I have a few rules, such as: never leave the game without saving, so there is no turning back on sims died or children taken away. No mods. Money cheating only if it lowers the amount for the household played. No change of physical appearance through CAS.
Phillipa Erdnuss
Mayoress of SimCity and all associated districts
I really try to make rules. I really do. I make reasonable ones, like “don’t make the moody teenage daughter turn into a vampire and lock up the rest of the family and suck their blood” and “don’t make the lady kill all her boyfriends, put their urns in a dark basement, and woohoo with each of their ghosts in turn each night”. But I just can’t seem to follow my own rules.
I have a few rules that have made my plots a little more interesting:
1. Ghosts can join a household but cannot be permanently revived. They may come back briefly to finish some sort of task, but they must become ghosts again within a few days at most. Also, physical interaction with a ghost has a chance of putting a curse on a living Sim and causing them to join the afterlife, as well.
2. If you can become a PlantSim and you become Infected, you must also become a PlantSim. Mother prefers this.
3. The final tier of any adult aspiration may be cheated if desired. Child aspirations may be completely cheated when the child maxes out the relevant skill. (There are too many fun creative things for a kid to do for me to sit down and force them to draw the same five pictures every single time.)
4. Money and fame may be cheated IF starting a new family with a Sim who logically would be famous and/or rich already.
I think that's about it. These are really fun to read.
Watch me mash together Sims and Pokémon to tell a story about battling glitches in Penny Saves Paldea. Updated every other Thursday.
Usually varies depending on what I'm doing, but I keep most of the same ones for my gameplay.
-No cheating needs
-No money cheats (only subtract money)
-Start out with an unfurnished home or apartment. (Less my sim is living in a tent)
-Most skill building done off lot
-Only sale items with the yard sale table
I do tend to set myself some basic rules, but it tends to vary depending on what family I'm playing at the time.
My only rule that I tend to stick too across all my families (unless i'm playing a challenge where it's not allowed) is to try and make sure I visit another lot at least once per sim week (active careers don't count as being off lot), this is just to make sure I don't get stuck into making my sims hermits who never leave the house
No cheating. For myself, I play on normal lifespan, but I may go to long for my new YouTube save. I've decided I'm going to randomize traits in the future because my Sims are all too similar! I want to challenge myself!
Basically just no cheating for me.
Even if I play a challenge that tells me not to use aspiration rewards, for instance, I use them anyway. They’re part of the game. Maybe that makes it less challenging but I don’t care, I only use challenges as a guide sometimes for stepping out of the box.
I am only allowed to furnish Venues. I am only allowed to place fixtures in Residents, Restaurants, Retail Lots.
Sims are only allowed to purchase furnishings, Appliances, Electronics, Clothes, and Groceries from Retail Stores.
> @MasonGamer said: > Sims are only allowed to purchase furnishings, Appliances, Electronics, Clothes, and Groceries from Retail Stores.
Oh this is interesting! I don't think I've ever bought anything from the stores, but I should! Would feel more realistic and give them more to do than just work, eat, sleep, and work on skills!
> @MasonGamer said:
> Sims are only allowed to purchase furnishings, Appliances, Electronics, Clothes, and Groceries from Retail Stores.
Oh this is interesting! I don't think I've ever bought anything from the stores, but I should! Would feel more realistic and give them more to do than just work, eat, sleep, and work on skills!
yeah I'm trying to give my self reasons to explore everything, So I have characters who own restaurants, Retail Stores.
I have a grocery store, a Men's clothing Store and a Women's Clothing, a Mash of Best Buy and the Apple Store, and in the process of building a Furniture Store, I sort of want to do a Home Depot, Lowes Store, So it can Be Furniture, Home Improvement, and Garden.
Plus it allows me to check on my sims that I rotate households with, but I don't get to play often.
I forgot a biggie, about family play. My Sims do not have kids until both Sims share a whim to have kids.
This is a little flexible. If I have the whims, and lock them in, but lose them because I Manage Worlds or something else that clears locked whims, I will try to wait until both share the whim again. But it's enough that I know that, at some point, both Sims wanted a child. Then I'll go ahead.
This slows my rate of offspring, considerably, and that is intentional.
So reading other response my rules are more like guidelines. I don't always follow them. The biggest are, no skill/career cheats, any death is either permanent or has to be fixed by in-game means, and no money cheats beyond splitting up inheritance (which I wish we had a better system for in game).
Really I make rules to fit whatever story I'm telling.
I do often set myself rules, such as not using the debug or motherlode/kaching cheats. But I often find myself breaking them, especially on my larger sim households (6+ sims) just trying to get everyone ready in the morning for work/school. Toddlers take up the most of the morning routine since child, teens and adult sims tend to take care of themselves. I also try to play with autonomy on, but end up turning it off in the larger households, because sims in TS4 are so absentminded and easily distracted it's hilarious but mostly frustrating. Like really, you're walking up three steps onto your veranda so you can enter your house, no need to stop two steps away from the front door to look up at the ceiling...
Give our Vampires back their fangs!!! Reverse the Nerf!!! Occult simmers should not be shoved aside for the "realism players"! It's time Occult lovers/players started to demand equal treatment. #JusticeForOccults
I just caught myself doing a thing I do, and while not a "rule" per-se, I recognized it as something typical of how I generally go about Simming.
I do outside research to keep my play more "authentic".
In TS3, when I made a Sim for Roaring Heights, I was very careful to research 1920s apparel, to keep him in visual tone with the setting. Amongst other things I confirmed was that Converse "All Star" basketball shoes were in fact athletic shoes of the period, and allowed my Sim to wear the CAS lookalikes.
Right now, I am planning ahead for my household: I know at some point I want my Culinary Sim to open a restaraunt, and I know I want to use Build/Buy assets from Island Living to give his place a mid-mod "Tiki" theme. What I caught myself doing just now is actually researching the origins and history of American "Tiki culture", to prepare to do that "right".
It's just for my own amusement, and a mild manifestation of my compulsion to look things up from having been raised by a school teacher, but it's definitely one of the weird ways I moderate my own Sims play.
3. Always save the game even when something bad happens.
I keep wanting to follow this rule, but it's so, so hard! Especially when I feel like a Sim died in an "unfair" way. (Case in point, I had one of my favorite vampires die because I forgot I locked the door, so she couldn't get into the house for a club meeting.)
Watch me mash together Sims and Pokémon to tell a story about battling glitches in Penny Saves Paldea. Updated every other Thursday.
I've tried some, like not using cheats, but I always fold lol. I like trying out playing cheat-less for a while, then "reward" myself by maxing out my Sim's motives, etc., then just giving in and using cheats anyway haha. I've done a few challenges, though, and those can be fun, and I find not using cheats on those (or only rarely using them, like if I blame lag or a glitch from preventing my Sim from filling a motive, I may fill it by cheating) adds to the fun.
I have one rule. When a sim is born and ages up and I jump into cas for a makeover, I won't change any of their features! I will even keep the same hair color unless it fits the story of the specific sim. If I think their physical appearance needs to be changed then I will have them work out or eat more during gameplay.
I have a large save. I started with 8 "Original Sims" (OS) in Newcrest. They are the "Founders". And their children/grandchildren etc are "Founders Heirs". As the game progressed I added other fams, but they are not Founders. One rep from each of the 8 Founding fams is on a council (group) and they vote and implement rules (imagination!). For instance, an OS is not allowed to marry another OS. Only Sims "born in world" can move to another city. No structures over two levels high may be constructed in Sulani. Certain careers require a distinguished degree. There are more. It seems like a lot, but it really adds depth to the game. Each time EA adds a new town, I get to add a new OS. I've had the save since launch day. All of the Original Founders are dead and in the summer we have Founders Day. Fireworks, bbq, swimming, it's pretty great.
CC. Skins and overlays are to be avoided, period. They have been nothing but a hassle to deal with. Between getting broken, and the fact that I've had a ton of weird problems with it (i.e. Sims entirely missing their face, tongues and teeth that are floating in front of the head). I have (from places other than the gallery) downloaded Sims that originally used skins and overlays, just adding their Tray files and not the CC; and have been quite surprised at how good some look even without all that extra stuff. Of course, almost all of them are bald and wearing nothing, so you've got to start over with what the game has, not the CC used by the creator.
Mods. No mods that allow a Sim to do something I wouldn't. And yes, there are some weird mods out there. I honestly have no problem with the infamous, but widely used here mod that we can't mention by name, but there are some that involve some really sick, graphic stuff.
Actual gameplay. Unless my Sim knows another Sim well, I do not even bother to respond to their invitations.
I start with one Sim, let them fall in love and raise a family. I follow their whims for kids and stuff. Then, when I the kids age, they get the first trait that gets randomized. I don't alter the kids' appearances. If they're ugly, oh well. Then, I play all the kids and their families once they move out. It's a great deal of fun because each house always has something different going on. I also use no cheats.
The only rule I follow is, that every sim has his own unique looking room. Even when I re-use some of my favourite rooms in different saves, I change the appearance so far, that it is still looking unique, but this room will never exist twice in one save.
Comments
Mayoress of SimCity and all associated districts
1. Ghosts can join a household but cannot be permanently revived. They may come back briefly to finish some sort of task, but they must become ghosts again within a few days at most. Also, physical interaction with a ghost has a chance of putting a curse on a living Sim and causing them to join the afterlife, as well.
2. If you can become a PlantSim and you become Infected, you must also become a PlantSim. Mother prefers this.
3. The final tier of any adult aspiration may be cheated if desired. Child aspirations may be completely cheated when the child maxes out the relevant skill. (There are too many fun creative things for a kid to do for me to sit down and force them to draw the same five pictures every single time.)
4. Money and fame may be cheated IF starting a new family with a Sim who logically would be famous and/or rich already.
I think that's about it. These are really fun to read.
-No cheating needs
-No money cheats (only subtract money)
-Start out with an unfurnished home or apartment. (Less my sim is living in a tent)
-Most skill building done off lot
-Only sale items with the yard sale table
1. No cheats allowed!
2. The traits must be randomised.
3. Always save the game even when something bad happens.
Improvise, adapt, overcome
My only rule that I tend to stick too across all my families (unless i'm playing a challenge where it's not allowed) is to try and make sure I visit another lot at least once per sim week (active careers don't count as being off lot), this is just to make sure I don't get stuck into making my sims hermits who never leave the house
Even if I play a challenge that tells me not to use aspiration rewards, for instance, I use them anyway. They’re part of the game. Maybe that makes it less challenging but I don’t care, I only use challenges as a guide sometimes for stepping out of the box.
Sims are only allowed to purchase furnishings, Appliances, Electronics, Clothes, and Groceries from Retail Stores.
My Mood:
> Sims are only allowed to purchase furnishings, Appliances, Electronics, Clothes, and Groceries from Retail Stores.
Oh this is interesting! I don't think I've ever bought anything from the stores, but I should! Would feel more realistic and give them more to do than just work, eat, sleep, and work on skills!
yeah I'm trying to give my self reasons to explore everything, So I have characters who own restaurants, Retail Stores.
I have a grocery store, a Men's clothing Store and a Women's Clothing, a Mash of Best Buy and the Apple Store, and in the process of building a Furniture Store, I sort of want to do a Home Depot, Lowes Store, So it can Be Furniture, Home Improvement, and Garden.
Plus it allows me to check on my sims that I rotate households with, but I don't get to play often.
My Mood:
This is a little flexible. If I have the whims, and lock them in, but lose them because I Manage Worlds or something else that clears locked whims, I will try to wait until both share the whim again. But it's enough that I know that, at some point, both Sims wanted a child. Then I'll go ahead.
This slows my rate of offspring, considerably, and that is intentional.
Really I make rules to fit whatever story I'm telling.
I do outside research to keep my play more "authentic".
In TS3, when I made a Sim for Roaring Heights, I was very careful to research 1920s apparel, to keep him in visual tone with the setting. Amongst other things I confirmed was that Converse "All Star" basketball shoes were in fact athletic shoes of the period, and allowed my Sim to wear the CAS lookalikes.
Right now, I am planning ahead for my household: I know at some point I want my Culinary Sim to open a restaraunt, and I know I want to use Build/Buy assets from Island Living to give his place a mid-mod "Tiki" theme. What I caught myself doing just now is actually researching the origins and history of American "Tiki culture", to prepare to do that "right".
It's just for my own amusement, and a mild manifestation of my compulsion to look things up from having been raised by a school teacher, but it's definitely one of the weird ways I moderate my own Sims play.
I keep wanting to follow this rule, but it's so, so hard! Especially when I feel like a Sim died in an "unfair" way. (Case in point, I had one of my favorite vampires die because I forgot I locked the door, so she couldn't get into the house for a club meeting.)
Mods. No mods that allow a Sim to do something I wouldn't. And yes, there are some weird mods out there. I honestly have no problem with the infamous, but widely used here mod that we can't mention by name, but there are some that involve some really sick, graphic stuff.
Actual gameplay. Unless my Sim knows another Sim well, I do not even bother to respond to their invitations.