Is it possible to hide maxis content from the game?

[kazebird]

Because that stupid neighborhood pond pancake from AL drives me nuts! Not only does it spawn as a tree when making a hood, but it looks horrible. What were they thinking? If they wanted a lake for Belladonna Cove, they should have dug one when making the terrain!

[kewian]

Have you tried REMOVING it?

[kazebird]

Of course, but that neither stops it spawning as a tree, nor gets the eyesore out of my catalog.

[tunaisafish]

I've got no idea what object you're talking about, but if you find the OBJD (Object Definition) file then it's simple from there on.
Locate the OBJD file.  Extract it with SimPE.  Edit the catalog sort fields to all zero's.  Save the file and drop it in your downloads.

The hardest part is finding it.  There isn't a pancakes.package anywhere!
If you're still looking for it after an hour, then you might feel that averting your eyes from the tiny little icon is easier.

[CandyToast]

Thank you Tuna, I will kill that Will Wright neighborhood rock forever. That pond that Parrot mentioned does indeed show up in the trees section of the neighborhood deco, it came with AL. God only knows why they put it there.

[kazebird]

I wouldn't mind it's location, if it didn't mean they spawn by the hundreds if I make a new neighborhood.

[J. M. Pescado]

Because that stupid neighborhood pond pancake from AL drives me nuts! Not only does it spawn as a tree when making a hood, but it looks horrible. What were they thinking? If they wanted a lake for Belladonna Cove, they should have dug one when making the terrain!

"Spawn as a tree"? I've never heard of trees SPAWNING in the game. Trees actually multiply themselves in the neighborhood?

[kazebird]

I am talking about the spawning of trees that occurs when you make a new neighborhood.

Though it would be cool, I don't think it is possible to make trees reproduce in-game.

[tunaisafish]

I was wondering the same thing, having never made a new hood I didn't know that happened.
That's why I didn't know what the hell you were talking about
Sorry parrot I seem to have glossed over the word 'neighborhood' above.

As it's a neighbourhood package, then I don't think it even has an OBJD file to look for.
The equivalent for them (afaik) is the XNGB file, which is XML format.
There's a field in those that says... showincatalog=1

I still don't know where they are stored.
Or whether you can override them by a file in the downloads folder.
Or whether changing the catalog field will make them any less spawnable.

I'll watch this thread with interest until someone that knows what they are talking about turns up

[dragoness]

I don't think I've ever had a new hood that spontaneously spawned with trees in it... just the surface of the land itself, the roads, and the built-in water features. Trees, ponds, rocks should all need to be added by hand.

Are you using a downloaded terrain when this happens? Because if so, that's your problem. Terrains are made in SimCity4, and some creators go nuts with the tree tool. Every instance of "tree" in the terrain file gets converted to "random item from the tree bin", which now includes that pond.

Say no to terrains with trees spewed all over them!

[eccentricgnat]

I've had the tree "spawning problem" when I use certain downloaded maps. I have to spend hours getting rid of the damn trees...usually one by one.  My son suggested I use SimCity4, load the map, and see if I could get rid of the trees in SimCity4, then try loading the newer map.

I have not tried this. But it is a good suggestion, if you have SimCity4, and want to see if it will work. Otherwise, you just have to give up using those maps, (and there are some very nice ones) or spend hours deleting the damn trees, and now ponds, by hand.

[J. M. Pescado]

You could just use neighborhood terrain surgery via the Mootilda tool: Swap the neighborhood decorations in from a neighborhood devoid of such decorations.

[dragoness]

I've had the tree "spawning problem" when I use certain downloaded maps. I have to spend hours getting rid of the damn trees...usually one by one.  My son suggested I use SimCity4, load the map, and see if I could get rid of the trees in SimCity4, then try loading the newer map.

I have not tried this. But it is a good suggestion, if you have SimCity4, and want to see if it will work. Otherwise, you just have to give up using those maps, (and there are some very nice ones) or spend hours deleting the damn trees, and now ponds, by hand.

It's been a long time since I used SC4 to make a few terrains and I don't have it installed right now to test, but from what I remember it should be easy to remove trees via SC4 and it's easily pirated.

If it's just one terrain, it might be faster to just take out the ponds by hand, but if this happens to you a lot, it'll be a lot simpler to have a copy of SC4 on hand to whip off the trees with.

[witch]

I had to learn how to make treeless terrains, damn things used a different tree almost every time a hood was generated off the terrain. Once I had a hood filled with PINK trees. Ghastly.

[seelindarun]

You could just use neighborhood terrain surgery via the Mootilda tool: Swap the neighborhood decorations in from a neighborhood devoid of such decorations.

I did terrain surgery by hand a few times, just to rid myself of trees, before Mootilda's tool.  Since the old method never preserved 'hood deco, I just replaced the terrain with a copy of the same one.  It was much easier than using SC4.  I assume Mootilda's tool makes it even simpler.

[Mootilda]

HoodReplace has an option to delete all trees.  That should do the trick.