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Rebuilding Viper Valley and The Apocalypse Challenge

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  • NightRowanNightRowan Posts: 19 Member
    edited August 2011
    I still am Mik! Well, not so much the playing at the moment, but that's because the lot I was playing on became way too glitched between one thing and another. I'm exercising massive amounts of self control to wait for Rattlesnake Ridge before starting my next apocalypse. I'm totally psyched about it! I even downloaded the Lite version to check out the layout. Figured out that with the most expensive challenge lot your sim gets to live in a basement with a sink, a toilet, and a sleeping bag. Should make things very interesting. (That's if I set aside $1300 for skill books)
  • rambleramble Posts: 70 New Member
    edited August 2011
    I am still playing as well. My sims are now trying to lift Science, Music - Rock, Private Eye and Criminal Mastermind. After those I only have eight restrictions left! That means I will be done with the challenge in about two generations *crosses fingers* - yay! :mrgreen:
  • mikitta47mikitta47 Posts: 2,250 New Member
    edited August 2011
    Ramble - that's AWESOME! It feels so good to lift those restrictions!

    NightRowan - so am I LOL - waiting on RR that is. The kids went to band camp this evening so that means I have all week in PEACE and QUIET to work on things and get them ready :D

    It's good to know what you can get with that legacy priced lot in the AC. I think I made the right decision to do several different priced lots :) When I do another Apocalypse world, I'll follow that trend.

    God Bless,
    mik

  • LAKEEMMALAKEEMMA Posts: 50 New Member
    edited August 2011
    I'm still playing! It's giving me something to do in the gap between having finished my diploma and when I start working. I hate being unemployed :(

    I'm in the middle of generation 3 at the moment, trying to lift Science and International Super Spy. Already done Military, Culinary, Medical and Business. I've been putting together a photobucket album of everything as well, may post you a link later if you'd like to see.

    Can't wait for RR to be released, I've been following the thread in the other forum. Tend to lurk more than I post though.
  • mikitta47mikitta47 Posts: 2,250 New Member
    edited August 2011
    I would love to see pictures of your challenge, Lakeema!

    I've been working on the last tomb all day today. There's a lot of tedious bits to it - not HARD, just very repetative. In the corners of the Community Landfill are incinerators. There are 4 levels for each incinerator and each one has 15 fire traps. When you solve the puzzle for each one of these levels, the light and the traps for that room go off. When you have all 16 corner incinerators turned off, that will turn off the main incinerator at the bottom of the tomb. That main incinerator has 32 fire traps :P It's a lot of triggers to set up. Tedious, but I think the visual effect is going to be astounding. I HOPE it is :D

    God Bless,
    mik
  • Anghara130Anghara130 Posts: 233 New Member
    edited August 2011
    I'm back from my holiday (don't ask, was not fun) and almost ready to go back to work (riots permitting) which means I should get some time to play as well soon! Of course I have another essay due in four weeks, and with my son home from school that makes playtime a premium item! But I should get somewhere with it, hopefully!

    Glad to hear that things are progressing well Mikitta, I think I might download RR Lite and have a look round for myself! I can't wait for the completed package deal though.... *hugs* enjoy the peace and quiet while the kids are away!
  • mikitta47mikitta47 Posts: 2,250 New Member
    edited August 2011
    Anghara130 wrote:
    I'm back from my holiday (don't ask, was not fun) and almost ready to go back to work (riots permitting) which means I should get some time to play as well soon! Of course I have another essay due in four weeks, and with my son home from school that makes playtime a premium item! But I should get somewhere with it, hopefully!

    Glad to hear that things are progressing well Mikitta, I think I might download RR Lite and have a look round for myself! I can't wait for the completed package deal though.... *hugs* enjoy the peace and quiet while the kids are away!

    I'm sorry your holiday wasn't all you wanted it to be. *hugs* I won't ask, but you have my commiseration.

    I sure hope the authorities get those riots under control - it's horrid what is happening in London :/ Please PLEASE stay safe and be careful if you have to go out into those areas at all!

    I thought you were done with essays for the summer ... Ah well - it will go fine and you will do a good job on it :D

    I wanted to let you all know that as of right now ... Rattlesnake Ridge is in closed beta testing. I'll work on polishing up any loose ends, making sure all the tombs that are in work (there's only one left I'm waiting on and the guy doing it for me is on vacation now), and generally making sure it is fabulous. I'll post some screen shots :)

    Ang, I haven't put in any of your houses yet - I will be doing that as I see how things are working. I'm only going to put in 3 builds for the challenge lots, though - the reason for that is I want ONE build for each of the three economic zones. Low class is going to be cheapest at around 10k for a bare lot, middle class will come in around 12.5k and the hoity toity area is going to be 14,700 simoleons - the cost of a standard legacy lot. If I do a build at all on a high end lot, it is going to have to be very minimal LOL!

    Anyway - I'm off to play withe beta. I promise some screen shots this week!!

    God Bless,
    mik
  • mikitta47mikitta47 Posts: 2,250 New Member
    edited August 2011
    The crepuscular light of predawn illuminates the basin. Looking toward th east, you can see the far ridge where the road to elsewhere is being rebuilt.

    screenshot_original.jpg

    While much of the town is similar to Shanty Town, the Simunion Armed Command takes pride in ensuring it's personel have the minimum standards of comfort, such as a nicely decorated parade ground.

    screenshot_original.jpg

    Even the parks and recreation board have alotted property for the storage of unused equipment. Perhaps there are treasures a pleanty to find here.

    screenshot_original.jpg

    Those are just a few of the sneak peeks at Rattlesnake Ridge. I figured out what I was doing wrong with so SO many of my trigger set ups - things are moving along much more smoothly now. I'm hoping to have it all ready and play-testable by the end of the month :D

    I can't wait -I want to play here. The tombs are very good - even the ones I built :P I'm not bragging, or trying not to anyway - but there's a certain flair to them that lets them shine even in comparison to the tombs in China, France and Egypt. Not so much the ones I built ... but definitely the ones built by Amaholus, Rflong, Ehnaught, Glen and BunBunny :) I hope this world will be a special experience for everyone and that it will be especially memorable for anyone playing the Challenge in it :)

    God Bless,
    mik

  • Anghara130Anghara130 Posts: 233 New Member
    edited August 2011
    The new pics look awesome! I can't wait either.... *bounces* but I guess I have to since you're not done with it yet! It is looking fabulous though, and I'm hoping to have a really nice sim ready to start a new challenge in it.
  • mikitta47mikitta47 Posts: 2,250 New Member
    edited August 2011
    Hey guys :) It's been a rather busy week with the kids back from band camp. I spent all day yesterday running around doing errands - got the mirrors fixed on my car as they were broken, got my inspection sticker, paid the property taxes and took the darling daughter in to town where we spent $20 on scrap booking stuff. LOL if we had the $$$ we could have dropped $2000 without batting our eyes much :P Husband was home and so tired he was snoring up a storm so I couldn't sleep. Today I've just been playing catch up and didn't do anything sims wise either. Tomorrow I have to work on house cleaning because we are going camping this weekend. Kids start school on Thursday, which means cleaning cleaning cleaning for me and getting gear sorted and prepared. WHEW.

    Ok - after this weekend, I'm hitting RR hard to finish it because PETS is coming up in just about 2 months. I finished watching the latest trailer on Youtube and WOWOWOWOWOW - we are going to have to think about the Challenge rules. Seriously.


    Just to dash it off the top of my head ....

    - feeding a pet of any kind is going to count against the one meal a day. Just like it did in Sims 2.

    - Catching wild horses is going to be restricted by Naturalist.

    - Participating in dog or cat or horse shows is going to be restricted by the Film careers.

    - Riding horses is going to be restricted by Athletics. The horses themselves are physically challenged and can't bear the weight of sims and sims do not have the stamina to ride.

    - Hmmm the Unicorn ... that is the occult with this expansion ... we'll have to wait and see what special things Unis bring.



    Some other things to discuss concerning the challenge ...

    - It's becoming clear that we will have to consider point of purchase items from the store in the rules from now on. I'm thinking specifically of the Gothique library with the spell book and Hidden Springs with the Fountain of Youth. These things will be restricted. The spell book currently doesn't have much utility, but I'm thinking the fountain of youth is simply going to be disallowed, just like the young forever potion you can make with the chemistry set, or cloning for heirs. I expect to see more point of purchase options that change game play in upcoming store offerings. We are also going to start seeing some game play changes with stuff packs I think. BECAUSE of the store, the stuff packs aren't as necessary for increasing content as they were in previous games. Town Life breaks from tradition by offering new rabbit hole styles, for instance. I expect to see stuff packs start to offer more things traditional reserved for expansions - that is things that change game play - only on a much smaller scale than an EP. We will deal with each as they come, just like we do with expansions.

    OK - I need y'all's help now. We need to go through the current rules and make sure we have everything covered as far as what in Generations is restricted, where it is restricted and have it included in the rules. I haven't played much for the last couple of months because my focus has been on getting RR out the door. Once RR is done, I'll be building a world specifically with Pets in mind that is NOT a challenge world. But I also will have much more time to devote to polishing the rules. I would like to see all the generations info squared away before Pets is released.

    So to that end - you don't have to do any of the updates if that's not your thing, but if you look through the rules, check and see if something or other from generations is included. If not - bring it up here and I'll make the decision on where they should go after we've all discussed the options.

    I want y'all to know this is a community effort - I might have spear headed getting the rules up and running on a Wiki and doing a lot of updates - but the feed back I get from you all, the discussions about the rules - are so important to keeping the challenge fresh and alive. If we keep the original spirit of Pinstar's Apocalypse in mind, we really can't go wrong :D

    One question for y'all --- UNLESS there is some major type of career added, how do you all feel about making most new careers only restrict what comes in the associated expansion pack - like I did with Day Care, which only restricts things that come w/ Generations - ? I'm thinking MOST of the new careers are going to be the self employment variety, though it WOULD be nice if they included an oceanography career to make an alternate to the Naturalist profession ... or make Naturalist an alternate of, as the case may be. I know it's a case by case thing - but I'm rather reluctant to constantly increase the number of careers that have to be cleared and like the basic 25 we have now, and I certainly don't want to just add careers BECAUSE they are available.

    Anyway - this is all food for thought. I look forward to hearing your thoughts :)

    God Bless,
    mik
  • mikitta47mikitta47 Posts: 2,250 New Member
    edited August 2011
    Some info about PETS ...
    -Cas with mowhawk for horses. You can use layers for fur again. Completely customisable

    - Markings are REALLY customisable, like custom place per spot

    - Pets are fully playable on PC too. Including traits.

    - New neighbourhood for pets: entirely new set of buildings including rabbit holes

    - Horses live, sleep and ‘woohoo’ in horse boxes

    - Horse ranch with obstacles to ride and train your horse

    - Ooh, unicorns! They leave a magic stream of air behind them when the gallop

    - Pets get around in different ways with different species like dogs can run though other people’s garden

    - No new careers in this game. Pet careers are exclusive to the console game


    - New lifetime wishes for sims concerning pets, not for pets themselves. They do have memories though.

    - Minor pets like rodents and turtles will return (no rabbits). Sims can only get allergic to pets on the console version.



    So ... I'm a tad disappointed we don't have something to alternate with DaVinci or Naturalist, but I'm just glad we don't have to mess around with pet careers for the challenge.

    So, yeah - the whole feeding a pet = family's 1 meal of the day stands. If you have a dog or cat that will lick off a plate, that's ok. I'm thinking of saying you can start your founder WITH a pet ... what do you guys think? It would be hard, because you would have to give your unlicked plate to your animal to keep them fed instead of being able to lick it clean yourself. And there are all the issues of the things we DON'T know yet.

    Over all, this expansion will be easier to update than any of the previous ones, because it's just deciding where restrictions fit under existing categories.

    Horses - Hmm Depending on how big or how expensive the horse box is, it may not be feasible to allow a horse right off the bat. There's the issue of feeding the horse - they get a trough, so I don't know how that is handled exactly. If the horsebox is bigger than 8x8, you won't be able to do it until Political is cleared.

    Small animals - I'm of the mind that there will be spawners for snakes, rodents and birds and that they will be collectable items since they cannot be played as sims, nor are they interacted with like sims are. We shall see. BUT any caged animal - bird, reptile, fish - that you have, feeding them = family's 1 meal.

    Amazing Naturalist - Depending on how they do the small animals in the neighborhood, I may amend Naturalist rules to require collecting one of each animal + 1 ultra rare butterfly and 1 ultra rare beetle. You will get to play Dr. Doolittle :P Of course, if you have to go to the pet store and BUY the animals, then I won't do that, but if you can collect them in the wild, as it were ... then yeah :)

    God Bless,
    mik
  • bunbunnynybunbunnyny Posts: 3,678 Member
    edited August 2011
    How do you catch wild animals for pets? Did they explain that yet?
    I wanna know where I can find the information where you got that quote, Mikitta.
    I'm gonna be up for a long time tomorrow, since I'm comin' home tomorrow. I can stay up for long periods of time without getting sleepy :) :thumbup:
  • mikitta47mikitta47 Posts: 2,250 New Member
    edited August 2011
    I think I found that list either on Sims VIP or Sunset Valley Times. Can't remember which.

    I imagine that catching the small animals will be a lot like catching beetles or butterflies.

    God Bless,
    mik
  • mikitta47mikitta47 Posts: 2,250 New Member
    edited August 2011
    For those who have downloaded Rattlesnake Ridge Lite ... I'm beginning to upload the lots to my studio so you can grab what you want out of it.

    Here is Check Point Doug, a small tomb. It goes into 174 Military Park (or 147 ... something like that LOL). There's only one lot in the world sized to take it, so it should be fairly obvious.

    I'll release more lots over time. Some have more expansion and stuff pack content than others - which can be an issue for people who don't have said stuff pack or expansion. This allows people to pick and choose :)

    God Bless,
    mik
  • mikitta47mikitta47 Posts: 2,250 New Member
    edited August 2011
    Is everyone ok - those who were near the Virginia earthquake? Just checking in. Supposedly it was felt less than 20 miles from where I live, but I didn't feel a thing.

    God Bless,
    mik
  • mikitta47mikitta47 Posts: 2,250 New Member
    edited August 2011
    Is everyone ok after Irene this weekend?

    God Bless,
    mik
  • Anghara130Anghara130 Posts: 233 New Member
    edited August 2011
    I'm fine, but then, this side of the pond we didn't see Irene yet... no doubt by the time what's left of her gets here we'll be lucky if she stirs up a breeze. Otherwise, everyone I hope is ok along the Eastern Seaboard.... some very scary pictures made it onto UK TV.... So glad we very rarely have hurricanes (1987 was our last one! I remember it well.....)

  • mikitta47mikitta47 Posts: 2,250 New Member
    edited August 2011
    Hehe - honestly, I haven't heard very much about Irene doing tons of damage on the US east coast either, the Mainstream Media notwithstanding :P There was some flooding, though, and property damage, but I haven't heard of any loss of life because of the storm - which is a good thing. We saw the outer bands here on Sunday evening, and they looked really amazingly beautiful. Because of the Allegheny Mountains, it would take a Cat5 doing a direct strike in northern Virginia, southern Maryland to even affect us with more than a little rain and some mild wind.

    Hey, got an update for everyone - Grogan's War Surplus is uploaded to my studio now. PLEASE play test it if you have the requisite expansions, and let me know if there are any issues (same with Checkpoint Doug and L,R,C.)

    http://www.thesims3.com/assetDetail.html?assetId=4536249

    The only store content is free I think - the Tera plant that came with the Renault set or the Prius set.

    I'm working on The Library now - and having to redo almost EVERY SINGLE combination trigger because I just suck that bad at making tombs LOL! It's ok, though - I know the main things I did wrong because I had a wrong paradigm about how the processors worked. Once I've got the Library and the Landfill fixed - pretty much I just need some townie housing and it's ready to go into beta. Of course, that could take weeks since I'm slow LOL!

    I tell you guys - I'm ready to play the challenge already in this neighborhood. I haven't actually PLAYED The Sims 3 except to test and tweak and otherwise manage things in ... 2 months :P

    I still need to settle down and actually figure out what all needs to be updated for Generations since Pets is just around the corner.

    God Bless,
    mik
  • mikitta47mikitta47 Posts: 2,250 New Member
    edited August 2011
    I created a Facebook Group for those who want to join it ...

    http://www.facebook.com/groups/169191289823753/

    I figure it might lend itself better to swift conversation of the rules with less "board twitch" than we get from Liam here LOL.

    It was just a thought - but it's there none the less. I made it an open group :)

    http://www.facebook.com/groups/169191289823753/

    God Bless,
    mik
  • Anghara130Anghara130 Posts: 233 New Member
    edited August 2011
    I asked to join the group, can you guess who I am yet? LOL...

    Charlie goes back to school on Saturday, so Sunday I have to finish my essay (no **** time this side of the weekend now!), then I can play for a day or two, so I plan on getting all the lots placed, and I can go playtest them to my heart's content (between zumba and fitness sesions, batch cooking and desperately cleaning up after small boy to reclaim MY house for ME!!!). I look forward to that.
  • mikitta47mikitta47 Posts: 2,250 New Member
    edited September 2011
    You gotta be Sam - because all the rest of us, so far, are in the US :P

    I've taken the last couple days off to just play in RR-Alpha ... and I remember now why I love Twallen. I don't have story progression or overwatch installed on my build TS3 folder instance and oiye - bugs, lag and crashes galore! I'm going to delete that particular neighborhood. BUT some good did come of it. I made a rather nice 4 unit apartment complex for the Military. If there is a lack of other housing, NPC's will move into your apartments and become psuedo-townies.

    I am also going to work on the last level of the Library basement tomorrow. On the one hand, I like the honeycomb maze it is right now, but on the other ... I really don't like it LOL! I may do that at some other time.

    God Bless,
    mik
  • lberen00lberen00 Posts: 15 New Member
    edited September 2011
    I love that you have a facebook page now! Great idea!
  • mikitta47mikitta47 Posts: 2,250 New Member
    edited September 2011
    Thanks, Iberen - I should have thought of it AGES ago!

    I didn't get anything done on anything yesterday (it's tomorrow already ...). My daughter fell down while on a nature path hike at school and broke her arm. We sat at the ER for 5 hours while they decided weather to try to straighten the Ulna, cast it as is or prep her for surgery. They finally decided on what is called a Sugar Tong splint and wrap and then we go to the orthopedist on Tuesday (Monday is Memorial Day). She's in pain and can't do much because of the way it's splinted - she can't bend her elbow.

    What is really amazing is she never cried. Except once getting in the car she cried just a tiny bit and also when she realized she would not get to play with the band at the ball game tonight (we got creamed 16 to 28 :/ BUT are an A school and they are an AA school .... so nothing to be ashamed of).

    I was going to work on some stuff but it wasn't in the cards. Perhaps tomorrow after the pool party.

    God Bless,
    mik
  • bunbunnynybunbunnyny Posts: 3,678 Member
    edited September 2011
    I never even knew this, and I'm sure that a lot of people don't, but in Generations, there's actually a use with the Baker's Half Dozen stand! Bake sales! That should be restricted by something. I realized that when I was in Twinbrook, and a whole bunch of people on the beach started crowding around this little girl that had sugary sweets that she was selling! Buying from these kids might be restricted.

    Actually, now that I think about it, it could be a requirement for those who have Generations to have the kids have bake sales to support their family, but that would be restricted by a whole bunch of stuff. So how about once you Unlock everything that restricts children being off their lots, having food on other properties (or an exception,) and the Culinary & Athletic Categories, it automatically becomes required? Like a Restriction Category that only applies once you have lifted the others?

    Oh, and don't you have to pay to have a Facebook page, or am I thinking of having a game on that website?
  • mikitta47mikitta47 Posts: 2,250 New Member
    edited September 2011
    The Baker's Half Dozen stand ... I'm not quite sure I understand what you mean with this, Bun. Kids have been able to set up that stand since Ambitions and sell baked goods. Is there something new concerning it with Generations? I should have had it amended in the rules already - up to date with Ambitions anyway, so thanks for pointing it out :)

    Under Culinary
    - No using the toy oven to make baked goods

    Under DaVinci
    - No using the toy oven at all

    Under Business
    - No using the Baker's Half Dozen stand to sell baked goods

    Under Journalism
    - Can't use the paper to get the bake sale report

    Under Military
    - Can't leave the lot at all except for school (for kids)

    Under Law Enforcement Dynamic DNA Profiler
    - Children with a body skill less than 10 cannot leave the lot except for school.

    That's 6 restrictions !!


    As for making it it's own category .. I'm not going to put it in the official rules, but I may start a section of the wikia titled Alternate Challenges and Optional Rules, where things like this can be added in for those who want to do it. Also, for including some of the more interesting variations on legacies so people can see how it would fit in with the AC.

    God Bless,
    mik
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