Occults should have On-Off switches «123...Next Go

Loanet

Bust The Dust came with an On-Off switch - despite the fact that if you've bought the Dust, that's the ONLY thing about it.

On the other hand, do you remember when people bought Vampires and then complained about the Vampires visiting them too often? Now, Vampires never leave Forgotten Hollow (except for Vlad), and Spellcasters never leave Glimmerbrook. Presumably they bought the games for the building material, and hey, there's great build and CAS items in both packs. But people who bought it for the gameplay were seriously shafted. Vampires and Spellcasters weren't merely nerfed in the game; their presence was practically removed. Because it is easier to satisfy builders than story-players.

Somehow, that seems a little... the wrong way around? Shouldn't a game about life simulation be focused on satisfying the players than the builders?

But EA never updates previous packs, apart from the occasional bug patch. So seeing Vampires and Spellcasters in clubs and gyms... feh. Good luck with that.

Thoughts?

VeeDub

I don't have Vampires, so I can't really comment on that. But in my game, I do see spellcasters out and about, though you might not notice them if you don't already know they're magical peeps. But a couple of times I definitely noticed. Once my sim was at a karaoke bar and a really, really bad singer kept trying to use the machine again, so I used a cheat to break it (I was gonna fix it later). But a spellcaster autonomously cast repairio on it and ruined my plan. I'm not complaining, though; it was cool to see that happen, lol.

Edit: Geez, I forgot to add that I agree about a toggle. As in I also wish they existed for occult life states.

DaWaterRat

In my play last night I had a visit from Lilith and a randomly created NPC vampire that I only knew was a vampire because she left by turning into a bat. Caleb was a good friend of the grandmother to the current generation.

I also had an NPC sim join the household with a good friendship with Morgyn already in place, and she wasn't even a spellcaster or from Glimmerbrook.

I've also run into the occasional Alien when they were glowing with emotion.

So I don't find Vampires and Spellcasters all that invisible in my games, though I'd certainly like to see them more. So if adding toggles would let that happen, I'm all for it.

I do have vague memories of reading somewhere that at one time they were concerned about too many toggles impacting game performance. Not to mention that each toggle added increases testing exponentially as they have to make sure the toggles don't interfere with each other in bad ways. And I'm not sure how easy it would be to go back and implement them, so hopefully, it's something they can do with Sims 5 whenever that comes.

CelSims

VeeDub wrote: »

I don't have Vampires, so I can't really comment on that. But in my game, I do see spellcasters out and about, though you might not notice them if you don't already know they're magical peeps. But a couple of times I definitely noticed. Once my sim was at a karaoke bar and a really, really bad singer kept trying to use the machine again, so I used a cheat to break it (I was gonna fix it later). But a spellcaster autonomously cast repairio on it and ruined my plan. I'm not complaining, though; it was cool to see that happen, lol.

Sadly you are mistaken unless you have created a club with cast spells as the activity. Spellcasters do not have the ability to autonomously cast anything outside of club settings and even then, they seem to only cast inferniate and scruberoo. I'm watching my magic club at the bar right now and my own sim is just spamming scruberoo on herself while the rest of the club talk and haven't performed a single spell .
They don't even cast any thing in the magical realm, they only do duel and practice animations.

Believe me, I WISH they would do this stuff autonomously. I may have got quite angry about it and locked spellcasters in empty rooms to either die or save themselves with the magic I KNOW they know. They all die.

Mareah

CelSims wrote: »

VeeDub wrote: »

I don't have Vampires, so I can't really comment on that. But in my game, I do see spellcasters out and about, though you might not notice them if you don't already know they're magical peeps. But a couple of times I definitely noticed. Once my sim was at a karaoke bar and a really, really bad singer kept trying to use the machine again, so I used a cheat to break it (I was gonna fix it later). But a spellcaster autonomously cast repairio on it and ruined my plan. I'm not complaining, though; it was cool to see that happen, lol.

Sadly you are mistaken unless you have created a club with cast spells as the activity. Spellcasters do not have the ability to autonomously cast anything outside of club settings and even then, they seem to only cast inferniate and scruberoo. I'm watching my magic club at the bar right now and my own sim is just spamming scruberoo on herself while the rest of the club talk and haven't performed a single spell .

This is my spellcasters club as well! I was vastly disappointed by how boring their meetups turned to be since only my sim was casting spells while the others were just chatting. Was it always like that for you, or does it work sometimes? i am thinking the club system might be bugged.

VeeDub

CelSims wrote: »

VeeDub wrote: »

I don't have Vampires, so I can't really comment on that. But in my game, I do see spellcasters out and about, though you might not notice them if you don't already know they're magical peeps. But a couple of times I definitely noticed. Once my sim was at a karaoke bar and a really, really bad singer kept trying to use the machine again, so I used a cheat to break it (I was gonna fix it later). But a spellcaster autonomously cast repairio on it and ruined my plan. I'm not complaining, though; it was cool to see that happen, lol.

Sadly you are mistaken unless you have created a club with cast spells as the activity. Spellcasters do not have the ability to autonomously cast anything outside of club settings and even then, they seem to only cast inferniate and scruberoo. I'm watching my magic club at the bar right now and my own sim is just spamming scruberoo on herself while the rest of the club talk and haven't performed a single spell .
They don't even cast any thing in the magical realm, they only do duel and practice animations.

Believe me, I WISH they would do this stuff autonomously. I may have got quite angry about it and locked spellcasters in empty rooms to either die or save themselves with the magic I KNOW they know. They all die.

Ah, you may be right. It was indeed repairio that had been cast that night (and it has happened other times as well), but I realize now that the autonomy could have been influenced by one of my mods. I'm not sure which, as I have none specifically for spellcasters, but it may be a more general side-effect of something else.

Loanet

Yes, a stronger presence should be felt. Vlad came into my flat and drank my plasma at night. It was frustrating. But, I own Vampires. And obviously my Sims don't want their plasma drunk. But I haven't seen any others.

And Casters barely cast magic in their own world, except when duelling and teaching, let alone outside their world.

Likewise, Mermaids. You never see Mermaids outside of Sulani- partly because there's no swimming, of course, but my point remains.

I can appreciate on-off would take some time to program, but seeing as it would improve gameplay so much for so many... I mean, people act like Occult is a tiny niche, but it's not. In fact if the reception of Paranormal Stuff was anything to go by, Occult players are in the majority. Even if they don't play Occult all the time, that's why they buy the packs. To see its effects in the world.

You could say even Paranormal Stuff's spookiness has an On-Off switch, since you can choose to have a Haunted House before you see its spooks, and you must choose to perform the Paranormal job.

So Vampires, Spellcasters and Mermaids, and any future Occults like Fairies or Werewolves, don't they deserve On-Off? It shouldn't have to take up an entire Lot Trait like Ghosts do.

CelSims

VeeDub wrote: »

CelSims wrote: »

VeeDub wrote: »

I don't have Vampires, so I can't really comment on that. But in my game, I do see spellcasters out and about, though you might not notice them if you don't already know they're magical peeps. But a couple of times I definitely noticed. Once my sim was at a karaoke bar and a really, really bad singer kept trying to use the machine again, so I used a cheat to break it (I was gonna fix it later). But a spellcaster autonomously cast repairio on it and ruined my plan. I'm not complaining, though; it was cool to see that happen, lol.

Sadly you are mistaken unless you have created a club with cast spells as the activity. Spellcasters do not have the ability to autonomously cast anything outside of club settings and even then, they seem to only cast inferniate and scruberoo. I'm watching my magic club at the bar right now and my own sim is just spamming scruberoo on herself while the rest of the club talk and haven't performed a single spell .
They don't even cast any thing in the magical realm, they only do duel and practice animations.

Believe me, I WISH they would do this stuff autonomously. I may have got quite angry about it and locked spellcasters in empty rooms to either die or save themselves with the magic I KNOW they know. They all die.

Ah, you may be right. It was indeed repairio that had been cast that night (and it has happened other times as well), but I realize now that the autonomy could have been influenced by one of my mods. I'm not sure which, as I have none specifically for spellcasters, but it may be a more general side-effect of something else.

I'd love to know if it's a side effect of a mod because I would go grab it immediately! I have never found one that enables any magic autonomy. Almost all of my families are spellcasters and it is a constant disappointment that when I see them around they act like regular sims.

CelSims

Mareah wrote: »

CelSims wrote: »

VeeDub wrote: »

I don't have Vampires, so I can't really comment on that. But in my game, I do see spellcasters out and about, though you might not notice them if you don't already know they're magical peeps. But a couple of times I definitely noticed. Once my sim was at a karaoke bar and a really, really bad singer kept trying to use the machine again, so I used a cheat to break it (I was gonna fix it later). But a spellcaster autonomously cast repairio on it and ruined my plan. I'm not complaining, though; it was cool to see that happen, lol.

Sadly you are mistaken unless you have created a club with cast spells as the activity. Spellcasters do not have the ability to autonomously cast anything outside of club settings and even then, they seem to only cast inferniate and scruberoo. I'm watching my magic club at the bar right now and my own sim is just spamming scruberoo on herself while the rest of the club talk and haven't performed a single spell .

This is my spellcasters club as well! I was vastly disappointed by how boring their meetups turned to be since only my sim was casting spells while the others were just chatting. Was it always like that for you, or does it work sometimes? i am thinking the club system might be bugged.

The NPC members used to just constantly cast inferniate, which was it's own annoyance. Now they seem to do nothing.

As far as an on/off switch, I would like one for autonomy - just for the spells that wouldn't be a nuisance. I wouldn't want my sims inferniating their own stuff for example, or zip zapping their own tv. But why not scruberoo the toddler, or summon a family meal?
As far as the sims themselves spawing, that would be another toggle.
To suit most people it would need both, some people want to play out stories of occults being in the world but hiding. Others, like me, want full blown in your face occult.

Nikkih

In the past game I would of said yes because the occults used to be thrown with other stuff that realism players want to, so I'd say for aliens and mermaids should have options to turn off in the sims 4 but vampires & spellcasters you have to buy a pack especially to get them, if someone hates occults why would they buy those packs in the first place 🤔 but on the grand scale of things some people are going to buy those packs only for items so probably best to put a switch off button so they don't have to water it down, annoying the players that actually bought it for the gameplay lol, us occult players want aliens to abduct our sims, vampires breaking in to drink our sims plasma, spellcasters autonomously casting spells anywhere, mermaids swimming anywhere but this isn't happening we need toggles and those updated to be like this

Lazzial

Loanet wrote: »

Bust The Dust came with an On-Off switch - despite the fact that if you've bought the Dust, that's the ONLY thing about it.

On the other hand, do you remember when people bought Vampires and then complained about the Vampires visiting them too often? Now, Vampires never leave Forgotten Hollow (except for Vlad), and Spellcasters never leave Glimmerbrook. Presumably they bought the games for the building material, and hey, there's great build and CAS items in both packs. But people who bought it for the gameplay were seriously shafted. Vampires and Spellcasters weren't merely nerfed in the game; their presence was practically removed. Because it is easier to satisfy builders than story-players.

Somehow, that seems a little... the wrong way around? Shouldn't a game about life simulation be focused on satisfying the players than the builders?

But EA never updates previous packs, apart from the occasional bug patch. So seeing Vampires and Spellcasters in clubs and gyms... feh. Good luck with that.

Thoughts?

Yeah, they nerfed them to death and I'm still not happy about it. They completely ruined my vampire game. I don't even get the late night invites from vampires asking if I want eternal life anymore. That's what really ticks me off. I don't mind so much that they aren't all over the world. One of the problems was that the game spawned too many vampires. There only needed to be a few to make the game play interesting. Same goes for spell casters.

Onverser

I really don't understand how they dealt with them. It just seems completely lazy and thoughtless, a simple toggle would be easy to add and would work for everyone. But instead they just screwed over occult players to make occult packs friendly to people who hate occults. I just want occults to exist in my sims world like they did in 2 and 3.

Loanet

The irony being, some people act as if Occult players are a tiny minority, but they are not. While they have many different favourites, the number of people who like occults is in the majority. It's not a niche. Of course there's an extreme side to everything.

But ultimately the people who don't want ANY occults in their game but buy it anyway are on a level with people who think vacuuming and cleaning is exciting. And on-off will actually serve them better because that way, nobody EVER sneaks into their apartment at night.

Sunflowergal227

i don't have vampires yet, so i am not sure. but it may be useful for people who don't like something to have an on/off switch. of course i like some of the occults so it's alright. although ghosts are annoying when all they do is break stuff but i presume you can just send to the netherworld and then grieve when you want to resurrect them? i do like that you can interact with ghosts and still talk with them.

Simmingal

i love my occults
but what they really should do is give us control over randomly generated sims and their endless spawning

I really love seeing my vampires
I love seeing my spellcasters
I love seeing my aliens
and I love seeing my mermaids

but what i really really hate

is seeing randomized sims gain these powers out of nowhere from no one

and i especially hate when randomized sims gain fame out of nowhere so they drown out any actually famous sims as well

like game should stop overriding whatever sims the player creates with randomized sims

there should not be vampires unless you make some (or well have in premade household)
and if you cure all of them?
even more there should not be vampires

there should not be randomized spellcasters
there should only be sages (which should be possible to choose yourself)
and the sims you have made spellcasters

there shouldn't be randomized aliens because well meanwhile true you could say their invasion cant be controlled id still like to make the aliens myself and not have game forcing its idea of what aliens are (for which id also like to be able to change pollinator to sim of choice)

mermaids though less invasive also shouldnt randomly spawn cause well, again if you turn them all to just human there should not be mermaids

+ just to be clear I'm all for occults in my game acting occulty after ive made them one vampires should attack sims and spellcasters should do magic stuff and mermaids should swim with their tails and aliens should abduct

its just that if ive deleted/cured all the occults from my game the game shouldnt spawn more of them and that should end whatever the occult issue is

Atreya33

I completely agree with the statement that occults should have on and off switches. I like playing with them and hate it that they are nerfed. I would like to see spellcasters actually act like spellcasters autonomously, and not just on the one lot in the magic realm. Spellcasters should not be forced into permanent hiding because people who dislike occults complain about them. Same goes for vampires. They just ring my sims doorbell once and that's it.

I also understand not everybody feels the same way about them. People who dislike occults should be able to turn them off, especially occults that come in an EP and not a dedicated GP. But even for those in a GP it would make sense to have a on/off switch . Just because I have vampires installed doesn't mean I want to play them all the time. It would be nice if I could choose between full unnerfed vampire gameplay or no vampires. But not this half baked in between solution.

EnkiSchmidt

On off switches are severly needed!

What's so hard to understand about players having several saves with different metaphysics? I'm not interested in nerfed, family save vampires, I want them 100% active in saves where they exist and I don't want to see another bat in saves where no vampires exist.

It wouldn't even have to be a switch, if pressing a button in the options menu is too believed to be too intimidating for the casual player. It could be something like an automated culling mechanism that auto-deletes a vampire the moment it spawns in the neighborhood. Place your vampire-b-gone on your lot or venue and it does its thing all across the active neighborhood.

CelSims

Just to add, back when I joined this forum, there was a discussion asking for toggles for occults. Other players said the gurus had said that toggles were too difficult to implement and caused lag or bugs.
And then we get more toggles with Eco Lifestyle and Bust the Dust.

Please give us toggles and stop nerfing our occults. And bring back our vampires.

InuMiroLover

We need that dang toggle already. I like occults in my game. I dont like them being invisible just because someone who had no interest in an occult pack bought an occult pack because they simply had to have a new couch in their game and then complain endlessly about all the occults apparently taking over their neighborhoods. #StopNerfingOccults

NightwalkerArkanis

I wouldn't mind some Occult 'toggle' options for each type. Then I would have been able to hide my spellcasters while letting my Vampires run amok. The choice of what kind of world my occults live in would be nice to have with these options.

Simmingal wrote: »

i love my occults
but what they really should do is give us control over randomly generated sims and their endless spawning

like game should stop overriding whatever sims the player creates with randomized sims

its just that if ive deleted/cured all the occults from my game the game shouldnt spawn more of them and that should end whatever the occult issue is

And for the love of Simgod, this. Why they decided to flat out force randomly generated Sims on us, I do not know. Does the worlds *have* to be filled with people beyond those you create yourself + service NPC and those who run bars and other commercial stands? How many Sims do I have to create before you stop infuse my game with your random spam creations? Or you just won't?

At least include that as a choice/toggle too, the option to create random sims for those who want it. Same with the "we must have a number of clubs at all times" rule that Get Together came up with. You're helping me filling a town even when it isn't needed. An exception might be needed for all those visitable careers with colleagues.

This is a sandbox game *we* play, EA. Please let us create/decide the Simmers we want in our towns, random or not.

Sharonia

I miss when vampires would break in my sims homes. It hasn't happened in my game for the longest time.

Pamtastic72

Ha ha ha ha ha! It cracks me up when people think toggles are going to solve anything.

• They nerfed weather deaths pretty much entirely even though there was a toggle included with the pack to keep weather from affecting sims.
• They nerfed aliens even though there was a toggle on the satellite dish to prevent abductions.
• They nerfed vampires even though there were multiple in game toggles including garlic to prevent break-ins.
• They nerfed Murphy bed deaths even though there was a toggle in the form of an upgrade to prevent those too.
• They nerfed fame & reactions to celebrities even though there were toggles in game for those in the form of the celebrity disguise and the ability to turn fame off entirely. Now you’re global superstar hardly merits reactions from the common folk.

Toggles only work if people actually use them and the dollhouse crowd won’t. They prefer to simply have key pack features removed for their convenience and immersion, and anyone who specifically paid good money for those features can just go kick rocks.

Atreya33

Pamtastic72 wrote: »

Ha ha ha ha ha! It cracks me up when people think toggles are going to solve anything.

• They nerfed weather deaths pretty much entirely even though there was a toggle included with the pack to keep weather from affecting sims.
• They nerfed aliens even though there was a toggle on the satellite dish to prevent abductions.
• They nerfed vampires even though there were multiple in game toggles including garlic to prevent break-ins.
• They nerfed Murphy bed deaths even though there was a toggle in the form of an upgrade to prevent those too.
• They nerfed fame & reactions to celebrities even though there were toggles in game for those in the form of the celebrity disguise and the ability to turn fame off entirely. Now you’re global superstar hardly merits reactions from the common folk.

Toggles only work if people actually use them and the dollhouse crowd won’t. They prefer to simply have key pack features removed for their convenience and immersion, and anyone who specifically paid good money for those features can just go kick rocks.

If this is true they could disable them by default and give those who are willing the option to turn occults on. They did this with whims after all.

JustMeAlb

Can't believe EA missed a money grabbing opportunity, after releasing the Vampire pack they could have released a Gothic Build pack.

But seriously, someone buying a pack called Vampires then complaining about there being vampires?!

Sara1010P

A lot of the toggles they already have don't work for me personally because they provided us with all or nothing type toggles. For example the toggle for weather effects being turned off, I don't want my sims not to experience weather effects, but I also don't want them freezing to death during a blizzard because they don't have enough sense not to go jogging in it, and this did happen to me. So my choice with the toggles provided would have been either let them freeze to death or not experience any effects at all. That is not satisfactory in any sense. I had to get a mod to correct the issue. I still use it because even though it has been nerfed as some say, I still experience this issue without the mod in. Toggles only work as options when it isn't just on or off.

SERVERFRA

I would only want a turn off toggle if they put in those creepy Zombies.
I love the Vamps, Mermaids, Aliens & Spellcasters. I still want Fairies, Genies & Werewolves in Sims 4.