A Question of Rank

Wouldn't non-experts be the ones most qualified to assess who the greatest of all time is from a certain perspective?

Like. As smarks and fans we get too obsessed with who we like. We might put guys higher up than they should be because we're fans of theirs or because "they deserve" to be there. But, like, from the outside looking in there are only a handful of people who are really known and those handful probably have the rights to be in contention for the GOAT.

I'm not a basketball fan by any stretch, but I can name Michael Jordan, Wilt Chamerlain, Kobe Bryant, and a lot of other people who are considered to be the GOAT. Same with boxing, football, and a lot of other niche things. And while someone more versed in those things could pick apart those contenders and say "Yeah, well, he's disqualified for this reason or he didn't do as much as this guy," the fact that I know them already should put them in that conversation.

It's not just about popularity of crossover appeal, but I think those are great places to start when you're determining who belongs at S Rank. Who does an outsider know? Usually they know them because those people were so incredibly good at their job that they broke out of the wrestling bubble and had success elsewhere.

If S Rank represents the contenders for GOAT, then it shouldn't just take into account workrate or how they're presented from a kayfabe standpoint, it should include specifically the guys non-fans recognize and would easily identify.

By that metric, in American wrestling, Hogan, Austin, Cena, Goldberg, Flair, Undertaker, Savage, HBK, Rock, Lesnar, and Andre would probably be the S Rank people from the modern era. Randy Orton, CM Punk, and Kurt Angle might also be in contention. In ten years Roman Reigns might be there, too. When you look at that list, more of them than not have shown up in movies or TV shows (of varying quality, acclaim, and success) and I think your average person on the street could identify them as "that guy who does a wrestle" instead of "some wrestler, I guess?".

Expanding beyond that into older eras it would get trickier because the lack of a national platform makes it such that someone who was the biggest thing ever in one region might be almost unknown in another. From a purely kayfabe perspective, Bruno probably belongs on the list (and I'd probably put him on there), but, I mean...I wouldn't honestly expect anyone on the street to know who he even is outside of New York.

Then crossing borders there's Stu Hart, Inoki, Baba, Rikidozan, Santo, Johnny Saint and probably a few more that people from those areas can speak to better than I can.

And then crossing into other combat sports, you'd have guys like Ali and Tyson, McGregor and Helio.

So, while not everyone would belong at that level and it should be a hard club to get into, I guess you could have a dozen or more contenders.

It's not just success for me, it's international name recognition and what the individual did for the wrestling industry as a whole. Outside of the USA, I don't think Austin ever became a huge name vs someone like Hogan or Flair who are still known in Japan and the rest of the world. Regardless of their problems, I would rank Hogan/Flair higher than Austin/Rock for promoter purposes.

Of course, it's all subjective and you're free to put Austin at that legendary S rank in your game. He'll just be A rank in my version, which I treat like a broad main event status.
When I want to put a someone like Austin/Rock at the point of huge popularity but not god/legend status they get A Rank & S Charisma. Hell, I would put Modern Hogan at S Rank & C Charisma just to simulate how disliked he is now (not interested in getting into the reasons why, please focus on the game).

Don’t personalize when editing. Rank grades are not validating the worth of your favorite wrestlers. They are simply a tool for Promoter. If you have too many As Ior Ss, you couldn’t afford to have them in that mode.

Some of the greatest names of all time were not A rated, because they dod not constantly main event. The Great Muta would be a B or C by definition. Steamboat would be a B i(because the NWA used his talent far better than THE WWF, and h the aaa a main eventer in the former).

If I remember correctly, higher ranking edits in MOTR scored better in larger arenas but were more expensive to hire/keep on contract.
Charisma affected your fan base (how many tickets you sold, how much merchandise, etc) and the audience's cheer rate for a wrestler within a match. I think these mechanics actually carried over into World, it's just that you need to manipulate the venue settings directly in order to see Rank have an effect; most of the in-game venues have the same size/rating, even though they each have a different style attached (Big Garden is Showman and Yurakuen is Strong, but they're both at the same size).

This is a great question. When I started playing FPR I remember needing clarification on this. I've also been play a lot of FFPW. I'll start paying a little more attention and see what I find

we actually do have a defintive answer already based off of manager of the ring mode from final fire pro. wrestlers were given ranks in each territory(usa, japan, mexico, europe i believe)