I had that problem before, with challenges were the number of families are small and I didn't want to marry outsiders. First generation: 6 girls, one boy. What now? I think it's not so unrealistic, but how are the poor girls even to get a date without squabbles and fits of rage as soon as a previous date of the boy walks by?

On the danger of appearing to have very low morals: I'm thinking of introducing matri-central families, complete with "visiting marriage" - not made up, it's done in some places in Asia, like the Yunnan province. Basically means that marriage partners can change more easily, children belong in their maternal family and who exactly their biological father (or fathers) are isn't of much concern. I think I remember there's a no-jealousy-hack around; that would certainly be helpful.

Hi,

I had the same problem and it reduced drastically once I put in a ceiling and closed all the walls in the hut - yep, due to my building system (I force my Sims to dig up enough bones and stones to build walls from them) they weren't all closed.

I also googled a bit, and apparently in Sims2, rooms directly under a roof, without a ceiling or another floor above them, get very hot. Could be a bug or could be on purpose, I'm not sure.


** Plant Sims **

Ree Conn-Ar has just vaporized one plant too many and is now a (very pretty!) Plant Sim. Dang. Or should I say "good"? I think I read somewhere that in this challenge, Plant Sims are allowed to have one or two babies. But I didn't have the nerve to dig through 90 pages of comments. (I am however toying with the thought of doing that and collecting all the known issues, rule-questions answered and common exceptions / variations to the rules. Because I'm an idiot .)

I interpreted "one small shack" as such a small building that it's just large enough to house two cribs for the babies. My Sims spend the whole day outside -> lots of heatstrokes without the waterfall. I'll be glad when I'm out of the stone age.

The thing is this isn't the first generation and the number of boys has slowly been creeping up for a few generations now leading to a possible problem down the track. Hopefully it doesn't last too much longer. I did something similar in one of my earlier attempts and it was fun I think if I ever restarted again I'd try something different to patriachal societies.

@alchemist There are actually no official rules concerning plantsims, but I think most of us limit plantsim babies to one per plantsim. ^-^

@Phoenixfire88 My prehistoric sims had all their beds plus a bathroom plus fridge, sink and toys inside their hut. Tables, chairs and fire-/cooking places were mostly outside.

@taliahneth I've been catching up with your blog yesterday evening and I have a question: How exactly do you manage the THS/birth system? For example if one of your female sims dies during birth. Killing her is rather easy with the one or other hacked object, but what do you do with the baby? If it's an single birth, you can calculate the different values beforehand and avoid the baby being created, but what about multiples? Can you kill babies with normal hacked objects? Or toddlers?

On another note, my blog is now updated until the end of round 10 (family tree, posts and family funds).

Thank you! Then I'll let her have one plant-baby and afterward probaby change her back to her chlorophyl-free state.

And yet another question: do you use the aspiration rewards? I'm hesitant because I often feel that they make the game too easy, and because the look of the them! The more prehistoric or medieval a hood looks, the worse an eye-sore the thinking helmet is. And I haven't seen recolors anywhere.

@alchemist Just remember that plantbabies grow up way quicker than normal sims (4 days toddler and then adult), so if you want to keep the generations in sync you could wait until other sims of the generation are close to adulthood before you let your sim have the plantbaby.

I don't use the aspiration rewards, but I don't use them in my normal game either because they make things too easy.

I use the aspiration rewards on occasion, mostly smart milk because I very rarely direct my tot sims to skill and do like for them to accumulate more than a skill point or two.

I'm doing things a little differently with plantsims. When a plantsim grows into an elder I set the T&Q odds to 35 single/35 twins/15 triplets/15 quads for the plantsim and have them grow a plantbaby. It's likely that my plantsim numbers will grow very, very slowly (if all the adults survive to elderhood) but it makes it a little random.

I first thought that I might cure Ree (that's the gardener who overdid it with the bug spray) from being a PlantSim, especially when one morning around 5 her sunlight level was near the minimum and I was afraid she might die away from it. But it's not that easy - I can't reach anyone from the gardner club under "call - service", the matchmaker/gypsy doesn't sell the cure, and no witch in sight.

For that matter - I'd love to have a witch Sim, after all, for most of history there were shamans, witch doctors, healer deities and their priests, miracle cures... and there's nothing against it in the rules. Only trouble: I'd have to send a Sim to a community lot to meet someone magically inclined.


By the way, I made the mistake of allowing my Sims to dig for treasure, because I only let them build walls when the have stones and wood (well, bones) to build with. I think I'll have them hand all the maps, golden frogs, vases and treasure chests to the tax collector. That should allow for a community lot soon enough.

How do you handle digging for treasure?

They can't die from lack of sunlight they'll just pass out on the grass until they wake up. I know some people cured a few plantsims by using hacks or calling the garden club so if you wanted to the option is there.

I'm trying to get a collection of all the supernaturals by the end so I'm probably going to make a sim a witch if they make four genie wishes. Easier said than done in my game since from now on they can use a lamp exactly once (well I may keep a few around for emergencies like if someone wipes out the Morans). I think if someone is magically inclined enough to give themselves wealth, a long life, power to cheat death, and peace of mind from four genie lamps their family earns they deserve the occult status. I still have no idea how to work in a vampire (maybe if a witch ressurects a dead sim or something) but plantsims and zombies should be easy enough to keep going. Witches will be hereditary just like my werewolves but maybe just in the same gender as the original sim or something to keep them rarer. Or perhaps rather than rolling and making it automatic their initiation can have a chance of killing young witches/warlocks.

I love the idea of using stones to build with. If you wanted to give them a free lot I'm sure real Neanderthals went for a walk in the woods every now and then. I didn't use digging at all personally but the money may come in later when it comes to building Rome.

So I started this challenge a while ago and today I made it to the Roman Era... Just to realize that I wasn't happy with my Neanderthal Era at all. I feel like I just hurried through it and didn't play it properly, plus I only had 8 families or so when I made it to Roman. I just wasn't happy with it! So, crazy as I am, I started over. This time I'll be active in this thread about it too. I'm not sure if I should make a blog for it as well, anyone has any thoughts? Are you who blog about your challenge feeling like you're enjoying it more?

Well, anyway, I'm gonna post some pics here and tell some of my progress. I haven't even started the first round yet, but the families are made, the huts built and the rules set so here we go!

I named my neighborhood Winter Valley, and I plan to have a little twist in the weather where the seasons go Spring -> Fall -> Winter -> Winter when I finish the Neanderthal Era. First I'll go Summer -> Summer -> Fall -> Spring to make the tropical heat a little "wintery" and after this rotation I'll start an ice age. I also saw some interesting rolls on some page earler where the wolves might attack, the rain made flooding and such and I'll be incorporating this too! With this, InTeen and ACR I'm expecting lots of drama this time

I have to be honest I cure my plant sims. With the female sims constantly being pregnant a lot of the farming falls to the male sims and so far 3 guys morphed into plant sims. I don't want a whole community of them so they all called on the "wise shamaness who lives in the woods" and bought cures from her.
Thinking of building bigger huts once the 2nd generation rolls around, just to keep the sims out of the sun.

Sorry for the double post, but one of my families (the reptilian one) just collectively died. Apparently the game did not recognize the floor tiles I put on their house as a roof -> both parents down with sunstroke . By the time I realized what was going on the father had already died, then the mother had her twins, passed out again and had all four children taken by a social worker. Then she had another breakdown (the first was after her husband died), another heat stroke and then died.

Since losing a whole family on the second rotation would be bad I replaced them with crimson-skinned demon mutants who moved into the jungle with the purple gnomes. To avoid basically cheating I'll also replace the two cheetah families with another crimson skinned one and a pair consisting of a green guy and a pale blue lady (Elf mutants?) only keeping the purple families around.(since I've kinda grown attached to them) In the storyline in my head the Cheetah people will still stick around on their plateau (I'll just won't play them anymore) and will be driven off (moved to the family bin) when the other families enter the Roman stage.
Is that permissible?

@TheFlyingRaccoon - I might not be interpreting the question right (it may have something to do with reading 2500 pages in two days therefore my eyeballs aren't quite as firmly attached to my brain as usual) but here's the answer to what I think you're asking! Babies all get a free shot at life so no worries about how to kill them. The THS for babies is a 1 to 100, they can't die, if they get a 1 and then as a toddler roll a -1, that gives them 0 and therefore the poor tot dies, but if it rolls a +1 making it 2 then happy travels~ As for birthing mothers - their birthing score is rolled AFTER the birth therefore if they end up with their THS in negative numbers they die and leave the baby behind. Clear as mud? Good good.

To be perfectly honest when I first started using the THS for the Warwickshire challenge I was kinda staring at it sort of in awe like "that is SO cool!" and then confusion "ok... how does it actually work..." and then horror "...I am never figuring this out..." and then about a week later I don't even know how I was doing it. So anyone serious in learning more I suggest heading on over to the Warwickshire challenge thread and asking the inventor there~

@abcbok - I'm sorry what? Did you just say you're starting again? Are you crazy?! (don't mind taliah she's lost count of how many times she's played the neanderthal era) ahem... while I've got my serious face on I wasn't happy with how my last hood ended up and I restarted, so all power to ya! I had to think about the blog and I've come to the conclusion that, personally, I find the blog does help, especially in the first few rounds; it helps me get to know my sims, and therefore I care more about them and am less inclined to rush hastily toward Roman Era not knowing a single of the four hundred and sixty seven souls now at mercy of my hand bwahaha... I'm sorry, evil side has been locked up too long, ahem. (467 souls may be an exaggeration... maybe...). But at the same time it delays things a lot, so, it's really a personal thing. Also a blog helps remind me of what's been going on when I get many rounds down the track and have totally forgotten which great-grandparent belongs to who. Changing the seasons is a great idea also; reminding me of the exact reason WHY my sims are not now currently roasting because I didn't give them four summers of hell... (pretty sure the THS is killing them off enough already but we'll see, there may be a climate changing asteroid catastrophe in the near future...)

I dislike plant sims very much

No, actually I find plant sim toddlers too freaking adorable and breed a gazillion of the cute little gremlins... which then grow up what do you do with a gazillion adult plant sims?! XD ie - best to just avoid temptation altogether.

taliah~

@taliahneth That was exactly what I wanted to know, thanks. One last question though: What if you get twins (or triplets) and the mother reaches a health score under 0 after the first (or second) birth? I guess, you simply keep that additional baby then? The Warwickshire is really awe-inspiring. And genius.

@abcbok You could simply try and start a blog. If you don't like it or feel it's slowing you down too much, you can always stop.

Thanks for the replies guys! I just finished the first round, already have lots of things going on I'm gonna try this blogging-thing out just to "bond" more with my characters. Don't wan't to be playing a bunch of strangers haha. I'll post a link as soon as I get it started

To avoid a double post: My blog! Feel free to check it out

lbsgirl talking about supernaturals, made me think about how I'll handle it in my challenge. I would really like to introduce werewolves and witches/wizards during the roman era. But I fear that her idea with the four wishes may take too long? I mean, until now I got 3 lamps in 11 rounds, so the chance that one household gets four lamps is really small. =/ So I might just give the first person to pass the magic lamp after it was brought by the gypsy a 50% chance to discover the world of magic if it is an adult or teen. ^-^ As for werewolves: My problem is that if you're not controling your sims it's close to impossible to get one. So if I get a knowledge sim who's a master of a dog/wolf, I'll probably make him one.

And I resumed and actually finished (I think? at least for the moment) the work on my ROS, which I'll use from the roman era on to make things more interesting.

I updated the blog again today, things are really moving on unexpectedly A lot different from my first neanderthal hood, this time it's truly fun and not just work to hurry to the Roman Era. Going to play the third round now, can't wait :D

Supernaturals are a major part of how I play my game, so I've got about three tons of rules about them. They are actually an essential part of civilisation-building in my world, in that a clan needs to have a plantsim before it can learn agriculture (gardening), a werewolf for fishing/hunting, a vampire for dates, parties and influence, a witch for aspiration/career rewards and an alien for fire (ovens, lamps, fireplaces, etc.)

In addition to the Accidentals (sims who get transformed during gameplay), I have Genetic Occults, who are born that way. I geneticized Astiees's sparkling skins among my normal skin set so I always have a chance of a sim being born with sparkling skin - those are automatically Occults, and must remain so all their lives (no chance to be cured). I either roll to see which type of Occult they will be or pick the same type as that sim's closest Occult ancestor, if there is one.

-Plantsims: Someone who gets turned into a plantsim must spawn a plantbaby immediately, and they are changed back to normal via cheat (Parsimonious potions) right after. The way I see it, the weirdness all gets out with the baby because plantsimism was just the symptoms of Mother Nature having a little gift for that family...
A plantsim is "worth" half a generation, so if a founder (Gen01) has a plantbaby, it will be numbered as Gen00.5, and if it has a plantbaby in its turn that one will be numbered Gen02. That way, it takes two gens of plantsims to catch up with the Normals, so the problem with their aging faster is less pronounced. Sims born plantsims can't be changed back to normal by spawning a plantbaby.

-Vampires: A vampire who reaches permaplat is automatically cured, even if their state is genetic (they're finally at peace with their life and can now go on), which takes care of the immortality problem that might arise otherwise (having a vampire from Gen02 still alive by the end of the challenge would be funny and can still be done, but I'd rather not have all my vampires stick around for that long).

-Witches choose their alignment according to how many Nice points they have, so a grouchy sim will be a bad witch, a nice one will be a good witch and in-between gets neutral witch.

-Zombies are not allowed to interact with the population; no matter the era, they're still dangerous brain-eaters (I have the zombie apocalypse mod from MATY).

-Aliens: Every night, I roll a dice (odds are 1/10 for Prehistory) for all adults, teens and elders on the lot to see if they get abducted by aliens. If they are and are not already pregnant/unable to have children, they get impregnated - if our modern technology isn't enough to dissuade them from messing around, what makes you think they will refrain from it back in a time where nobody could even detect their presence, let alone try to stop them?

-Nothing to say about werewolves yet, sorry

During Prehistory (I'm still in that era because I'm actually at my third attempt right now), my Occults get treated the same as Normals, but afterwards, there will be more or less strict restrictions proper to each era. Imagine Renaissance and the witch hunts, or certain Occults being treated as the avatars of gods during Antiquity, or them being hunted down to be experimented upon in the Victorian era...

Any suggestions?

@TheFlyingRacoon did I misread that or are you not controlling your sims? O.o how are they still living?

@Eldonyx I'm in awe of how well thought out your supernaturals are. Depending on how rare you want them to be you might find you have a ton of supernaturals by the end though.

Ehmm... no, you didn't misread that? I mean, it's not that I never give them commands, but I try to interfere as little as possible. I'm actually mostly observing, giving them just commands for things they can't do autonomously (like repairing stuff or gardening and most of the time baby/toddler care, too, because they are kind of unable to manage that XD), apart from that I sometimes cancel interactions I don't want them to do, so I'm kind of guiding them in the right direction. And sometimes (really rare, I swear) when they're simply too stupid/annoying, I lose patience and give them a nudge in the right direction. But yeah, generally I'm not controlling them.

Wow...I can't imagine just letting my Sims do whatever, I think they'd annoy me too much if I left them to their own devices.

How do you guys handle pets? The domestication of the dog started in prehistoric times, but the rules don't say anything about it..

Am in my second rotation now, lots of children, lots of farming. But man, I'll be glad once the prehistoric era is over... I just finally want to get to antiquity. .

I played my last neighborhood like that, not controlling them at all, but for me it led to generation 3 being smaller than generation 2 because of all the fights the kids had So this time I'm controlling them a little more... Not much though, I still want the sims to decide what's going to happen ^^

I just posted Round 3, in this round I had my first children die because of the rolls I do everytime they have a thunderstorm Two girls, but now the ratio is 7-7 so it doesn't matter too much... Except both of them were pretty and it's kind of rare in my game I don't like to play with nothing but perfect sims, now I get happy everytime someone turns out to be cute

That supernatural thing sounds pretty awesome. I've read through lots of pages here and gotten tons of inspiration. I'm thinking that all families will be normal humans, until someone gets a genie lamp... Then they have a chance of becoming a supernatural or something like this We'll see!

EDIT: I roll everytime a wolf enters the lot to see if an attack occurs. If it doesn't, they are free to befriend and try to adopt the wolf. Having a wolf can protect them from future wolf attacks

So my sims are expecting generation 3 now I've been posting on the blog after each round so if anyone is curious just take a look
I have nearly two weeks off now so I might make it to the Roman Age very soon *nolife*

Wow you go fast im just starting my TOT and plan to blog about it (even though it's my first time) and lbsgirl24 wow ive also never seen a entire family die without elders before either ouch