Awesomod discussion/questions/helpful tips thread

[simwit]

I have about 110 cribs in my neighborhood and even more beds. So far the game still runs fine, as well as can be expected on my not-so-good pc (RAM shortage, mucho cache file access). But I think a BFBVFS will be inevitable in the near future.

Mortimer Goth (family-oriented) has many kids with Bella Bachelor. After she died, he clearly decided not to mourn, but to get re-married immediately and get his new wife pregnant right away.  

Some sims seem to get left out in the cold by AwesomeStory, but I guess it's trait-related. One single woman occasionaly gets involved in romantic interactions, but she can't or won't get a husband. I wish an accidental pregnancy could result in such cases.

Edit: a few spelling errors, some may be left, whatever...

[Kyna]

Okay well then when one of ya'll figures out the perfect mathematical ratio for cribs and beds in a neighborhood then place them all and put up a save for us to download because I don't want to deal with that sort of micromanagement headache.

The demographic function on Twallan's supercomputer might be useful for anyone working out the ratio of cribs needed.

[Motoki]

I have about 110 cribs in my neighborhood and even more beds. So far the game still runs fine, as well as can be expected on my not-so-good pc (RAM shortage, mucho cache file access). But I think a BFBVFS will be inevitable in the near future.

Yeah, that's kind of why although I don't want to be bothered placing all the damned cribs myself, I'm also not especially keen to download a save that puts cribs everywhere because it seems like that might eventually lead to Indie Stone style over population.

Some sims seem te get left out in the cold by AwsomeStory, but I guess it's trait-related. One single woman occasionaly gets involved in romantic interactions, but she can't or won't get a husband. I wish an accidental pregnancy could result in such cases.

In theory it's an interesting feature I just don't know how it could be coded to not get totally out of control. I don't know, maybe you could make it a very small chance or something. I wouldn't mind a few unwed pregnancies but I also do not want a neighborhood full of bastard children and twisted family trees where every kid in a family has a different dad like they were all born to some trashy mom who keeps churning out kids with different men.

[simwit]

I don't want an 'invasion of the bastard children' either, but a few of them is only realistic. Knowing Pescado's sense of realism I dare to think he'll try to work something out, something realistically acceptable.

On the other hand, women who dislike children, but get knocked up, would probably have an abortion.

[Buzzler]

I have about 110 cribs in my neighborhood and even more beds. So far the game still runs fine, as well as can be expected on my not-so-good pc (RAM shortage, mucho cache file access). But I think a BFBVFS will be inevitable in the near future.

OK, while I wouldn't go that far to call that complètement ridicule that sure is a lot. It's not certain that your 'hood is doomed but it's probably bound to be capped by the number of beds and concerning perfomance it might do ye olde running kick to the crotch sooner or later.

It really depends on whether Pescado is able to give an estimate on the breeding chances. If the Sims are really desperate to breed and try to breed as soon as a crib becomes unoccupied it'd be easy since the number of cribs needed would be 10% of the wanted population size, maybe one more since it takes the Sims some time to move. I doubt it's that easy though. My guess is the number is somewhere between 10% and 20% and if this is somewhere near the truth 110 cribs would lead to an equilibrium of 550 to 1100 Sims probably being capped way before reaching that due to the lack of beds.

The demographic function on Twallan's supercomputer might be useful for anyone working out the ratio of cribs needed.

Since there are no wars in the Sims nor sudden developments in contraceptives nor anything else to affect birth rates there's no reason the age distribution should be substantially different from the AgingStageLengths. That is no reason I can think of.

[simwit]

Yes yes, I'm sure it's complètement ridicule. I went overboard. I have no more small houses. I guess my neighborhood has enough beds for at least 300 sims. I obviously don't have that many sims now. I'd have to check with twallan's supercomputer. I must have more than 100 sims though. But this is just a test anyway.

As soon as things go wrong I intend to start again with twoftmama's empty Awesomized Sunset Valley. I'd like to seed it myself with red, green and blue sims, with purple hair, pink hair, etc. This time I'm going for completely-over-the-top-silly genetics.

[Gastfyr]

I thought maybe the 52 cribs in my hood were going overboard.  But then, considering my computer is kind of a piece of crap, it may very well be.

[dilpill]

The demographic function on Twallan's supercomputer might be useful for anyone working out the ratio of cribs needed.

Using the ratio from the population screen to figure out the optimal number of cribs per hood would be a very tedious task. You would need to go through a long process of trail and error before you could get the Adult:Child ratio to stabilize because of the delay between when you place cribs and when sims have their babies. The semi-randomness of it doesn't help much either. You would need to wait around two sim weeks between each change in the number of cribs to get a valid test result, and after the multiple tests required to find the optimal number of cribs, the population of the neighborhood will have changed significantly, rendering the results of the test almost worthless. 

If only AwesomeMod did the calculations by itself, and automated the whole process of trying to keep the population stable. 

[Kyna]

The demographic function on Twallan's supercomputer might be useful for anyone working out the ratio of cribs needed.

Using the ratio from the population screen to figure out the optimal number of cribs per hood would be a very tedious task. You would need to go through a long process of trail and error before you could get the Adult:Child ratio to stabilize because of the delay between when you place cribs and when sims have their babies. The semi-randomness of it doesn't help much either. You would need to wait around two sim weeks between each change in the number of cribs to get a valid test result, and after the multiple tests required to find the optimal number of cribs, the population of the neighborhood will have changed significantly, rendering the results of the test almost worthless. 

If only AwesomeMod did the calculations by itself, and automated the whole process of trying to keep the population stable. 

I don't know why you think the computer's demographic function wouldn't be useful.

I would assume that anyone who worked out the crib ratio would be playtesting several times before they posted "this is definitely the crib to adult ratio you want for a stable population", otherwise they're just going to look silly when it turns out they're wrong.  The supercomputer's demographic function would be handy during those playtests - unless you're suggesting counting the sims of each age group manually?

If only AwesomeMod did the calculations by itself, and automated the whole process of trying to keep the population stable. 

You are making the assumption that everyone who uses AM wants to keep the population stable.  There are times when players might want to have a higher or lower rate of population growth.  Someone who gassed all the premades is going to want a higher rate of population growth than someone starting a game in a pre-made hood, and someone who switches to ASM after EA story mode or ISM may want to slow the rate of population growth to gradually reduce the size of their neighbourhood.

[IreneDAdler]

Some sims seem te get left out in the cold by AwsomeStory, but I guess it's trait-related. One single woman occasionaly gets involved in romantic interactions, but she can't or won't get a husband. I wish an accidental pregnancy could result in such cases.

In theory it's an interesting feature I just don't know how it could be coded to not get totally out of control. I don't know, maybe you could make it a very small chance or something. I wouldn't mind a few unwed pregnancies but I also do not want a neighborhood full of bastard children and twisted family trees where every kid in a family has a different dad like they were all born to some trashy mom who keeps churning out kids with different men.

That's actually exactly what I'm trying to achieve.  The way EA genetics works right now, monogamous families turn out an army of clones.  So boring.

As for the crib system, I had approached it with some wariness, since it does sound rather tedious to set up, but I'm actually having a lot of fun doing it.  I guess your experience depends on how you go about doing it.  I was trying to rescue my town from ghost-town-dom, so I ctrl-clicked around to houses with sims in them and set them up with 2 cribs each.  While I was there, I fiddled with the sims in those houses, getting them jobs, skills, grabbing some romance for some of them, and I had a lot of fun dabbling around in different households.  I'm normally very myopic, and tend to over-focus on one particular household, and this crib business forces me to shift my focus around, and I think helps me enjoy the game more.  But I can imagine if you're building a neighborhood from scratch, going into build mode for empty house after empty house to plop cribs down would get quite boring quite fast.

I agree that the population management is fine without a separate immigration system.  Randomly generated sims would probably have to come from the bin, which means that you're likely to get duplicates.  Personally, I'd much rather my town was populated by products of breeding rather than random cookie-cutter droppings, and if I felt like my gene pool needs stirring up, I could add my own from CAS.

[dilpill]

The demographic function on Twallan's supercomputer might be useful for anyone working out the ratio of cribs needed.

Using the ratio from the population screen to figure out the optimal number of cribs per hood would be a very tedious task. You would need to go through a long process of trail and error before you could get the Adult:Child ratio to stabilize because of the delay between when you place cribs and when sims have their babies. The semi-randomness of it doesn't help much either. You would need to wait around two sim weeks between each change in the number of cribs to get a valid test result, and after the multiple tests required to find the optimal number of cribs, the population of the neighborhood will have changed significantly, rendering the results of the test almost worthless.  

If only AwesomeMod did the calculations by itself, and automated the whole process of trying to keep the population stable.  

I don't know why you think the computer's demographic function wouldn't be useful.

I would assume that anyone who worked out the crib ratio would be playtesting several times before they posted "this is definitely the crib to adult ratio you want for a stable population", otherwise they're just going to look silly when it turns out they're wrong.  The supercomputer's demographic function would be handy during those playtests - unless you're suggesting counting the sims of each age group manually?

Oh, the demographic function would definitely be useful. I was just saying that doing the testing would probably take loads of time, just because of the nature of births and deaths in the Sims.

If only AwesomeMod did the calculations by itself, and automated the whole process of trying to keep the population stable.  

You are making the assumption that everyone who uses AM wants to keep the population stable.  There are times when players might want to have a higher or lower rate of population growth.  Someone who gassed all the premades is going to want a higher rate of population growth than someone starting a game in a pre-made hood, and someone who switches to ASM after EA story mode or ISM may want to slow the rate of population growth to gradually reduce the size of their neighbourhood.

This would be better achieved by having a way in ASM to specify a target population growth rate (or target population and maximum change), say per generation or per lifetime. This whole "experiment with different numbers of cribs indefinitely until you get the population growth rate you want" thing isn't very user friendly, and distracts time away from actually playing the game.

[Buzzler]

Using the ratio from the population screen to figure out the optimal number of cribs per hood would be a very tedious task. You would need to go through a long process of trail and error before you could get the Adult:Child ratio to stabilize because of the delay between when you place cribs and when sims have their babies. The semi-randomness of it doesn't help much either. You would need to wait around two sim weeks between each change in the number of cribs to get a valid test result, and after the multiple tests required to find the optimal number of cribs, the population of the neighborhood will have changed significantly, rendering the results of the test almost worthless. 

It's even worse. To gain meaningful results you'd probably have to let it run for at least a couple of Sims' life cycles until the age distribution fits the AgingStageLengths again. Semi-randomness shouldn't be that much of a problem though due to the law of large numbers, you just have to keep in mind there's some variance to the results. It's a brute-force low-brain approach at any rate though.

To me this is all systems theory. The 'hood is a system, the number of cribs is the input, and the population size is the output. That system should be stable, meaning that a change in the input should lead to specific stable output. The million dollar question is what the gain of that system is going to be. It can't be anything more than 10 (and that would mean that every crib is occupied at any given time) for the default AgingStageLengths, but it can basically be even less than one. Something around 5 would be reasonable IMHO.

Still importent is the damping since it is an indicator for how fast the system will react to a change of the input and how resistent it is to disturbances to the system state (or in other words: playing). If the damping is to high the StoryDriver won't be able to preserve a 'hood and if it is to low it will compromise immersion or will even render the system unstable.

If only AwesomeMod did the calculations by itself, and automated the whole process of trying to keep the population stable. 

That would be the cheating.   

I would assume that anyone who worked out the crib ratio would be playtesting several times before they posted "this is definitely the crib to adult ratio you want for a stable population", otherwise they're just going to look silly when it turns out they're wrong.

I don't think there's a way to tell for sure any time soon. Even less since there's always the chance that Pescado changes something in the next build.

You are making the assumption that everyone who uses AM wants to keep the population stable.  There are times when players might want to have a higher or lower rate of population growth.  Someone who gassed all the premades is going to want a higher rate of population growth than someone starting a game in a pre-made hood, and someone who switches to ASM after EA story mode or ISM may want to slow the rate of population growth to gradually reduce the size of their neighbourhood.

That's the beauty of the crib dependency: It doesn't really depend on the current population size but on the number of cribs which lead to a certain stable population size mostly independent from whatever the current population size might be (as long as the population is able to breed). So if the population is larger than the target population given by the number of cribs birth rates should decrease because it is harder for the families to find breeding space, and if it's smaller birth rates should increase because it is easier to find breeding space.

[J. M. Pescado]

It's even worse. To gain meaningful results you'd probably have to let it run for at least a couple of Sims' life cycles until the age distribution fits the AgingStageLengths again. Semi-randomness shouldn't be that much of a problem though due to the law of large numbers, you just have to keep in mind there's some variance to the results.

Actually, the law of large numbers doesn't QUITE work out in a Sims neighborhood, because the numbers aren't really that large.

To me this is all systems theory. The 'hood is a system, the number of cribs is the input, and the population size is the output. That system should be stable, meaning that a change in the input should lead to specific stable output.

Well, the system SHOULD be upward-stable, because cribs is not the only boundary constraint.

The million dollar question is what the gain of that system is going to be. It can't be anything more than 10 (and that would mean that every crib is occupied at any given time) for the default AgingStageLengths, but it can basically be even less than one. Something around 5 would be reasonable IMHO

Yes, and WHERE you put them also has a significant effect on the game. If you put them in cheap houses, your sims will tend to reproduce at lower levels of income than if you place them in more upscale houses.

Still importent is the damping since it is an indicator for how fast the system will react to a change of the input and how resistent it is to disturbances to the system state (or in other words: playing). If the damping is to high the StoryDriver won't be able to preserve a 'hood and if it is to low it will compromise immersion or will even render the system unstable.

Well, upward expansion has a damper at present in the crippling housing crisis endemic to the stock neighborhoods. We are working on a shiny to address that, but I need a mesher. As for the damping being too high, wouldn't having damping too HIGH also compromise the immersion? A system with extremely high damping response is essentially on rails. Most people do not enjoy externally-imposed railroad plots.

If only AwesomeMod did the calculations by itself, and automated the whole process of trying to keep the population stable. 

That would be the cheating.   

It would, not to mention it would be uninteresting. At this point, half the point of  the thing is the experiment! If you wanted a system where sims robotically pop out the exact same number of kids and had no response whatosever to the environment you created, you could probably go back to ISM.

[Buzzler]

Actually, the law of large numbers doesn't QUITE work out in a Sims neighborhood, because the numbers aren't really that large.

That's true but the law of large numbers despite its name doesn't necessarily need large numbers to apply, usually it's straightening out the mean pretty soon. If you take dice rolling for example, it usually doesn't take much more than 10 rolls to keep the mean between 3 and 4. Unless someone wants to foretell the population size after 100 generation or something there's really no need to be overly accurate. The player's interference will almost certainly mask/overrule all slow drifts to extinction or overpopulation anyhow.

Well, the system SHOULD be upward-stable, because cribs is not the only boundary constraint.

Well yes, but the population size being hard-capped by the number of beds isn't really what I had in mind when I said stable. Unless we're not talking digital...

As for the damping being too high, wouldn't having damping too HIGH also compromise the immersion? A system with extremely high damping response is essentially on rails. Most people do not enjoy externally-imposed railroad plots.

Actually a system with "excessive" damping usually doesn't do anything (noticeable) at all, so yes that would definitely compromise immersion. Besides that the only difference between stable systems with different damping is the reaction speed and the fact that systems with low damping are able to "overreact" to an input change.

It would, not to mention it would be uninteresting. At this point, half the point of  the thing is the experiment! If you wanted a system where sims robotically pop out the exact same number of kids and had no response whatosever to the environment you created, you could probably go back to ISM.

I agree. Did I mention that I actually like the crib dependency?  

[Inge]

What does everyone think of this idea:  When a sim joins a company, if there is not already a boss in situ, and there is *currently* no one in the hood with the right qualifications to be that boss, your own sim gets lucky and fills the role himself?   It would probably only happen for the first generation in a new hood, but it's semi-realistic, and would be fun, I think.   This could also be used for if the owner sacks most of the people in the firm, they can do so corruptly in order for someone without the right qualifications to get to the top.

[ciane]

Inge, I don't like that idea at all! I prefer a new Sim popping into the hood to be a boss for my Sim. Some people don't play a lot of generations or the whole hood at once, so what fun would it be to have the Sim start a job and achieve their LTW right away?

[Motoki]

It would, not to mention it would be uninteresting. At this point, half the point of  the thing is the experiment! If you wanted a system where sims robotically pop out the exact same number of kids and had no response whatosever to the environment you created, you could probably go back to ISM.

It's not about that. I think things happening in some sort of sensible order with controls in place is a good thing I just don't want to be forced into some Sim City style of gameplay to manage the whole damned town.

The problem with Indie Stone mod is it overpopulates. I simply refuse to believe there is no way impose some sort of overpopulation limit without this crib stuff.

I know you want to play the game in a control freak style where you can control all aspects of the neighborhood but I don't want that. To me that's not what story mode is about. It's about the game running everything for the town behind the scenes itself so that your family can live and interact in a changing town where your family's further generations will meet further generations of town's people. Not like TS2 where the founding sim knew Goopy and his great great great great great great great grandson knew Goopy too. That's basically what it's for.

To me being forced to manage the town is a hassle I don't want and it discourages me from wanting to play the game. Admittedly I've been on that streak lately anyway but this isn't helping.

In any case, for the pro-crib people I highly encourage you to do wolfuns on fast speed and let the game run for a while and create progressive generations with these cribs in place and see what happens. It hasn't been tested long term and I am curious to see if the outcome will be what was intended.

[simwit]

I completely agree with Motoki, of course.

But anyway, I've played a while in my ridiculous neighborhood, and there doesn't seem to be any danger of overpopulation. According to twallan's supercomputer, the population has even declined from 101 to 95 residents while I was playing. I suppose it could be a gene pool problem. I'm going to move the sims from the bin (Funke, etc.) back in. They were already there under ISM control, but now I wonder how AwesomeStory will treat them.

I also have at least 60 npcs. Why on earth does the game create so many of them? I already gassed all of them once but the game immediately creates at least 40 new ones, and of course they all have the same face (well, one face for men and one face for women).

The game also froze for the first time under AwesomeStory control. I closed it with task manager and went  to bed. I hope it's not a reproducible freeze.

I also make a habit of regularly deleting all the graves in the mausoleum. I have no idea if that's a good or bad idea, or if it even matters.

[Motoki]

I noticed the npcs too. I got rid of them all and in a short time I had over 40 again. I can't for the life of me understand why. I almost never interact with them except for one or two. The paper kids and mail people I understand since they always come around, but why do we need the others unless we do something that specifically requires their presence?

Also they don't need to rotate the paper kids or mail people. I am perfectly content to have the same one every day. I think that's fairly normal anyway.

I suppose they could get replaced every so many sim days or whatever to simulate growing up/retiring but eh, I'm not even too worried about that.

Actually, I wouldn't mind if adult neigbhorhood sims in level 1 of the Journalism career ended up being the paper delivery person instead of the kid because level 1 journalism is a paper deliverer.

[Solmyr]

Those paper kids and babysitter teens actually go to school, too. You can meet them there.

[Motoki]

That's fine but I guess I just feel like since there's a finite amount of sims you can have in your neighborhood before it starts getting all slow and wonky, I'd rather save those slots. Especially if I'm not calling the babysitter and there may be other sims in town who could be used for paper delivery people.

[ingeli]

I like that the NPC:s grow and change. I would like them to marry and move in too, when appropriate - I see they are romancing, but I haven't had anyone move in autonomously. I like the crib/bed rule, and I can't see why it wouldn't work as you want it to, Motoki, after the initial set up of the city.
I would also like a SMALL chance of pregnancies from all the adultery going on in the rabbit holes, their names really have a new philosophical meaing now. Especially the graveyard at night, they swarm there like kids going to school in the morning, lol.

[simwit]

The main problem with moving in NPCs is that you'll only get more clones in your neighborhood. I have seen enough clones in my own household already, thank you very much. 

[Motoki]

I don't think the (service) NPCs by default are really touched by story mode, are they? I have never seen one move in autonomously or have a kid or any of that.

[kimmyfrmtx]

Agreed.  And why oh why do I need a different maid for each day of the week?