Blech. Well, that didn't go well. Or, at least, it went ok riiiight up until the end. And then, kaput. Basically, I did not get Jericho to the top of his career fast enough. He was finally promoted the tuesday before turning into an elder. Which means he missed his window for calling and inviting Rosemarie (or whatever her name is) over by like, SIX HOURS. And he went on to transition into an elder (an uncontrollable elder, I might add) on Monday of the next week.
I did try to salvage it. During that week, I ignored the possible restriction to adopting stray pets (the rules say don't use the phone; it's unclear and I was desperate) inflicted by the Law Enforcement restriction and took on a stray lab named Hatbox. He was a really nice dog, and I immediately got him onto the Service animal career; or, at least, as immediately as taking only the first job offered can be. In other words, I got him onto the career about two days before elder transition. I made sure he knew every command so he would be able to be promoted. Then I executed my plan: I ran everything on super-fast mode (since I was unable to control any characters anyways) and only unblocked the fridge once a day. The truth is, more than once poor, starving Hatbox urged Jericho to refill his food bowl, and I allowed it to happen (actually, the first time I didn't even notice until I checked Hatbox's hunger meter). Things went along; Jericho missed a day of work and was forced to quit, but Hatbox actually got promoted. Then, soooo close, the day that Hatbox should reach the top of the career, ONE OF THOSE STUPID CHANCE CARDS POPS UP. I'll bet you can guess the result of THAT. Bah humbug. Hatbox got fired, and all hope disappeared. I exited out of Jericho's house; I plan to play the house again later, although not as an Apocalypse challenge. I really like Jericho, and I plan to see his offspring populating the restored wasteland of Brookwood someday soon.
Monday, July 23, 2007
Friday, July 20, 2007
Side Note: Being Burgled
Hilarious. Frustrating, but hilarious.
There he is, the little burglar, which my game slows down for so I'll know he's there even though my sim is sleeping. He creeps up to Jericho's messed-up house. Meantime I'm frantically trying to wake Jericho in the hope that I can chase off the bad guy. I mean, he's got full body points. Heck, he's even still in the Law Enforcement career.
Ha! Lotta good that did me. I had Jericho run up to the only door in and try to block it. Instead, he and the burglar stood side by side: Jericho hummed a little tune and swayed, and the burglar cackled evilly and rubbed his hands (or some such reaction).
"Haha," he thinks to himself. "I will now steal this fun sim game, and this ugly but useful bookcase... and this rather cheap chair and table... Muahaha!" Burglar-sim now runs right past the thousand dollar bed, up out the door, to the sidewalk while Stupid-Jericho-Sim, apparently befuddled by sleepiness, calmly walks back down to the basement to clean some dishes. But wait! In his mad dash to escape, Burglar-sim notes that he passed a single lawn chair sitting in the cold, retail value approximately two buttons and a ball of string. He must have it! So back he goes to the house, swipes the chair, and THEN runs off the lot to the tune of "nanner-nanner-boo-boo." Now that he's gone, Jericho emerges from his dazed state to whine about his poor missing objects.
Morons. Both of them.
There he is, the little burglar, which my game slows down for so I'll know he's there even though my sim is sleeping. He creeps up to Jericho's messed-up house. Meantime I'm frantically trying to wake Jericho in the hope that I can chase off the bad guy. I mean, he's got full body points. Heck, he's even still in the Law Enforcement career.
Ha! Lotta good that did me. I had Jericho run up to the only door in and try to block it. Instead, he and the burglar stood side by side: Jericho hummed a little tune and swayed, and the burglar cackled evilly and rubbed his hands (or some such reaction).
"Haha," he thinks to himself. "I will now steal this fun sim game, and this ugly but useful bookcase... and this rather cheap chair and table... Muahaha!" Burglar-sim now runs right past the thousand dollar bed, up out the door, to the sidewalk while Stupid-Jericho-Sim, apparently befuddled by sleepiness, calmly walks back down to the basement to clean some dishes. But wait! In his mad dash to escape, Burglar-sim notes that he passed a single lawn chair sitting in the cold, retail value approximately two buttons and a ball of string. He must have it! So back he goes to the house, swipes the chair, and THEN runs off the lot to the tune of "nanner-nanner-boo-boo." Now that he's gone, Jericho emerges from his dazed state to whine about his poor missing objects.
Morons. Both of them.
Apocalypse III: Finding a Job
So Jericho moved into his "little" five by five lot. And the insanity began. What I learned overall from last night: it is really, really hard to remember all the restrictions before breaking them.
I started by building a 6x6 basement (8x8 once the foundation is put around it). Since everything has to have a roof over it, and funds are limited, I basically put a tiny corridor of house above the staircase, and roofed it. Looks pretty silly; hopefully I'll remember to bring pictures Monday.
So Jericho has a tiny basement, and I'm down to something like a thousand dollars. I go in, place the allowed fridge, grill, sink, the fun toy I brought, and the treadmill (NB next time, leave objects with no purpose IN the inventory, so don't have to pay protection on them). And realize I'm flat broke. I have no money for the nice bed that I'm allowed to use as a 10 body point sim. If I do it over, this is something I'll change. Screw the treadmill; buy a bed. So I sold the treadmill, and bought a bed, toilet, and bookcase with the proceeds. Completely forgetting that I'm not allowed to sell anything back until after the business restriction is lifted. Actually, I forgot this rule multiple times during play last night. I forgot it when I went to upgrade my sink to one with better hygiene (now I have two sinks: a useless one and a nice one that I pay huge amounts of protection for). I also forgot this rule when I tired to create a "porch" for Jericho so he would stop walking aaaaalll the way back into the house to check the newspaper for a job. In fact, I initially tried to place the chair and roofing right next to the mailbox for convenience, forgetting the 8x8 rule and causing lost money when I went back to fix it. And I forgot the selling rule again later when I went to upgrade Jericho's bookcase to meet a want.
My inventory is getting full with stupid mistakes. I've tried to fix the errors as best I could, but to be honest the treadmill gave me a nice advantage, especially because I didn't realize I'd broken the rule for quite a while. I had time and money to get a little established. I suppose I can technically squeeze it in under the exceptions for the first sim day of play, but it goes against the heart of the challenge so I feel bad about it.
Not bad enough to start over, though (I really don't like playing thru Uni). Just bad enough to buy a treadmill again (damn, those things are expensive!) and put it back into my inventory where it should have stayed to begin with.
Other adventures in gaming: the journalism restriction really sucks. The first day he looked for a job was Law Enforcement. Not what I wanted for first career, but definitely good pay to start with. And then I watched as a series of jobs passed me by. Law, Adventure, Science (tried this one, but missed my carpool so had to quit), Music, and Military all became available, and are important restrictions to lift. But not important enough to be the first restriction to lift. And I just know that a few careers from now, none of these will be available. All the job searching did teach me a thing or two though: if possible, job hunt at least an hour before your carpool is scheduled to arrive, and if you see a job you want to switch to, verify that you can still make the carpool that day. If you can't, set the paper down and go to work at your current job, then just switch after work. You get one more day of pay out of it, which is always nice. Disadvantages if your new carpool is too soon after you get off work, because your needs will be low, but I still wish I'd done it this way.
Jericho ended up on the Medical career. I actually wanted either the Natural Science or Culinary, and I'm still worried about this one. Culinary's restriction will be much worse once I have a pregnant female in the house, and I wanted Natural Science so I could push for plant sims (except I need to do a little playtesting first: are orchard trees still dormant in the winter if they are in a green house?? This is important). Imagine how much easier this challenge would be with those little buggers.... *sigh*. If the trees are still dormant, then I'll need to unlock the music career in addition to the Natural Science. Even if the trees are not dormant inside a greenhouse, then I'll have to scramble to find a way to put the greenhouse on the 8x8 square... *wince*. I'm not sure I've thought that one thru enough. But I'm discovering new things every time I play, so maybe this will just be one of those things.
Also, in other news, Jericho has started a fire EVERY time he uses the grill, despite having full cooking skill points (a function of it being inside, I wonder?). And he's been burgled. In the FIRST WEEK. I've been burgled maybe five times since I've started playing Sims 2 (you know, years ago?). Makes me wish, at least a little, that I'd stuck with Law Enforcement.
I started by building a 6x6 basement (8x8 once the foundation is put around it). Since everything has to have a roof over it, and funds are limited, I basically put a tiny corridor of house above the staircase, and roofed it. Looks pretty silly; hopefully I'll remember to bring pictures Monday.
So Jericho has a tiny basement, and I'm down to something like a thousand dollars. I go in, place the allowed fridge, grill, sink, the fun toy I brought, and the treadmill (NB next time, leave objects with no purpose IN the inventory, so don't have to pay protection on them). And realize I'm flat broke. I have no money for the nice bed that I'm allowed to use as a 10 body point sim. If I do it over, this is something I'll change. Screw the treadmill; buy a bed. So I sold the treadmill, and bought a bed, toilet, and bookcase with the proceeds. Completely forgetting that I'm not allowed to sell anything back until after the business restriction is lifted. Actually, I forgot this rule multiple times during play last night. I forgot it when I went to upgrade my sink to one with better hygiene (now I have two sinks: a useless one and a nice one that I pay huge amounts of protection for). I also forgot this rule when I tired to create a "porch" for Jericho so he would stop walking aaaaalll the way back into the house to check the newspaper for a job. In fact, I initially tried to place the chair and roofing right next to the mailbox for convenience, forgetting the 8x8 rule and causing lost money when I went back to fix it. And I forgot the selling rule again later when I went to upgrade Jericho's bookcase to meet a want.
My inventory is getting full with stupid mistakes. I've tried to fix the errors as best I could, but to be honest the treadmill gave me a nice advantage, especially because I didn't realize I'd broken the rule for quite a while. I had time and money to get a little established. I suppose I can technically squeeze it in under the exceptions for the first sim day of play, but it goes against the heart of the challenge so I feel bad about it.
Not bad enough to start over, though (I really don't like playing thru Uni). Just bad enough to buy a treadmill again (damn, those things are expensive!) and put it back into my inventory where it should have stayed to begin with.
Other adventures in gaming: the journalism restriction really sucks. The first day he looked for a job was Law Enforcement. Not what I wanted for first career, but definitely good pay to start with. And then I watched as a series of jobs passed me by. Law, Adventure, Science (tried this one, but missed my carpool so had to quit), Music, and Military all became available, and are important restrictions to lift. But not important enough to be the first restriction to lift. And I just know that a few careers from now, none of these will be available. All the job searching did teach me a thing or two though: if possible, job hunt at least an hour before your carpool is scheduled to arrive, and if you see a job you want to switch to, verify that you can still make the carpool that day. If you can't, set the paper down and go to work at your current job, then just switch after work. You get one more day of pay out of it, which is always nice. Disadvantages if your new carpool is too soon after you get off work, because your needs will be low, but I still wish I'd done it this way.
Jericho ended up on the Medical career. I actually wanted either the Natural Science or Culinary, and I'm still worried about this one. Culinary's restriction will be much worse once I have a pregnant female in the house, and I wanted Natural Science so I could push for plant sims (except I need to do a little playtesting first: are orchard trees still dormant in the winter if they are in a green house?? This is important). Imagine how much easier this challenge would be with those little buggers.... *sigh*. If the trees are still dormant, then I'll need to unlock the music career in addition to the Natural Science. Even if the trees are not dormant inside a greenhouse, then I'll have to scramble to find a way to put the greenhouse on the 8x8 square... *wince*. I'm not sure I've thought that one thru enough. But I'm discovering new things every time I play, so maybe this will just be one of those things.
Also, in other news, Jericho has started a fire EVERY time he uses the grill, despite having full cooking skill points (a function of it being inside, I wonder?). And he's been burgled. In the FIRST WEEK. I've been burgled maybe five times since I've started playing Sims 2 (you know, years ago?). Makes me wish, at least a little, that I'd stuck with Law Enforcement.
Apocolypse II: Wrapping up college
Well, sadly, I forgot to put the pictures I took last night onto my jump drive. So... still no pictures. However, I do have more to add in regards to progress.
Jericho spent his last few days at college stocking up on friends, and in one case, losing them. Last post I mentioned my dissatisfaction with available mating options? Well, as luck would have it, I went to a the campus library to meet new people, and stumbled upon a three-lightning-bolt, decent looking NPC. AFTER I'd already gotten him engaged to his dorm-mate.
Being a sucker for good genetics, I immediately starting taking advantage of those lightning bolts. And just as fast, Jericho got caught cheating. So I initiate my first ever sim break-up (I've been playing for years, always wanted to cause one, but never could bring myself to do it), which, by the way, is heartbreaking to watch (but all's fair in the pursuit of red hair, right?) and go back to courting Rosalina. It turns out you can go from 20 lifetime to engaged in just three dates, one right after the other. I'm going to be so much better at relationships after this challenge. So, with nine hours left on his senior year, Jericho ended one engagement and started a new one.
A side effect of this is his trash can is continually being kicked over now by the ex-fiance.
So I wrapped up college and decided that my two items would be 1. that fun game for 800 simoleons that sims "practice," and 2. the treadmill. My logic for the second was that it's a fun way to build body points, and a sim with 10 body points is not under the Athletic restriction or the Security animal restriction. So I figured I'd buy this object now, while Jericho is loaded, and keep it for his spouse who would undoubtedly benefit from being able to sleep at night.
Dumb move, in hindsight.
Jericho spent his last few days at college stocking up on friends, and in one case, losing them. Last post I mentioned my dissatisfaction with available mating options? Well, as luck would have it, I went to a the campus library to meet new people, and stumbled upon a three-lightning-bolt, decent looking NPC. AFTER I'd already gotten him engaged to his dorm-mate.
Being a sucker for good genetics, I immediately starting taking advantage of those lightning bolts. And just as fast, Jericho got caught cheating. So I initiate my first ever sim break-up (I've been playing for years, always wanted to cause one, but never could bring myself to do it), which, by the way, is heartbreaking to watch (but all's fair in the pursuit of red hair, right?) and go back to courting Rosalina. It turns out you can go from 20 lifetime to engaged in just three dates, one right after the other. I'm going to be so much better at relationships after this challenge. So, with nine hours left on his senior year, Jericho ended one engagement and started a new one.
A side effect of this is his trash can is continually being kicked over now by the ex-fiance.
So I wrapped up college and decided that my two items would be 1. that fun game for 800 simoleons that sims "practice," and 2. the treadmill. My logic for the second was that it's a fun way to build body points, and a sim with 10 body points is not under the Athletic restriction or the Security animal restriction. So I figured I'd buy this object now, while Jericho is loaded, and keep it for his spouse who would undoubtedly benefit from being able to sleep at night.
Dumb move, in hindsight.
Thursday, July 19, 2007
Apocalypse I: The Founder/College
Introducing Jericho Founder. I've made him above-average neat, very serious, very active, and moderate outgoing. Just-below average nice points, mainly because I ran out of points. I really wanted an active sim, just because of all the work he's going to be doing. I kept the neat points because I want to be able to clean up after himself, and I want spontaneous-sponge baths to happen earlier.
On The Sims Resource, where I first came across a reference to this challenge, a fellow-simmer complained that she ended up in danger of her founder (female) reaching elder-hood before being able to produce the next generation. This danger is maximized by the presence of Seasons, which limits the phone usage in a very severe manner (and therefore times you can invite a sweetheart over). Jericho is a guy, because I figure the benefit of being able to produce offspring all thru the adult and elder stages outweighs the benefit of being able to produce offspring before the no-moving-in-others restriction is lifted. Of course, this is keeping in mind that once Jericho is an elder, unless I've got a pet lifting the Service Animal restriction, I won't be able to control him at all. :( That could be bad, but I'm going to risk it.
I sent Jericho off to Academie Le Tour, where he's been living in pre-apocalyptic bliss for the last seven semesters. I exploited a loophole while he's here; Academie Le Tour has had its seasons set to fallx4, giving me a learning bonus which has allowed me to just about max out all his skills but two (Mechanical and cleaning; cooking is only at 8 as well). I consider this only a partial exploitation, since I normally keep my colleges at fall, fall, winter, spring anyways.
I'm not sure about the wisdom of how I've used Jericho's Uni time, though, and if the challenge flops I may do it differently for round 2. I tried to maximize his skills because I don't actually have a firm, fixed game plan for how I want to approach the order of restrictions. Since so much of job-acquisition is now chance (thanks a lot, pinstar, for that darn journalism restriction *mock scowl*) I wanted Jericho to be able to move quickly up any employment ladder that makes itself available.
BUT, as a result of this focus, he currently has only five friends. I've got a semester and a half to bump that number up, but I don't think I'll be able to go beyond seven or eight. AND even if he has these friends now, maintaining college friends will be next to impossible, since they don't do walk-bys and he can only use the phone Tuesday mornings. Sooooo, really, the only point of college friends is probably to buy you time to make other friends as you (hopefully) move up the career. But since I haven't started that part of the challenge yet, I don't really know.
Pinstar, in an interview recorded on The Sims 2 Challenges (love the show, Rachel, by the way) commented that the hardest needs to meet once your founder graduates are hygiene and fun. I don't think there's anything I can really do for hygiene until the Medical restriction is lifted (btw, I think I will take his advice and make that my founder's spouse restriction), but I've been thinking about how to address the fun issue. Creativity-building objects are restricted by the Artist career, but games are not. I'm going to give Jericho the group game, whose name I can't remember, that raises fun quickly thru the "practice" interaction. It's pricey, which is one reason I'm buying it while at Uni instead of on the lot. Protection money for it will be a brat, but I think it will be worth it.
A gripe on the subject of spouses: Somehow I managed to pick the only dorm with only ONE female student living it it. She's typical townie quality, and I don't have time to make a new friend to replace her with. There's a professor that I like a little better, but I remember all the frustration that comes from moving professors off campus, and I don't know if it's been fixed. My game is buggy enough with all the new seasons stuff, so I'm stuck with blech for the next few generation's genetics. Gorram it!
On The Sims Resource, where I first came across a reference to this challenge, a fellow-simmer complained that she ended up in danger of her founder (female) reaching elder-hood before being able to produce the next generation. This danger is maximized by the presence of Seasons, which limits the phone usage in a very severe manner (and therefore times you can invite a sweetheart over). Jericho is a guy, because I figure the benefit of being able to produce offspring all thru the adult and elder stages outweighs the benefit of being able to produce offspring before the no-moving-in-others restriction is lifted. Of course, this is keeping in mind that once Jericho is an elder, unless I've got a pet lifting the Service Animal restriction, I won't be able to control him at all. :( That could be bad, but I'm going to risk it.
I sent Jericho off to Academie Le Tour, where he's been living in pre-apocalyptic bliss for the last seven semesters. I exploited a loophole while he's here; Academie Le Tour has had its seasons set to fallx4, giving me a learning bonus which has allowed me to just about max out all his skills but two (Mechanical and cleaning; cooking is only at 8 as well). I consider this only a partial exploitation, since I normally keep my colleges at fall, fall, winter, spring anyways.
I'm not sure about the wisdom of how I've used Jericho's Uni time, though, and if the challenge flops I may do it differently for round 2. I tried to maximize his skills because I don't actually have a firm, fixed game plan for how I want to approach the order of restrictions. Since so much of job-acquisition is now chance (thanks a lot, pinstar, for that darn journalism restriction *mock scowl*) I wanted Jericho to be able to move quickly up any employment ladder that makes itself available.
BUT, as a result of this focus, he currently has only five friends. I've got a semester and a half to bump that number up, but I don't think I'll be able to go beyond seven or eight. AND even if he has these friends now, maintaining college friends will be next to impossible, since they don't do walk-bys and he can only use the phone Tuesday mornings. Sooooo, really, the only point of college friends is probably to buy you time to make other friends as you (hopefully) move up the career. But since I haven't started that part of the challenge yet, I don't really know.
Pinstar, in an interview recorded on The Sims 2 Challenges (love the show, Rachel, by the way) commented that the hardest needs to meet once your founder graduates are hygiene and fun. I don't think there's anything I can really do for hygiene until the Medical restriction is lifted (btw, I think I will take his advice and make that my founder's spouse restriction), but I've been thinking about how to address the fun issue. Creativity-building objects are restricted by the Artist career, but games are not. I'm going to give Jericho the group game, whose name I can't remember, that raises fun quickly thru the "practice" interaction. It's pricey, which is one reason I'm buying it while at Uni instead of on the lot. Protection money for it will be a brat, but I think it will be worth it.
A gripe on the subject of spouses: Somehow I managed to pick the only dorm with only ONE female student living it it. She's typical townie quality, and I don't have time to make a new friend to replace her with. There's a professor that I like a little better, but I remember all the frustration that comes from moving professors off campus, and I don't know if it's been fixed. My game is buggy enough with all the new seasons stuff, so I'm stuck with blech for the next few generation's genetics. Gorram it!
The Apocolypse Challenge
It seems that all simming comes in phases, and I am about to enter another phase. I've discovered the "Apocolypse Challenge" by pinstar, and boy does that look complicated! I've also found pinstar's excel sheet for counting legacy points, and I privately wonder if I would have gone farther in my legacy if I'd had that from the beginning. Being able to keep track of the goals in a tangible way adds to my drive.
Anyway, I'd like to chronicle my progress with this new challenge, be it to destruction or completion. Plus, I'm bored at work today. So, here's the blog dedicated to it (no pics for now).
I started with the neighborhood rather than the sim. I'm never satisfied with the neighborhood decoration I create for myself in my custom 'hoods; ever. This will be no exception, but I'm trying again, so I guess that's good. I've started with the "givens" from the challenge, and plan to add structures and decorations as I progress.
We know that three nuclear power plants have gone into meltdown, so I've taken the cooling towers from the decorations screen and placed them on my dirt neighborhood (I think the dirt is uglier than the desert terrain *smile*). Between two of these "power plants" I've placed a Zombie lot, with Mother, Father, Friend, Daughter, Son, and Baby (boy, I was feeling creative when I named these people). I used Debugging mode to make the zombies, so I'm not sure if they're infertile or not. Regardless, they exist as the technicians who were maintaining the power plants when the meltdown occurred. I've also made Joey "The Comb" and four thugs which I've moved into a townhouse in the middle of the neighborhood, and way off to the side I've created a pretty lame secret lab for Dr. Vu and his minions (not created yet).
Now, on to college!
(boy, this is dry reading. I've gotta think of a way to spice it up)
Anyway, I'd like to chronicle my progress with this new challenge, be it to destruction or completion. Plus, I'm bored at work today. So, here's the blog dedicated to it (no pics for now).
I started with the neighborhood rather than the sim. I'm never satisfied with the neighborhood decoration I create for myself in my custom 'hoods; ever. This will be no exception, but I'm trying again, so I guess that's good. I've started with the "givens" from the challenge, and plan to add structures and decorations as I progress.
We know that three nuclear power plants have gone into meltdown, so I've taken the cooling towers from the decorations screen and placed them on my dirt neighborhood (I think the dirt is uglier than the desert terrain *smile*). Between two of these "power plants" I've placed a Zombie lot, with Mother, Father, Friend, Daughter, Son, and Baby (boy, I was feeling creative when I named these people). I used Debugging mode to make the zombies, so I'm not sure if they're infertile or not. Regardless, they exist as the technicians who were maintaining the power plants when the meltdown occurred. I've also made Joey "The Comb" and four thugs which I've moved into a townhouse in the middle of the neighborhood, and way off to the side I've created a pretty lame secret lab for Dr. Vu and his minions (not created yet).
Now, on to college!
(boy, this is dry reading. I've gotta think of a way to spice it up)
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