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Scholar
Original Poster
#1 Old 29th Dec 2020 at 4:54 AM
Default advice for a horse ranch
I've never played with horses, but I feel like the world I'm setting up should have a horse ranch. I mean a residential one, not an equestrian rabbithole or a venue for training. I'll probably leave the family I move into it inactive most of the time, but I would like to make it functional and good-looking. The family's not going to be wealthy except for owning horses.

Since I've never set up a horse ranch before, I have a number of questions.

What do horses need? What does a horse barn need? What size should stalls be? I assume they need a corral, is there a correct size for that? What equipment do they need? Are there special routing problems for horses I should take into account? What am I not thinking of?
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#2 Old 29th Dec 2020 at 6:02 AM Last edited by fascisthater : 29th Dec 2020 at 6:19 AM.
Quote: Originally posted by lucy kemnitzer
I've never played with horses, but I feel like the world I'm setting up should have a horse ranch. I mean a residential one, not an equestrian rabbithole or a venue for training. I'll probably leave the family I move into it inactive most of the time, but I would like to make it functional and good-looking. The family's not going to be wealthy except for owning horses.

Since I've never set up a horse ranch before, I have a number of questions.

What do horses need? What does a horse barn need? What size should stalls be? I assume they need a corral, is there a correct size for that? What equipment do they need? Are there special routing problems for horses I should take into account? What am I not thinking of?



This info may help you with horses Link The pets expansion came with 3 types of box stalls I think(that have their own spacing). Make sure the door to the stall is routable to the horse. Horses cannot use stairs so do not place anything you want them to use on an elevated platform.

Edited to add -Horses are not able to pass through regular doors -so make sure where you want the horse to path to doesn't have regular doors in the way.
Top Secret Researcher
#3 Old 29th Dec 2020 at 8:34 AM
Horses have the worst routing in game. So no matter what you do, take a large lot (at least 40x40, better 50x50 or bigger). Leave lots of space for them to just walk and gallop around, i.e. put the buildings to the edges of the lot and don't obstruct the area with decorations.
They would need either a trough or the stalls that come with the game. Easiest and safest way to build a barn is to use those stalls and simply add a roof to them. Horses don't freeze in winter so you don't have to bother with additional doors or enclosed rooms.

As fascisthater said, they can't use regular doors, there are 2-storey barn doors which you would have to use if you intend to build a full barn with walls. It would need to be 2-stories high then obviously. You can still use the stables in there, just make sure to have enough room for the horses to enter and exit the stalls.

Everything else is optional. They like the salt lumps that come with the game. If you add the large horse ball you are in for some funny scenes! But really the most important thing is to leave lots of space for them. They don't technically need a corral, but if you want to have it look like one you can add fences. Leave the tiles at the edges of the lot entirely free, don't build on them and add many gates so that sims and horses can route freely.
dodgy builder
#4 Old 29th Dec 2020 at 10:21 AM
In Stranda I had 2 different horse lots. One is the rabbithole and the other is a lot they can visit and keep their horses at. I remember I tested having the horse in a stable on the ranch and live somewhere else. Sometimes the horses comes to the residential lot of the family I played, but sometimes it worked. I used the ranch lot as a training facility for my sims. It's a very long time since I played Stranda and made it, but the track for horse riding was a very nice thing to make. I didn't use it that much later, mainly because horses was a hassle to play with for my game style.
Scholar
Original Poster
#5 Old 1st Jan 2021 at 1:12 AM
Thanks guys! I understood what you meant about how much space is needed when I built a barn over the stables. My, that's a huge building. I've built it on a 50X50 lot with a pretty small house on it so there's a little room for the horses to have some play space and one jump object. Since this family is mostly going to be inactive, I am trying to make it look nice for passersby and also to have no places where sims and horses can get trapped. I've moved a large family on to the lot but I'm going to kill off over half of them to make room for horses.
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