[EWR] December 1997 - MASTERS Scenario (Development Thread)

[OGpistolpete]

And so it begins. Another new adventure into the EWR MASTERS scenario timeline. August 1996 is complete. April 1997 was completed a few months ago. Now I would like to move on to your next moment in time…

November, 1997.

Yes, oh yes, what a month this was. Of course, the events which took place on the night of November 9^th, 1997 have forever lived on in infamy. The Montreal Screwjob is perhaps still to this day, the most controversial happenstance to take place during a live show. It is truly one of those rare moments where Kayfabe seceded to the reality of what was taking place backstage. Where Vince McMahon screwed Bret Hart, or if you so please, Bret Hart screwed Bret Hart. No matter what your opinions on the matter, there is no doubt the landscape of professional wrestling changed dramatically on November 9^th, making the month of November the next logical stop on our passing through the times.

But do not forget what is coming in just a month from November 1997. Arguably one of WCW’s biggest blunders on their biggest night in the company’s history. Starrcade 1997. It’s been almost an entire year since Sting has stepped foot in a WCW ring with wrestling as the intention. Since then, the New World Order has revolutionized professional wrestling forever, and WCW has never been the same. But the first glimpses of their beloved hero has turned into attack after attack against the nWo, as Sting appears to be the only man who can challenge the “immortal” ‘Hollywood’ Hulk Hogan and recapture the WCW World Heavyweight championship.

Don't forget, the WWF Attitude Era is right around the corner...

Will you lead the WWF into your version of the Attitude Era?

Will you save WCW from their own demise?

Will you lead ECW to the national stage?

Or will you find a different path?

Plenty of work to be done. Not much time for me to do it. But I will try my best!

Edited September 16, 2014 by OGpistolpete

[OGpistolpete]

So I am just about finished with the WWF roster. My only hold up right now is the salary scale. I have been using one scale I developed when I first started this project that has been working out fine I believe, but I am considering taking a more realistic approach to it. Reading Dave Meltzer's comments on the Montreal Screwjob episode of the Monday Night War on the WWE Network, he mentions that at the time of the screwjob Bret Hart was guaranteed $1.5 million, while Shawn Michaels and the Undertaker were making double that. At $1.5M a year, that is $125k a month, while Michaels and Undertaker would hypothetically be making about $60-70k a month. Right now I have guys like Michaels at $200k a month and the Undertaker at $175k.

Are there any thoughts on a potential adjustment of everyone's salaries in the game?

Does anybody have any other information concerning wrestlers salaries around this time?

[kdcastles]

So I am just about finished with the WWF roster. My only hold up right now is the salary scale. I have been using one scale I developed when I first started this project that has been working out fine I believe, but I am considering taking a more realistic approach to it. Reading Dave Meltzer's comments on the Montreal Screwjob episode of the Monday Night War on the WWE Network, he mentions that at the time of the screwjob Bret Hart was guaranteed $1.5 million, while Shawn Michaels and the Undertaker were making double that. At $1.5M a year, that is $125k a month, while Michaels and Undertaker would hypothetically be making about $60-70k a month. Right now I have guys like Michaels at $200k a month and the Undertaker at $175k.

Are there any thoughts on a potential adjustment of everyone's salaries in the game?

Does anybody have any other information concerning wrestlers salaries around this time?

If you try to make it realistic, the game becomes too easy based on the numbers you are putting out there. If my top guys are making 125k and I can get over $800,000 from one sponsor I'll never lose enough money to lose the game, nor will any company be bought out.

[OGpistolpete]

That's what I have been worried about. The only problem is it's hard to estimate how much a company like the WWF spends and makes per month. On average they would make $2.8M from sponsors a month given what I have in the game. The part I have difficulty calculating is the revenue from TV and PPV's. Anybody willing to run through a month and do the numbers for me?

[OGpistolpete]

Having autobooked a month with the complete WWF roster finished, I have come to the conclusion that sponsporship pays too much and workers don't earn enough. Here are the numbers for the first month I ran.

Ticket Sales ..............5570400

PPV Rev. ..................2050000

Sponsorship .............6342000

Merchandise .............2400000

Total Revenue ......16362400

Worker Costs ...........3086000

Staff Costs .................324000

Production Costs .....3700000

Merchandise Costs ..2000000

Advertising Costs .....1000000

Total Expenses ....10110000

Monthly Profit ........6252400

Given this situation, the only real options I see to sort this out is to adjust worker and staff wages in order to increase how much they cost, as well as lowering the amount of money that companies earn from sponsorship. Merchandise and Advertising are at 100%, and I believe would increase a bit as Public Image would increase (correct? WWF starts at 20% PI, Global). Considering that the WWF was in really bad shape financially in 1997, I would like to see their profit decreased to around only a few hundred thousand per month, which means cutting almost $6 million from what they are making right now per month. That is just way too much.

I'm also thinking that with different sponsorship files, the ease of the game could be increased or decreased. Sort of like choosing between playing Easy, Medium, or Hard. With the current sponsorship file, I would consider the mode "Easy" and just lets you book things without having the worry about finances.

Thoughts?

Edited September 19, 2014 by OGpistolpete

[KJE]

I'm also thinking that with different sponsorship files, the ease of the game could be increased or decreased. Sort of like choosing between playing Easy, Medium, or Hard. With the current sponsorship file, I would consider the mode "Easy" and just lets you book things without having the worry about finances.

Thoughts?

I really like that idea if you are willing to do the work.

[OGpistolpete]

With a salary scale I think is applicable designed for WCW and WWF, my initial test run of a month saw WCW walk away with a profit of ~$2.5M. This is without sponsorship decrease. Decreasing sponsorship numbers should bring this down to around ~2.0M, so I'd say I'm making progress. I'd say that's a fair income for WCW to bring in around this time.

WCW's roster is just about finished. Just have to do the tag teams which takes no time, as well as stables, and adjust pictures and they are all set. Funny seeing how these roster's change over a half a year's period. WCW definitely cut a lot of dead weight between April 1997 and entering 1998.

ECW's roster is just about finished as well. Just have to make sure things look good and polish pictures. However, I did try to adjust their roster's salaries. This resulted in the company losing a ridiculous amount of money in just one month. They are certainly at a disadvantage just running one small-time TV show weekly and one large show (not a PPV) a month. Thought what I adjusted to was appropriate, but definitely have to bring that back down.

At this point I'm about ~30% finished. Adjusting non-contracted workers takes awhile since the data set is about 70% of them. Still have to adjust sponsors which may take awhile too. But other than that things are looking good.

[OGpistolpete]

So I think I've come up with the final pay scale to accompany the game's embedded overness scales which will be used from here on out. I have to adjust a few of the promotions to this new scale, but I think this along with an adjusted sponsorship pay scale will completely revamp game play to maximize its efficiency. Feel free to use this for your mod making.

EDIT: By the way, OV for Managers and Non-Wrestlers means that their pay should be equivalent to the overness of a wrestler in that size promotion.

Edited October 8, 2014 by OGpistolpete

[OGpistolpete]

One month later and I'm finally finished! All of the data is up to standards for December 1997.

The only things left I have to do are update pictures for all workers (which is gonna take awhile since I don't have Photoshop anymore and will have to go to my school's computer lab to do so), and mess with the sponsorships. Implementing the new pay scale, the WWF and WCW should now be making an acceptable amount of money. Now I want to test what regional and small size promotions will be making with the current sponsorship set-up, and see whether or not it needs to be adjusted. I'm pretty sure it does because I like to play small sized promotion games and end up making a few $100,000 every month, when I should just be scraping buy. Of course, I will keep it this way for my "Easy Mode" Sponsor list, but I do want to make one that is "Hard Mode", like I mentioned a few weeks ago.

So be on the look out for this! Will post a separate thread, and may or may not re-release my previous two scenarios.

[PAC69]

any up date

[The Judas Factor]

I was a big fan on WCW when this was going on so if you would like I can help you make sure that the WCW roster is correct. I've looked at your other scenarios and you've done a lot of work but I did notice several things were still off with it. Let me know if you'd like me to help.