already established on your roster to populate your cruiserweight division. I am trying to think of who you could use that was on the roster back then.

 

Looking at the data (I have the 2016 version of the mod, not sure why I never got the 2020 version) I guess the first question is, what do you want to consider cruiserweight?

 

I tend to go middleweight and under. If you follow that way you have Tom Zenk, Tito Santana (Who would make a killer first champ), Hot Rod (Though I would not put him there), Ricky Steamboat (Another great first champ), both of the Killer Bees, if you want to break up the Bulldogs then Dynamite would be a great first champion, Koko B. Ware, Lanny Poffo, both Rougeau's.

 

Now granted I am going off TEW16 data and things might have changed, but if you take any of the above names and put them into the division with some quality free agents, I think you could build a pretty good division.

 

Edited to add: Because I edited my post, I thought I would add that the women Archeo below suggests you hire are really good choices. In fact, a lot of them worked for the WWF around that time or a little later as well. Therefore, if you want to be somewhat historically accurate in your hirings people like Judy Maritn, Rockin' Robin, Leilani Kai, Aja Kong (I think I remember her being there, but I could be wrong.) and the most obvious scary Sherri, were all part of the roster at one time.

[ArcheoOutOfNowhere]

For the Women's Division, I think at first, and like others have said, you'll be tempted to sign plenty of Joshi and luchadoras so you have talented people in the ring. However, since you're playing a company where in ring talent isn't enough (and is more or less second to popularity), you'll also want to have women that are already decently popular so one can "leech" the popularity of the other, and the less talented worker can learn from the talented one. Plus, let's face it, it's always nice to have someone who already speak the language for promos.

 

With that in mind, and if their skills haven't changed too much compared to the TEW16 mod, I'd say any one of those workers could be interesting in at least one category: Wendi Richter (duh), Velvet McIntyre, Tracy Richards, Tina Ferrari (or Lisa Moretti), Susan Sexton, Sherri Martel, Candi Devine, Brittany Brown, Debbie Combs, Heidi Lee Morgan, Joyce Grable, Judy Martin, Kat LeRoux, Lady Apache, Lola Gonzalez, Akira Hakuto, Aja Kong, Leilani Kai, Rockin' Robin, Yukari Omori, Reggie Bennett, Misty Dawn, Luna Vachon, Lioness Asuka, Madusa Micelli, Jumbo Hori, etc. I've had a lot of success with Sindy Paradise in my saves on the 16's version of the mod too, but I can't remember if she was one of those I imported or not.

I would also recommend taking a look at the women fed (AJW and GLOW if they're in the mod, plus any that would pop later) to see if there isn't someone who got a lucky destiny roll and whose pop is exploding.