More Awesome Than You!

In a sims relationship panel, if it doesn't show the little blue family icon on a family members pic, does that mean the game doesn't see the two sims as being related?

Sorta. Some in-laws can end up in a state of being "quasi-family" where often one side, but not necessarily both, will see the other as "unavailable", and not manifest any of the flirt options, only "Family Kiss"....this is rarely a symmetric view, and there doesn't seem to be any trend as to why this happens.

I had a sim, Kath, who dated a sim named Gray when they were both teenagers.  She aged before he did and she eventually fell in love with his father, Rhett.  Kath and Rhett were married and eventually Gray became an adult as well and for a while, Kath and Gray both had the romantic options available but she lost hers after awhile.  It was strange. 

Ewwww, does that mean he was banging his step-mom?

How very... Metal Gear Solid 2 of him....

Oh okay, I didn't even think to check for in-laws. Most of mine of 2-3bolts for each other and I didn't want to start a family feud, lol.
I noticed that some cousins show up as being family but others don't.
For example, one sim shows his uncle's daughter as his cousin/family but the other cousins don't show him as family. They show being related to "the cousin" they have in common but not to each other.

They never actually did anything after she married his father.  I just toyed with the idea from time to time, and would be tempted when the options came up.  Gray was obsessed with her until the day he died, though.  :'(

Awww poor guy.

Could you imagine her bedroom conversations with his dad though?

"Your son was a much better kisser."

Yea, I saw this last night -- the step-daughter of a sim autonomously popped up the 'Family Kiss' thing for her step-father.  I'd never seen that before. They have a high relationship, but no family icons for each other.

I see it quite often, it usually depends on how old the step-child is when the parent and step-parent marry.  Romance sims seem to be less able to register and keep such a relationship, though.  when Don Lothario married Brandi in one of my games, the youngest boy, Keanu, was still a child, and Don definitely saw him as family, until he (Keanu) went to college, when suddenly they both started to get flirt wants for the other!

I've got something similar going on in my game. I have a Greek house with only cousins in it. Then I noticed 2 flirting with each other. Checked and no family icon.

But it isn't even consistent. When calling the siblings of their kissin cousin they see some of the siblings as family members and others as not related. There are no step families involved.

I don't have any mods that mess with family ties so this must be one of those weird Maxian things. This is the first time I've had this happen though.

I've had several incidences involving this sort of thing, a couple in particular, both of which I've discussed here.

In my original Pleasantview, Desdemona Dreamer (daughter of Cassandra & Darren) was the half-auntie of Melinda Dreamer, daughter of Dirk & Lilith (half-auntie insofar as Dirk was her half-brother).  Melinda was married to Jonathan Burb, son of Jennifer & John, which meant he was actually related to his wife in that his mother was her gt. aunt, but they didn't see each other as family.  There was clearly a very strong connection between Desdemona & Jonathan, but the only options they had were family-related, even though they weren't actually related at all except by marriage.  JM thought this was because Desdemona had been present at the wedding of Jonathan & Melinda.  I tested it by giving them a crush and they were all over each other!

In my current Pleasantview, once Alexander went to Uni I noticed he had 3 lightning bolts for his stepmother, Dina.  Mortimer was dead by then, but Alexander & Dina only had the option for family-related interactions, even though it was clear they were crazy about each other (or would be, given half a chance).  No matter what I did, I couldn't change things, so I had to give them a crush to start things off.  In the end I removed it because Dina just couldn't get pregnant (although they've since autonomously fallen in love again) and Alexander is now with Missdoh, who has just had his daughter.  As Alexander was still a child when Dina moved in, I suppose that might have been the cause of it, because theoretically there was nothing to stop them getting together as they weren't related.

But maybe some sims, like some humans, find certain non-blood relationships to be taboo!

I have strangeness in what is considered family a lot in my game.

The most common is the father/mother in law who have romantic interactions available for son/daughter in laws but son/daughter in law only has family interactions or vice versa.

I don't really care one way or another...I usually don't go that route when playing my families anyways...I try to keep the cheating outside of the family ;)

I've spoken about my Steven Parker incident before though..him being the apparent neighborhood perv he decided he was going to grab and make out with his niece by marriage in his sister in law's toy shop (I notice a lot of whore like behavior going on in that toy shop..hmmmm)  That has been the most surprising one...has neice/uncle/cousin/nephew/aunt blah blah blah is always clearly marked in my game.  They also have no family maker so i have no idea what is up with that but it's still creepy. 

Well, the family marker as shown when you check in SimPE is not always correct.  Various Maxis originals have the marker when they shouldn't - Dustin/Angela and Dirk/Lilith spring to mind, and I think there are various instances in Strangetown and Veronaville too.  I think sometimes the game just doesn't record the relationships correctly.

And of course, you can always prevent unacceptable behaviour by ticking the family checkbox.  Sisters/brothers in law are frequently seen as family, but never by romance sims, but once the box is ticked, they usually behave themselves!

Yeah, but there is no consistency.  Where it will consider one type of relationship off-limits, it will allow another kind.  I've had the situation skandelouslala describes in that sons and daughters-in-law will consider their parents-in-law family, but the parents-in-law will have romance options available for the son/daughter-in-law.  I had a test version of Pleasantview where I allowed Cassandra to marry Don, and I had brought back Bella.  I tried to get Don to get romantic with  Bella, but Don did not have any of the options, just Family kiss and friendly hug.  Bella had the options to flirt with Don, however. 

I think with Bella there could be problems, unless when you brought her back all her memories were intact, which they never have been when I've done it.  Also, with romance sims, I've noticed a tendency for the family tick-box to be ignored, as in the case of Don Lothario when he was married to Brandi and, after treating Keanu as family, this suddenly stopped.  But he always seemed to see both Beau and Dustin as family, and when Dustin's son was born, it was him that turned up unannounced to see the baby, not Brandi, and he turned up again just after Justin grew up to a toddler and just walked in and started playing with him on the charisma toy.

Bringing back Bella will cause extreme screwiness. Necromancy is bad, mmkay?

You're a fast learner!

It will only cause problems if you don't know what you're doing.  :P  I've brought back Bella in several of my games.  The one I'm playing now I've played since I got the game, and I've not had any problems.  In fact, Bella is now an elder, she's reached several LTWs, and she's had 4 kids in addition to Cass and Alex.  No problems whatsoever.  I know for a fact that several other people have her in their games with no problems.  You probably missed a step, which can indeed cause strange things to happen.

ZZ:  I was just using Bella and Don as an example, since they are well-known sims.  I have observed this situation with other families as well, including CAS sims and born-in-game sims.  Obviously it's not an issue with Bella because skandelouslala mentions it, and this has been mentioned in other threads as well. 

And CAS sims never get screwed up in this game?  Some of mine behave in ways that would make all the Goths seem normal by comparison!  I think a lot depends on whether the aspiration *fits* the starsign/personality!    I have a pleasure sim with 0 for Outgoing - makes life very difficult for her!

I didn't say that CAS sims didn't get messed up.  You seemed to think the problem was caused by Bella, when I have noticed this problem consistently across the board.  I don't think you are understanding what I'm trying to say.

I think you're basically saying that Bella is no more screwed up than any other sim, and if you know what you're doing when you bring her back then you are no more likely to have odd behaviours from her than you are from any other sim.  since she's alive and kicking in my current PV, and hasn't so far acted wierdly, I'd tend to agree with you.  But I do think some star-signs find romance a difficult aspiration, and I've definitely noticed with Pisces romance sims they have a very pronounced interest in family sim things like cooking and cleaning!

Yes, that is pretty much what I am trying to say.  I'm glad that you understand what I meant.  Is your Bella Pisces?  I think mine is Cancer, but I may have tweaked her personality a bit and it changed her sign...but I never really paid much attention to star signs until NL forced me to.  Now I use the astrological compatibility chart to try to get compatible sims together.

No, I think Bella has always been Cancer, even in Strangetown (the original one in Sims1 was too, but Mortimer has been changed from Taurus to Cancer.)  But Cancer, like Pisces, in the CAS format, is a shy and retiring sign, which doesn't really fit with romance, although they often beat popularity sims for making friends! 

I tend to think there's something so wrong in the whole NL thing that I don't bother too much now, sims with no LBs for each other seem to have perfectly happy relationships, so why worry!  But it really annoys me, I have a Leo popularity sim and another Leo who's Romance, and they get 3LBs, although the two aspirations rarely seem to in my game - but make a Romance Leo and a Knowledge leo with the exact-same turn-ons. interests and personality profile, and the most they'll ever get is 2!  Me, I can't see what an aspiration has to do with whether you get the hots for someone or not!

Well, in this case the girl was a teen (born when mom was a teen due to the kitten killer :) ).  Real Dad (Romance) was barely in her life, though they're both best friends now and they both get occasional wants to talk to each other.  Step-dad is Family, she's knowledge, so maybe that makes the difference.  In any case, she's off to uni now, so lets see how they are when she comes back.

Hope so, or they'll end up selling their story to Hello Magazine!

As far as I can tell, once a sim becomes more removed than a first cousin they can date, flirt, etc., in theory.

In practice, the game is inconsistent. I've got some sims who lust after their in-laws and others who can't, even when I want them to. I've even had spouses unable to flirt with their spouse's first cousins! Quite vexing. But I've also got fathers-in-law who lust after their son's, or grandson's, wives, and who presumably could act upon that lust if I let them.

As for kissing cousins, it's really the only way to control your population, IMHO. Once you get past generation 4 you're going to have to have sims who are vaguely related get romatically involved, unless you want to keep creating more sims. At least I've found that to be true in my neighborhood.

Well, if you don't give them the family aspiration when they become teens, they'll probably only get the want for a baby once!

China rules is the best policy.  If however there a family sim concered and they consistantly roll the want for another child I may let them have another (providing they don't tick me off).

Lord too many children stress me out. I had a family that had 4 kids back to back.

I do have some consistency on the family/flirt thing on my legacy family.  I'm on the 5th generation and every father has become obsessed with (in rolling constant flirt wants) their daughters-in-law.  Ick.  The DIL's don't have the same wants or I'd have had a huge catfight on my hands I'm sure.  Weird. 

And lately, playing large families has been stressing me out too. 

It kind of amused me when Joe Carr had his twins and Komei his daughter (all due to alien abduction, of course!) on the same day - at a time when I didn't use any cheat but the always abduct telescope - and they were constantly exhausted and having to change nappies etc.  But it's hard work keeping them alive!

Luckily the new OFB thing of storing food in inventories makes it much easier to cope with children - you can just whip out a bottle or some food and tell the tyke to go eat.

Well, if you have Carrigon's Little Baker Pizza Oven you don't need inventories!  And the best thing about pizza for harassed sim mums - no washing up!

Have you seen Carrigon's new Toy oven?  Kids can fix anything in there now.  She still has the Pizza oven as a separate object, so you can have both, but sim kids can fix just about any meal, prepare a snack, or "warm" leftover pizza or Chinese.  I just started using it, and it's interesting to see what they'll decide to cook.  I've used the pizza oven for a while, and it's true that there are no plates to clean up, but I hate those stinky pizza boxes!  I make the kids clean up after themselves if they aren't neat enough to do it on their own.  :)

Well, macro-clean on an active sim and it's gone in no time!  I'll have to go and take a look at that new oven, Rainbow!  I used to love C&C's fridges and stoves for Sims1, when kids could cook!  Although I do have the option as I'm still using smart-serve, but I only let them make things that don't involve using the stove! 

Have you tried the buffet counters from Paladin's?  I don't know if kids can use them, or the replicator, though, as I've only had them in houses with teens and up.

Dizzy2's smart serve also enables child cooking and meal serving. I've been using it since it came out, and while it isn't 100% OFB compatible it doesn't conflict with actually working code (only bakeries are broken, and these don't work right anyway).

That's what I use, and the only problem is, as you say, in sims not being able to make many and stick stuff in their inventories.  But it saves all those uneaten rotten plates which  don't get cleaned up autonomously until they get fly-blown!  And they're always in the way too!  (Although now I have Numenor's corner counter hack I have more space in my little kitchens, so it's less of a problem.)

I'm not using Dizzy's Smart Serve hack anymore.  I took it out when I installed OFB because I loved the idea of making a lot of plates of food and sticking them in the inventory.  So far it's working pretty good.  If they are hungry enough, Macrotastics will have them whip out a plate of food, grab a serving, and stick it back real quick.  Especially useful for kids on the Skillinator who can't normally cook or sims who are too hungry to spend time cooking.  The best thing is that the food never spoils while in their inventory!  I also got Monique's hack that makes food last longer before spoiling.  It comes in three flavors:  12 hours, 24 hours, and never.  I started with the 12 hour but now I'm using the 24 hour.  I probably won't use the never spoil one though.  I think of it as having left overs, since you can't put them back in the fridge.  Anyway, I'm really loving the ability to store food in the inventory now.  I just have them cook up a bunch of food when they have time and store it, kind of like keeping it in the freezer, and thawing out a portion when you need it.  :)

Now there is an idea. Wouldn't it be great if you could return uneaten (but unspoiled) plates to the fridge to refill it slightly?

Delayed-spoilage or leftovers-to-fridge are no longer really necessary since you can packrat them to inventory now.

Do you know if putting food in the inventory will reset how long that particular plate has until it spoils, or will it remember how long it has been out of the inventory?  For example, if a plate of pork chops spoils in six hours, and it was sitting on the counter for three hours before being put in the inventory, would it then spoil in three hours after taking it back out, or would it reset back to six?

How realistic is placing food in the inventory, though?

I don't tend to carry food in my pockets for days. And not just because of the smell factor.

Whenever possible I play as realistically as possible. Otherwise TS2 just becomes a skill building race, after which the only goal left is to achieve perma-plat (if that hasn't happened yet) and spawn  the next generation.
Enforcing some restrictive "realism" rules on the game is the only way I can find it worthwhile to keep playing.

Me too, which is one of the reasons I like using smart-serve.  If you have a couple of people living in one house, no kids, no visitors, and they have dinner, they don't normally cook enough to feed next door as well!

I tend to run larger households.  I get bored playing just two or three sims, and just playing one sim bores me to tears.  Plus, my sims almost always have friends over, and they stay longer if you feed them. 

But if you have ten hungry sims, smart-serve means you make enough for ten plates!  If you only make six, you have to have another sim cook as well.

It will remember its present state, but why would you leave it out 3 hours anyway?

Well, you can put an entire car in one's inventory. Presumably, one's inventory involves some abstracted space where stuff can be appropriately stored in whatever form is needed. Or maybe it's extradimensional Hammerspace. Who knows?thwhile to keep playing.

I doubt Smart-serve actually charges the fridge appropriately for the amount of food taken. Plus the entire "inventory" thing obviously doubles as "vacuum freeze". I suppose you could buy a freezercase and use that, if you want to go into buy mode to have to get it every time.

Well, that's only too true!  So sims are actually 4-dimensionsl beings - three dimensions are visible, the 4th is invisible and limitless!  (Or is it 5 - there's the invisible place where they store the mops and buckets etc. that are only visible when in use!)

Obviously Sims' inventories are the same as adventure games pockets.

The part in Gabriel Knight 3 where Gabriel stuffs Mosely's coat down his pants still cracks me up, the animations are so overplayed it is an obvious reference to the pocket dimensional inventories.

In best Mae West impersonation - "is that a cheesecake, pizza, spaghetti, car and bouquet of flowers in your pocket, or are you just pleased to see me?"

ROFL ;D  But sims still can't buy flowers and give them to their loved one!  Or a toy for the kids as a gift!

Well, they do bring flowers after dates. And big-screen TVs. They also want to buy toys for their children, especially family Sims.

A lot of this is really roleplaying. Sims only do what we make them do, after all.

Yes, but it was the whole point, really, in sims1, of going Downtown, when you had fridges that didn't need restocking, buying gifts was the only reason for going to the shops!

I think Dizzy attempted to adjust the fridge according to how many servings were prepared.  One thing I miss about it is that it would prevent sims from just "Having" a meal and instead "serve" a meal, and it would lock the fridge for one hour to autonomous attempts by other sims to have a meal, although you could still order them to do so if you wanted.  It would be nice if someone would update SmartServe for OFB.

Maybe they will, although unless you want the make many option, it works perfectly well, so it's only a matter of adding some new coding, not updating what's already there, at least, that's how it seems to me - it's not broken, just doesn't cover all the new options.

Semantics :P

Are you putting your tongue out at me? ::)

Are you rolling your eyes at me?

No, just rolling my eyes!

Well, I was just sticking out my tongue!

More semantics....... :)

I always thought it stupid that kids weren't allowed to fix themselves a bowl of cereal.  Or that cereal and grilled cheese weren't available as options at all times.  (Now they are thanks to the food-replicator  ;))


That is one thing I miss from TS1 too - and wouldn't it be fun for a sim to go to the shop to choose and buy an engagement ring (or other jewellery) instead of producing the same solitaire for males or females.

Yes, that diamond sparkly thing isn't exactly suitable if it's the male sim that's being proposed to - and since when did men wear an engagement ring, no matter which of them does the asking?  The woman might suggest it, they go and buy a ring, and then the man probably either puts it on her finger in the shop, or keeps it until they get home or to a restaurant, and then does the whole down on knees bit, just to set the record straight!

I wonder if there is a way to override the ring the sims use for proposing? A plain band would work for both sexes.

Or, like mine, it could be two gold bands around a white gold band for TRIPLE MARRIAGE ACTION!

I love my wedding ring.....

Even a deeper stone like an emerald or a ruby in a heavy antique setting like a cage could work for both.

Yeah, something that looks all family heirloom-ish.

Especially good for Goths!

In this country it isn't so strange for men to wear engagement rings or "promise" rings... but they are usually very plain. I think my dad did something like that for his second marriage.

I'll bite...which country?

It's not so strange here in the States, either. I mean, I've seen lots of guys wear "Promise rings" and the like. Not a big custom, but still not all that strange.

Also, Squinge has a hack that allows any food at any time. It just changes the menu on the fridge so all the foods show up. I got it because I was tired of my sim having a want to learn how to prepare a certain food, then finding out I couldn't do it because it was the wrong time of day to make that particular food. I like the replicator, but it doesn't satisfy the "learn to cook (item) want, nor does it advance your cooking skills.

http://www.insimenator.net/showthread.php?t=8464

The replicator is great for campus lots. Eliminates the need for the dorm cook. And you can always cook normally if you want for skilling and fulfilling wants.

Also, my kids can cook food on regular appliances. I'm trying to remember why. I think it might be Christianlov's NPC & Nanny mod that allows this, but not 100% sure.

Dizzy's smart-serve allows kids to cook, but they don't waste time putting the meals on the table - it's help-yourself time!

Ok. That's the one I have. I like the serve yourself that sims used to use better anyway. I hate to see a starving pregnant sim run around to place 8 plates on the table while she gets ready to pass out! And if you cancel the action they always put the plate on the floor even if a cabinet is close by. How irritating.

Short answer is tell the pregnant sim to cook for themselves, and let someone else cook for the family and guests!  Or if she's a single mum tell one of the kids to phone for pizza - but if you have the hack, then they can cook - although I don't let mine actually cook with the stove, but make them study cooking until they can make chef salad!

Dizzy had one that did that also, it may still be on MTS2. That's the version I use (which is why I never made a new one). Squinge's version may or may not be pretty much the same thing.

Found it. I remember why I didn't get it before. If you read the replies they are mostly very strange. I couldn't tell if there was a problem with the mod or the posters. Also, Dizzy is reported as not being around anymore.

But for all those that want it now that the Boss says he is using it, here it is:

http://www.modthesims2.com/showthread.php?t=31003&c=1

It's probably the posters, since Dizzy is dead and can't answer any weird questions they have.

I've been using Dizzy's Breakfast Anytime hack since the base game with no problems.  Actually it's more like Pork Chops Anytime.  Now using with OFB.  I never knew Fishman used it too.   8)

No one knows for sure what happened to Dizzy.  Pescado just assumes that if someone hasn't been heard from in a while, they must be dead.  He has no proof of this.  :P

He thought I might be dead too!

With OFB you don't really need breakfast at any time or whatever, you can just tell your sim to make one single plate or group meal.  If they can cook it, it's available.

He never thought you were dead.  You were spotted around.

But he did suggest it, and made the comment "People do die, you know!"  I remember reading it and thinking, well, if I ws dead, you'd never really know for sure!

I think that was Rainbow, in your case. Dizzy, however, is reported dead by others.

Maybe it was Rainbow, I can't be bothered to go and read all through that great long thread just to find out - but I did think it was you said it!

I'm sorry if Dizzy is dead, he will be missed.

I'm kind of curious as to what Pescado was referring to in the chat about my death.  I said if I died, no one would know because I don't have any relatives to log on for me and announce my death (like so many others do  :P ).  He said he had his sources and would know shortly after I die.

dizzy is really dead, as in biologically nonviable?

pescado might well be able to tell if you were dead blue soup.   all he has to do is hack the database of the grim reaper.

course the grim reaper wont show up for me.  wrong mythology.

It's only Pescado who says Dizzy is dead.  I don't think he is - he lost interest in Sims long before he disappeared.

What I want to know is, Where's Bippy?

at least dizzy wrote the super server first..  sims eating time was just chaos before that.  in fact, it was a pescado-ish hack,  it could have been called 'kitchen manages you'.   maybe thats why pescado thinks dizzy is dead?

i have to check, i think im still getting people sitting down and eating green food wth the noeatcrap patch in.   ive had deviations  since OFB that i never had with pescado/twojeffs hacks before.  its weird.

is bippy a modder?

Bippy is not a modder, but she has Skills of an Artist!  And she designed many of the icons and the front page of the site, as well as all the other pages.

I'm pretty sure sloppy sims always would eat green food!  I have DJS putyourbooksaway and sloppy sims won't bother to do that either.  By sloppy I mean 0 for neatness.

ah, well lets hope bippy returns then.

i'll have to check neatness of my sims eating green food.   i just double checked and i have the hack.  its gets so confusing  with the updating,  trying to drop the hacks we dont need any more but yet get the still needed hacks and the new needed hacks in. 

No, that is not the type of thing I would say at all.  It is the type of thing Pescado would say.  And he did, in the very first reply to MissDoh's post.  He must be going senile because he can't remember what he said just last month.  :P

While there's no evidence one way or another, Bippy is very likely dead. Her profile places her as living in DC, which is a hellish warzone that's more unsafe than, say, Baghdad. People routinely disappear or are killed in the various gang wars that occur there. If someone living in DC goes missing, death is very likely.

Well, whatever happened to Motoki? He dissapeared as well. I just assumed he got gobbled up by the monster that is Oblivion.

Motoki's around.  I see him a lot on myspace, etc.

Sometimes RL and all it's associated problems just takes over!  People don't die, but meaybe they retire their Internet personas for a while.  (Some even return as someone completely different.....)

Well, Bippy has a website of her own, so I've tried the obvious tack: Shouting "BIPPY!" on her shoutbox. If we don't get any kind of response, it's safe to say Bippy is very likely dead. After all, DC is a very nasty place, the American equivalent of Beirut or Fallujah, only much worse. It's one of the most unsafe cities in the entire world, if not THE most unsafe city in the world.

Well, they'd have to have a fair few murders there to beat Baghdad at the moment!

As spoken by someone who doesn't live in or near DC and hasn't a clue as to what it's really like... :)

I've been there before. Twice. Someone fired a frikken' BAZOOKA at me. Now, this isn't really much worse than Beirut or Baghdad, but with one key difference: If you shoot back in Beirut or Baghdad, this is no big deal. When you have to shoot back in DC, now you have to evade both the police AND the gangsters. Horrible place, DC is.

That's what you get for trying to invade the Pentagon on your own. :)

Are you kidding? That's the SAFE part of town. It's when you get OUTSIDE the capitol district that it goes royally to hell.

I love Dizzy's breakfast at midnight hack and have never had any problems with it.  Some of my sims like nothing better than chili at 3 a.m.  Dizzy must have been a very good hacker to make something that can work through every expansion without any updates.

I've seen (East coast, USA) a lot of guys wear claddagh rings either as promise or engagement rings.  I surprised my husband with an engagement watch after he gave me my ring :)  Maybe the Glamour pack will include jewelry, that was one of the best little details about Hot Date.

Um, the Pentagon isn't even in DC -- it's in Arlington VA. :)  And as someone who lives across the river from DC, and works downtown at least 2 days a week (telecommute the other 3), and goes to DC frequently for museums, shows, concerts, dinners, etc, I can happily say that in the 20-odd years we've been living here we've never felt threatened (other than on 09/11/01, of course) or been attacked by anyone.  Like any big cities, there are areas to avoid, but you'd have to go looking for them to find them -- they're certainly not in the main parts of town where most normal folks would go.

Yes, but I couldn't expect YOU to know anything about it. I figured that was a general-purpose joke anyway.

You're kidding? You must have your head buried in the dirt half the time or something. I'm running 2 for 2, just passing through briefly, and have come under fire both times. I figure the "Areas to avoid" mean "the vast majority of it".

Or you're just a more inviting target than the average person. :)  DC is no worse than any other major city when it comes to there being dangerous areas.  For the average person who isn't a drug dealer or gang-banger, you have a better chance of getting hit by a Metro bus crossing the street than you do getting shot at or mugged or assaulted.

All major cities are dangerous, but DC is more so than others. Frankly, I'd feel safer in the middle of Baghdad. At least there, nobody minds if you keep your AK-47 ready, which by itself is a pretty hefty deterrent factor.

Says the man whose state has a smaller population than DC. :)
Not that I should talk: my little rez is worse.

I feel a helluva lot safer in D.C., which I visit very regularly, than driving down the road in Florida. Even factoring D.C. traffic into account.

Hey, I remind you, I have never been shot at by a bear.

that's because roads in Florida have this nasty habit of having been destroyed in the last hurricane of the year, meaning you will not have any warning about when it will dump you into an alligator-filled swamp.

True enough, bears don't (usually) own guns, and I'm sure the bunker has been bear-proofed. The real threats in MT are:
1) crazed "grainers" from Missoula who are out of patchouli and smokes.
2) crazed rich kids near Bozeman who can't ski in June.
3) mosquitoes.
4) frightening people who think trophy homes should have 10-foot windows, flat roofs, and wooden siding in an area known for hail, snow, wind, snow, and fire.
Shall I assume the bunker is safe from all of the above?