Stuff I'd like to see

[sintrinity]

I was thinking of the things that really annoy me the most in TS2 and thought I would ask and see if there are any mods out there that anyone knows of to fix them -

Sim routing failure going up/down stairs - I always remodel all houses that have more than one floor to have two staircases because of this

Can't queue anything for parents helping with homework or they will stop immediately (and it is a real pain in the neck to get them nailed down to do it in the first place unless I turn free will off)

Jealousy that doesn't go by lot but by aspiration - for example I don't ever want my romance sims to get jealous (unless maybe they are married) but I don't want to stop my family sims on the same lot from getting ticked about cheating

Some kind of a slow down for aspiration decay.  For example - Alex Goth is a Pleasure Sim this time around and he is really high maintenance even tho he should NEVER go anywhere near depressed.  He'll come home from school, go on a date, invite a group over for an outing when he gets back and then spend the evening playing poker with his buddies and STILL manage to almost go green by the time he goes to bed.  To me, it seems like he should not lose aspiration status while he is doing something he wanted to do in the first place instead of me having to have him jump on the couch (cancel it), mix drinks (cancel), play pinball (cancel), take a bubble bath AGAIN (cancel) etc, etc.  Same thing with the other aspirations - Don Lothario can woohoo 5 times in one day (guess he has the weekender Viagra) and still manage to not get promoted the next day because he is not happy enough with his life??

last  - Does every Fortune Sim HAVE to have a bowling alley and a DJ booth at their house???  It used to be every instrument with UNI (thank you twojeffs that I don't get that anymore) but now my fortune Sims all have to either have a huge house with room for that or throw one in the yard (which looks really dumb)

[Brynne]

Well, the Romance Mod will take care of that jealousy issue.

[sintrinity]

Thanks, for some reason I was thinking that one didn't work with NL when I redownloaded recently after an install.  Gonna try it again

[Brynne]

There's an updated version, now.

[skandelouslala]

I have yet to use the romance mod, but I'm pretty sure it's supposed to take care of a lot of that, especially with romance sims if I recall reading about it all correctly.

The fortune sim wanting the expensive game..there's 2 work around for this... buy them one and then stick in in their inventory so you don't have to look at it or there is also an expensive dart board game that fulfills the want...I got the link to it here..I think it was posted a MTS2 (don't quote me on that though)  I still haven't found anything to make the annoying DJ booth want go away.  In fact the expensive game want is similar in that it will also  reappear after you buy them on..although it usually takes a while.  Again, if I do get them a DJ booth, unless they have the space for it, it usually goes straight into inventory just so they can quit wanting it for a while.

Not sure about the aspiration decay..then again I don't mind much b/c it provides more of a challenge.  However, Pleasure sims seem almost worthless b/c nothing makes them happy for long and their LTWs are pretty ridiculous IMO.    In fact even their general wants are boring and repetative.

The stairs thing..this is why I always using connecting stairs in my homes unless there just not enough space and I don't want to remodel.  Connecting stairs allow more than one sim to go up/down them at a time.

I hate the homework thing too.  It is such a hassle.  If you have to get the parent and kid in exactly the same spot, make sure nothing else is in que and have to have the child or parent initiate for help immediatly before one of them walks away.  I would love something that would make it priority instead of dropping from cue so quickly.

[ZephyrZodiac]

Unless Don actually wants to woohoo, it won't matter how often he does it, it won't help his aspiration meter.  If he wants a public woohoo, then a woohoo in bed or the hot tub won't fit the bill either.  Make sure you have don in the profession of his choice - ie. get him OUT of the medical profession! and he'll immediately be happier and if in your game he wants to be a celebrity chef, and you start him on that path he'll start to get cooking and creativity wants.

Also, if your sim is in gold or platinum, and then something happens that causes one of his fears to be realised, he will drop right down to green or even red - so watch for that too.

I believe JM's no route fail hack is what you need to solve your stairs problem, but having modular stairs rather than the solid ones helps too.

[sintrinity]

Yeah, the aspiration decay would take some of the challenge away but it seems like some of them are just ridiculous - particularly with family and pleasure sims.  Unless my family sims are hanging all over their spouse ALL day long they are just not happy doing anything else which is kinda tedious.  I mean - I love my hubby too but not THAT much! 

I think those types of things should still be their wants but not to the point that they go green or red if they are doing something else so long as they have spent some "quality" time.  My stay-at-home family sims can go green just waiting on their poor spouse to get home from work so they can cling and be happy again.  Too many times I just send a platinum sim to bed or to meditate until work which is just boring.

It also annoys me that all my sims end up with 5 gazillion aspiration points and there is nothing I want to get with them.  I only use the thinking cap, smart milk and sometimes the hot tub and the shades.  The elixir and the energizer just make everything WAY too easy and I already have a hard time getting sims to die of anything but old age without cheating.

[RainbowTigress]

Platinum aspiration only lasts for 8 hours, then it will start to decay at the top of the next hour.  Gold lasts a little longer, and green the longest.  Aspiration does not decay while the sim is sleeping or at work.  For this reason, JM recommends getting your sim into platinum before sending them to bed, and then getting them up right after the hour when the carpool arrives.  This can be accomplished easily with the aid of the sleep clock.  Even if your sim's energy bar is not quite full,  is hungry, or needs to use the bathroom, Platinum practically guarantees promotion because of the boost it adds to your sim's Mood and thus Job Performance. 

Also, you can try using a hack like the one posted by Carrigon at VS.  It is a big cheat though, so only use it if you don't mind cheating a bit.   http://www.variousimmers.net/vsimforum/showthread.php?t=1262&highlight=Aspiration+Decay

I get frustrated with the homework thing too.  What someone suggested and usually helps me is to pause the game, clear both sims' queues, then have the parent ask the kid to help them with their homework while simultaneously getting the kid to ask the parent for help.  Only one action will carry through while the other drops out, but this has the benefit of occupying them and getting them to walk toward each other.  If they are too far away from each other or the homework object, then you can try moving the homework to a different location, or have the two sims to "run" to the homework (helps if they are 6+ active) and then queue up the "Ask" commands.  The farther away they are, the greater the chance of the command timing out or something distracting them.  Stairs can be bad for this as well.  Be sure there is nothing blocking the parent from standing near the child or the action will fail also.  Sims are such peculiar little creatures!

I have found that modular stairs are the best way to go as well, but they sometimes require modifying the house because for some reason, they won't always fit in the same space as the other type.

I think everyone pretty much covered your other question about the DJ booth and bowling alley.  This has bugged me also.  Fortune sims get on my nerves sometimes anyway always wanting to buy useless stuff and ignoring their family.  So I don't play them as much anymore, but I do still have some.  They seem to be better now with NL and the attraction system, but those bowling alleys and DJ booths...grrr!!!

I hope I've been able to help!

EDIT:  I just read back over the discussion, and I agree about the Romance Mod.  It was one hack I missed the most when NL came out.  It is awesome.  My Romance sims can be sluts and their other Romance lovers don't care, as long as their Nice, Outgoing, and Playful points add up to 15 or more.  Everyone else gets jealous as usual.  Sims in a committed relationship should not fall for a flirt from another sim if their relationship with their SO is in good shape, although this doesn't seem to be working as well in NL as it did before.  JM thinks it may be due to the NL attraction system skewing the Sims' acceptance threshold.

[maxon]

EDIT:  I just read back over the discussion, and I agree about the Romance Mod.  It was one hack I missed the most when NL came out.  It is awesome.  My Romance sims can be sluts and their other Romance lovers don't care, as long as their Nice, Outgoing, and Playful points add up to 15 or more.  Everyone else gets jealous as usual.  Sims in a committed relationship should not fall for a flirt from another sim if their relationship with their SO is in good shape, although this doesn't seem to be working as well in NL as it did before.  JM thinks it may be due to the NL attraction system skewing the Sims' acceptance threshold.

I was going to ask about that.  I thought the Romance mod hadn't been updated for Nightlife and I hadn't put it back in.  Does it work with NL then?

[ZephyrZodiac]

There's a trial version of it somewhere.

But remember, not ALL Romance sims don't get jealous!  Watch out for Aries and Pisces, they both get violently mad!  Leos are about the least bothered by their partner's aberrations.

[Brynne]

I think it's dependent upon their personality, if I remember correctly. They have to have 15 points total from playful, outgoing, and...nice, I think? I forget.

[maxon]

There's a trial version of it somewhere.

But remember, not ALL Romance sims don't get jealous!  Watch out for Aries and Pisces, they both get violently mad!  Leos are about the least bothered by their partner's aberrations.

Right-o - I'll have a hunt for it later.

Gah - I HATE the astrology thing and I pretty much ignore the aspiration thing too.  So if they get mad because they're Aries or whatever - tough.  It just means more fights which in my book is a Good Thing.  Thanks god for Pescado's Fight Club that's all I can say.

[ZephyrZodiac]

I think it's dependent upon their personality, if I remember correctly. They have to have 15 points total from playful, outgoing, and...nice, I think? I forget.

That explains why Keanu Broke never gets jealous - 20 points in playful/outgoing plus 1 for niceness so obviously he won't get jealous!  But maybe some of his partners were just short of the total!

[RainbowTigress]

I didn't pay attention to astrology signs until NL came along.  Like Brynne said and I said in my post earlier, the way the mod is programmed, Romance sims must have 15+ points in Nice, Outgoing, and Playful.  That may mean some signs are more predisposed to jealousy because they would have less than 15 points in these areas, but I have never paid attention to which signs they are.  I do know that Nina as she comes out of the box is very shy and not very nice or playful, so she will always get jealous unless you tweak her personality.  I don't know what her sign is.  Don, being very outgoing, does not tend to get jealous under these conditions.

[ZephyrZodiac]

Nina is Scorpio, I think, and Dina is a very tweaked Sagittarius!  Her personality is really far more suited to Libra (the lazy kind)!

[sintrinity]

Thanks Rainbow!  Gonna try that mod for the aspiration.  I don't mind cheating as long as it makes things more realistic to me and the way aspiration works now I don't really get to "play" or have them display any personality because they are so busy running around doing silly stuff trying to stay platinum.

Thanks for the stairs hints too.  I didn't know that the connecting stairs allowed more than one sim at a time but on the downside I have a lot of problems placing those too

The homework suggestions were great too.  I usually cancel the school icon as they are getting off the bus so they drop it in the yard and it is easier to get two sims out there at once with nothing close by to distract them.  I am just annoyed that I can't queue stuff or they quit.  Most of my houses have several sims in them and if I don't queue and move on life can get pretty bad for my simlings

Great idea to put the DJ booth and bowling alley in inventory.  I hadn't thought of that because I don't like to use inventory usually.  It seems like some things get busted if they have been in inventory - beds, dressers...  When I take them out they won't place against a wall anymore unless I use moveobjects but even then my sims can't use them to woohoo anymore so I just end up selling and buying new anyways.

I used to have the romance mod and life was good so I think if it works NL I will be very happy.  I tend to be having lots of Romance sims these days, mostly just to add some excitement to my usual knowledge run.  Brandi's last boy Donny is just so cute and so good at it plus I want him to be one of my breeders so it will work out well.  I have a risky woohoo mod that spices things up nicely so most of my kids are from romance sims and I never "try for baby" (family sims just have to get a fertile wife or a few mistresses if they want to have five million kids).  Nina is on her 3rd unknown father kid with her 15th woohoo for now - unfortunately she and Don don't get to see each other much since they were always busting each other and staying furious but they make such nice kids I think they are gonna have to make up or change aspiration since he is perma plat anyways now and Nina will be soon

[ZephyrZodiac]

The patch is supposed to fix those inventory problems (at least, most of them!)

Gwill made a very expensive golden dartboard to satisfy that want.  It's at MTS2.  Just search for GoldenDart.

[mistymage]

Over in Peasantry Gwill has links to her paintings that cover a lot of the wants.. dj booth, bowling alley, instruments, trash compactor, expensive car etc.  It's much easier to find a spot on the wall than to place some of the bigger stuff.

[flowerchile]

Stuff I'd like to see...
Hmmmm.  I know

A computer that fixes itself.
No crashes in the Sims.
Downloads that don't need coaxing, they will just install themselves.
Someone on this forum who knows less than me.  (I feel smart at BBS)
Roosters without fingers so they can't type. (Hang on, they DON'T have fingers).
Alias' (fromMTS2) avatar in person. 

Gonna go think of more, this'll do for now.

[Ancient Sim]

I never queue anything for after homework, but I do use the Macrotastics "Concentrate" facility on both the kid and the parent when they're doing it, which stops them going off to do anything else until it's done, so that might work with queuing.  To actually get them in the right place, I either tell one to "Go Here" and then put them onto "Procrastinate" with Macrotastics again while the other one gets there, or teleport them both over using the ... er ... Insim click on the floor thingy.  Never have any probs with homework using those methods.

[eamethyst]

I was just going to suggest the same thing Ancient Sim said.  I'll send the parent to stand by the homework and use the Procrastinate command in Macrotastics and then have the child ask for help.  Then use the Concentrate to keep the parent there until their finished.

[ZephyrZodiac]

I find it's rare for a parent not to complete the task, with or without macrotastics. the main problem is just getting the kid to ask before hubby decides to congratulate yet again!  "Darling, I must congratulate you!  You were sitting so beautifully!

[Brynne]

My problem doesn't seem to be the adults, it's the kids who keep breaking the "help with homework" interaction to sob over their C grade. 

[ZephyrZodiac]

I've never had that happen!  (At least, not after they've read the report!  But I have a teen who just got caught sneaking out, parents were fast asleep and didn't know anything about it, but for the rest of the following day she kept bursting into tears!

 I always make sure both kids and parent have fairly full fun bars before I queue the homework, maybe that (and my flamingo) is why it works for me!

[Pegasys]

It also annoys me that all my sims end up with 5 gazillion aspiration points and there is nothing I want to get with them.  I only use the thinking cap, smart milk and sometimes the hot tub and the shades.  The elixir and the energizer just make everything WAY too easy and I already have a hard time getting sims to die of anything but old age without cheating.

Maybe we need an "expensive_aspirationrewards" hack?

(By the way, did I mention I'm loving the expensivenpcs hack?)