Legacy play: By the Rulebook or Free-form?

luthienrising · March 2016

So, I'm vaguely considering starting a separate save that would be more Legacy-style play, but I'm thinking of veering off the rules a bit. Let myself use mods so Sims in clubs remember each other; rotate now and then to a club leader to keep a club going; not keep count on anything but the generation numbers; let the household move as it grows instead of starting on a huge lot. Odds are I'd end up wanting to play rotationally some of the time just because some Sim catches my interest, but it seemed a good thing to do for a different save.

For those of you who already do Legacy-type play, do you follow the Legacy rules? If you don't, what do you tend to do that way?

Glimmer50 · March 2016

I have tried and failed to play a legacy countless times. I just can't stay on the same lot for that long. I really like the beginning where you start off poor so my solution has been to play the Drifter Challenge. I managed to make it 8 generations. I just started playing the Prosperity Challenge and have never played rotation before but am having more fun with it then sticking with one family.

I guess what I am saying is do what makes you happy. I have found staying in one house for 10 generations impossible for me since I get bored once they have it all. So, once the house is all done, I move on no matter what challenge I am playing I alter the rules so I can move to a different lot even if I have to bring the whole family.

I have also wound up playing the kids and leaving the parents in the old house. Depends on how attached I get to the parents.

Colton147147 · March 2016

I play by my own rules when it comes to challenges.

I never follow their rules; I play by my own rules.

Rflong7 · March 2016

If I'm playing a challenge I play by the rules. It's just the way I am.

TheMomminator · March 2016

I'm not a great rule follower so I always bend them how they are the most fun for me. I don't play any challenges with anyone else or keep score so it doesn't really matter. Play how you want. There are a million take offs on the Legacy Challenge so if your way is fun and interesting, write new rules and add it to the list.

Polyrhythm · March 2016

I tried a legacy once and by generation 4 I gave up. I couldn't stand being on the same huge lot all that time with a small house since I can't build large houses. I also played as other families and used debug cheats to remove moodlets, cause with 8 Sims always in the house they kept walking in on each other in the bathroom...I thought about moving lots but by then other factors bored me.

Simpkin · March 2016

I'm not sure of the (legacy) rules but I do play legacy. As in generational play.

duhboy2u2 · March 2016

For the most part I follow the rules, but I feel like if a mod isn't 'cheaty' its ok to use it and I rarely play on one single lot for the whole challenge. I prefer to play in Newcrest and change lots per generation. For me its more comfortable to do so and I get to build Newcrest as I go.

ctroihd1 · March 2016

I love to try challenges and legacies. But I play them by myself and so if it is boring or not working out, I modify the rules to suit me. Since I am not into taking extensive notes and such, I go with what sounds like fun to me for the most part. That is why I take the legacy/challenge info and try to stick to it, but end up modifying for myself. I don't want to MAKE myself play if I am not enjoying it.

My daughter and I are doing a Rags to Riches type thing. She made the guy, I made the gal. We got each other's Sim and both married them and compare their families and lives with each other. It is cool.

Rflong7 · March 2016

I want to also add there's nothing wrong with amending the rules to suit you. That's how many challenges have changed and are more fun for different people.

I do follow the rules if I call it a Legacy Challenge- I tend to share my game play when doing challenges- but if I want to play them differently I'll post it- IF I'm sharing my game play.

So, while I stick to the rules, that's just me.

Renamed2002180839 · March 2016

I always veer off the Legacy rules. For one thing there's like TOO MANY of them to remember- lol. Also I like to make it up as I go along. I always move the next generation to a new house by the way where the last generation can live with their kids in retirement. I also place it in a new world. Like starting in Willow Creek 1st generation- then Oasis 2nd- Magnolia Promenade 3rd, Newcrest and as of now Winderberg following that. Then I stop and do something else, ha! I started this way in 3 because there were so many worlds to chose from and since you had to make a clean break anyway when you moved worlds I figured a new generation setting off on it's own made sense. The great thing about 4 is you don't lose those ties- well, if you use mods to stop the hideous culling you don't.

Writin_Reg · March 2016

Rflong7 wrote: »

If I'm playing a challenge I play by the rules. It's just the way I am.

Same here. I prefer the rules of the Sims 2 legacy - as it is the most challenging to me. The others are a bit too easy I think. Besides dealing with toddlers in the mix is a lot more challenging than Sims 4 legacy rules.

The only legacys though I totally fail on is the apocalypse challenge and the Assylum Challenge. I fail on the first because I sometimes forget certain things are not yet open for a particular household - which of course means I have to start over - lol. And the Assylum challenge gets me because I will still feeling real sorry for some of the sims situation and just give up. I also do not like the idea that only one sim can be left standing - so I actually no longer even attempt that challenge.

As like Rflong I play strictly by the rules other wise I see no point in doing a challenge. Anyone can cheat what they want - but I just can't. I guess I just believe in playing by the rules or not to accept a challenge game. I am the same way in real life. It is just who I am so no matter how badly I wish a rule was different - like in the Assylum challenge - well I just find it better not to play that challenge if I can't play by the rules.

Also I might add because I so often have messed up in the Apocalypse challenge I have to yet ever finish one and started trying them way back early in Sims 2. Maybe one of these days I will succeed and stop messing up. LOL.

I must add though just because I am so hard on myself as far as rules go - I would not ever suggest anyone else should be like me. I say it is a game and if you have no qualms about relaxing the rules - then do it - as i am sure you will probably enjoy it better than if you tried it exactly like I play. You know you best and really no one else should influence you on how you play your game. I can see it not being much fun for you if you feel you have no choice but play someone elses way. Just do what makes you happy. You can always choose to try it exactly as the rules state, and then try it with relaxing certain rules if you are unlike me and can play like that. LOL. I am my own worse enemy and would get super guilty feeling over circumventing a rule - but thank goodness not everyone is like me.

Also my fav legacies, both using Sims 2 play - is the alphabet legacy which means the generations start with the letter A for the first name and go to the letter z and is 26 generations long instead of the normal 10. My second fav legacy play is the 7 toddler challenge. That is 7 toddlers and 1 adult that must get them to teen agers safely and with some if not all baby skills and child skills.

I guess I was not much help in your quest to know. Sorry.

Arletta · March 2016

I tend to go free form, more than anything, when I play legacy style. I follow the rules vaguely. Unless you're blogging, nobody but you knows anyway.

RamblineRose · March 2016

I think making your own legacy is a good idea. Be creative, play how you want to, write about it and have fun a Sim life is short and so is ours. Live life to the fullest and enjoy.

GalacticGal · March 2016

I have a tendency to 'play by the rules'. I totally messed up with the Sims4 version of Pinstar's Legacy Challenge. (this wasn't simply a case where I could 'roll with the punch' and make the best of it. I MOVED out the heir, then when I realized I couldn't 'fix' things by reconstructing that generation, I deleted the game save. We're talking a total destruction/mess-up.

I had no other choice but to start over.

What I've got going now is a reboot, if you will, inasmuch as I used the same Founder, his background story blog, editing out the original stuff and revising where needed to fit the new stuff in the beginning chapter. I should have copied, saved and deleted the original, but didn't realize it would keep the date from 2014. LOL Without realizing it I rebooted just about one year from the date I began. Weird, huh?

But, yeah, I sometimes am so rigid I get hung-up as you've read above. My name is GalacticGal and I'm type A personality, but, I'm working on it. I am 'winging it' a bit, since so far no word on the use of the Whispering Wishing Well has come down to the best of my knowledge. I had my 'spare' wish for funds and he got an overwhelming amount, so I had him donate much of it back to the well. I figured that was fair. He made a gift of it to his brother, my heir, so the Gen. 3 heir could get married. I just had my Gen. 4 heir use it for romance, since he's already half way to Adult in age.

Time is running out. Nobody has been alive when their grandchildren came along. So, I feel a tad rushed. However, if I stick to the rules and gain lots of points, then I will feel good about it. If I regard the rules as merely 'guidelines' and rack up many more points than I may have, I will feel terrible.

loubyloulou · March 2016

I don't follow the rules strictly and I certainly don't count up points. I do, however, choose at the outset what sort of legacy it will be in terms of heir; for example, at the moment I'm doing a strict matriarchy, i.e. my heir can only ever be a female, which really is a challenge at the moment as all my sims seem to be having is boy babies (and I don't cheat on this with the MC Command Center mod, which you can do).

Simfan923 · March 2016

I just stick to what I feel suits my playing style. When it comes to legacies I just do what I want honestly. It's really just for you anyway.

DominicLaurence · March 2016

I never liked people telling me what to do, so when it comes to legacies I play it like I want too. It doesn't mean I can't create my own rules tho, I think I know what would be fun to play, what's a real challenge for myself and so on.

GalacticGal · March 2016

I may adapt my own way of playing to something akin to a Legacy Challenge, but not actually play the Legacy, per se. For instance, it is more fun to start out in a nearly desperate state and have to build a house over time. But, I will change the game length to Long. Th rest of the time I will play how I like to play.

AlbaWaterhouse · March 2016

I always set my own rules as I don't like how strict challenges usually are.

I also like to do the opposite of one of the basic legacy rules. I always move my heir out as soon as they become YA, and is the rest of the family that stays in the parents house. I always have some sort of object that they must have in their new house. Right now it's 2 growfruit trees in the spring challenge special planters.

I often set specific rules at random when playing. Like I would tell myself when the heir is a teenager: "this one is going to marry several times but only to gingers", or "this heir is going to reach level 10 of the whatever career and not getting married until 10 days before becoming an elder" etc

3KNPen · March 2016

For me it depends on how intensely I feel like playing it. Sometimes I want to follow all the rules. Sometimes I just want something comfortable and fun for myself. I rarely play a Legacy for points so I never feel bad tweaking the rules to fit my playstyle. For me Legacies are a lot more comfy and open ended in the whole then a lot of the challenges I play and it's more about building the family from nothing and seeing them grown rather then keeping track of how many aspirations or skills have been completed within the family. I almost always start the family from scratch with an empty lot and almost no money. Because for me that's the challenge of building them from nothing. (The exception is my current "Legacy" which I'm trying to do a complete collection run I started my founder off on a lot with an actual house because I didn't feel like dealing with her struggling with her needs while also needing to run around trying to collect All the Things. However I ended up giving myself a handicap in that I'm playing on the short lifespan so everyone has less time to complete things)

Other challenges though I'm very strict about the rules. I do tend to prefer challenges that don't require you to keep track of points (because I'm awful at remembering to keep track of points) but even if I take one that does have a points system and I remove it I strive to stay as strict to the rules as possible just because that's part of the fun of doing a challenge.

luthienrising · March 2016

You're all awesome

I might use this save to see if I can tolerate *any* rule constraint! Maybe if I can, I can look look at some of the other challenges. Definitely dropping the points part, and I prefer the idea of starting on a smaller lot and growing bigger - it just feels more "right" somehow. I might actually make myself stick to the Matriarchy option, though, instead of leaving that free-for-all. Maybe even the firstborn thing combined with that. And I think maybe I'll delete all the premades. I've left most of them in my current save, which I've been playing for four months now, so they feel like they "belong" there. It would be an accomplishment for me to actually get past 3 or 4 generations in a save, so that's a good goal too for doing something different.

sillyangel0906 · March 2016

I play by my own rules

Sweet_Italy · March 2016

I think I'm cursed, I've tried legacies before, I never use the points, and I loosely follow the rules, and I can't ever get past the 3rd generation. I just can't seem to get attatched to the next generations as I can the founders I create. I may have found a legacy that might help me get past that though. The Four Immortal Sisters legacy let's you play with 4 sims that use the cow plant to stay young forever, so I can play as them the whole time, even as their offspring age and die off, lol...

nanashi-sims · March 2016

Colton147147 wrote: »

I play by my own rules when it comes to challenges.

I never follow their rules; I play by my own rules.

Me too. I never even knew that there was an unofficial 'official' legacy challenge until I started creating content for TS2 and spent more time in community forums. Until then I always thought when players mentioned legacy challenges they were talking about their own challenges

I play with a lot of constraints for my challenge. I like being able to make my own constraints, and hope that future iterations will let players do that a bit more. I find I don't really mind playing TS4 goals, but would just prefer if there were less of them so I could spend less time trying to achieve things and maintain certain emotional states and more time creating stories

Shades302 · March 2016

I also play how ever suits my play style, I tried to follow legacy rules but it always ends up too strict and constraining for my play style, I want to spend as much time with my CAS sim as possible, when he dies with his beautiful waifu then I will look at my 'flock' of offspring and choose my next victim. lol

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Legacy play: By the Rulebook or Free-form?

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