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Scholar
Original Poster
#1 Old 8th Aug 2014 at 1:36 AM Last edited by d_dgjdhh : 17th Apr 2018 at 1:51 AM.
Hotels & Lodging ISO 18513:2003 (Tips/Rules/Mod Recommendations)
For those who've made hotels or other lodging locations in The Sims 2, I was wondering if there's any standards or set rules you follow in making your hotels (like an industry standard ISO, if you will).

_________________________________________________________________________________________

ISO for "The Sims 2" Lodging Accommodations
Hotels & Lodging ISO 18513:2003 (Tips & Rules) by d_dgjdhh


Here it is in PDF format in a zip archive file.
This is Draft 1.

See Post #23 for the DOC formatted file in rar archive.
_________________________________________________________________________________________


My ISO for Lodging Accommodations
---------------------------------
A. Always have room for at least 8 guests, whether family or visitors.
B. Always include an emergency route in case of elevator breakdowns or other hotel disasters (stairs for more than one floor)
C. Always include public bathrooms for visitors.
D. Always leave at least 1 floor tile of empty space on the left or right of the concierge's desk for one-tile desks (for maids to stand and wait).

As for glitches or happenings that occur in hotels that make me think, why the heck did that happen?
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1. Sims getting stuck between the wall & chair after dining.
2. Chairs becoming unusable after a Sim dines.
3. Having the restaurant waiters travel to a vacation visitor's bathroom to clean the toilet bowl.
4. Elevators breaking and Sims getting stuck on certain floors, unless someone repairs the elevator.
5. Tour Guide not appearing when doing a 2nd vacation trip to the hotel again (or with a different family).
6. Maids not cleaning properly.

How do you try to avoid them from happening?
---------------------------------------------
1. I try to place space between both sides of the chairs in my dining rooms to avoid that from happening. But sometimes space is limited. Are there certain chairs that don't have this problem of Sims getting out from the incorrect side?

2. Haven't found a solution to that. But it appears booth seating is less likely for it to occur. Unless it's just me.

3. Haven't got the solution to that either. I guess making bathrooms excluded from the room (and into a public area) will work? Or having rooms placed closer to the kitchen area will work.

4. I'm using the Bellhop Repair mod from Paladin's website, but sometimes the bellhop won't repair. I had a waiter use the elevator to go up, along with a 2nd Sim who followed him to go up. The elevator plummeted, and the waiter got stuck inside, stomping his foot trying to get out. I needed one of my Sims to fix the elevator himself, but then had to Force Error/Reset the waiter to come out. I create a set emergency stairs in the back of the hotel in case the elevator breaks down.

5. I keep a Sims2Pack version of the completed hotel, and then place the hotel on the lot after using it once. Then deleting and using the Sims2Pack version in the vacation neighborhood again. Bit of a tedious process, perhaps.

6. Again with Paladin's mod, Improved Housekeeping. But sometimes they become frozen, by standing somewhere not moving, unless I Force Error/Reset the maid. Are there other mods to recommend as a compliment or replacement?
Attached files:
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Top Secret Researcher
#2 Old 9th Aug 2014 at 2:47 AM
2. Even Pescado said this - just force and error on the chair and reset it. Boom, the inconsiderate ghost that occupies the chair is now off of it.
3. I have that happen a lot of times! I guess the housekeeper should just thank the waiter instead of just complaining that she can't get out of the bathroom. It also works if I have hotel patrons that are socializing in the lobby at 3am and just conveniently got the toilet dirty. Since the housekeeper is off-duty, the waiter-that-never-sleeps can clean the toilet instead of everyone waiting until morning for it to be cleaned.
4. I have BO's Unbreakable Elevators mod, just so my apartment-dwellers can live without fear. Though yes, I make it a personal rule that all buildings with elevators MUST have stairs, just like in real life. What if there's a fire? Well, that doesn't matter in The Sims, I've had the firefighter try to use the elevator in a fire before. Seriously. Oh well, the stairs are there for active Sims to run down and playful Sims to slide down. I used to have the Bellhop Repair mod, but removed it for housekeeping purposes, since I decided I didn't really need it, and I could just use a teleporter cat to force a Servo or NPC repairman over to fix the sink the waiter keeps breaking, because they never stop washing their hands, as if they're afraid of germs or something.
6. I have that mod, and I've never had an issue with the housekeeper being frozen. Nevertheless, it is the best mod out there to get the housekeeper to keep the house (clean). Without the mod the housekeeper did absolutely nothing except disappear into someone else's suite and never emerge from it again, presumably to have WooHoo with the guests inside. Nice life, but my Sims's rooms are just unacceptably unclean.
Mad Poster
#3 Old 9th Aug 2014 at 4:15 AM
Without the mod, the housekeeper just stands by the front desk all day in my game, but with the mod the housekeeper kept getting in my Sim's way. A lot of the time when my Sims needed to use the bathroom, the housekeeper was cleaning the shower, cleaning the toilet, or washing dishes in the bathroom from the room service meal. I took the mod out, because I was tired of the housekeeper getting in the way.
Top Secret Researcher
#4 Old 29th Apr 2015 at 7:32 AM
6. I've found that Improved Housekeeping doesn't work right because of Pescado's vacationfixes.
Having built several custom vacation destinations, I've had a lot of testing to do with various hacks/mods in and out, and for me, Improved Housekeeping works great... unless I also have vacationfixes in the Downloads.
Meaning I'm stuck with a frozen maid in tropical destinations, because I need Pescado's mod to prevent the beach towels from accumulating
Needs Coffee
retired moderator
#5 Old 29th Apr 2015 at 7:57 AM
While I try to build any building with good flow through some of those things can not be prevented by building style and players need to know how to enabling build and buy and use move objects to grab stuck sims.

I have only uploaded one resort/hotel. https://www.modthesims.info/d/479586

That had room for 4-10. Depends if the sim is alone or a couple. One room was for families taking 2 adults and 2 children. I would make rooms to suit the hotel, not try and fit in 8 if it called for more or less.
I used stairs.
Public bathroom on the first floor (that means ground floor)
Space left and right at the check in desk.

Looking at it, I hope nobody got a sim stuck in the dining room as there is one table where perhaps that could happen. :/

One hotel I downloaded did not have a public phone. I enabled build and buy and placed one but someone else might have been in trouble.

"I dream of a better tomorrow, where chickens can cross the road and not be questioned about their motives." - Unknown
~Call me Jo~
Mad Poster
#6 Old 29th Apr 2015 at 9:29 AM
All I used to do before having mods was not to allow anyone else into my Sims' rooms. They had to clean up themselves but no maids got stuck again.
Once, a Sim got stuck in his bed - he had to go home too! I saved, and he was actually home with his family - after that, simply no maids. Never had one stuck anywhere else but in their rooms.
But if they should get stuck, now at least I know what to do.
Mad Poster
#7 Old 30th Mar 2016 at 3:04 PM Last edited by gazania : 30th Mar 2016 at 11:22 PM.
Just thought I'd attach this post to d_dgjdhh's and joandsarah77's very detailed descriptions in previous posts. Sorry about the necromancy, but d_dgjdhh was actually the first one who brought up the housekeeper problem, and I think it useful to other hotel builders to know a few tips when building one.

http://www.modthesims.info/showthre...074#post4996074

I should also add, my hypothesis about the door not being directly against an adjoining wall is not always a given. I have a hotel room in one of my lots with a door directly near an adjoining wall and the housekeeper works just fine. However, this room does not have another room directly near that door. The room juts out a little from the next. And I do have those toilet paper holders in one motel and the housekeeper works OK. I will leave those suggestions in, however, because they have caused me trouble in other hotels and fixing them might help.

One thing I am noticing is that there are certain vulnerable areas where the housekeeper seems particularly inclined to freeze:

1. Near plants, as joandsarah77 mentioned. Even if you have Perfect Plants, you can still have a problem if you have a CC mod involving any autonomy with plant-gathering, such as Echo's and some of Sunni's crops. The housekeeper seems compelled to gather crops at the same time as a Sim, and there you go. Petrified housekeeper. Some CC plants, though, seem to work fairly well, such as Sunni's grapes and mushrooms.
2. In the kitchen. If you see a housekeeper freeze there, try re-arranging the garbage disposal, sink and/or dishwashers. Sometimes, you can get that NPC working correctly. (Not always, but sometimes. Apparently, other factors come into play, such as adequate room in the kitchen and others I simply don't know about yet.) Also, watch out if the sink breaks. The housekeeper can freeze if an NPC tries repairing it at the same time the housekeeper is compelled to use it. Really, really annoying. Right now, I'm trying to find a recently-updated mod that will reduce sink breakage.
3. In the bathroom. If a bunch of Sims want to use the public bathroom at the same time and go in there at the same time as the housekeeper, thus trapping the housekeeper in there, the NPC could freeze. I find maxing bladder motives from time to time via the Blender helpful, but I don't always remember to do that!

Making a hotel could be so much more fun if it wasn't for that blinkin' housekeeper! What can be especially aggravating is that the NPC can work just fine for two days and freeze on the third if something unexpected comes up, so even if you think you've solved the problem, you might not have. Apparently, I was a little too optimistic in my previous post about this. My success rate has shot up a lot more since reading helpful posts such as the ones here and through my own bumbling mistakes, but it's still not 100%, particularly if the stupid sink breaks!

@Lili975. What a great choice. Use Pescado's mod (which I also have and might not be helping any here) and encounter more maid problems or not use it and have a dirty hotel and a statue (which you might end up with anyway if you do use the mod).

I am really, really glad I'm not the only one with stuck housekeeper problems, by the way! Probably only a small amount of us are determined enough to make hotels that don't have housekeeper statues.

Thanks to ALL free-site creators, admins and mods.

RIP Sunni ... truly a ray of light.
Mad Poster
#8 Old 30th Mar 2016 at 8:42 PM
Statue is fine by me
The Sims, these days all having mechanical points due to military training, WILL go and fix those broken sinks. Or book out and go camping- depending on my mood.
Mad Poster
#9 Old 30th Mar 2016 at 9:01 PM Last edited by gazania : 30th Mar 2016 at 9:14 PM.
It has almost come to the point that if the pest does freeze, I hope it at least isn't in the way. I switch to dorm tools, use move_objects, move it to a remote area, and exclaim, "FINE. You stay there until my Sims are good and ready to leave."

So far, fingers crossed, though, once I re-arranged the sink, dishwasher and garbage disposal in the hotel that gave me trouble ... No. I dare not write it.

Sims Wardrobe has a freezing gun that a Sim can use on another. I would love to see an anti-freezing gun. Sims point it at the housekeeper, and bam. The housekeeper is up and about again, maybe with a temporary blue nose or something. Wishful thinking on my part.

By the way, I' m taking it that forcing errors on the housekeeper during gameplay using the boolprop cheat is perfectly fine? Too bad you can't find out what you need to do to prevent the error next time.

This is a stupid question, but do all housekeepers have the same traits? I don't know if it's safe to select housekeepers to check them. I think it might be. I am not sure. (It's the concierge whom you shouldn't mess with.) I'm wondering if certain ones are more prone to freezing than others. Sim PE might be of help here.

Thanks to ALL free-site creators, admins and mods.

RIP Sunni ... truly a ray of light.
Needs Coffee
retired moderator
#10 Old 30th Mar 2016 at 10:50 PM
Did we say deleting housekeepers with the hand tool, saving and reloading the lot fixed them?

I would say most players don't even notice a frozen housekeeper they are too busy watching their own sims. One thing I didn't test, does having your sims leave the lot and arrive back do anything to her/him?

I will be uploading the hotel from the Monopoly contest but my mind immediately goes to my plants, some of which are of course not accessible. Not that there is a huge amount like my Wet N Wild resort, just the front garden beds and the fountain out the back. All plants on window ledges are pot plants.

"I dream of a better tomorrow, where chickens can cross the road and not be questioned about their motives." - Unknown
~Call me Jo~
Mad Poster
#11 Old 30th Mar 2016 at 11:16 PM Last edited by gazania : 30th Mar 2016 at 11:34 PM.
If your Sims leave and come back, the housekeeper still remains frozen. I did try that before rearranging the kitchen.

I agree with other players and their not paying much attention to the housekeeper. Sometimes, the housekeeper can really throw you for a loop. The NPC will move its head and follow Sims, just like normal. It just won't move from the spot for ... oh ... six hours or so! I've seen two states of frozen:

1. It doesn't move at all. Just stands there and looks straight ahead (a sign to me there's a REALLY nice obstacle on your lot), or
2. It will move its head, but that's about it. (Often, the problem is a little more fixable, at least from what I've seen. Just a little more fixable. Not significantly more.)

One thing to notice is if the housekeeper also does certain hand gestures and movements while it's standing there. If all it's doing is moving its head, it's frozen. If it's moving its arms, it is not.

Thanks to ALL free-site creators, admins and mods.

RIP Sunni ... truly a ray of light.
Link Ninja
#12 Old 31st Mar 2016 at 12:07 AM
Quote: Originally posted by gazania
If your Sims leave and come back, the housekeeper still remains frozen. I did try that before rearranging the kitchen.

I agree with other players and their not paying much attention to the housekeeper. Sometimes, the housekeeper can really throw you for a loop. The NPC will move its head and follow Sims, just like normal. It just won't move from the spot for ... oh ... six hours or so! I've seen two states of frozen:

1. It doesn't move at all. Just stands there and looks straight ahead (a sign to me there's a REALLY nice obstacle on your lot), or
2. It will move its head, but that's about it. (Often, the problem is a little more fixable, at least from what I've seen. Just a little more fixable. Not significantly more.)

One thing to notice is if the housekeeper also does certain hand gestures and movements while it's standing there. If all it's doing is moving its head, it's frozen. If it's moving its arms, it is not.


I just noticed a frozen housekeeper on one of the pre-made hotel lots in Takemizu. They were frozen at the bottom of one of the stairs at the Jaid Villas. I have the mod from Sim Wardrobe that makes them better. Not sure why they were frozen but knew they weren't at some point during the vacation because they came to take away plates. After I noticed, they didn't move the rest of the vacation - again, nothing was in their path so I have no idea why they were frozen in place. I even turned object moving on and moved them and they still were frozen.

Uh oh! My social bar is low - that's why I posted today.

Needs Coffee
retired moderator
#13 Old 31st Mar 2016 at 12:26 AM
I'm not even sure why they freeze. We say they freeze due to routing problems, which are a problem for no other sim besides themselves, but other times they will navigate places that look like they will give trouble.At my resort she got into her swimsuit and went around my pool slide just to get to some plants. That would take a fair bit of routing yet she manages that successfully. Then she walks out the front steps and freezes there at the hedge. We think that is the one tile door which as we know sims can use and she does sometimes and other times apparently not. I don't think we should make over hotels just to suit housekeeping, all they do is clean and garden, your sim isn't relying on her for food. So I will not be adding another door into my hotel just for her. Let her freeze, let people delete with the hand tool, force error or ignore her. She or occasionally he (mine always seem to be female sims) is not going to be the be all and end all of my building choices. Obviously they are very badly coded and perhaps someone else needs to look at making a fix. >cough< @BoilingOil >cough<.

"I dream of a better tomorrow, where chickens can cross the road and not be questioned about their motives." - Unknown
~Call me Jo~
Mad Poster
#14 Old 31st Mar 2016 at 1:58 AM Last edited by gazania : 31st Mar 2016 at 2:39 AM.
I found one in Three Lakes as well. He kept freezing in the bathroom. This was in the cabin group that had the single entrance in and out of the lobby. (Three Lakes Cabins). This even happened in an almost-vanilla test game. (Just the Sim Wardrobe fix, I believe. I am not sure if Pescado's fix was in there, too, but there were no other CC items of any other sort in there, so it was obviously not due to any of my CC outside of those one or two mods.) Without the fix(es), he froze much sooner. Totally useless, as opposed to mostly useless.

So even MAXIS hotels can have freezing problems. Kind of makes me feel a little better.

I will make and re-make over my hotels and try to reduce the chances of freezing as much as possible, sometimes over the course of several days. With the exception of the one failed hotel that did not work no matter what I tried, I can usually reduce the chances to a one-digit percentage, unless something unusual happens. But perhaps there is always that 2% or so chance that no matter what you do, something outside of your control might still occasionally freeze the housekeeper. All you can do is to allow lots of routing and do what we know will lower the possibility.

Thanks to ALL free-site creators, admins and mods.

RIP Sunni ... truly a ray of light.
Scholar
Original Poster
#15 Old 31st Mar 2016 at 6:11 AM
I've been re-writing & adding some of the findings from those pages to try and make a new ISO document. It's not complete, and probably has some stuff that can be refuted based on others' experience.

_________________________________________________________________________________________

ISO for "The Sims 2" Lodging Accommodations
Hotels & Lodging ISO 18513:2003 (Tips & Rules) by d_dgjdhh


Here it is in PDF format in a zip archive file.
This is Draft 1.
_________________________________________________________________________________________

It'll definitely need reviewing and changing as more information comes to light.

Check out my latest version of Superman's Classic Uniform for The Sims 2.
See what images I have posted on DeviantArt as well related to The Sims 2 and designs.
Also check out My Website to see my superhero uniform creations for The Sims 2. THANKS!!!
Mad Poster
#16 Old 31st Mar 2016 at 8:05 AM Last edited by gazania : 5th May 2018 at 6:06 PM.
Very informative, d_dgjdhh. I might have to concur with your finding about the dining room chairs, but in another way. I'm finding that in a hotel (surprisingly, I'm not finding this in a community lot restaurant), the waiter seems to not be able to deliver meals to my Sims with the tables against the walls. Fortunately, no one freezes or stomps, but it just seems my Sims who are unfortunate enough to get the seats near the wall are awfully hungry. I'll try moving the chairs and tables one tile over to see what happens. Thank you for the tip.

I did not have as much luck with a buffet. My housekeeper froze when she had to deal with all the dishes! It might have worked, though, if the buffet was after-hours and more guests cleaned up. And I admit the only time I tried it was in the failed hotel, which had other problems. I've had a couple of hotels that work fine without any resaurant at all. Wide access to food is not a necessary part of a hotel, I found, though it does help entice Sims. And enticements, in moderation, are good. The buffet table worked great in later builds. I'm concluding the problem was lot-specific, and had nothing to do with the table.

I DO find that the game is not happy if you don't have things in it to keep your Sims busy. I started getting the shuttle message when, in desperation, I stripped my failed hotel of just about all enticements. A hotel needs something to attract Sims. I kept getting the shuttle notice if i didn't have anything. The vending machines work great in a pinch! Hot tubs and games are useful, too. They are also a good way to see if you are a candidate for the shuttle notice or Freezy. If other Sims start fiddling around with the enticements, it's a good sign. If not, that may indicate a problem. Sims may delay moving into rooms. That is fine. What is not is if they don't check into any rooms at all. That's a really bad sign.

ABSOLUTELY you should save and package the lot as a community lot before converting it! It might still be a good lot .... just not a hotel. Why waste all that effort if the hotel fails? This can't be stressed enough ... save and package as a community lot BEFORE you make it a hotel. One reason I think my beach hotel crashed, besides a possible slope problem that necessitated my moving it a few tiles over, was that to my surprise, although I never save a hotel as a residential lot (ever), the game thought it was a residence, even though it had the community lot phone and trash can on it. No wonder the game got frustrated. I'm wondering if it's because I accidentally saved it as a hotel before packaging it, or moved the hotel to the bin. I did not play the hotel before packaging it, so it was not related to Sim references, fortunately. Also luckily, I had an earlier prototype that I saved as a community lot, so I fixed and used that one. You can always get rid of unwanted packages later.

The staircases in my hotel work pretty well (So far ... I'm still knocking wood), BUT ... there needs to be two together with at least two tiles around them. My failed hotel had one staircase, It was Inge's landing staircase which is based on a Maxis staircase, and I wound up with one tile on one side and two tiles on the other. No matter what I did, the housekeeper froze, even if I used the Targas Ascension circles (I WAS getting a little desperate!) Be aware, though, that a double staircase with all that room around it can make the inside of your hotel look a little barn-like.

I also find you do not need Maxis double doors on a hotel. None of my hotels that seem to work OK at least 95% of the time have them. (I don't know if any of us can guarantee their hotel will work 100% of the time, so I won't ever write 100%). BUT I find that at least two double door sets were essential for me. Anytime I used single doors, even two of them, they caused freezing for me. Maxis' Three Lakes Cabins also seems to be having this problem. The Jade Villas, the lot with another frozen housekeeper according to Charity, also have single doors, though they are pretty close together.

I'm going to do something that gives me pause, but beneath the spoilers are pictures of my FAILED hotel. This was supposed to be a saltbox that was converted into a bed and breakfast. I was so proud that the final effort came out looking very much like the real building on which this house was based. I thought it cute. I thought it fit perfectly into the theme of my vacation hood.

Problem was, it utterly flopped as a hotel, and nothing I did ... nothing ... could save it. Even bulldozing and rebuilding it a number of times, or using a fresh lot, did not work.



EDIT ... Gotta love Photobucket. Sorry, MTS ... I used your service to avoid disappearing pictures. But I thought it might be useful to show what you SHOULDN'T do in a hotel/motel as well as the basics of what you should.

Thanks to ALL free-site creators, admins and mods.

RIP Sunni ... truly a ray of light.
Mad Poster
#17 Old 1st Apr 2016 at 11:04 AM Last edited by gazania : 3rd May 2018 at 6:53 PM.
Yeah. Double-post. But that previous one was getting longer and longer. Editing has its limits!

I see what d_dgjdhh means by having to replenish your hotel. Freezy the Housekeeper did her thing in a hotel I've tested at least a dozen times or more in three different hoods with no problem whatsoever. This is why I don't think ANY of us can claim our hotels are 100% effective. I tested the crap out of this thing!

I noticed a small problem already brought up by ... someone here. Not me. I thought the magnolia trees didn't shed leaves, and proceeded to line my hotel with a bunch of them. When Fall came around, Freezy did her freezy thing. There were just too many leaves. When my Sims raked them, she moved, but slowly and jerkily. So yes ... landscaping IS a big factor in hotels.

OK. Got rid of all magnolias and stuck in plastic plants. Noticed other potential plant problems, fixed those. Noticed a kitchen glitch ... fixed that. Moved tables around to accommodate the change.

So Freezy should no longer freeze, right?

Right. Yes, right. She didn't freeze. She was a cleanin' demon. No, really. She was.

But there was another problem ... one a little more severe. My GUESTS are now missing. Freezy is super-effective ... in an empty hotel!

When my Sim was seated for dinner, the Batbox indicated a stuck diner. I indicated to fix that. Only it didn't, and my Sim stayed stuck. Move_objects didn't affect him. So now HE'S Freezy? The housekeeper, on the other hand, is so super-efficient it's mind-boggling. I had to quit out of the hotel without saving because of the frozen Sim, which I do not like to do because it can cause problems.

Maybe d_dgjdhh IS right. I don't know if you have to replenish the hotel every time, but it seems like you might have to consider doing it at some intervals, for instance. Kind of clean everything out from time to time. Too bad there isn't a CC renovation sign somewhere.

Also, you CAN go back to the hotel to make structural changes using the dormtools cheat. I do it frequently, and don't have problems if it's a minor problem. However, I find that one needs to be careful about overdoing it, and remember to change it back. I'm finding that it's usually just better to get rid of the old lot and use your packaged lot again if we're talking about extensive renovation. Might be just me, though.

EDIT ... Before I bulldoze the lot, I want to see if I can bring the guests back. I'm trying a few things first, and have already backed up the hood with the guest-less hotel

SPOILER .... BOY, are my posts getting verbose. I'm getting a whole herd of teal deers at this point! Further attempts under the tag if anyone actually cares two whits what I'm doing. If not, please don't look. Get a good dose of caffeine if you go forward. LOTS of words. (Oh, and a quick note. The green-tea maker CC item ... http://modthesims.info/d/286359 ... MIGHT cause a jump bug on a hotel lot. That is what I'm seeing on mine, anyway. So unfortunately, my Sims are going to have to get complimentary coffee only and LIKE it, darn it! It seems to work fine everywhere else, though. I haven't had this problem recently. Don't know what to tell you there.


Thanks to ALL free-site creators, admins and mods.

RIP Sunni ... truly a ray of light.
Mad Poster
#18 Old 14th Apr 2018 at 7:03 AM Last edited by gazania : 5th May 2018 at 6:15 PM. Reason: Thank you, maxon!
Since these apply to the hotel-building guide, I necro'd this thread. This is new information that might help those making hotels, but really should be placed in the same thread as the guide.

Some more things I found out via the "Wanderlust" contest. And yup ... most include my nemesis and most disliked Maxis character:

1. Sinking a foundation using Grid Adjuster may affect the housekeeper's routing and cause freezing. Before I sunk the foundations to a two-step level in a hotel lot, the housekeeper worked great. Once I sunk them, however, the housekeeper kept freezing. Initially, I thought it was because two foundations were fairly close together (though why sinking would change everything, I don't know), so I moved entrances far away from each other. But the freezing continued; only this time, with another unit that was working fine before.

Recommendation: Avoid sinking foundations using Grid Adjuster when making a hotel. The hotel may look pretty, but Freezy may not approve.

2. The housekeeper seems to have a huge issue with Inge's Shiny Tyme NPC Everywhere patch: http://www.simlogical.com/sl/Sims2P...ims2_Eating.htm . I am guessing that the freeze happens when clearing or washing dishes, since that's when I noticed the freezing. The addition of an extra sink or dishwasher does not help the situation.

Strangely, though, of the three hotels where I tried the Uni Cook mod, one has worked great for two years. I'll take a look to see what I did right there, but honestly ... I haven't the foggiest.

Recommendation: Avoid using the Shiny Tyme stove if you have this patch. The buffet table, by the way, works fine, as mentioned in the tutorial. The housekeeper will even clear away the stinky dishes.

3. If you have two garbage disposal units, or a trash bin and a garbage disposal unit on the same floor of a small building, this might confuse the housekeeper. Mine kept going back and forth between the two trash units several times before taking the garbage out.

Recommendation: One trash unit per floor.

4. If you have a fence around your hotel, make sure that the tour guide isn't blocking your housekeeper's route. If he is, the housekeeper can freeze.

Recommendation: Move the fence farther away from the tour guide if you notice he's pretty close to the fence. Watch out for blocked fence gates.

5. Placing something on a table in a room can confuse the bellhop/concierge, and he might not be able to put food on a table. Keep tables clear. This means curtains or decor put on walls with move_objects. A curtain overlapping on a table can cause problems.

Recommendation: Watch what is on those tables!

Thanks to ALL free-site creators, admins and mods.

RIP Sunni ... truly a ray of light.
Mad Poster
#19 Old 15th Apr 2018 at 10:53 AM
Be careful of placing the hotel door on a diagonal wall. The room service is simply put down on the floor outside and the locals steal the plates of food
The Great AntiJen
retired moderator
#20 Old 15th Apr 2018 at 12:25 PM
When you sank your foundation gazania was it with the constrainfloorelevation cheat or the Grid Adjuster? I ask because Moo did something quite extreme with the Grid Adjuster and it needs to be used quite precisely.

I no longer come over to MTS very often but if you would like to ask me a question then you can find me on tumblr or my own site tflc. TFLC has an archive of all my CC downloads.
I'm here on tumblr and my site, tflc
Mad Poster
#21 Old 16th Apr 2018 at 12:08 AM
Grid Adjuster. Maybe that was the difference.

I never had a problem with sunken foundations before (well, barring boneheaded moves on my part!), but then again, I never did a hotel with them, and to be honest, I've seen pitifully few hotels that have sunken foundations ... if any. And that might just be a reason!

I've edited the text to add the bit about Grid Adjuster. Thank you!

Thanks to ALL free-site creators, admins and mods.

RIP Sunni ... truly a ray of light.
The Great AntiJen
retired moderator
#22 Old 16th Apr 2018 at 1:03 AM
Oh I go bonkers with it too - not really had problems with it but then I'm not building a lot of hotels either.

I no longer come over to MTS very often but if you would like to ask me a question then you can find me on tumblr or my own site tflc. TFLC has an archive of all my CC downloads.
I'm here on tumblr and my site, tflc
Scholar
Original Poster
#23 Old 17th Apr 2018 at 1:48 AM
Since I haven't been editing the guide, I figured I'd upload the files here for anyone to take and edit for release of new information. It's a Word Document.

I also copy/pasted information into the SimsWiki here. So maybe it will transition to that article with someone who can format it nicely:

http://simswiki.info/wiki.php?title..._ISO_18513:2003

Thanks for your research, gazania. These tips will certainly help those don't want the maid freezing all the time.
Attached files:
File Type: rar  ISO for Lodging Accommodations (2018-04-16-2047).rar (23.6 KB, 8 downloads) - View custom content

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Mad Poster
#24 Old 2nd May 2018 at 4:41 AM Last edited by gazania : 5th May 2018 at 6:19 PM.
Because I'm curious that way, I've been playing with a hotel in a Uni hood. Uni can be odd. If you build a dorm in a main hood, then move it to a Uni hood, you have to do some fiddling to get the "go to class" and final exam messages in the dorm. It's possible, but you have to move the students out then in ... twice. At least that's what worked for me! If you build a Uni student house, then move in a pregnant Sim in a copy of the house in the main hood, it can affect the pregnancy. My Sim's pregnancy could not progress until I moved her into another lot.

So would a hotel built in a main hood work on a Uni campus? And why on earth would you want one? And would they work? Here are some posts in another thread about that:

http://www.modthesims.info/showthre...528#post5382528 (I really do need to fix that picture. I was trying to show that vacation Sims move into the other rooms, but it really isn't very clear.)

http://www.modthesims.info/showthre...556#post5382556 , Chris Hatch gave it a try and didn't find anything alarming.

http://www.modthesims.info/showthre...580#post5382580 More of my fiddling with the Uni hotel.

In other messing around, my Uni hotel has continued to work pretty well as a hotel. Freezy and the bellhop work great. (I have no restaurant in this motel, so that isn't an issue. It's a cheap motel!) My next hotel (I seem to love punishment) will be a bed and breakfast, with a large common room containing a banquet. Honestly, folks, if you don't want hassles with an on-premises restaurant, a banquet table or food stand is a good idea. d_dgjdhh was so right about the banquet table! Yes, without a mod, your Sim will have to cough up cash. (Inge's mod is a global one.) But the housekeeper is happy! Reimburse that Sim later!

Since I have the motel that has seen better days in the grungier area of my Uni hood, it makes sense to make one for the fancier area. I will make it on a main lot, and package as a community lot before changing it to a hotel. Just two to four rooms, I prefer smaller hotels because Freezy is annoying enough to track on THOSE, and darn it, I want my motels to be Freezy-resistant!

Anyway, there are some differences with Uni hood, and one I found with a main hood:

1. ControlPets kind of works in a main-hood motel, but not nearly as well as on a regular vacation lot. The "pet" Sim sometimes completely ignores the command ... at least in my case.

2, ControlPets doesn't work at all in a Uni hood hotel. So if your student decides to invite a professor over, you might find the professor is more interested in Myshuno than the student!

The problem with the above two is perhaps that pets can be a problem on a community lot unless you have the mod that allows them to do so. Perhaps that extends to motels. And as far as I know (and at least without a mod), college students cannot have cats or dogs on campus.

3. Like Chris, I decided to invite someone from the main hood to the Uni hood. The premise isn't so soap-opera-like. The student's sister wanted to stay overnight and visit the campus on both days before attending that college. Pretty real-life.

I found ControlPets didn't work because of the younger sister. You can use room-service food to at least get the Sim to not starve to death, but if you take out another room, the main hood Sim will not sleep in it on its own. I have the sleep on community lots mod ... I guess that doesn't apply to motels. She might have used the main Sim's shower ... I don't recall, but I think she did. I did not use any select Sim mod, such as Inge's cat. That might work, but I'm already feeling a little risky with the Uni hotel at this point, since I cannot find anyone else who has done this and written about this at any length. Of course, if need be, you can use Sim Blender to up motives.

And while you can sometimes make a Sim stay in the bed by woo-hooing with the Sim, the two sisters ... well, that was too out there for me. Nope. Not interested. They're not related by blood, but just ... no. I'm not writing a yuri/ecchi manga here.

So the Uni motel does have a couple more limitations than a main-hood motel, unless a mod or modded item would fix the problem.

But on a good note, the main-hood Sim does not age, The Uni motel seems to follow community-lot time with main hood Sims on the campus, and that's very good! So my results are similar to Chris' in that regard.

One thing that is a little weird, but fun ... the drama professor even goes to the motel! And you will see a mix of Uni and vacation Sims there.

We need much more verification to make sure doing this is safe. But Chris didn't find anything initially, I haven't, HoodChecker hasn't, and SimPE found nothing odd re memories. I didn't see any weird memories in the Sim's memory panel in the game; nor did I see anything else amiss with the visiting sister or the elder sister in college. So far, so good ... I think. I still will not attest that this is 100% safe until more time has passed.

Thanks to ALL free-site creators, admins and mods.

RIP Sunni ... truly a ray of light.
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