Harder finances hack?

[Grater]

Does a hack exist, or would it be possible to make one, where the promotion bonus is eliminated or greatly reduced?

[flowerchile]

You are a hard taskmaster.  These poor little simmies already have to work so "HARD" for those little luxuries and you want to take that from them.  Shame, shame, shame.

[Ancient Sim]

Maybe it would make more sense if there was some sort of facility to "Donate to Charity".  There are a few things floating around that enable you to just get rid of money, but it would feel better somehow if it was a proper option on the phone menu or something. 

[Grater]

The game is so financially trivial it's not funny. In a single days work a sim can afford the most non-car expensive item in the game. I'd like working to be relatively on par with painting and raising old people for insurance, after all working gives free mood boosts and chance card chances.

It IS possible to get rid of money with a number of hacks such as JM's money order, but I'd rather they didn't get the surplus money in the first place.

Besides it's make more sense if instead of getting promoted they just get a new title and (worthless) stock options  .

[J. M. Pescado]

Does a hack exist, or would it be possible to make one, where the promotion bonus is eliminated or greatly reduced?

Well, I do have a hack on the test directory which makes jobs in general harder and meaner, so you can't just start at level 9 and rake in a bazillion dollars at once. Would that sound more like your thing?

[Grater]

Does it lower the chances of being promoted?

In the perfect world (for me) the sim would EITHER get a bonus OR get promoted for good performance, not both on the same day. Less optimal but still acceptable would be reducing the chance of promotion and/or the promotion bonus. Starting at lower levels is good too, altough I do want my sims to be more impoverished at the start too. Oh, it'd be nice if bills were large enough to cause cardiac arrest as well (maybe not literally, altough it'd be funny!).

[flowerchile]

Starting at lower levels!  I dunno about you but I can't see many lower jobs than drive through attendant, (Slacker Career).  No special PhD's required for that.  (Is there)??  

[BlueSoup]

When a Sim graduates from Uni, they will automatically start off at the higher levels of jobs found on the computer if they have enough skills. If their skills are maxed, then that can be as high as Level 9.  That's the point of the harderjobs hack.

Edited for spelling.

[Emma]

Do they start at a higher level if they get their job from the newspaper?

[BlueSoup]

Not really sure.  I think so, but I hadn't tested it out.

[Grater]

If anyone is wondering why I would want it to be financially harder, it's not just because I enjoy torturing my sims / myself, I feel it'd make legacy "challenge" (and prosperity and so on) more interesting, because as it is generation zero earns "more money than can be reasonably spent" and all subsequent generations live in luxury. Heck if I had it my way they'd start with a mortage rather than money and pay 3% interest a day. Actually I should hack inge's mortage shrub to my likings...

... woohoo. There, costs $10,000 and charges $300 a day, since I've never modded anything in TS2 before I now feel a tiny bit more awesome than I was.

[BlueSoup]

So, you have "challenges" in quotes because you don't really play them as strict as they should be?

[Grater]

Mainly because the challenge is based on tedium & repitition rather than being clever. I always prefer to mix it up, like for a prosperity challenge I might have an email family (because some sim seemed ideally suited to the open-air lifestyle) and a mafia family and if the mafia wants to whack another families sim I'll do it dagnammit. And there's no freaking way I'm actually going to take the time (or keep the notes) to score the things and I'll reloooad if I want tooo. I somehow doubt a legacy highscore would earn me any respect or self-worth anyway.

Frankly, I'm frustrated by how darn easy the game is, especially with NL dates which are "Aspiration on Demand", University Perma-plat was bad, then came dates! I respect that it's easy for the non-hardcore players, but it's not just easy, it's trivialized! And it has become more trivial with each expansion, as if EA is deathly afraid of adding anything remotely hard! I think I might have to start playing alternating want/fear days to raise the level of sim-suffering to tolerable levels. Sims need to have bad days too!
</rant>

[angelyne]

I don't think they ever meant this game to be a challenge on any level.  The way I look at is, it's an elaborate dollhouse for older teens/adults where you can dress your little dolls and put them in fancy houses and have them carry on with their virtual lives.  Some people like to be good to their sims, some people enjoy torturing them.  So people like to focus on the housing aspect.  There is a little bit for everyone ( that is into the game anyway).  It's completely open-ended.  But what it's not is a game for "gamers", so challenge is pretty trivial.

So any restrictions to increase the level of difficulty will have to be put in by you.  What you could do for jobs, is you could make your own careers.  This way you could determine your own level of salaries, bonuses, ect.  It's pretty well documented with tutorials and even a plug in for SimsPE (I think).  I speculate that it might not be so hard to start from a base career and just modify the areas that are of interest to you. 

Oh and you can always get rid of money now, with the new hack for NL.  familyFunds name amount sets the family fund amount to whatever you specify.

[J. M. Pescado]

And it has become more trivial with each expansion, as if EA is deathly afraid of adding anything remotely hard!

That's because it's inherently the case that every expansion will make the core game get easier: If every expansion introduces more items, in order for those items to remain competitive, they must be superior to the existing options. Which means that the game grows steadily easier as you get better and better tools to tackle the basic challenges with. It would be nice if these new scenarios were actually HARD, but can you imagine the bleating of thousands of sheep if the scenario were sadistic? Why, some people think the headmaster is hard!

I think I might have to start playing alternating want/fear days to raise the level of sim-suffering to tolerable levels. Sims need to have bad days too!
</rant>

Given the nature of sim-fears, I think this essentially amounts to deliberate torture as opposed to merely "bad". The real answer is that sims need to somehow be more competitive. If the game were more zero-sum, in the sense that, like in real life, your gain is someone else's loss, you'd have to make some more serious choices about what your sims should do.

[knitro]

I have a tendancy to get too much money for my sims houses, some are millionaires, no challeng ethere,...so yeah,a charity on the phone would be awesome...but for now i'm contemplating just leting a generation or two be complete slackers and not work!
K

[J. M. Pescado]

I have a tendancy to get too much money for my sims houses, some are millionaires, no challeng ethere,...so yeah,a charity on the phone would be awesome...but for now i'm contemplating just leting a generation or two be complete slackers and not work!

The problem with that is that working is less effort than not working. If your sim works, he spends a goodly portion of the day not having to do anything. If he doesn't work, he now has to do something instead.

[knitro]

well, maybe when OFB comes out, i can make a business that is isn't profitable.....it would be nice if there was a work for charity job..doesn't pay, but maybe gets skill perks..but if i have a bunch or romance and pleasure sims, they dont' really need to work, their happy just "getting around" the neighborhood heheehe
K

[Marvelleaux]

The problem with that is that working is less effort than not working. If your sim works, he spends a goodly portion of the day not having to do anything. If he doesn't work, he now has to do something instead.
[/quote]


This is one of the most annoying gameplay situations for me.  The only way I could tolerate having a sim at home all the time is 1.) if the sim is pregnant and sleeps most of the day, and 2.) back in sims 1 when they could queue them up to farm all day long on fast-forward. 

Macro-Clean and Macro-Garden really help for stay-at-home sims, or sims who have too many days off (another feature I really dislike) because you can fast-forward, but they don't make moola.  The money trees are gaudy, loud, and have been known to crash my game when too many are on one lot and they all regenerate at the same time. 

Gah.

[J. M. Pescado]

well, maybe when OFB comes out, i can make a business that is isn't profitable.....it would be nice if there was a work for charity job..doesn't pay, but maybe gets skill perks..but if i have a bunch or romance and pleasure sims, they dont' really need to work, their happy just "getting around" the neighborhood heheehe

Heh, a definitely not for profit business, like running your own soup kitchen?

This is one of the most annoying gameplay situations for me.  The only way I could tolerate having a sim at home all the time is 1.) if the sim is pregnant and sleeps most of the day, and 2.) back in sims 1 when they could queue them up to farm all day long on fast-forward. 

Macro-Clean and Macro-Garden really help for stay-at-home sims, or sims who have too many days off (another feature I really dislike) because you can fast-forward, but they don't make moola.  The money trees are gaudy, loud, and have been known to crash my game when too many are on one lot and they all regenerate at the same time.

Macro-anything is really helpful for stay at home sims, because it keeps them from bugging you with either stupid, destructive, and pointless noise, or screaming from low needs. In fact, as I write this, my game happily plugs along as my sims macro-college-rampage, skillinate, and power idle without the need for my constant intervention.

[knitro]

Definitely something of that nature.

[Marvelleaux]

Macro-anything is really helpful for stay at home sims, because it keeps them from bugging you with either stupid, destructive, and pointless noise, or screaming from low needs. In fact, as I write this, my game happily plugs along as my sims macro-college-rampage, skillinate, and power idle without the need for my constant intervention.

Oh yes.  College rampage rocks my box.  Without it I'd probably turn this game disk into a dog toy. 

[Grater]

The problem with that is that working is less effort than not working. If your sim works, he spends a goodly portion of the day not having to do anything. If he doesn't work, he now has to do something instead.

Yeah this bugs me too, I kind of like the teenage stage because they actually have some serious fun-drain and then need to build fun up again, and their jobs suck. Work should bottom out at least 2 or 3 of Fun, Comfort, Hunger or Social (I cede sims should pee at work). Some careers should be fun (like artsy ones), some comfortable (like business?), some social (like Politics) and some get free food (culinary). And ones like criminal/science should suck at all motives, but pay fairly well. And there should be bad days, that randomly hit motives extra hard.
And what's with kids getting free all-you-can-eat breakfasts at school?

What kind of sick capitalistic communistic anarchist utopia do sims live in?

[J. M. Pescado]

Yeah this bugs me too, I kind of like the teenage stage because they actually have some serious fun-drain and then need to build fun up again, and their jobs suck.

There needs to be more sucky dead end-jobs. Maybe with OFB, we can create sucky dead end jobs for people to work at.

As for fun drain....meh. Fun drain is nothing when you have the Sport of Kings.

Work should bottom out at least 2 or 3 of Fun, Comfort, Hunger or Social (I cede sims should pee at work). Some careers should be fun (like artsy ones), some comfortable (like business?), some social (like Politics) and some get free food (culinary). And ones like criminal/science should suck at all motives, but pay fairly well.

I think it'd have been cooler if different sims reacted differently to their jobs. The "free food at work" effect is largely to prevent the distinct possibility that your sim may end up DYING at work like in TS2, and, of course, bag lunches. Most workplaces with extended work hours do tend to give workers time to eat so they don't starve, because workers that starve to death have to be replaced, which adds to training costs. But hey, not all jobs suck that badly. Only some jobs. Which seem not to have made it into the game anyway.

And what's with kids getting free all-you-can-eat breakfasts at school?

Once again, the entire "don't starve to death" thing. Otherwise kids would come home and be taken by the SS before they had a chance to actually eat. That's not to say school is at all fun, and invariably is a fairly large fun sucker, but you adapt to this surprisingly fast. Even if motive drains for work were increased, you should know by now how quickly a sim can bounce back from pretty shitty shape to full green.

[Grater]

I wouldn't mind small meals at work, but the "I had all you can eat at school/work so wont need dinner" bit seems a bit strange to me .

I've noticed teenagers can easily starve to death when going/sneaking out  .

edit:

As for fun drain....meh. Fun drain is nothing when you have the Sport of Kings.

Oddly, I'm not actually a sim slave-driver/task-master, I mostly let my sims be lazy free will bums. Now, the reason I like fun-drain is it lets my sims engage in fun social activities without being plauged by ADHD. This is why i like the teens, their fun is rotten by the end of a long days school, homework and work, and they can spend the evening with their friends playing pool, smustling, group freestyling or whatever. Heck, sometimes I even let them watch TV.