EAxis house of Phail: May 09

[chobeegal]

Well, other than that it commits the cardinal sin of diagonalizing a multitile tub, which is strictly verboten or else it will fuck up the game.

Does it actually cause corruption?

I've done it a number of times and never seen any adverse effects on my games. But I'm no expert about coding etc. I am admittedly binary illiterate. And I can't even get HomeCrafter to work for me, though I actually did get SimPe to function for making some changes in my game. I had to remove SimPe though because it prevented me from downloading anything from the internet, Sims related or otherwise. So now when I want to use it for anything I have to instal it for whatever I use it to do and then remove it to restore functionality to my PC.

[SalixTree]

Well, other than that it commits the cardinal sin of diagonalizing a multitile tub, which is strictly verboten or else it will fuck up the game.

eek! Really? I had my Sim take a bath to test it out, and all seemed ok. Plus, my game still works. I haven't noticed anything unusual either. What is meant to go wrong?
Shall I go back in and re-design the bathroom? Could do that.

*edit* ok, I remodeled the bath. Actually, thinking back, something DID go a bit wonky before. After his bath, the guy went outside in the nude to welcome some old lady. See?

Is that what happens with diagonal tubs?

I'll go and edit my original post in a sec.

[Yecats]

Coming out of my coma to post a house.



This lovely apartment building has 4 'island' units connected by a ying-yang bridge of peace and tranquility.

Not suited for a family sim, the two smaller apartments are 1- single bedroom while the two bigger apartments are 1-double bedrooms.

I apologize for the bare looking apartments, I forgot to take pics while in build mode.

Roof:


Top floor.  Awning conceals the spa on the two smaller apartment decks.


Main floor:  Outdoor dining by way of the balcony.  Seating for 4 outside and 2 (or 3) inside.
Main floor contains bathroom, kitchen, dining room, sitting room and in the larger apartments, bedroom.


Basement:  Basement of the smaller rooms contains a single bedroom.  Basement of the larger apartments contains skilling stations.
All basements contain a bookshelf and comfy chair.


Bonus images:




I didn't realize I was taking pics in such low quality.  I'm very sorry.

Download from here:  4 Danish Drive.rar

[chobeegal]

eek! Really? I had my Sim take a bath to test it out, and all seemed ok. Plus, my game still works. I haven't noticed anything unusual either. What is meant to go wrong?

Like I said before; I've done a diagonal tub a number of times and never seen any problems in my games.

...Actually, thinking back, something DID go a bit wonky before. After his bath, the guy went outside in the nude to welcome some old lady...
Is that what happens with diagonal tubs?

I have had my Sims decide to be nudists also, but it was not when or because of the use of the diagonal tub. I had mods to let them wear casual to work and to sleep nude and they were the culprits (maybe a conflict with another mod) because removing them cured the nudist problem.

[Yecats]

Why are my apartments not working?

I've created two apartments from the HOF, but they won't register as apartments.  They're both fully enclosed, although there IS a pond separating the two.  Does this need to be fenced in?  

I'll post the residential version today (once I've finished the deco) and maybe someone can give me some pointers as to why it appears to be failing.

UPDATE:



Front of house. Ment to be 2 apartments, each sleeping 8 sims.  If anyone can work out what I did wrong to cause it to fail the conversion to apartments, please, be my guest to fix it.



Three fruit trees.  There is room for play equipment if you squish it between the trees, or move the trees to one side.



Greenhouses - 1 for each apartment, accessible only from the apartment next to it.  Pond access through greenhouses.  Pond is fishable.





Kitchen, Living, Dining and Study.  Kitchen is gated off, and stairs have a door.  Bathroom for guest use.





Bedrooms and playroom for children.  Crib room can be converted into a bedroom by removing the walls.
Teen bedroom can be converted into 2 single beds.



Due to the lack of stuff to do outside the house, I've put a lot of stuff into the top floor.  Mainly skilling, but some fun stuff too.



Make your own power!

Download here:
4 Danish Drive2x8.rar


Kindly tested by the Ottomas and Newson families.  All 12 of them.  At once.  God I hate toddlers.

[Mootilda]

There's a faq over at MTS2 for apartments; it has a good list of things to avoid.

If I get a chance a bit later, I'll install your lot and see whether I can figure out what the problem is.

[jim]

The problem may be that you don't have a single entrance to each apartment. There's a back door too, leading onto an open area. If you fence off the bit of garden that belongs to each apartment, making it a sealed unit, that might solve the problem.

[chobeegal]

The problem may be that you don't have a single entrance to each apartment. There's a back door too, leading onto an open area. If you fence off the bit of garden that belongs to each apartment, making it a sealed unit, that might solve the problem.

This definitely would be the problem. To fix it you would either have to remove the second door from each apartment or put a closed fence around the area. The trouble with enclosing a fenced area is that with a foundation the fencing has to be done on two levels, and this can only normaly be done leaving two squares from lot edges. If your building is too close to lot edges it will not be possible to enclose a "garden" area.
EDIT: OK, after "diving into" the lot here is what I found; there was not just a problem with an unenclosed back door, there were doors from the "apartments" opening directly into the pond area. This can not be done, even if you "fence in" or completely enclose the pond. The game will view doors from the apartments into the pond area as accessing into each other, even if the pond is in between and completely seperating them. The pond can only be used as a "common area" with no direct access from the apartments. I was able with some alterations to get working apartments and keep the same basic "look" to your lot.

[chobeegal]

Here's my Fifth (and maybe last) submission for this month. It is definitely not symetrical and is also quite a major departure from my usual, more traditional and conventional, exterior color scheme, but I like it a lot! There are two apartments; a one bedroom 1& 1/2 bath for a single or couple and a two bedroom 2 & 1/2 bath for a couple with 3 same sex (I decorated for girls) children. The CC included is only the recolored things necessary to achieve the proper effect. I play tested it quite extensively using several different family compositions.

Front

Back


Sides




First floor




Second floor

http://www.box.net/shared/dg3l1uh98v

[Yecats]

Thanks for testing it.

I'll just have to refrain from using ponds as separators from now on.  *sigh*.
Sudden thought:  If a pond had a fence/wall through the middle, but was still visibly a pond, would that work?

My 3rd house for the month is slowly coming - it's an orphanage for 20~ sims (including adults, DMA sims and toddlers).
I use the DMA set for live-in NPC's, and think that if you are planning on downloading my next house, you'll need at least the nanny/maid. 

[HomeschooledByTards]

Suggestions for next months House of Phail? It's almost that time again.

[Mootilda]

Popular vote for June (so far):
407 Edgewater Parkway from Bluewater

[chobeegal]

Sudden thought:  If a pond had a fence/wall through the middle, but was still visibly a pond, would that work?

Sorry but no. I thought of that as a possible solution so I tried that on your lot and it would not work.

[Mootilda]

Sudden thought:  If a pond had a fence/wall through the middle, but was still visibly a pond, would that work?

Sorry but no. I thought of that as a possible solution so I tried that on your lot and it would not work.

There's some trick that you have to use to get backyards for apartments to work... I seem to remember that it involves having a fence on both the ground level and the level of the main floor of the house.  Having never used that trick myself, I can't tell you much more.  However, I know that there's a tutorial or discussion about this at ModTheSims2.

[J. M. Pescado]

To get an apartment to have a "backyard", it needs to follow the rules of standard apartments, namely, that there must be no portals leading "out" of the apartment except through the apartment door. The back yard must therefore be fully enclosed by something that defines it as a "room", and no portals must lead out: Sims, assuming the walls/fences were actually SOLID, must not be able to enter or leave the yard and reach the mailbox or any other apartment unit without going through the apartment door. In practice, the fences don't need to be solid because the floor dividers will count, yet sims walk over them unimpeded. This results in wonkiness if you don't have the Director's Cut installed and you walk into another apartment via the back door.

[chobeegal]

There's some trick that you have to use to get backyards for apartments to work... I seem to remember that it involves having a fence on both the ground level and the level of the main floor of the house.  Having never used that trick myself, I can't tell you much more.  However, I know that there's a tutorial or discussion about this at ModTheSims2.

I already explained that particular idiosencracy in an earlier post.

To fix it you would either have to remove the second door from each apartment or put a closed fence around the area. The trouble with enclosing a fenced area is that with a foundation the fencing has to be done on two levels, and this can only normaly be done leaving two squares from lot edges. If your building is too close to lot edges it will not be possible to enclose a "garden" area.

The trick to do this is to place a foundation surrounding the area you need to enclose, draw your fence on it then delete it and draw another fence at ground level directly below the other. Since a foundation can only be placed two spaces from lot edge there must always be that distance from the edge for your yard or garden.

[Ayana]

So, this is my first attempt at a House of Phail. Unfortunately, an Interior Designer is not me, so I hope it works. Most of my houses are built to accommodate the sims living in them, so they're kind of slapdash. Maybe this will help with that.

Need a place to conduct your experiments in peace, while still putting up a respectable front? Want a sooper secrit labratory? Look no further! I present, the Mad Scientist Special!

Neighborhood View


Outside View


Main Floor


Lockable Kitchen, 2 full baths, 1 half bath, office area, master bedroom, and a tiny bedroom/closet off the kitchen.

Basement


Tacky game room complete with pool table, train set, tv and game system, jukebox, and that microphone thingie. Behind the revolving bookcase is the lab, currently mostly unfinished. Specimen holding tank and robot creation station complementary. (How you get the specimen into the tank is up to you to figure out.) Small bathroom with terlit and shower, along with the necessary desk and computer to record observations.

A few interior shots:






http://www.4shared.com/file/108454051/261264d6/Mad_Scientist_Special.html


Edit: Fixed one duplicate picture. Also, it's 135,251 unwanded. Because I haven't gotten around to installing all my awsomeware on  my shiny new computer.

[ajcrawly]

I was in a green mood this month so this is 4 Green Danish Drive. (Click to see bigger picture.)

Front of House

Top Floor

First Floor


Download: http://www.mediafire.com/file/fmd0dhnutjw/4GreenDanishDrive.7z

* I have all EP's and SP's.

[Yecats]

My last house for this month.

4 Danish Drive Orphanage.rar

An orphanage for those damned Newson kids (and the Ottomas family - everyone needs parents & a nana!).




Top floor is skilling and gaming items.  There is not a lot of room in this house for a backyard, so everything is upstairs.



Bedrooms and bathrooms.  10 single beds & 3 double beds - 5 bathrooms.  I turned one of the double bedrooms into an NPC room.


The main floor.  Nursery holds 5 babies and contains a few skilling items.  Door leads from the kitchen straight into the nursery.  Dining room for 15 14, bar seating for 5.  There is a large bathroom on the main floor.


The DMA NPC's Mr. & Mrs. Smith enjoy a game of Mahjong.  Mr. Smith is a 'Manager' who does the cooking, cleaning, pays bills and looks after the house.  Mrs. Smith is a nanny, babysitter, maid and cook all in one.



Nana Ottomas and one of the children put towns into the train set.


One of the children gains a skillpoint using the play table.



This lot is HUGE.  It runs, but very slowly on my machine.  With 12 playable sims + 2 NPC's and guests, you're looking at about 20 people on the lot at once.  

This lot might make a good dorm.

[pentabet]

I love Immaculate Zest and The Orphanage- I know where some of my older SimBin couples are going in the UberHood I just downloaded.
I never have any good ideas for my elders, I just move them in with Olive Specter and have her kill them off slowly.
Muahaha.

This month had some nice stuff.
My vote for June is still 407 in Bluewater.

[kazebird]

Same with mine.

[chobeegal]

OK, is this challenge now dead due to the arrival of Sims3?

[allon_midbar]

OK, is this challenge now dead due to the arrival of Sims3?

I hope not. I've been waiting for the June edition because I just couldn't think of anything useful to do with April & May's phailures.

[HomeschooledByTards]

OK, is this challenge now dead due to the arrival of Sims3?

I suspect everyone has been busy with The HORROR. I started the next months topic. Better late than never!

[witch]

Yeah, sorry, I've been temporarily seduced by TS3.    Whoops.

I do have a lot almost completed for May and will even finish it, hopefully soon. I'm still keen to carry on.