Around 10 households until I can get back to my apox! o wo

By the by, in terms of decorating: I know we can't use "artistic" decorations, but are we allowed to use ruins and dirty objects and the like (such as, oh, broken dishes and odds and ends clutter) for atmosphere even if they're technically deco items? It's weird to have a sort of clean apocalypse.

Totally. Go for it, make it as grudge and depressing as possible.

Thanks!

My game is going well so far. My founder's wife became Chief of Staff last night (finally, running water again!) and they just adopted a stray cat named Kim who got a job in the Security career. Their son is 3 days from his teen birthday and he's slated for the Military career.

(Though I sincerely wish they'd stop pestering me to hire a butler...)

Last edited by Amalia81 : 14th May 2012 at 09:42 PM.

I finished off the first tier last night when my heir hit the top of the military career! Time to start building/upgrading community lots and decide what I want to unlock next. :D

Congrats, Arathe1 Bronze Survivor!

Hm, I capped out the service pet career, but my elders are still unselectable. Would it hurt anything to remove the service career file from the mods folder?

ETA: And thank you! I'm having a blast with this challenge. <3

Last edited by Arathe1 : 16th May 2012 at 01:18 AM.

No, it won't hurt anything to remove the service pet career file, in fact, that's what you're supposed to do after topping each of the careers. Exit the game, remove any mods relating to careers you've topped, then restart your game. Your elders should be selectable again.

Arathe1, Amalia81 is correct. The mods are pretty dead simple, they are only hiders and disablers. They have no intelligent coding to check to see if anyone has ever reached the top of a particular career. You need to save, exit, remove the mod, and restart after topping each career.

Oh! I hadn't even realized, probably because I haven't unlocked anything yet that the mods keep me from doing anything important (I have the version without the object hiders, since I'm missing a couple of stuff packs). Excellent, thanks guys.

I think I might try this challenge. I've always wanted to do an apocalypse-type neighborhood.

I've almost finished off Tier 1 - my Apox heir is a Commander in the military career! Once I've topped that, I'll be adopting another stray to work on lifting Service Pet. It drove me nuts having uncontrollable elders. (It's all fine and well that my founder and his wife were 3-bolters, but they spent nearly every waking moment flirting with each other... all the while neglecting their other needs. I love how sim pets seem to be better at taking care of themselves than human sims.)

Aside from that, I'm having lots of fun with this challenge!

Update 5/23: My Apox heir just became General! Woo-hoo!

Last edited by Amalia81 : 23rd May 2012 at 11:35 PM.

Sorry for the double post, but a quick update: I've finished off all of Tier 1 as of last week, and my second-generation heir's wife just became Education Minister, so their teenage daughter is now college-bound with a future in the Business career. I've also lifted Service Pet, so elderhood is no longer something to be dreaded.

>.< I've never even finished this challenge, I will try now though.

One of my heirs topped the Law Enforcement career, which finishes off the second tier for me! Only one to go. d(' 'd)

A few observations/tips:

- Don't bother with a computer unless you really want to be able to write novels. You'll be spending all your time canceling sims trying to get their game on.

- Between Military and Education, just take the whole family to your military community lot and use the obstacle course (assuming you have skill ups on community lots and purchasable career rewards. Also assuming you forgot to buy one for the family/didn't have anywhere to put it) to build body. WAY more efficient than the radio. It also raises fun, which means kids and teens can use it!

-Twins are a micromanagement nightmare before you can hire a nanny. Be wary of the twins family aspiration perk, especially if the social worker has already been re-enabled by Law.

- Don't choose the Romance aspiration unless you want a challenge keeping your sim happy. Popularity is probably not a good idea either.

On the subject of career order:

Aim to unlock Law and Politics early. Politics will save you a lot of grief in the career department by allowing you to ignore chance cards (and thus avoid getting fired), and Law will allow you to start moving heirs out and work on unlocking careers in tandem. Law also allows you to finally lock wants, which is nice because if your game is anything like mine, your sims will be in red aspiration more often than not.

Education is another good one to get out of the way early. It allows you to redeem knowledge aspiration perks; Eureka in particular comes in handy. Not to mention that college is basically a free chunk of time to work on skill building so you can max out careers asap. I've also found the Bookshelf of Education invaluable for building body. Seriously, nuts to the radio. =P

Consider Intelligence as another early career. Being able to chat on the phone went MILES towards making friends more easily. It's also half of the requirement to hire service sims.

Which leads me to Business. Being able to own your own business is sort of useless, since you'll (presumably) be using all your adult sims to unlock a career, BUT being able to finally sell off all those refrigerators littering your lawn is priceless. It's also the second half of the service sim requirement.

Once you knock those out of the way, it's really a matter of preference.

The only real benefit of unlocking Journalism is being able to check all the day's job offerings instead of just the first. Something to consider if you're having a hard time finding the job you want.

Science is handy for the Spray command if your sims are always running outside to stomp roaches. It also allows you to purchase a few convenient appliances such as the dishwasher.

Law Enforcement isn't a biggie. The smoke alarm/sprinkler is nice to have, and the career reward is handy for raising kids' cleaning, but that's about it.

Architecture and Natural Science are both largely cosmetic and can be left until the end, unless the dreary environment is getting you down. Architecture *does* lift the 8x8 restriction, which is nice for any new houses you build after Law.

Oceanography restrictions aren't a big deal, but being able to add spring into your season rotation is nice after all that snow.

Life of Crime really ought to be last on your list, since by the second generation the criminal cut is peanuts. Unless you unlock Architecture early and pour a lot of money into fancying the house up the value won't increase much, if at all.

Anyhow! That's just my two cents, and it really all depends on your playstyle. On to tier three! :D

Congrats to both Amalia81 and Arathe1 as our latest Bronze Apox Survivor and our first Silver Apox Survivor. Thank you for that good run down, it's very helpful, not just to the others trying to 'survive', but me as well, to know where the hard parts are.

Okay I reinstalled my game, everything seems to be running proper again, so I am going to give this a go!

*Just notice been here seven years and this is the eighth post, about one a year, is there a Lifetime Lurker Award? rotflmao

I'm back to my Apox!

I just finished lifting business. Our house is now much cleaner and all of the one square items look nicer. The beds are still terrible, though.

Out of the three adult sims I gave left one is an elder and the woman who lifted business is going to have children soon. Her townie husband is halfway through education.

Oh, and don't use Garden Club sims for this challenge. They come as a completely clean slate with no money, skills, badges, no nothing.

Thanks for those pointers, Arathe1! (Cool avatar pic, by the way.) Next up on my to-do list are Business and Politics. My Apox heiress just had a baby girl, so she'll be going into Business while grandpa looks after the little one, and her townie husband has almost unlocked Politics.

I'm sorry, I might've missed something here: once we've cleared Education are we allowed (or should we) send teens to college? The grandson of my founder has successfully toped Education right before turning elder & his eldest daughter has rolled a want for an education at Poisonwood Valley's barebones uni. I'm tempted to let her stay at home but it would be nice to make old dad proud of at least one of his kids (middle child Carl has recently joined the furry sect of werewolves & had to leave home early)....Gotta say, I have never had so many graves on one lot before, even with my Black Widow (which admittedly didn't last long, basically using her as an excuse to clear out ugly townies). My founder's lot has 14 graves on it already, truthfully 3 of which are townies that were prospective mates that were caught in an unfortunate elder-cooking-with-no-skills fire & one of which was a townie who was beset upon by all 3 roaming & very po'd family ghosts, one right after another. I'm thinking once challenge is done I might have to move out last descendent & turn the founder's lot into community haunted house. Take too long to move them all to community graveyard appropriate to their distinction...

hey all... are toddler toys prohibited by any of the restrictions? I can't remember.

As far as I can tell, none of the toddler toys (except the activity table, which is restricted by Art) are restricted, although Phaenoh might be better able to answer that question.

Update: My fourth-gen heiress is a sophomore in college and her boyfriend is studying architecture. It's fitting that she's slated for Intelligence, since she looks like a younger version of Scully from X-Files (with reddish-brown hair instead of red).



My founder Charlie can be seen in this thread at Garden of Shadows. Those cheekbones have really carried down through the generations!

Last edited by Amalia81 : 13th Jun 2012 at 02:05 PM.

she's very pretty!

EDIT: fearful of the dreaded double post, I have a quick question I am really hoping someone can answer...I read & reread the restrictions, but I am unable to find out where the restriction on the telescopes will be lifted. For story purposes I love the idea of a lot with supernatural spares & an alien family that have to live with isolation & discrimination until Intelligence is lifted. I know I could likely cheat & just make someone preggers with alien spawn via the blender & it's ilk, but I really do enjoy the adbuction (sorry, bad spelling this early) scene & the effects it has on any family members witnessing it....

Last edited by sweetbaby160 : 18th Jun 2012 at 12:26 PM.

Founder Vivian Fay dropped out during the first semester of her sophomore year due to the apocalypse and made it a little over halfway in the Military career before flubbing a chance card that got her fired. She was less than ten days from elderhood and senility at the time, so I used the Elixer of Life she brought back from college. Now she's a single promotion away from Celebrity Chef status (Culinary), and has adopted a stray dog she affectionately dubbed Rascal, who became a hero and ended the Security Pet restriction while Vivian was still working drivethru at the Mess Hall. And she's got about two weeks left on the clock.

The best part: Vivian still can't cook. Every time she touches the grill, she ends up setting the house on fire. She's living on the cooking hobby cheese trays and cafeteria food at the Mess Hall.

Last edited by Proxian_girl : 20th Jun 2012 at 02:16 AM.

sweetbaby, Music is what lifts the ban on telescopes. Your supernatural spares can not band together, isolation means 1 per lot. I could see if you have multiples of one kind living together, like a family of all aliens, but if you end up having normal children from them, I think the main family would try to 'rescue' the kids and take them away from their monster parents. Still, if you are following the rules, you won't have any supernaturals.

Proxian, if you are grilling inside, you will set the house on fire 100% of the time, regardless of cooking skill.