Hi everyone.

I have a desperate hankering to read the glory details of how you manage your hoods. I eat up anything to do with your playstyle, your bacc setups, how you use interests, chemistry, aspirations, personality in your game. I'd love to make this a thread with hardore nerdiness. Give me numbers.


For example, my sims ability to gain skills directly relates to their personality. An lazy sim (less than 6 active-lazy points) cannot have gain than 5 points in the body skill, just as an incredibly playful Sim (7 or more points on the playful-serious scale) simply can't get earn more than 5 points in logic. I have an exception for sims in university, who may gain up to the points they need to pass in the skill they are closest to qualifying for.

Another quirk of my gameplay is that Sims may not study any skills via the bookshelf (yes, even in university). The skills that don't have an attached personality trait nor a continuous and practical way to learn them (e.g. cooking, mechanical and cleaning) must all be learnt as the need arises. That means that the mechanical skill, and to a lesser extent, the cleaning skill, are very highly prized in my game and I don't have a single sim who has mastered either.

Naturally, these elements lead to a lot of sims having blue collar, low-level careers in either neighbourhood businesses or service jobs in what I imagine are nearby larger cities. The few sims that have the money to own property (about 75% of families rent - keeping them poorer, just like real life) generally still struggle with mortgages (Monique's computer loans) and payments for university.

What else? I use interests to decide my sims one true hobby because I prefer variety in hobbies and personality. Most sims don't get to use their oth in their career at the moment but they all indulge in it at least a little in their lives. Sims can't persue a career in something tied to a interest they care about very little for unless their is some important reason to do so - perhaps to take over a family business or continue a military tradition.

I currently only assign a primary aspiration, no secondaries because I'm quite satisfied with the variety of wants I'm getting. I do look at and often reassign my sims ltw, but most don't satisfy it of course. I use their wants to guide me through decisions, and I admit I have a habit of locking fears I think particularly realistic and likely to occur! I hope I'm not the only one who does that! I let my sims age when they age and try not to pay attention to their aspiration metre too much as they become elders because I rather like the idea of their lifespan being determined on how they feel on that given day.

I want to hear about your games and i have so much more about mine if anyone is interested.
I hope to hear from you all about your hoods and games 😊

My rules are not hard and fast. The only major restrictions I play with are that teens must have two skill points in each category to get into college. It shows they are dedicated to a continuing education IMO. In addition, SSU requires the good grades scholarship. Academy LeTour requires that, the first criteria and one skill of seven or more as a 'focus.'

I have job caps in my game. Only one mayor for the entirety of hood and sub hoods but there can be as many ploice chiefs as there are downtown's + shopping districts. Acieving LTW is a privilege and not all sims get there.

For their romantic persuits I usually don't encourage sims to hook up unless they have bolts however a romance sim trying to get with 20 dates may not care.

Like you, the interests really dictate what they do for careers unless there's a reason not to such as a family of politicians or cops that want to continue in that career path likes it's an heirloom.

Like I said my playstyle isn't very one way or heavily restricted and that's because deviations can make for good story

Really interesting stuff, Charmful. I only have one university at the at moment so the only requirements are a C grade and $2000. The harder grades mod I use makes this is bit more interesring but I still love the idea of having a couple of different universities with varying grade requirements.

Also love the games attraction system and rely on it heavily. I consider two bolts to be my minimum threshold for a hookup for mosssst sims, but I'm interested in your numbers? I have very few couples with over 100 averaged chemistry for some reason.

A majority of my sims still go to college in one way or another. If they don't make it, they take online courses and can only advance so much in their career. The way out of that is if they start a business. I love the ya stage so I use squinges mega college mod to allow them to be young adults in the regular hoods and sub hoods. You should start a thread about your hood in the 'whats going on in your game' social group to expound more about it! More about my hood can be found in the link in my signature

Edit: sorry didn't see your last question. I don't know the numbers off the top of my head but now I'm curious too so will have a look when I play tonight.

I like to go for 3Bolts for normal hookups because they're often based on attraction alone (although I do often go for 2Bolts if I can't find any 3Bolters, unless its a Romance sim in which case I don't take attraction into consideration), but for relationships, I take genes, backstory, mutual friends and more into consideration for a little more realism.

I also like the idea of older Sims taking university courses Charmful. Never quite made sense to me the way it is now, being one-time-only opportunity. I don't know how to implement a better system that suits my playstyle though. I don't particularly like playing my YA Sims so university is a short and sweet 8 day, two round affair.

I actually have talked about my hood there before! I just love this 'strategy' discussion (I suppose you could say). I miss it sorely from the earlier days of sims 2.

I just wonder why I get so few three bolter couples! I think I only have three at the moment. The others would all be two bolts, upwards from 60 average attraction. The Find A Mate Crystal Ball hacked object has been a lifesaver though. I don't know what I did without it with so little chemistry in my game!

IIRC, chemistry is derived from turn ons/offs and then zodiac sign. So if you have a sim attracted to charisma but all the other sims in their dating pool are shy then they aren't going to have a lot of potential loves to mesh with. I never pay attention to the zodiac in my game, like. ever. When I create a sim I'm focused on personality points and since they are tied to the zodiac I just don't worry about where it falls since I can't separate the mechanic. I love me the crystal ball mod. I use it a lot for sims in college looking for dates and random hook ups or lonley bachelors/bachelorettes in the city. It's akin to online dating where they know they have a higher chance to do well with someone because they've looked at the profile to find something in common.

It's awesome, isn't it? Takes the guess work out.

I really enjoy Cyjon's study of chemistry here (http://www.cyjon.net/node/86) and upon re-reading, it's perhaps due to the fact a lot of my Sims have turn one relating to being good at a skill, and most of my Sims aren't particularly good at any skills! A lack of the turn on bonus could definitely be it I think.

BTW @citybeyond, if you want to read through detailed play styles of the members of the board, here's a handful of specific threads. Take a gander if interested, but these are old threads so prob best not to comment and raise them from the dead. Nevermind, Jo said you could if you has something new to add :D

-Sim Politics
-Sims Romance
-Obsessive Actions in your Sims Play
-Sim Skills
-Concerning Alternative Money
-Maintaining Sim Friendships
-Handling Mean Sims and Enemies
-Handling Chance Card
-How you play Sim Vacations

I don't have too many hard-and-fast rules, except to make sure that the houses are adaptable to any size family. I've changed a few of my money rules to reflect that modern society has to have a banking system and that pixels need to plan for the future. They all have bank accounts that are supposed to be used for future education and eventual retirement.
Others that have been adapted:
Skills are only gained when absolutely necessary and the pixel actively wants to fulfill them. I limit them to the level they're supposed to have for promotion, and until they reach that level, no stray skilling unless needed. (I use Two Jeff's blender with skill limiter to do this) Babies and toddlers are also limited, as are children. I don't want a bunch of grinds not having fun. It also depends heavily on the personality of the pixel. If they're lazy and unambitious or do not care about work or money that much, they'll stay at their career level until they aren't.
Couples are allowed only two children. However my pixels have been breaking this rule with gay abandon in Tinsel Town by having triplets and quads by the bucketful. I know they know what I'm doing, because once they do that, they're not allowed to have any more children, no matter how much they whine about it.
The children's college tuition must be paid for on the day they become YA's, and they're under the same restrictions that the adults are regarding skills. They don't advance to the next semester until they do their studies. I'll push them do to study those skills, because I don't want to keep playing the same pixel at the same grade every day until they get a clue.

aspiration, interests, personality, chemistry; I recall at least some past threads mentioning each of those.

Build A City Challenge; never attempted any.

aspiration; usually base those on personality. told about that in a number of past threads.

interests; have not paid much mind to that.

personality; generally set Create-A-Sim males to Serious+Active and Create-A-Sim females to Neat.

chemistry; most Create-A-Family couples have 3 bolts after moving in.

@citybeyond Welcome to the board! We love new blood people! You know though, I think I will be thinking your name is hardore nerdiness-you should consider changing it to that.

My playstyle is integrated also known as sim to sim or self sustaining.
This play style is a little bit like BACC except it doesn't have rules except the ones I apply. Integrated play style is basically sims running the town. So if you can buy from a playable sim run store you do so, if you can use the services of a playable sim you do so. How strict and far it's taken is up to the individual player.

Interests
play quite a big part in helping me to decide what career to give a sim. Born in sims that is, the ones I make I already have roles for. I may set hobby to match.

Chemistry
Well they help me match up born in sims, but I don't worry about it too much, I simply change it to suit.

Personality
This helps me to decide what the sim wears, sometimes with careers.

Skilling
Yes I also have that linked to personality. I took my calculations from a couple of simmers on here, they are called motivations levels.
High achievers have 8 or more points, average sims have 0-7 although I do debate with myself if I should make that 1-7, and low achivers are less then 0. How I calculate this is neatness + activity - playfulness. So if a sim is 10 active they will often be high achievers but if this is paired say with 3 neat and 9 playful the sim would only come to 4 average because they are simply too playful and sloppy to be focused.
With this 3 motivation levels I have quite a lot of rules starting from toddlerhood.
A low motivation toddler is allowed to do whatever he likes, meaning he can play with toys, leaves, the toilet etc but this can change if he has a highly motivated family member. So while I won't direct the LM toddler to skill at all the HM adult may try to get him to do what they want by using a baby gate to keep him away from the toilet for example, or will teach him skills.
Low motivated toddlers are restricted to 1 skill in each area, average to 2 and HM to 3. I've done are fair bit of tweaking to this as I started with 3-4-5 skills but it was simply too many. I am still deciding on new limits for this generation of kids, but probably 3-4-5. I do want average sims to be able to gain a scholership if they want to. So teens I will probably set at 6-8-10, the scholarship kind of binds me to that level of 8.
The main thing with LM sims is I can't direct them to skill directly. I do use quite a lot of mods and objects which can be used autonomously and I also allow for them to be asked to join. So if they go and use the exoputter and gain some charisma that is fine but I can't direct them to use it.
Average sims I go by their wants. So if they have a want to skill they can skill. The same goes to uni, if they have a want to write a term paper or assignment or skill they can do so, if they don't have a want, they don't do it. I do make sure they go to class and final exam.
HM sims are directed to skill often.
Low and average sims from toddlerhood are set as 'stupid' in the batbox (which is a sims basic skilling speed without smart milk) HM are set as smart from toddlerhood, I don't bother with smart milk, this is the same effect.

I have tons more rules and ways of playing than this.

Just adding, please feel free to bump my career thread (in my siggy) and most of those ones linked to above are also fine to bump so long as you have something interesting to say. There are also threads on UNI and Motivation levels around as well. What we don't want bumping is some help thread from 2008 to say "I never had no problems!" or a thread asking what SP they should get or something else meaningless to now. < Don't do that.

I choose aspirations based on the sim's personality and interests. There's no hard-and-fixed formula, but I interpret high nice points as a marker for a family sim, low playful points as a marker for a knowledge sim, high interest in Money/Work as a fortune sim, that sort of thing. High active can be a marker for Fortune, since the Sim may roll a desire to be an athlete. High outgoing is a marker for both Popularity and Romance, but very few of my sims are Romance. I may have one every...three generations. I've never come out with a comprehensive system, but right after a kid ages up into a teen, I hit "Pause" real fast so I can study their newly-jiggled interests and see what kind of person they're becoming.

A sim's preferred hobby will prompt me to choose a career based on it, if possible. Science and nature sims go for science/natural science, music sims go for music, etc.

There are certain jobs that I restrict: I only allow one Mayor per neighborhood, one Police Chief, one minister of education, that sort of thing. While I'm not trying to do something like the build-a-town challenge, I do like some semblance of reality. That means one mayor, and it means I ignore the weird careers. The "Adventure" career in Sims 1 was much better.

My playstyle has changed a lot over the years. Back in 2004, 2005, all of my Sims would have been married before they woohooed, and I would have made matches for them as teens. These days I still do a little matchmaking, but mostly they choose based on who they have bolts for, and dating is no longer a sedate, chaste affair. If there's a closet on the lot where sims can do a one-click woohoo that doesn't trigger jealousy, it's probably happening.

My sims don't have televisions because they're too noisy,.

My sims learn 4 points cooking and 3 mechanical, no exceptions. I find fires and electrocutions more tiresome than entertaining at this point.

Boy oh boy, this is going to be fun to write! I'll write up as much info I can think of and take inspiration from the above posts.

To add to the list of threads, I made an aspiration discussion thread several months back! If anyone needs ideas, feel free to check it out.

In Kesry, my BACC, I'm working on getting the gross Sim population up to 150 (currently at 91--the number of babies each generation increases greatly, and it's fun to see), and then I'm going to start doing rolls to kill Sims off every rotation. This is to ensure that the BACC lasts a long, long time, and it's great for stirring up drama. As for the rest of the BACC, I admittedly don't start nearly as many businesses as the challenge intends. After a few weeks, I found myself dipping back into my usual, lazy play-style, ignoring community lots almost altogether. I'm working on forcing myself out of that zone and into one that includes businesses more. I have one business whose owner hasn't come around to run it since it was passed on to her--but to her defense, she had a baby, wound up in the homeless shelter, and had to get a newspaper job as part of the contract for living there. Anyway, I'm most excited about opening a pet store, which I believe will happen next rotation!

Interests in my 'hood dictate what business a Sim might open or what career they might go into. I have blocked myself from using mirrors to change Sims' hair and makeup until I have a running salon, for example (and let me tell you, I have most certainly not cheated a few times ).

Personality is something I occasionally glance at to figure out what direction a Sim's life might take. A meaner Sim might end up upset because they don't have friends or a romantic partner and they're not sure why, but to any outsider, it's pretty obvious. I let personality affect general gameplay and storylines, but I don't have their personalities memorized or anything like that.

Aspirations are rolled using random.org when the Sim becomes a teenager. I like the challenge of coming up with a story about why a Sim with certain personality points would aspire toward something that seems to oppose who they are. Why would a shy Sim aspire to be popular? Perhaps they were bullied at school and want to break out of their shell and make many friends. Maybe they want to test the waters and find others who are like them that they can connect to. It could be that they want superficial connections for the sake of appearance or to climb the career ladder.

LTW is a natural follow-up to Aspiration. I rarely remember to look at these, to be quite honest. If it matches up with a Sim's personality, interests, and my personal vision for them (if I have one--if not, great, the LTW will probably help out), then I'll go for it if possible. Unfortunately, several LTWs require college careers or other things that are currently blocked in my BACC, which means most of my Sims can't achieve their LTWs even if I wanted them to.

Skills are pretty easygoing. If a Sim needs a skill point for a promotion, I'll only actively have them study for it (via whatever object is appropriate) if they roll a wish to level up in that skill. It's about the only way I can keep myself from letting everyone get promotions willy-nilly (well, that and the lovely lower job promotion chance mod by Lamare). However, after reading your post @citybuilder, I've gotta say your way of skill-building is incredibly enticing, and I might just using that system myself!

College is not yet in effect in my BACC, but I did have a university set up in Oaville. Sims pay $10,000 in tuition prior to moving. If they cannot afford this, they don't go to college. They must also have at least a C grade. If I don't think a Sim has a use for college/I don't think they would want to take that route, I'll have them skip it. Teenage parents can't go to college unless they can find someone to raise their kid while they're gone or give it up for adoption.

Chemistry is a pretty strong factor in my Sims' romantic relationships. The lower the chemistry, the more likely the relationship is to end in a split; after all, chemistry in real life isn't all about physical attraction or basic bits of personality. How likely are the Sims to work things out? How badly do they need/want to fix it? Do they have kids whose lives they don't want to affect with a divorce? Are they together to make family members happy? Did they shack up because they were childhood friends and high school sweethearts, and they wouldn't know how to get started in the dating world (stop me, I'm giving myself ideas at 2 AM)? I don't do any hard calculations on this, I just go based on the Sims' personalities and get a feel for the situation. For example, Piper Rite and Vic Remy broke up because Piper was angry at Vic for refusing to take time off work to care for their child, forcing Piper to stay home and diminishing her chances at becoming a world-class chef. Other couples have gone their own ways after one party cheated. Others still have split because the two Sims had kids and then one learned that being a parent wasn't what they wanted out of life.

@didyouevenmakeasound, I never in a million years would've thought to take mutual friends into consideration for this! That's a great idea and it's something I'll definitely keep in mind for the future. Genes, on the other hand, I lean on perhaps a bit too much for match-making.

Families in my 'hoods are not the most interactive bunch. Generally my Sims don't cuddle or play with their babies (unless they roll a wish to) because they have more important things to do. That sounds awful, I know--trust me, I wouldn't apply that logic to real babies! It's mostly the same with toddlers: Parents interact with them to bump their needs up and teach them their skills, and then the tots spend their free time playing with toys, usually by themselves. These are more habits I'm trying to change.

Regarding conception, ACR handles that if the Sims have no direct wish to have children; if they do, I have them Try for Babe once a day and let ACR do the rest. I leave the ideal children number at -1. The most children anyone has had in Kesry was six kids by Melissa and Chandler Kesry: Two sets of twins and two singlets. Each Sim has a static fertility, which is rolled when they become teens:

1 = Less than parent's fertility
2 = Greater than parent's fertility

1 = Mother's fertility
2 = Father's fertility

1-20 = Number to raise or lower the fertility by

So let's say Mary's parents Annie and Tyler have 80% and 30% fertility, respectively. Mary's first roll results in a 1. Her second roll also results in a 1. Mary will have less fertility than her mother. By how much? We'll say she rolled a 20. Mary's static fertility is then set to 60.

In the case of CAS Sims, fertility is rolled 0-100, with 0 resulting in the Sim's "can get/can impregnate" status to "No".

Gay couples can opt to adopt for $5,000, or they can pay $10,000 for a biological child that uses their DNA. In my head, this is a finalized version of something scientists are working on (using two men as an example here): Extracting DNA from an egg, replacing it with the DNA of Guy A's sperm, and using Guy B's sperm to fertilize the egg. In actuality, I use a mod that has an option stating "I want a baby with..." and a little pie menu of Sims in the zone.

Sims' autonomy in the romance department is generally left up to ACR, though if I feel a Sim's personality warrants it, I'll change it. I recently made two Sims for whom jealousy didn't really fit, so I turned it off for them. Though married, they can happily romp about with other Sims without worrying about ruining their relationship.

Edit: It was definitely a fun post to make, lol. I didn't expect to write this much!

Ha, thanks! Of course, it makes some things a little awkward in my game when I go for the 3-bolter hookups and mutual friends, because Natasha Una has 3B for her second cousin (Victor I think? I don't play the Aspirs much.) and 2B for the very person I'm trying to set her up with
It could make for drama, I guess, but it squicks me a bit, I guess because I see my second cousins as first cousins.
Hookups are the one thing I don't take mutual friends into consideration for

My game revolves around community lots - and a lot of social interaction. I want it to have the feel of a town where everyone is involved in the community.
Sims all go to community lots to gain skills - they very seldom study at home. Students at Uni cannot study in their dorms, because I don't give them anything to gain skills with, they just sleep there. So they have to go out for everything else.
I have a rule that sims who need anything have to buy from my sims who own businesses. No ordering food over the phone
I also use the goup outings as much as I can - I have bands in groups, co-workers in groups, sims sharing hobbies in groups, etc. - and they go out a lot.
Elders are very important as well; they are the "wise people" and other sims need to learn from them. So elders who are knowledge sims will teach skills on community lots, others will train sims on exercise equipment or just share hobby tips with them, or play chess with the youngsters. Elders also have to serve food at the unemployment center and take others hiking from the hiking club thingy.

As many flaws as the Sims 3 University Life has, the fact that you can take a university course at any point is one of the things I liked.

My playstyle? Well, I give both the Sims challenges (bigger bills, and it's harder to get promotions) but leniency (I have a mod so that Sims get a bonus after staying at the same job level for some time). Most of the time my Sims do what rolls up in their wants, but sometimes I don't. I try to give them careers and hobbies that match their personality to some extent (no, my lazy Sim is not getting a job in athletic). I use BO's aspiration notebook thing to give non-Uni bound Sims more wants after they get enough aspiration points. They can unlock a second aspiration either during Uni or after getting more want slots. Nearly every one of my Sims has a radio because I like to listen to my custom stations. There's other things too but this is what I recall right now.

Hard to say, because I always jump from one particular game principle to another. Current hood I play will have only sims be unemployed (entrepreneurs) or employed as "Employees". Predestined hobby, personality, aspiration, interest, etc. - it's what their duties or biography is based of. Can't think of anything at the moment that sticks out from other simmers and their playstyles.

My version of BACC is much simplified so that the unlocking thing is based on realistic actions and not on some population count, because I don't do that.

I need to get a sim that is invested in Film&Literature, because I remember sims to none

A little summary of my gameplay notes from my integrated hood:

Play Time: Each family is played for seven sim days
Skills: I only fulfill skill wants if they are needed for job promotions.
Jobs: Sims can get any job they want, except the ones that are locked.
Hobbies: I go by what the game assigns. Sims open businesses base of their hobby. I need more cuisine sims, so the hood can have a food market.
Aspirations: Are picked randomly.
Romance: ACR takes full control of sims romances, however, I'll have a couple 'go steady' if they are romantic for two rounds. Sims don't get married unless they want to.
Pregnancy: Sims can have how many babies they want. Child support is charged to the parent that doesn't live with their babies.
Education; child and teen sims attend local public school. College doesn't exist.
Immigration: CAS sims are only allowed to move to the hood, to fulfill a role of a public servant,

I recently added a ROS to my gameplay, so the town can progress faster. Originally, I was sitting back letting everything happen naturally. It was fun at first, but the hood progression is moving too slow for me.

Weird perk(?) of mine: I'm not brother by what assets are available in game, because I tend to (well, 'tend' makes it sound like "not always") go with a randomized sim from cas every time. I said that certainly sticks out from me as a simmer in the crowd. I also have gotten even lazier by building quite ugly houses and what not in the game. Dun care bout luks, only care bout playability.

Aside from taking care of my Sims' basic needs, I only force them to perform actions (skill-building, making friends, doing homework, etc.) if they roll a want to do so. I try to let them choose their own fate and follow their own dreams. Very few of my Sims ever attain their LTW because of this, but I think it makes it much more fun to play. All Sims end up in different places in life.

I also have very specific rules I follow and a lot of mods. If anyone is interested, you can read my Gameplay Rules here .

For some reason I'm always suprised by all the rules people have in their own games? Like how much they control and change different aspects to make really cool worlds? I know its a thing that lots of choose to do, but I always forget its a thing because I don't really do anything in my game? One day I'll give it a go, probably by using several of your approaches as inspiration

I don't think rules are important at all - it is a game We all play the way we like to. I could never to one of these challenges with the hundreds of rules, it will take the joy out of the game for me completely. My 2 or 3 rules are flexible, but I really enjoy community lots. I really love to see what my playable sims, when I am not controlling them, are getting up to behind my back - which of them are dining/fishing/playing chess together who is perhaps going to drag a surprising partner into a photo booth somewhere I also like to keep an eye on as many sims as possible, and since I now have 250+ families, it makes that part easier as well. I can at least drag sims from 4 or 5 families to a group outing at once.

Don't you hate it when unimportant things such as work and my life get in the way of the Sims?

So much good stuff here guys. It's wonderful to see so many people still playing this 20 year old game in such depth and variety. Thank you all also for the reading material! You're great Charmful.

I love all the discussion about skilling. I wasn't entirely satisfied with how I handled skill limiting in college. I think perhaps from reading this thread a wants based system might work well for the duration of their univerisity years.

Nuuk, my gay Sims can also pay to have a genetic child! Some of their genes are just too good not to pass down. One of the main joys in my game is watching sims pass down their features and quirks to their children. I don't currently use aspirations but I'm toying with the idea of having a genetic (it would be nurture rather than nature, though, I suppose) component to them. I currently have my child sims be Encouraged by sims they live with but aren't immediate family, like grandparents, housemates in that sims most prominent personality trait, because I feel that simulates something the influence those around you has on you. My sims also share interests sporadically, but I don't really have a system for that.

Special note to petro with over 250 families! That's amazing. I bow down.

(Would quote the part of the reply If I weren't on the phone) Yes I hate when work/life gets in my way of playing The SIMS.