altering butlers?

[simmilk]

What's the best way to go about altering neighborhood butlers?  I was able to do some stuff in game with hacks/cheats (age-down from elder->adult and change his hair style) but I stopped before I changed his wardrobe since I worried about screwing the whole neighborhood and quit without saving.

Is this a job for SIMPE .. if so, any basic directions for where to start on modifying a service npcs this way would be awesome. 

Thanks

[jolrei]

If all you want to do is change his appearance (not his behaviour) you can do that with simsurgery in SimPE.  There are tutorials at MTS2 for changing appearances.  I'm pretty sure assigning a different set of clothing as the butler uniform would also not bork the butler; it wouldn't alter any of the butler programming.

[Gwill]

I've changed my butler's appearance with the batbox and clothing tool, but the bald hair is part of his uniform, so he'll always be bald while on the job.

I was annoyed at his formal wear.  He walks around all day in a tux, but in the middle of a wedding party he suddenly spun into a patched and worn brown tweed suit.  That just won't do.

[jolrei]

No, that's fine.  The butler is clearly modelled after a P.G. Wodehouse meme, in which the Edwardian butler would wear formalwear while on duty, and tweeds off-duty.  Admittedly, it's odd to see that change in the middle of a wedding, but that's a glitchy clothing change, but not a fault with the particular clothing.  Mind you, if you hate tweed (or Wodehouse) there's no real reason to stick with that.  I've never bothered to change the work uniforms of NPCs, but I know people do it.  Would the bald head not be changeable as well (if it's part of the uniform)?

[Gwill]

Everyone on the lot changes into formal wear when the wedding arch ceremony starts.  Even random walk-bys and the postman.

[Magicmoon]

I stopped before I changed his wardrobe since I worried about screwing the whole neighborhood and quit without saving.

I've found Christianlov's clothing rack at MTS2 to be the most reliable way to change an NPCs clothing. The NPC will come onto the lot, change into the outfit you select and then leave.  Other methods often leave the NPC behaving strangely or not keep the newly assigned outfit.

I think it also allows for plastic surgery and hair change, but it's possible I'm thinking of one of his other tools. Although I haven't specifically tried these on the butler yet, it has worked for other NPCs I've altered.

[simmilk]

Thanks for all the good replies.  I'll mess around with him this evening and see what I can do with SIMPe and Insimenator.

But... say I manage to screw him until I'm looking at a worst case scenario... the worst thing I'd have to do is delete the custom neighborhood I use and start a new one, right? 

[Gwill]

I can't imagine any way you could mess it up beyond what starting a new neighbourhood would fix.