Had to get the "no vacation greetings" mod because that stupid bow erases whatever you queue afterwards.

But the mountain autonomous greeting is even worse... "AAAAAARGHH!"

I can't find anything about it requiring additional files to function. According to the note here, it's supposed to be identical to the Twikkii bar in terms of functions. While hunting around for something I may have missed, I came upon meetme2theriver's Castaway collection here, and she mentions that she excluded nonfunctional stuff. The food stand is included in the downloads and the file is identical to the one I already had, suggesting it should be able to work. I let it overwrite just in case, but no luck. I wondered if it was something wrong with my game, but since Pennysims didn't get it to work either, it's at least not something just on my end. Real shame indeed though, it looked great with the Twikkii lot makeovers I did.


Different question: is there a way to check whether a vacation sim is a local or a tourist? I use clean templates so my game spawned new sims, but they all walk around in random clothes, so I no longer know who is who. I'd like to put the locals back in their "local" outfits so they're visually discernible again.

Do you have core functions? Not sure if the food stand needs it or not, but some items do.

If you use SimWardrobe's Teleportal you can look at the three Vacation Locals and the Tourists in separate panels, you would have 4 panels for these, so you could check to see which panel the Sim was in, that would tell you at a glance which sim is which.

Check this archive for the mod http://simfileshare.net/folder/87829/

You're right. I don't understand why am I so hung up on this. I guess I hate the inconsistency and unpredictability of it. For example, I'm used to CFE looking awful in neighborhood view, because it always looked awful so I accepted it as inevitability. But this is something I noticed fairly recently, so I guess I need some time to adjust. Typically, neighborhood aesthetics doesn't bother me that much, or else I wouldn't still be playing TS2. I'll get over it eventually. It helps seeing some of you advanced builders not being bothered by it.

...although, I will admit, in my shiny new 1920's 'Hood I'm working on, it IS starting to bother me.
Because I'm packing all these little 2X2 lots (all with basements) cheek to jowl next to each other so they line up prettily down the street - BUT, when I'm in one lot taking photos, every now and again I'll see the neighbor's fugly basement "problem" and it ruins the aesthetics of the shot. Then I have to go back out to hood view and rearrange things/add decos, go back into the lot and see if it's any better, then continue the photoshoot. *grrrrr* Anywho, like I said, if anyone ever comes up with a solution, I hope I hear about it!
I've decided regular basements with their "problem" are preferable to no-slope basements with their nether-world-drop problem. Even in hood view - with neighbors turned off - the no-slope hole is worse. (IMHO)

I did check the thread at MATY where files are posted. You need CS barstools to make it work.
http://www.moreawesomethanyou.com/s....html#msg369252

The food stand globals sort out the food available menu for each food stand by the GUID of the food stand, since they don't contain the GUID of the food stand from Castaway Stories there is no menu available to it. The file named CS-FoodStandEnabled.zip from http://simfileshare.net/folder/93287/ should do the trick.

Thank YOU - times 3
(I can only guess about the others - I'm sure - as I have all of the maty CS stuffeths - I need them too!)

I took this screenshot a while ago. I haven't played in a while but when I loaded the game to start a new save, my old Uberhood was still there because I forgot to remove it. Anyway, what does this "thumbnail" it's showing mean? I'm just curious. I have no intentions of playing it anytime soon, may it RIP.

In a Maxis grave yard there is cheap BBQ in a building; do they NOT automatically catch fire (like they do in a home lot)? What about a regular fireplace OUTSIDE, with a cozy rug...will it catch fire on community lot? I think playables can't die on community lots..right? Can they be abducted?.. with a hacked object that ALWAYS abducts - at least on a residential lot. You can't take a "very" pregnant sim to a community lot (they get a pop up that they need to stay home); but what if you have a wishing well and pick "accelerate pregnancy" - do they just insist on going home to deliver?

It's been a long while since I've tested, but I think general rule of thumb is that sims can't die on community lots, but they can die on player-owned business lots. And by "they" I mean your lot owner family--I didn't test for visitors so I don't know what happens if your playables are just visiting a player owned lot that a different family owns. And while I'm tempted to say that fires don't start on community lots, it's more likely that the BBQ inside a building is just Maxis stupidity, and/or pre-OFB & Seasons behavior. I'd fix that. As for the rug, again, I don't think fires start on community lots--I could be wrong because comm lots do get lightning, which is known to strike objects and cause fires--but anyway, the rug isn't guaranteed to catch fire. It's just that if there is a fire, it's more likely to catch on the rug and spread, especially if the rug is very close to the fire.

Not sure about abductions, but for pregnancy, Squinge made a mod to allow pregnant sims to visit community lots in their third trimester. You can get it via the wayback machine (https://web.archive.org/web/2015091...ic,9883.0.html). Also, aging & pregnancy does not advance on community lots (unless you have a mod like Chris Hatch's hospital mod or something), so if you click Accelerate pregnancy, my guess is that nothing would happen until the sim goes home, at which point the pregnancy would start to accelerate and then the sim would give birth.

For people who use those "more than 8 Sims per household mods"
How many Sims are feasable in one house4hold on a decent, modern computer?

I think it is more a case of what you can handle as a player - unless you are playing it like an asylum hands-off and if they die they die.
I had a house with 14 once, it just got too much. As to what my computer can take I filmed a large event for a story years ago and it crashed at 52 sims on the lot.

I've had around 40 sims on a lot (I think most were babies at the time), though I don't recommend it. I tend to keep to around 20 at the most (I have some lots I use for stand-in sims for storytelling), but for actually playing I rarely have more than 8-15 unless more are required for a picture. You may want to keep track of CC with high-poly meshes or large textures and not use too many of those at the same time on those lots, though.

Under 20 sims I can't say I've experienced a lot of game lag, but I've had pink-flashy problems on the PC I've previously played my story lots on, and things like big lots or 20+ sims does eventually cause some issues (snow and big lots with tons of CC tend to be worse, though).

Agree with what Jo and simmer22 said. I like a lot of sims around when I'm on community lots, and I find 20-30 sims, depending on the lot and npcs needed, is perfectly doable on a modern computer. Any more than that and it's probably chaos unless it's a giant lot--I mean like 4x5, or similar; I know some simmers think 2x3 is pretty huge, ! Anyway, a computer can probably handle more than that, but it's just not really necessary. Sims can get into fights, there's queue stomps, and, if the hood is small, you'll see the same people all the time. Plus, I find if there's a scenario like a party or date going on, you really are rolling the dice in terms of crashing. Sometimes things will go fine and other times you'll have to do a party over again. That probably has to do with cc limitations, though, like simmer22 mentioned.

As for actually playing sims on their home lot, 12-13 is my limit. Definitely under 15 at all costs. I regularly have large sim families and I find that once you get to double digits, the gameplay is more about scheduling and setting up queues. Queue for the bathroom, queue to eat, to, to skill, to socialize, etc., etc., etc. It can be hard to give sims unique personalities and get to know them/develop individual stories under such circumstances. I don't mind the odd household or two that large, but if you're a simmer that likes to dig into the details, I'd recommend keeping household size under 10 and just using the mods for the occasional surprise triplet or quad birth when the house is at max capacity, or for when you have a big family but you want to have puppies or kittens.

Tips for making a composite sim? I trying to make one between Fremma Agyeman and tessa Thompson

I have 18 on one residential lot with no lag issues. It's time-consuming to play, but that's unrelated to game performance.

If I select more than 40 sims as the limit on the teleporter shrub, the game always crashes. But I think it has more to do with spawning so many sims than them being on the lot.
I regularly handle 12+ sims, but it starts to feel too much at around 14. I try not to have more than 13 because that's when you get 2 sim columns.

Just checked an ancient legacy post from 2011 where I had a household of more than 40 people. I counted 38 portraits, but it was a screencap taken when the social worker arrived (I wanted to show how many people she insisted upon lecturing), so the children are missing from it. It was so slow, it basically ran in real time, but it was surprisingly stable. I would actually expect it to be a bit crashier on modern computers due to problems with newer hardware.

I've had 35, counting babies, toddlers, and pets. Most of the "play" was in pause as I set up everyone's Q. And after a few minutes it was: OMG they just made ANOTHER baby! (thanks ACR), why is the puppy starving - Oh, someone took it upstairs; where's that toddler? somebody put the baby in a toddler bed and toddler was found in a dog house. Spaghetti, again? no one is even hungry. But crazy grammpa just peed on the floor because his favorite bathroom was being used. STOP! STOP!

Any more than 8-10, and it gets really difficult taking care of everyone's needs. I use cheats for storytelling. There's absolutely no way I'm making sure everyone eats and sleeps while I'm busy taking pictures...

TS2 needs are also harder than for instance TS4, because they don't always fill all the way, or fill up slower, and need a bit more management. In TS4 I can manage 8 sims with ease and have a lot of time for other things like skilling or work, while in TS2 I'd have my hands full with the same amount of sims. Or perhaps I've just gotten too used to cheats in TS2... I cheat a bit in TS4 too, but not because the needs are difficult to manage (they are a bit more boring, though - especially sleeping, which tends to be the one I skip).

The Freetime motive decay rewards are essential to my gameplay, even when I'm not playing huge households.

Speaking as someone who started with Sims 1 - Sims 2 needs are a breeze. It's all about what you're used to I reckon.

Then it doesn't count! Anything is manageable in pause!
No but wow, how long took a sim day in real time?