I had this question for a while and made me wonder even more whilst I was playing TS3 Ambitions expansion pack, about on how TS2 players simulate careers/jobs/work while your sims are on the lot without leaving off the screen.I have little experence and never got the chance to dwell into and try out it (as much as I want, but something is holding me back), but....

*I'm really bad at starting threads and often can't come with good introductions, so ummm.... maybe I'll ask more questions in replies, so answer this thread however you want*

Well, the easiest and most obvious thing that can be done is to use ownable lots - it's the thing from OFB that was a real gift to the game.

You can use owned lots in the regular way to set up a business and have customers and sell stuff, either hand crafted or from the game catalogue - so shops mostly - or sell services - hairdressers maybe. Little Carping and surrounding areas have a lot of shops. There are hacks that can enhance this too - for example SimWardrobe's fish packing station means you can have a fish shop (and can 'craft' the goods by being a fisherperson) which you can't do otherwise. Other sims get employed by business owners too so I see them working when the shop owner opens their lot/shop.

But there are a variety of other things you can do with ownable lots to simulate work environments. One thing that occurs to me that I do a lot is have what you might call service lots - schools, police stations, a prison, fire stations, medical clinics, churches and so on. Lots that provide some sort of social service. These have the advantage that your other sims can visit them. I have no home business lots at all because I like other sims to be able to visit the lots. There are all sorts of hacks available which allow you to run these types of lot. To give an example: with the church lots (and there are a few of those), the church lot is owned by the vicar (priest or minister whatever you want to call them) and they set up one of those ticket machines with the ticket price set at the lowest possible level. This means that sims will come on to the lot to visit and Len and his cohorts earn a small amount of money when they buy tickets but not too much. Vicars in my game are meant to be poor and they remain that way. I regard the income from the ticket machine as the stipend that Len gets from his See. Len (and his cohorts) visit their churches every day and do stuff: talk to parishioners, conduct weddings (and funerals when I eventually sort that out), taking evensong at 7pm, practice the organ, talk to the organist, play darts in the church hall. Running the schools is slightly different. With schools, I have the lot owner (the headmaster/mistress or principal teacher) go to the school lot from Monday to Friday but they are also in the education career. So they go to work every day. I work it by letting them go off to school in the morning and then taking them to their school lot once they return home to 'play out their day' so to speak. Obviously, this is very energy draining for the sim as they basically play two days at once but I get round that by yanking up their energy motive (and other motives too if needed) when they get home from work before they go off to their lot - I let them have this bonus because I'm asking them to work double shifts, so to speak. Because of this, they don't need to earn any money from running the owned lot - they get their salary from the career. All they need is to own the lot because that's how the game works. I give them the money for the lot using the money cheat (and take it off them the same way should they leave that career and sell the lot). I work several of the other careers in the same way. With the schools, it's fairly easy to simulate the school days with Inge's school system. With fire-fighters, that's a bit more of a challenge but there are things you can do.

The third way in which I use ownable lots is to simulate more regular jobs, like business or law. These are run on a similar principle to the service lots above in that a lawyer sim is employed in the career and also owns a law office where they don't actually have to earn money. There are hacked objects that let you simulate office work or factory work so I use those. There's a bank in Little Carping which I run as a business. I use some of the banking hacked objects for customers who come into the bank and also have Gunther (for it is he) spend a lot of his day giving financial advice on a computer in his office upstairs in the bank. I also send sims there to talk to Gunther when they need a loan or mortgage (Gunther lends them the money and they have to pay him back).

When OFB was originally announced, I wasn't too keen on it as an idea for an EP. I thought what's interesting about shopping? But the ownable lots don't have to be shops and you can do a huge amount with them. Although I've been talking about businesses and simulating work here, I use them for other stuff too. In the end, a pretty amazing enhancement to the game in my opinion.

I kinda thought of doing is having a sim applied for a career (like culinary), then the hour before the carpool arrives freeze his motive decay and send the sim to a workplace (restaurant), have him work there during the shift before coming home and from there have him take the carpool to work off the rest of the day to pass. Though one problem: got to find a way/mod to prevent income just to have the sim be playable and employee at the same time.

I give my sims a job often just for the title. Often times they never go to a rabbit hole job, I stop that with the institution sign. Then if it's a service they live at that service, or they own a business and go there to work or they are employed somewhere. I try and have each sim have appropriate clothing, some are career clothes unlocked in CAS others are downloaded. I talked a lot about this on my career and business for sims thread, in my siggy. Feel free to post and bump it.

You could always have him donate the money that he makes to charity using Monique's Computer; or you can use a default version of the career and remove the wages along with the chance cards. This is only a good idea if you want this to be your neighborhood standard for that career.

Another option:
http://www.insimenator.org/index.ph...b&topic=13404.0

I use the self-employed version in my game for some of my Sims who own businesses that are their only source of income. I have other Sims who have an outside career and their business is an extension of that career. For example Media Mogul owns the town newspaper; I defaulted the Law Enforcement Career and created my own career Small Town Police Officer Career ... the Sheriff owns the Police Station. Sim in the cosmetology career owns a salon; Sim employed as a Florist - owns her own florist. I don't mind them making extra money as there are plenty of things in my game for them to spend it on. I often change prices of custom content to balance things out; I find that many items are seriously under priced, while other things of lesser value cost a fortune.

To have them stay home and work I use the in game "Write a Book" option. Set up and office looking room and go at it.
It makes it look like there working.
I don't use mods other than essential mods to keep my game from breaking.

on-screen jobs; there are many shipped version temporary ones.
-selling sim-made objects in Build/Buy.
-novel writing.
- money-making career rewards.
-Perform interaction on instruments.
-the money-earning self interactions.
-sims searching for objects. in base game, within trash can; Salvage interaction. with Bon Voyage, on beach/ground or in pirate ship; then selling the objects.
-the wishing objects; Season's well, Freetime's genie lamp.
-"replacing" various NPCs; barista, cafeteria NPC, University's bartender, DJ.
at least one thing in common with all of those: they would need to be repeatedly done for sims to be regularly paid.

permanent on-screen jobs; I take only shipped version ones are through Open For Business.

Sometimes I send a single Sim off to do "landscaping" on a community lot (or rather, digging for treasure). When they get back they still have their whole day to do other stuff.

One amusing thing I like is Ebeneezer Lambert, keeper of the Victorian cemetary in Sirencester, digs regularly. Well, you would if you were a keeper of a cemetery and its sexton - he's also a funeral director. I wonder if he'd like to start a black market in things he's dug up. Not sure the local council would approve - or the families of the people who're buried there.

I did not even know you could dig for treasure on a community lot..o_0
What a perfect place to do so.

Oh, yes, you can dig for treasure on a CL. What you can do as well is buy an empty community lot, dig for treasure, save that treasure and then sell it to your unsuspecting customers as 'relics'. Pixels will buy anything, including bones...

You can dig anywhere.

I have a community lot just for digging. There are toilets, street lights and a BBQ. It has helped out some poor Sims in the past

I believe Chris Hatch has some things you can put on a lot, and they turn it into job locations? I want to make a doctor owned clinic actually.

I just use my imagination. I pick a job that is closest to what the 'story in my head' says that sim does and send them off to work. <shrugs> My sims live rich lives, in my head.

That's an awesome idea.
I put a sim in a mausoleum career but neither the town nor him can afford buying the cemetery lot yet. I guess he should dig to earn money (my sims don't dig).

He earns money by conducting funerals - not that there are that many in Little Carping at present - but if he digs up valuable stuff, he may not report it to anyone.