MyGM: Does Mic Skill Level Up Aside from Shakeups?

[Gentoo]

I have noticed when running local talents that sometimes they usually have minimal mic skills, maybe a 1 or 2. But I checked on and found some with high mic skills. Is this exclusively because of shake up cards effecting them, or do mic skills develop on their own in any other way?

[captain403]

I can't be 100% positive, but they may develop. Had Rhea Ripley '17 in my roster (mic 2/5). About 2/3 the way through the 1st season I see she has a skill of 3/5, but I don't recall having got any shakeups that improved mic skills. Her ring level had increased a few times, so that MIGHT have affected it.

Of course I could be completely wrong and the increase was as a result of a shakeup that I'd forgotten about.

[Rina Kasakura]

(Better late than never; I dun wanna do this again in 2K25 if I don't have to....)
--------------
So, after a more dedicated MyGM testing session, I found out that it is possible to raise Promo Skill (at least once) just by having matches. However, this test session was only testing "LOCAL" Superstars; outside of that, I dunno. Doing Promos, oddly enough, aren't important towards this, at all. The only things to do, for sure, are matches AND keeping an eye on your fan comments - I'll explain that part in a bit.

For this test, I used the following LOCAL talent who all had a Promo Skill level of either 1 or 2 in this session:

Chuck McWagon (Promo Skill: 1) // Dante Roberts (PS:2) // Red Monsoon (PS:1) // Rich Orikawa (PS:1) // Gunther McGirder (PS:1) // Eddie Pop (PS:1)

The rest of the roster were 2 CAWs treated as ACTIVE talents - both of which had PS:3 - and in-game Superstars with PS:4 or PS:5 - also as ACTIVE talent.

I had made a basic Excel worksheet to track everyone's progress using differing variables on a loop. For example, I had Chuck McWagon do 2 Training Promos, then a match, then repeat; Rich Orikawa did 1 Self Promo, 1 match, then repeat; Gunther McG did 1 Call Out Promo , a match, and repeat; Dante Roberts did ONLY 1v1 matches against anyone WHILE Eddie Pop did only 1v1 matches vs people with PS:4/5. Red Monsoon was tasked with looping 2 matches then a Self Promo. (After a certain point, I decided to disrupt their schedules to ensure I completed rivalries at the PLEs [made 'em have a PLE match to end their rivalry, if they were at Rivalry Lv3 or higher and scheduled to do something else].)

The first to raise their Promo Skill was Dante Roberts after Week 5, His rivalry with one of my PS:3 CAWs WAS NOT COMPLETED as it was only at Rivalry Lv2 when the PLE began. (after the PLE, his W/L record was [L/L/W/L/W], in case it's meaningful.) His PS went from [2] to [4]; here's how I found out.

While looking at the End-of-Week-5 Fan Comment Section, I noticed a fan saying something along the lines of "[Dante Roberts] is becoming something of a cult hit on [Smackdown]." To me, that was oddly specific, so I wondered if that did/meant anything. On Week 6, I went and checked him, and that's how I noticed the bump up.

I continued on with the testing. But to test the same strategy again (Dante's "Only matches" run), I hired a new LOCAL talent: Lurch Evans (PS:1)

The next one to increase was Eddie Pop in Week 8. (L/L/W/L/W/L/W/L). His went from [1] to [2]. He had completed a rivalry with CM Punk at the PLE and was in the middle of a new one with Pat McAfee. On the Fan Comments Section, it said something like "[Eddie Pop] is quite popular with the crowd now."

At this point, I noticed that the first 2 increases came to guys who did only matches, showing me that promos are not a necessity.

Week 10 PLE: Gunther McG won a Fatal 4-Way for the IC Title and got the "cult hit" comment. (L/W/W/W/L/W) He went from [1] to [3]. When this happened I had assumed that "cult hit" raises PS by 2 and "quite popular" raises by 1....

Week 11 would also mark the starting point of me breaking away from everyone's schedule, as only matches were raising Promo Skills, thus far. I focused the remaining LOCAL people moreso on matches

Week 11: Rich Orikawa won a match vs LA Knight (No ongoing rivalry; ended a rivalry at the PLE vs my other PS:3 CAW). Got the "cult hit" comment. HOWEVER, he went from [1] to [5]. I was caught off guard, but pleasantly surprised. So I guess the comment phrases don't indicate a fixed number increase after all.

Week 13 was Red Monsoon's turn. (I also hired a LOCAL woman in Beth Spartan [PS:2] and a CAW treated as ACTIVE [PS:5] that week.) Red Monsoon went from [1] to [4] with the fan comment saying "The crowd are starting to like [Red Monsoon]."

Week 16: Lurch Evans. (L/W/L/W/L/W/L/W/W) From [1] to [4]. He won a Fatal 4-Way match after The Miz (WWE Champ) wanted a challenge in facing Lurch and IC Champ Gunther McG. (Added Red Monsoon to the mix). The fan comment was a new one: something like "Seems [Lurch Evans] is being treated as a regular superstar whenever he's in a match now."

Lastly, to this point, is Beth Spartan in Week 17. Went from [2] to [3]. This one was the most surprising as this one happened with a Training Promo that I randomly decided to stray to, from doing only matches and running down her Stamina, but not needing a full rest. (W/W/L/L/TP) Fan Comment: "Another appearance by [Beth Spartan] and she's quite popular with the crowd now."

Chuck McWagon is the only one who hasn't increased his PS yet - but to his defense, he's way behind, as he was doing the 2-Training-Promos-then-a-match thing, and he's STILL in his first rivalry with Logan Paul (with a 2nd Tag Rivalry w/Gunther McG vs Logan Paul and Eddie Pop).

I'm wondering if Tag Matches would raise PS or not.

I'm wondering if PS can be raised TWICE (example: from [1] to [3] to [4] // [1] to [2] to [3]
-------------

tl;dr: Doing matches can raise LOCAL talents' Promo Skill level. In the Fan Comments section, look for Key Phrases to know when it has increased:

- "[X] is becoming something of a cult hit at [Brand]"
- "The crowd are starting to like [X]"
- "Seems [X] is being treated as a regular superstar whenever he/she's in a match now"
- "Another appearance by [X] and he/she's quite popular with the crowd now."

[captain403]

'Twould be kinda helpful if the game had proper documentation. But it's 2K. We all know that they don't care about their customers in any way that doesn't get them money.