Create-A-World Tips, Tricks, and Annoyances

[Zazazu]

Ah, I see. I hadn't known that was possible. It makes sense that sims would be walking half-on, half-off your mini sidewalks since on the normal ones they walk at the midpoint. Love the sidewalk texture you used. The walled off pathways are definitely a cute effect, but would look just as good with the proper spacing. Honestly, as a sim, a one-tile walkway would be uncomfortably claustrophobic.

[nanacake]

I am considering uploading a set of custom road textures when I finish. Yeah, it was pretty claustrophobic . The last tiles bordering inside of a lot are to be considered too in small space. Not being able to build walls on the edge of lots, I tried to leave at least two tiles around. Most of the houses there is a place to plant a row of vegetable garden plants and walk to the back.

[nanacake]

Nice, it looks great. CC definitely works in CAW. AwesomeMod even popped up with the outdated message in EIG once . When I tried to install with the launcher it did extract it to the right spot. It just wouldn't show up in game. I think the patch broke the launcher for some. Moving any .world files to the folder location I posted a page or so back in this thread will register the new world in the drop down menu for sure.

[Zazazu]

I am considering uploading a set of custom road textures when I finish. Yeah, it was pretty claustrophobic . The last tiles bordering inside of a lot are to be considered too in small space. Not being able to build walls on the edge of lots, I tried to leave at least two tiles around. Most of the houses there is a place to plant a row of vegetable garden plants and walk to the back.

We both like the tiny. I started in the tightest area of my neighborhood, so most of the homes there only have a one-square buffer on all sides but the road, which is two or three spaces. Then only one space between lots. With an itty bit of landscaping, only one lot in the first built block actually has space for a tiny garden, and that because I built the house around a gem spawn spot.


Fun cramped real estate. Looks are deceiving...most are two or three bedroom homes with at least two bathrooms.


Only house on the block with garden space. I didn't have a good photo...I shot this one to show Reid Powers, the 'hood manwhore, visiting two of his paramours after his wife went to work. The glass-walled hallway has a door in back that opens onto a 4x4 area with a gem spawn point.


More spaced-out homes on larger lots. The area on the right is a fake abandoned, overgrown warehouse where I've planted a lot of harvestables.

[Moryrie]

I hope you plan on uploading the final version of your world Zazazu. I downloaded the empty one, and liked the layout a lot, but I'm not the world's greatest builder.

[Zazazu]

I hadn't. It's a gradual grower, so it will be a few months before it is complete. Plus, it's ridiculous with CC. My second, loosely called Windabout, I plan on sharing a built-up version of.

[Anach]

Like a couple of other posters here, what I'm really interested in is editing the official towns, not recreating them from scratch from the "lite" versions. If someone works out how to do that, they will be my new best friend (what an incentive huh?)

[Moryrie]

If sunset valley could be halved and have lots added/expanded to make up for the halving I'd be happy. =P

[pbox]

The limit for making lots this close is about half of a square using the CAW grid for a precise guideline. I placed the sidewalks after the lots to fill in the grass gaps.

I'm not sure if I understand what you mean by "limit for making lots this close"; could you elaborate on this? It sounds a bit as if it weren't possible to put lots right next to each other (with no space in between) .. is that so? Or did you deliberately leave a little space in between because you wanted sims to be able to walk between the lots?

(Reason I ask is that for me it would be quite a bit of hassle to install CAW and test it myself - I'd have to set up a dual boot machine, buy Windows, install Windows, reinstall the game, and install CAW - but if I can't place lots next to each other the whole thing would be useless for me. So I'd be really grateful if someone could enlighten me on that .. thanks in advance =).

[ingeli]

You can place lots next to each other. Only be careful if one lot is all surrounded by other lots and the door of the house is close to the outer border, things can then block the door, or the lot can level just a little with lots moving around and THAT can block the door. This is only a problem if you work with small lots placed close together, but done with precaution and testing it is possible.

[pbox]

Thanks ingeli!

Just to make sure we're really really talking about the same thing (I've had misunderstandings with others about this in the past, probably a language issue): with "next to" I mean immediately adjacent, two lots sharing one border, like so:

|  Lot1  |   Lot2   |

and not:

|  Lot1  ||   Lot2   |

.. that would work, yes?

I guess I can deal with the other issues you mentioned .. it's not like this ever worked flawlessly in TS2 either (so I'm used to having to twiddle), but thanks for the heads-up.

[J. M. Pescado]

Just to make sure we're really really talking about the same thing (I've had misunderstandings with others about this in the past, probably a language issue): with "next to" I mean immediately adjacent, two lots sharing one border, like so:

|  Lot1  |   Lot2   |

You can't do this, no. Create-a-crap will not let you place lots closer than one tile (of the in-game build grid equivalent) from each other.

|  Lot1  ||   Lot2   |

This works without issues, yes.

[ingeli]

Just to confirm, there need to be one tile in between all lots, yes. Roads/paths can be adjacent though (thats what was discusses by other posters). Apparently routing on a lot and routing in the world around is separated. But, don't despair, the versatility of the lot sizes (total, from 1-64 tiles) makes up for this. Do try it, I think you will like it.

[nanacake]

Just to make sure we're really really talking about the same thing (I've had misunderstandings with others about this in the past, probably a language issue): with "next to" I mean immediately adjacent, two lots sharing one border, like so:

|  Lot1  |   Lot2   |

You can't do this, no. Create-a-crap will not let you place lots closer than one tile (of the in-game build grid equivalent) from each other.

|  Lot1  ||   Lot2   |

This works without issues, yes.

Yeah, once you see any (or all) sides your new lot edges turn red, that lot is unusable/invalid and will have to be deleted.

[Lion]

It sounds a bit as if it weren't possible to put lots right next to each other (with no space in between) .. is that so?

Like Pescado said, you can NOT place lots right next to each other with no space in between. There has to be at least one tile of space in between. What I do is paint the terrain with paving_slateSquare or paving_riverRock (my choice for the town center) for the whole area, and leave it as grass for the suburbs.

In addition to that, since you can't build wall at the edge of the lot, the gap between two townhouse type of buildings is minimum of 3 in-game tiles.

[pbox]

Just to confirm, there need to be one tile in between all lots, yes. (..) But, don't despair, the versatility of the lot sizes (total, from 1-64 tiles) makes up for this.

To me it doesn't. I've built enough lots and neighbourhoods to be 100% certain about what features I need, and the ability to place lots wherever the fuck I want is one of them. If that's not an option, I can just uninstall the entire game now.

Thanks JMP for the info - you just saved me a bunch of §§, plenty of HD space and lots of wasted time =).

[J. M. Pescado]

I'm guessing you just really, really, really love nailing lots right smack up against each other to the point of obsessiveness. Usually, though, such a thing is accomplished by building the thing you're trying to build on a single plot. The ability to subdivide a lot into multiple residences is presently being researched, but it's very possible to do such a thing in a mod. It may also be possible that these limitations are things artificially imposed by create-a-crap, and can possibly be bypassed with sufficient armtwisting.

[Zazazu]

This is Plasticbox. He loves the party wall.

I know it's not what we can get with TS2 and LotAdjuster, but the three tile gap is still a big improvement on a four tile gap default with TS2. And since you are pretty much stuck seeing neighboring lots, with only a three tile gap it can be difficult to find a good viewpoint. Plus, you're hearing bits and pieces from the neighbor lots...doorbells ringing, snippets of conversation and flirting, toddler babble. The urban feel is definitely there in my 'hood, and I'd argue that Nanacake's has more of it in the look even though her lots seem to be bigger.

[J. M. Pescado]

IIRC, TS2 reacted to various attempts to commit such atrocities by crashing if you built walls right up against the very border of the lot.

[Zazazu]

Yup. No walls along the edge, but you could keep the effect through the use of a faux party wall, a wall segment that ran perpendicular to the edge on both sides of the house.

[Lion]

The ability to subdivide a lot into multiple residences is presently being researched, but it's very possible to do such a thing in a mod. It may also be possible that these limitations are things artificially imposed by create-a-crap, and can possibly be bypassed with sufficient armtwisting.

  Really?! "very possible" sounds really promising. DO WANT!

pbox, don't leave .  I love your lots, and am looking forward to more of them and worlds from you.

[nanacake]

Latest AM makes the option for lockable doors (I think? It just started to appear?), with a few more mods making townhouses as apartments on one very long lot is possible. I have an idea pbox -if you used a new recolorable fence mesh the size and shape of a normal wall, then placed the fence on the lot edges, it could look pretty good I think. I understand your frustration though, they would still be faux walls.

Close lots are not very good for a slow computer (low RAM) though.  I had high lot detail set to 1, but since the lots are all within camera range the game seems to have trouble deciding which one to focus. This results in lots consistently loading. So I have to keep it on at least 3 high detail lots.

[pbox]

I actually wasn't asking so much because of party walls (it would certainly be great to be able to build them, but I already got used to the thought that it's not), more because I indeed "really, really, really love nailing lots right smack up against each other" =P. To me it's just normal to divide land like pizza, not with funny unuseable spaces everywhere, and this worked just fine in TS2 ever since the base game so I really don't see why I should have to bend over backwards now, just so that a crippled broken game will be happy.

I dunno, maybe it would work to close the gaps between lots with fences in "world space" rather than "lot space", but from what people said about routing on and off lots, I don't expect the EA routing to be able to deal with that. Seamless my ass. 

[robindw]

I have been slowly figuring out CAW thanks to posts here and elsewhere, but am having a problem. I haven't seen this reported anywhere - if it is, please let me know and feel free to delete this thread.

I have a large triangular shaped artifact that I cannot get out of my world. It appears in CAW and in Edit in Game. I had a couple others that I managed to get rid of by deleting misplaced rapids or distant terrains, but I can't seem to find what is causing this one. Any ideas?

(look in the upper left corner of the world.)

[J. M. Pescado]

Try sanding down the affected areas with the smooth and flatten tools. It should go away once you remove any jagged undersea ridges or shoreline jaggies.