Pinstar's new Apocalypse challenge

[sloppyhousewife]

How did he get a stove? Stoves have to be unlocked with culinary.

I suspect the cheapest grill.

[Emma]

You know what they say-cheaters never prosper. (Translated in this case as-your sim will be burnt to death. Haha)

[sloppyhousewife]

You know what they say-cheaters never prosper. (Translated in this case as-your sim will be burnt to death. Haha)

The grill is allowed, though

-Sims may not purchase or use anything from the "Ovens" or "Small appliances" category except for the cheapest grill.

Not a good idea to use it indoors, of course...

[Emma]

Eep, that teaches me not to skim posts, I only read Zaza's

[Lyra]

It was the cheapest grill

Problem was, though, anytime I told him to extinguish the fire, it dropped out of his queue so he could panic about said fire.

[Aggie]

Sounds like you could use the firemod, although I'm not sure if that would be "allowed" by the challenge.

[Lyra]

That would probably be a good idea. I assume it would be allowed as it stops stupid behavior like burning themselves to death by panicking.

Still, no-one's answered my first question. How much more annoying is the challenge with Seasons rules?

[mitchellcjs]

I never tried it without the seasons rules, so I can't answer.  It is quite difficult, and temptation to cheat must be fought a lot in my case.  I've been considering using pre-seasons rules.  Anybody know if Pinstar is going to update for bon voyage?

[Iolanthe]

Because of the whole spouse loophole, I've decided to add a few difficulties: only every other generation may marry, and each unlocked restriction will necessitate generating one uncontrollable sim (using boolprop).  If the house becomes full, the heir cannot have children or get married until an uncontrollable sim dies.  Furthermore, it is not permissable to kill an uncontrollable sim intentionally.

[Zazazu]

Still, no-one's answered my first question. How much more annoying is the challenge with Seasons rules?

It's annoying period, and the Seasons rules make even less sense than the earlier ones. Use it as inspiration and do your own.

[Kyna]

The Seasons rules aren't as annoying as the Pets rule.  When I did a Seasons playthrough of this challenge, I ignored the Pets rules.

The phone restriction and the jobsearch restriction can be a hassle (it makes it harder to plan your path).  I had my founder call her lover over on a Tuesday and get knocked up before she found a job.  My founder didn't look for work until the kid was a teen.  I wasn't going to wait until she'd hit the top of her career and then wait for the next Tuesday before she could move her spouse in.  That would have meant too long a delay before the second generation. 

The not going to school thing for teens makes their aspiration drop within a few days, so it's easier to force age the first teen to adult with elixir.

Money was no problem for my last founder, given how easy it is to make cash in the game before the challenge starts.  She spent a lot of time fishing at a downtown community lot before she finished uni, which made her a lot of friends as well as a lot of cash. 

Before she graduated, I had her invite over sims who were high level in high priority careers (i.e. potential spouses for future generations), and had her fall in love with them.  That way she could invite them over later and introduce them to her children & grandchildren.

Hmm, I think I might play it again ... this time not getting my founder a job at all, just getting her pregnant every Tuesday until she's too old.

[angelyne]

I've started this challenge and modified the rules a bit.  I'm ignoring the pets rules (and pets).  I just can't be bothered with that.  I am also ignoring the season rules, because I think the original rules are more than enough. However, I am going to respect the restrictions and career paths that unlocks the new features of Season. 

The one fun addition to the challenge that Season brought is to change all the season to winter.  That's an awesome. idea  I am going to only change it back, only once the challenge is accomplished.  That seems to make sense to me.

[Zazazu]

When I did my pseudo-apocalypse in the sixth generation of my alphabet family, I went with constant summer instead of constant winter. But then it wasn't a nuclear event that did the 'hood in, it was the Oversoul killing all life in a rain of fire. But I changed the rules around a lot. No environmental until medicine (water for raising plants) was unlocked, plus all food had to be grown on lot, beyond that provided in the first fridge, until military (supply chain) was unlocked. Kind of made it harder, kind of not... I chucked pets restrictions as well as a couple of Seasons ones that made no logical sense.

[spaceface]

The concept of this challenge is great but there are TOO MANY RULES.

I read other people's challenge stories with great enjoyment, and even printed out the rules for myself. One day, I would love to try it but logistically, before you do anything, you have to go through 5 pages of rules to check if whatever-it-is is permitted.

[SnootCB]

I'm having fun with this challenge.  Yeah, there are a lot of rules, but you quickly get used to assuming something is restricted until you've done a good search and find it isn't.  And if you make a mistake it isn't as if you fail the challenge, as long as you fix it.  And I certainly have made some mistakes.  I'm not doing the Pets rules- those can pretty much be ignored, especially if you pretty much ignore pets anyways- but I'm not sure what I'll do about BV restrictions, since I started the challenge before that EP. 

[MadameUgly]

Add me to the list of "don't play pet and seasons rules".  I just completely ignore pets.  If they roll the want to get a bird cage/womrat cage, I might indulge them but never fill the cage.  Basically it just becomes another piece of furniture you have to sell and re-buy if you haven't lifted criminal (which I haven't yet).

I'm also ignoring the new Season's careers.  Since I'm doing that, I do allow the computer to find jobs but ONLY if I get majority seasons jobs when using the newspaper (so 2 seasons jobs means I get to use the computer).  As for growing food, I didn't allow it until Natural Science was unlocked and the planting has to follow the building restrictions still in play until I lift politics.  So the McNut family has a few growable plots along the side of the driveway.  They aren't allowed to sell the produce, so it just sits in inventory.  Most of the produce is pathetic, so there's no reason to do anything with it.

I did end up cheating a bit when generation 2's spawn came along.  I was in the process of lifting Medical but the toddlers/children were doing horribly without being able to get clean.  So I'd wait until they were totally red for hygiene then bought the most expensive tub.  All kids got washed and then I tucked it in my "penalty box" (the fourth floor of the house, not accessible to anyone).  The penalty box is used to penalize myself when I cheat (either accidentally or on purpose).  It currently has about 6 of the most expensive tubs (all from cheating before Medical was lifted), three baby beds, two tables, a changing table, and easel.  I have to sell/re-buy it all due to not having criminal lifted, so I figure it evens out.

I'm getting ready to begin generation four and have already lifted:  Hopelessness/Nat Sci/Alien Technology (all with the founder), Medical (founder's wife), Athletic (gen 2 son), Slacker (gen 2 daughter), Military (gen 2 son's wife), Law Enforcement (gen 2 daughter's husband).  Gen 3's son (of gen 2's son) just graduated college and returned home while his cousin headed off to college.  The household consists of three elders (all gen 2--one moved out due to divorce), 1 adult, and 1 child.  I'm thinking Paranormal and Culinary will be the next two careers I go for.

I know there's some debate over how heirs work.  In my challenge, if you live in the main house and have the founder's last name (McNut) then you can lift a restriction (exception being only one spouse per sim--so if you divorce, that's it for you).  There is no "one" heir.  That rule was just too stupid for me.  If it was REALLY an apocalypse, would they restrict themselves like that?  And, the "one" heir rule makes the apocalypse challenge nothing more than a legacy and I've been there, done that.  

http://madame-ugly.livejournal.com/tag/apocalypse+challenge  (if you want to see some pics of what's happened so far)

[angelyne]

I forgot one fun thing I added to the challenge, doh!.  It's what prompted me to start the challenge.  I installed JM's apocalypse zombie hack.  Before the game started, I used that annoying Traveller's family and killed them off.  I had the daughter resurrect them and turn them into zombies (I spawned the aspiration reward using the boolprop cheat).  Then I zombified the gypsy (lol, I enjoyed that) and a couple more unfortunate got zombified, who happened to drop by the lot.  You could also use JM's hack "make me a zombie". I discovered that only after I did all this.

So now there really ARE hordes of zombies in the neighborhood and they WILL eat your brain, if you loose the fight.  Make sure you got 10 body points lol.

I also installed one of Danny's multi-pc hack that allows you to phone the police to stop a fight.  I tested it and it works fine.  If you call the police they will stop the fight and take away the zombie.  Zombification only occurs if you loose the fight. Of course that can't be used until that restriction is lifted.  I also downloaded a dezombifying potion, but that won't be available till medical is unlocked.

I tried running a shop in college, before I noticed the rule against it, and let me tell you, zombies makes that near impossible.  They are constantly trying to attack you, so I had to prevent them accessing my sims, whose actions was constanly dropping from her queue trying to respond to the "attack" action.  But then the zombies attacked my customers instead lol.  Fun!

oh, here is a litle trick I learned reading a story.  Don't toilet train the toddlers, so when they poop their pants, you do a "change diaper" and that fills their bar halfway.  I'm hoping that my sims' husband will reach the top of his medical career soon, because I'll suffer with the kids, as there is no way for them to be clean.    It's really hard because his needs are too low to get promoted.  And there is no way to make him permaplat. Then I remembered meditation doh!.  I might actually get somewhere now.

I had to cheat and break the eat only once a day rule, because my sims would have starved.  That was before I remembered about meditation as well.

I haven't seen any update for BV, but I'll just ignore the whole expansion for now.  It's not like people trying to subsist in an apocalyptic world can have a nice little break away from it all

MadameUgly, your interpretation of the rules seem correct to me.  It specificially states"  Only Sims part of the bloodline and the spouses to heirs can unlock restrictions.".  To me that indicates clearly that any child of your founder can lift a restriction.   You are also limited by the fact that no member of your family can move out until the Military restriction is lifted. 

The way I see it, true blood children can lift restrictions, but only heirs can continue the bloodline (or at least for the purpose of lifting restrictions). The last doesn't seem to be stated anywhere but that's how I will play it.

[Zazazu]

As for growing food, I didn't allow it until Natural Science was unlocked and the planting has to follow the building restrictions still in play until I lift politics.  So the McNut family has a few growable plots along the side of the driveway.  They aren't allowed to sell the produce, so it just sits in inventory.  Most of the produce is pathetic, so there's no reason to do anything with it.

I have a mod from MTS2 that allows for plots on foundations/upper stories, so I was using those but they had to be inside the house (tower, as it were) and hence take away precious living space.
Plots:

Tower, in early stages:

I did end up cheating a bit when generation 2's spawn came along.  I was in the process of lifting Medical but the toddlers/children were doing horribly without being able to get clean.  So I'd wait until they were totally red for hygiene then bought the most expensive tub.

I've been reading Apocalypse-a-go-go by Toast recently, and he made an important "discovery" in the third generation. One of those things that you probably noticed when first playing the game but then took never let a toddler go low on bladder again and forgot. If you let them crap their pants and then change the diaper, they get half their hygeine back.

As for the zombies, I had approximately 20 Romance sims in the 'hood. I rolled new aspirations for them, and those who got Romance or Cheese were killed, zombified, and changed to Cheese. Would have been much more fun with Pescado's mod and then changing to cheese. Seriously, there's just something about the undead jonesing for a cheese sandwich that cracks me up.

Grr, this is making me want to do this again, and I already have a legacy/prosperity thing in the 3rd generation.

[J. M. Pescado]

I did end up cheating a bit when generation 2's spawn came along.  I was in the process of lifting Medical but the toddlers/children were doing horribly without being able to get clean.  So I'd wait until they were totally red for hygiene then bought the most expensive tub.

I've been reading Apocalypse-a-go-go by Toast recently, and he made an important "discovery" in the third generation. One of those things that you probably noticed when first playing the game but then took never let a toddler go low on bladder again and forgot. If you let them crap their pants and then change the diaper, they get half their hygeine back.

They get it all back if you use the changing table. Is that outlawed anywhere?

[Kyna]

Yep.  Changing tables not allowed until Medical is lifted.

[angelyne]

I finally unlocked the damn medical career.  It took FOREVER.  phew.  Guess what turn off all my sims will have this generation.  Stink!.  Should be a piece of cake now.

PS I just love Toast's stories.  They are hilarious.  I just finished her apocalypse story and am starting to read his Uglacy.  Are you sure it's a him? His/her? simself is female.

[Zazazu]

Doi. Toast's a she. Her avatar over at Boolprop is of some low-resolution monkies, and for some reason that says male to me. I have to remind myself that Assmitten's a girl all the time, too.

[MadameUgly]

I finally unlocked the damn medical career.  It took FOREVER.  phew.  Guess what turn off all my sims will have his generation.  Stink!.  Should be a piece of cake now.

I thought I had everything planned out when I started my apocalypse (what careers I would go for in what order) and Medical wasn't one of the first.  Until I started playing.  It ended up being second because I couldn't get anyone to do anything if they were dirty.  And in order to sponge bathe, they had to chase everyone out of the room, which meant a pile up at the stairs and a lot of arm flailing and gnashing of teeth over having to wait.

Last night I was playing the McNut abode and I had a flu outbreak.  It's all because Amin (the guy who got divorced and evicted from the house) keeps knocking over the trash.  I finally had to set up a quarantine situation, where the healthy family members ended up sleeping in the living room while the sickies took over the upstairs.  Chick (gen 3 who just graduated college) missed his first day of work (paranormal) because I had him locked in a room (he was the last sicky and there was no way he was re-infecting the household--took the door off the room and everything).

[SnootCB]

I tried to plan the thing out, but I quickly discovered that with Journalism in place you just have to take what you can get.  And in this challenge, esp. in the early days, meditation is your best friend.  I'm a bit worried about this upcoming generation- they are all too Playful to meditate and neither Medical nor Culinary has been unlocked yet.  So far I have managed not to just kill them off.

[angelyne]

I wanted to plan it out too, inspired (I should say copied) by Toast's Apocalypse strategy.  I got my founder a gold badge in flower making and planned to get her in the natural science career path to unlock the use of snapdragons bouquets.  Unfortunately that career was not in the paper, so I got her another job instead, hoping to see the natural science show up eventually.  But at the same time I was also conscious of the fact she had to reach the top of a career fairly fast, in order to move in a husband and get started on unlocking a second path. Eventually I had to settle on science, as that was the only half-decent choice.  I figured it would at least unlock the computer so I could have a better selection of jobs for her spouse, still hoping for that natural science career.  I managed to get her husband into medicine, but it took a long time for him to  get promoted, struggling as I was to maintain a half decent mood. 

If I had to do it again, I'd choose medicine for my founder.  It's so freaking miserable without hygiene.  The adults do ok with sponge baths, but it take so much longer than a shower, and you can't direct them to do it.  The less neat sims will either not do it at all, or do it only when they reach failure.  For the babies and toddlers a diaper change does the trick.  But for children, there is no way to get their hygiene up and being in failure makes them obessively wash their hands to no effect.  Which hogs the bathroom and prevents the parents from doing their sponge bath.  And stinky kids will refuse to do any homework.  (how unatural is that!).  I wish I'd find a hack that lets kids sponge bath.  It doesn't seem to make sense that they don't.