Following Gummilutt's suggestion to create a separate thread for this I am posting it here :-)


So yes, I'm quoting myself :-D This is something that I posted last week in the "Hacks & CC That You'd Like To See" thread.

I've been thinking a bit more about it since then, and I was wondering if it would be possible to achieve something similar using SimPE.

So, you know that if you go into SimPE and load a neighbourhood and then a specific sim's data, under the Nightlife tab there is a "Traits" list that shows all of the possible turn on's and turn off's, with check boxes next to them - and the ones that the sim has (as in the ones that they meet the criteria for, not the things that turn them on/off) are all checked? What would happen if you checked extra boxes, corresponding to things that the sim didn't actually have? Would it be possible to, for example, imagine that the "lycanthropy" check-box actually meant "is married"? Then, if you went through all of your sims in SimPE and checked the "lycanthropy" check-box for all of the married sims, then any sim who had "lycanthropy" as a turn on or off would be turned on or off by married sims.

It would be necessary to only use traits that no sims in your 'hood actually have, which may not work for some people if you use all of the different things that Maxis/EA gave us. I myself only use a selection of the "traits" - my sims don't use cologne; they never become vampires, werewolves or zombies; they don't wear hats and in most of my 'hoods I don't have any plantsims or servos. So that would give me between five and seven traits that I could use to represent something else that the game isn't designed to recognise within the turn on's/off's system.

For example:

- Lycanthropy = Married
- Vampirism = Single (i.e. not married, engaged or in a relationship)
- Plantsimism = Has One Or More Children
- Zombiism = Doesn't Have Children
- Servo = Talented (i.e. has one or more gold talent badges, two or more silver talent badges, one silver and two bronze talent badges or four or more bronze talent badges)
- Cologne = Rich
- Hats = Poor

That way one could have, for example, a sim who was attracted to rich, childless sims, or to older rich sims (using the grey hair turn-on, or my adapted "face-paint" turn-on which I use for wrinkles, to show attraction to older sims). Or, like in my example on the Hacks & CC thread, Brandi Broke could be attracted to sims who have children of their own - it makes sense to me for her to like the idea of marrying someone who has kids, so that Dustin and Beau gain (a) step-sibling(s), who they could hopefully make friends with. It would be kind of a drag having to go through each sim in SimPE to check the boxes, and having to update them every so often (for example if a sim got married or divorced, had a baby or gained some talent badges), but if it would work as I intend it would so be worth it!

Anyway, does this make any kind of sense to anyone? Do you understand what I'm getting at, what I'd like to achieve and how I'm thinking about trying to achieve it? Would my idea be possible, even? Comments and suggestions are much appreciated! :-)

**ETA** I'm trying it out in my game now. I've used SimPE to check Leod McGreggor's check-boxes for Vampirism (because he's single), Zombiism (because he doesn't have children) and Cologne (because he's quite well off, as I recall - a guy who owns a sizeable house and working farm would be quite the catch, no?). I'm about to load my game to test if a) the boxes stay checked when I enter the game, open his lot and then save and exit the game and b) if having those boxes checked affects his chemistry with other sims who have one or more of those traits as their turn on's/off.

Looking forward to seeing if the trait remains ticked You might want to test things that might make it re-calculate, like using the mirror to change his appearance, or going to a community lot.

The only question I would have about the marriage/single/children/no children is this: You have a sims about to get married. If your sim is turned off by married sims, would they be turned off by their new spouse?

I do love the talented, rich, and poor too!

Alas! Cologne stayed checked, the others did not :-(

And checking the Cologne box meant that Leod had the annoying flower special effects thing around him, too......

Oh well, it was worth a try! Shame!

Isn't there a mod that re-programs some of the original wants? Perhaps you could mod the game to recognize the wants you want

Well, tunaisafish did create a custom 'trait' (turn on/off) which replaces the broken custom hair turn on/off - so changing that is possible though I seem to remember that there was something about only being able to replace them not make new ones. Would be worth checking since my memory is not all that.

You can tick any number of turn ons/offs for the sim (to find attractive in other sims - or not) but I think the game will revert any extra traits you give a sim if the sim doesn't actually have them.

If you want to give it a try lauratje, I'll help in whatever way I can

So, this idea came to nothing as the game reverts traits if the sim doesn't actually have them. However, I may have found a (somewhat limited, rather time-consuming) way to make use of the Hats trait, which I never use in my game.

I have been looking at some tutorials by Phaenoh and Almighty Hat, and I think that it would be possible to recategorise certain hairstyles as hats, which will then effect chemistry when the Hats turn on/off is used.

For one 'hood I would like to recategorise all custom/unnatural hairstyles as "hats", so that I can kind of replace the broken Custom Hair trait (that tunaisafish replaced with things that actually work!) - if I recategorise all of the custom hairs as Hats and then give a sim the Hats turn on, in my game that would in effect mean that they were attracted to sims with custom/unnaturally coloured hair.

For a possible future 'hood I would like to recategorise specific sims' hairstyles as hats, to help divide sims into three social groups with regards to turn-on's/off's. The lowest social group will have facial tattoos, in the form of face-paint, so a face-paint turn on/off will select for them. The middle social group will have nothing special, probably, as I can't come up with anything that would work. And the handful of sims in the highest social group will have their hairstyles recategorised (or copied and then recategorised, so that only they will have that hairstyle) as Hats, so that a turn on/off for hats will equate to a turn on/off for a high-status sim.

Would this/these idea(s) work, do people think?

If you are willing to go through the hassle of doing it, I don't see why it wouldn't work A face paint that doesn't actually do anything should be doable, and the game can't know if there's a hat or not, so as long as they are properly set up they should be the same as any other. I wouldn't have the energy myself, but the idea is neat

Well, I don't use many unnatural hairs in my game (pretty much only the Maxis ones) and there won't be many of the high-status social group sims in my 'hood, so I would only have to recategorise about 20-25 hairs for each 'hood. Should be doable (and not too arduous)! :-)