Useful exploit if you want to build something simple, say a garage, and don't quite have the §§§ for it: use foundation walls in place of real ones, they are much cheaper (§3 instead of §70). I just built a simple box-shaped garage in order to make the tutorial attached below; the difference was more than §1800 (two cars!). (Edit: No, 1.923 cars actually)


Cheap trick: Using foundations in place of walls

... because that's a lot cheaper. This is purely a simoleon-saving method, it has no aesthetical or technical advantages whatsoever. Useful for starter houses and the like, really pointless if you're motherlode-ing anyway (you can stop reading now if you do).


I'm using a simple garage as an example, but in principle you can build anything you want with this method. It's based on the fact that foundations only "make" walls where there aren't any walls already (something I learned from a mini tutorial on porches; unfortunately I don't remember where that was and who wrote it. You know who you are, thank you very much!).

So if you place "dummy walls" where you *don't* want a wall, and the foundation where you *do* want one, and then delete the dummy walls, what you get is a wall that costs 3§ instead of 70§ (in case there's already sims on the lot, it's 17§ instead of 70§ (if my math is correct)).

Disadvantages: Foundation walls will always behave like foundation walls -- you can't place windows/doors in them, you need moveobjects to place pictures and wall lamps etc, and you can't delete the floor tiles on top of a foundation. And you can't do basements (except for advanced multi-story basement constructions).



This garage costs 4214§ when built normally, and 2387§ when built with foundations. You can buy two cars from the §§§ you save -- up to you to decide whether it's worth the hassle or not.


Step 1

Place a driveway, extension, and a garage door like you normally would.


Step 2

This is not technically necessary: the carpet illustrates where the foundation will go --> that is the final size of our garage.


Step 3

Put walls around the extension. These are our "dummy walls" that we'll delete later on.


Step 4

Make a one-tile (or bigger, if you want) "hill" somewhere nearby. It must be 12 clicks high.


Step 5

Pull a foundation from the top of the hill over to the garage wall. Doesn't matter where exactly, as long as it touches the wall. (If the foundation tool goes red at this point and complains, you've done something wrong with the hill. Raise or lower it a bit and try again.)


Step 6

This is how it should look like.


Step 7

Pull your foundation all around the garage ...


Step 8

... until it looks like this. You can delete that funny "appendix" now and flatten the hill, we don't need it anymore.


Step 9

We're almost there.


Step 10

This is how it looks on the inside -- note that the foundation has three sides (the outsides) that are foundation, but the innermost side is still a regular wall. Because we put it there in step 3.


Step 11

This is the trick: Delete that inner wall, and get your money back. (Didn't get a proper screenshot of this step (with the cute bulldozer icon), but I guess you all know how to delete a wall.)


Step 12 ...

Add roof, done.
As a side-effect, the foundation walls are brick-coloured already, so you don't absolutely have to paint them. Here I painted only the frontmost part (where the door is -- these are real walls) "in brick", this saves another couple of §§§.


... or 13

You can use a regular roof as well if you like that better.



Windows and doors

You need to use actual walls where you want to place windows and doors (unless there's a trick that I don't know about). You can either plan ahead and put walls where needed, or substitute them after the fact. The only thing that you need to remember: You need to use the foundation tool, and not the wall tool, in order to delete a foundation wall (sounds obvious, but the difference is not easily visible, so you have to keep that in mind -- if you forget which wall is which, you'll be really stumped. That's why I haven't used this method in any of the houses that I posted at mts2).


This is how to add a window to this garage (after the fact):

1 -- Put regular walls to the left and right of the window-to-be, like shown (I painted it yellow where I want the window to be -- not technically necessary, just to make it clear). These are dummy walls.
2 -- Use the *foundation* tool to delete the bit between the dummy walls.
3 -- Delete the dummy walls.
4 -- Close the hole with a regular wall, and put in your window.

Lol, I'm really curious about what's in there...

One may want to make this thread sound more like a tutorial with a more specific name.
So, moderators and other people will know this is a tutorial and what it's about.

As for moving this tutorial to the tutorial section, it takes at least a moderator to do so... You may try to send a pm to a relevant moderator when this thread is not moved there in a few days...

Hope to see the content soon...

Good luck...


Update:
Some foundation or basement tutorials or info threads related links:

CERuppel
Better basements
http://www.modthesims2.com/showthread.php?t=60917

MikeInside
mikeInside's Basement Tutorials
http://mikeinside.modthesims2.com/b...ents/index.html
Multi-Level Basements.
http://mikeinside.modthesims2.com/b...ment/index.html

niol
TS2 Foundation Wall behaviour Basic Build tutorial
http://www.modthesims2.com/showthread.php?t=87464

nyaren
Advanced Basement Tutorial
http://thesims2.ea.com/exchange/sto...y=&view=feature
Basement Tutorial
http://thesims2.ea.com/exchange/sto...y=&view=feature

plasticbox
Cheap trick: Using foundation walls in place of real ones
http://www.modthesims2.com/showthread.php?t=113202
Observations on basements
http://www.modthesims2.com/showthread.php?t=113189

Yuurei
How to create cellars, read here.
http://www.modthesims2.com/showthread.php?t=52319

niol,

1. It's not sooo exciting (to you it'll probably be old news anyway) -- how to make a foundation 16 clicks high and wrap it around a few dummy walls and delete those again in order to a) get your money back and b) make your foundation walls act like real ones. That's all, in principle -- only with with pretty screenshots and in more words.

2. Right about the title ... thanks for pointing it out =). Is fixed now.

3. I know it takes a moderator ... I somehow expected one to pass by here wihin the next couple of seconds or so. I'm totally spoiled I guess (in the downloads/lots department (where I do most of my stuff) they are *lightning fast*). Anyhow, I shall wait + see ... I basically just wanted to say there was some kind of reason behind putting it here.

Thanks for the great tutorial!

I just tried this method for making a walk-out basement (I know, there are other ways, that probably worked better) (and also I didn't even follow this tutorial. I found it when I realized I couldn't get rid of my foundation walls like I thought I could. :D)

Whatever.

Anyways, I noticed something in the last thing, "This is how to add a window to this garage (after the fact):"
I tried placing 2 dummy walls, just like in the picture, but then when I deleted the squares of foundation, it added a foundation wall on that 3rd side (what would be the inside of the room ...) That, of course, couldn't be deleted with the regular wall tool.

So, I realized you actually have to place *3* dummy walls there, before you delete foundation, and then there's no problem. :D

"Picture" (ignore the dots):
.............._____
.............| . . .. |
________|_____| _________
(Explanation ... the bottom line is the outside wall, is foundation wall. The left and right walls are dummy walls. The top wall was not included in your original picture, but needs to be another regular, dummy wall.)

PS - this may be something that doesn't happen to everybody ... I have all EP's up to Seasons, except Pets. Soooooo ... :D