Building the City of Brass: Final Assembly

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Breakdown of a wrestling match!

Seemingly everyone knows it's "Scripted" theses days.

Broadly speaking, any wrestling match will follow the same format;

SHINE - start of the match, the babyface is in control, showing why he's the babyface, why we should cheer for him and, ultimately, that he is unequivocally the better wrestler of the two and bound to win a clean fight. This is A New Hope; you meet the good guys, and HEAT - The heel cuts off the face using underhanded tactics, and now he's in control. The face is selling and getting beaten down, the pace is slowing. As the Shine was designed to put over the babyface and why he's a babyface, the Heat is there to do the same for the heel. This is The Empire Strikes Back; the bad guys turn things around, everything goes wrong for our hero, and it feels like all hope is lost. COMEBACK - This leads into the finish, and it's the babyface turning things around, the crowd on his side, and besting the heel. The pace quickens, the face starts to rally, gets his shit in, and leads to the finish.

Obviously, not every match works exactly like that - sometimes you'll all but skip the Heat and do a straight babyface win. Sometimes the Shine isn't even part of the match, but just a particularly energetic entrance to get the face over, and the Heat begins as the heel jumps him as he gets in the ring. Often, during the heat, you'll see Hope Spots - effectively a tease of a comeback before it's delivered. Between the Comeback and the Finish, in a longer match you'll go to Falsies - the section of the match where you start teasing finishes, rather than going straight to a clean finish, and so on. 

But knowing that structure is integral to putting the match together, regardless of what approach you take vis a vis rehearsal and scripting and so on.

This post is all because of John Wick putting a new game together this past weekend from Crit Hit, the pic will tell you why!

So John Wick Came up with a style of Story telling wrestling match as a style of a game in which participants had to make up their own wrestling characters. It was Awesome, they way he breaks down the wrestling match for everyone.  John Wick was playing the part of the Booker and he seemed to know what he was doing so i voleenteerd to be Tigerman Hedges one more time sense thier was not going to be any physical interaction. So I made up my babyface/heal persona Tigerman Hedges went to the crowed in a promo. I wished I had some one record this for prosperity but alas I didn't.

My friend Chelsea decided she wanted to play as a wrestler and I helped here make up a wrestler character explaning the rules of what makes a good wrestling persona and walking her through her character creation of sorts that John Wick had laid out the rules which I have to admit was quite simple and intelligent. John wick was playing booker that night and decided  to pair Tigerman Hedges VS Lavender Cougar up in a wretling singles match so it was a chance to show Chelsea what it felt to become a pro wrestler even if only it was a game style format. Now my character Tigerman Hedges was to be more of a heal with letting Chelsea's character the lovely Lavender Cougar be more of  baby face sinse I was playing a male wrestler and she was playing a female wrestler. It didn't go over so well, first she started the match with a hard real shove that almost knocked me over. The Referee said no putting your hands on each ither just pretend and walk around and say what your character is doing. So she growled a lot, and pretended to throw all kinds of chop, kicks, which i took but then did a bit of a cut off with a Tiger Leg Sweep. 

Now most people will tell you these days my short term memory is shot and I had other things on my mind. It Also didn't help that my ride wanted to go home ASAP. So I had to rush through the match,  I wanted to do the match before I left to give Chelsea a chance to let her character of Lavender Cougar shine. So I was trying to do the match in 2 minutes, I actually admit I did flip things around her as I all of sudden became the baby face, she became a bit of a heal, I really confused the hell out of her at that point. Of course that was on me not her and I royally messed things up. It did get her character some heat however, it didn't get her over as a babyface it did get her over as a bit of a heal. As I called out she did a claw throat, thrust, and I pretended to choke form it. She followed that up quickly with a stomach claw which caused my character to quickly tap out giving Lavender Cougar the Win. 

My character Tigerman Hedges did get Chelesa's character the Lovely Lavender Cougar over some. But after words she was right it wasn’t what we talked about doing. So I decided to write this blog post for one because I wanted to record what happened for prosperity sake. The other reason I wanted to write down this format before I lost it from my memory completely as I was so afraid of loosing all the rules in my head and on index cards. I took my notes on Index Cards and refering to them now as i write this post. I wanted to have all the rules written down in a place where I could go and review them just in case I ever wanted to run my own version of this game as a LARP. So I hope Chelsea accepts this late apology. If we ever wrestle again in a rematch putting Tigerman Hedges VS Lavender Cougar again and I am sure we probably will sometime later on down the road at some point. I will strive to better in my wrestling performance with you. It was a pleasure and a lot of pressure, taking on my old persona of Tigerman VS your new persona Lavender cougar. See you around some where until our paths cross again happy trails to you. Yours Capatin Hedges

UPDATE 1:15 PM 7/21/2018 REFLECTIONS of MY PAST.

After spending many grewling hours in the wrestling ring I shuld have known better and did a better Job. I should take the following advice for myself and try and do the following by relearning again that which was lost. When pretending to wrestle in a Live Action Role Play Wrestling Format. After all its pretty much the same as a breakdown of a real wrestling match. 

So as My friend Tony Paradigemas would say what have we learned,  he also commented I also could have dune a better job in that wrestling match after all that was my day/night Job for 30 years. So guess what? Ring rust still shows even in a Live Action Role Play Wrestling game format.

So let's learn the basic match structure before you try to deviate from it. It pains me to see guys in the ring who don’t know how to work even a basic match. It’s like watching two guys play Raw vs. Smackdown on PlayStation—just a series of moves with no rhyme or reason.

Here is are the bare bones of a match: entrances, shine, heat, comeback, and finish.
Before a match begins, the wrestlers must obviously enter the ring. Music typically plays during the entrances, and it should be chosen wisely. Make sure it isn’t obscene (unless you’re in an environment that allows it) and that it matches your character. If you walk slowly to the ring, then “Push It” by Static-X isn’t the best one to choose (Guilty … hindsight’s — well, you know.). Entrances are usually when fans are shown which wrestlers they should expect to cheer and to boo in the match.

The babyface should shine early, giving the fans a reason to support him when the going gets tough. The heel stops the “shine” — often with an underhanded tactic — and begins his “heat”, the part of the match where he has the advantage of the babyface. The babyface exploits a mistake, hitting a move on the heel to give himself some recuperative time. This leads into the “comeback”, which is the babyface’s chance to give the heel his comeuppance. Out of the comeback, the heel cuts off the babyface and they go directly into the “finish” before the crowd catches its breath from the comeback.

That’s your basic singles match.

Before I break down the bell-to-bell components of a match, it’s important to note that neither the babyface nor the heel should look finished (figuratively, die) before the finish except when selling a false-finish, so it’s important to show that each wrestler still has some fight left in him. When a wrestler dead-sells, it looks stupid when he comes back to life ten seconds later to reverse an Irish whip and hit a backdrop.
During the “shine”, the heel tries to counter the babyface’s offense, but the babyface is one step ahead of the heel. The shine doesn’t consist of the babyface strictly kicking the heel’s ass for the first half of the match. There should be short cutoffs by the heel, then a spot to put the babyface back in control.

During the “heat”, the fans must have hope that the babyface will come back and win the match, so it is important to give the babyface hope spots (moves or sequences of moves where the babyface tries to regain the advantage). Hope spots should not end with the babyface in control with a hold for more than a quick moment before being cut off. The heel cuts off the babyface hope spot and goes back into his heat. A babyface shouldn’t be afraid to throw some shots while selling the heat—it shows the crowd he’s still alive without overusing hope spots.

The “comeback” is a late-match offensive burst from the babyface, his second wind. This is no place for wrestling holds. During the comeback, the heel should bump and sell while feeding the babyface for the next comeback maneuver. As a babyface, my biggest annoyance was when the heel didn’t feed me for my comeback. I was always there for every move and I sold my butt off for the heel during the heat, so I expected the same from him when it was time for me to come back. As a heel, my biggest annoyance was a babyface forgetting his own comeback.

While a babyface shouldn’t Superman up, forgetting the ass-kicking he’s taken throughout the match, the comeback is the fourth-quarter adrenaline rush a defensive back would get stepping in front of an under-thrown pass and running it back 80 yards for the score. It can be hard for those without a background in competitive sports to grasp this.

Babyface, remember what you’ve selling and register it between moves, showing you’re hurt but game for the fight. If you’ve been selling the back and you body slam your opponent, sell the back with one hand and pump your fist or challenge your opponent to get up with the other, for instance.

A comeback is all about momentum. Covering your opponent too early kills that momentum, so make sure you don’t cover the heel too soon. A little tip for the heel: if the babyface covers you too soon, kick out, feed to a corner, and call a spot to continue the comeback while he gives you a couple shots. This keeps the action going and the crowd up.

The comeback ends with a cutoff before the “finish”. It can be as simple as the babyface missing a splash in the corner. Usually, wrestlers like to go into some false-finishes before the actual finish, and we will go into those later. For now I will just say that too many false-finishes during one show often leaves the crowd flat for them when they matter.

In the basic match, the finish comes straight out of the cutoff: the babyface makes his comeback, misses a splash in the corner and feeds into a spine-buster for the pin, or feeds to the center of the ring, ducks a clothesline, and gets the pin with an O’Connor roll.

That’s your basic match.

I am sure I might have more to say on this subject later.......................

Coffee History of the America’s and the World.

Did you know that coffee is second only to oil, coffee is the most valuable legally traded commodity in the world!

We love it, we rely on it, and we drink it in massive quantities. It is estimated that 2.25 billion cups of coffee are consumed each day worldwide. New Yorkers are said to drink 7 times the amount of any other U.S. city, which is why it may seem like there is a Starbucks on every corner of Manhattan. Famed French writer and philosopher Voltaire was rumored to have drunk 40 – 50 cups per day. Coffee is a daily ritual in the lives of millions of humans around the globe. Where exactly did this caffeinated phenomenon begin?

As with most foods that have been around for centuries, coffee’s beginnings are enveloped in mystery and lore. There is a popular Ethiopian legend wherein coffee is discovered by a goat herder named Kaldi, who found his goats frolicking and full of energy after eating the red fruit of the coffee shrub. Kaldi tried the fruit for himself and had a similar reaction. After witnessing their strange behavior, a monk took some of the fruit back to his fellow monks; they too spent the night awake and alert. Of course, they would have been reacting to coffee’s high dose of caffeine. This natural stimulant also serves as an inborn plant pesticide, protecting the coffee fruit from insects.
Before coffee became our morning beverage of choice, it appeared in a variety of different preparations. In its most basic, unprocessed form, coffee is a cherry-like fruit, which becomes red when ripe; the coffee bean is found at the center of the red coffee fruit. Seen in the pictures below.
Green Coffee fruit.


Ripe Red Coffee Fruit.



Early on, the fruit were mixed with animal fat to create a protein rich snack bar. At one point, the fermented pulp was used to make a wine-like concoction; incidentally, a similar beverage was made from the cacao fruit, before the advent of chocolate, which goes to show that humans are especially adept at finding new ways to imbibe. Another drink that appeared around 1000 A.D. was made from the whole coffee fruit, including the beans and the hull. It wasn’t until the 13th century that people began to roast coffee beans, the first step in the process of making coffee as we know it today.
The word “coffee” has roots in several languages. In Yemen it earned the name qahwah, which was originally a romantic term for wine. It later became the Turkish kahveh, then Dutch koffie and finally coffee in English.

The modern version of roasted coffee originated in Arabia. During the 13th century, coffee was extremely popular with the Muslim community for its stimulant powers, which proved useful during long prayer sessions. By parching and boiling the coffee beans, rendering them infertile, the Arabs were able to corner the market on coffee crops. In fact, tradition says that not a single coffee plant existed outside of Arabia or Africa until the 1600s, when Baba Budan, an Indian pilgrim, left Mecca with fertile beans fastened to a strap across his abdomen. Baba’s beans resulted in a new and competitive European coffee trade.
In 1616, the Dutch founded the first European-owned coffee estate in Sri Lanka, then Ceylon, then Java in 1696. The French began growing coffee in the Caribbean, followed by the Spanish in Central America and the Portuguese in Brazil. European coffee houses sprang up in Italy and later France, where they reached a new level of popularity. Now, it is de rigueur for Parisians to indulge in a cup of coffee and a baguette or croissant at the numerous coffee cafes throughout Paris.
Coffee plants reached the New World during the early 18th century, though the drink wasn’t really popular in America until the Boston Tea Party of 1773, when making the switch from tea to coffee became something of a patriotic duty. 



The Civil War and other conflicts that followed also helped to increase coffee consumption, as soldiers relied on the caffeine for a boost of energy. It may have started a bit later here, but Americans love coffee just as much as the rest of the world. Teddy Roosevelt himself is counted among America’s great coffee drinkers due to his rumored consumption of a gallon of coffee daily! Roosevelt is also said to have coined Maxwell House’s famous “Good to the Last Drop” slogan after being served the coffee at Andrew Jackson’s historical home, the Hermitage, in Tennessee.

By the late 1800s, coffee had become a worldwide commodity, and entrepreneurs began looking for new ways to profit from the popular beverage. In 1864, John and Charles Arbuckle, brothers from Pittsburgh, purchased Jabez Burns’ newly invented self-emptying coffee bean roaster. The Arbuckle brothers began selling pre-roasted coffee in paper bags by the pound. They named their coffee “Ariosa,” and found great success selling it to the cowboys of the American West. It wasn’t long before James Folger followed suit and began selling coffee to the gold miners of California. This blazed the trail for several other big name coffee producers, including Maxwell House and Hills Brothers.

In the 1960s, a certain awareness for specialty coffee started to grow, inspiring the opening of the first Starbucks in Seattle in 1971. Today, the grass-roots coffee movement continues to grow with the increase of small independently-owned cafes boasting sustainable, locally roasted, fair trade beans. Coffee has become an artistic trade that is valued for its complexity of flavors and terroir, much like wine.
From a simple cup of black coffee to a complex, multi-adjective Starbucks order, each coffee drinker has their own favorite way of indulging in this caffeinated wonder-drink. So It is not so stretching the truth to say that coffee played an important role in the founding of this country. From its introduction to European culture, coffee had been considered synonymous with intellectual discourse. Because of the connection between coffee and politics, it is perhaps the most important drink for American history.

On American Soil

The great thinkers of the 18th Century would gather at colonial coffee houses/taverns, such as the Green Dragon in Boston, to discuss the important issues of the time. In 1765, a crowd gathered burn an effigy of Andrew Oliver a Liberty Tree. Oliver was doing the unpopular work of King George III by selling stamps, a form of taxation.

The group eventually dispersed, but they gathered the next day at the Green Dragon to discuss the political events of the previous day. In so doing, they formed a group that they dubbed the Sons of Liberty. The Green Dragon Inn, Tavern and Coffee House was their regular meeting place; (seen in the picture below).

Green Dragon Tavern in Boston – credit BPL (Wikipedia) 

Coffee as Patriotism

When the British sought to punish the colonies by unfair taxation on tea, coffee became not only the preferred drink, but the patriotic one as well. The East India Company couldn’t conceive of the colonists doing without tea, so they sent over a full cargo of tea in a marketing scheme that would pay the taxes to the King, but cut out the middlemen merchants. This scheme infuriated the colonists. A particularly energized group in Boston carried out the event which became known as the Boston Tea Party. They threw tea overboard and vowed against drinking tea, in favor of coffee.

With the advent of the Revolutionary War, coffee houses soon became the preferred meeting place of the newly formed Continental Congress. The most famous coffee house of the time was the Merchant’s Coffee House in Philadelphia, also known as the City Tavern. It was there where the Declaration of Independence was first read aloud to the public.

One could argue that America began to define itself by it’s connection with coffee as opposed to tea. So stand up for something you believe in, drink coffee and make our forefathers proud.

Founding Fathers at the signing of the Declaration of Independence. Image by John pictured below.

References

1 Refer to History of Food by Toussant-Soamat translated by Anthea Bell, page 585.

2 Green Dragon Tavern – Wikipedia page

Title image by Gabbt Orcutt

Research Sources

“Coffee.” National Geographic. National Geographic Society, n.d. Web. 28 Feb. 2013.
Davidson, Alan (2006). 

The History of Coffee Culture in America. Dir. Devin Hahn. Smithsonian.com. Smithsonian Media, n.d. Web. 28 Feb. 2013.
“Maxwell House Coffee – “Good to the Last Drop!” Myths, Legend or True Trivia on Theodore Roosevelt. Theodore Roosevelt Association, n.d. Web. 08 Mar. 2013. Ponte, Stefano (2002). 

“The ‘Latte Revolution’? Regulation, Markets and Consumption in the Global Coffee Chain.” World Development (Elsevier Science Ltd.), n.d. Web. 30 Mar. 2013. Smith, Andrew F. (2007). 

The Oxford Companion to Food. Oxford University Press, UK.

The Oxford Companion to American Food and Drink. Oxford University Press, NY.

Am I going to Crit hit this year?

Update July 16 2018, 

So I went to Crit Hit this past Saturday July 15th and the day got full of surprises 

Tony Padegimas, was running Go Action Fun Time at 10am I planed to be playing at his table. However not many people signed up, so we musters a bit got a few players. Then after that we’ll see what type of mischief I can get into.......

I saw a lot of old friends that I hadn’t seen in a long time like Daniel Pawlicki pictured below with me at his Texas Hold’em with Zombies game booth. 

In addition they had a charity tournament, I played in me playing in the below picture.

In addition I got to also hang a bit at the Frog God Game Booth with Zach Glayzer, Skeeter Green, 

and Charles Wright.

I had a good time, even though it was a long day. 

Mostly because I wanted to play in this midnight game, it was a new cool game by John Wick. I have to say this he knows exactly how to put a wrestling match together. Sense I have so much wrestling experience I need to put my own wrestling game into action soon. I was going for an RPG however John got me thinking of along the lines of a wrestling LARP. 

My Orginal post on Thursday June 1st, 2018.

I  submitted games for Crit hit this year, to run Swords and Wizardry. It just made sense with Zach Glacier Chief Operations Officer for Frog God Games being confirmed as a guest I decided to Submit some Sword And Wizardry Games. Although they have yet to get back with me I may just show up hangout with my friend Zach and maybe play some games for a change.

If I am asked to run a session of SW I will be running the new Zolker’s ferry content, I recently received from my backers kit. So yep you probably Guest right welcome to the new. Rappan Athhuk the lair of the dung monster.  

look here for Rappan Athuk products from Frog God Games.

Look here for Swords and Wizardry products by Frog God Games.

What is Crit Hit? 

Crit Hit is an Adventure Gaming weekend held July 15-16 at the Hilton Phoenix Airport Hotel. 

Go here for Crit Hits Website.

Crit Hit features: RPG’S – from Pathfinder and D&D, to a wide selection of indie games you wont play anywhere else!

BOARD GAMES – Sling Card board and see how Crit Hit does board games!

GUESTS – Industry people that will throw dice and share wisdom with YOU!

PANELS AND ENTERTAINMENT– from discussion panels, to live play, to a few other surprises, Crit Hit will have a unique assortment of panels and entertainment for you.

VENDORS – a hand picked list of the finest wares from across the realm. Including an open table for you to get sell your books and games to people who will give them the love you could not.

So I guess I will see you all their yours Captain Hedges.