Peni Griffin
22nd Aug 2011, 3:47 PM
I have not playtested this because I'm not prepared to add four new households to my rotation. I'm mostly posting it to get it out of my head, but this doesn't mean I won't take suggestions or answer questions.
Required EPs: Apartment Life
Setup: The Matriarch and Patriarch are getting on, and they've had a marvelous idea. They build a compound and move their entire brood into it, where they can keep an eye on their beloved children and grandchildren, encourage them, provide support, advise them on important life decisions, and generally Be There For Them. In other words, where they can run the kids' lives. Matriarch and Patriarch are fond of revising their wills, too...the kids are motivated to keep them happy.
Execution: Build an 8-person family in CAS, centered on a Family-aspiration elder couple. The remaining six people should divide logically into three subfamily units, but they can be any combination of adults, teens, children, and toddlers you like; or, determine each unit randomly: one single mother with toddler, one adult couple with teen, and one single adult, for example. Aspirations and personalities for adults and teens should be determined randomly. If you want a harder challenge, eliminate Family aspiration as a possibility and either roll a virtual 5-sided die or use a 6-sider and add Grilled Cheese to the possibilities.
Build a Fourplex with a large common area and units suited to the needs of each sub-family unit. If you've never built an apartment before, be aware that it's tricky and hard to fix mistakes. Refer heavily to the article in the wiki (http://simswiki.info/wiki.php?title=Tutorials:Building_an_Apartment) and to the sticky thread on this newsgroup. I recommend that all units have ground-floor entrances giving onto a central courtyard, and that each have at least 1.5 bathrooms.
Designate one unit as the Parental Unit and move the family into it. Play the first day long enough to establish relationships among the members and in particular for the kids to schmooze the Old Folks. Before day's end, have the head of each subfamily Find Own Place and move out, taking the rest of that subfamily with him. Finish the day with Matriarch and Patriarch going to bed, and make note of what their aspirations are at that time.
Return to Neighborhood View and move the three offspring family units into the remaining apartments. Do not play a full day with any of them until they are all moved in. Then determine a rotation order, and play each family in one-day rotations. You've already played the Parental Unit one full day, so give each kid a full day and then cycle back to the Parental Unit. Play the entire compound until the first parental death. If teens go to University in the course of play, add their University households to the rotation at a rate of 1 Compound Day = 3/4 University Days (approximately 1 semester). I would recommend keeping all University family members in the same residence. Leaving for University is the only acceptable reason for moving out of the Compound; however, moving in with another family unit in the same compound is allowed. Graduates will move back in with whichever family member they have the highest score with that has room for them. No apartments should be locked - this is the sort of family that barges in on each other all the damn time, and there's only going to be family members and service sims on this lot regularly.
The object here is for each family unit to maintain a strong relationship with the Parental Units and do its best to fulfill each and every unreasonable aspiration they have for their descendants. If Patriarch wants #1Grandson to be an overachiever, he by-God needs to set out to be an overachiever, even if he's a Pleasure aspiration with one point in Activity. If Matriarch wants somebody in the family to get engaged, Single Mom and Grandson in College are both under pressure to get hitched; if Grandson in College gets engaged and Matriarch wants somebody to get married, if Single Mom isn't also engaged he's facing the hard choice of dropping out in order to marry or taking a hit in the Favored Grandson department. If they want a grandchild, it's time for Married Daughter to get pregnant again, whether she wants to or not - or maybe Single Romance Daughter can take on the duty. That's up to the player.
You are allowed to choose whether or not to lock long-term aspirations and to use whatever method seems good to you to note what new wants roll in between the Parental Unit rotation - checking in between rotations is the most straightforward way. You won't be able to track it perfectly, but keep an eye out for small aspirations (like Play with Grandchild) that get fulfilled when the Old Folks are visiting in their children's apartments and interacting with them in the common area. When playing the Parental Unit, fulfill all their relative-related wants in the most straightforward way possible, and keep track of which relatives they roll the most wants about. Don't try to keep a point score unless you just enjoy that sort of thing, but at the end of every rotation rank each individual family member in order of their success in Keeping the Old Folks happy. Members who fulfilled parental aspirations move up; members who disappointed them move down.
Eventually one of the Parental Units will die. At that time, the non-University sim who is farthest ahead in the rankings should move in with the surviving parent. If the highest-ranking sim is due to graduate on his rotation, let him do so and move back to the neighborhood immediately if that's how you think it will play best. The amount of insurance payment made to each relative will help to guide you in the rankings. If the moved-in sim ever loses his front ranking with the Parental Unit, on the Parental Rotation they ask the current favorite to move in and the deposed favorite must change apartments with him. You may have to do some juggling here to keep children from being left unattended in an apartment.
Whoever is living with the surviving parent when the Grim Reaper shows up, gets the pot; and each family is now free to move out of the Compound and live their lives according to their own desires.
Special Victory Condition: If one of the Units has the Have Six Grandchildren want, I believe the only LTW that can be fulfilled under this CAS setup, the offspring who presents them with the sixth grandkid leaps to the head of line, wins, and frees the entire family from the Compound!
Note that, since you're playing with Apartment Life, at the end of Day 1 the Parental Unit will be much richer than any of the subfamilies, as they were given enough starting money to buy and furnish a house for eight people and only had to pay starting rent on an apartment and furnish it for two people. (If one subfamily has a toddler, you should go ahead and buy necessary toddler items to get through the day, and sell them back after that subfamily moves out.) If you aren't playing with the No $20K Handout, University graduates moving back in with the family are a huge boost in available cash, but this doesn't help much if you can't leave the apartment. Feel free to adjust the amount with whatever cheat or modification suits your purposes best, and to boost the Parental Units' monetary value, if you want a particularly meaningful Race for the Inheritance. But Parental Approval is the real reward here.
Also note that it is absolutely necessary that the surviving parent not die alone in an apartment! The Apartment Life coding causes problems when the last sim in an apartment dies. Somebody must be on hand to move the tombstone to the graveyard properly.
Required EPs: Apartment Life
Setup: The Matriarch and Patriarch are getting on, and they've had a marvelous idea. They build a compound and move their entire brood into it, where they can keep an eye on their beloved children and grandchildren, encourage them, provide support, advise them on important life decisions, and generally Be There For Them. In other words, where they can run the kids' lives. Matriarch and Patriarch are fond of revising their wills, too...the kids are motivated to keep them happy.
Execution: Build an 8-person family in CAS, centered on a Family-aspiration elder couple. The remaining six people should divide logically into three subfamily units, but they can be any combination of adults, teens, children, and toddlers you like; or, determine each unit randomly: one single mother with toddler, one adult couple with teen, and one single adult, for example. Aspirations and personalities for adults and teens should be determined randomly. If you want a harder challenge, eliminate Family aspiration as a possibility and either roll a virtual 5-sided die or use a 6-sider and add Grilled Cheese to the possibilities.
Build a Fourplex with a large common area and units suited to the needs of each sub-family unit. If you've never built an apartment before, be aware that it's tricky and hard to fix mistakes. Refer heavily to the article in the wiki (http://simswiki.info/wiki.php?title=Tutorials:Building_an_Apartment) and to the sticky thread on this newsgroup. I recommend that all units have ground-floor entrances giving onto a central courtyard, and that each have at least 1.5 bathrooms.
Designate one unit as the Parental Unit and move the family into it. Play the first day long enough to establish relationships among the members and in particular for the kids to schmooze the Old Folks. Before day's end, have the head of each subfamily Find Own Place and move out, taking the rest of that subfamily with him. Finish the day with Matriarch and Patriarch going to bed, and make note of what their aspirations are at that time.
Return to Neighborhood View and move the three offspring family units into the remaining apartments. Do not play a full day with any of them until they are all moved in. Then determine a rotation order, and play each family in one-day rotations. You've already played the Parental Unit one full day, so give each kid a full day and then cycle back to the Parental Unit. Play the entire compound until the first parental death. If teens go to University in the course of play, add their University households to the rotation at a rate of 1 Compound Day = 3/4 University Days (approximately 1 semester). I would recommend keeping all University family members in the same residence. Leaving for University is the only acceptable reason for moving out of the Compound; however, moving in with another family unit in the same compound is allowed. Graduates will move back in with whichever family member they have the highest score with that has room for them. No apartments should be locked - this is the sort of family that barges in on each other all the damn time, and there's only going to be family members and service sims on this lot regularly.
The object here is for each family unit to maintain a strong relationship with the Parental Units and do its best to fulfill each and every unreasonable aspiration they have for their descendants. If Patriarch wants #1Grandson to be an overachiever, he by-God needs to set out to be an overachiever, even if he's a Pleasure aspiration with one point in Activity. If Matriarch wants somebody in the family to get engaged, Single Mom and Grandson in College are both under pressure to get hitched; if Grandson in College gets engaged and Matriarch wants somebody to get married, if Single Mom isn't also engaged he's facing the hard choice of dropping out in order to marry or taking a hit in the Favored Grandson department. If they want a grandchild, it's time for Married Daughter to get pregnant again, whether she wants to or not - or maybe Single Romance Daughter can take on the duty. That's up to the player.
You are allowed to choose whether or not to lock long-term aspirations and to use whatever method seems good to you to note what new wants roll in between the Parental Unit rotation - checking in between rotations is the most straightforward way. You won't be able to track it perfectly, but keep an eye out for small aspirations (like Play with Grandchild) that get fulfilled when the Old Folks are visiting in their children's apartments and interacting with them in the common area. When playing the Parental Unit, fulfill all their relative-related wants in the most straightforward way possible, and keep track of which relatives they roll the most wants about. Don't try to keep a point score unless you just enjoy that sort of thing, but at the end of every rotation rank each individual family member in order of their success in Keeping the Old Folks happy. Members who fulfilled parental aspirations move up; members who disappointed them move down.
Eventually one of the Parental Units will die. At that time, the non-University sim who is farthest ahead in the rankings should move in with the surviving parent. If the highest-ranking sim is due to graduate on his rotation, let him do so and move back to the neighborhood immediately if that's how you think it will play best. The amount of insurance payment made to each relative will help to guide you in the rankings. If the moved-in sim ever loses his front ranking with the Parental Unit, on the Parental Rotation they ask the current favorite to move in and the deposed favorite must change apartments with him. You may have to do some juggling here to keep children from being left unattended in an apartment.
Whoever is living with the surviving parent when the Grim Reaper shows up, gets the pot; and each family is now free to move out of the Compound and live their lives according to their own desires.
Special Victory Condition: If one of the Units has the Have Six Grandchildren want, I believe the only LTW that can be fulfilled under this CAS setup, the offspring who presents them with the sixth grandkid leaps to the head of line, wins, and frees the entire family from the Compound!
Note that, since you're playing with Apartment Life, at the end of Day 1 the Parental Unit will be much richer than any of the subfamilies, as they were given enough starting money to buy and furnish a house for eight people and only had to pay starting rent on an apartment and furnish it for two people. (If one subfamily has a toddler, you should go ahead and buy necessary toddler items to get through the day, and sell them back after that subfamily moves out.) If you aren't playing with the No $20K Handout, University graduates moving back in with the family are a huge boost in available cash, but this doesn't help much if you can't leave the apartment. Feel free to adjust the amount with whatever cheat or modification suits your purposes best, and to boost the Parental Units' monetary value, if you want a particularly meaningful Race for the Inheritance. But Parental Approval is the real reward here.
Also note that it is absolutely necessary that the surviving parent not die alone in an apartment! The Apartment Life coding causes problems when the last sim in an apartment dies. Somebody must be on hand to move the tombstone to the graveyard properly.