Roll Up - Ringside Companions

[Sam Fain]

We start things off with a review of the Holiday Kickoff Virtual Con replete with Idolmania and tournament madness! Then we gear up for our main event - a rundown of all five officially released Ringside Companions. We cover the matches, rule changes, game charts, and more for each one. Plus we have a small preview of the upcoming spiral bound Ringside Companion that has promoters abuzz. Thank you as always for listening!

Website

Apple

Google

Spotify

[the_faction]

I had no idea there was a 2096 Ringside companion, but this was a great trip down memory lane going through all the handbooks and matches, really enjoyed getting into the weeds match by match and what you two considered your favorites or what got great play time.

As to future virtual cons having guests is a great way to create an event around and breaks up the pacing. I have to admit I don't know a lot about Memphis wrestling as it just didn't reach up to where I was in the 80s, but that doesn't make an interview and discussion from one of its top stars any less interesting.

BTW great job MCing and taking questions Sam, I really hope you were getting help moderating those questions while trying to stay engaged w/ Austin!

[LAWraith]

Listening on the way to work. And here I was thinking no one liked my other game ideas lol. Great to hear they were liked AND talked out about on the show!

My ringside companions are not in great shape so I am looking forward to this release!

I have the 2096, 2101 and one other one ... I didnt know there were any other ones so wow.

I also came up with alternate battle royal rules that I kind of like where I put the participants in a pile , close my eyes and shuffle and pull out two random guys, fate decided those two were involved in first Elimination and play out like a match until someone eliminated. The person not eliminated if they got tokens I update in my notebook and reshuffle. I know it's not perfect but I like it cause it feels random and goes sort of quick.

[victoryroll84]

Another great episode guys!

The only Companion I'm missing was the 2112 version (Still makes me sad to this day)

One question, will this Ringside include every match or more like a compilation of some of the best matches and charts?

I love that it'll be spiral bound, so it'll lay flat!

Take my money now

[malicelover]

@tigersamuri and Tournament Master - the old Ringside Companions are fantastic. I did have a question that I would love to hear some thoughts on - is there any chance that we might see a re-release of past charts (into the ropes, out of the ring, deathjump, pin save, turnbuckle, feud table, etc.) at some point. Even as a PDF with margins set to match up. I only ask because for those who want to play back the old times with the official charts during those eras that were released to get the "classic" feel, this would be AWESOME.

Really loved the PodCast and am eagerly anticipating the new Ringside Companion. I will probably use it for after 2112! Another great episode.

Completely unrelated - do we know specifically where GCON will be held in Chicago? I'd love to book my hotel sooner rather than later if possible - and also to map out what public transit I might need to take to get to all of my old haunts (closest Lou's; closest Stan's, my favorite cigar bar [that I will have to drive too], Bat 17; and my favorite BBQ place)?

[LAWraith]

@malice I do want to book as soon as possible too cause I'd love to do Wrigley and deep dish pizza and experience chicago and go for couple days

[Deleted]

So.... You're 'borrowing' Pete and mine Galacticon build up gimmick eh? 😜

We had it planned for weeks and tried to make it look as real as possible on the board.

We all know how that turned out... SWEEP!
... and Pete wearing a I ❤ D.O.T. tee-shirt. Plus next Galacticon he will be wearing a custom made Disciple of Terror tee-shirt. Plus buying me one as well!

The Randy Bugdale art for Amazonia, Thrash and Supernova was on the cover of a promoter. I will have to go to the basement and dig em out to tell you exactly what issue # it was.

[LAWraith]

Listening on lunch now ... so I dont know how to respond to Sam's comments about women in wrestling. And it's not cause I disagree, i think more my views are changing to an extent.

So in regard to the inter gender chart, the person who came back to the game two years ago would never ever do this. I wouldnt have a man face a woman. Put them separate. Here I am about to enter 2137 and Bulldoze is going to be Fist partner and I'm strongly considering changing the womens title to the lightweight (222lbs) title one of my feds and mix some of the women into the fed. Their weight class would dictate if the heavy or the light would be their top prize but they could win say the Openweight or Heavy metal title from the guys.

[Pete]

I used the intergender chart and matches a few times when it came out because Tom was booking multiple man vs. woman feuds, notably Wolf vs. Amazonia, and I've always been pretty by-the-book. But I haven't booked any since (with a few exceptions that I'll get into) and probably won't again. I just have no taste for intergender wrestling at all whether in fantasy or in real life. Just the act of a male beating on a woman, even if it's doing suplexes and power bombs and not really resembling the horrors of actual abuse, comes off as skeevy to me. It's just too established in real life that women are not a physical match for men all other things being equal--yes, Serena Williams could kill me at tennis and Amanda Nunes could beat up all of us promoters probably at the same time. They can't compete with even a 75th-ranked person on the men's circuit in their respective sports. And I'm all for equality and representation, but facts is facts.

And I know people like to bring up the existence of the Irish whip or 450 splash as "gotcha"s when the discussion of realism in wrestling is ever brought up, even before we get into Transevolvers and AniMen. But everyone has a line somewhere--long before I ever knew what a podcast was much less one hosted by Jim Cornette, I remember watching the Undertaker fly out of the video wall at the '94 Royal Rumble and thinking I was watching the stupidest thing I'd ever seen, in wrestling or otherwise. I'm sure some people saw wrestling as "entertainment" and decided that it shouldn't have any RULES, MAAAN and that it was really cool. But everyone does have a line somewhere, whether they want to admit to it or not. For men, men vs. women just completely shatters immersion--if that "doesn't matter" in service to the story, then what does matter? And why should I watch wrestling if nothing matters? As disagreeable as they can come across, this is the kind of thing that JR and Cornette continually try to stress. If you just ignore all the rules and restrictions because you have 25 minutes worth of tornado tag spots to get through, eventually fans are going to lose focus and your heat's going to dissipate and more people are going to wonder why the referee is standing there with his thumb up his rear orifice than enforcing the rules.

Anyway...all that said, well before the conversion chart came out, as soon as Amazonia got a card I started planning for a big storyline blowoff match with her vs. Reynard B. Guile. That goes back to the "all things being equal" qualifier above--the skill level between Amazonia and Guile is decidedly not equal. At the last virtual con discussion turned to the possibilty of an Andy Kaufman-type character, and we had one in Rouser, another scrawny non-wrestler who competed in the women's division. That stuff I'm okay with. I even think at her peak you could have gotten some interest in booking Awesome Kong against a man, as a special one-off with a reason and an angle behind it. But women's wrestlers and men's wrestlers should be kept separate as a general rule.

(One other thing...MMA and particularly the freak-show fights in PRIDE have shown pretty conclusively in real life that giants can't fight. They're too slow, too uncoordinated, and there's just more of them to get hit. "The Mountain" from Game of Thrones would get eaten alive by a guy like Conor MacGregor, because he wouldn't be able to touch him before gassing out and because while the Mountain may weigh 400 pounds of muscle, his limbs don't and a BJJ fighter applying full strength to one limb is going to win out over the limb every time. In New Japan, Akira Maeda pretty much shattered the Myth of Andre when their match broke down into a shoot, making Andre look completely helpless against his kicks. So I don't think booking a 7', 400-pound guy against a 230-pound guy in a wrestling match is a viable analogue to a man vs. a woman even if the size differences are proportionate. Just getting that out there.)

[Swarm]

They actually had that fight. Kind of.