Is there any way to make a spawner spawn a certain insect/mammal/bird/fish? I want to fill my custom cemetery with crows.

Now that our pets can hunt, can they also eat the stuff they catch? my cat has currently only catched one empty bag of chips, but I really hope if he ever catches a mouse, we could eat it.

---edit--- to add question 2

The cat wants to sniff the certain Sim. I've had the Sim let the cat sniff her hand but the want doesn't got away. Is there something else I need to sniff for it to work?

Pets, or dogs at least, can eat the empty crisp packets if you drag them onto the ground. Dunno about minor animals though.

My pets tend to only get the want to sniff a Sim after I've already told them to sniff a Sim, so I usually have to get them to do it twice for the want to fulfill.

Your cat can eat minor animals too, but you have to drag them to the ground first. I'm not sure if dogs can, since they can't hunt for them.

For the sniff want, you have to use the "Sniff" interaction from the pet to the Sim for it to fulfill. It's under the friendly menu.

So.. my game has been laggy. I think it's because a) I'm onto generation 5 and the game is tired of all the memory it has to store and b) I'm 4 EPs in. Can I somehow pick and choose what households I move into a new save game? I want to take just the current generation(s) I have (grandparents, heir, spares, children) and move them to a new town fresh from all the past generations/crap from the current save game.

Will it preserve the relationships of the people I take? So the family members will remain family?

Don't think so... some spawners are item-specific, but if there isn't one for crows you're out of luck.

There are some ambient birds that are produced as a special effect from the "fog emitter" object that came with Ambitions... not sure if any of those are crows (and they wouldn't be catchable, of course).



If you want to move multiple households and have them preserve their relationships, you can use Twallan's Porter mod. http://www.the-isz.com/nraas/index....ed-2011-nov-09/

If they're all in one household, they'll preserve their relationships anyway, so you can just move em via the bin.

Thanks Menaceman44 and KaiRuh for the answer.
But what do dogs hunt then? I thought it was minor pets.

Is it possible to have a pets only household? I have one elder couple with an elder cat, and if the Sims die before the cat will social services take him?
Just want to know should I start feeding lifeplant for my Sims until the pet dies first.

Dogs hunt treasure.

You can't have a pets-only household without mods. You can make one in CAH, but you have to merge it with humans to play it.

I'm trying to comprehend the CC installation process while reading Wiki:

It's necessary to have used EPs/SPs, this I understand, nothing new. But what about the game version? Can I use only the CC with exactly the same game version as mine or anything released earlier will do?

I browsed through countless lots here and every single one had a different game version, plus none matched with mine, which is 4.0.87.013001, patch 1.26 (the closest was one lot built with game version 4.0.87.006 ). Question is can I install lots that were built, let's say, with game version 10.0.96.01 or 8.0.152.01, or I should look for only those with 4.0.87.013001?
I'm looking at the Sims 3 patch table, and there it's written that game version 10.0.96 is for Pets, and 8.0.152 is for Generations, while none of uploaders indicated these EPs were used for making the lots, so i"m confused even more now.
On top of all of this, I see that every EP of mine has its own game version! Base game - 1.26.89, WA - 2.0.86, High-End stuff SP - 3.038 and Ambitions - 4.0.87.013001!

I just want the crows. I don't mind if they aren't catchable. I'll have to look into the fog emitter settings to see if there is one for crows. I know there's one for pigeons and rats, unsure for crows, though.

Can a sim have more than one imaginary friend? I had three children that got imaginary friend dolls, but I didn't know how to play with them to turn them into living sims until the sims had already aged into children. So, if the second generation doesn't get any dolls, I wanted to give them all to one of the children so that she could have the dolls of her mother and twin aunt and uncle to transform them all into living sims. But I'm not sure if it allows more than one imaginary friend...

Amairani, with Lots I think the version number should be taken as a minimum requirement. If you have a newer version you should be fine but if you don't meet the version then they may not install.
1.26 is currently the most recent version of the game. (1.27 if you are on a Mac)

There is one for crows, but it's not great- it creates a flying crow/ crows, hovering over a specific point (plus, they look like blackbirds). Type crow into the fog emitter to see it.

To have perched crows, I would suggest recolouring the pigeon texture then using the ep3pigeonstandingone code to have a single standing bird. You can use Whiterider's shiftable fog emitter to have it perch on a fence.

For flying crows, use the 'birds' code to have them fly out from a bush- in the unmodded game this would create a flurry of pigeons and crows, but if you recolour the pigeon you would have all black coloured birds.

Becoming Celebrities w/o knowing celebrities?
 

This sounds like a really stupid question. I mean I know how you can gain celebrity points, by getting to know another celebrity. But what if its a brand new town (not bridgeport) and there are no Sims that are celebrities.

Is there a way a sim can become a celebrity w/o getting to know another?

just give it...oh ill say a conservative 2 sim days...and trust me celebs will show up!

I see, thank you! I think I will just try installing some lots I suppose might work for me, and see what happens.

YES! My self-sim has become a celebrity after completing an opportunity for painting which awarded celebrity points. Dunno if he got it because of painting in general or because he is a self employed painter.

I had a Sim who was a fisherman, his inventory full of fish. Other Sims had also random stuffs in their inventories (paintings, produce, books, balls...). I switched between active households every 4-5 sim days, also moved in some Sims from the library (they were actually Sims from other neighborhoods). Could any of this movings and switchings have caused for my Sims' inventories to get emptied?

Please ignore. Info is wrong.

Yep. When you switch families there should be a warning message pop up to let you know you will lose all wishes and personal inventory items if you continue. Core mods such as AwesomeMod can be used to prevent this.

Thanks, didn't know that. The message just said about losing wishes.

I have never lost inventory items. I also - of course - got the "losing wishes and promises" message (never a word about inventory) but the inventory items of the simmies have always stayed in their inventories. Though, the switches were temporary and never lasted longer than one or only a half sim day. And I don't use awesome.

Been reading up on the subject, apparently the empty inventories were a bug fixed in a patch. Will update game as soon as the clock strikes Dec 1st and see what happens.

Oops, sorry for the incorrect info. Didn't mean to mislead anyone.

Next question:

I have a "community garden" project in plan - I'm tired of my Sim farmers replanting and replanting to get the perfect produce, so I've made a Sim to do it on a 40x40 lot. Once I have all the produce up to perfect, I will plant 5 of each, then move out Sim and...

1. Can I change zoning type of that into a community lot (and keep the plants)?
2. What happens with these plants over time? Do they die out? Or are they forever there, offering generations of Sims their perfect fruits?

(I've seen plants growing in the wild, how did they get there in the first place?)

1. Yes. I'd recommend one of the park settings. You may want to fence it in and then lock the gate, though. Deer and pets eat garden plants.

2. Uhm, to my understanding they'll be fine until you harvest them. I believe the way plants work is they go barren after X harvested vegetables, but I'm not sure how that applies to public gardens. If nothing else, if you see it go barren, replant one of the fruits you just harvested, since it should be Perfect.

Okay.... My stupid question is this; How do I get non-default skintones to show up in CAS? I know the simple answer already - "UI Mod--CAS Basics--See Your Non-Default Skintones". BUT, I guess my real question is where to FIND that mod, and/or if its included in any of NRaas'/MATY's mods.

The long version, aka "this is what I tried and why I failed":


Right now I've downloaded the cmar skintonepanel package, since its the closest thing I've found. However, there is a warning about possible conflicts... so I'm a little wary of trying to use it together with NRaas' mods.

1) Yes, without mods that is the only way I know of to make a community garden with perfect plants.

2) I'm pretty sure the plants will live forever. They will not need to be watered ever. But they won't be constantly harvestable, so having a few of each type of plant is a good idea.

If you have AwsomeMod, or if you're thinking of getting it, it adds the feature allowing your Sim to plant on community lots. I created a "Johnny Appleseed" for one of my neighborhoods and had him go around the neighborhood planting things everywhere.

If they're not perfect plants, then BuyDebug was probably used to make them.

Before pets came out, there was talk that we will get carrots with pets. Did we? I've not at least seen any new plants or veggies in my game since pets.

Actually, we do have carrots. I feed them to my horses and grow them in my garden.

Yay for carrots \o/ unless this was sarcasm and you meant you have them in RL and not in game :/

There really are carrots in game.

Carrots are in the game but EA didn't include a BuyDebug plant for them, just like the plasma fruit. Sims_MX has a mod that adds both of these to the BuyDebug catalogue available on here.

Ok, thank you

Speaking of carrots, my horse seems to magic them up somehow. There can be no one around, but suddenly I'll hear a little noise, turn back to look at the horse, and there'll be carrots just sitting there n front of the horse. What's going on here?

They dig them up from ground. Onions too and possibly other produce. Especially the 'piggy' horses do this.

No, in RL I don't have a garden. I just feed store bought carrots (and no, not organic, let them eat the same pesticides that I do ) to horses. Really, it is in game.

Yeah, they can dig up produce. It actually feeds them almost completely, if I recall correctly. If you want to command it yourself it's the "Dig here" option when you click on the ground.

Oooh, thank you. I was wondering if it was a glitch with unicorn magic being partly available to horses or something.

For some reason or other, the stairs are giving me Hell. I was trying to make a studio with a garage under it, but I couldn't get the stairs to connect to the platform-balcony thing I have outside of the second floor. Any tips on that?
Actually, I tried to build stairs inside a room, too, and that didn't work either... I wanted to chuck my computer across the room, I was so frustrated!

@joof:
I find that the spiral stair and this modded spriral (http://drealm.info/simlogical/sl/Si...irsscripted.htm) is much easier to put and space-saving as well.
I have this annoying problem of floating hair, I have a lot of CC hair but I read that it can happen with EA hair as well, is there a way to identify the hair's name via the exported sims3pack so I can re-categorize the hair:

I don't know. I'd say remove your hairs and readd them in order to find out which one it is.

How do I use a public laundromat?
I've put the basket in the Household Inventory and the option has been there, and they'll wash the clothes like normal (For a fee of course)
But once home I'll take the basket out and it'll still be full.

I now put the basket somewhere they never change clothes and just pile them up on the floor and take them then.
Is there a way to put clothes in the inventory from the basket?
Otherwise I'm pretty baffled.

I don't have a laundromat in my town right now but there is an option to "collection laundry on the lot" when you click the laundry basket/hamper, then the dirty laundry pile would be stored in your inventory. I guess that's what you should take to your laundromat, not your laundry basket/hamper.

heyas - I accidentally made my family in sunset valley instead of appaloosa plains, can sims move from one place to the other? (Or is it like sims 2 - the two places being two different neighbourhoods?)

Sims can move from one town to another.

MsScribble, add the family to the Family Bin in edit town and then you will be able to select them to place in a home once you start up the correct town.

Hi - again! I'm building a house for the first time and finding it a bit difficult. When I put a window in the bathroom the room goes completely dark, so I'm not sure what to do.

I noticed with the small privacy windows that it makes the room darker then it was before, but you could also try and turn the window around so the footprint arrows are facing the other way?

I don't have that option in game.

Perhaps it's a mod you have?

Do you have the EP laundry was introduced in?

Yeah, it is Moar Interaction of Buzzler that introduce the new interaction "Collect All Clothes On Lot" for Hamper, you remind me that I have used many mods for too long to recognize the differences.

I have a Laundry download from the Sims store and can play laundry from basegame on. When I reloaded the game, I played basegame with my store content and the Ambition items were not available but t-mobiles hoop basket was, as was the laundrymat set. My Sims had the option to collect laundry and the washer dryer worked.

heyas - as soon as i put the roof on my houses my rooms go dark, even if there are windows filling the outer wall. The only room that has light in it is the open plan part of the house that can have windows on either side. But i can't do this with bedrooms etc. Does anyone have any tips? Its bringing me down and I don't want to have to move sims into houses with gloomy rooms! lol




without the roof.

Uh...put lamps in? I think that fixes things. (I'm too lazy to build/decorate homes myself most of the time. )

Thanks. I did browse at downloading that, so I'll have another look

P.S- Zok - I've got all EPs so that wasn't a problem xD

Unfortunately for you that is intended behaviour of the Sims 3 lighting system.
The only way to lighten an enclosed room, with or without windows, is to add lights and lamps.
I find it helps if while you are still in Buy/Build mode you Shift+Control+Click the lights and set the brightness setting to Bright. If you put a lot of lights in one room though, choose Normal or Dim or your room will be washed out in bright white.

MrsNervousSubject, I've never got a Sim to empty their home lot hampers by using a community laundrette either. I can get them to do their laundry on a community lot but like you say, when they return hoome their hampers are still full.

Its me - again. Sorry.
I'm having a hard time understanding the sims 3. I've been reading the game guides and this message board etc but am still unsure of some things, so. . . can I only play one family in each game without mods? Someone here mentioned turning off storyline progression but I'm unsure if this was a game option or something a mod offered. How do you play multiple family's without them growing up etc without mods? I know there's a similar thread, but its started by someone that has mods.
I'm going to stop saying mods now, lol.

You are not limited to playing just one family. You can play as many families as you like, however it is important to remember that the entire town ages and grows together and so if you play one family all the others will carry on with their lives without your input.

You can switch off Aging and Story Progression in the game options and this will prevent sims you aren't playing from growing up, getting jobs, falling in love, having kids etc. If you just want the household you're playing to age, and you don't want to use mods, then you'll have to turn off Aging and age your sims up manually (you can enter "testingcheatsenabled true" in your cheat box, and then shift+click a sim and choose 'trigger age transition').

I turned off story progression and played one family for a sim week, but when I went into another household, the horse was in the red with thirst while the owner was in bed snoring her head off. Does this mean, if you're not playing a household and looking after the animals, the animals are going to drop dead of neglect?
I'm very confused! lol.

Needs progress as usual when SP is turned off. SP really only effects things like marriages and moves and having babies and such.

What level do you have Free Will set to?

Its on high for all sims. Am I supposed to use the 'change household' option to check on other houses to make sure no-one's dying / on fire / eating spoiled food?
I tried switching the tutorial back on yesterday, but that takes away the 'choose household' option for some reason.

Normally, no.

To improve game performance, most of the time inactives spend their days staring at the paint on the inside of their front door, and don't actually do anything.

So to ensure that those sims don't perish while not being simulated, the game either does not decay their motives at all, or periodically resets the motives back to mid-range.

It is highly unlikely that a sim will die of starvation, unless you are watching them constantly (while being watched the simulator is forced to decay their motives as if they were active).

Is it possible to cheat in order to get a broken television, dirty/clogged toilet, dirty dishes, spoiled food, etc? I'm creating a CC-free slobby house and don't really have time to wait for the occupants to dirty it up.

Also, I have some fog emitters on that I've set to have "rats" and "rat" display, but they don't turn up. I can HEAR them but I can't see them. I can see the cockroaches scurrying around, but I can't see the rats. Any reason why this would happen?

I tried using "rat" on the fog emitter once. A single rat showed up where the emitter was, ran in place for a few seconds and then shrank into nothingness. I could still hear it but it never showed up again.

Actually, they will if you don't have a good enough computer for the population that you have. On my old computer, before I knew any better, I'd throw in 5-6 families into Sunset Valley to spice up the gene pool. However, I'd end up with a full graveyard pretty quickly because the unwatched sims wouldn't take care of themselves. Once, I had four of them croak in front of City Hall at the same time because they wouldn't go home or even walk over to the park and grab a bite to eat.

Keep in mind that I didn't have the minimum system requirements to run the base game.

About the rats: Well, I have something like 7 of them set to "rats" and I watched the house for a really long time (long enough for the rodent spawners to spawn critters) but none of them have shown up. I'm wondering if I need to do more than just set it to "rats"... like maybe set up a trigger or something.

Hate to double post, but I have a question... will .sim files bring CC into my game? I'm asking because I want to move all my old sims from my old Saved Sims files over to my new game files but I don't want the CC that comes with them as I've had some crazy problems with skins and leftover bits that I can't seem to get rid of, like clothing set to wrong genders and age groups and set to Naked. I'm not using the sim3pack files, just the .sim files.

CC won't transfer from a .sim file. Any CC stuff on the Sim that you don't have installed will turn to default.
But if the Sim had non-default replacement CC skins you don't have, you get a Sim with a black skin.

Actually, I saw an option for Sims 2 style aging in the options.


(Oh, and about the lighting. I build and decorate with the roof off. Then I add the roof, switch to night, and add as many lights as are necessary. If one light isn't bright enough even at its brightest and a second light wouldn't look good there, I supplement the light with a buydebug light.)

Really? That's new then, it's certainly not been there all along.

Actually, pretty sure it has. At least for the past several EPs.

What option is that? I just looked at the options and don't see something like that...

How to install a SP?
 

I have a Stuff Pack that I want to install. I'm guessing it's just like installing an EP. Make a backup, remove my Mods folders, install and then put the Mods back in. Right?

I'm installing HELS and I already have Ambitions installed, so I'm assuming I won't have to worry about any mods not working with the new SP since it was released before Ambitions was.

Is is going to be a problem that I am still on patch 24? Is it going to force me to update my patch if I install something new?

(I never updated the patch because I heard that 26 caused some CC problems, then I got lazy and never figured out what the problems where and if I should install 26.)

I was looking through my sim folders and noticed a 'custom music' folder. There were 7 song I didn't put in there. Does everyone get that??

Yes. The music already in there is sample EA music. If you set your sim's stereo to the custom channel it'll play the music you put in that folder. You can also set your sim's favorite music to custom.

If you're installing a stuff pack that was released earlier than the last EP you installed, you don't need to worry about compatibility issues.

As for patching... IMO the main reason to patch is to keep your game compatible with the latest MODS. Modders don't typically maintain versions for obsolete game versions.

However, the patches that come out when EPs come out... are typically full of a lot of free new gameplay features. So you're getting a ton of content, along with whatever new bugs go with it For that reason too, I would recommend keeping your game up to date.

Even the patch that came out yesterday had a bunch of new trees, walls and floors.

Thanks Srikandi. I used to know everything about the Sims 2, now Sims 3 is making me feel like an idiot.


I did want to get the new patch (I heard 26 had a fix for the WA camera in it, and I really want that), but what CC did patch 26 break? I heard a bunch of people complaining about it, but now I can't find any details to see if it's worth updating my patch.

does anyone know how to delete a sim that you can't see?
(some mailman keeps erroring & twallan's error trap keeps catching it, id rather just delete him altogether than deal with the crapload of error messages.)

You could use a sim (or make one just for this), do a "Make me friends with all", invite him over, and delete him then...

will that work if its a service NPC?

Well, you can befriend NPCs, so it should. I'd suggest making a sim and moving him into the neighborhood especially for this, otherwise whatever family you're playing will end up friends with everyone in the neighborhood.

alright, thank you.

Unless you have a very small neighborhood, definitely use a Sim you don't play when you befriend everyone. Also be prepared that befriending everyone may take a bit.

If it looks like your computer froze, don't worry right away, it's probably just thinking. Go make yourself a sandwich, get something to drink, and then come back.

Is chicken pet food for dogs. . . or for chickens?

And. . . what are those wierd little static pets that move when you're not looking? Are they a completely random thing or do they pop onto the property because of something a simmie has done? My simmie house has three now - possibly more, considering how small they are. I'm just glad its not garden gnomes. Garden gnomes freak me out. Is it okay to sell them?

Chicken pet food is made with chicken (or turkey apparently) to feed to your pets. There are no chickens in The Sims 3.
Have you got a picture of any of these "static pets"? I can only think of the new 'wildlife' that came with Pets. You should be able to catch them and put them in cages if it is them.

Amberland, The CC affected was anything that a Sim interacted with. So chairs, tables, sinks, baths, beds, etc. Most of it has been corrected now but will require you to redownload it all or use one of the available community tools to fix it yourself.

Have you got a picture of the static pets you're talking about, MsScribble? Small animals - like snakes, tortoises, birds, etc. - will spawn for cats and dogs to hunt, but they do move.

If a pet has hunted down something and caught (killed) it, it can drop it and it won't move. I've had my cat drop snakes, birds, etc from their inventory. They were all dead and they won't move.

From what I understand, if you delete the "Documents\Electronic Arts\The Sims 3" folder, the game will regenerate it upon loading the game, but without any saved data right? Does this also apply to things like installed worlds and store content?

Basically, I want to clear out everything (particularly store content) and start over with as vanilla a game as possible, short of uninstalling/reinstalling. Would deleting the folder work?

Yes it would.

If there's anything in there that you MIGHT want back again someday, though, you might as well just move it to a different location on your disk rather than removing it... or just rename it. Unless of course you are really short on disk space



My guess is these are the new animal gnomes... in which case... sorry... they are, in fact, garden gnomes They generate in response to particular actions; for instance, you have a chance of getting a horse gnome when a horse licks a saltlick.

It's fine to sell them.

Thanks for the response!

I did create copies of what I planned on keeping, and I have a backup of the entire The Sims 3 folder just in case things go badly.

Do you have any idea what generates the dog gnome? I just got one, I don't know why. My family does have a dog. It has also had two cats (one is deceased, the other is an elder), but I've never gotten a cat gnome. I don't think I've done anything particularly special with dog, so I'd love to know what triggers the pet gnomes.

The dog has a .7% chance to spawn per dog best friend you have. And the cat has a chance to spawn when a cat gets a Whacked Out moodlet, which judging by the moodlet description they get from catnip or a toy containing catnip or something.

Additionally the freezer bunny gnome has a chance to spawn when your dog barks at the fridge.

While looking that up I discovered there is apparently a moodlet called "Every day I'm Rustlin'." I really don't know what to make of that.

Thanks, Zoku. My cats are frequently whacked out, but still no cat gnome. I guess I'll just keep Rowley good and stoned until I get one.
I'd really love to know about that Rustlin' moodlet now.

The image is a cowboy on a horse and the description is something like "Might never give this horse back" so I suspect it happens when you ride/lead around one of your neighbor's horses for a long time.

Are mods updated for exp packs still usable in the base game?
 

Yeah stupid question here. Okay, I only have the base ts3 game, no expansion packs.

If a mod is updated for an expansion pack, would it still be compatible with my base game? What if there's multiple versions for different expansion packs available to download. Would those only pertain to people that have those expansion packs? Would it even matter which version I picked if had none of the exp packs listed?

TL;DR Version
If I download a mod updated for Pets (for example), and I don't have Pets, would the mod still run on the base game?

Thanks for any help.

I'm not positive, as I've always gotten EPs, but I'd say you're good, as long as it's not a mod for a feature from an EP. I hope helped a little, at least. Just make sure you're game is up to date.

Thanks! Yeah that was what I was thinking, just wanted to see if other people thought the same. lol

Try and check the PATCH level the mods are compatible with. That's probably more important than which packs you have unless the mods are for EP specific features.

My question is is there a maxium age for Elders? I have one that just hit 100 days and I kinda want her to kick the bucket here soon. I know there are cheats I can use to just kill her off my self, but I would like her to pass on "naturally"

(Also, sorry if someone already asked this question)

My elders bite the dust at 139 days, but that's because I have the age adjusted to something that works for me (I have really long YA and Adult stages). The maximum is 999 days, and you can lower the Elder length in the Game Options menu.

I have aging set to Normal so the span for Elders is 17 days, but they can live past the span just like my elder Sim (her husband was also the same, but only lived to about 92-93 days). I think how long Elders live depends on how well their life have been i.e. fulfilling their LTW, maxing out skills, ect. Anyways, thanks for the answer