considering getting more expansions, seeking advice
jennydeenyc:
Thanks so much for all your input! I'll be picking up Seasons soon, and then will look into FT some more after I get used to it. Don't want to blow my whole new EP wad at once :-)
The hack upgrade thing is the part I'm most dreading, I hope I can track down versions of stuff that work with Seasons but don't also require later expansions to function as well. Oh, and not that it has anything to do with this topic in particular, but has anyone made/seen a hack that lowers the attractiveness of the bubble blower? I only buy them when sims who want them are really in need of an aspiration boost, but I generally end up deleting them a day or so later to keep sims on the lot from obsessing over them. Also, are there any hacks that people find especially useful for Seasons? Thanks!
Liz:
I'm gonna be totally original and say... Seasons. Honestly, if your style of play is more centered around home lots, it'll open up more activities for your sims to try without having to leave. I also love Pets, especially as an EP your homebody sims can get something out of. You'll need to adopt strays or add via CAS if you don't want to fuss with a pet shop (though you'll want to "go out" to buy some collars if you want to retrieve runaways... I've never had a runaway, though). If you want to add dogs & cats (or a werewolf) to your family, you may want Pets, but that's the extent of the EP. (If you decide to get Pets, you might consider adding "boolProp petActionCancel true" and "boolProp ControlPets on" to your userstartup.cheat file.)
With Seasons you have weather, and each season has a corresponding bonus. "Accelerated" romance in the spring and bonus family soc in winter don't really do anything for me, but the "faster friends" bonus in summer is very handy, and the faster skilling in autumn is wonderful. Also, you get the ability to grow crops and fish in ponds, both of which can be very profitable, especially if you have the garden club come over and judge your yard every few days. The juices you can make with your produce are kind of neat (both as an alternative to cooking and for their different effects), and there are some new fish dishes to grill/cook, as well as a couple of new desserts. Building snowmen is fun in winter (if a bitch to quit out of) too, and Plantsims are very low-maintenance. Plus there's the fun of seeing sims getting fried by lightning, which is always a hit, even though it's not deadly enough for me (^_-).
Seasons is not without its drawbacks, however. Managing your sims' body temperature can be a hassle, especially if you go it hackless. Don't go it hackless ;). Sim kids who love to jump on the bed can have their body temp skyrocket quite quickly, which will bring the social worker. The skating rinks are cool, but despite their constant wants to go skating, my sims never manage more than once around the rink before they're bored and on to something else. And without "antiweatherreaction" in your DL folder, every time it rains, every sim on the lot will drop what they're doing to run to the window and gawk.
As far as the SPs go, Celebration does add some cool stuff for your parties. Holiday has neat decorations, plus Santa and holiday cookies/roast to cook. H&M adds some nice clothing (though you can easily to better than with CC); most of its benefit is comm lot store stuff, which probably won't thrill you. I don't have Teen and suspect that I'm not missing much (I'd only get it if there were lots of CC things out that used the meshes). And I've bought but not installed K&B. Bought it because it was cheap, just to have the meshes for future CC, but it sounds like a bug-filled mess. Only just started playing with BV and FT, and now I get to diagnose a wacky new graphics snafu that's crashing my game (and locked my computer a couple of times), but once I get that sorted (please just be my card drivers!), I expect I'll quite enjoy the new home activities.
Enough ramble - hope that helps!
Liz:
Ha, I just missed you, jennydee! Hope the ramble was a little useful anyway - I did mention a couple of hack bits in there. Regarding the hookah, jfade has a Less Bubble Blower Obsession hack on pg. 2 of the Global Hacks at http://www.djssims.com.
notveryawesome:
I've found that pets are great for single sims with low outgoing points. A shy sim shouldn't need to talk on the phone every time its social motive gets low, because a shy sim is, well, shy. Having a pet or, better yet, two (to keep each other company when the human-sim isn't there) really helps with this. Seasons is definitely the best EP, IMO, for the reasons that others have mentioned, but the Pets EP is also good for the homebody sims. There are hacks to fix all the annoyances (TJs' visitor controller is a must), and pet-breeding makes for a very lucrative home-business. Cyd Roseland made a fortune running a puppy-mill. A pet with a few skills (being housebroken, learning not to destroy furniture, etc) can fetch (forgive the pun) over §1000, and it can all be done from home. Also, if you sell the pets to townies, the pets end up as strays, and this is a good way to populate your 'hood with only the strays that you want, as long as you use an empty template for your neighbourhood.
Zazazu:
I also love how my sims with dogs or cats will occasionally come as walk-bys with their pet in tow. I'm eventually planning on starting to breed pets again, this time making matches between animals in the neighborhood by inviting their families over and putting them in a playpen to socialize.
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