Before the Servers Shut Down: Building a Custom Roster

[desaix]

I don't think they've announced when the servers are going to be shut down, but I'm expecting it to be soon. So, with that in mind, I'm getting ready to set my "final" pre-server-shutdown roster, before I'm no longer able to download characters and\or movesets I'm not comfortable making on my own. I'm wiping out all the CAS currently on my roster who don't fit in my post-server plans, and now have a lot of holes to fill. If anyone has any good CAS (WITH custom moveset, or they do me no good) to suggest that are available on the PC servers right now, I'd like the suggestions.

In my Universe, I've set up Raw, Smackdown, and NXT with roster's as close to the current real-life rosters as I can manage, using only four downloaded superstars. I deleted 205-Live so I could set up three shows, which is where the bulk of my CAS-wrestlers will be performing. That means I can download\create about 32 CAS per show.

The first show I've made is "BCW." That's where all of the imaginary wrestlers are going to perform -- it includes all five versions of "Buzz" (re-created), Barron Blade, Cole Quinn, El Mago, two characters named Owen Shwartz and Mason Q-Nan (based on BB's commentary). I also re-created El Mago Jr. and Josie Jane (from 2k20), and my Red and Tre (also re-created from my one... uh, abandoned attempt to complete the 2k20 storyline). The rest of the roster is mostly just me having fun with themes (for example, a CAW called Catfish Franklin whose moves are almost entirely various versions of Fisherman Suplexes). I don't need any help with this one, obviously, though if anyone wants to suggest original CAWs with interesting movesets (appearance doesn't matter, much, here, because I can always change that to something I'd like), I'd appreciate it.

The second show I've created is "Defiant," after the short-lived mostly-streamed-on-Youtube British Indie promotion that went defunct last year. My intention is for this promotion to cover "real" Indie wrestlers in England and the rest of Europe. I'm creating a four divisions -- Championship, Internet Championship, Women's Championship, and Tag Team Championship. I've already filled all the divisions (barely, in the Tag Team division, but I made it) EXCEPT the Women's Championship. I've got Lana Austin, Little Miss Roxxy, Bea Priestly, and Kanji; I want a champion and at least five others in each division, so I'm two shy (I have space on the roster for three characters). Are there any other good recreations (with movesets) of indie women's wrestlers from the UK\Europe anyone can think of available for download?

My third show (again, bringing the elements of 2k20 that I actually liked back into 2k19) is LA Wrestling, the indie show from that game that seemed analogous to Evolve or something like that. I'm using it for any CAWs of indies from North America and Japan. Just three divisions for this one -- men's championship, women's championship, and tag team championship. All three divisions are filled, but I still have several open roster spots, so I'd like to add at least one tag team (I've pulled the Colon's, Ascension, TM-61, and the Revival from the regular roster, added Lance Anoa'i and Hikuleo as a Samoan Dynasty tag team with Rikishi (already on the roster) to manage them, Nick and Matt Jackson, and Luchasaurus and Jungle Boy), one single's competitor (most of this division comes from the on-game roster characters -- people like Sin Cara, Harper, Hideo Itami, Mike Kanelis, TJP, Tye Dillinger, Chris Jericho, and Matt Hardy -- alongside a downloaded Kenny Omega, Kota Ibushi, and Tetsuya Naito), and several Women's competitors (I've currently downloaded Hikaru Shida, Mayu Iwatani, Taya Valkyrie, Kylie Rae, Kharma, and Tessa Blanchard). This roster could use a lot of help, as I'm far more familiar with the UK indie wrestling scene than the North American Indie wrestling scene.

Any suggestions would be appreciated!

[Zeokage]

Originally posted by desaix:

I don't think they've announced when the servers are going to be shut down, but I'm expecting it to be soon.

The manual says May 31, 2020.

For Defiant, you could include WWE NXT, World of Sport, Progress, Revolution Pro and the like. I use Wikipedia for the rosters and to get ideas of who to search and potentially download. You might find some female wrestlers on those pages.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_professional_wrestling_promotions#United_Kingdom

For LA Wrestling, as Defiant is full, I'd definitely include those British wrestlers who have gone elsewhere and made a name but not in WWE, like Zack Sabre Jr., Will Ospreay and Marty Scurll (all three were all in New Japan and Marty has moved on to RoH if I remember correctly). Other than that, I have a leaning towards New Japan so I'd end up getting the main people from each faction (Okada, Goto, Suzuki, Tanahashi, EVIL/Sanada for a tag team). But you have the non-WWE promotions like Impact, AEW, RoH and Shimmer you could check from that link above.

[desaix]

Defiant already has those three. My full Defiant roster includes:
(stars indicate I made them, plusses indicate they were downloaded, I put them into divisions based on which championship they competed for the most when competing in Defiant (assuming they competed for a title; one or two never competed for a championship, so I based it on who they were competing against)... except in the Tag division, which I had to struggle to fill out)

Defiant Championship Division:
Drew McIntyre
Killian Dane (as Big Damo)
Noam Dar
Rampage Brown*
Will Ospreay+
Joe Hendry*
Joseph Conners+
PAC\Neville+
BT Gunn+
Zack Sabre Jr+

Tag Titles:
Mustache Mountain (Tyler Bate and Trent Seven+)
Prospect (Alex Gracie* and Lucas Archer*)
Primate(downloaded appearance, my moveset) and Jimmy Havoc+
The Coffey Brothers (Joe Coffey+ and Mark Coffey+)
Drake and Dragon (Howard\HT Drake* and Micky the Dragon*. Never competed as a tag team in Defiant, note, but they had been one for a while before they were in Defiant)
RenBen (Conor Renshaw* and Benji Rage*)

Women's Division:
Kanji*
Bea Priestley+
Lana Austin+
Little Miss Roxxy*

Internet Championship:
Pete Dunne
EC3
El Ligero+
Liam Slater*
Amir Jordan+
Prince Ameen*
Simon Miller*
Marty Scurll+
Grado+

(had I ever had the opportunity to upload more than five characters, I'd have uploaded quite a few of my own creations from this list)

[Zeokage]

I don't know if it matters that Bea Priestley is in AEW now, not sure if it's exclusive.

Just looking through the Wikipedia pages for the UK promotions I've heard of and their female rosters, the following might fit, if they're available.

World of Sport
Kay Lee Ray (also NXT UK)
Viper/Piper Niven (also NXT UK)
Ayesha
Katy Lees

Revolution Pro
Bobbi Tyler
Chardonnay
Charli Evans
Debbie Keitel
Gisele Shaw
Jayde
Millie Mckenzie
Shanna
Zan Phoenix
Zoe Lucas

NXT UK
Aoife Valkyrie
Dani Luna
Isla Dawn
Jinn
Nina Samuels
Toni Storm
Xia Brookside

[desaix]

I've tried a few of those.

I already have a downloaded version of Toni Storm on the NXT roster as one of the four downloads I allowed for the "main" roster (others are Keith Lee and the tag team of the Timesplitters, KUSHIDA and Alex Shelley). I found a Millie McKenzie for download, but her appearance was off and her moveset was badly wrong; I didn't think I could fix her (to fix a moveset that messed up, I'd need a lot more youtube footage to study than I can find). Same goes for Xia Brookside and Viper. I searched for Zoe Lucas, but while someone made a version of her on 2k20 there isn't one on 2k19.

I don't think any of the others ever appeared on the real Defiant, but then this isn't supposed to be an accurate Defiant roster (if it were, there's no way I'd get that Drew McIntyre vs. PAC match I expect will be for the championship, early going, as they were on the roster in different eras on the promotion). It's supposed to be a stand-in for a bunch of promotions. I'll look and see if anyone's built any of the remaining people on that list for download, as I don't think I could make any of them myself.

[desaix]

*cough* Well, today's cuts just gave me that boost to the LA Wrestling roster. Sheesh. Maybe I can even move some slots over to expand Defiant and BCW.