Apocalypse Challenge - Realistic/Tiered Variant (Ruleset Mods Available!)

[Phaenoh]

It's the super bowl and all across the region, people are watching. The whistle blows for half time and every Sim in the city goes to use the toilet. Every single toilet in the region is flushed at the same time. The resulting drop in water pressure causes the three nuclear power plants in the area to go critical and melt down, devastating the region. Thankfully, the founder is off at college when this happens, but when he returns to start his family, he finds a very different world he must survive in.

453509

Chances are most of us have read these words and have either at least read though, perhaps attempted, or possibly even accomplished Pinstar's Apocalypse challenge. I'm in that second group. I think its a fantastic idea, but the 12 pages of rules were just impossible for me to keep in my head all at the same time. This might be true for you as well. The other problem I had with it was that it was too darn easy to cheat, or to accidentally cheat. With these issues in mind I decided I needed to make a set of mods to make my game force the rules on me and my sims. This set of mods is available for download here at MTS (http://www.modthesims.info/d/453509).

While reviewing the rule set I decided to make my own adjustments. The rules have grown organically while the EPs were still coming out, so the full final set doesn't make as much sense as it would if you had started with all the EPs. Some of the rules bugged me or didn't make sense so for my own version I rearranged a lot. Hopefully these changes make sense or help you remember whats left of the rule. One of the major changes I've made is that the rules have to be lifted in a particular order. I've not mapped out each individual one to do in which order, rather I've grouped the 28 careers into Restriction Levels. The first level is the 'Securing the Basics'. In this level your sims are focused on security, food, and medical attention. The next is 'Rebuilding Society', in this level, your sims are focusing on unlocking careers that will help rebuild the town and the community. The final level is 'Rebuilding Culture'. At this level, your sims have more time to devote themselves to the arts and pleasures in life.

There are a couple basic major differences between this Apocalypse Challenge and any others you may have done before. 1) Mine is tiered. You need to do each level before the next. 2) I allow and encourage your family to move the spares out and start their own homes (after lifting the Law Restriction) to help the afflicted neighborhood rebuild itself twice as fast. This doesn't effect how much time it takes you to finish it, but it helps the neighborhood grow more organically and when its over you should have a completely playable 'hood. 3) I've included mods to help you remember all the rules (http://www.modthesims.info/d/453509) ;) I've listed the rules that are taken care of with my mods (http://www.modthesims.info/d/453509) in GREY. Though, I didn't do very thorough testing, so please let me know if something is wrong. 4) I require you to have and visit community lots. Before your sim can take a job in any career, they must visit the corresponding community lot to 'apply' or 'volunteer'. While this is an end of the world scenario, it's also about rebuilding the community. You can't do that without visiting the community.

[Phaenoh]

Apocalypse Challenge – Realistic Variant

The following is a set of harsh restrictions the family must obey. Each set of restrictions is tied to a specific career field. When a Sim reaches level 10 in that career field, that restriction is lifted. A single Sim may only lift one restriction in his or her lifetime. To lift all 28 of the main restrictions, it will take 25 different Sims and 3 different pets. There are 3 levels of restrictions; all restrictions in each level must be completed before moving on to the next. I recommend downloading Pescado's Zombie Apocalypse (http://www.moreawesomethanyou.com/smf/index.php/topic,6720.0.html) mod to add some flavor to your challenge.

Sims part of the bloodline and the spouses to heirs can unlock restrictions. Servos cannot lift restrictions. The ONLY Sims that may be moved into the Legacy family’s household are Sims that will directly contribute to the birth of the next generation. (In other words, the spouse of each heir.) After the Law Restriction has been lifted, the ‘spares’ can move out of the house and start their own households to continue unlocking restrictions in tandem. You must keep the other houses in time sync with the main house and follow all the same rules. Only Townies and NPCs may be brought into the family. Moved in Social Townies may not keep their Uni jobs unless your Sims are otherwise able to attend Uni themselves. Until your founder lifts the first restriction, you may not move in any Sims or pets, or redeem Family Aspiration Perks.

If a Townie at the top of a career joins the house as a spouse and that career is not lifted and is in the current restriction level, it is lifted instantly. If it is for a future restriction level, those restrictions may be lifted as soon as that restriction level is reached, even if the sim has already passed away. However, they may not work toward lifting a different one in the meantime. If that career has already been lifted, the spouse can work on lifting a different career. If you have the Pets EP, you must unlock the three pet restrictions to complete the challenge. If you do not have the EP for a career, consider that career restricted until all others on the same level have been lifted. At that point the ones you are missing can be considered lifted and you may move on to the next restriction level.

The family lot must be on a desert or dirt tile set. You may not place the home family lot on a beach lot. When your founder returns to the neighborhood, move him or her into an empty lot. Any lots built after the disaster that your sims visit must comply with all current Apocalypse restrictions. This includes all lots but those in vacation neighborhoods. Any lots built pre-disaster must be stripped of objects that can not be used anymore, and the architecture should be modified to look as if it is barely surviving.

If an object has no value, (such as a used up Aspiration Reward), you may delete it, regardless of existing restrictions. Cheats, mods, or hacked objects that would give you an unfair advantage over a player who didn't have or use them may not be used. You can use any custom object as long as its cost, ability and mood fulfillment exactly mirrors an existing 'official' object. Autonomous actions need not be canceled unless specified by the restriction. If you do accidentally break a rule, just fix your mistake - make up for it, and continue. As long as it was just an honest mistake, you don't need to consider failing the challenge.

Starting Options:
Full Uni Start: The founder starts as a Young Adult in college. None of the restrictions applies to the founder in college, as the disaster has not happened yet. The college has a strict no-pets rule. Neither the founder, nor any Sims attending college afterwards may purchase them while there. Founders may bring up to 3 items back from college that were purchased with their own money. If the founder graduates, one of these three items MUST be the diploma. The founder may not start an off-campus business. The founder must leave college after 9 semesters. If the founder goes on academic probation, those extra semesters count against the 9 you are allowed. Founders who graduate on time (8 semesters), may stay for the full post-graduation period. (The 9th semester.) If the founder goes on academic probation once, but still graduates, he or she must return to the neighborhood immediately after graduation. The founder does not need to graduate. Founders and anyone who comes after are prohibited from raiding the Secret Society house and bringing objects that were originally there back to the Apocalypse Family house. After the founder has returned, any future Sim sent to college may not move into a dorm, and must move into an empty lot (any size). Their college must also be on a dirt or desert tile set. Young Adult Sims that come after the founder must obey any restrictions that have not been lifted yet. Neither the founder, nor any Sims that come after may found or join Greek houses. The founder may not give gifts to prospective spouses before the ‘disaster’ happens.

Mid-Uni Start: The disaster is going to happen sometime during Uni, and you don't know when. At the beginning of each day, roll two dice. Double sixes means the disaster is happening and you need to drop out of Uni by noon. If you make it all the way out of college without rolling double sixes, then it happens upon Graduation. All of the Full Uni rules still apply except with changes on the time limits of course.

Adult Start: Either you don't have Uni, or you hate playing it. Start with an adult Sim, put them in a regular house, grab them 3 items for their inventory, play them as you would normally for 2 days and on Wednesday morning, you've suddenly been sent into the Dark Ages. You house has been totaled. Move out out and into an Apocalypse Lot.

Suggested Housing Arrangements:
These lots meet the basic building requirements for the challenge, but might be furnished a little too nicely for the beginning of the challenge. You might have to do some stripping. More lots will be added as I find them. ;) I think its alright to use lots or build lots that only have a footprint of 64 squares in the living area and use walls and fences and other things to 'build up security' against the zombies or looters.

453546 453748 214126 285356 454180 410114 284933 252406 271828 229252 and Nengi's Ghetto Grundge (http://nengi65.blogspot.com/2010/09/ghetto-grunge.html#more)

[Phaenoh]

"It is better to light a single candle than to curse the darkness."
The physical effects of the nuclear winter are clear, but it is only half of the devastation. The damage to the population's mindset and willpower has also been great. People are starting to give up hope and despair has begun to set in. People have no motivation to band together or leave the shelters they have made.
Once your founder reaches the top of a career, (ANY of the first 3 careers, it doesn't matter which), he or she shows the region that the worst is over, and that things can and will begin to get better. A few Sims are even willing to risk traveling the streets to be with the regions new and only ray of hope. You may move-in/marry spouses for your founder and future heirs and redeem Family Aspiration Perks. You are still restricted to moving in only those who will contribute to the next generation. *Note* As the newspaper isn't being published, nor do the carriers feel it is safe to travel, you may use whatever means you like to get your sims into any of these first three jobs - at level 1, of course. I recommend MogHughson's Job Notice Board (http://www.modthesims.info/d/304689). The region is so badly off, each of these fields can use as many recruits as possible. Pick whichever you'd like. ;)

Interesting Rule Change:
Here you should include a few community lots in your hood at the moment. A military base, a soup kitchen/food bank, and a First Aid station may be built and sims may visit them a few times provided they follow certain rules. While these comm lots *may* include items currently restricted, such as a restaurant stove to feed the hungry. They still need to be very VERY limited. This challenge is much more about story telling than it is about finding sneaky ways to win. Your military base should include things that a forward war zone military post would have. Really get into the spirit of it. I had planned on making the official versions of these lots, but I just haven't gotten around to it yet. I'll update this thread if that changes. As for visiting them, the entire family needs to visit when you go. Protection in numbers, you can't leave anyone at home either. If you have toddlers or infants currently, you will have to wait. You may only go out once a week, and you need to visit all before going to any a second time. Once all lots have been visited once, you don't need to go to them again if you don't want to. Your sims may NOT take a job without visiting their new 'place of employment' first. Send your founder down to the military base, first aid station, or soup kitchen to become their newest 'recruit'. Community lots are allowed to break their own rules but no others. You are allowed to eat at the Culinary community lot, and you are allowed to fish at the Oceanography lot, however, you can't have electrical lights at the Medical facility until Science has been lifted, understand? Update/Rule Change: Teen jobs are restricted even further. Its really just not safe enough out for teens to go by themselves. They may join the military, but if they want to be in medical or culinary, they may only take that job if one of the adults in the house also has that job. Once they themselves are adults they may, of course, switch jobs by visiting a different career center comm lot.

Culinary - "Hunger is the best spice."
The gas lines and power grid have been severely damaged. Running a gas stove or electric appliance carries too much of a risk. Food is scarce. The quality of the food the Sims can get is very poor and can bring illness to some. Coffee is now scarce in the region due to supply cuts. Fresh food is non-existent.

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Sims may not purchase or use anything from the Ovens or Small Appliance category except for the cheapest grill.
You may only prepare food once per sim day. Once any Sim has prepared food, no other may do so for the rest of the day. A Sim making a one-serving meal counts. Filling any pet food bowl counts against the family's "one meal per day" limit.Sims pulling out baby bottles does NOT count against this limit and may be done as many times per day as needed.
Grilled Cheese Aspiration Perks may not be redeemed.
Sims may not Give Treats to pets.
Sims may not prepare Gelatin.
Sims may not purchase or use the Nectar Bar or Vending Machines.
Sims may NOT store leftovers; either in the fridge or in inventory.
Sims may not prepare food, eat, or purchase food on community lots.
You may not use the Delivery menu on the phone to order Pizza or Chinese food.
Sims may not purchase or use birthday cakes, wedding cakes, the bakery display case or any catering buffet tables.
Only Sims in the Culinary career track can make use of the Chocolate Maker.
Once a Culinary master emerges from the household, new ways are invented to preserve food. Sims learn better ways to cook the artificial food and how to rewire home appliances so they can be used again. They also open up supply chains to coffee growers. All Culinary restrictions are lifted.

Medical - "It's the dark ages once again."
The plumbing has been severely damaged in the region. Water brought to the house is dirty and unsanitary. To make things worse, local drug stores have been cleaned out by looters. You are suggested to download the Sponge Bathe for All (http://drupal.cyjon.net/node/140) mod.

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You may not give dogs a bath or purchase or use the litter box.
No showers, bathtubs, Medicine Cabinet, or changing tables may be purchased or used.
Pools,sprinklers, hot tubs, and saunas may not be built or used.
Sims may not use medicine, Vamprocillin-D, WitchBeGone, Lycanthropic-B, or Plantophic-C.
Sims may not redeem Needs perks, except children may redeem any Needs perks available on their toddler-to-child birthday.
Whenever Sims Woohoo, they MUST choose Try for Baby.
Sims may not purchase Only Sims currently employed in the Medical career may use the Surgical Dummy.
Once a leader in the medical field emerges from the family and leads the Red Cross restoration effort, clean running water is restored to the region. Supplies of medicine and contraceptives are now available to the people who need it. The Medical restrictions are lifted.

Military - "The government advises all citizens to lock their doors and remain indoors."
The mobs of radiated zombies wandering the streets make it unsafe to travel anywhere but a select few highways. Neighborhoods are scattered as nobody is willing to risk traveling just to visit with friends. The roads to and from local colleges are blocked. Your founder just barely made it back to the neighborhood.

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Sims may not travel to any community lots, with the exception of the above required comm lot visits. Also, Law Enforcement restriction can be ignored for these special trips as well.
You may not invite over any Sims except Sims they are have red hearts with, or are engaged to.
Teenage Sims may not Ask Permission to Go Out or Sneak Out
Sims may not go Hiking/Jogging or Walk off the lot.
Only Sims currently in the military can use the Obstacle Course object.
Once a brave general from the family leads the local National Guard in a strike force against the zombie hordes, the streets will become safe to travel again and the Military restriction is lifted.

Security Pet
Zombies, mobsters, anarchists, burglars . . . there is a lot out there that can get you. Even if these threats don't directly harm Sims, the fear of them does. A thick blanket of paranoia has spread over the region. Sleep does not come easy to a fearful mind, and the idea of these bad guys out to get them is enough to keep most Sims awake at night.
Sims may not sleep in a bed or on a couch with an Energy rating higher than 3.
Once a family pet is inducted to the Pet Corps, Sims begin to rid themselves of paranoia and get in the habit of sleeping soundly at night. The Service Pet restriction is lifted. If you do not have Pets EP, then this restriction becomes part of the Military restriction, and is lifted when that one is.

[Phaenoh]

Now that your sims are safer and have been able to provide the basics, they are starting to really focus on the community. At this point (or right when your sim takes a job) you need to include community lots for these new jobs to be based out of. At the bare minimum, you need a City Hall (Architecture, Business, Law, Politics), a school (Education), a news center (Journalism), law enforcement station (Intelligence, Law Enforcement, police and firefighting services), and a research laboratory (Natural Science, Oceanography, Science). You can make individual ones for each career or you can double them up, doesn't really matter. These still need to be very bare bones versions of what they would be in *normal* society. You should also go back and upgrade your lots from last round to be more of a hospital, simple diner, and a slightly less war version of a military training facility. The restrictions for visiting the lots this round are different. Your entire family doesn't have to go, you can leave the little ones home with an adult, teenager, or a cognizant elder (elders after Pet Service is lifted). To go to one of these lots you need to have either two adults or an adult with either a teen or non-foggy elder. Your teens may now get jobs, it's a bit safer out now.

Architecture - �Rome wasn't built in a day.�
The nuclear meltdown and resulting steam explosion contaminated the local area, including the buildings. Their structural integrity lost, many buildings simply collapsed while others were condemned due to heavy radiation. As the survivors cling to life, they resort to building basic shelters to protect themselves from the elements. Without proper knowledge of building safety requirements, these shelters were kept as simple as possible to avoid risk of collapse. Making do with scraps of wood, carpet, metal, mortar, and bricks, survivors no longer dream of building beautiful abodes.

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You need to use your judgment in this one. You are not allowed to use any �fancy� architecture, roofing, fences, windows, doors, flooring, wall covering, stairs, columns, awnings, any elevators, *nothing*.
You may not build on more than two floors above ground (ground level, next floor, next floor, flat roof is the highest allowed). You may have an accessible flat roof and place items there, and you may have an awning above that to comply with Music restrictions. Basements do not count against this rule.
Sims� houses may not occupy any larger than an 8X8 area, the rest of the lot must be unused. You may not place any items outside of this 8X8 area, nor modify tiles outside of it. The trash can, mailbox, sidewalk tiles, delivered newspapers, bills, and Genie Lamps do not count for this restriction. They don�t need to be in the 8X8 area. The 8X8 area may be anywhere on the lot, but once designated may not be moved. Driveway extension pieces do not need to follow this rule as long as the 8x8 covers the driveway.
Items dropped off from Dates and Outings may remain outside the 8X8 area. If the items are moved, they must be placed in inventory or within the 8X8 area. Sims may extend the house underground within the 8X8 area. Sims may build upwards, as long as the higher floors do not hang outside the 8X8 area.
You may not use or place the Very Mysterious Shelving.
Only Sims currently in the Architecture career may use the Drafting Table.
Once a great architect rises in the family, blueprints are drawn up to create safer homes for the survivors. With the construction company the architect started up, sights are set on rebuilding the community areas damaged by the catastrophe. Building supplies from other parts of the country are shipped in and distributed to those who need it. Together with the newly arrived City Planner, the region begins to make use of the quality building supplies stashed at formerly secret locations. The Architecture Restrictions are lifted.

Business - "Your money is no good here."
The chaos in the region set off by the power plant explosions has broken down the basic economic fabric of society. The value of a Simolean varies wildly from place to place. All major markets have been destroyed or looted dry. With the economy of the region in shambles, people are unwilling to go shopping. The only thing that sells well are stories from survivors, as media outside the region is hungry to know what happened and what it is like to live in such a land.

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You may not buy pets from pet stores (player run or community) or other Sims.
Your Sims may not start their own business.
You may not sell buy mode items via the buy or build tab.
Your Sims may not hire Service Sims of any kind, nor the Gypsy Matchmaker or Head Witches.
Fortune Aspiration Perks may not be redeemed.
The only car your Sims may purchase or use is the Restorable Car, (or CC Maxis drivable Military car)
Sims may not Pass On learned Business Perks to other Sims.
Only Sims currently working in the Business career field may use the Execuputter.
Once an economic leader from the family rebuilds the economic structure of the region, the Business restrictions are lifted. In addition, the Open/Closed sign may be purchased and used from the Miscellaneous Decorative category. The old-style cash register may be purchased from the Electronics tab, even if these items are still restricted otherwise.

Education
All the major school systems are in ruins. Education has all but gone from the region. All that remains is a small gathering of teachers in a safe house to teach younger Sims the basics.

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Sims may not attend school or college.
Sims may not teach other Sims skills via career rewards.
Knowledge Aspiration Perks may not be redeemed.
Aspirations may not be changed, but Secondary Aspirations must be selected on the teen birthday.
Only Sims in the Education career may use the Bookshelf of Education.
The Sim who becomes an Education Minister rebuilds the region�s educational system, and even restores the old college back to its former glory. The Education restrictions are lifted.

Intelligence - "Trust no one."
The entire region is devastated. Zombies, bandits, motorcycle gangs, and other horrors roam the land, mercilessly taking from those that try to rebuild. Locked behind closed doors and barred windows, many pray that the evils roaming the wastes never find them. When something starts banging at the door and eerie shadows loom through windows, terror grips the heart. Is that a call for help? Is someone begging for their life, hoping, praying that someone will save them? Or worse? Could it be a group of bandits, waiting for someone to unlock that door so they can break in and take whatever they please? Everyone's afraid of what's waiting for them outside. People have no choice but to make do with the limited goods provided by the only trusted supplier in the region. People sit and hope, waiting for the day when they can trust again. No one asks questions and no one exchanges packages. Sims do not venture from their homes without an escort, except to go to work or school.

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Sims may not answer the phone, nor Chat on the phone. Only Invite Over is allowed.
Sims may not perform any action from the Ask pie menu that came with Nightlife.
Sims who are not friends with a member of the household may not enter the house.
Proposals to move in may only be offered by the heir intending marriage.
Sims may not accept blind dates, jobs, or contact numbers from social townies.
Sims may not hire or befriend Service Sims (NPCs).
Sims may not hire employees.
Sims may not give gifts, but giving away pets is allowed.
Sims may not visit community lots alone�they must take a friend or family member along.
Sims may not Search for UFOs or Summon Aliens.
Popularity Aspiration Perks may not be redeemed.
Your sims may not become zombies, vampires, werewolves, plantsims, or witches. If they do, move this sim out immediately. You must still play their household and keep it in sync. They may not move in other sims and they and their heirs cannot lift restrictions. Similarly you may not play with Aliens, Servos, or Bigfoot. Once this restriction is lifted, the family can trust them again and they are treated as regular spares.
Only Sims currently in the Intelligence career may use the Audio Augmenter Earpiece.
Out of the shadows shines a light. While they work in secretive and mysterious ways, the recently re-instated SCIA brings trust back into everyday living. With thoroughly checked out agents filling the ranks, operatives are sent out to clearly distinguish friend from foe. Information travels quickly and soon everyone knows who is trustworthy and who is not. As the paranoia fades, a sense of community blossoms. Sims ask questions of their neighors to learn about them. Gifts are no longer looked upon with suspicion. The Intelligence Restrictions are lifted.

Journalism
While there are many newsworthy events going on at ground zero, there are barely any news reporters to cover it. As a result, the local newspaper has become even less useful than before. While the newspaper continues to be delivered every day (the paper carriers were zombies even before the disaster), its content has become almost nothing.

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Only the first job listed in the paper may be taken. If the first job (or second) is for a tier level that you haven't reached yet, you may look at the next.
The paper may not be used for anything other than recycling, composting or turning into a paper airplane.
Sims may not order or read Hobby Magazines.
Sims may not Read Book unless it is a novel that has been published by someone in the family. Most bookcases are restricted.
The Journalism career reward may not be placed until Journalism has been unlocked.
Once a Sim becomes a Media Magnate, the the local paper is restored to its former glory, allowing the few industries left to announce their full job postings. The Journalism restriction is lifted.

Law
The law in the region has all but vanished. There are no checks, no balances. While the threat of lawsuits has dropped, all the GOOD things with the court systems have vanished as well. Without law in the region, even the greatest people cannot permanently restore parts of society.

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Sims may not adopt, and Social Workers will not take away neglected children.
Sims may not purchase vacation homes or community lots.
Wants and Fears may not be locked.
Sims may not Find Own Place or otherwise move out of the house. (This rule is actually coded into Journalism for now, you can temporarily remove Journalism when you need to move someone out after lifting Law)
Sims returning from college must rejoin the household, they may not be left in the Sim Bin.
Only Sims in the Law career may use the Litigator Podium.
The Sim who becomes The Law restores the code of laws to the region, and the foundation is set for other parts of society to be restored. The Law restrictions are lifted. Now non-heir sims may move out and �found� their own family lot. Both households can lift restrictions as long as the houses are kept in time synch with each other. (Play each for a week and rotate.)

Law Enforcement - "Go ahead and call for help, nobody will listen."
The local police and fire departments are in shambles and unable to do their job. A strong air of anarchy and lawlessness has swept the region. Violent gangs of anarchists prey on the old and weak. You may not call the Pet Adoption Service to adopt or give up a pet.

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You may not call to report a runaway teen or a lost pet.
Your Sims may not purchase smoke detectors, fire sprinklers, burglar alarms or car alarms.
Your Sims may not use the Emergency tab on the phones.
Children may not leave the lot for any reason without going with either two adults, an adult and a teen, or an adult and a controllable elder.
Only Sims in the Law Enforcement career field may use the Fingerprint Scanner.
Once a brave hero from the family emerges, the streets are cleaned up and order is restored, allowing police and firefighters to once again help people. The Law Enforcement restrictions are lifted. The smoke detector and burglar alarm may be purchased and used, even if the Science restriction has not been lifted.

Life of Crime - "Nice place you have. I'd hate to see anything bad happen to it."
The local organized crime family has taken advantage of the lawlessness in the region to set up a protection racket. Joey "The Comb" and his goons force people to pay hefty sums to ensure nothing "bad" happens to what few possessions they have left. While some try to fight the mob, most just give in and pay.

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Once per week, by midnight, your Sims must pay protection to the mobsters, they charge 50% of your lot value (not family value). Go into buy or build mode and find the lot value from the button at the top left, then use FamilyFunds to subtract the amount.
Only members currently in the Life of Crime career may use the Lie Finder object.
The first household member to rise to the top of the underworld becomes part of the "family". While the household does not get a cut of the profits, they no longer have to pay any protection money. The Life of Crime restriction is lifted.

Natural Science - �Why do they call it nuclear winter? Because everything is dead. The snow you see is toxic ash.�
Any and all plant life in the region is dead. Nothing grows anymore. Natural and organic food is non-existent. With no plants to hold the soil together, the whole region is plagued with dust storms that block out the sun and whip across the land.

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You may not place any flowers, bushes, trees, or plants, except the dead tree on community lots.
You may not plant fruit bearing trees, garden vegetables, or the Cow Plant.
You may not alter the ground color to grass colors.
You may not purchase or use the wedding arch.
You may not buy or place the composting bin.
Chef Salads may not be cooked, ordered at restaurants, or bought pre-made.
You may not order groceries for delivery via the phone or computer.
Any flowers received as Date Rewards must be placed into inventory or sold by midnight.
Sims may not use the Ant Habitat or Collect Bugs.
Houses MUST be built on a foundation/deck and/or be built on pillars. (You may still have objects on the ground, but walls may not be placed on the ground level.)
Once a brilliant Natural Scientist emerges from the family, a plant serum is invented that lets plants use toxic ash as fertilizer without making the plant itself toxic. With this serum in wide supply, the region begins to return to life. Food can actually be grown again and people can have lawns. With plants once again anchoring the soil, the raging dust storms cease and the sky can once again be seen. All Natural Science restrictions are lifted.

Oceanography - �You will suffer.� Poseidon, The Odyssey
The fallout didn't just bury the land in toxic ash, it contaminated the local waterways. Whole populations of fish were poisoned. Marine life suffered in the ocean areas contaminated by the toxic flow. The hot waters disturbed weather patterns in even far off places. In the darkest depths of the deep, an old god's rage runneth over. The forgotten Poseidon unleashes his wrath upon the region, cursing the minds of the people. No one knows what they want or fear anymore.

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After this restriction is lifted you may now include Spring in your seasons rotation, but no more than twice. (regardless of Music)
The water tool from the landscaping menu may not be used.
No fountains or fishtanks may be purchased or placed.
The Koi Pond may not be placed.
Sims may not eat Salmon or Lobster Thermidor.
Sims may not visit beach lots nor buy or wear shell jewelry.
The Weathernaught 57x may not be purchased or used at all.
Sims may not fish on the home lot; the water is too foul to catch anything alive.
Once a member of the family tops the Oceanography career, the Hand of Poseidon dons diving gear and plunges into the murky abyss. Beseeching the old water god to forgive the populace, The Hand of Poseidon asks how to restore the waters and correct the weather patterns. His anger quelled, Poseidon bestows a boon of knowledge to the Hand. The Poseidon Project is born and opens its doors; explaining to all what must be done to revive both fresh and salt water. Endangered marine life gain in number due to an intensive breeding program, and there have even been sightings of newborn whales! The Poseidon Project works to re-establish ocean currents and tides, using artificial means to stimulate them until the natural balance is fully restored. This artificial method has given way to a hint of winter thaw. Seeing the progress the people are making, Poseidon restores their minds with the wave of his trident. The Oceanography Restrictions are lifted.

Politics - "Democracy is said to be the worst form of government, except for all the others that have been tried."
The political scene is a mess, more so than it normally is. Local officials are haggling over the how and when supplies are sent to the region, while the citizens suffer. Corruption is rampant and waste is constant. The mayor has restricted the supply of building materials in an effort �conserve� them. Harsh and unreasonable property laws have been enacted. What is left of the police force seems oddly motivated to enforce this building law in particular while turning a blind eye to the looting and anarchy.

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Sims who miss a SINGLE day of work for any reason (including pregnancy) must quit their jobs.
If Sims lose employment in a career for any reason (quitting or being fired) they may never take a job in that career again. This cross-applies to teenage, adult and elder careers.
Elders may not retire, they must quit if they wish to stop working.
You may not ignore chance cards; you MUST select one of the two options.
Only Sims currently in the Politics career may use the Teleprompter podium.
After a great political leader emerges from the family and takes over the office of Mayor, political corruption is cleaned up. The prestige and notoriety gained by the family allows them to sway the actions others, who see everybody from the family as a leader. Confronted by the new powerful mayor, the labor leaders agree to follow the proper labor laws.The Political restrictions are lifted.

Science - "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic." -Arthur C. Clark
Without the flawless power grid and advanced electronics companies of modern day, the high tech gizmos that were once relied upon have slipped out of the population�s reach again. Technology has taken a step backwards.

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Sims may not purchase or use anything from the Electronics category except for a single computer, a single phone, and a single boombox (the $99 one), many items are also restricted by Gamer. The one computer you are allowed is nothing more than a typewriter. You may only use the computer to Write Novel or Write Term Paper. (If Sims autonomously play games just cancel the action.)
Sims may not use non-compost fertilizer.
You may not use the Spray command on plants, trees, or roaches; the spray needs to be reinvented.
You may not call the exterminator (also requires Business to hire Service Sim).
Sims may not purchase or use anything from the Lights category or the Toasty Garden Lamp.
You may not place or use the Ceiling Fans.
Sims may not purchase or use the food processors, trash compactor, or dishwashers.
Only Sims in the Science career track may use the Biotech Station.
Sims who have redeemed Knowledge Aspiration Perks may not Summon Aliens.
Once a great scientist emerges from the family, the knowledge of known technologies is restored to the area, so the gizmos may be produced again. The power grid is repaired enough to use these gizmos and gadgets in the house.

Service Pet
The combined stress of living in fallout and the lingering radiation in the air has had a terrible effect on the minds of the elderly. Older minds decay faster and senility sets in early and badly. Surviving to elderhood in this new world is both a blessing and a curse.
Once any Sim turns Elder, you may no longer issue any direct commands to them, nor cancel any of their actions. You may still cancel actions that would otherwise break another restriction (such as playing computer games).
Once a Pet reaches the top of the Service career, it helps the household's elderly. Interacting with a trained Rescue Pet heals the mental and emotional damage done to the minds of the Elders. They are slowly helped out of their cloud of senility and brought back to reality by their furry friends. The Service Pet restriction is lifted. If you do not have Pets EP, then this restriction becomes part of the Education restriction, and is lifted when that one is.

[Phaenoh]

In this last round, its much easier to visit lots. You still may not leave children home unattended, but your sim can visit comm lots alone. You will need an artist studio (Art, Dance, Music), a Trail Head (Adventure), Sports Complex or Gym (Athletic), Coffee Shop (Gamer, Slacker), Nightclub or TV Station (can be built onto News Center) (Entertainment, Show Business), Cemetery, Church, or Mystic shop (Paranormal). You can go back and upgrade your old lots as new things become available to you.

Artist - “Imagination is more important than knowledge” –Albert Einstein
With survival on everybody’s mind, the arts have virtually disappeared overnight. People are more worried about finding their next meal than attending a concert in the park or buying art.

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No items from the Wall Hanging, Sculpture, Rugs or Miscellaneous Decorative tabs may be purchased or placed. Old boots, fish and maps are not 'art', and may be placed/displayed on the lot.
Sims may not display the Bug Box, Hobby Plaques, Contest Ribbons, Magical Statue, pottery, potholders, quilts or reagents.
Sims may not purchase or use the Activity Table.
Sims may not Take Picture.
Sims may not use easel, crafting benches, sewing machine, or pottery wheels.
Only Sims currently in the Artist career may use the Camera.
Once a great Artist is produced from the family, a wave of culture is set off and art and music return to people’s minds. The Artist restrictions are lifted.

Adventure
There is a particular energy around certain objects that gives them special properties. Objects with this energy are frequently given out as aspiration rewards. Ever since the Apocalypse, these objects have suddenly lost this energy and have become useless. While many are baffled by this, there are a few theories. It is said that the stone of Unga-Nunga is the key to the energy that makes Aspiration objects work so well. This stone was being held at the Sim City museum, where it powered the city's reward objects as well as slowed the EQ decay of the city's population. In the chaos of the meltdowns, somebody stole the stone.

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Sims may not go on vacations.
Jumbok IV may not be placed until your Sim has topped Adventure.
Sims may not purchase any Aspiration Reward objects.
The Sim who reaches the top of the Adventure career locates the stone's thief, the nefarious Dr. Vu. In a daring raid of Dr. Vu’s lab guarded by pirates, ninjas, ninja-pirates, pirate-ninjas and chartered accountants; your Sim makes off with Dr. Vu’s ill gotten gains. In addition to recovering the stone of Unga-Nunga, your Sim makes off with top secret technology Dr. Vu had hidden at the base. The Adventure restriction is lifted.

Athletic - “Only the strong survive.”
The radiation in the air weakens muscles and bones. As a result, muscle degeneration has set in. Even simple physical tasks have become impossible.

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Any item that takes up more than one square may not be moved or placed back into inventory once placed on the lot, with one exception. Items received as Date or Outing Rewards may be placed into inventory or moved one time, even if they are larger than 1 square.
Sims may not restock or delete out-of-stock items larger than one square. Items that have spaces beyond their actual footprint do not count as multi-square objects.
Sims may not sell Buy Mode objects that are larger than 1 square.
Nothing from the Exercise tab may be purchased or used, nor the Soccer Net or Basketball Hoop.
Sims cannot Jump Rope because their weak bones won't hold up to the repeated strain.
Sims may not perform the Leap in Arms or Swing Around interactions.
Sims may carry no more than 3 items in their inventory. Earned, but not placed, career reward objects do not count against this inventory limit. If a spouse moves in with an inventory larger than 3 items, you must downsize it immediately upon their moving in. The Bon Voyage display shelving with items on it is counted as a single item in inventory.
Sims may not open or close the Murphy Bed
The Punching Bag may only be used by Sims currently in the Athletic career.
Once a Sim joins the Hall of Fame from the "Mutant League Football" arena, new training techniques are invented to overcome the muscle degeneration set in by the disaster. All Athletic restrictions are lifted.

Dance
Amongst the toxic ash and hoards of zombies lies a region of despair. Sims are not able to psychologically calm themselves enough to meditate. They are constantly off balance: either anxious or apathetic. Rhythm is lost to them and nobody even considers tapping their foot or humming. Stores containing stereo equipment have been cleared out by looters or destroyed in the wreckage. All dance left the region when the famous dancers fled.

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Sims may not dance at all, including the dance sphere or ballet barre.
Sims may not do tai chi or meditate.
Stereos may be used only to build body.
Once a talented dancer rises in the family, and walks into a crowd of survivors, it took only a solid, steady beat. That beat wasn't made with an instrument or heard through electronic sound waves. The dancer simply started tapping a foot. The tap was accompanied by a bob of the head. Before long, someone joined in, mimicking the movements. The dancer added more complex moves as the line continued to grow. Having been shown the steps, Sims of the region learned to dance once more. With rhythm restored, they reclaimed their physical and mental balance and were able once again to meditate and dance. The Dance Restrictions are lifted.

Entertainment - "All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy."
Before the incident, it was common for people to balance work and relaxation. Too much stress can make people snap if they don't find fun things like television, books, and the internet to keep them entertained. Now many of those things have been taken away by the disaster. Whether destroyed in the blast or lost in some other manner, the people of the region are left to themselves. How can anyone conceive of cracking a joke in such a dismal state?

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Sims may not be directed to perform any action from the Entertain pie menu.
Sims may not throw parties.
Sims may not sing the Sea Shanty, Tell Dragon Legend, or Juggle.
No item from the Party tab or Recreation tab may be purchased or used, except for the King for a Day Outdoor Chess Table, cake, and the wedding arch.
Sims may not use the karaoke machine (also restricted by Artist).
Sims with televisions are limited to the Yummy Channel, the Workout Channel and the News/Weather Channel.
Pleasure Aspiration Perks may not be redeemed.
The Starstruck Personal Fame Star may not be placed.
"Nothing up my sleeves! Presto, chango, magico!" Shouts the prestidigitator. With a clap of the hands and a snap of the fingers, ribbons appear from thin air, dazzling the gathering audience. As the crowd begins to grow, the magician can't help but smile. "And for my next trick: I will need a volunteer from the audience." Excitement begins to spread while people both old and young gasp as the person is placed in a box and then sawn in half. But it was all a trick! Applause echoes across the land with the hope that by bringing a little fun into life, everyone can have a brighter tomorrow. Sims clap their hands in surprise when they learn that a little slight of hand was all that was required. The Entertainment Restrictions are lifted.

Gamer
The disaster has fried most of the delicate electronic components, this means anything programmable is toast.

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Sims cannot use the computer for anything other than "write novel" or "write term paper".
No console games, no computer games, no pinball machines, no remote control toys. Personal electronics (cell phone, handheld game, MP3 player) may not be bought. The founder may keep and use personal electronics if they bought them in college, but they can’t give them to anyone else.
Sims cannot use microwaves, digital clocks, or stereos.
Sims may not purchase or craft robots, including Servos.Servos may not be activated.
Only Sims in the Gamer career can make use of the Gamer career reward.
Your Sim is extremely bored. After becoming a Game Designer, your Sim is capable of fixing and reprogramming all these items. The Gamer restrictions are lifted.

Music
The skies are dark and packed with clouds; No more concerts, no more crowds.
The land sleeps in a blanket of snow; Waiting for the start of the show.
All that's missing is the lead; For the land to wake and take heed.
Blast Mother Nature’s eardrums out; Show grandfather winter what you're about.
Make the existence look and nod; To the emergence of the Rock God.

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The weather must be changed to Winter/Winter/Winter/Winter.
Sims cannot StarGaze or Watch Clouds, or use telescopes.
Sims cannot use the weather control Aspiration Reward, even if one was brought back from college.
Items may not be placed outdoors. Everything must be covered by a roof or awning. Cars, pools, trees, and delivered items do not count for this restriction.
Sims may not go on Vacation because the weather is too rough to permit flight.
You may not purchase or use Solar Panels or the Windmill.
Sims may not purchase the synthesizer, electric guitar or bass.
Only Sims in the Music career may use the Rock Hammer.
With a mighty chord and a mighty roar; The icy grasp of winter is no more
All of the Music restrictions are lifted.

Paranormal - “One death is a tragedy. 1,000 deaths are a statistic. Stop bothering me before you become a statistic.” –The Grim Reaper
With the death toll in the thousands, the Grim Reaper has been pulling long shifts. He is so tired of hearing pleas he has stopped bargaining for the dead. The whole region has become haunted with angry spirits. These spirits have disrupted the mystical energies, and all magical items have become mundane.

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Sims may not plead with the Grim Reaper.
A Sim’s grave may not be moved from the place it initially appears, urns may be moved once.
Graves and urns may not be sold, even if a sim has smashed them. Graves and urns may not be placed into inventory.
Sims may not use the Wishing Well, Genie Lamp, Voodoo Doll, Spiritual Shrine of Odd Blessings, or Temple of Jumbok IV.
Bon Voyage display racks with special properties may not be placed.
Only Sims in the Paranormal career may use the Resurrect-o-Nomitron.
Once a Sim from the household heads up a cult, they begin to perform rituals to calm down the angry spirits. With the spirits of the dead calmed, the Reaper can take a much needed vacation and is much more willing to bargain with Sims upon his return. The Paranormal restrictions are lifted.

Slacker - "White hot iron, red hot iron, cold black iron. An Iron taste and iron smell, and everywhere an iron sound." -Bleakhouse
With government regulators unable to enforce fair labor laws and the remaining businesses able to mistreat their workers who are desperate to keep their jobs, standards of employment have gone down the drain.

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Sims may not use vacation days, nor go on Vacation.
Sims may not perform influence actions.
You may not call the Garden Club while the restriction is in place.
Sims may not redeem Work Perks.
Sims may not have casual or scored Outings, or scored dates.
Only those in the Slacker career may use the Hydroponic Garden reward object.
Once a Sim from the family becomes a Professional Party Guest, a huge party is hosted with all the leaders of industry in attendance. Little do they know that the federal labor enforcement agents have also been invited. Confronted by the federal agents, the labor leaders agree to follow the proper labor laws. The Slacker restrictions are lifted.

Show Business - “It’s the end of the world and you’re wearing THAT?”
Sims don't care about personal appearance anymore. They would rather be fed and safe than pretty. Cosmetics, hair care supplies, and clothing stores have all been cleaned out by looters or destroyed. Nobody wants to spend any money to bring these items back to the region. As a result, Sims' appearances have taken a turn for the worse, leading most to keep to themselves. Large gatherings, socials, brunches and parties have virtually disappeared. The social elite of the region have long since fled for greener pastures.

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Sims may only use the Practice Speech or Practice Romance interactions on mirrors
Sims may not purchase or use closets or anything from the Wardrobe tab.
Sims may not purchase perfume or the Love Potion 8.5
Sims may not redeem Romance Aspiration Perks.
The Diva and Mr. Big NPCs may not be moved into the house for any reason.
Sims may not purchase or use the stylist’s makeover chair.
Once a Sim from the house rises to superstar, they unleash their show, "Stylish Eye for the Zombie Guy" on the world. The Sims of the region, seeing radiated zombies shambling around looking 10 times better than them, gain a renewed interest in appearances. The profits from the show are used to bring fresh supplies of cosmetics, hair care products and stylish clothing to the region. "Fallout Wear" becomes a new trend across the country. Once Sims have bought their new threads and gotten all gussied up, they are once again confident enough to organize social gatherings and show off their new looks. Even some members of the social elite decide to return. All Show Business restrictions are lifted.

Showbiz Pet
Life in a desolate world is harsh to Sims of all ages. Younger Sims find the new world they are growing up in not only scary, but mind numbingly boring as well. With no entertainment for kids and teenagers, concentrating on work is very difficult.
Children and teenagers may not Learn to do Homework
Children and teenagers may not build skill with objects that do not also raise fun.
Once a family pet becomes a Star, it provides some much needed entertainment to the household's youngsters. With their minds stimulated, they can finally focus on school work and learning. The Showbiz Pet restrictions are lifted. If you do not have Pets EP, then this restriction becomes part of the Entertainment restriction, and is lifted when that one is.

[Phaenoh]

The skies clear, the zombies are gone. The power plants are repaired and life returns to normal. The family stands as a testament to a Sim’s will and ability to survive. The whole city owes a great debt of gratitude to the host of leaders and heroes that have emerged from the family. By this time you should have a fully functional and realistically built up neighborhood. Congratulations! From this point you can take your neighborhood and play out the lives of all the residents. Your town is thriving again, all thanks to your hard work!

Scoring:
100 pts for each level 1 Restriction lifted
50 pts for each level 2 Restriction lifted
25 pts for each level 3 Restriction lifted

Perfect score is 1325, but as this is a very long challenge, we have different levels of winning. ;)

Lifting all of Restriction Level 1 makes you a Bronze Apox Survivor,
lifting all of Restriction Level 2 makes you a Silver Apox Survivor,
and lifting all of Restriction Level 3 makes you a Gold Apox Survivor.

Tell us all how you did! We'd love to hear some 'survivor' stories! Also, tell me if you ran into a wall with anything, as this challenge is so restrictive and requires things to be done in certain orders, I'm not 100% its actually do-able yet. It is supposed to be super hard, but its not supposed to be impossible. Let me know and I'll see about a fix.

Suggestions:
I highly recommend Pescado's Zombie Apocalypse and ARC to make the threat of Zombies real. Remember, this challenge is about rebuilding a community and telling a story of hard work and survival. Have fun with it!

[leesester]

This is looking awesome Phae - but aww my poor sims. So no shower, no cooker, no fridge, no sink. Right.

Is there a list of lots available that we can download? Or do you need people to build/share lots? I guess once the travel restriction is lifted we could have some bars and markets... my poor, poor sims.

I am starting to ponder a strategy - which one first.

[Cynnix]

I can't wait to try this challenge Phaenoh.

I love the compound you built. A set of lots to work within the rules is an excellent idea. I'm searching for lots now so I can get started :)

[anna220]

So many challenges and so little time ! Why do I have to work so many hours a week when I would gladly sim them instead :cry:

[Ugly Duckling]

Hmm, as a "normal" Apocalypse player I'm a little confused on some of your rule changes; could you possibly clarify?

The Military section still restricts traveling to community lots, but you say that going to the "workplaces" is how jobs are acquired. Does it not apply? And can you simply go there any time, for any purpose? I know you say you shouldn't use these to cheat, but is there a purpose to these lots besides flavor? Are we allowed to meet other sims there, and are the restricted objects allowed to be used, or is it all just for look?

Intelligence restricts talking on the phone, saying that only "invite over" is allowed. Are we allowed to do this at all times? I may just be looking too hard, but there isn't any Tuesday 12-12 restriction, right? And why the restriction on supernaturals? I assume they are moved out even if Law is in place, but afterwards why aren't they allowed to unlock restrictions? Is the post-apocalyptic world just too species-ist to accept their contributions to society? Getting on the subject of moving spares out, once they're moved out they act almost like a new founder, right?

Heh, I guess I asked quite a few questions. Sorry for the bother. I'll definitely try it out, even though I think the ordering of restrictions removes a lot of the strategy from the challenge. I am, however, quite excited to destroy some lots for this new neighborhood.

...Oh! And one last thing. How would you feel about an Adult Start? I'm never very fond of the beginning Uni phase, so I tend to just skip it and make the beginning a bit hellish.

[FranH]

I'm seriously thinking that I ought to convert my uberhood into a 'post-apocalyptic' one, at the end of their week-with all the mods installed. My idea is when the meltdown happens, all families are evacuated into their shelters, and they have to give up all of their previous lives to adapt to the new conditions.

Quite a concept, especially since there are mods that can really make survival tough, like the 'real sickness' one from MATY, which I'm probably going to use. With no doctors around, nobody can survive a minor illness quite so easily. I'd call it 'reversal of fortune' for the entire neighborhood. Nobody is spared.

I'd do it the other way from scratch, but I'd forget which CC I like so much, and I do so hate to start fresh with my 'empty templates' that I have installed, which will make it harder to really get the neighborhood off to the proper start.

[Phaenoh]

The Military section still restricts traveling to community lots, but you say that going to the "workplaces" is how jobs are acquired. Does it not apply? And can you simply go there any time, for any purpose? I know you say you shouldn't use these to cheat, but is there a purpose to these lots besides flavor? Are we allowed to meet other sims there, and are the restricted objects allowed to be used, or is it all just for look?

Intelligence restricts talking on the phone, saying that only "invite over" is allowed. Are we allowed to do this at all times? I may just be looking too hard, but there isn't any Tuesday 12-12 restriction, right? And why the restriction on supernaturals? I assume they are moved out even if Law is in place, but afterwards why aren't they allowed to unlock restrictions? Is the post-apocalyptic world just too species-ist to accept their contributions to society? Getting on the subject of moving spares out, once they're moved out they act almost like a new founder, right?

...Oh! And one last thing. How would you feel about an Adult Start? I'm never very fond of the beginning Uni phase, so I tend to just skip it and make the beginning a bit hellish.
Goodness thats a lot of questions but I'm glad you've asked them. Military restricts visiting other community lots besides the ones listed in the fashion I've explained. In my version of the military lot, there will be an obstacle course that you sims can use (assuming they are in that career) and there are showers. This is not considered cheating as the military would be one of the first into a region and they would be able to set up things like showers and a base camp. The community at large doesn't have running water yet, but they would. You may meet sims and interact with them as Intelligence allows, just watch out for zombies. ;) Just don't go over board with what you place there. I'm not including computers in mine because I don't want to babysit them from playing games.

As for the Invite over, Tuesday thing, that's gone. The restriction on Supernaturals isn't being speciest, or whats, they are being disallowed from the stance of simplicity. They have too many special powers to rule against. They are to be moved out regardless of Law restrictions, and they still must be played to keep in sync. However, it's Intelligence that is ruling against them in general. After that has been lifted the rest of the hood can trust them again, fall in love, get married, move in, and unlock restrictions. It's just slightly more likely that they would die alone and shunned before Intelligence gets lifted. Also, after Intelligence is lifted, the family no longer needs to 'kick them out'. It's purely a trust issue. And for the regular spares, yeah, they behave just like a founder of their own lot, but all lots *must* be kept in time sync with each other.

Adult starting is allowed, its just much harder. Uni allows your founder to skill up while they can. If you adult start, you may choose your three items and go from there. I personally prefer a mix of the two. The disaster is going to happen sometime during Uni, and you don't know when. At the beginning of each day, roll two dice. Double sixes means the disaster is happening and you need to drop out of Uni by noon. If you make it all the way out of college without rolling double sixes, then it happens upon Graduation. It always seemed odd to me that your sim seemed to know what was coming and was preparing for it on a deadline.

Hope that clears some things up!

[nuidyaforever]

Since post-apocalypse/industrial/dystopia-style settings are my new default playstyle, but I have always thought the original Apocalypse Challenge was a Big Ball O' Ridiculous, I was considering this challenge - but I also object to the discrimination against supernaturals, which is very Not Allowed in my game (discrimination against humans is fine, though - they were also very Not Allowed in my game until recently). So I would say count me in, but... just... no. Sorry, but that's not the way I roll.

(I am not trying to be rude or anything. Just stating my opinion. Feel free to completely ignore me - everyone else does.)

- VT

[Phaenoh]

If you'd like to include the Supernaturals in your version of you, you may, but you will have to look up and follow all of the rules against them that the original version does. The supernaturals have lots of special attributes that would give them an unfair advantage over other sims. I simply ruled them out for simplicity's sake. There are a lot of rules against them and the whole purpose of this from the beginning was to simplify the rule set.

[nuidyaforever]

Thanks for the reply, Phaenoh. I think I might do that - in which case, count me in! :P

*goes off to find original version of the challenge to check rules now*

(of course, that's not too hard. I'll just look under 'A' since I print off all the challenges I like and keep them in an alphabetised folder. Three, to be exact - I love challenges)

- VT

edit: I just thought of something. I play with clean templates. Clean templates = no townies. Can I make my own? (I think it would probably add more flavour if I used custom townies, since I could create suitably apocalyptic looks rather than facepalming every time I see a townie walk through a zombie-infested fallout zone in a suit and tie, but I just thought I'd check first)

[leesester]

Crikey, I am in a building frenzy for this :) I have another lot coming up - a community lot - which is a food/showers/used clothing depot set up by the Sim government. Its not very apocalyptic - but its very sterile and governmenty.

[A.G.Doren]

This looks interesting. I've been thinking of writing a version that incorporates some more aspects of how people actually deal with an apocalyptic situation myself.

[Phaenoh]

I just thought of something. I play with clean templates. Clean templates = no townies. Can I make my own? (I think it would probably add more flavour if I used custom townies, since I could create suitably apocalyptic looks rather than facepalming every time I see a townie walk through a zombie-infested fallout zone in a suit and tie, but I just thought I'd check first) That sounds perfect! I personally have a 'zombie infestation lot' where I have a family of zombies who's only real purpose in life is to attack and infest the townies. It's a game, have fun! As long as you are staying within the spirit of the rules, it doesn't much matter. ;)

Lee? I love it. I'm also building up as much as I can, hopefully get those uploaded soon. If you get some lots that are built to these specifications, I will link to them. (and that goes for anyone else as well, not just Lee!)

[leesester]

um well, built to specs... why does it have to be a 5 by 5 lot? Is it just for the lot value? Cos I don't want a load of enormous empty looking lots with a little blob in the middle.

[A.G.Doren]

Phaenoh- I've never used Zombies much, but I've been working on a post-apocalyptic neighborhood and I've been thinking about adding them. Are the zombies you're using modified or can regular spread zombism like an infection??

[Phaenoh]

Lee, I have no idea why it has to be a 5x5, but I find that too be the least important lot building rule out there. Things like keeping to the footprint, raising it above ground level, nothing living growing, and having nothing left outside in the elements are the important ones to stick to.

A.G.Doren, I've only used zombies with Pescado's hack which makes it more like an infection, I think regular ol' zombies would behave more.

[Darby]

I've always assumed the 5x5 rule was for starting the sim with as little money as possible. So what I do, if I want to use a smaller lot, is simply familyfunds the price difference away so they start with the same amount, regardless of lot size.

[A.G.Doren]

So with MATY's zombie hack you'll get zombie outbreaks from time-to-time. I've heard that hack would pretty much overwhelm your neighborhood...how would you manage to build the community??

[Darby]

So with MATY's zombie hack you'll get zombie outbreaks from time-to-time. I've heard that hack would pretty much overwhelm your neighborhood...how would you manage to build the community??

Someone on this thread at MATY suggests using Paladin's weapons in defense. :lol:
http://www.moreawesomethanyou.com/smf/index.php/topic,6720.25.html

That, and making sure your playables have really high body skill. Apparently, with the hack in place, zombies gain body skill with each attack, so over time, their attacks will have higher chances of succeeding.

[nuidyaforever]

um well, built to specs... why does it have to be a 5 by 5 lot? Is it just for the lot value? Cos I don't want a load of enormous empty looking lots with a little blob in the middle.

I think that rule is just for residential lots, so the founder doesn't start out loaded. I found no mention of community lots having to be 5x5 in either the original Apocalypse challenge or the Legacy challenge, so I'm assuming that the lot size rules don't apply to community lots.

- VT

[hweldon81]

Just wanted to say that I'm having an excellent time doing this challenge. It is so fun and worth the complication of following the rules!

So far my founder Landon has a wife Marion, and 4 sons. Keynan is a child, Tildon is a toddler, and natural twins Jarius and Darius are newborns. I'm hoping having twins doesn't sink the family before I even get through any restrictions. Landon is working on the Culinary restriction set. Marion was in Law Enforcement (came with the job) but quit at pregnancy. She will stay home until Landon completes his career, then he'll stay home while she goes into the Medical field.

Keynan spends his days unsuccessfully trying to befriend neighborhood pets. I need to read up on that because I've never adopted a stray in the regular game. So far my challenges are having everyone "bathe" by repeatedly washing their hands, and keeping everyone fed. Marion barely made it through her second pregnancy. I wish the sponge bath option was available as player directed.

[Darby]

Couple tips for you:
Utilize Appreciate:Groom between spouses! (Also available between siblings and parent/child once both parties are adult and/or elder.) Doesn't help keep kids clean, but it's certainly helpful for pregnant sims.

The key to developing relationships quickly, whether between human or animal sims, is to rotate between three or more interactions. Reason being that the effect of an interaction is diluted if repeated one after another. Thus Chat/Admire/Play is more effective than Talk/Talk/Talk.

With strays, you can't use Feed Treat yet, but a lot of strays know tricks (and those are the ones you want to adopt anyway!), so you should have Stroke/Command [do trick]/Play options right away. Switch from Stroke to Rub Belly (dogs) or Hug (cats) as soon as those options are available. It's quite possible to get the Adopt option with one visit this way.

ETA: Sponge-bathing can be induced pretty easily by locking the stinky sim into the bathroom with nothing else to do. Do be aware that sims with high Neat points will never sponge bathe. I think 6 Neat is as high as it can be for them to do this.

[hweldon81]

Thanks for the tips!

I read somewhere else that only teen and higher can initiate a stray adoption, so Keynan will keep making friends and training the dog and will adopt once he turns teen. The parents have too much else going on to even venture into the yard to meet animals for now.

I'm finding the child's hygeine is even harder to raise with "wash hands" than the adults. Good thing he doesn't go to school!

A tip for those of you with toddlers. If it's before tubs and showers (medical) then don't potty train them. Wetting themselves and the resultant diaper change is the only way they get clean.

Great challenge!!

[Phaenoh]

So far my founder Landon has a wife Marion, and 4 sons. Keynan is a child, Tildon is a toddler, and natural twins Jarius and Darius are newborns. I'm hoping having twins doesn't sink the family before I even get through any restrictions. Landon is working on the Culinary restriction set. Marion was in Law Enforcement (came with the job) but quit at pregnancy. She will stay home until Landon completes his career, then he'll stay home while she goes into the Medical field. I think technically you already broke the rules, you aren't allowed to get your founder a spouse until after they've reached the top of their career, see the Hopelessness bit. ;)

Thanks for the tips about Adopting Strays, I've also never done that and I wondered how it worked.

[hweldon81]

Oh man........I totally did miss that when reading through. Shoot!

I did an adult start and had him married by Wednesday, so I thought I could get around having to find a spouse without being able to call and invite her over. On reading the rules through I knew it would be really hard to build up that kind of relationship without being able to go anywhere or call anyone without a heart, so I decided to marry him off ahead of time. I thought I was being so clever........

Of course you're right though. I totally cheated my face off upon closer reading of the setting up section of the rules. Oh man..........Well, I'm already connected to the characters, so I'm going to play through the best I can and start again when this one is complete or goes up in flames. I won't score it, but I'm having enough fun that I don't want to bail on days worth of playing.

[Phaenoh]

Why don't you use your first child as your new founder and just play the family out without lifting any restrictions? That will give you a cleaner start, kinda like a Uni start, but in your case I think it would save you from failing. The not having a spouse before the first restriction is lifted is a big part of the challenge to get past. I totally understand about being attached to the characters. I started my founder years ago under the regular apox rules, lifted military, got married and had kids and haven't done anything since. I'm going to keep using that family and follow my new rule set instead.

[Rayea]

have you considered using the hack that unlocks sponge baths for everyone? also, custom content, a question. (or 5 lol)

if something is designed to look like it is older (say for example, a pestle and mortar. we have those even now, but in sims its copied from the food processor) could that be used instead of the more modern items?
i have a lot of ancient items like those, and things that were copied out of castaways (such as a shower that has a bucket of water over the top, water tower for collecting rainwater [even though it would be irradieted] BBQ from an oil drum ect) if they have the parts to be used without the modern tech, would they be allowed to be used?

have you considered turning the player made chars that become zombies into the inteligent Ghouls of fallout? (if they were a usefull founder type at least, if zombie infestation made too many then you could save your fave as a ghoul then move the rest out as ferals?) you could technicaly then move the new ghoul into a lot that was designed to be like Underworld (from f3) where they could hide out? (allowing the person who prefers no humans to at least have a lot they can move their non-humans to if they aren just zombies, or even vampires since we had the Famly in fallout3, so long as they stayed out of sight and sunlight hehe)

[nuidyaforever]

I'm about to start setting up my challenge hood, however I don't do 'ordinary' or 'modern'. I don't even do Earth. So, I'm going to tweak the setting somehow (not quite sure how yet, but I will). I am also probably going to make the scenario more about building a new society than recreating the old one, because that's more my style.

I already have one post-apocalypse hood going; it's the one hood that gets away with being Earth, because in that hood all the humans have died out, leaving only mutants. I wanted to combine the challenge with that hood at first, but since it already has five families (all couples with kids), I don't think I'll get away with that. ;) Fortunately I have plenty of grungy and apocalyptic-looking CC (my favourite style after steampunk) so I can set up another one easy.

- VT

[Darby]

have you considered using the hack that unlocks sponge baths for everyone?

That would qualify as a hack that would allow the user an advantage over players who don't use hacks, and thus be illegal.

The whole idea behind most challenges is to see what you can do with what's provided by the game. Many challenge creators have relaxed about mods/hacks that save the player finger clicks, but that's different. In this challenge, the fact that some sims can sponge-bathe and others can't is an important, inherent part of the challenge. Makes you think about the pros and cons of uber-Neat sims versus uber-Sloppy sims when selecting your founder's personality traits.

[Rayea]

well i wasnt actualy asking the players, i was asking the creator of the chalange (maybe i should have clarified that)
this is the first time a chalange has grabbed my interest, and since im terrible at langscape gardening i thought a zombie infested world with no greenary might be just the place to start building (and posably uploading for others to use)

hence why i wanted to clarify the CC use/do not use of items that could be listed in the shopping list. as there is no point in me including most things if they are out of the list. since housing tends not to be my thing in post-apocalyptia but com units might be, i wanted more info about CC on those rather than for how i could cheat thru the challenge via what others *will not* or choose not to use.

[Phaenoh]

Actually Rayea and Darby, I'm ruling opposite on both of these. I was actually working toward including a 'sponge bathe for everyone' mod in my Medical restriction but either forgot or ran out of time or whatever and it didn't make it in. Its silly that there would be a reason why a sim physically could not sponge bathe if he got dirty enough, but the neat ones tend to do it autonomously on their own more. You may not however, use 'old' technology that has been cloned from a restricted item. No motar and pestal food processors.

I also don't really know what you mean about the player characters becoming zombies. I've already ruled against the supernaturals, but the zombies themselves are even worse! (From a strickly storytelling point of view) Your family would be in dire peril!

And the rule about disadvantages to those not using hacks is dumb too, I'm practically requiring you to use mods to begin with so the people who don't play with mods already might not be likely to be playing this challenge.

As for those asking about the storytelling aspect of it, you don't have to pretend it was a nuclear meltdown that turned all the townies into zombies, you could be starting your own settlement on Vega 7 or colonizing a corner of the African desert, whatever backstory gets *YOU* excited to play and build up the hood. As long as your changes don't alter how the challenge is set up and played through its ok. After all, this is more about having fun, we aren't competing against each other, just against ourselves and our game.

[SusannaG]

I like the sound of the "sponge baths for all" mod; does one already exist? If so, where can I find it?

[Darby]

And the rule about disadvantages to those not using hacks is dumb too, I'm practically requiring you to use mods to begin with so the people who don't play with mods already might not be likely to be playing this challenge.

Good point. :lol:

Don't mind me - I'm an old-school AC vet. I think your take on it is awesome, though, Phaenoh. Just a new way of thinking for me that could take awhile to get used to.

[Rayea]

well i use alot of hacks from MoreAwesomeThanYou, especialy the bathroom controler. depending on the version you have, you might find the hack in any of the sub directories here
http://www.moreawesomethanyou.com/smf/index.php/topic,7.0.html

my own usual reason for using spongebath hacks is im a roman builder. i love to make and build roman hoods (in all 3 sims versions)
and plebians didnt HAVE a bathroom hehe, they had to go to the local baths, but my sims drive me nuts crying about being dirty, so sponge baths from bucket sinks it is^^

well, what i meant about zombification and Ghouls is...say you have a famly, and dad gets bitten, turns zombie...your rule (i think) say he goes out into the wasteland and finds himself a place to hide out (ie, he gets moved to a new lot and canot realy take part in the chalenge)
now one poster up above was unhapy that humans dominated the chalenge (which is understandable to them, the humans are the ones rebuilding the world after the big Whatever happened *grin*) since they usualy play with supernatual chars. while i understand most of those have access to abilites that would mean they have an unfair advantage (such as zombies being imune to sicknes, radiation [the imagined, since we cant code it into the game] and so on..) they also have huge dissadvantages (even if they are assumed, such as being shot at while trying to collect the days firewood hehe)

so, your zombies (which are hacked) are now more like the chemical zombies from the rez evil films or the dawn of the dead type? and since Grimmy is over worked (and under paid, i hear him yelling lol) there are no zombies from dying and getting back up hm....

i guess what i meant was that, if your fave famly memeber got turned, you could send them to an appartment (or style lot if you havent got appartment life) built just for sims that were faves but are now the shambling dead....allthough he (or she) might be dead, and couldnt unlock anything, they could at least, still be playable in a fashon. perhaps a side-story about Bob the Zombie and how he faired after he became the recently deseaced? (is reminded of a song called 'all we want to do is eat your brains' about the attack from the zombies PoV hehe)

as fer the mortar n pestle, i have decorative versions so its not all bad. have been working on a food place allready but im not sure its fit for use yet, maybe an outdoor place might fare better since all my stoves are ether low grade outdoors ones or hunger10 versions...and i cant realy play properly becasue i have a hack to stop fires XD so while my sims might fare fine, everyone elses sims would be toast if i used a bbq indoors...hard to build everything as i want becasue i have Numenors invisible and prizon walls but others may not and suddenly finding your watchtowers invisible walls are now visible in everyone elses game is no fun as a builder

*edit ooh, is this one of the ones you use?
http://www.moreawesomethanyou.com/smf/index.php/topic,6720.0.html (zombie apocalypse, now with more BRAIIINS!! hehe)
i might actualy grab a new PSU and do a clean install no CC on my older machine to try a real zomb-apocalipse ^^ (well...maybe next month, my fiance arrives tomorow and he's not much of a sims player..though he might, if his sims had to live in fallout-simsVille hehe)

[SusannaG]

Thanks!

Looking around, I also found a sponge bath mod from CJ: http://drupal.cyjon.net/node/140 .

[lorinsv60]

Regarding children and Hygiene, who suffer the most before Medical:

If I understand correctly, with these mods the Social Worker won't come before Law is lifted, which is a huge advantage because kids (not teens) who refuse to do homework due to tanked Hygiene levels would normally be taken away due to poor grades (along with all their pre-teen siblings). Obviously this can be devastating and even a challenge killer, if Mom is too old to have more children. Once you get that first child safely to teen, it becomes less important because they can do little brother/sister's homework for them. But back on topic: with this ruleset, Medical should be lifted before the Social Worker can come so you wouldn't need a spongebathing mod for very long anyway... if I've got all this right... :sheep:

[A.G.Doren]

And the rule about disadvantages to those not using hacks is dumb too, I'm practically requiring you to use mods to begin with so the people who don't play with mods already might not be likely to be playing this challenge.

After all, this is more about having fun, we aren't competing against each other, just against ourselves and our game.

You know phaenoh this is how I tend to feel about challenges. Challenges have rules for reasons otherwise they wouldn't be challenges, but at the same time there is no point if its not actually fun. For the apocalypse hood I'm building I downloaded the no social worker hack because where the bloody hell is the social worker coming from in an apocalyptic society. Also I decided no school for kids because what the hell school are they going to. Instead your founder has to spend so much time reading to them otherwise they are ignorant. I'm not sure how I would restrict that maybe your founder has to put the bookcase in their inventory when they are off the lot or something...

Also I play with Inteen and use the flavor pack miscarriages for low motives. Miscarriages make sense under these circumstances so I figure there would be a higher food ration for pregnant sims, but the danger would still be present. Another thing I'd been thinking of is that there is no birth control under these situations so maybe sims could only try for baby...or if they use ACR just let the sims take their chances...dunno'. I'm still sorting out what I want to do with it all.

[Skimmer55]

I wonder. Would i be able to build lots my self? or do i have to download houses?

[Phaenoh]

Rayea, you can follow any zombified sims you want to enhance your storyline; if its fun, do whatever, they just can't lift Restrictions. ;)

Yup lorinsv, you've got it right. The sponge bathing mod is only until Medical is lifted, and Medical is in the first Restriction level while Law is in the second.

Skimmer, you can definitely build your own lots! I personally would prefer everyone to build their own lots, but a lot of people don't like building so downloading is an option.

[Skimmer55]

Skimmer, you can definitely build your own lots! I personally would prefer everyone to build their own lots, but a lot of people don't like building so downloading is an option.
Oh good cus i was not looking forward to trawling through thousands of lots.

[Skimmer55]

Right. My first lot is complete. I just wondered if it broke any of the rules before i use it. The furniture shouldn't break the rules because i built it with the mods already in place. but i wanted to make sure. Pics below with .rar file. ( I will remove rar if it breaks any rules).

[Phaenoh]

Oh good cus i was not looking forward to trawling through thousands of lots. I'm doing a lot of the trawling for you, lots that I find that I believe are right for this challenge I'm including links for. You can look at them to see what I'm thinking is appropriate and either download them or create your own along those lines.

[Raiya44]

First off, I have to say, after setting up a clean downloads folder and downloading the recommended lots and content, I am excited to be starting the challenge. Ive decided to play the mid-uni version and so far (day 1!) I am safe.

I was wondering about this: Founders may bring up to 3 items back from college that were purchased with their own money

If you can bring back 3 items, what 3 items do you select (or 2 plus diploma if you make it to graduation), and can you use those items even if the restriction has not yet been lifted, or is it for resale value or what purpose does this serve? Curious as to what other people selected as their items and why.

[Phaenoh]

For the most part people bring back either Aspiration Rewards or high priced items to sell back. Many things still have restrictions based on them, so you can't bring back a shower. I personally brought back SmartMilk, as skilling seems to be one of the most important things to this challenge, and everyone older than kids have a harder time of it. Power skill baby, while you still can ;)

I'm very interested to hear how your story ends up, you are the first to report with a mid-uni start. That one is my favorite, but its untested, you are the guinea pig (or womrat). Keep us informed!

[Rayea]

*head-desk moment*

i just realised..i can take my entire downloads folder out, make a new one just for the chalenge and pop THAT one in instead of doing a full install...
maybe the zombies have been nibbling XD on m allready.

i can recomend prety much everythin made by the purity project here at MtS becasue its cosmetic stuff or build stuff, most of pixlehates and pheno's stuff too. (so i think i might actualy make an apocalipse folder, slap all the fallout theme and apocalipse them build and buy recols in here and have a go in a totaly new hood.)

so, can i check..the grungify your yard, since its dead grass and trees, is that okay? (my decoration set) grungy or apocaliptic recolors of non CC stuff too?
i also grabbed http://skuld.modthesims.info/files/1/5/2/5/3/1/4/MTS_guatla_946848_Demolition_set.rar it has a HUGE amount of windows and doors that are just holes....ya know, i might make a set of ghoul appartments (not actualy appartments mind, just a place to move the ex playables into to keep em safe) and some deco houses with that. i tend not to actualy *play* the sims these days, just build and do basic 20min testing. guess im a frustraited interior designer at heart :P

[Phaenoh]

Sorry Skimmer, you can't use that one. It very much breaks the 8x8 rule. The building cannot use more than 64 tiles per floor. Yours is over by a bit. It wouldn't take much to fix it though, you just need to shave off 8 tiles somewhere.

Reyea, that's exactly what I do now. I used to have an AnyGame set up for this so I wouldn't have to move my Downloads folder, but something went janky with it when I reinstalled Windows. If you'll notice, the dead tree was left in the catalog, anything dead and ugly would be perfectly acceptable (as long as it isn't some sort of weird magic plant like the snapdragon or something. Dead deco is ok. I've already got that demolition set in my downloads folder, but I felt too scared for my poor simmies sakes to make them live in a place the zombies can get at them. I'll prolly use them somewhere though.

[mackieG13]

Phae-

I love this enough to reccomend this to reccomend this as a follow-up/sequel to my Zombie Apocalypse Challenge!

[Rayea]

well i made 3 houses last night. not sure if they are 100% chalenge-worthy as their overall footprint may (on 2 at least) go over the tile limit. but they make great deco and could potentialy be alowable if its *useable* footprint.

i used the demolition set to make about half of house number 1 unuseable. front door, back parlor on the ground floor, and all but one room upstairs look like they are totaly unuseable. admitedly downstairs back could be useable becasue it has a floor and they are only crack windows, but i can (on my game at least) use numenors invisible wall to block the areas off i dont want them accessing.
the broken windows and broken kitchen i got for cheap sims years ago are a godsend now, becasue they fit right in.
house number 2 is acutaly a shack built on the side of another derrelict home. its made to look like they built the shack on the side of a bathroom that was left intact (ish) becasue it still had a useable toilet. oh how i wish had a deco only bath and sink XD and a busted broken toilet that i could use for upstairs ruined bathrooms so my sims wouldnt keep wanting to use them.

house 3 is a watchtower style place with a double floor matress and direct to septic-tank style bathroom of loo and sink (i love the colony bunker bat set for this, its so rusty and industrial. still kinda half done.

they may not be any good (looks at Pheno to check that its actual floorspace and not just useable floorspace) for the actual chalenge but they could be good for deco and for moving famlies into as they occupy more derelict homes or moving out infecteds you want to keep playing with.
will try to post pics if anyone wants to see.

[Phaenoh]

Come on Rayea, lets spell my name right, it's Phae ;) I've already ruled before about the difference between the spirit of the rules and the letter of the law. As long as those unusable spaces really aren't usable, they can't just look unusable. If a sim can hang out in there and do his thing to get out of the way of the rest of the family, that's cheating, but if its more like a blocked off hallway they can't get to, its fine. I'd love to see pics!

[Rayea]

sorry Phae :)

well i didnt want to use the invisible walls on them if i was going to upload them anyplace. and i cant find anything suitable that i can place to block the door off. but i CAN block them off if i was playing.
next house may have no doors to the damaged parts. if i just use the window versions that might work. (since there are door versions, i used them in the side of the wall for the clamp-on shack :)
infact, im getting a mental image of a hallway with no floor ^^ to stop them pesky sims getting up there XD hmmm......

will have to attach some picks (if i can remember how to do that here XD been a couple of years or more..about 09 when i last uploaded anything to the site lol.)
has anyone seen any deco furniture and items anyplace? like a deco only door, kitchen apliances ect. i realy REALY need deco only bathroom stuff, especialy baths and toilets, and a door that i can place thats just not realy a door. a painting version that was not even 'view'able by sims would be perfect (and uses the basic base game door's textures would be amzing XD as i have the recolor'd metal and wood doors from pixlehates stuff.)

[Raiya44]

My founder is still in college, rolling the dice every day is nerve-wracking! But he is in the later half of sophomore year now.

My question is one related to when he gets out of college!

I notice two of the rules for natural science (which is in tier 2) are
1-You may not order groceries for delivery via the phone or computer.
2-You may not plant fruit bearing trees, garden vegetables, or the Cow Plant.

The refrigerator appears to be allowed (Does anyone know of a non-refrigerator looking one. Maybe that looks more like a pantry closet? Going to get nice cold food and drinks from a running fridge right after the disaster just sounds funny to me)

But once the frig is empty of its inital supply, how does my sim get more food, or am I missing something here?

Maybe there is a small supply base (in the form of a grocery store?) at the soup kitchen or military base that I dont know about? I could imagine survivors line up for weekly rations? Which I could restock from on my allowed weekly outing in that case. Hmm!

[Rayea]

i have had a good few medievil looking pantrys from mod the sims but they are usualy built on the more expensive kitchen sets and still tend to look like fridges (at least to me lol)

try the KIS (keep it simple) set from here, its cheap, looks like its an antique (allthough it could do with a worn looking version, looks like great grandma kept her heirlooms in covers hehe) and is low poly
http://thesorceressandcompany.com/Forum/index.php?topic=988.0
you will need to grab the master file to make sure you dont get blue flashy (as i found out after i coped em into my zombie folder and forgot which item WAS the master XD so had to copy the whole set in, meh no worries)

of there are the woodcutters pantries at parsim
http://www.parsimonious.org/furniture2/kitchen/k8-Woodcutters_Gypsy_Kitchen.shtml
this one will have the original mesh, but page befor this one will have the dark wood (dusty) version as well as the mesh.

hm...there must be a super-duper mart someplace in the hood..shame we cant stock it with Raiders or zombies XD
i might try making a food bank again, my last one wasnt satisfying (i wasnt happy with it lol)
my problem is, i have only one pack of cans i can use to stock the shelves and they arent post OfB so i have to work around. anyone know of deco cans here at MtS?
oh and check the medievil section themed area for wooden recols of the supermarket if you want basic, or
http://www.parsimonious.org/furniture2/shops/k8-Pirate_Bay_Market.shtml
the shelves look good for a knocked together feel too (and you need at least one shelf as its a master repository set)

*edit* im finding THE most fantastic sets at GoS from someone called Kativip. not everything in them is good, some have some not so nice extras (like 1940's wartime items hehe) but its worth getting them for the fantastic OTHER bits like sandbags and bed barricades :) im saving the links to a notepad so i dont forget where i got them, and what ones they are...damnit, my DL folder for the apocalipse is going to be as big as my normal roman/medievil set XD

oh, and i sugest grabbing the medievil replacement food set from here at MtS becaue it makes all the food look much less..modern, admitedly but it swaps a good few of the foods. mac'n cheese turned into something that looks like brown mush ^^ (much more apropriate for the end of your world *grin* than happy shiny cheesey pasta)

[Raiya44]

Thanks for the links, I really like the dusty pantry stuff, and also on page 8 there is whats called colony bunker kitchen, which could work for this as well.

Going to check out the rest of these I am certain I will find useful! Thanks.

[hweldon81]

Been away a few days and no time to play until the weekend. I'm a teacher and back to school in Canada was this week.

My bottom "floor" in a wall-less driveway with the pillared home atop it. I already have 2 fridges stored down there. I'll sell them once I can, but until then they sit in the carport. I do have grocery bins set up at my community lot "Emergency Supply Centre" but since I still have toddlers in the home and still need everyone to travel together, the emergency supplies have only been accessed once by my founder when he went to get his culinary job there. The toughest things currently have been feeding, bathing, and remembering not to sell items by deleting them.

My oldest child is a teen now, and he is actually going to be my founder because I cheated by accident early on but in an important way. (Great suggestion for salvaging Phae!) So I'm letting the parents keep with their jobs, but lift no restrictions. It's easier because there is more money coming in, but much much harder because I have too many mouths to feed and many, many days before a single restriction can be lifted. Someone will die of starvation, it's just who....... The family had 4 kids, anticipating the culinary being lifted by the time they were all child and up. Now that it is not happening, the daily meal of hamburgers is not enough.

Feeding trick though. Let them go to work hungry. They'll come home fed. One less mouth.......

My items I brought over were a bed, a half full fridge, and a sofa.

[Rayea]

well i finaly grabbed some pics :)

thanks to Kativip's 'Memories' series at GoS (the one thats designed around a WW2 and resistance theme) i have more sandbags, home lot old store deco (so it looks like someone may have to later on open a food bank store, or maybe i will have to make an NPC who looks after the food bank....)

hey thats a question, Phae..
alot of nice things are home lot only, so this one is....if the NPC-Sim isnt taking part in the chalenge by unlocking, can you make a home buisnes lot for them that includes all the wonderfull things. this sim would be like a bodyguard for a com lot (although becasue of the item makers choice, the lot is actualy a home lot) you could just send your sim to the NPC-Sims lot *as if* it was a com lot, most of the normal chalenge restrictions would still work if you had the chalenge mods in place, right?
this sim wouldnt be allowed to be played much, or even at all, untill after the buisness restrictions were lifted (probably not at all since technicaly they are profiteering off the poor XD) but it *would* allow for a more community feeling lot in one or two instances (feel free to whack me if thats too much XD)

the other one is, im having trouble building com lots on the 5x5 when they arent large military run places. i wanted to make a container yard-esk food kitchen (especialy as i found the old Simlogical prizon-school food server that serves 3 kinds of Sim-Mush rather than nice food) but the 5x5 size makes it gloat at me and im left looking at the screen wondering where to put everything...is the 5x5 rule for just the founders home base? i been using 3x3 mainly becasue they let me place copies all over the place for deco look hehe.

but still, once i get those deco beds and rubble into the houses to block off the areas i dont want them using, my houses can look derrelict AND be useable :)

[Phaenoh]

hweldon, I'm really enjoying hearing about your story, and yup, you found the answer to the fridge problem. You just have to buy more and let the empty ones sit and rot [rul=http://www.modthesims.info/download.php?t=317716]out in the yard[/url]. As they are empty and no longer useful, you don't have to keep them in your 8x8. See the bottom pic ;)

Rayea, the pics are looking great! I have no idea which rooms are accessible, but I'm trusting you to not go over 64 tiles. The 5x5 lot restriction isn't required for the comm lots, it's barely required for founder lots. These comm lots are supposed to continued existing after you've completed the challenge, so it should be built on what fits your hood and what is right for the building itself. As for other sims, only career based community lots can ignore unlocked restrictions, and then only of their career's restriction. If a sim were living on a career based lot, it would stand to reason that they were the ones who had unlocked it, and as they haven't lifted it yet, it doesn't make much sense. I could see one of your bloodline sims moving out on her own, going to a church or cemetary to join Paranormal, working her way up, lifting it, and then turning her house into a Cult Shoppe, but there wouldn't be much reason for your other sims to visit her there as her restriction has been lifted. I might not really be understanding what you are asking about, but the answer is nope. Your legacy family is supposed to be the bright hope for the future, they are the ones with all the shiny things.

[Rayea]

well i just found out that if i realy want a food bank with the simlogical slop server ^^ i will have to use it on a home lot (bah, humbug) and i cant make a shop style food bank at home (cause the food bins dont show up in buy. maybe they do if you make a buisness, i dunno lol) so that ones out too *mutter, twitch*

i made sure that the third house pictured had 64 (or as i though, 62 lol) tiles in areas i can access. the back room behind the room with the beds has no access, up past the top step of the stairs is currently floored with the Muse invisible tile and a lot of the splintered wood fence from the demo set (to give the impression that alot of the houses 2nd floor is unsafe to even walk on) but i will be sure to place something ruble like in there if i use it.

im going to make a befor-after house at some point. take a nice suburban home from my hood befor the Event and then trash the frell out of it, reducing the place to the required 64 or less useable floor tiles.
however that will have to wait a while...casue the good news is..I THINK I GOT MY MAN ADDICTED TO SIMS ^^
lol
i also think i know why my hood looks like its allready been hit befor the Event. i decided it was allready in the desert, casue the founders from a century ago, were all rich paranoids that expected the bomb. but after it never came, the real estate people pulled up nearly all of the family home shelters left to make swimming pools and underground garages XD so there arent more than abour 3 or 4 left, and i decided where 2 of those are. one is under the old supermarket (owned my a town founders family member) and the other is under the supermarkets owners house XD (the one thing they passed on in their family line was...paranoia XD so he kept the shelters expecting some conspiracy. once the Event hits, he's gona be hunkered down inside his little Vault-tech bunker lol. the others might end up as areas that got exposed after earthquake or somethin, im not sure.

right now, im gong to go see if i can find the radio stuff from fallout3, if they are MP3's....*grin*

also, sorry if i keep asking dumb questions, Phae. i just like to make sure im not doing it wrong :P

[Ileeya]

I'm really glad you're asking all those questions, Rayea - because I'm (and probably others are, too) learning from the answers. ;)

I am looking forward to starting this soon. I'm going to do a mid-Uni start because it sounds the most intriguing. I played the Apocalypse challenge a long time ago and had my sim graduate college. During that time she maxed out all of her skills and made about 15 or so best friends. So she was well prepared. But that's not very realistic.

I'm excited about all the mods made to protect the player from making mistakes because, even though I tried my hardest to do everything right, there was just way too much stuff to remember.

Has anyone tried this with Pescado's Zombie Apocalypse installed? I'm thinking of trying it, but I'm not sure if I want to always be in danger of becoming a zombie. It would be exciting, but boy would I get mad if I spent hours worth of set up time just to become a zombie and for it all to be over.

And that's a brilliant idea - to take a house that's all ready built and then trashify it - hmmm....Might be a good option for me since I hate building. All of my community buildings will be downloaded, lol.

[Raiya44]

Nice house Rayea!

My founder is in the 2nd half of junior year and so far so good, no disaster yet. He just fell in love with a girl that lives in the dorm, and being in 2nd half of junior year and a family sim, he decided to get engaged! So hopefully after the disaster and hope is restored maybe theyll be reunited.. we will see. I am almost hoping that the disaster does happen before he graduates, because I plan to transport as much elixir of life as I can back from college, and that would give me 3 spaces towork with instead of 2!

-edit update: My founder just graduated. Looks like I pretty much have a full-uni start after all... I was surprised I didnt roll any double sixes (used random.org for my numbers)

[lorinsv60]

I love the ideas of a random Uni Start and the two-day jump on an Adult Start. I suppose if you wanted to increase the suspense on the Uni Start, you could roll one die and use 6 as the Apocalypse trigger.

[Raiya44]

Hmm, maybe this should be obvious, but how is my founder supposed to increase body skills? I thought there was supposed to be a workout option on the cheap radio that is allowed but there is not...

[hweldon81]

Everyone is still alive....barely. If the family dog didn't have a job, he'd be a goner for sure!

Mom just finally started the medical field because the whole household is now child and up. There are two teens and two children (twins) in the house. The oldest teen son, Kaynan, tried to get a job also on their family trip to the "Emergency Supply Centre" but was denied due to his poor grades. I guess he gets to continue skilling and I can hold off on work until he turns adult. The father is three days from elder, where he becomes uncontrollable. That will be interesting keeping him out of the kitchen.

Still a really fun challenge. Money is now starting to wear on me. I think they might have too many expensive chairs because each week they lose all their funds. Stupid criminals.....

[Raiya44]

Oh that brings up another question, Im still in my first week of play but when Monday rolls around what happens if I cant afford to pay the criminals the full amount, do I just pay all the money I have?

I spent the first couple of days fixing up a restorable car so I wouldnt be breaking the 'walk to' rule, even if it doesnt apply to the allowable visits it sounded strange to go strolling around the block alone and unprotected, so my play week started Mon but I didnt get a job until Wed.

My founder joined the military. The story in my mind is that right after graduation the disaster struck, and as he trudged his way back to his hometown in the ever-deepening cold and snow, he joined up with a military convoy. Being a young man fresh out of college and returning to a hometown that is nothing like he remembered, he decided to enlist with the military. I placed the founders lot that Phae created (stripped within an inch of its life so that my founder could afford it) adjacent to the military base, as well as a couple of copies of it so it looks like it is sort of part of the base, maybe bunkers/quarters for the higher ranking. Or those brave/foolish enough to live off the base.. haha! - I cant figure a way to gain body skill however, I was under the impression I would be able to use the equipment at the military base to do so, but it doesnt seem to work..

Also I have the zombie mod in place, Im guessing it wont really do anything until an initial zombie is somehow brought into being in the hood? Not that I am eager to see brains eaten, Im actually worried that it would turn all the non-playables into zombies rather quickly and I would have no one to make a spouse for my heir and the human race would end...

edit - oh! also, I wanted to 'invite over' the girl he had gotten engaged to in college, but the option is not on the phone! I thought if they had red hearts or were engaged we were allowed to invite them over. Hopefully if I lift military I can invite anyone over then it looks like. It was only because his social was tanking... it wouldnt fit my story anyways, it would have had to have been a dream hehe.

[Rayea]

from what i remember, you have to have your founder reach 10 in the military to use the obsticle coiurse, and he cant do any of those interactions (ask over ect) untill he is also at 10 career. then the game gets saved, you take out the military section one rule mod and restart your game, go into your founders lot and he should then be able to use the course and ask his love over?

(peers at Phae to check that right or off a bit) :P
but im not sure but i think also that you still wolndnt be able to invite just anyone over, only your potential spouse casue love is Dumb and dosent care about nuclear winters XD

[Peni Griffin]

Body skill - do you get the option to "jump rope?" Because that is the cheap, fun way to body skill heaven.

[Ileeya]

I was going to use 'jump rope' for body skilling, too, but it's forbidden because of Athletic.

I have a really stupid question. I have heard that you can use lots that have different EP/SP configurations than your own, if you use Cleanpack installer. But how can you tell which items come with which EP's and SP's? I can't use any of Phae's buildings (or several of the others) because I don't have the correct SP's.

Oh, and one more. Phae, you said you highly recommend Pescado's Zombie Apocalypse and ARC for this challenge to make the threat of zombies real. What is ARC?

[jeffallenroberts]

Well, my founder made General and moments ago my pet made it to the top of Security. So far neither has bought me much relief. True, my Founder could marry his collage sweetheart and have an heir, but he'll be an elder before the child reaches teen. Mom is working on Medical. She's only on level 2 and on a day off. Will she have to quit to take care of the kid when dad reaches elder? The obstacle course can't be placed on the lot because it won't fit the approved footprint. I can't afford better beds. Life will just have to go on as it has to date with no improvement, I guess.

Peni, jump rope is restricted by Athlete. Be a couple generations before that is unlocked. Buy a boom box.

[lorinsv60]

Raiya44:
Hmm, maybe this should be obvious, but how is my founder supposed to increase body skills? I thought there was supposed to be a workout option on the cheap radio that is allowed but there is not...

The option to workout to the boombox won't appear if your Sim's Fun level is too high. I usually have them sit and skill something else to drain Fun, then have them workout. It always sort of ticked me off about the boombox being the only way to build Body at the beginning of the challenge. At least once you get three points you can switch to Yoga, which I like better than exercise equipment anyway.

[Phaenoh]

It sounds like everyone is still surviving. That's really good. You know, you could write up your own Sims Stories and post them over in the Sims 2 Story forum (http://www.modthesims.info/forumdisplay.php?f=567). You'd just need decent pictures and a bit of writing flair. Catch all the funny and interesting things that happen along the way, you've already got the plot - survival! You can earn your MTS Storyteller badge that way. (http://www.modthesims.info/images/achievements/59.gif)

I'll look into the issue about the Invite Over, that might have gotten tossed in without regard for the <3 exceptions. You can use Inge's Teleporter Cat to summon over your sweetheart if that was the case.

[MaxiBuckle]

I can't tell you how happy it makes me to see the Apocalypse Challenge is alive, well and continuing to improve!

I'm an old granny with very little time to play Sims, but I have to say you are sorely tempting me to carve out a little time for my old passion.

[Rayea]

well, i finaly made a house and poped my old uni sim into it.
had to make modifications after i got in there, so i am going to have to remake the package (not too difficult) becasue of these.
i have a nice little radio cloned from the boom-box, so that is allowed? the good thing about this lot is, jump rope is impossable inside XD there just is not room lol.

got some pictures for the place, if anyone is interested?
also, i found some links to more great stuff :)

the stuff i had to remove were...i had to swap the bed over. allthough the bunk is absolutely perfect to look at, its not for sleeping as your sims sink into the matress and the covers are invisible. and the top bunk is decor only.
but for decor only it is 100% perfect :)
i also had to move the sandbags at the bottom becasue the mail was getting stuck XD i ended up with a 6k bill befor i realised lmao.

i replaced things in my own version that i didnt want to use in the packed one. stuff i ether dont know where to get, or dont want to use links for (i dont like using pay stuff in lots i upload, to be honest) but they were clones of the same thing prety much (a water barrle sink and toilet)

the bed i eventualy replaced after finding the bunk was deco mostly was the wonderfull asylum bed from GoS :) works fine and with the bedding from the trashed set (the brown one with the bitten sheet and patched sacking looking quilt) looks perfectly scavenged.

i found i have to make the befor houses...AFTER XD the wrecked ones...in other words, make the wreck then fill in the spaces...my befor and after first try was nice house first then wreck it and it wasnt as good as i hoped....

[lorinsv60]

These look great! How are you factoring in the Politics 8x8 footprint or is this mainly neighborhood deco?

[Raiya44]

Mail has started to show up at my founders house. So he checks the mailbox and finds a bill for $5400! Why is it so much? I also have to pay the criminals off today. Yipes!

Update-wise, founder used yoga to get his body skill up. It seems like it shouldnt be allowed but apparently it is. He max'd out the military track, and was able to invite over his fiance. Actually, in the story, he was working at the military base loading supplies when a truck arrived with some medical staff who were going to be starting up the first aid unit. One of the nurses looks familiar.. yes, of course, his college sweetheart. He wastes no time, and asks her to marry him on the spot!

Now I am working on getting her skills up for the medical field, since they cannot have an outing until sim-wednesday. I initially toyed with the idea of having a child first, but then realized they wouldnt be able to go out for a while, since the entire family would have to travel together and the baby would have to grow all the way to child before she could get a job. My founder is trying (so far unsuccessfully) to befriend a pet, however I am not sure I want to do that with the food restrictions in place, I might have to wait until the child grows up and lifts the food restriction, then worry about the pet.

[Rayea]

well i would have to ask the boss (looks at Phae lol) but i think its a 'spirit' of the law house rather than a 'letter' of the law house.
was more concerned with making sure it was off the ground when i started building and didnt want to build another floor.
havent emptied my fridge yet ether since there is only Patty in the house atm and she has only been eating 2 meals at home each week (1 each day off) so i havent had to dump my old scaved fridge outside yet. been building more than playing, and i sent the BF home yesterday so i havent had a lot of playtime for the poor kid
allready lost most of the sandbags due to pets chewing or scratching them XD

one thing thats puzzling me though...the walkbys....i have seen so many damn sims walk thru my lot.
now from a storytelling level it can be explained away as poor cold sims sheltering under my walkway for a moment to get away from the snow but...every day at least one walks thru my non existant yard o.o i have had 3 at least once lol.
i am left to wonder if its just normal for sims game when you have all expansions and stuff packs (this is becasue i have played very little sims so far, i mostly build, then find my Hdd suddenly corrupt and needing re-installing in the past...not THIS time though hehe)

hm..totaly forgot about sims wensday XD Patty has the day off then atm so i guess she could go to the base and chat on her day off.

and now im wondering if i am allowed to use those walkby sims to chat and befriend or are they technicaly *not* there?

i tried making an appartment lot ( 3 houses, each with the 64tile footprint.) worked...sort of.... the two homes at the back were available to rent but the house made ontop of containers wasnt. (i have a non apox sim in the bin i decided to use to test out lots. if he cant use everything, he goes back in and i dont save when i exit to hood. he isnt part of the playables, he's existing in a special dimension behind the Scary Door XD) so i have to tweek it some more. but the buildings themselves look decent (and 2 of em are also inside the 8x8 size.) so i can probably re-copy those two as normal houses once i have more than just one sim in my hood that is part of the chalenge

[Phaenoh]

Raiya, the bill is super high because that's your criminal payoff. Did you notice it came on Monday in the middle of the night? I had wanted to default replace the mailman with the burglar, but I hadn't gotten to that. If you are playing with my modding, remember, you ignore the rules in gray as they are already taken care of for you.

Rayea, as long as you don't go over you 64 floor tiles you are fine. It was good of you to remember about the "not on the ground" rule, some of the houses I had suggested did not meet that, but all new construction needs too. As for the walkbys, they are fine to interact with - as long as they aren't zombies! With the zombie mod installed my walkbys slowly became zombies but it hasn't swept my neighbor like some people are afraid of.

[Rayea]

when it comes to the undead (chemical and radiation versions at least) off the ground is IMPORTANT XD
i have spent too much time playing zombie games to NOT want where i live in a game (even if it is not me living there lol) to live on the ground. bunkers are fine only if they have a secret exit or are defensble by one person with ether a sword, a lot of guns and ammo, or access to a rob-co RoboTurret XD
houses for me are better above ground anyway :)

next question.
if the house is ground floor BUT! i only make the 2nd floor accessable and useable,that counts as allowed, instead of a floor ontop of foundation? (am seeing a house where parts of the top floor are still inhabitable, but the ground floors shattered...i just need a floor of wood that has see thru parts like the bottomfull megaton floors, and a coupe of placeable planks that i can pop over the invisible floor tile Muse made...)

[Ileeya]

I'm glad you clarified the crime payoff. I was thinking I would have super high bills and have to do the familyfunds cheat once a week to pay off the criminals.

[Rayea]

i think the criminals just take your best (ie, most expensive) stuff if you cant pay your friendly neighbourhood crime lord his dues ^^
i remember someone saying they kept taking their best chairs, lol.
they would be hard pressed in my (patty's) place, everything is grungy and cheap XD i have the square table, suburban dining chair and wrecked office chair from fallout in the kitchen and the wrecked loveseat (ea one) along with Silent hill asylum bed in the living area. a medical trolly from the asylum set, and a side table and set of drawers from fallout3 are the rest. thats it XD oh and an oil drum sink and loo (the stuff i swapped out when patty moved in)

as to the keeping your junk in the 8x8, those of us who built on stilts have an advantage :P we shove our junk under the house, where it can stop the Undead Hordes from lurking there and trying to claw us from under our beds :P

oh, how do we even tell if a walkby is a zombie? are they all..green and shuffly like on the sims? (i admit i have never had a sims2 zombie befor lol..or a sims3 one for that matter, even if they are actualy in the game?)

[Raiya44]

Ohh! I thought it was the criminal payoff, but the amount of $5400 did not equal half my lot value (which was like 20,441) so I was confused. That means I get a refund because I paid the mail bill of 5400 and then I also deducted 10220 from myself!!! hah

I was following the instructions given to use family funds, even though it was in grey, I didnt realize the bill would come in the mail!

• Once per week, by midnight, your Sims must pay protection to the mobsters, they charge 50% of your lot value (not family value). Go into buy or build mode and find the lot value from the button at the top left, then use FamilyFunds to subtract the amount.

[jeffallenroberts]

Pheanoh, the Zombie mod doesn't seem to work as aggressively with your mods installed. When I've played it before it trashed a neighborhood fast. This time I've had just one new zombie in a Sim-year and a half with a four zombie start. I don't have a single non-playable zombie. I've gotten used to ignoring them ; ). Of course my played family are all still maxed in Body, just to be sure and to follow the rules.

Edit: Seems I typed too soon. My founder lived and died without seeing a zombie. The next session I played the sim-bin households, including the zombie homes, and Nathan Gavigan showed up to attack during the next community lot visit by my family. Three fights, three defeats, but he did attack.

[Rayea]

jeffallenroberts, what do they look like? the zombies i mean?

i havent seen a sims2 zombie you see. i dont want to accidentaly talk to a walk-by if i cant tell its a zombie XD
(also, did you make the zombies yourself and place em in the hood in housing or what? i thought the mod might randomly generate me a zombie to start me off you see)

more pics time ^^
made a couple new houses.
one is a couple of wooden shacks one of which is ontop of a container.

the other is the Vault-Tech ShowBunker.
it hasnt been too badly devastated (Vault-Tech know how, garenteed not to rust, corrode or generaly go manky for 50 years minimum, or your money back!) it has 3 bunkbeds and a prototype Vault-Tech Service Station for all your food needs...sadly, the Stations program got corrupted, so it only serves....3 kinds of mush, gray, brown and green...and only between the hours of 1200 and 1300hrs...but still, its going to work every day..provided the fusion generators dont pack in

(i used Simlogicals bunk beds and the prison-school server. you use the menu when the sim arrives and choose 'Auto..' then set one of the 6 time slots to the time you want the food server to open, then do it again and choose the next time slot for when it has to close. the food appears, sim rushes over to eat and then after the time is done, it closes again. perfect for a 1 meal a day serving and no fridge. may be cheating, but it *is* a prototype Vault-Tech item hehe [as in, i would only use the bunker once per hood] though once the adventure restrictions are lifted and families can vacation, it might be available elsewhere, such as a hotel? if not, anyone know if it's been moddified to appear on com and away lots?)

[jeffallenroberts]

They are blue and drag one leg behind them. If you haven't made a zombie, you don't have any. The hack makes them aggressive and able to turn anyone they beat in an attack into zombies. It doesn't create any zombies. Kill a Sim and resurrect them for around 1,000 simoliens. That will give you a starter.

[Rayea]

ah, THAT explains it....
that is going to be..difficult XD i couldnt even kill my Kowalski :(
(thats kinda a stargate joke lol...only its true. i made one and even though i made him to drown him..i couldnt do it properly XD and didnt save.)

i think i will have to use the ffs debugger, testing cheats, or vincents sim modder (or mix of all) to make the Zombie Founder. i also have a painting i can use that offers to make a sim anything, then sell the painting out of zombies house.
i take it zombie still has to abide by all the other restrictions in place but the ones that deal with unlocking?

[Ileeya]

Rayea - all of your lots are looking fantastic! I really wish I liked building more. I did end up building my founder's home, but it's kind of a box.

http://i481.photobucket.com/albums/rr179/JondakIrnaxxian/Foundershome.jpg

http://i481.photobucket.com/albums/rr179/JondakIrnaxxian/insidebottomfloor.jpg

http://i481.photobucket.com/albums/rr179/JondakIrnaxxian/yard.jpg
I did give her a fun trash pile in her yard.

I got her all the way up to the top of culinary, then reviewed the rules and realized I broke a whole bunch of them! Even with the mods in place. The rules I broke (not intentionally!) are:

--"You may not invite over any Sims except Sims they are have red hearts with, or are engaged to." I was inviting over BFFs toward the end of her career because she hadn't talked to any of them since college and the relationship numbers were falling.

--"Sims who are not friends with a member of the household may not enter the house." I would have her skilling during her free time, then greet whoever happened to walk by that day so she could have some company because she was always so lonely.

--"Wants and Fears may not be locked."

--"Sims may not purchase or use anything from the Lights category" Crap - she has lights in the house.

--"Sims may not dance at all, including the dance sphere or ballet barre." Crap - she danced a bit with her fiance.

Sigh! So I've decided, rather than call it a failure, I'll continue on without lifting Culinary, even though she reached the top of the career. I had gotten her married immediately after, and the plan was to put the spouse in medical. I'm going to continue with that, and let her have children, and possibly add the dog she befriended to the family. I'll make them wait until the next generation to lift culinary.

Also, under showbiz pet is: "Children and teenagers may not build skill with objects that do not also raise fun." Does that mean children and teens can't use the boombox to workout? Does working out increase fun? I've never really noticed.

[Phaenoh]

Breaking things unintentionally, noticing it and then trying not break them again is allowable. You've lifted Culinary, keep going and try not to mess up to much again, it's a lot of rules and they are hard to remember them all. I'm a little curious about the lights category break, I'd removed all the electric lights from Buy Mode, either you are using CC lights, (which you need to pay close attention to rules before using CC) or you are using candles, which are completely fine. If it's Maxis and I left it in the catalog, you are allowed to use it, no matter what the greyed out rules actually say. I, and others, use catalog mods to rearrange things, so we can't just say no to particular categories, things are removed based on sense and logic instead.

[Ileeya]

It's an overhead CC light that I had placed in the house before moving her in - you can see it in my middle picture. I picked it because of the themed look. But I'm pretty sure I have candles, though, so I can take the lights out and use those, instead.

[Rayea]

yeah, i added nothing but candle based lights in mine, except for the Vault-Tech bunker (it has a couple of fusion gennerators, but i would take the solar pannles out XD having 2 of them and the windmill game the testing sim cash back)
good one for that is the set from parsimonious of anywhere candles :)

i have an empty house if anyones interested. 64 tiles, no furniture, minimal CC from anywhere but MtS
only things that arent are the Insmouth fence, parsims pirate build windows and a door from GoS

[lorinsv60]

Ileeya, your founder's lot looks so dismal and depressing - I love it! With the more lenient 64 tiles vs a a strict 8x8 area in the ruleset, I guess buildings don't have to be as boxy, but it is the more classic Apocalypse look. Anyway, great job on your lot. :)

EDIT: Working out to the boombox does not raise fun. Basically toddlers can get charisma and logic points, and kids/teens are stuck with chess and building cleaning and mechanical skills by doing chores and fixing things.

[Darby]

Ileeya, your founder's lot looks so dismal and depressing - I love it!

:lol: Me too! We AC fans are a different breed, aren't we.

All the pics posted so far look awesome! I need to find and download some of the stuff y'all are using. No plans to do an AC for awhile (I've done pretty much nothing but ACs for years), but it's not a question of whether so much as when...

[Rayea]

hehe. well i can give ya a list of a lot of the stuff i have, Darby :)

*snip* goes the edit fairy (my day off from being the Wedding Fairy lol....)
check my reply to Phae below for the links in another way?

whew..thats the lot i have found that are not at mod the sims...(wow, i didnt think there was so much o.o)

[Ileeya]

Thanks for the compliments, lorinsv60 and Darby!

Yes, I noticed last night that working out to the boombox does not raise fun. Unless I'm missing something, there is no way for children/teens to get any body skills at all, then. My original plan was to skill the heck out of them since they wouldn't have school - but they are very limited in what they can (or will) do. Children are a nightmare. All the other age groups can get at least halfway clean, but the children won't sponge bathe and they're filthy and miserable all the time. They refuse to play chess and they won't use the little cooker oven. You can make them play the violin, though, so at least they can get a few creativity points, but that's about it.

My founder's spouse was supposed to unlock Medical...but he got fired. So I put him in Military...then he got fired. My kids just barely grew into teens, so the family is going to stink for a loooong time. The spouse only has 9 or so days before elderhood, so there's no way he can lift a restriction to save for later. Is he allowed to get a job just for the sake of earning money?

Which brings up a question. Is the mod supposed to make my elders unselectable? I still have complete control over my elder founder - though I don't play her now. She repeatedly carried the babies out to the old junk refrigerators to feed them bottles, even though there was a perfectly good one in the house. Then she deposited one of them on the ground where he passed out! Sounds pretty foggy to me!

http://i481.photobucket.com/albums/rr179/JondakIrnaxxian/junkyardbaby.jpg

http://i481.photobucket.com/albums/rr179/JondakIrnaxxian/junkyardbaby1.jpg

[Rayea]

just checked. the elders info on the front page is grayed out, so they should be unselectable. *edit* uncancelable, not unselectable lol

Once any Sim turns Elder, you may no longer issue any direct commands to them, nor cancel any of their actions. You may still cancel actions that would otherwise break another restriction (such as playing computer games).

is what it says. hm..working as intended? did you try canceling them when trying to carry the tots about?

[Ileeya]

No. I didn't actually do that, but I noticed I was able to select her and issue commands. Now that you mention it, though, I didn't have her do anything since she's not supposed to be issued commands, but it looked as if she would do as directed. I was just wondering if the mod was supposed to make her completely untouchable, like the newborns.

Awesome goodies list! Time to do more grunge shopping! :D

[Phaenoh]

It was supposed to make the completely untouchable like the newborns, so this is a surprise for me. You have all the EPs and SPs right? Are you sure Service Pet is still installed in your Downloads folder? You can get your founder's spouse a job in the last career available under R1, but you can't get started on the next yet. That rule was only a way of incorporating Townies marrying in.

Rayea, can I get you to edit your long links post to use [url = www.website .com ] description here [/url ] so it condenses down into a nice paragraph instead please? (take out the spaces so it formats all correctly)

[Rayea]

um..i wouldnt know how to do it XD
but i'll try something else.
awaiting edit in3....2....1....

[Phaenoh]

um..i wouldnt know how to do it XD I just showed you. You type [url= webaddress ] description words here [/url ] but you don't include the spaces between the = or the []s.

[Darby]

um..i wouldnt know how to do it XD
but i'll try something else.
awaiting edit in3....2....1....

Much appreciated - thank you! :)

[Rayea]

ah XD
*head desk moment*

well i'll leave it like that anyway, im working on a MtS version one at work to post with it XD
(would have finished that one but i had to finish my build and close shop for the day, so internet off and PC to sleep hehe)

i may have to try it sometime :)

[Ileeya]

After going back into the game, the Service Pet was acting like it's supposed to - I couldn't select my elder founder at all. But when her spouse aged, I could select him and issue commands like anyone else, until I saved and exited the lot, then returned. Then he became unselectable.

It's frightful and delightful to have elders you can't control, lol. They are truly out of reach - you can't even peek at their stats.

You can get your founder's spouse a job in the last career available under R1, but you can't get started on the next yet. That rule was only a way of incorporating Townies marrying in.
Ah, I see. My founder's spouse spent the last few days of adulthood milling about the house, watching the little nest egg his wife had built up slowly disappear as the bandits take an ever increasing chunk of money. The bills are up to $7,200 now. Thank goodness the teens grow up soon - they'll be broke before too long at this rate. He wrote a couple of novels, but never got paid for them. They were published, and a copy delivered to his house, but no phone call with money came. I blame that on the bandits, too.

Teens don't gain fun by practicing romance - so they can't skill for that. About the only things mine could do is play chess and play the violin. I had them clean the kitchen and toilet, cook when possible, and repair things when they broke. It doesn't add up that much, but hey, it's a few extra points. They also spend time befriending the women that walk by the house so they'll have future mates.

I can't believe how much harder it is to keep your sims happy when you don't lock wants. Especially since they change everyday. I guess I always took that for granted. The whole family is miserable most of the time, lol.

[Rayea]

i finished my MtS list (then found some mor elinks...*smacks self* typical)

going to try what you said Phae...(for the leftovers)

fallout 3 edging fence (http://www.modthesims.info/download.php?t=328942) and razorwire fencing for your defence bunkers (http://www.modthesims.info/download.php?t=291905) and tornado fencing for your military lots (http://www.modthesims.info/download.php?t=248511)

*hopes that worked properly*

anyway, here is a rar (oopsy, brains being nibbled on, rar not zip doh) of links to grungy, dirty, rusty, industrial and generaly tatty or trashed items here at MtS :)

edit:: great, it worked ^^ now, i only have one more problem....i have the insmouth fences (dune fence and rope fence) but i cant find them here..and insims gone..and beo's sites not got them *sniffles* (goes to look again, eventualy finds only the rope fence at tsr....grrr)

oh, and i forgot the playground set! i use the rope ladder a LOT! (http://www.modthesims.info/download.php?t=412635) becasue zombies have trouble with ropes

[jeffallenroberts]

It's frightful and delightful to have elders you can't control, lol. They are truly out of reach - you can't even peek at their stats.

Yes, it is, which brings up a story that will likely get this reply removed. My Elder founder and his wife, both unselectable, were home with their pregnant daughter-in-law, Meadow (nee Thayer). Both still worked at level 10, and were on days off. Meadow was due that afternoon. Her comfort, fun, and social were near critical. She wanted to make BFF with her Father-in-law, so I sat them down at the chess board. When the above stats were improved and her bladder near failure I canceled the chess. As soon as my founder stood up the Reaper spawned. Before the Reaper reached my Founder, Meadow went into labor. Due to the lag and all, when I had control of the camera my Founder had a Platinum urn! He was Family, so must have scored on the granddaughter. No way to tell now.


The whole family is miserable most of the time, lol.

That is the whole point, it means you're doing it right. Now that I've cleared level R1 They are a lot happier. Last session I cleared Service Pet, but that's all I'll be able to do with R2 until the toddler reaches teen. Meadow's pregnant again and Granny won't last much longer.

[Raiya44]

I am excited to check out the links, I think I spend more time looking for stuff then I do playing my lot! I am thinking of starting another neighborhood with a mid-uni start in which I increase the odds, maybe any double roll, or only roll one die for 6.

In my current lot, I was planning to hold off on getting a pet, but I found a dark gray cat that was already toilet trained, and has 3 other commands learned as well. Its a bit harsh, but if I leave the food out from the one meal a day they cook, even if it spoils the cat can jump up and eat some of it off the counter. Kind of gross but beats starving to death. Once I get the spouse and cat employed that should ease the feeding since they can eat at work I believe.

As a side note, if I do the other neighborhood I am thinking I might remove the sponge bath mod that was recommended. I dont see the challenge in being able to essentially tell them to go wash off, although in my little scenario I imagine they bring in some snow to melt into slush in the sink so they can use it for washing to explain it...

[Rayea]

well sponge bath only works well when they are below half hygene.
if you tell them to use it when your close to, or above half the bar, it gives you little benefit, and hand washing over and over works better.
you could do like i did, get a barrel for water. im currently using oil drum sink in Pattys (its a cyclonesue) but there is a good few bucket sinks and toilets around.
a wooden one that was a castaway shower add on (http://www.modthesims.info/download.php?t=309210) or this bucket bathroom sink and loo (http://www.modthesims.info/download.php?t=91677) recolor of same set (http://www.modthesims.info/download.php?t=188146) and i use lethe s kitchen waterbut and brick stove (http://www.modthesims.info/download.php?t=72971) alot in my old medievil lots. the waterbutt sinks a good item as it makes it look like your sim stores water to wash with. you can think of it as if your sims could also collect rainwater/falling snow.
technicaly it might be radioactive if thats what your apocalipse is, but if yours is something else...(zombie apocalipse from magic/greed/chemicals....Umbrella Corp induced end of the world lol) then the snow and rainwater would be fine.

for me, well the town was allready in the desert, so it was hit less badly by the radiation, and more badly by being cut off from all the rest of the simland necesities like the main watersuply, gas supply and trade routs ect. i decided that it used to be a nuclear nutter place (about 100 sim years ago rich paranoia sims built it for the Bomb Dropping...but after it never did, they retired from panic mode) so it has a lot of left over (mostly unuseable, but still semi usefull in a story way) stuff. if my simmies scaveneged well enough they could find some of this stuff. so the waters dirty (rainwater and snowfall melt mostly) but not totally toxic...the big City that went boom and the power plants that melted down are a good distance over the mountains from my hood hehe.
also,. if you grabbed one of coopers set of storage barrels (http://www.modthesims.info/download.php?t=399654) and used the wheatherd texture, empty view outside, it ends up looking filled with snow (casue i had a old tub outside befor the pets chewed and scratched it up lol, and it had snow on it and it looked like it was inside it too) so you sim could look like they were collecting fallen snow in that

[Pearlie]

I really love this version - it actually makes sense. I'm planning to play with TS3, just trying to figure out how to make the TS3 only careers make sense..

[Rayea]

well most of the rules would work the same for sims3 right? the mods wouldnt but the rules would.
appart from the additional careers such as interior designer and fireman ect lol, most careers would be okay.
ghost hunter would cary over into the paranormal i guess, hairdressing/tatooist would be in art or entertainment? the best usefull one would be tinkering / engineering/ inventing. allthough the time machine would be banned becasue its too tempting to go back and stop the Event hehe.
maybe we can get a sims3 version running parralelle to this one?

[Ileeya]

That's a funny story, Jeff. Grandpa got his grandchild just in time.

I'm having a blast with this so far. My two boys grew up, one got a job in medical and the other in military. The one in medical was fired. So now he stays at home with the babies, and his wife will attempt to lift medical. These people are going to be sponge bathing forever, lol. At least they can eat whatever and whenever they want.

[MaxiBuckle]

You know phaenoh this is how I tend to feel about challenges. Challenges have rules for reasons otherwise they wouldn't be challenges, but at the same time there is no point if its not actually fun. For the apocalypse hood I'm building I downloaded the no social worker hack because where the bloody hell is the social worker coming from in an apocalyptic society. Also I decided no school for kids because what the hell school are they going to. Instead your founder has to spend so much time reading to them otherwise they are ignorant. I'm not sure how I would restrict that maybe your founder has to put the bookcase in their inventory when they are off the lot or something...


Oh, you are so right. There would not be a social worker in a post apocalyptic society, but the threat of disease would be extremely high.

A social worker removes a child forever because of failed grades resulting from to hygiene failure. In the more realistic post apocalyptic world, the child would become sick and risk death from bacterial infection.

There would be no school buses, and the fallout of not reading to your child and instructing them at home would be that they skill more slowly throughout their lives.

[Rayea]

hm..i just found something in a redon RTFM that might be usefull. its a hack that limits the walkbys to sims actualy in your hood.
it might be usefull, might not, what do you think, boss?

*peers at Phae to see*

http://www.moreawesomethanyou.com/ffs/al/hacks look for the one called localwalkby
it says in the redone rtfm localwalkby.package

Sim residential walkbys now will only be people who actually live in your subneighborhood, so it will greatly prefer actual neighbors, not "guy who walked all the way here from Pleasantview".

this might force the zombies to walkby sooner rather than later, and limit the walkbys a bit. i swear, i have had 3 sims per day now for over a week. usefull for social but without the

interactwogreet.package
Has it always bothered you that you have to greet people, thus giving them free run to traipse through your house at will, even if the only thing you plan to do is pummel the living crapola out of them for kicking your trashcan? Want to just unceremoniously pummel the living crap out of them, or say a word or two to passers-by, and then let them go on their way, without having wave, hug, or do whatever it is that sims insist on doing? Want to beat the snot out of that cow? Go for it!

it takes me too long to cancle qued action, get down the ladder and then say hi.not as bad for sims living on foundation houses but all my homes i want to place playable in will be on 2nd floor, and i plan to place zombified sims in the others...what do you think?

*edit
well after testing..nether seems to have any affect. same mount of walkbys, same amount of the same sims. so...that answers that question XD
on a happier note..Patty made general just 30 mins ago and platinumed out casue her dreem was to be a general :D
now i just have to find her a mate and get the next generation cracking befor she gets too old hehe

[jeffallenroberts]

*edit
well after testing..nether seems to have any affect. same mount of walkbys, same amount of the same sims. so...that answers that question XD

If you have constructed your 'hood properly, you shouldn't have any sub-hoods except for the University. Therefor the hacks won't have any visible effect. I'm using a hack by Cyjon called "Vampire Walkbys" (sorry, no link) that adds more walkbys at night if your goal is to increase the number and variety of your walkbys.

[Ileeya]

http://i481.photobucket.com/albums/rr179/JondakIrnaxxian/topmilitary.jpg
One of my founder's sons finally unlocked military. Only 6 hours before hitting elderhood!

http://i481.photobucket.com/albums/rr179/JondakIrnaxxian/firedmedical.jpg
His brother, however, got fired from his job in the medical field. So I got him married to the first girl I could get him to fall in love with, she had two kids, and then went into medical. But I didn't leave her enough time to unlock it. So I've failed to unlock medical three times now. :faceslap:

http://i481.photobucket.com/albums/rr179/JondakIrnaxxian/fierce.jpg
They finally managed to take in a stray, named Tigger, who got a job in Security. I was hoping for a large dog for this job, but you can't deny the fierceness of this little guy. Sadly, Tigger was fired. I'm having lots of luck so far! I'm assuming that dogs have to follow the same employment rules as the humans - that they can't take a job in the same career again? Does anyone know?

This is way harder than the original Apocalypse Challenge in that you have to clear the entire first round before you can start on the second. I now have all these useless adults in the house who were supposed to be unlocking the second round, but we're still in R1. This Apocalypse is going to take forever, lol.

[lorinsv60]

Wow, Ileeya, that's tough... I didn't think of that.

Just curious, is it bad job performance or chance cards getting your Sims fired? If it's chance cards, Snooty Sims Chance Card Guide (http://www.snootysims.com/infoindex.php?id=careercards06) (Base, Uni and Seasons careers only) is a great resource for avoiding the options that cause your Sim to get fired. I've noticed the Seasons careers seem to have quite a few "both are risky" options, though.

Also, this thread at Boolprop (http://forums.boolprop.com/viewtopic.php?f=50&t=23074) lists the pet careers as well and was actually what I used for all the careers in my AC, but I've heard that a choice in one of the human careers is wrong and I found under the Law career the descriptions for Level 6 sb Personal Injury Attorney and Level 7 sb Family Law Attorney (chance card results jive with the actual levels, though), so I'd advise sticking with Snooty for the humans and use the boolprop link for the Pet careers (though once you see what the Pets are, it's pretty easy to remember which ones you'll want to choose). ;)

I haven't been able to find a guide for the FT careers. :turtle:

[Phaenoh]

Nope, sorry lorinsv, that would be cheating. I've hacked the chance cards to not let your ignore them, but I haven't made them any more or less risky or popping up. I also hacked the jobs to fire upon missing a single day so I'm not surprised you are getting fired more often. MATY does have a list of right and wrong answers that you could memorize, or try to remember the key phrases. That's a lot to remember and still kinda cheaty, but I think after failing to lift a career more than once you could take a look at that chart to help. ;)

Ileeya, you might want to lift Law as soon as you hit R2, that way you can move them all out and spread out your hood a bit. You are starting to sound a bit crowded, can we see a pic of your 'compound'? Its interesting to notice that starting off with a slower pace at breeding, you might actually do better in this challenge, but that makes sense too. If the world has gone to hell, do you really want to bring that many kids into it just to watch them all suffer because they all have to fight for the same rations, same bed, same space.

[Ileeya]

Thanks, lorinsv, but peeking at the chart would give an advantage, and I kind of like randomness. :o)

Law is one of the front runners for R2 for me. Or maybe Intelligence. I am ever so sick of the family getting roaches. They are obsessed with running outside and stomping on them every few minutes and then getting the flu. It would be nice to be able to hire an exterminator!

Three of the elders have died of old age, so the house is more manageable. I did breed a little too much at first. But I actually did have a plan - it just didn't work, lol. Back years ago, when I played the original Apocalypse Challenge, it didn't matter which order the restrictions were lifted, so I had several adults working on them at the same time. But this one plays different. And I like it. I may go architecture soon, and just build another floor up. That would help a lot, as well. And the breeding will be kept to a minimum for a bit. There are currently 6 people living in the house plus the dog.

http://i481.photobucket.com/albums/rr179/JondakIrnaxxian/FirstFloor.jpg
The first floor. It's 8x8, which includes the landing at the door.

http://i481.photobucket.com/albums/rr179/JondakIrnaxxian/SecondFloor.jpg
2nd floor. It's not a pretty building, but it's functional. Sleeping for 4 plus the raggedy little recliner for napping. They sleep in shifts, with the working adult(s) getting first dibs.

[lorinsv60]

I thought I liked it rough, but it's clear now I've got nothing on you. Your pictures are wonderful... I'll just sit back and enjoy watching the filth and misery then. :D

[Rayea]

if you are having trouble with sleeping in shifts becasue there isnt enough room for beds, try these bunks ^^
the shelf beds at simlogical (http://www.drealm.info/simlogical/sl/Sims2Pages/Sims2_Shelfbeds.htm)
save the double bed version for after you loft the sleeping restrictions casue its better than 3 rest, but the singles are perfect

the grab the natural (and atomic-neon if you want also lol) recolors from GoS here shelby made nice worn recols in natural (http://www.digitalperversion.net/gardenofshadows/index.php?topic=15100.0)

all you do is place the botom one, then moveObjects on and use the [ and ] keys to move the other beds up and down. i have had three in a line and you just use a sim in game to set the top two bunks at intersecatble and then sims can use them. admitedly, they get on the bottom bunk while the other bunks bedding moves, then they float up to it but those bunks are a godsend for a crampd apocalipse house hehe. i bought the double and 2 singles and made a kinda double bunk from them. my sims dosent use the bottom to sleep in, she's only going to use it to woowhoo in once she is married. (which is why i got 2 top beds lol) once i realised it was too good to use. (i think you have to have appartment life to use the up and down shiftables, but we're supposed to have all eps to play the apox anyway lol)

and the best bit? with the worn natural recolors, the rustic set of the beds (not the modern ones but ya might as well grab those anyway lol, i did for my Vault-Tech bunker) look like they were built for packing sims into shacks like this...they were originaly made for cabin beds in caravans and similar but i think we found their natural home here :)

[Ileeya]

LOL! They're pathetic, aren't they? But I'm loving it. Thanks, lorinsv.

Rayea - I thought about these beds before I started, but I wasn't sure if that would fall under the 'unfair advantage' category since I could squeeze more sleeping area into a small space. They would certainly fit, though, wouldn't they? Thanks for the links - love the recolors!

http://i481.photobucket.com/albums/rr179/JondakIrnaxxian/Medicaltop.jpg
OMG I finally lifted medical! FINALLY! The 4th gen. kid is now a teen - he'll finally know what it's like to bathe. The second generation lived and died never knowing what a bathtub was. And the poor little doggie, Fierce Tigger, who is now an elder, will finally get his first bath. I don't even care if it takes another whole generation to life the Pet Security restriction before I can move on to R2 -the whole family can BATHE. The kids, especially, are insufferable. They're hygiene is always in the red, and they're constantly clogging up everyone's way by obsessing over the sink. You tell them to do something and they ignore you and go to the stinking sink. I've actually locked them in their bedrooms a couple of times because they were annoying me so much. Happier sims are on the way!

http://i481.photobucket.com/albums/rr179/JondakIrnaxxian/ride.jpg
Check out that ride. We're assuming that's an armored limo. :rofl:

[Rayea]

well i dunno about it being unfair casue i guess you could also make bunk beds with the osmp stuff, or just use the gray recolors of the grand trianon or the metal institutional beds from simlogical too...but i can understand what you mean.

im thinking of uploading an empty build house pack actualy. a few homes with nothing but the walls ect, so fewer links for me to have to remember (im terrible at it sometimes) so in general i wouldnt have to have too many links just to the build and walls/floors.
so i just wana check something else first (or a couple of somethings)
64 tiles, is that interior tiles (so your walkways are not counted, or only counted if they are 2tiles wide becasue a 1tile wide walkway cant have a sim do anything on it) or all tile that can be accessed? i usualy use a 1tile wide only walkway because it looks more apocalipse like...
(another thing, anyone seen a wooden slat floor with see-thru parts like the metal ones Phae and co did with the megaton bottomfull floors? i realy wan to make rickety looking constrainFloorElevation wooden bumpy slat walkways...)
*thinks* i thinks thats the main question i forgot to ask about the tile restrictions, so yeah...walkways counted or only counted if a sim can do anything but stand and go 'its snowing' all day long on? lmao (mine do it all day as i have winter as all 4 seasons)

[Ileeya]

I counted the landing area as part of my 64 tiles. I originally started it as a 1 tile entryway, but after the family grew, it became very clustery with people and animals all trying to go past each other and everyone getting stuck. I had to expand it to 2 tiles, so I moved in the wall of the house in a little - I didn't add any extra tiles. I wasn't sure if walkways were supposed to be included in the 64 tiles or not, so I did.

[Rayea]

i did the same, but now i think about it, i guess we need to ask the boss :)

BOSS?

:P yae or nae, Phae :)

hm, that reminds me...(i was walking over to morrisons for the boss at the time :P ) i have been using 64 tiles total, not 64 tiles as my base...becasue i caught myself wondering how you managed to get so much space. then i remembered you saying your base size was 8x8...*does a calculation on watch* yup thats the magic number. so have i cheated my sims out of another layer of room they were allowed or is upstairs optional?
all my currently build lots use just those 64 tiles as space with no upstairs. but i have a groundprint for one thats 64 tiles with the upstairs *included in the 64 itself*.
so...have i oopsied becasue i didnt build upstairs (if its optional then thats not so bad, the next generation of my builds can have them instead ^^)

[Ileeya]

Yes, I have two floors. Under Architecture it says: "You may not build on more than two floors above ground (ground level, next floor, next floor, flat roof is the highest allowed). You may have an accessible flat roof and place items there, and you may have an awning above that to comply with Music restrictions. Basements do not count against this rule."

So you can have a basement, too, without breaking the rule. I've recently added a ladder leading up to the roof, with an awning covering part of it. So far, just the doggie bed and toy are up there, but after I lift Architecture, I may wall it in and make it another house level.

[Rayea]

ah.
so it looks like the seccond floor does not count towards the 64 tile rule unless it went over the 64 tiles you originaly used on the bottom? (floor i mean)
and here was me using a 64 tile TOTAL rule XD no wonder there wasnt room to swing a cat (or sim) in my homes lmao
well my first gen sims for the apox can continue to live in those small pokey homes, and then once the law restrictions and move em out a bit to the bigger ones hehe ^^
and i can now build bigger homes with the same amount of bottom but optional upstairs :) and if i like them enough, upload empty unfurnished versions so you can trashify em yourselves (or not hehe)

[Ileeya]

I thought the 64 tiles pertained to each floor. So you can have 2 floors in the beginning and one basement - 64 tiles for each. Yeah, having an 8x8 space to live in would be really tight once you added a spouse and child. The beds, themselves, would take up a lot of room. I see why you really needed those shelf beds, now!

[lorinsv60]

8x8 area (or 64 tiles for less boxy) should be allowed for each level.

[Rayea]

great ^^ then i have some empty (unfurnished) lots for peeps

the first ones are from befor, when i was restricting myself to 64 tiles total, but can still be usefull for the chalenge (call em mini-lots)

there is the container house. its built ontop of a couple of containers for strength so the floors dont give too much. 2 seperate rooms, so kitchen/bathroom and bed/livingroom i guess.
(hm, cant seem to get it to take my rar file)

[Rayea]

anyway, i wil show the pics here, and work out the spannering later hehe.
the seccond one is an old abandoned farm with a large old (empty) grain silo

this one has 3 sperate rooms, the kichen and bathroom together (so you only need one sink lol) a sperate living room are that can later be swapped into a babys room if needed maybe and a third room for sleeping in (mine has 6 bunks in with the cabin bunks hehe)

[Rayea]

lastly, a big (for me lol) bunker thats from after the 64 tile total period.

2 floors, a parking space for if you want to grab the junkyard car fixer upper, and plenty of razorwire to kee p out the neighbours..assuming the neighbrous are the undead that is. this ones got a mixture of fences but its all from mod the sims

[lorinsv60]

Wow, those all look really great, and your bunker looks AWESOME!!

(Btw, did you know the gridlines in Buy- and Build-Mode don't show up when you click the color swatch tool thingie?)

[Rayea]

yeah, i just didnt notice i was still in fence mode XD
im just wondering why it wouldnt take the rar file. someone uploaded their images and files on page 2 or 3 i think it was, the factory. do youhave to keep the rar or zip files in a special place?

*edit. i just cant seem to get it to take the files :( i get a error 500 when using the normal mode and it just sits there prosessing on the old mode...nothing is over the 10mg limit so i dunno why is whining at me.

[lorinsv60]

Haha, it just occurred to me the gridlines are good for compliance audits. ;)

[Ileeya]

Those are really awesome, Rayea! Great job. Did you say you were going to upload them? I was thinking that after I got my Apocalypse Challenge done, I might do a kind of military/post apocalyptic style Prosperity Challenge using this hood. Your big bunker would come in handy.

http://i481.photobucket.com/albums/rr179/JondakIrnaxxian/Tiggerbath.jpg
Tigger was the first to use the new bathtub.

http://i481.photobucket.com/albums/rr179/JondakIrnaxxian/Kirby.jpg
And cheers to Kirby who unlocked Pet Security and enabled the family to move on to R2! I had my adult male get a job in Intelligence because I think that is the one that feels the most restrictive. Two of the elders passed away, so the house only has 4 people living in it now.

I'm having a glitch with my repo man. He gets out of his truck, but then leaves without taking anything, and the bills are gone. I'm not sure if I one of my mods is conflicting with it, but I don't have anything that alters repo men in my game. HDCU doesn't turn up anything. Maybe I'll pull out everything and see if it's still a problem.

[Rayea]

yeah, i was going to upload 3 of them last night (the ones in the pictures) but i cant get the attatchment part to take my rar files.
does this mean if i try to make a full upload it will still give me error 500?
(i kinda wanted to just upload em here on the thread hehe, so they would stay in the alt version thread.)

also, i got a comic compilation today andin it was a zombie version of big brother XD he who is last survivor standing wins and gets out of the house..now THATS a big brother i would watch :D (wonder if there is a way to do that here some how?)

(edit2: im not sure they would get past moderation Phae, casue my picture taking skills arent up to the rules i read. plus im not sure i can use the clean installer as last time i did, it only worked up to seasons or so. and i cant get any info about what expansions and stuff packs it supports now, only the info on what its update numbers are ect :( so that also means i cant upload these ones. infact the only one i might be able to upload is a 8x8 one i made. but again, without the clean installer i dont think im allowed to upload here. have them on a file site but not sure if its against rules to point peeps at them in a thread, or if its okay to in a PM ect. been so long since i uploaded anything here.)

[Phaenoh]

Rayea, you can't upload them in this thread. You need to upload them the normal way, through moderation. Once they've been approved, I'll add them to the list of suggested living arrangements.

Illeeya, it might be that your bills are so high you just don't have enough stuff for him to repo. Does your $$ change when that happens?

Please guys, can we get back on topic of actually playing the challenge? I think I've settled all the rules, now I want to hear how your survivors are ... surviving. Illeeya, you are officially the first person ever to get to R2, congrats!!! You are a Bronze Apox Survivor, keep going!

[Ileeya]

No, the money doesn't change after the repo man comes. You may be right. Nothing the family has is worth much of anything. Maybe I'll throw something expensive in the yard to test.

R2 - here I come! :bunny:

[nuidyaforever]

Hi everyone! VT is back, and ready to get started, after being way too busy with other stuff. What did I miss?

OK, maybe 'ready to get started' is a tiny bit optimistic. I still have a half-built hood awaiting completion and I want to get that done first. It's not a challenge, but it is post-apocalyptic, and I'd be having fun with the building if I didn't hate building. I'm just struggling with the community lots, as I've decided that my mutant survivors have set up camp in an abandoned university, but aside from the premade colleges (which I never use because they're too modern and ordinary, alien in LFT aside) I have no idea what one looks like. (Writing from England, where colleges work differently, and I don't go out much anyway) Hmm. So any new projects are on hold until I finish that, which could take a while unless anyone has any tips on building abandoned student unions that don't look like abandoned shoeboxes. :)

- VT

[Ileeya]

I'm not a builder either, nuidya. I downloaded community lots for this challenge. I did build my home lot though...which looks like a box, but it's functional and gets the job done.

The repo man is working just fine. I plunked some expensive statues down in the yard, and he was all too happy to take them when the bills were past due.

[jeffallenroberts]

Illeeya, you are officially the first person ever to get to R2, congrats!!! You are a Bronze Apox Survivor, keep going!

Hey, I thought I announced I'd made it to R2 way back in post 106. I've gone nowhere since, but I did make it that far. I'm just waiting for the kids to grow up so I have someone to start clearing something in R2. The son is slated for Politics. The jury is still out on the daughter. I'm leaning toward Journalism, but Oceanography and Education look more useful.

[Phaenoh]

Whoops, you are right, jeff. I missed you saying you had made it into R2 because it was at the very bottom of your post underneath a quote. You are also officially a Bronze Apox Survivor. Congrats to you both.

[Ileeya]

:up: Congrats, Jeff.

After clearing medical, it is so much easier to keep the family happy, especially the kids. They'll play chess, now, for hours, whereas before, they refused because their hygiene was always in the red. They actually refused to do a lot of things. The family is overall still miserable because they rarely get what they want since I can't lock in wants, yet. The elders, in particular, cry all the time. But the family is in a much better place than it was at the beginning.

[nuidyaforever]

I haven't started yet, but I've come up with my backstory for the challenge. I had two goals with the backstory, which were to explain how the hood got into that state (especially as I'm going for a mid-uni start, which sounds to me like the most fun way to start off) and to give a plausible reason why the challenge family ages and the townies do not. I opted for a sort of "science-fantasy" theme, and from that came up with this:

The setting is a world that, at the start, is similar to our own with two major exceptions: 1) technology is powered by magical means and 2) there are no humans, the world is populated by another race that is vaguely humanoid with different genetics. (Large collection of custom skins and eyes ahoy!) My founder will be a young genius studying at an academy for advanced techno-magical research. He is conducting private experiments involving tinkering about with time, which is never a good idea. If I roll double sixes during uni, one of his experiments will go horribly wrong; if I don't, then he will create a machine of some sort and demonstrate it at graduation... and that will go horribly wrong.

Either way, he will find himself in the middle of a frozen wasteland which, of course, is his hometown. Only he's been transported into the future, several thousand years to be exact. Everyone else has just stopped going there (making excuses again, this time for the annoying "it's only one region that's been devastated by disaster, but no one on the outside is doing anything to help and the only ones on the inside who can are blood relatives of this one random Sim" thing that has always bugged me). However, all the townsfolk he knew from his own time are still there, not aging, due to side effects of the experiments. (This is also why it's always snowing.) But living an immortal life in a perpetual winter has driven most of them mad. A few have managed to keep their sanity and set up some basic community lots, and when he learns what happened, the founder will of course step in to help. The place where he lands, as another side effect, is a small zone where time still moves, so anyone brought into that area will begin to age again. This zone will expand over time (as I unlock the ability to move Sims out) until the entire region is restored.

I'm quite proud of that. I think it turned out pretty well to say I only took five minutes to come up with it. :D My only issue is starting with a male founder. Nothing against the guys, but my personal Simmer's Code happens to include a rule that all hoods must be VT Original Settings and all VTOS must be matriarchal to some degree, which is difficult to pull off with a male founder. (I have noticed that the rules might restrict you from moving a Sim in before the Hopelessness restriction is lifted, but say nothing about not breeding with the townies... but then that would make working a little tricky with a baby in the house, and whether or not the rule mods stop the social worker, I'm playing other hoods too, so I'm not using the rule mods...)

- VT

[Phaenoh]

Nuidya, that all sounds fun! There are a couple things I'd like to point out. Apparently the odds of not rolling double sixes before you make it out of Uni are quite high, so just look out for plain doubles instead. Secondly, “Why do they call it nuclear winter? Because everything is dead. The snow you see is toxic ash.”. Thirdly, there is nothing wrong with using the townies as sperm donors, but the pregnancy rule still applies. You will have a bit of a harder time with keeping the social worker at bay with a baby in the house and you at work, so good luck with that one. Though, nothing wrong with using the kids as your first lifts, but I think we proved that kids kinda hate not being able to shower... I'm interested to hear how it all turns out for you!

[nuidyaforever]

Thanks for the feedback, Phae. Any doubles it is, and as for the baby thing - you have to be a little insane to try an Apocalypse in the first place if you ask me, so why not go completely insane like my timeless townie survivors?

(As far as the snow goes, hey, alternate universe, it could be snow OR toxic ash OR some other third thing entirely. It could be a mixture of all three. It could be an ice demon in the sky with really bad dandruff. Either way, it's freezing and there's lots of it. ;) )

And just so you all know, I'm actually called VT. I just named my account after my favourite 'hood.

- VT

[Rayea]

wait, no one told me my founder had to be MALE? o.o i started with a girl (Patty lol)
VT, that sounds both weird and fantastic :) makes me think that not only is it your founders fault at technomage academy (oopsies, there goes the neighbourhood lol) but that maybe his returning also helped casue more chaos becasue his temporal constancy bubble expanding clashing eventualy with the temporaly static bubble that his accident casued, and its backlash went backwards causing even more mess (yeah, i loved that effect on LiS movie and the crstal bubbles)

im not sure what to do now though. Patty got lucky, an old friend from Uni was a walkby and when she checked him out, he was her type :) they did first kiss and everything and he's her guy now. but if i was supposed to start with a male..do i stick the militaryR1 back in and carry on from him or carry on reguardless or start over?

[Phaenoh]

There is no rule saying the founder needs to be male. It just tends to be easier as they are fertile longer. Have your founder get a little May-December action ;) Keep going with your challenge Rayea! Good luck!

[Babahara]

I'd love to play it, but I just can't memorize all the rules! It sounds downright impossible, even with the mod collection there are too many other rules to memorize.

[Rayea]

thats why Phae added a small wordfile to the mod set. what i did was unrar'd the files, made a seperate folder (OMG ZOMBIES lol) and placed everyhting for the zombies in there. then made a shortcut to the list of rules that cant be made into mods on my desktop and when i am not sure, i alt+TAB button to my desktop and scan thru them. if it isnt listed in those, and can be done then its usualy okay

(and i finaly got my stuff sorted. if you want to take a look, check my sig for a pointer to my old forum heheh. i have pics there in the housing for the apocalypse section)

[Babahara]

Hmm, well, I think that if I try, I will break a lot of rules without ever noticing.

Please clarify the rules.

This rule puzzles me:
- You may not order groceries for delivery via the phone or computer.

Does it mean that once you run out of food, your sims will starve? After all, fishing is not allowed, either.

Another rule:
- You may not invite over any Sims except Sims they are have red hearts with, or are engaged to.

But in that case it would be impossible to marry anybody, as you can't gain red hearts with a sim during one single conversation. Do you have to wait till they happen to come again?

Another question is about the zombie mod. If my sim is turned into the zombie, it breaks the rule of having no supernaturals, right? Zombies are immortal. I guess it's too dangerous to use this mod then, as it can ruin the whole challenge randomly.

Rayea, the link in your sig doesn't work.

[Rayea]

no, what you do is take your fridge and dump it outside, probably under the house. then you buy a new FULL fridge.
untill certain restrictions are lifted (like the ones that stop your STR7 and below sims from leaving the home lot at all) there are no groceries to go buy from. so sims just buy a new fridge instead (and consider themselves having gone scavenging for grocieries) hm..we need to get a food bank com lot set up....maybe i will try making a garrage sale place hehe
i clicked on my link d it took me to here
http://www.phpbbplanet.com/rithfree/index.php?c=16&mforum=rithfree
have you got some hardcore anti-sales blocker maybe? the free forums have banners unfortunatley, that might be affecting if you have something like that. or antivirus and protections turned to max.
try this one, which is direct. even logged out , i managed to get to the forum hehe
http://www.phpbbplanet.com/rithfree/viewtopic.php?t=157&mforum=rithfree

[Babahara]

no, what you do is take your fridge and dump it outside, probably under the house. then you buy a new FULL fridge.
untill certain restrictions are lifted (like the ones that stop your STR7 and below sims from leaving the home lot at all) there are no groceries to go buy from. so sims just buy a new fridge instead (and consider themselves having gone scavenging for grocieries)
Thanx, I see now. Still willing to try this challenge. ;)

i clicked on my link d it took me to here
http://www.phpbbplanet.com/rithfree/index.php?c=16&mforum=rithfree
have you got some hardcore anti-sales blocker maybe? the free forums have banners unfortunatley, that might be affecting if you have something like that. or antivirus and protections turned to max.
try this one, which is direct. even logged out , i managed to get to the forum hehe
http://www.phpbbplanet.com/rithfree/viewtopic.php?t=157&mforum=rithfree
I've got no idea what's wrong, but both links do not work, they say "your PC is not connected to the Internet". I know that youtube is blocked here, but nothing else. Surely these aren't youtube links, though...

[Rayea]

no, they arent u tube, but the banner ads might be doing it. which means the mediafire would also be likely to do the same becasue that also has banner ads?
on a sader note, my sims2 instilation just BFBVFS so no more sims2 for a while.
its showing the same simptoms as my last problem, not loading at all, closing the prosess seconds after it appears and similar.
i removed the last things i installed and the last things i installed BEFOR this also, but nether of these have had any luck, and last time it happend, i had to do a total reinstall of windows to fix it *sigh* becasue every time i uninstalled sims2 then reinstalled sims2, it worked till i turned the pc off then jumped me once i turned it back on again. and i dont think i will have time to sit about redoing things yet again with my current shedule for next month being sleep/work/eat/sleep rinse and repeate.

(BFBVFS = Big Fiery Ball Visible From Space)

yes, it takes time to get a sim to love you but alot of sims walk by and the locals do this alot.i mean ALOT lol. so you can talk to them alot and flirt and hug and stuff if they like your sims back.
zombies, well if a sims you are playing goes zombie (thru fightclub fighting interaction and loosing) you have to move them out of your lot to another lot, and keep lpaying them as normal but they cant progress the chalenge. if this is your Founder, yes its bad casue you have to start again, unless your Founder has a spouse and/or kids who can carry on the Good Fight. (at least, i *think* thats the way it would work)

*edit again
just have to tell you guys about a place i just found. i allready have some of the creators work from GoS but her older site has some absolutely AwesomeSauce items on it, and links to some real gems hit the see all button to get links to stuff at GoS too (http://javiera.dreamwidth.org/) her name is Ja and she has a totaly awesom looking desert replacement that is fallout extracted terrain, and road covers that have cracked asphalt and extraced fallout3 hood deco, cardboard box babyroom gear...oooh i love the stuff even if i cant use it atm :)

[Ileeya]

VT - I'm kind of curious to see how that's going to work out, too, as I thought we weren't allowed to leave children alone.

But in that case it would be impossible to marry anybody, as you can't gain red hearts with a sim during one single conversation. Do you have to wait till they happen to come again? I had my founder fall in love while in college. I used the Uni time she had (before I rolled the double 6's) to make friends and find a mate. Otherwise, it would be very difficult to breed.

I've lifted politics - so now my sims can enjoy maternity leave, they can take a job in the same career if they get fired, and, although I should be allowed to ignore chance cards, I'm still choosing an option.. And I've also lifted Pet Service - so the foggy elder illness is a thing of the past. Now sims have more time to lift restrictions.

Life continues to get easier - though most of the sims are still unhappy. Not being able to lock in wants makes it difficult. But I have to confess that I broke a rule on purpose because I just couldn't take it anymore. They had roaches for the third time, and every five minutes all the family members were obsessed about running downstairs and stomping on them. They were driving me batty. I didn't particularly care that they had them, and it didn't bother me that they were crying about it all the time, but the stopping what they were doing every five minutes - and then of course everyone was always getting the flu, which was in danger to spreading to their townie friends, who would be sick forever and keep bringing the sickness back into the house. I would have simply kept the door locked unless one of them was working - but the doggie needed to go outside to potty. It was so freaking annoying that I almost quit playing altogether. So, my bad. Next time I'll try to man up and let it ride. :faceslap:

So a word to future players - keep an eye on your garbage can. Your cranky teens will go down and kick it over, even if you try to stop them, and jerk townies will walk by and kick it over for no reason.

[Darby]

I would have simply kept the door locked unless one of them was working - but the doggie needed to go outside to potty.

When you think about it, it's kinda funny what our human sensibilities bring to the situation. In-game, there's not really a problem with letting a pet pee indoors, is there? ;)

I empathize, though. The roach/flu thing has been VERY hard on some ACs I've done in the past! I remember one time when the roaches made it inside the house, and I actually just put walls around them. That helped (still had some outside, iirc), but it was a pain having a 1x1, inaccessible "room" taking up space in the middle of things! :lol:

[Ileeya]

LOL! That's pretty funny.

I guess, in hindsight, it wouldn't have hurt anything to let Ollie pee on the floor. But you're right - the idea is gross and I've always taught the dogs to go outside. What's funny, though, is that with only one bathroom, the humans pee on the floor more often the dog ever would! :P

[jeffallenroberts]

I solved the roach problem by putting my trashcan inside the fence with a locked gate. The pet has the whole lot to pee in, but Townies can't get the can. Grandma's Comfort Soup will knock out the flu and Family Perks are unlocked with R1. HTH

P.S. I'll be away for the weekend for RL fun; if you call running around in a kilt and sword RL ; ). See you Sunday night.

[Ileeya]

I think running around in a kilt and sword sounds like a blast! ;)

If I'm lucky enough to have a family sim (I roll them randomly), then I'll have access to Grandma's Comfort Soup. And I like the idea of enclosing the trashcan, but that doesn't stop the townies from getting sick and never getting better. They'll transfer the illness back. Or does the soup cure them, too? Still, it's a lot more realistic than spraying - sigh, dangit, I just couldn't take it. :rolleyes:


http://i481.photobucket.com/albums/rr179/JondakIrnaxxian/fortress.jpg
I've lifted Architecture. So now the family can enjoy much more space. I've added on to the house, and it's looking like a fortress.

http://i481.photobucket.com/albums/rr179/JondakIrnaxxian/homey.jpg
It has almost a homey look to it now, the family can enjoy a wider dining space and a second bathroom. I also put in another small bedroom and a piano. Things are looking up.

One of the adults is in Intelligence. I think he's been demoted almost as many times as he's been promoted. :faceslap: I'm hoping he can actually lift the restriction before he dies of old age. At least he can still advance his career now that he's an elder.

http://i481.photobucket.com/albums/rr179/JondakIrnaxxian/heiress.jpg
And this...is what the heiress was wearing when she morphed into an adult. This is the goofiest outfit, yet, besides one of the males wearing mismatching plaid 2 generations ago. I'm going to have to look at this for her entire adulthood. :rofl:

Since the newspaper is being published again, adults looking for a job may only take the first one listed. One of the first ones that came up (that hadn't already been lifted) was Crime. The heriess's husband got Science.

[Rayea]

i wouldnt say its goofy looking, but it is definately not apropriate, those tights will last about a day runing from things trying to eat you after an apocalypse.
i plan to make a start again once i fix the game (be it reinstall og game or windows) and im going to make a bigger effort to make everything built BEFOR i start with the mods.
so i will build the buildings (befor lifted restrictions and after restriction livted versions i will need) in a seperate 'hood and then make a new actual hodd for the chalenege (so i dont need to move the zombies folder as much, that might have casue the game to get sulky with me)
daftest transition i had was patty comming to full adulthood in a fur coat and high heels, i dread to think what she had under it....if only we had coats that were over the top of normal clothing hehe.
but i cant make up my mind between the red-hued apox sky or the stormy but normal one from GoH. i might have it half and half for storytelling purposes. start the first few generations or so in the red, then after maybe lifting the first 2 sets (r1 and r2) i might swap over to the clear but stormy looking sky dome to show the worlds starting to get back to normalish.
and that house looks great, Ileeya :)

*edit what about replacement defalts for those ea outfits? or removers, im sure i have seen some hiders that can hide hats and stuff, maybe someone can make a defalt replacement set that turns the tutu's and tiaras into dungarees and ripped jeans, just for the apocalypse?

[lorinsv60]

Be glad it was one of your females! I read an AC story where a guy transitioned into the male version of that outfit, so yeah... it gets worse. :giggler:

[Peni Griffin]

Perhaps y'all should have a special Apocalypse Downloads folder which replaces the regular downloads folder when you play that neighborhood? Which wouldn't help with the Maxis outfits, alas.

[jeffallenroberts]

Perhaps y'all should have a special Apocalypse Downloads folder which replaces the regular downloads folder when you play that neighborhood? Which wouldn't help with the Maxis outfits, alas.

Some of us have already indicated we do that. I don't because if I play any other 'hood at the same time I'll never finish the challenge. I have no custom outfits installed in the current folder for the first time since discovering CC. Maxis only, for now--and I've gotten some doosies showing up. Much as I like kilts (I shivered the whole day, BTW), it was ridiculous on my first Heir in a Nuclear Winter augmented by Crumplebottom Marky's "More Snow in Winter" mod. He got a much more fitting suit on reaching Elder. Meadow Thayer got a halter top and long skirt on being aged to adult. I so longed to replace that top. I shudder to think of what lies in the future satorially.

[Rayea]

well i have some defalt ea replacements for some things...swimsuits and kids clothes. they are old though.
what we need is someoen that makes clothing, and someone that makes defalts to get togeter and make some replacements that are grunged up, cut up and generaly blergh looking out of the original ea items (where possable) and make a batch of replacements of the stranger (and wholy unsuitable for an apocalipse, such as fur coat with high heels or football gear types) ones and replace em with something suitable, but JUST for an apocalypse. you know, dirty smeared cowboy shirt instead of clean one ect.
there is always the castaways stuff you could use but its not defalt (and has no shoes, sadly. cant have everyone wandering barefoot in a nuclear winter, except maybe the zombies...they shouldnt even feel the temperatures realy lol)

or you could grab that global Pescado had that allowed you to buy clothing on home lots (or an item that does it like the hacked hatstand thing) and consider it not actualy cheating, but making sure that your survivors dont go through life in tiaras and tutu's. (think of it like...if your transition goes borked casue your sims wearing a number painted on his chest, and bermuda shorts with flipflops...yes, a townie had that who patty brought home...i was all what the flip?! casue he was fine in his army outfit and outdoors...then as the only present your sim gets is something the family scavenged, its one trip to the bodyshop for getting something decent. then after that your on your own. i would say it was the family scavenging for useable clothing befor your sims birthday becasue they know their current stuff getting too small hehe)

*edit ah, jeffallenroberts that means you were doing it right :P but thats also why your supposed to keep a little hip flask in your sporen (sp?) with something to warm you up in it. but hugs anyway, being cold about the knees can be a pain, specialy if your whirling your claymour about two handed ^^

*edit2 ooh, thats an idea....*files away reminder to make sure all future garbage areas have a gated are to place the trashcan into* if i make them that way to begin with, less to add ^^ (plus i think i got a deco dumpster i can use also, someplace..and there is the trashcan fire fireplace too hehe, make it look like they dispose of rubbish in fire to make their lot less atractive to zombies (via smell at least.)

[Ileeya]

Yes, the whole point to the 'growing up in whatever the game gives you and don't fix your hair or makeup' thing is that sims don't care about appearance until after Showbiz is lifted. It would be helpful though, to have default Apox wear to morph into so your sims still fit into the theme. Grungy everyday already available Maxis clothes would even work, because I'm always assuming that every outfit the family wears was scrounged from somewhere.

My heiress's husband FINALLY unlocked Intelligence. I didn't think he'd ever do it with all the demotions he kept getting. Now the family can enjoy many new things. Guests no longer have to have a friend status before being invited into the house. They can call friends on the phone to chat instead of always inviting them over. There are a lot of other benefits, as well. Specifically - they can now hire an exterminator - YAY! Although I do have to say - thank you, Jeff, for the awesome idea to put the garbage can in an enclosed space where disgruntled townies, teens, and kids can't reach it. I have it fenced in with a locked gate. Only the heiress can get to the garbage, now.

The heiress's sister unlocked Crime. I wasn't particularly worried about lifting that one right away, because, even though the bills are 12k a week, the family has quite the nest egg. But that was the job in the paper the day she looked, and the next few times she looked the only jobs available were Tier 3 jobs or jobs for restrictions that were already lifted. She did very well in her career, so I just left her in it.

The heiress's husband got fired from his job in Science. He is allowed to get a job in Science again, but it hasn't come up as the first job listed (still limited to the first job listed in the paper), and he ended up with a job in Business. So far he's doing well.

The heiress herself is in Science and doing well.

Finding level 2 jobs will get progressively harder with each career that's unlocked since they can only take the first job listed. It could take half an adulthood to find a job that needs to be done, lol.

[Phaenoh]

Ileeya, that might be a problem that shouldn't be happening. If the first job available to you is in Tier 3, you can look at the second. If its for a job that has been done, too bad, better luck tomorrow. Society isn't ready for Tier 3 jobs yet, so they shouldn't even be in the paper. I didn't get around to hacking the jobs as well as I had wanted to, so there's your work around ruling.

[Ileeya]

Oh, thanks. That will make things a little easier, lol.

[Babahara]

I think I give up, haha, there are still too many rules even with the helpful file of additional rules. Not that it's a big contribution to this thread, but I just felt like saying it :) Maybe I need to train my memory :)

[jeffallenroberts]

AAaaarrrrrgggh! I still haven't unlocked anything in R2, except Service Pet. Mom has been in Law since giving birth to her second child. She's been at level 9 for a Sim-week, with a full performance bar and all the skills, and still can't get promoted! Her husband maxed two careers and raised the kids. The pet lived out its whole life and died two days ago. Her daughter grew up, but can't move out or marry her boyfriend. Aaaarrrgggh!

I think I give up, haha, there are still too many rules even with the helpful file of additional rules. Not that it's a big contribution to this thread, but I just felt like saying it :) Maybe I need to train my memory :)

Read the top of the thread. The rules are there to provide a challenge, not to frustrate. If you make a mistake, just fix it and go on. No need to give up! Really, despite the start of my post, this is fun. How often have you just played one happy family after another? Enough to get boring? How often have you tried to make a family disfunctional, only to have the game routines "fix" everything? (How often have you looked up the spelling of disfunctional, only to find your Dictionary omits it?) Here's a chance to do something DIFFERENT! Come on, join the party.

Edit; Well, I've demonstrated that playing a modified game does not qualify as knowing how the game is intended to work. I've always had a mod that removes the friends requirement from jobs, not installed this time, and did not know how to read the friend count information in the employment panel. Mom needed more friends to be promoted.

Phaenoh, I've removed the locker for Law, but still don't have the Find Own Place option in the paper. I see it is not greyed out in your description for the rules. Any thoughts?

[Phaenoh]

Good catch jeff. Looks like when I was making changes to the newspaper for Journalism, I hid that option. Editing the pie menus are hard; I can't seem to do half for one and half for another, its either all in one unlocker or none. Remove Journalism temporarily so you can move out. I'll remember to fix that on my next round of updates.

[Rayea]

still havent goten my sims2 fixed yet but of course, i am still searching for stuff and found these defalt replacements (http://ocsenave.dreamwidth.org/22070.html?#cutid1) for your foundations, decks and bare walls. since these are perfect for us using apox hoods, i thought i would share the find.
also ghost town hood deco (http://curiousb.dreamwidth.org/22690.html) for some derelict appartments and various hood deco's that might help to make your hood feel derelict enough hehe (its near the bottom but theres also a couple of grungied items in the list too)

and at least you managed to get to R2 jeffallenroberts :P my game must hate me casue my sims stank it to death :P maybe thats why it imploded? XD

*edit wow..i had no idea i shared such tastes as these guys but some of my older fave creators also have apox hoods. someplace i still have Ghani's stillsuits :D Ghanima's fallout 3 objects (http://ghanima-atreides.dreamwidth.org/35299.html) and she has a sort of blog about the life of her apocallyptic surviors, if anyone is feeling stuck for ideas and motivations :)

[Russett]

Rayea, I've had trouble with my game refusing to load and the problem was evidently the group.cache. Once that was deleted (it rebuilds), the game loaded normally. From time to time, I'd have to delete it. Then, for several months, WoW got all my gaming attention. When the urge to play Sims came back, sure enough, it wouldn't load. I'd forgotten about the group.cache problem, and uninstalled. Reinstalling didn't go as well as it could have, because the Pets disc insists Pets is still on my computer. Nope. Spent days trying to straighten that out, googling ways to fix it. Nope. No Pets. Sad. A prosperity neighborhood in which pets were very prominent, down the drain.

Phae, love this variant idea, the tiers. It makes me want to finish out my Sims 2 collection beyond Seasons. That would make birthday gift-giving so simple for my family. :lol:

In my Apocalypse attempts, the Sims are allowed access to appearance changing and wardrobe immediately after aging, solely for the purpose of being 'groomed' and dressed appropriately. Zombified playables also receive a makeover.

[Rayea]

right now i dont know what to do first.
*grabs russett and feeds hot fudge sundae cake or cookies, whichever is preferd*

i dont know whether to bang my head against the wall (for all the frustration i have had befor), dance, sing, cry or just stuff my face with chocolate (i had some fudge brownie pudding, im bad i know but why not, im celebrating!)
if you had not mentioned groups.cache i would never have googled it, found the threads here and at the wiki for deleting em and found my game runing again with no loss so far.

to remove the pets, check the sims wiki for how to totaly remove it (theres CCcleaner and regestry cleaning in there but it might help you out :) )incase your problem is windows thinking it still has your game in there someplace. but at least...

I CAN BEGIN AGAIN :D (this time with better decorated hood, better real fallout kitchen, thanks Ghani :D and maybe a real start with the apropriate amount of zombies)
all i realy need now, is confermation from someone in the know, that sims clean installer will clean all the way up to mansions and gardens and i might be able to even upload here at MtS

[Russett]

Hot fudge sundae works, thanks! Glad that was the problem, it's so easily fixed. Repeatedly, in my case, but easy. Wonderful!

I spent a couple of days googling fixes for the Pets thing when it happened, including registry cleaning, etc. Two days into that, I remembered the group.cache, a real headdesk moment. May be worth searching again, just in case I overlooked something, or a new suggestion has been added. It's been since December. Haven't had the heart to delete the prosperity neighborhood, just in case.

Btw, I've downloaded those houses. And lots of other content. Now to go try them out.

[jeffallenroberts]

Here's a new one. I was playing forward the Sim-bin families. The Ottomas family had already been played some. The teen son was grown up and his sister a teen, so I moved them out. That left no-one to watch the kids (Duh!). Dad stayed home from work. He was fired, and the game went into an endless loop telling me so. It didn't freeze the game, so I quit normally and deleted the caches to no avail. The game loaded normally, but the household is still stuck endlessly telling me that he was fired. The rest of the family plays, but Dad can't do anything. I tried the Bat-box, without effect. I'll now remove the Politics locker and try to load.

Edit: That worked to a degree, but didn't solve the whole problem. Peter wasn't fired, he used a vacation day, but he was stuck in the "I've been fired" animation. After three retries I used the "Force Resets" option on the Bat-box. I've always been too scared to try that one. It worked. Sorry Phea, no error log as I didn't have Testing Cheats enabled.

[Phaenoh]

Try move_objects deleting the dad then respawn him? I have no idea what's going on with your game. :( If that doesn't work, maybe try moving the family out to the sim bin then back into their house?

[jeffallenroberts]

Try move_objects deleting the dad then respawn him? I have no idea what's going on with your game. :( If that doesn't work, maybe try moving the family out to the sim bin then back into their house?

The last operation I described worked. I did try moving him, but not deleting, should have remembered that one. He got up from supper to receive his warning, so may have been stuck between the chairs, however I think the main problem was that I saved and exited while he was receiving serial firing notices. I should have quit without saving, but that would have been cheating ;^).

[Peni Griffin]

Let this be your mantra: "Nothing can be cheating if the game's glitching!"

[Blewbachu]

exuse me, but I'm having a problem with the mod. I wait till wednesday, It doesn't kick me out. and then i move him him out manualy, and into a new 'apocolyptic' house. (custom made by moi) and no greying out occurs. Help?

[Sunbee]

So I failed an adult start last night--male founder. So I'll try again another day.

I wanted to report something slightly odd as well after I saw Jeff's issue above. Founder was socializing with one of his friends/lovers when another walked by (because I am all about potential spouse choices here). Girl #1 decided it was a great time for an autonomous serenade, and before I could cancel it out, girl #2, ungreeted, queued up a slap Founder. Which I also canceled out. She then proceeded to throw a tantrum that looked suspiciously like a loop of the oh my gosh I caught him cheating animation, while I tried to get him to greet her, but it kept dropping from his queue (I wanted to fix the relationship before she kicked his trash can, of course). Then she bailed. I do play with testingcheats enabled, and there were no errors in all of this. As far as I remember, the mods I have which effect romance are ACR 2 (autonomy off, EA jealousy setting), Inteen and harder romances, in that load order and with the apoc mods loading after everything else--but my suspicion would be some sort of mod conflict--as obviously my game is heavily modded. I've had sims catch lovers cheating before without the apoc mods in, canceled the slapping, and not had this tantrum loop. I'm also using it in a Permagame, not my main game. Girl #2 walked by again the next day and acted like she wasn't furious, and cooperated nicely with falling back in love. No flamey thoughts, no rejected interactions.

Stupid chance cards. He never got fired but kept getting demoted. Only got to level 8 by his birthday. He was in military.

[Phaenoh]

Blewbachu, I think you misunderstood something. You will not automatically get kicked out of your founder's house if you are doing an Adult Start. You need to do that yourself. As for the greying out, that's just in my post, how you can tell what my mod removes completely for you. Anything that I have written in grey should not be doable by your sims.

Sunbee, I'm not even going to bother trying to track down a mod conflict between my mods and those big names. They shouldn't be included in your game when you are playing this challenge anyways. They give you interactions others wouldn't have, such as ungreeted social interactions. I do highly recommend playing in a PermaGame because then you don't need to keep moving mods back and forth when you want to play different games, but you should really take those other mods out for this challenge. And yeah, the first time I played this I had the same problem, my founder failed to unlock military before his elder birthday. That's why I didn't save the entire time I played him, I had a clean fresh start straight from college and he had plenty of time the second time around.

[Sunbee]

Oh, I don't think you should try to track it down. I was more thinking it was an fyi thing--and if nothing else, if someone else experiences a looping animation and has one or more of them in, then they'll know they aren't the only one. I only mentioned it--I thought I'd said this--because of Jeff's issue. I know some of the mods I use allow for cheating--I can avoid using ungreeted interactions easily enough--but I couldn't play sims at all without macrotastics because of my wrist: last time I tried (playtesting apocalypse rules, of course) I caused my carpel tunnel to flare up. I figure having the other Pescado stuff like harder jobs and romances makes up a little bit for that!
I wouldn't say that what I'm playing is really the Apocalypse challenge, but it is hard, and it is fun.

[Phaenoh]

Well Sunbee, to paraphrase a statement above, its not cheating if your health is glitching. ;) I've been there with the carpel tunnel. It's not fun. I'd still suggest striping out most of the mods you can do without to try to keep it as close as possible to everyone elses. Harder jobs doesn't make much sense as the jobs are now made hard enough with no vacation days, autofiring, and no option to ignore chance cards.

[Blewbachu]

Hmmm...... I can get everything in buy mode, the mod doesn't even appear in the cc warning....

[Rayea]

do you have any custom content much? i ask becasue the mods tend to make only some items invisible in the cataloge.
such things as baths and showers, and the more expensive game cookers. also the small apliances, all cars and any EA items that are not listed in the allowed sections. however, custom content tends to stay appearing in the cataloge. i have (when folder zombies is in Downloads) only one car visable and one other vehicle (those being a cc tow truck, and the ea banger you fix up yourself)
most of my decoratives are visable, but all the plants in build are gone unless they are the fallout custom dead grasses and trees.

[Blewbachu]

LOL! the files weere saved in public documetns/sims 2not documents/sims2!

It's now fuctioning correctly.

but, do the handicaps of the challenge e.g winter/winter/winter/winter apply throughout the challenge or only when you reach that step?

[Phaenoh]

They apply throughout, once you lift Music then you can have whatever seasons you want. Basically, in the beginning, everything is sucky and hard. As you progress, things get easier.

[Blewbachu]

do you have to lift restricitions in order individualy, or just in the respective blocks (bronze,silver,gold)

[Phaenoh]

You do them in chunks, you can pick which order you lift the first three; Military, Medical, and Cusine. Then you move on to the next set. You can not lift anything in Restriction level 2 or 3 without first lifting everything in Restriction level 1, and you can't start lifting anything in tier 3 without first having done all of level 1 and 2. Do all in one level in any order, then move on to the next level.

[nuidyaforever]

Hey everyone, sorry for the disappearing act. I just haven't been making any progress with setting up my hood for this challenge... and then I had a cold. :(

I have to admit I'm struggling with motivation a little. I do want to play, but I hate setting up. Not to mention I have to make my own townies (even more of a chore!) and, well, I don't like single-family challenges that much because they involve playing one family exclusively for a long period of time. My record for that is eleven Sim days. But yeah, I need multiple families from the start or I fall asleep on the desk.

I am going to try though, since it's the one thing I actually have an idea for at the moment. :P

- VT

[Rayea]

dont you have to play the zombies too?
i thought you have to play the founder some, then the zombies some, then the founder again untill you get the move out restriction lifted. then you just add the moved out simmies to the list of round robin playing?

not sure why you would have to make your own townies, casue as soon as i place a sim, i get a slew of em on walkby (even with just my main hood and Uni hood) unless you have say, noTownieRespawn on or...you want em manualy for names, maybe? i know there are special mods for name lists, i have seen ones for medievil and harry potter hoods :)

dont give up, by the way, VT. take a look at the things i managed to find in the links :) what about a red apocalypse sky? there was also a darker blue stormy one that might help get the look going for you :)

[nuidyaforever]

I use clean templates and notownieregen to stop them spawning. It just annoys me when I get human-looking townies wandering around my alien planets. I want townies that fit the setting (the human-less setting, because it's one of my hoods).

Thanks for being so good at finding stuff, by the way. I couldn't find the link to the awesome-sounding red sky though. Where did you find it again?

- VT

[Rayea]

well i found the link at the GoS apocalypse thread (http://www.digitalperversion.net/gardenofshadows/index.php?topic=18111.msg471903#msg471903)
you have to look down the gray links at the top of the page for the link to Psychosims recolor / remmake
there is also a normal color version here at psychosims world (http://psychosim.livejournal.com/4708.html)

but i would sugest trawling thru the whole of the lists of themes on the GoS archive. its called Quick, into the TARDIS :D (http://www.digitalperversion.net/gardenofshadows/index.php?PHPSESSID=mqq4cf0s0eq4c5hhh5ql1qrkb0&board=57.0) there are lots of things in there

[nuidyaforever]

Thanks for the links, Rayea. :gjob: You sure know where to find the most apocalyptic stuff.

- VT

[Rayea]

hehe, well i had to do *something* when i was down in the dumps, thinking my sims was broke :) rather than just shovel chocolate, i thought, go on a hunt for more cc

this is how a small part of my newer hood is looking

http://i305.photobucket.com/albums/nn201/Julliana-Silverbane/HopevilleCanyon.jpg

i have derelict building shell hood decor, with fallout3 desert terrain and custom roads there. in between the fake houses are real lots i built. im working on ideas for a uni on an island next. prety much all of the stuff comes from those links at GoH or from users there's blogs, dreamwidth ect :)
oh, while im here VT, have you a link for a colonization chalenge rules set? od IS there such a thing? i have heard of poverty and prosperity but not sure if there is one for colonizing places (worlds, the past, the future..alternet realites ect XD)

[nuidyaforever]

Can't say I've heard of one, and this is the Simmer who has spent five years of playing TS2 printing off challenges and stuffing four large ring binders with them. :lol: But if you could give me some idea of what sort of thing you want, I might be able to write one for you since I'm working on a couple of challenge rewrites at the moment anyway.

Your new hood is looking good so far, by the way.

- VT

[Rayea]

well.....blame speilberg XD (yeah, i probly spelled that wrong)
4 back to backs of Terra Nova will make anyone think about a repopulate <insert name of scenario here> especialy if you have a brain line mine..that suddenly starts working on full speed, if it gets a tasty idea.

i was looking at the houses there..made from what looked like cardboard shipping tubes and inside roofs draped with material and thinking to myself hm....i could make that roof with constrainFloorElevation false....i could use numenors glass wall window sets columns in biscut to make those walls (with his invisible wall set) and moveObjects on, plus snapObjectsToGrid....
i caught myself looking at the arieal construction of their town and thinking it wasnt laid out too well, less a town and more of an armed camp...that their going to have to cut into the crop area once the population gets bigger (or expand outside the walls, create a seccond set of walls, which may casue ghettofication of the original housing blocks)

so yeah. as a sim builder, i wonderd...could i (or we) do better. then i wondered if there was a ruleset for a repopulate the (sim) World type chalenge.
i mean most of them would be simple or obvious, starting pairs, no kids allready, prefab buildings for housing units and so on...but allthough im good at putting the pieces together, i tend to see worst case scenarios rather than best case, which is why apocalypse is easy. i allready plan for the worst, out of boredom (my town allready HAS zombies...we have real townies in my area XD and i mean sim style townies)
*edit* ooh, after seeing the new store stuff for s3 (sci-fi bedroom stuff, with a bed that looks just like the MindChair device from Total Recall XD lol) it might even be good to try a repop chalenge for sims3 (but i wont pester for that, this is sims2 stuff hehe)

[nuidyaforever]

Please don't ask for anything T"S"3 related from me. I hate it. ;) But as far as a TS2 version of a repopulation challenge goes, I tend to be pretty good with working out scenarios once I get started - maybe we could try working something out together? Or maybe not, just asking. :p

As for your PM, the "no friends for careers" mod is on this page (http://www.simbology.com/smf/index.php?PHPSESSID=004bd4bb0cf37cdf58f4aea152e4e9b9&topic=15.0) at Simbology. You'll have to scroll down a bit to find it but it's there.

- VT

[Rayea]

thanks, the BF will be much happier if he can play with that in the folder. and i wouldnt ask for sims3 stuff in a sims 2 thread. i just had to say that the so called bed reminded me of the chair from total recall XD

[Phaenoh]

Guys, this conversation is fun and all, but this thread is for my challenge. Please keep your posts on topic. I think its a great idea for you two to create a 'repopulate world' challenge, but not here, kthanx? ;)

[nuidyaforever]

Sorry Phae. Maybe Rayea and I could work something out via PM? I was starting to think we were getting off topic, so that would have been my next suggestion.

- VT

[Rayea]

actualy, that WAS why i used a PM :P

however, back on topic. i just got half my university buildings built.
seems Vault-Tech went an financed a university, all sensible like...beccasue they need smart young minds...but they built it on..an ISLAND XD so when the Event hits, its going to wash all those surfers and hippies into the square....now, where did i put those bodies from Kativip?

not to worry though, both the island and the mainland are connected with a nice sturdy monrail. it will withstand the Event reasonably intact becasue of the rock formation the lighthouse is built on. my founder can walk back to the mainland via the track and stop to rest in the broken monocars.main part of the island may be battered badly (im going to strew a LOT of seaweed about the place on com lots) and there WILL be power outages becasue someone will have to go replace the wind turbines bent blades...
but the main housing of the secret society (Enclave recrutement, i named the building befor it vanished, leaving a dent in the smaller of the two islands) and home made dorms should be reasonably intact.
i plan to use Numenors invisible walls (and the prison variant) to make tent style dorms and housing using the fallout vegas Legion stuff from Ghani.mostly for the large Ceasers tent one, but i can also use it with a aircraft cammo tent i have that was extracted from castaways (i think Ghani did that too hehe)

once i am done, i will take a pic of the island BEFOR the event (and befor my founder goes to uni) and pop it in here via edit :)

[jeffallenroberts]

Well, time for another Argh! moment. This one is minor, and in no way involves the Mod set. My Heir grew up and has been aging Marsha Brunig up along with him. I love the grow friends up feature of Freetime, but it often doesn't handle children correctly, and that's what happened here. They married, and Marsha still had Grow Up as her aspiration as an adult. Argh! The good news is I got to choose an aspiration for her, I chose Family, and she rolled a child want to match the wants of her husband and in-laws. The bad news is she never had any teen or adult wants for romance, engagement or marriage, so started off slightly in the red. Could have been worse, she could have gotten Romance or Pleasure.

[Blewbachu]

Hey, Phaeno! I'm playing the Apocalypse Challenge on YouTube. my username is cmbheadquarters If you wanna check it out.

Also, does the Zombie Mod make zombie neighbors walk onto your lot?

AND.... by 'get a job via notice board at level 1' do you mean level 1 as in the restrictions block or level 1 by career levels.... cause my graduated sim starts all careers at atleast level 2.

[jeffallenroberts]

... does the Zombie Mod make zombie neighbors walk onto your lot?

AND.... by 'get a job via notice board at level 1' do you mean level 1 as in the restrictions block or level 1 by career levels.... cause my graduated sim starts all careers at atleast level 2.

Zombies may attack while in walk-by mode or, if you are good friends or relations with them, when acting as drop-ins. They follow the same rules as always about showing up on your lot. The most common place to encounter them is Community Lots.

The Jobs Notice Board gives the level your Sim qualifies for. I cheated them down to One with either TwoJeff's Sim Blender or Pescado's Batbox. If you enable Testing Cheats you can do the same thing on the Newspaper via Shift-click.

[Blewbachu]

That would be cheating, and been as I struggled to get summa cum laude, I may as well take extra long getting the skills to get the promotion to make up for time getting to rank 4.
Plus you can't get a newspaper, remember?

[Phaenoh]

You need to start your founder at job level 1. The time spent in Uni is best spent skilling (as it is hard to do after the Event happens) and making friends (another hard thing to do post Event). While you will be down at lowly level 1, you should already have the skills and friends needed to quickly get promoted.

[Blewbachu]

But I can't, I can't boolprop the newspaper, nor can i get any job in restriction 1 below level 3....

[jeffallenroberts]

But I can't, I can't boolprop the newspaper, nor can i get any job in restriction 1 below level 3....

So go to MATY and get the ffsdebugger (aka Batbox) or Simbology and get the Sim Blender.

[sweetbaby160]

I did a brief read of the orginal thread for the zombie apox (meaning I read about a paragraph ;) ) my question is...on the orginal (sry forgot gent's name who started ~ assuming it was a 'gent' lol) it stated that it was needed for the apox to start in a heavily populated 'hood, is that still true with this variation? I'm revved to have a go at this (been watching too much "Walking Dead") but I have a tendency of cherishing my established generations, don't often get too bored with them...awesome idea for all this!! Cannot believe the amount of effort you have put into it Phaenoh!!

[Phaenoh]

Unless you've got a hood that you are dying to nuke and zombify, I suggest you start with a new and blank hood with only your founder and some 'starter' zombies. This challenge also tasks you with rebuilding the hood, so your community lots will come along in time. Your family can even start spreading out after you've lifted Law, so at the end of the challenge you should have a nice well balanced, well populated grown up hood.

The 'gent' was Pinstar, and he is a he. ;) Good luck with it! Let us all know how it is going. This thread is supposed to be for questions about my challenge and for progress reports from the people playing it. We all love pictures! :)

[juliejaz]

Okay, after reading this entire thread (or novel) I have a question. I use a bunch of hacks, inteen and ACR are a couple of the big ones. Do these mesh well with this challenge or should I ditch them? What hacks are okay to use, ones that won't interfere with the Apocalypse hacks?

[Rayea]

well, i think what most of us do is have a seperate folder of custom conetent and hacks, designed JUST for use when playing the apocalypse.
i know i sure do *looks over at the OMG ZOMBIES folder on her desktop*

that way, all you have to do is remember to swap your normal Downloads folder for the one in your zombies folder and back again when you want your normal game... just also whipe that little anoying bugger (Groups.cache) befor you play, casue i know i sure do ^^
(stops your game from getting all paniced becasue your CC list dosent match, and not even starting the game for you)

[juliejaz]

Wow! I reread everything again and noticed a few things I didn't see or read well enough the first time - winter, winter, winter and winter until the 3rd tier!

I started with Mid-Uni. Rob Cooper is currently getting ready to take his sophomore final. I'm hoping he doesn't roll those double 6's just yet. His lifetime want is to become chief of staff, so I guess he'll be going into medicine. I set Uni to fall as the first season and he did nothing except skill and make friends and find his future wife. I'm hoping those red hearts stay around for a while. I had him work on body skill first, as that seems to be the most difficult thing back in the main neighborhood. He is currently platinum and on the Deans List. He might as well enjoy that platinum mood because once he hits the neighborhood he's probably going to tank. Oh and he's a knowledge sim.

I downloaded a bunch of the lots in this thread and have my new apoco downloads folder put together. I'm going to swap it out before he leaves college town. I'm kind of looking forward to seeing his adult clothes - *sarcasm* the game really puts together some really nice outfits sometimes. His college look was straight up Maxis stuff. I didn't want his hair to change.

We'll see what tomorrow brings:0)

Edit: I have a question. I downloaded JM's zombie hack thing, but what is the ARC thing that is mentioned on the first page of this thread?

[sweetbaby160]

just have to tell you guys about a place i just found. i allready have some of the creators work from GoS but her older site has some absolutely AwesomeSauce items on it, and links to some real gems hit the see all button to get links to stuff at GoS too (http://javiera.dreamwidth.org/) her name is Ja and she has a totaly awesom looking desert replacement that is fallout extracted terrain, and road covers that have cracked asphalt and extraced fallout3 hood deco, cardboard box babyroom gear...oooh i love the stuff even if i cant use it atm :)

Rayea, tried this link (actually have tried every link you've posted LOL good call!!) but I can't seem to find the desert replacement dl that you mentioned...could be I'm over-tired (been at this for approx 6 hrs hahaha) but pls would you mind giving 'direction' (ie~ turn left onto Broadway & Parkplace is just up the street) ;) thanks

[Rayea]

not to worry :)
it was quite a way down, after all the garden of shadows stuff.
this is the page, you want the desert version, if you want the desert terrains to look like the ones i have

http://javiera.dreamwidth.org/13874.html

dont forget to get the road overlays for your roads. you have to moveObjects on them to place over your roads, but it makes the actual lots look as much like the neighbourhood view as possable :)

[juliejaz]

The Zombies are taking over! I used boolprop to create townies and then created 1 zombie. I have 11 now, including the one I created. My founder started out in the medical field and he is now a resident...and that is level 5 I think. I've stopped taking him to the Red Cross/Field hospital/clinic...whatever you want to call it, because every time he visits several zombies visit and one or two new zombies are created each time and somehow I think those hacked guns aren't legal to use in this challenge...maybe after military and police have been lifted? I don't know...

[Phaenoh]

Man, I *totally* have an AK-47 in my founders compound. He has to protect his family doesn't he? Also, zombies are supposed to take over! Somewhere during level 2 or 3 you should take out Pescado's zombie mod so your community can start healing.

Might I suggest this mod (http://www.modthesims.info/d/436793) to help you keep track of where you are in each career? ;)

[juliejaz]

Man, I *totally* have an AK-47 in my founders compound. He has to protect his family doesn't he? Also, zombies are supposed to take over! Somewhere during level 2 or 3 you should take out Pescado's zombie mod so your community can start healing.

Might I suggest this mod (http://www.modthesims.info/d/436793) to help you keep track of where you are in each career? ;)

I guess if you have and AK-47 then I'll go get myself one too. And thanks for the job board - that will be very helpful.

[sweetbaby160]

not to worry :)
it was quite a way down, after all the garden of shadows stuff.
this is the page, you want the desert version, if you want the desert terrains to look like the ones i have

http://javiera.dreamwidth.org/13874.html

dont forget to get the road overlays for your roads. you have to moveObjects on them to place over your roads, but it makes the actual lots look as much like the neighbourhood view as possable :)

thank you bunches Rayea!! *runs off to start building*....soooo cool heehee

[juliejaz]

Does the Apocalypse mods change how often promotions happen?

[Phaenoh]

No, they do not. It does change whether you can hit 'Ignore' on chance cards, and it will fire you if you miss a single day, but promotions are still based only on job performance. Its much more miserable to live in the apocalypse, so that might be why promotions don't come up as often.

[juliejaz]

No, they do not. It does change whether you can hit 'Ignore' on chance cards, and it will fire you if you miss a single day, but promotions are still based only on job performance. Its much more miserable to live in the apocalypse, so that might be why promotions don't come up as often.

Okay, he's got 10 days until he's an elder and he's at level 9. He stalled at levels 5 and 8 for what seemed like forever, but then just a few minutes ago zipped right to 9. My Sims life spans are different than the regular game sets us up for. My adult is 44 days.

I also got a bad chance card and he lost 5 grand and will not have enough for his bills on Monday. I'm wondering what the repo guy will take...

Edit: It worked itself out. He got the promotion he needed and lifted medical, his paycheck was enough to pay the bills and 65 bucks left over. :up:

[juliejaz]

The school bus keeps showing up each morning, but kids aren't allowed to go to school. Will the social worker show up if the kids don't attend school?

[Phaenoh]

I'm surprised the school bus is showing up, but no, the social worker shouldn't come and get them. What EPs do you have? You are using my entire mod set, yes?

[juliejaz]

I'm surprised the school bus is showing up, but no, the social worker shouldn't come and get them. What EPs do you have? You are using my entire mod set, yes?

I have all the EP's and Stuff packs. I haven't let them get on the school bus, they have failing grades but the social worker didn't come - so I guess it's okay. One girl just had her teen transition and the boy has 2 more days. Yes, I have the entire mod set.

[lorinsv60]

I couldn't find the lifting Hopelessness after the first restriction was lifted aspect, so my question is does the original apply to both spouse and pets? Because I think adopting a stray for companionship before lifting Hopelessness would be a nice and realistic touch for both Sim and pet.

EDIT: Oops, found it. But does it also apply to pets?

EDIT 2: Another question. Because the social worker doesn't come, does that mean even children aren't supposed to go to school?

[Phaenoh]

I'm not really sure what your first question means, but you are not supposed to move in any sim or pet until you've lifted the first restriction. Its too hard to take care of a pet until you've gotten at least some of the rules lifted. Pets are unhappy because you can't bathe them or give them a litter box, and their food intake is restricted, so you should really lift one of them first.

No one goes to school. I might try to update my mods to make the bus not come at all.

[lorinsv60]

I've played several cats in apocalyptic conditions, and they clean themselves, can be toilet trained, and don't mind eating rotten food nearly as much as I mind giving it to them. They also are pretty happy considering as long as they get attention and have a scratching post. I'm okay with not having a pet before Hopelessness, it was just a thought for realism (thinks I Am Legend)...

[Phaenoh]

Well, I'd be willing to argue that Will Smith had already lifted Hopelessness. He was owning that town, he hadn't given up. In the movie that one was based on though, Charlton Heston didn't have an animal, he had a bust of Plato or someone to talk to. (Movie was The Omega Man, super trippy. Sparkly zombie vampires with afros and disco capes...)

[jjdcoach]

I'm enjoying this challenge, but since I don't have all the game versions am doing the best I can. I have Uni, Nightlife, Pets, Apartments.

First I built a shack on piers with room to grow up and since I knew culinary would be the way to go I made my own Apocalypse Iron Chef (Robert Irvine Pike) Pike is from Star Trek Pilot.

And "Chef Robert" has just made it through "Dinner Impossible" all the way to the top - not without a few hurdles.

I am scanning the thread and there are a lot of tough aspects to the challenge to name a few (and I'm not sure if I am following "all the rules perfectly)

1) I had him marry one of his college sweethearts... have one in the bank whom he loves in case she dies as my first two legacy mommies did in pregnancy... The rub is he's five days from elder - she's like 21. I think I will have her plop out the heir and then age her with a work around on the elixir. I'm sure she won't be in gold too much.

I'm presuming that is okay.

2) I made the Sim FEMA Center before the challenge and put in some showers a soup kitchen a grill and some clothes racks ...chess sets etc. The way I use it is you can go there once per week on your day off. It helps with the job promotions to be clean.

3) I am DLing some of the expansion mods (zombies and items) and will incorporate them.

4) Dumb question. I don't "like the supernatural stuff too much" so I'm not versed in zombies. I'm presuming I'll have to make one or two and put them in areas so they interact and make others. Is the best way just to DL some from somewhere? Do the pop up automatically with this mod or do I have to kill off some and bring in someone with the resurrection thingy and be cheap?

5) Another dumb question. I want to kill off some of the elders and age some of the adults and teens etc. With the teens I figured I'll just send em to college. With the college crop I'm not sure how to do much with them other than going to the dorm I was in letting them age - put them in a shack and let time warp thin the herd.

So - I was thinking though with the adults to use the clothes rack and then fool around with a bool thingy to age them. Would this work? Nothing worse than having Tasha Go and Goopy as family friends through 25 generations.

So - please if any know the most efficient way to age off people - kill them and make a lot of em walking dead I'd be grateful.

I'll post this up over the next few days with a link on the EA site as a story.

Thank you!

[Phaenoh]

Answers:
1) Unless the elixer was one of your 3 things you brought home from college you can't do that. Secondly, you can't control elders so its a very bad idea to age them up like that if you still have babies/toddlers/children in the house who need to be taken care of.

2) See restrictions about what objects are allowed on which lots. You are not allowed any items that break any of the challenge rules unless it is specifically for that lot. Your Sim FEMA Center sounds like its a combo lot of the first tier so you are allowed military, medical, and culinary restricted items. Sorry but your clothes rack will have to go.

3-4) You don't need zombies if you don't want them. Maybe your apox didn't involve gene mutations.

5) You are not allowed to purposely kill off sims. You can't send teens to college until you've lifted Education which is in tier 2. You also can't move anyone out until you've lifted Law. You need to be very careful about breeding during the first few generations.

Since you aren't allowed to create any new CAS sims, why not just get married to Tasha Go or Goopy and get rid of them that way?

I updated my mod set so people (like you) who don't have all EPs can at least use some of them. The object hiders have been removed from them.

[jjdcoach]

Thanks for the quick reply.

Yes, the elixir was in college - I knew I'd need that as I had done this challenge a few times and always found myself at like level nine and being an impotent elder.


Clothes going is fine not buying more for show than anything else. - but I hear what your saying.

I wouldn't mind putting some zombies in the game.... we'll see. If you don't mind giving me a link to a quick how to I'd be grateful!

I think I may have to use a no school cheat - since there is no school and I'm having enough woes with content (can't upload to Sims Exchange and don't know why a pity. Robert Irvine story is pretty funny if you like Chopped etc.

Well, hopefully will get two children ---- always good to have a backup plan and will either be Marie Curie Pike or Jonas Salk Pike etc as Med is next.

One thing I would actually like to do is make the career awards be given to the FEMA (SEMA) sites to help the masses - is there a way to send them from a player to a public lot? Sorry - I am by no means a details expert - I just more or less play "frontier simulations - so the little tech was easier.

JJD

Answers:
1) Unless the elixer was one of your 3 things you brought home from college you can't do that. Secondly, you can't control elders so its a very bad idea to age them up like that if you still have babies/toddlers/children in the house who need to be taken care of.

2) See restrictions about what objects are allowed on which lots. You are not allowed any items that break any of the challenge rules unless it is specifically for that lot. Your Sim FEMA Center sounds like its a combo lot of the first tier so you are allowed military, medical, and culinary restricted items. Sorry but your clothes rack will have to go.

3-4) You don't need zombies if you don't want them. Maybe your apox didn't involve gene mutations.

5) You are not allowed to purposely kill off sims. You can't send teens to college until you've lifted Education which is in tier 2. You also can't move anyone out until you've lifted Law. You need to be very careful about breeding during the first few generations.

Since you aren't allowed to create any new CAS sims, why not just get married to Tasha Go or Goopy and get rid of them that way?

I updated my mod set so people (like you) who don't have all EPs can at least use some of them. The object hiders have been removed from them.

[jjdcoach]

http://i478.photobucket.com/albums/rr144/lennythedink/thumbnail_00000014_7bd7dd52.jpg Well, I can't upload to TS2 so I figured I'd hit some of the highlights here.

The first is that I have the Apocalypse Challenger - Robert Irvine Pike who will try to unlock the Culinary Challenge as the Next APOC Iron Chef.

http://i478.photobucket.com/albums/rr144/lennythedink/snapshot_1bd5f310_9bd5f311.jpg

And this is him after graduation:

http://i478.photobucket.com/albums/rr144/lennythedink/snapshot_9bd6ee23_9bd5f311.jpg

Here is the FEMA Hazard Site that has food, porta pottys and shower station (for the radioactive materials)

Lastly, the house he moved into upon graduation - cost 19,782

http://i478.photobucket.com/albums/rr144/lennythedink/snapshot_9bd6ee23_3bd6ee24.jpg

The snaps are a bit too small so I may just start do some screen captures and post up that way.

[Phaenoh]

Why not upload your story here at MTS. We have our own story forum. -> http://www.modthesims.info/forumdisplay.php?f=567

[jjdcoach]

Is now a bit of a dotard...
Iron Chef made it to platinum when he hit the old timer age.
His wife is about to bear little heir #2 so we'll see how that goes. I can see what you mean about breeding carefully.

I am the worst builder and I really don't like messing with meshes etc. so my houses may have to be edited on occasion due to my error.

Even with the list I had to make a spread sheet and printed it out so I don't break a rule - some things are so automatic with play.

One problem I have is that the house is so high up I don't see the walkers so I have to be mindful of that or I'll run out of friends for generation 2. I made sure to have a bunch with the Founder.

I'm going to have Mama Sim try to get the medical career - but she has zippo skills and it will be a while before she can work. Don't think she's gonna do it - but we'll see!

Now one question on a rule:

Maybe I misread but it says you can't buy/sell objects < than 1 tile - so should I have bought cribs etc prior to the game play? I barely had enough for the shack I built and I can't see all eight trying to fit in one bed.

If I misread it's late and lack of sleep is due to playing this mod.

Happy holiday to those who celebrate Thursday.

[jjdcoach]

I have seen/heard about weapons mods. Would definitely add a nice flair for this mod.

Are these for show or for "blow" (literally)?

What mods etc are needed for them to work. I see that they are used by some in this challenge and an AK 47 does give one a certain "edge".

JJD

[Rayea]

i think the reason you might not be able to upload to the exchange is that EA took a lot of sims2 stuff offline.
patches and the store being the main ones.
so im asuming that they also took the sims2 exchange offline, or at least, closed it down to new content.

if your short for items for baby... grab the alice cardboard nursery set (http://javiera.dreamwidth.org/2098.html) that Javiera made, there is a 1 tile cardboard box for baby to sleep in thats nice and cheap

also BANG! 9 functional guns, with links (http://www.digitalperversion.net/gardenofshadows/index.php?topic=18111.msg473065#msg473065) in more shiny. you might have to scroll down, but maybe not :)

[jjdcoach]

Rayea, Thank you for the reply.

REading the rules:
Children and teenagers may not Learn to do Homework
Children and teenagers may not build skill with objects that do not also raise fun.

Doesn't sound like apocalypse for kids - but like heaven. So no cleaning? No Chores etc? They get to do nothing for 22 years? Just want to make sure that is correct. The first child - does not like to write - does not like to clean - does not like to exercise - does not like to do much of anything. I'm not seeing a Medical genius here.
Her #'s
5
6
9
5
1
Have me worried. And her younger brother has the same #'s. Hopefully they'll like to work out after awhile and then learn a lot of yoga (hope that is allowed)

[Rayea]

also radio's can only be used to work out if memory serves, no dancing till you get a prima ballerina/ballerino type world class dance top of the dance career (you have to cancle them doing it)

also, if you noticed earlier on...if your sim kids and teens are happy...YOUR DOIN IT WRONG! :P lol.
most people that have been playing this commented that their kids, teens and pets are anoyed most of the time
thru pretymuch all of stage one, they are supposed to be smelly, bored and crying/whinging all day long.
dont think joga is allowed ether.
nor is skip-rope.

so the little dear may have nothing to do..but they are also illiterate, smelly, paranoid and hungry all the time hehe.

[Darby]

also, if you noticed earlier on...if your sim kids and teens are happy...YOUR DOIN IT WRONG! :P lol.
most people that have been playing this commented that their kids, teens and pets are anoyed most of the time
thru pretymuch all of stage one, they are supposed to be smelly, bored and crying/whinging all day long.
dont think joga is allowed ether.
nor is skip-rope.

so the little dear may have nothing to do..but they are also illiterate, smelly, paranoid and hungry all the time hehe.

Yup, I can attest to all that. :lol:

[lorinsv60]

As far as I know with this ruleset, children and teens can do chores to build Cleaning, Mechanical and Cooking skills before lifting Pet Show Biz, just not study them with the bookcase. (They definitely are allowed to in Pinstar's original rules.)

[Phaenoh]

Rayea, Darby, and lorinsv are all right. If your kids are happy, you are doing it wrong. They can't dance or do yoga. Chores are allowed because you aren't directing them to skill build, you are directing them to do work. If a sim won't refuse your command, "Uh uh, I am NOT in the mood..." then it's not restricted that way.

You are allowed to buy large objects, but you can't move them (athletic) or sell them (business) once they are placed. Business restricts the selling of anything, not just large items.

[jjdcoach]

Oh, they're miserable mostly due to the hygeine.

I was more or less writing tongue in cheek - and may have over inferred from the rules and thought that I couldn't have them clean - as I read that as an interaction with an object (dirty one at that) - and I didn't want to give the benefit of the doubt to this family.

Not sure that it is so hard to keep sims happy as it is to advance to the top. When I play I almost always do historical type stuff - wild west blah blah blah - and I always used only tech items available - so the no showers, limited or no radio/tv/computers fit my playstyle for the last few years when I played- and always played the no pension and 50% of base salary mods- nor did I ever use the the extra awards like the smart milk etc.elixirs or the career rewards until they capped - which didn't typically happen... I guess I'm the SIMS version of Permadeath - Iron man - MMO gamer.

Even still I don't see this batch going too far. The combination of outgoing and grumpy in tight confines is going to be hell on earth for that household. However, the two kids find solidarity in their misery for now. Heh- I just re-read and made sure that playing "Red hands" is allowed - newspaper planes help - but only go so far. The BODY will be the killer for military - now that I know they can clean stuff - well that will be helpful to get one up for medical. Neither youngster like to work out with the radio and I presume that would be an interaction with an object to gain a skill point. I looked a few times and yoga is not restricted - meditation is out - but I didn't see yoga banned.

Another odd question - is the kiddie cake oven allowed if culinary is lifted. If it is an oven - yes - but if considered an electrical appliance I'd guess no. I figure that would be good for two to three cooking ranks.

I'm going to look every once in awhile to see if the personality changes a bit and they like to work out with radio. What makes them miserable right now is that they can't keep clean - at all.

On a funny note, the older founder's mind seems to have gone to gelatin. I wonder if not acting on him to do things makes him more of a dotard! Everyone will be complaining - and he does too if he forgets to take a sponge bath - but normally he's lying on the bed while everyone else howls and throws tantrums! I imagine a little bit of drool out of his mouth.

Money is going to be a problem in awhile - might have to have wife become Rosie the RIvetter and leave the youngsters home with the dullard. Luckily he won a big chance card - so they're e okay at the moment. I still have him working - as even with the radiation lobotomy at home, he is still the Apocolypse Iron Chef - and I don't see it written that upon hitting the golden years you get forced to quit. I consider him to be something of an idiot savant at this point.

I hope this isn't coming off as complaints - no one is holding a gun to my head to play and I am enjoying the overall hilarity of seeing the founder becoming...mushy headed.

Sorry for the length...and if my sleep deprived writing allowed my queries to come through clearly - would love a reply.

Oh-- getting a pet to like this family is gonna be a horror show. The only one that wants to interact is a wolf - bad juju.

JJD



also radio's can only be used to work out if memory serves, no dancing till you get a prima ballerina/ballerino type world class dance top of the dance career (you have to cancle them doing it)

also, if you noticed earlier on...if your sim kids and teens are happy...YOUR DOIN IT WRONG! :P lol.
most people that have been playing this commented that their kids, teens and pets are anoyed most of the time
thru pretymuch all of stage one, they are supposed to be smelly, bored and crying/whinging all day long.
dont think joga is allowed ether.
nor is skip-rope.

so the little dear may have nothing to do..but they are also illiterate, smelly, paranoid and hungry all the time hehe.

[jjdcoach]

As far as I know with this ruleset, children and teens can do chores to build Cleaning, Mechanical and Cooking skills before lifting Pet Show Biz, just not study them with the bookcase. (They definitely are allowed to in Pinstar's original rules.)

Thanks for the feedback. I "over-inferred" and felt that they were interacting with the object being cleaned - and didn't enjoy it by not getting the soap bubbles come up.

So based on the answers am I correct that working out via the radio is not allowed for a kid/teen if their fun meter does not improve?

[juliejaz]

Kid's have it tough in this challenge! Orange plumbbob's are the new norm. I think the elder dementia is the thing that bothers me the most, sure everyone stinks and the kids are whining constantly, but those foggy elders drive me nuts - which means I'm doing it right:0)

I will be starting over, because I lost. My founder was an elder when his wife got caught by the zombies (she had to move out). Then roach flu swept through (I also had the 'real sickness' hack in) and I lost both my kids who where teens and that left my founder with dementia who wanders around his empty home, crying. He'd quit his job to take care of the kids while his wife was attempting to lift culinary...so I considered that a fail. I'm going to attempt this challenge once more. I think I'm going to do an adult start instead of the Mid-Uni, like last time.

[lorinsv60]

Thanks for the feedback. I "over-inferred" and felt that they were interacting with the object being cleaned - and didn't enjoy it by not getting the soap bubbles come up.

So based on the answers am I correct that working out via the radio is not allowed for a kid/teen if their fun meter does not improve?
Yeah, the boombox doesn't raise fun when they're working out, so unfortunately they can't get Body skill that way. But in Phae's version, couldn't the family all go together to the Military community lot and use the obstacle course?

[juliejaz]

Yeah, the boombox doesn't raise fun when they're working out, so unfortunately they can't get Body skill that way. But in Phae's version, couldn't the family all go together to the Military community lot and use the obstacle course?

Only the Sim in the actual military field can use the obstacle career reward...at least that is how I read the rules.

[Rayea]

jjdcoach, i usualy play roman/greek style or medievil myself, so i have had a lot of modified CC for that befor now. :)
the problem with this chalenge is that even the *modified* stuffs not allowed (like, i have a shower thats a bucket on a tower, with a pipe to wash with lol..but thats technicaly a shower, and even though it shows up becasue its CC, its not allowed by the rules, even if sims wouldnt scream and cry becasue the water would be cold and probably green XD)

the best starts seem to be a lucky break in college where you get the full term and finish then go home.
my first girl patty, befor my sims went BFBVFS (and got fixed hehe, thanks to the Groups.cache delete trick) was like that. she had the lifetime want to be a general XD so i set her to military history style learning and off she went. she ended up with a body of at least 8 befor she graduated, becasue whenever she wasnt doing her lessons or training skills to fill her grades, she started using the dorm stereo and it just kept building. hehe. she seemed to get fun from it. i think her fave hobby was also sport, so i guess that helped too.
and her one love (a guy at college) his was cooking and he wanted to be a chef. it was just as he propsed to her, the day after that (sim time) that i saved, went to bed and found i couldnt start me game, i was blue faced with rage, it was funny now i look back on it

[jjdcoach]

jjdcoach, i usualy play roman/greek style or medievil myself, so i have had a lot of modified CC for that befor now. :)
the problem with this chalenge is that even the *modified* stuffs not allowed (like, i have a shower thats a bucket on a tower, with a pipe to wash with lol..but thats technicaly a shower, and even though it shows up becasue its CC, its not allowed by the rules, even if sims wouldnt scream and cry becasue the water would be cold and probably green XD)

the best starts seem to be a lucky break in college where you get the full term and finish then go home.
my first girl patty, befor my sims went BFBVFS (and got fixed hehe, thanks to the Groups.cache delete trick) was like that. she had the lifetime want to be a general XD so i set her to military history style learning and off she went. she ended up with a body of at least 8 befor she graduated, becasue whenever she wasnt doing her lessons or training skills to fill her grades, she started using the dorm stereo and it just kept building. hehe. she seemed to get fun from it. i think her fave hobby was also sport, so i guess that helped too.
and her one love (a guy at college) his was cooking and he wanted to be a chef. it was just as he propsed to her, the day after that (sim time) that i saved, went to bed and found i couldnt start me game, i was blue faced with rage, it was funny now i look back on it


Thanks for the feedback. Honestly, playing more "no tech and no alien tech" makes this not so horrible. I also put a lot of self restrictions about books and stuff as I liked to play riff raff who were often miserable with a lot of children's death (I made them run with scissors 1x/day to up the chance of dying pre-teen) and I would put the Cold box (buried fridge underground by a river area) a bit from the main house. More than a few pregnant women died on the way to that last meal as I had the no left-over thing going there too - I guess it was a way to vent :)

So, I am reading and you just need to get a pet into the home and into the field - which I did - and not cap it - which I can't since the dog got fired on a chance card. Now to probably dump off ROver and that is the dog I got on a friend.

Two of the kids are now adults and BOTH with romance aspiration- not helpful. The girl Marie Curie is about rank 3 medical three days into adulthood and I plan on having her be the makeout queen of the neighborhood - but that's all for the poor men of Apocalypse land. The male just hit adulthood and had a visit from the shrink. My plan for him is to go military and get married quickly.

As far as using the stuff on the site - I figured you couldn't use it until the level was opened and capped - but even then skills are not able to be added in the public grounds -or so I think.

Interesting that I forgot I had the 1/2 pay mod in place and was doing the kickback - but still am okay and with three working will probably just keep the mod in place - as I use it for my other runs. I was wondering why things got a little tight at times.

One thing I am allowing is sims to change their look - but they can't get the yippee sound when they change. I'm putting sunglasses on them and hats and heavier clothing to show for the eternal nasty ultraviolet winter. I also am making the females and males lose hair as they age - the wife of Robert I have her in the brown veils - there was a fire - and I like the storyline of the burns making her more susceptible to the radiation. Her hair is also very thin now from very full - and the kids look scruffy with nasty beards and the one with zits - looks like a good nuke burn.

I also made chef RObert (who died at 78) go a little insane and he wore the big chef hat in the last stages of his life and started to have a shaving problem...it caused me to laugh as he dithered.

I think I need to find a "hillbilly" type of beard for some of the males - and living in West Virginia I"m an expert at the hillbilly look - would make for some interesting features.

So here's the family status:

Robert Irvine "Pike" = capped Culinary died at 78 and due to capping was platinum. Way to go Chef Robert!

Ivy Pike - GF from college is about 60 and doddering - rank five or six in med (started at 48) and is just for the $$ and advanced baby-sitting. I'm going to try to keep her in the attic area as much as possible with any newborns and toddlers. Her job is childcare as soon as kid #2 is born and mommy can become Rosie the Rivter. Hopefully she lives till the younguns hit adolescence.

Marie Curie "Pike" is level three medical age 25 or so - Romance aspiration. Hope she can cap the Medical and then have a late birth around 45 or so. We'll see.

Robert E. Lee "Pike" is just hit adult and is going to join the military. He met a lot of the gals walking the streets - his kind of gal - and so will marry fast and be miserable as a Romance Aspiration - boo hoo for him. Good news is he is outgoing so he will like working out.
A question - do the aspiration awards have to go in the 8X8 - the obstacle course would be good to use - but putting on the 2 floors would pretty much take the whole level. I was thinking of building an underground chamber for it - and I know you can go down - but again that would be going beyond the allowable living space.
Any feedback is welcomed.

Rover unlocked security but was fired. He'll be gifted ASAP as his utility function is done and he just is a wasted spot on the roster which hopefully will go up by two within five turns.

If I do this again - and I have another shack made with a different theme - I'd not make a knowledge aspirant but a popularity one to get as many friends as possible and have as many others do my work for me and get out with a C and have as many skills capped as possible. Of course with the potential of going back to college in the mix - but I've not looked at it fully to see its potential - that would change due to the limit. A variant I'd like to try is to have (and it's a different challenge) is to have others allowed to leave earlier than this ruleset -but they start at ground zero in rules until they lift their own - then all come back to them. I get pretty bored playing the same people and not having the NPCs stay the same is just annoying. I wish I could figure a way to age them all as the main cohort ages have the kids to teens - teens to college etc.