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Test Subject
Original Poster
#1 Old 21st Apr 2020 at 8:55 PM
Default The Family on a Budget Challenge
Basic premise: Do the best job you can raising a family of 8 with your only source of income being one parent's part-time job, and additional expenses to worry about.

Getting started:

Create a YA couple in CAS. They should be human. Once must be able to get pregnant and the other must be able to get someone pregnant, but aside from that the custom gender settings are up to you. They can have whatever traits, aspiration, and appearance you want. Once you start the game, you can cheat 4 skills of your choice up to level 3 for each of them if you want to make them more fleshed out or give yourself a boost to start. Enter build mode as soon as you buy the house. If you buy a furnished lot, this will be your only chance to sell things that you don't want to keep. It is in your best interest to furnish the house as cheaply as you possibly can (note: no free debug objects for decor). Aging must be set to normal. Sims may not be aged up before you get their birthday announcement.

This couple must have 6 kids close in age. To ensure this, start trying for a baby before the end of the first day, and try to pregnant again before the end of the day that each baby ages up to toddler. You want to end up with all of the kids in the house at the same time before any of them age up to YA.

With so many kids to care for, one of your original sims must be a stay-at-home parent. The other can go work. However, times are tough. The only work that they can find is one part time job, and their steadily growing family has to make do.

Still, your parents are committed to giving their children the happiest childhoods that they possibly can. That is the first priority in their minds for every decision that they make.

Money Problems

-No selling things: Once you buy something, you can't just send it back into the void from whence it came to get some of your money back. No busting down walls and getting your money back either. You are either stuck with it or you have to get rid of it. To get rid of an object, you have to either give it away as a gift or leave it somewhere (if it can go in your inventory) or use cheats to destroy the object or sell it and then get your money back to what it was. This also means that you can't get one of the parents to start painting for extra money. Plan very carefully when using build mode. The only exception is that if you have City Living, you can attempt to sell things at the flea market.

-Clothes now cost money: You can freely set the outfits that your couple wears at the start, but after that you have to pay. When one of the kids ages up, they have their default outfit that they age up in to work with and nothing else. For instance, if your toddler ages up in their sleepwear, all of their outfits can only use items from their default sleepwear unless you buy them new clothes. If they age up and are wearing a shirt and pants, then the pants are the only bottoms they can use in their other outfits and the shirt is the only top (except the default shirt and underwear). Buying a new top to add to the mix costs 50 Simoleons, a new bottom also costs 50, new shoes cost 50, and a full body outfit costs 100 (use cheats to deduct the cost of any new clothes you "buy"). If you have Get to Work you can shop at retail store. If you are buying something for their formal wear, a top or bottom is 75 and a full outfit is 150. Deduct 50 for a new hair cut. Each new makeup option for the household costs 25 (think of it as buying one eye shadow, lipstick, mascara, or blush that they can share). New accessories also cost 25. The same goes for the parents if you want to give them a makeover. If they age up in winter gear, you can imagine that they have a shirt on under their sweater or coat and choose an appropriate one to use in their other outfits.

You can however use hand-me-downs. Once one of your kids outgrows something (ages up), a younger sibling can wear their old clothes for no extra cost. You can pass clothes around too, but only one member of the household can have a specific clothing item you have bought at a time. The parents can give their teens their old clothes to wear too if they buy new outfits or are fine going without. They can also "give" their teens their accessories, which means that the accessory can be added into the teens outfits but must be removed from the parent's.

-Extracurricular activities cost money: There is now a starting fee to enroll a child in scouts or drama club (or any other activities you might have through mods). 150 per activity

-Daycare costs money: sending a baby or toddler to daycare now costs 10 simoleons an hour per child. For instance, if you try to send your parents on a long date day with no teens in the house to babysit and send a baby and two toddlers to daycare for 8 hours, you must deduct 240.

Goals
Goals are not mandatory, but your parents should be aiming for them.
-Age each up each toddler with at least the "Happy Toddler" trait
-Each child should complete one of the Childhood Aspirations
-Complete holidays with every family member happy (Seasons)
-Have each kid gain the Scouting Aptitude trait (Seasons)
-Every teen should age into YA with an A in school.
-Every teen should age up with at least one character value trait (Parenthood)
-Every member of the family should have at least one friend of their own outside the family (except toddlers)
-Have a birthday party every time a family member ages up (except babies) where their friend is invited

Travelling costs money: You can go anywhere in your home world that you want for free, but if you want to take the family to another world you must deduct 200 (100 to get there and 100 to get back).

Other
-You automatically fail the challenge if one of the kids dies before aging up to YA or gets taken away.
-If a parent dies before all 6 children are conceived, you either must consider the challenge failed or bring in a step-parent.
-You can trade off on which parent has the part-time job, but only one can work at a time.
-Randomize toddler traits. You can choose the traits after that based on what makes most sense for the story, but all of the childhood aspirations must be used at least once.
-The present pile (Seasons) can be used, but Sims may only take one gift from it on their birthdays (they can take a second if the first one is something that makes them sad). At Winterfest, only Father Winter can place presents under the tree. You may not open Winterfest gifts after New Years.
-You can freely edit world lots. For instance, if you want to add toddler equipment at the park or a science table at the library, you can do that and have your children use them.
-All sims must get a birthday cake
-You can use a Tiny House and/or the Off the Grid trait. There are benefits to this, but they also add their own challenges.
-You can (and are encouraged) to use the handiness skill to upgrade objects
-You can use any objects you find or craft to decorate your house, but be careful! You don't want to make your lot too expensive and get those bills up.
-No using the Nanocan trash can or the Penny Pixies lot trait. No searching for change in the laundry hamper - your family is much too careful with their money to leave anything in their pockets. No busking for tips. The part-time job should be the ONLY income
-Teens can get a job, but all the money that they make must be saved for their own futures. Keep track of how much they earn and send it all with them when they move out of the house.
-Delete the free toys and books that come with the bookshelves and toy boxes, or sell them and then deduct the money.

Recommended Mods to Enhance Gameplay

-SNB and SNB bills (SimRealist)
-Srsly's Complete Cooking Overhaul (SrslySims)
-More Woodworking Objects (LittleMsSam)

-Enjoy!
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