Fed up of your klepto neighbours stealing your morning paper? Sick of the ungodly racket coming from the town “musician’s” guitar strings? Well, don’t put up with it any longer—take your grievance to the court!
Each case has its own criteria for application as well as different criteria for winning or losing the case. Aside from court hearings, there are numerous other legal activities that sims can partake in.
Recommended Mods (but not required): Missy Hissy Lawyer Career, my Functioning Printer Mod, GamesFreak's Advice Mod, Battery Script Utility Auto-Menu.
Modules (14/11/23)
Real Estate Module for this mod can be found: Here (simblr.cc)
16/05/24 - I forgot to update the package with the correct file. So, this is the ACTUAL fix for lawyers helping jailed clients.
26/04/24 - When called to help their jailed client, lawyers should actually go to the jail instead of changing clothes and standing around.
28/06/23 - Spanish Translation added thanks to Luandros
10/06/23 - Motives should now be properly taken care of in jail. Traditional Chinese translation thanks to cielokyuko, Brazilian Portuguese translation thanks to Hatm.
18/09/22 - Updated with the French Translation, courtesy of SecretX. French documentation also included.
Open Court Case Interactions
The following interactions are found on the City Hall rabbithole under 'Court Services'.
Can be opened by sims in Law Enforcement/Politics/Private Eye Careers.
Having a lawyer, being considered rich, and being employed in law enforcement/politics/private eye gives you an extra chance of winning.
Upon winning the case, the sim will get a performance boost of 10 points. This also goes if the defendant wins the case, providing they're in the criminal career.
Costs 261 simoleons to open the case and 593 simoleons at the time of the hearing.
Can be opened by married sims.
Extra fees are applied upon losing the case as well as the settlement cost. By default, there's an extra 250 simoleons for losing the case, and a random amount (calculated against the sims' wealth, housing situation, employment status) for the settlement. If the sim can't pay the settlement cost, due to living in the same house as their ex, the court will provide the sim with a legal document* stating the due amount. This document can be discarded at any time, and you, the player, can pay the fee via. your preferred method (e.g., postal cheque, tax collector, nraas, money bags, etc.)
The settlement will be paid by the sim with the higher net worth.
Any other misc fees will be added to the sim's household bills.
*The legal document interactions are: Read, Recycle/Throw, Pick up, Photocopy. Photocopy is only available if you have my Functioning Printer mod installed.
File For Custody
Costs 245 simoleons to open.
Can be opened by sims living in separate households from their children.
Having a lawyer, having more money than the other parent, having a job, and being rich will increase win chances.
Custody will only be granted if the sim wins the hearing, upon which time, the child will be transferred to the parent's household.
Currently, only one child can be taken for custody at a time.
This case is opened against your active sim if they are caught (20% default chance) doing the following activities: bar brawling, rowdy fighting, stealing objects, tagging buildings, pranking the school, hacking club listings, failing to bribe club bouncer, stealing candy from baby, detonating object, casting pestilence or haunting curse.
The case will not be opened if there are no city halls available in the world or if there are no police officers in the world.
Having a lawyer, being rich, having a job, increases win chances. Pregnant sims, teens, and those due to age up will never lose this suit.
Upon winning the summons case, your sim will receive a fine between 200 - 2000 simoleons. If they're in the criminal career, there's a 50% chance they'll get a raise.
Upon losing the case, those employed in Law Enforcement, Politics, Medicine or Missy Hissy's Local Council Career have a 40% chance of being demoted and a 5% chance of being fired. Young adult and above sims will also be sent to jail for a time (default 2 days).
Hearings are scheduled 2-3 days after opening a case. If there are no city halls in town, they'll be scheduled at the University Administration Centre, if possible. Their default start time is 7AM and they last for 1 hour.
All cases, besides summons cases, can be cancelled either by going to the city hall, or calling from a phone. Cancel hearing can be found under the Phone 'Services' tab.
Only one case can be opened at a time, and any sim that is taken to court will be given a -30 relationship decrease with the sim they're prosecuting.
All sims, except teens, will be given paid time off work if the hearing starts during their work day.
All sims have a base 30% chance of winning the suit. Both the prosecutor and the defendant's traits/buffs/wealth/employment etc. are taken into account when calculating the total win chance—aka. it's not any and anybody that you ought to take to court!
Please note: you must attend the hearing with the sim who opened the case, otherwise all sims will attend but there will be no winner or loser.
Legal Matters
Have Court Wedding
Engaged sims can get married at the court! Blood relatives and friends can be invited to attend.
Costs 200 simoleons.
Make sure to throw a wedding reception afterwards!
Ask If Eligible For Bail
While in jail, the active sim can ask if eligible for bail. If yes, they can pick one of their good friends (young adult and above only) to pay for their freedom. If the sim can afford it, the active sim will be released from jail early. If not, or if the sim has no friends, they will stay in prison and will have to wait for a while to be able to ask again.
Post Bail
While a sim from the active household is imprisoned after losing a summons case, any sim from their household can post their bail (if they can afford it - Default: random value between 500 - 4000 simoleons).
Un/Register As Lawyer
Available for sims employed in Missy Hissy's Lawyer Career as well as sims with a business/communications degree.
Sims are added to a registered lawyers list and can begin taking clients.
Find/Fire Lawyer
Look through the list of available lawyers in town and pick one to represent your sim.
Costs 300 simoleons.
The lawyer will then attend all of your sims court cases, and if the specific case benefits from having a lawyer, your sim will have an extra chance of winning it.
Get Legal Advice
If your sim has an active court case, they can get legal advice at the city hall.
Costs 80 simoleons.
Gives your sim a 72hr educated buff, increasing their chances of winning their court case.
Lawyers
Once a lawyer has clients (there’s no limit on the no. of clients), they will automatically attend all their court hearings if possible.
They will be paid 100 simoleons after each hearing and will also receive job performance benefits. There’s no penalty for not attending a hearing.
If a client in an inactive household is caught doing a summonable offense, instead of being called to court, they will be called to the police station for a while. The lawyer will be given a choice whether or not to join them at the station.
Lawyers can click on themselves and check their client list (returns list of clients) or check upcoming hearings (if any of their clients have any upcoming hearings - handy if your swapping households and need to remember to go back in time for a hearing).
Clients can open certain cases (ones that actually benefit from the presence of a lawyer) straight from the lawyer.
Sim Interactions
Threaten To Sue
Found under mean.
Report Crime
Found under friendly.
Crimes can only be reported to sims employed in Law Enforcement.
Uses the EA gossip system. If active sim has witnessed fight, the fighter will be called to the police station and get the 'being watched' moodlet. Else, the officer will brush the active sim off.
Talk about Court Case
Found under friendly.
Any sim with an active case can talk about it to others.
Registered Lawyers can always talk about cases to others.
Get Advice On Active Case
If sim has an active case, and has hired a lawyer, they can ask their lawyer for advice.
Found under 'Lawyer Services'.
Gives the educated moodlet, and a notification will pop up with case specific advice on the win/lose criteria.
Hire/Fire/Quit/Can I be Your Lawyer
Found under Friendly and/or Lawyer Services respectively.
Deals with the employment of registered lawyers.
Sims will never be prevented from hiring/firing lawyers regardless of relationship.
Computer Interactions
The following interactions are available on the computer under 'Court Services': Open Civil/Criminal Case, Sue For Compensation, File For Divorce/Custody, Un/Register as Lawyer, Find/Fire Lawyer.
3 New Buffs: Won Lawsuit, Lost Lawsuit, Hot Court Date.
1 New Object: Legal Document.
Tuning: All values, beside the traits/buffs that can help you win a case, are tuneable with Battery's Script Utility Auto Menu installed.
The legal document can not be found in buy mode. See 'File For Divorce' for details on how to obtain. Costs 0 simoleons. Recolourable. 2 Presets. Polycount: 25 vertices/12 faces.
Included in the download : Main mod package, mod objects package and mod documentation.
Thanks to my testers on the Creators Discord! @simsdeogloria @simbouquet @desiree-uk @misspats3
HYRDO1st for the Russian Translation.
Those who gave suggestions/ideas. @bietjie @twinsimming Sonja A, Olomaya
Gamesfreak for the Job Overhaul mod, a giant help and inspiration in this mod.
Battery for the Script Utility, which saved me the headache of making my own menu and/or xml file for the bajillion tuneable attributes.
Filename
Type
Size
PhoebeJaySims.TakeSimsToCourt.Rar
Rar
PhoebeJaySims.TakeSimsToCourt_OBJECTS.package
package
361878
Take Sims To Court Documentation.docx
docx
7198957
Traduire les Sims en justice Documentation.odt
odt
7196184
PhoebeJaySims.TakeSimsToCourt.package
package
432561
Custom Content
The following custom content is included in the downloadable files:
Sign in to Mod The Sims
Take Sims To Court - Sue Sims, Become a Lawyer, Have Court Weddings and More!
Take Sims To Court - Sue Sims, Become a Lawyer, Have Court Weddings and More!
(14/11/23)
