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Running matches can be fun on their own, but usually it's even more fun to run matches in the context of an entire wrestling league -- setting up feuds, sparring over championships, planning supercards, and other activities that extend outside of a pure wrestling bout.
Many wrestlers hire assistance from other individuals who accompany them to ringside; these persons may be called valets, coaches, personal trainers, spiritual advisors, or whatever title seems most appropriate, but in these rules they will all be generically referred to as "managers".
Managers are created like any other wrestler, but they can have anywhere between 10 and 50 Talent points. Managers typically have lower stats than wrestlers, and often take the "Non-Wrestler" Flaw; on the other hand, they also tend to have inflated SAV scores. Most managers are rulebreakers, since managers are most useful when they can interfere in a match with dirty tricks -- but even the purest hearted wrestler can find some use for a friendly hand and some moral support at ringside.
The most significant difference between a manager and other characters is that the manager has a license purchased from the promotion. This license gives him a certain set of benefits, mostly intangibles.
The Cut: Managers receive a percentage of their charges' earnings, equal to their Talent/2. (Thus, a 20 point manager receives the classic 10% cut). This is a true deduction -- the wrestler receives less money for his matches, as a portion is given to the manager instead.
Power of Attorney: A manager is empowered to sign contracts on his charges behalf, with regard to the promotion. They may also spend money to cover fines and other ring-related expenses incurred by their charges, but not Training or upkeep costs; managers who possess the Rich merit enjoy its usual benefits even when spending cash on behalf of another.
Press Agent: Managers are considered to be publicly recognized representatives of their charges, and as such can make press statements or public comments (read: flashes) in their charges' names. This allows Managers, among other things, to earn PRE for their charges.
Ring Presence: Managers are allowed to accompany their charges to ringside during matches; as "sanctioned participants", they cannot be fined for disrupting a match with their presence as other characters might.
Every match, even the wildest no-disqualification brawl, must have at least one referee present (if only to count the pinfall). The referee is (usually) the ultimate arbiter of any match, responsible for monitoring the match for any infraction of the rules and determining when one wrestler has won.
Referees are created by the Promoter. They have the following necessary ratings:
Promoters who wish to generate random referees can do so by this method:
Every so often, a character with actual wrestling ability (that is, one with a full character sheet) will put on a referee shirt and step into the ring, as part of the stipulations of a given match. A "special referee" operates a little differently than a standard official.
Skill: The effective Skill of a special referee is equal to his SAV, modified as follows:
I Am The Law: Special referees are not limited to a simple numeric Threshold -- they can set whatever circumstances desired for disqualifying a wrestler. They may also decide both when to issue a referee warning (including either ignoring blatant calls, or issuing spurious warnings), and how extreme/"in your face" they wish to be (selecting the attack penalty suffered by the wrestler being warned, from -0% to -20%). When running an asynchronous game, the referee should submit a "strategy" detailing when and why he would issue warnings or disqualify a wrestler.
Best Interests of Wrestling: Blatant mockery of the standard rules is a bad idea -- at least, the fans think so. When a wrestler performs an illegal action that the special referee ignores, the referee reduces his PRE (or increases his negative PRE) by half as much as the wrestler perfoming the action.
Optional Rule: Seniority Mandate
When a special referee is in the ring, take note of the Senior Referee's ratings as well. Make a Skill check for the senior referee when something illegal occurs; whenever the senior referee would have issued a warning and the special referee does not, or vice versa, mark a "shadow Warning" (note that any number of warnings beyond the senior referee's Threshold are warnings he would not deliver). When the number of "shadow Warnings" exceed the Threshold of the senior referee, he will come to ringside and replace the special referee.
Professional wrestlers earn money for their matches: that's what makes them "professional" wrestlers. They will also incur expenses as they build their careers in the ring, which will drain their pockets. The exact amounts a wrestler earns and/or pays is dependent on the Promoter and the style of federation he wishes to run; some Promoters may wish to forego tracking Money altogether. Some suggestions are given below, for a "default" promotion.
Every wrestler receives a base wage for participating in matches. This is $1000 for most wrestlers, $1500 for lesser champions, and $2000 for the World Champion.
Each match also has a purse which is taken by the winner. This purse starts off at $1000, modified as below:
If a wrestler is disqualified for any reason other than a non-deliberate countout, he forfeits half his basic wage as a penalty. If a match ends in a "clean" draw (time limit or double non-deliberate countout), the purse is divided between the wrestlers. If a match ends in a double disqualification, neither wrestler takes any of the purse, and both receive the half-wage penalty.
Managers do not earn money for their participation in matches, except as described under "The Cut", above.
A popular statistic (from 1998) holds that a "Stone Cold" Steve Austin t-shirt sells every 40 seconds worldwide -- imagine what that does for his checkbook. Though your own characters may never reach this level of popularity, it still stands to reason would think that a Superstar level PRE should be able to move some serious product.
To engage in a merchandising drive, just imagine a product line and describe it to the Promoter. If the Promoter approves of it, he will grade it (using the same scale as Flashes, below) and after one game month will award your wrestler an amount equal to $(Current PRE x Grade Multiple). Thus, a wrestler with 1,200 PRE who creates a "B" grade product will recieve $8,400.
Money has no value unless it is spent -- or, at least, unless it can be spent. A wrestler may find his wallet tapped in many ways.
Upkeep: A wrestler must spend $250 per game week in "upkeep". This represents the chunk that ordinary life takes out of your bank account: food, housing, etc. (and provides an incentive to keep wrestling as opposed to falling into semi-retirement.)
A wrestler can choose to spend more per week on upkeep, representing living on a "luxury" lifestyle. This increases his atmosphere of celebrity and draws more attention to him; each doubling of upkeep costs for a week adds +1 PRE (or -1 PRE for rulebreakers).
A wrestler who pays half the normal upkeep costs will get by, but has lowered morale and training quality -- he recieves one less Turnover than normal for his Prestige rating. A wrestler who can not (or simply does not) pay any upkeep costs during a week suffers this effect, plus a -5% to all ringside rolls -- a combination of poor morale, inferior training, deteriorating health, and other intangibles.
Manager's License: Managers must pay dues to keep their licenses from expiring. This is a monthly fee of $500 for a single charge; additional wrestlers covered under the license add $100 each.
Medical Care: The wrestler can spend $1000 for a week-long hospital stay if he has sustained Injuries. A hospitalized wrestler removes Injuries at double the normal rate (quadruple this rate if he is a Miracle Man), and eliminates upkeep requirements for that week (hospital food may not be gourmet fare, but it'll keep you alive). Hospital care cannot affect the "Nagging Injuries" Flaw.
Fines: A wrestler who violates the letter or spirit of the promotion's rules in a particularly offensive or detestable fashion may find himself facing more than an occasional disqualification -- the league administration often levies fines for various offenses (such as assaulting the league officials, including referees).
Training: A Promoter may require characters to purchase Experience with cash -- see below.
The Promoter always retains the right to demand certain exotic strategems (such as the infamous "referee double") have a price tag attached.
"Practice makes perfect," they say, and wrestling is no exception -- experience remains the best teacher, and a wrestler who wants to better his skills will have to practice. As a wrestler's career advances, he will gain Experience points, which can be devoted to improving his performance; improvement to a wrestler can take three forms: growth, polish, and education.
Growth: A player can spend a character's money to add new Talent points to that character. The first extra Talent point a character adds (beyond the original 50) requires 5 Experience points. Each additional Talent point costs double the previous Experience -- the 52nd point costs 10 Experience, the 53rd costs 20, and so on.
Polish: Rather than increasing the overall talent of a character, a player may simply wish to retune his design, changing the way his Talent has been spent. Each Talent point moved in this fashion requires spending 1 Experience point.
Note that Growth and Polish can be combined when changing a character -- a player who wishes to purchase a 2 point merit may add one point through Growth, and move another point via Polish. A character may alter his Attributes, Merits, Flaws, and even Weight through these methods, but not his Height; a character may change his Background as well, with the Promoter's permission.
Education: Changes to Talent after initial creation of a character do not alter his Arsenals in any fashion. However, a character can add new Arsenal slots directly, using Experience; each additional slot costs 2 Experience, and acts the same as the Training slots originally gained from SAV.
Gaining Experience: The Promoter will decide the exact method used for allocating experience. One suggestion is to allow characters to exchange money for Experience -- $1000 "buying" 1 Experience point. A simpler method (which can be used if the Promoter wishes to forego using Money completely) is to award 1 Experience point for each match, with an additional point if the character wins.
As a wrestler makes his way through the federation, he will gain and lose favor with the fans. This is represented by alterations to his Prestige rating. This is a list of the standard Prestige bonuses and penalties.
Defeating a fan favorite:
Defeating a rulebreaker:
If a wrestler wins by disqualification or draw, halve the PRE modification. If a wrestler wins by illegal means, halve the PRE modification -- unless the wrestler is a fan favorite who directly cheated to win. In this case, apply the modification as if he were a rulebreaker (that is, subtracting it).
Losing:
Title Matches:
Each of these values only applies once; a wrestler can only gain multiple bonuses for ring entrances and/or entrance music by changing his entrance style or music.
Vocal (i.e. on a microphone) interaction with or harassment of the fans is treated as a spontaneous flash (see below).
A wrestler gains "Spot Bonuses" for actions he takes during the match.
A character who makes no appearances within a game month reduces his total PRE by 20%.
A character with the "Foreign" flaw reduces all earned PRE in each cycle by 20%.
The Promoter must "grade" each flash according to its quality (originality, eloquence, and effectiveness).
League-sponsored (such as promotional merchandise): rate as a flash.
Non-wrestling product (i.e. Hogan's "Right Guard" ad): rate as a flash, but add a bonus grade (i.e. a completely mediocre commercial is worth +/- 10 PRE). An "A" rated commercial is worth 20 PRE.
This bonus is because stepping outside the world of wrestling makes one seem like a bigger deal, with broader appeal. However, non-wrestling commercials must be approved by the Promoter. (It's a real stretch to claim that your bloodthirsty rulebreaker is the perfect pitchman for children's cough syrup ...)
This includes being a guest on a talk show, being a guest star in a TV series episode, etc. If this is just mentioned or described by the wrestler, it is worth +/- 5 PRE. If the handler of the wrestler wants to write an excerpt of the appearance, it can be graded as a flash -- but the PRE is tripled. This is not only because of the "broader appeal" described above, but because frankly such an effort requires a lot of creative energy, which deserves to be rewarded.
A wrestler must be at least Superstar in rank (or Heel, for rulebreakers) to use this option (anything less, and you just get cameo roles like Mark "Undertaker" Calloway did in Suburban Commando).
All Prestige gained or lost at Pay-Per-View events is multiplied by 1.5. Prestige gained or lost at non-televised events, or at extrafederational events (if the Promoter allows moonlighting in the first place) is halved.
Wrestlers occasionally get a chance to sit in the booth as an announcer. In this case, his entire commentary is graded in its entirety as if it were a flash; commentating a single match earns standard PRE, commentating a whole card earns double PRE.