Townies and the notownieregen hack for OFB

[toriamos]

I want to know if it is ok to install OFB with the notownieregen hack left in the game.  Since it works with OFB, or do I need to take it out and put it back before I load the game for the first time.  I have a really serious dislike for townies  and I have rid my neighborhoods of all  of them (expect the few that will regenerate on the downtown hood.)  I would be grateful for any help with this matter.  The thought of those townies coming back makes the hair on the back of my neck stand up. 

Thank you

[Renatus]

Please read the sticky topic at the very top of the forum - it is labeled "FFS OFB Compatibility List'. It lists the status of most of Pescado's hacks.

[simmiecal]

I think the question that is being asked, since the OP stated that s/he knows it's compatable, is if the hack is left in while installing OFB, will that prevent OFB townies from spawning and whether or not that would cause a problem. At least, that's how I understood the question.

Unfortunately, I don't know the answer to that one.

[toriamos]

Yes, that is the question, thank you.  I don't want to screw up the installtion, because it not generating something it should be, but at the same time I don't want more townies that I have gotten rid of to regenerate.  I guess my question should be, when does the generating of townies take place during installtion and loading of game or just loading of game, if that makes sense.

[Qwiggles]

OFB definitely added more townies not to mention the families that came with Bluewater Village, the default shopping district.  I detest townies, too, but I'm resigned to the fact that I'll have to wait for the new SimPe to change skintones and/or use Christianlov's clothing boutique rack.

[angelyne]

Yes, that is the question, thank you.  I don't want to screw up the installtion, because it not generating something it should be, but at the same time I don't want more townies that I have gotten rid of to regenerate.  I guess my question should be, when does the generating of townies take place during installtion and loading of game or just loading of game, if that makes sense.

Townies come with a pre-existing neighbourdhood. Downtownies, dormies, etc.. are created from a stock of prexisting characters when you attach a pre-existing maxis downtown, university, shopping district.  When one of these characters die,  marry,  move in or stop being a townie for any reason, a new one is generated by the game to take its place.  If you have the noregen hack, this last process will not occur.  However you will still get the whole host of characters associated with a pre-existing downtown, university or shopping district if you attach one to your neighbourdhood, hack or not. 

I do know the hack is listed to be compatible with OFB, however, that doesn't mean it prevent new simmies from being generated in a shopping district.  That has yet to be determined

[akatonbo]

Far as I can tell, the notownieregen hack is intended to be used in conjunction with a) deleteallcharacters, if your hood is new enough that you can do this without nuking Sims you actually want, or b) using some other method, and there are many, to kill off or delete some or all of the existing townies in a neighborhood that you want to prune without committing genocide.

It shouldn't, for example, prevent townies from being created when you add a brand new neighborhood to an established game with the hack in place. That would be pretty annoying for people who play Legacy challenges. Not everyone who uses the hack wants to burninate all the townies in all (or even necessarily any) of their neighborhoods. Some just want to keep the game from adding more to replace the ones they've made playable and bloating the neighborhood when there are still plenty of townies left.

[Regina]

Nope.  It won't keep the original set of Townies and such from spawning.  I use it in my game all the time and have made quite a few new neighborhoods that come complete with all their associated default characters.

[Sandilou]

I am going to remove the no spawning hacks to see if it makes a difference to the number of available sims that I can hire for business.  Since i've been using it, the numbers available have dwindiled, as has the range.  It's calling up my playable sims, which is not what I want at all.  I need to play for a bit longer to decide whether the phone hire system functions like the newspaper - always with the same number of sims available for hire, or whether those hacks are reducing my options.  I'm less fussed about my hood blowing up than before, especially now the number of playable character files has been reportedly increased.

[J. M. Pescado]

The reason this happens is because the more playables you have in your neighborhood, by pure probability, the more likely they show up.

One thing I have currently in my game is a hack that excludes anyone already *IN* a career over level 6 from even appearing as a valid hire, so you don't accidentally A: Wreck the job of a playable sim, and B: Clog your hire panel with people who already have jobs.

[simmiecal]

One thing I have currently in my game is a hack that excludes anyone already *IN* a career over level 6 from even appearing as a valid hire, so you don't accidentally A: Wreck the job of a playable sim, and B: Clog your hire panel with people who already have jobs.

Wait a minute! Stop the presses! JM already has and is playing OFB?  I thought you had only procured an objects package?

[Renatus]

I wonder if it's a Yarr version or if his, ah, airdrop came through?

Anyhow, the beans are already spilled! We'll be expecting new shinies ponied up on a regular basis.

[AllenABQ]

I've got a theory... maybe someone can cross-check my thinking.  This assumes using SimPE to help with editing.

You've got neighborhood you're already playing, and you add shopping district (or downtown or university nhood) that adds a bunch of townies you don't want into your game.

Would it be possible to simply delete all the new townie character files before you ever play them?  Since they've interacted with no one from your game, it would seem possible that deleting them would avoid the squiggly line memory problem.  At any rate you could also use the Neighborhood Memory fixer plug-in to go through and remove all instances of unknown after the fact just to be safe.

It seems like a simple way to get around the installation of townies with new sub-nhoods if notownieregen isn't going to help in that case.

[angelyne]

The problem with that method is that it will leave loose ends in other sections of the neighbourdhood files.

[DrBeast]

It's been ages ago since I did this, or so it seems, but here's my experience with notownieregen:
When I first got TSU (a couple of months after its release), I decided to start from scratch. So, I uninstalled the base game, reinstalled, and introduced the Downloads folder (with the Uni-compatible hacks, among which were the various nosoandsoregen). I fired up the game, created a custom neighborhood, and deleteallcharacters. I THEN annexed a University neighborhood (Sim State, if it matters), quit, and started creating sims as YA using Bodyshop. I fired up the game again and plonked one Sim into an empty lot, let the game run a couple of seconds, saved, and quit. When I checked in SimPE, all Uni-related characters were there...but so where the default townies! With a notable difference: they hadn't been "introduced" into the game. Ever noticed that sims that have been created in CAS and left in the sim bin don't have any interest points at all? Well, that was the case with the townies as well! Anyway, I played the game for a while, going on a killing spree eliminating dormies (which were NOT regenerated courtesy of nodormieregen), and checked the townies periodically with SimPE. No change there! So, I went to the core neighborhood and ran a CAS created family of four (two adults, two teens). I ran that game for a couple of hours, saved, quit, checked in SimPE. Townies were still hibernating. Even their memories were blank. So I promptly deleted each and every one of them. No more townies for me! No BFBVFS, and this neighborhood still exists, along with all the sims I created and graduated from Uni. When I installed NL a couple of weeks ago, the game only created a couple of downtownies and downtown NPCs. Yup, the townies are no more!

[angelyne]

That's strange because I did the same thing as you, except I did the deleteallcharacter after annexing Uni, since I wanted to get rid of the dormies as well.  When I checked in SimPE, there was nothing.  Zilcho.  No characters whatesover.  I fired up the game and looked periodically and the only characters there were the ones I created and the NPC's that were slowly being generated at need.

[DrBeast]

I know, it smelled fishy to me too, but since I had no problems (and still don't have any, and it's been what? A year?), I'm OK with it. The scientist in me is screaming in protest as I write these lines, but I tell him to shut up and mind his own business! Maybe that way I can get the damn experiment WORKING and spend more time at home at weekends instead of having to drag my sorry ass to the Uni on a bloody SUNDAY!!!

[AllenABQ]

That's strange because I did the same thing as you, except I did the deleteallcharacter after annexing Uni, since I wanted to get rid of the dormies as well.  When I checked in SimPE, there was nothing.  Zilcho.  No characters whatesover.  I fired up the game and looked periodically and the only characters there were the ones I created and the NPC's that were slowly being generated at need.

Since installing NL, I noticed that nuking all characters worked fine.  But the moment I created one playable character in Uni, it auto-generated a whole new set of professors.  Hmmm...

[akatonbo]

The game probably believes it needs to have the full set of professors, since (much like service NPCs) they do play a specific role, even if some players would like to eliminate it.

[Regina]

Yep, unfortunately the profs aren't generated only on an as-needed basis.  If you use DeleteAllCharacters, then send a sim to Uni, the game will sit there for quite some time while generating all umpteen gazillion of the profs.

In my experience using DeleteAllCharacters (which has been quite a bit), if you start out with a base neighborhood and don't add anything then use it, it will delete all townies and service workers including repo men, social bunnies, social workers, etc.  Then if you attach a Downtown you will still get all the Downtownies generated, or if you attach a Uni you will get all the various characters associated there generated.  If you have all the areas attached then use DAC, you'll have empty main neighborhood, Downtown and Uni neighborhoods.

Unless I am actually having a sim adopt a child, I see no purpose to having social workers and since my sims pay their bills and don't need social bunnies, those character files are a good waste of space, too.  I also use nannies only very rarely, so they're a waste of character files, too.

[Sandilou]

JM, when I deleted the no spawning hacks, the number of sims available for hire increased from 4 to 6.  Is this due to random circumstances or is there a link to the notowniegen and nossspawn hacks?  Are these still critical fixes or have they become optional now that Maxis claim to have increased the number of character files in an effort to address neighbourhood bloatage?

[angelyne]

Since installing NL, I noticed that nuking all characters worked fine.  But the moment I created one playable character in Uni, it auto-generated a whole new set of professors.  Hmmm...

right that happened to me as well.  I didn't think of mentioning it, because at the time I checked, I had not yet sent any sims to Uni.

[Swiftgold]

I haaate townies and have gotten rid of them since the start, though occasionally they keep coming back. The noregen, townie and dormie, is working fine for me so far, though. I used to kill them with the NPC tool, but after NL gave me all the unwanted downtownies, I just deleted them (dormies too) and used the memory manager plugin to erase all bad memories of unknowns. So far no signs of fiery explosion yet, and this is the one and only hood I've played since the game first came out.

I never made a business district with OFB, just made a new neighborhood to steal all the Bluewater businesses and then put them in my main hood. Saves on loading time between house and shop, and I have no new townies, and I put up with the NPCs like the professors and mascots.