Comment
Sims Legacy: Generation A
on January 27, 2012 at 4:56 pmPosted In: Speaking Simlish, Start in a Tavern
So, following my disastrous (but informative) first attempt at the Legacy challenge, I created a new Sim to found my Legacy household. Because I used up most of my creative energy coming up with my first Sim, I decided to give my second Sim a silly name. Strike the earth! America Smith moved into her new home!
…Yeah, I went with America. I’m hoping for some sort of Colbert Bump.
Right. America is Capricorn with the Fortune Aspiration, and she wants to reach the height of the Adventurer Career track. I dig it, especially because I found an opening in the Adventurer Career track on the very first day, by happy chance. I made sure to buy her a bed instead of a couch, because a couch isn’t enough.
…And so far, she’s been steadily advancing through the Adventurer Career path. I used her first Aspiration points to buy a couple Simoleon plants to give her income a boost. Since they require harvesting and watering, I considered them a legitimate way to earn money. I’m not about denying game effects, just game exploits.
I’m having a hard time deciding whether to have her marry a male Sim and move him in, or just, *cough* use him. I think it’ll largely depend on whether I can find a way to build a source of income from home, because America would have to stay home with any children to avoid losing them to the Social Worker. America is exploitative.
Building Skills quickly past a certain point is difficult when a Sim doesn’t have a lot of money to throw around. I’ve noticed America is having trouble increasing her Body skill without access to an expensive treadmill. I have her using a barre, now that both jump rope and yoga have proven to take too long.
Oh, and as an additional challenge, I’m playing every Chance Card. Just ’cause.
As for her developing story, well, … America is still kind of new. I mean, it’s interesting advancing her in the Adventurer Career, but the rest of the time, she’s struggling to build up her Skills. Her Cooking is okay, but I haven’t bought a stove or upgraded her mini-fridge to a full-sized fridge yet. I plan to upgrade her bed, next.
You know what I thought of, though? It would be nice if you could just send your Sim off to a store with a bank account and a budget, and expect them to come home with food and new clothing. They could exercise their “fashion sense,” and there could be Chance Cards, as there are with Careers and School.
It got me thinking about how encounters work in Arkham Horror, and if it could be restructured in such a fashion as to have a “home base” that the players can upgrade and train, and venture from when they have a new mission or quest. It’d be an interesting angle, perhaps something akin to Elder Sign.
Sims Legacy: Angelica Houston
on January 27, 2012 at 12:13 pmPosted In: Speaking Simlish, Start in a Tavern
Last night, I started my first focused Sims 2 challenge game. Based on the rules outlined in my last post, I created a Sim named Angelica Houston to begin my dynasty. Her reign was incredibly brief and ended in tragedy, forcing me to restart my legacy challenge after less than an hour. But first, a little about her life.
The name requires a little bit of explanation. I played Creatures for the PC back when it came out, and it pretty much began my obsession with life simulation games. During the years I played Creatures, I picked up a number of habits for organizing multitudes of characters, starting with naming generations alphabetically. Hence, Angelica.
Family names have always been difficult for me in The Sims because I mostly don’t care what my characters are called to begin with — and I care even less about their family names. Give me a personality, some quirk or habit, a skill, a talent, a context, any reason to actually care, and then I’ll bother to remember their names.
So, I have all the expansions for The Sims 2, not including Stuff Packs, and cookiemonger has repeatedly expressed interest in the witches/magic system. The name she came up with for the lot/household in her game, “The Witch House,” is awesome enough that I totally ripped off her idea.
Now, Morticia Addams isn’t a witch (apparently some particularly deluded people think she’s a vampire, but that would discount her awesomeness) but she is awesome, and my favorite portrayal of Morticia is by Anjelica Huston, who also played the Lady of the Lake in The Mists of Avalon miniseries. I pay homage to her awesomeness.
Back to the Sim’s life… I started out by giving her a cozy little shack containing little more than a couch to nap on, a toilet, a public shower, and a mini fridge. I figured a couple days at work would give her the funds she needed to fill out the rest of her shack. A quick note to “minimalist” Sims players: a couch is not enough.
While she was able to secure a job in the Legal career track, Angelica couldn’t maintain a healthy weight or get regular sleep. After less than forty hours of gameplay, she succumbed to a combination of starvation and exhaustion, despite numerous preventative measures. To reiterate: a couch is not enough.
I was forced to destroy most of her belongings to bring the property value back under 20,000 Simoleons for the next Legacy attempt, but I kept her grave marker as a reminder to future generations. She’ll be one of the family’s “weird secrets.”
Speaking Simlish: Legacy Game in The Sims 2
on January 27, 2012 at 9:57 amPosted In: Speaking Simlish, Start in a Tavern
I think I was on TV Tropes the other day when I found a link to rules for a “Legacy Game” Challenge in The Sims. The challenge is for The Sims 3 but I think I can follow the spirit of the rules in The Sims 2 without breaking anything. The rules I found are here. In short: play through ten generations on one giant lot.
(I’m modifying the rules slightly for a unique personal challenge.)
Now, to expand on the basic premise of the rules: you are to begin with one Sim, who can be male or female. Obviously, for this to be a challenge, you have to not cheat. So, no codes, no console, no imported objects that give you a significant numerical advantage, nothing. Since I don’t use much custom content, this isn’t difficult.
You are to buy the largest lot possible, which I believe is 5×5. Your starting Sim shouldn’t have a college education, and should only have the normal starting 20,000 Simoleons. That means they’re going to be living in a shack for a while, until they can build up some capital to expand. That’s almost enough of a challenge in and of itself.
You may not extend your Sim’s life. Period.
While you aren’t allowed to use money cheats, you can certainly marry a Sim and move them in — that might well be necessary for the next stage of the challenge if your starting Sim is male. You must produce an heir for your household — an heir must match your starting Sim’s gender and must also be a direct descendent.
No heir (current or previous) may leave the lot. Ever.
You are encouraged to allow your Sims to live out their entire lives on the lot, and if you produce numerous offspring before you succeed in acquiring an heir, to keep as many of the children on the lot as possible, though you certainly don’t need to marry them and move their spouses onto the lot. Sims who move out are “disinherited.”
You are strongly discouraged from abusing the “move Sims in to get money before killing them off or moving them out,” unless you’re taking it on specifically to make the challenge more difficult, say by infesting your house with malevolent spirits. Make sure you have an area set aside for grave markers. You’ll probably need them.
You’re encouraged to achieve each heir’s Lifetime Aspiration, in turn. This isn’t necessary, but as stated, encouraged. It gives the heir a direction and adds a bit to the difficulty. Your Legacy family may own other lots, but may never leave the primary lot, as stated above. Non-heirs may go to college and manage businesses.
If you need a break from the Legacy family, you’re encouraged to avoid all contact with them and to send them away whenever they wander into another lot. Do not invite any heir to another lot. Ever. This is in violation of the “no heir may leave the lot” rule. Remember, these rules are to enhance your Sims experience.
The Ascalon Horror: Wandering Monsters
on January 26, 2012 at 3:07 pmPosted In: Start in a Tavern, The Ascalon Horror
Progress on the Ascalon location encounters is going fairly well today. My mind has come and gone a little bit between writing sessions, but I’m approaching the point where I should really think about monsters and their stats, and how the characters will be expected to track them to their respective lairs and kill them.
First things first. I really like my pared-down list of monsters for Arkham Horror. I like having the entire Mythos at my fingertips, but I also like to have a reasonable chance of fighting and beating whatever comes flying at my face. Whenever I settle down to write out monster stats, I’m starting with this list as a basis.
Next, there’s a question of what Pre-Searing monsters will actually appear in what amounts to the “basic game” of The Ascalon Horror. Of course, I’ve already narrowed down the list of the basic monster types that will be included as “wandering monsters,” but I’m trying to build up tension before I just tell you what I chose.
Charr won’t appear as wandering monsters in the basic game. They’re going to be saved for a hypothetical “Northlands” expansion. You know, hypothetically in the sense that if I should complete The Ascalon Horror, it’s an expansion I’d like to add if I’m not already sick of the project by then (which I might be, you can never be too sure).
Primary antagonists are Royalists. They’re a stand-in for Cultists and will pretty well match them for power and prevalence. Depending on the current scenario, they’ll have special powers, but otherwise, they’re your basic cannon fodder. They lack a distinct lair, so you’ll have to find them through location encounters. Happy hunting!
Remaining antagonists are divided into two main groups: creatures with bestial intelligence, whose tactics are pretty much “attack, attack, attack,” and those with limited sentience, whose tactics enable a bit more in the way of planning.
Monsters with bestial intelligence include spiders, devourers, elementals, while monsters with limited sentience include grawl, skale, and gargoyles. Undead are a little more difficult to place in one camp or the other, and so are judged on a case-by-case basis. Minions and spontaneous-arising undead typically have bestial intelligence.
Other monsters, such as the plants, worms, and naturally-occurring fauna (such as bears, birds, boars, Melandru’s stalkers, and wolves), will be treated as special-case creatures, particularly because some of them may be caught and trained as Beast Companions by heroes of the Ranger profession.
TAH: Locations and Special Encounters
on January 26, 2012 at 1:19 pmPosted In: Start in a Tavern, The Ascalon Horror
It occurred to me that I didn’t actually explain what “the unexpected mechanic” was in my previous post. The unexpected mechanic was the Skill Point, which you might have realized on you own, but now I’ve told you so you don’t have to wonder. Now you know, and as we all know, knowing is half the battle.
I’m going to talk a little more about locations.
So, Arkham Horror has thirteen locations with special encounters. Both recovery locations (the Asylum and the Hospital), the three shops (Common items, Unique items, and Spells), and everything else (Bank, Police Station, River Docks, Lodge, Admin. and Science Buildings, Ma’s Boarding House, and South Church).
From one perspective, The Ascalon Horror doesn’t need as many special locations as Arkham Horror, because TAH doesn’t have nearly as many pieces that go into the game. It isn’t necessary to redeem monster trophies to gain money or Clue tokens, and Common items, Unique items, and Spells are integrated into character sheets.
From another perspective, Guild Wars takes place before scientific advances that made standardized medical practices possible. The hospital and asylum aren’t concepts that translate well from one game to another. What we get instead, are temples and shrines that are selective toward whom they can (or will) treat.
So, there are five shrines, each one dedicated to one of the five gods, and one temple that’s a little less choosey than the shrines. Mostly, you’re looking at Stamina recovery, unless you belong to one of the spellcasting professions. In addition to those, there are six unstable locations with Special “hunting” encounters. These are the “lairs.”
Beyond those, there are six locations with “miscellaneous” special encounters. There’s the Ascalon Academy, The Guild Registry, the Merchant’s Quarter, Barradin’s Manor, Foible’s Fair, and the South Lake. Similar to the Silver Twilight Lodge, the South Lake opens up The Secret Garden to members of the exclusive Huntsmen affiliation.
The Merchant’s Quarter and Foible’s Fair replace the basic idea of the shops from Arkham Horror. They enable a hero to trade either two wealth treasures or two monster trophies (the two common reward types) for a magic treasure. Mentioned previously, magic treasures will be used to upgrade a hero’s built-in equipment.
At Barrdin’s Manor, you can turn in your monster trophies for wealth. You know, because sometimes you need cash, and you need it fast. Therefore, wealth is technically the most common reward type, but lairs for hunting creatures by type contributes a certain amount to the accessibility of monster trophies.
Finally, the Ascalon Academy takes the place of Ma’s Boarding House, enabling a character to choose a companion for the low, low cost of three trophies (one quest, two monster). The Guild Registry enables a hero to join the Ascalon Army, akin to becoming deputized in Arkham Horror. Almost, but not quite the same.