Yep, I agree that would open a position in the business career, too, but that's it. I just don't really like home businesses, myself.

In my BACC, I only have 2 home businesses. But both are the only level 10 businesses that I have and one of those opened a business position which ultimately opened business. It is not that hard to start a community lot business--I find I need about $5k to buy a lot, build a small building and put in a few things for sale. The little produce stands are affordable for a starter business and that can give your other sims somewhere to shop for food. If two families have one, then everyone can shop for food. Of course, some people just allow food to be delivered or buy a new frig or have their first community lot include groceries (which is what I did).

Hi everybody,

my population is just pleasantly exploding, from 1 household to at least 4, two community lots (one player owned, one for the 4 households) and 11 Sims.

And I'm trying to open up some careers and have questions on that, mostly because I never before had to design community lots.

Slacker: A position is opened whenever a "club" community lot is placed.

"Club" means a dance floor and dj booth? Since there're no more specifications I guess the club can be player-owner or not, right?

Music: The career is unlocked when a community lot including a stage and three musical instruments is placed. This lot does not have to be player-owned.

I'm really looking forward to having enough lots for an architecture career, too.

Have fun & happy building everyone!
No idea where to get a stage but I guess I'l find it.

I take "club" to mean anywhere people can be lazy and have fun. So, yeah, it could be a dance club, if you wanted it to be. I don't have one in my new BACC yet, but in my old one, my club was a pool hall/arcade with an espresso bar and a ticket machine outside; it did quite well. And no, it doesn't have to be player-owned.

For my music venue, I used the first "city-owned" community lot I earned, a park. I built a gazebo on it with instruments for visitors to use.

(I tend to reserve the "city-owned" lots for the types of things that, in real life, would be owned by the government: park, library, museums, recreation centers, things of that sort. The one exception I make is a city-owned restaurant...because I hate running restaurants. This means that I'll never open the Culinary career, but I'm OK with that. My hatred of running restaurants overrides my Sims' desires to be Celebrity Chefs. )

As for building stages...Well, for mine it was a gazebo: some foundation, a few columns, some decorative fencing and modular stairs, an octagonal roof, and that was it. If you're building a stage inside of a building already on a foundation, you can use the stage foundation that came with OFB.

Also, I got your PM, Alchemist. I'm out of time for tonight, but I'll give you a shout tomorrow.

so that's it! I thought the stage would be a huge object rather like a skating rink that could be bought in one go. Okay, got it. Thank you!

And already I'm standing in front of the next problem: what makes a dance studio be a dance studio? The ballet bars or a huge dj booth or both?

By now I have a player-owned sports lot but dear heaven, business is slow. There are rarely more than three Sims on it even though I put the entry as low as possible. And there's lots of stuff to do on it: ice skating, soccer field, lake, grills. Do I have to add more decorative stuff? Or have the Sim who runs it spend more time interacting with customers?

Shops make so much more sense to me because with them I know what the Sim has to do. On the pay-per-hour lots I never know what my owner can do to have the customers gain stars.

The higher the business's rank, the more customers you get. So, yes, you should have your owner interact with customers. You can use sales interactions to get them to buy a ticket, and once they're inside the business, do lots of social interactions with them. Talking, joking, appreciating, etc. Not only does it get the customers to spend more time there (and on these lots time = money), but if you make the customers interact with your owner Sim, you'll build relationships with customers and increase customer loyalty at the same time. As loyalty increases, you get stars.

Pay-per-use lots ARE harder than shops, indeed. But once you get them up in rank and have a base of loyal customers, I've found that they make money effortlessly. They're more difficult in the beginning and get easier as they "age." Shops are kind of the other way around, I think. They can get overwhelmingly busy when at high rank, especially if you don't have any/enough employees.

Because they have to do a lot of social interactions, I tend to have my friendly/outgoing/playful Sims own pay-per-use businesses, particularly if they have Popularity or Pleasure aspirations. Shyer and grouchier Sims just aren't cut out for them, I don't think. Especially grouches since they'll tend to autonomously annoy people if you don't watch them like hawks, and that's not good for business. These kinds of businesses are especially good for Popularity Sims with a "20 Best Friends" LTW; they rack up friends very quickly while owning these lots if you're having them do lots of social interactions to keep the customers around.

For a dance studio, I interpret them as a place to learn to dance. So, mine had ballet bars, mirrors, and a stereo for music. (Though I suppose you could have a DJ booth; I always forget about them!) Eventually, I added an electro-dance sphere. And the owner of mine was a Sim who had maxed out her Music & Dance enthusiasm so that she could instruct others in the hobby. I also had a small shop attached to it, stocked with CC dance stuff that I had downloaded. An employee cashier was stationed there so that the owner could "give lessons" while the cashier just rang up sales in the little shop.

Thanks very much! It makes more sense now, and it'll be much more fun working at my sports grounds now that I know what I'm doing.

I started this challenge three days ago, and I LOVE it! I have 9 sims which=pop 18. I'm trying to get my founder married, but having trouble finding a townie that likes him LOL I have 3 community lots which I am trying for a business section to turn into a military base. Thanks for posting this challenge, I look forward to playing The Sims again!

I have just begun mine today, after jotting down the rules to paper as I don't use the net on the Windows partition of my MacBook...and I don't have a printer

Anyhow...I decided to make it even harder for myself and make the founder of my city a legacy founder as well...and I'm trying to play with handicaps on that as well...yes, I may have taken on too much at once! But I shall not give up. I just hope his fishing improves quickly!

I think the Legacy challenge fits quite well into this challenge, if you're into them. (I get bored of the breeding, personally.) You could do multiple ones at the same time so that you can try out all the handicap variations and also see how your families might "collide" and interbreed. But yes, it's ambitious.

Me, I have decided to try the Xenophilia challenge on one of my lots in my new BACC. I've never done that one before, I want aliens in this neighborhood, I've got a spare CAS point, and according to my additional rules (Because, you know, there just weren't enough rules. ) I can add one more household this rotation so...Seems perfect. And I always seem to end up with an Asylum along the way. I have an affinity for them, apparently. I think for this neighborhood, since it's "religious," when I eventually start one it's going to be called a leper house. And I'm going to have an orphanage, too, though it won't be an Orphanage Challenge. Rather, since Sims can be banished from this 'hood for rule infractions, if they leave behind kids who don't have a teen sibling to look after them, they go into the adoption pool. Then I'll stick' em in the orphanage. Got two infant orphans already. Darn ACR. :p

And wow...That must have been some project to write down the rules! Does your hand hurt?

@blueskiesabove: Glad you're liking the challenge. I really like its flexibility and the fact that I can do other challenges alongside it, reducing the chances of boredom. There's always something new to try. And I'm really enjoying my new one, since I'm building everything in it instead of downloading lots. When I get frustrated with playing, I go build a house or a community lot.

I got one of my business owners to a level 5, put a sim in the business career that was opened from the level 5 business. Next I need to get them to max the business career, so I can have a Business District and start a Military Base. I think this is the most fun I have ever had playing this game.
My founder now has a wife and child!

My hand did rather hurt by the end of it, yes...but then I went to bed instead of starting my city straight away so fine by the time I woke!

Shall see how he gets on with gardening today...and if he can improve his 4 fish in 2 days record...

He got a bit of luck...twice! Got a couple of telly's to test out...he did, but he doesn't have time to sit watching telly, so sold them to build some walls and turned his pond into a home business to keep a few simoleons constantly rolling in...

Also met a potential wife and made a few friends...and now has a bronze badge in both fishing and gardening...will work on turning them into silver later!

I started participating in this challenge without even thinking about it, and then I was skimming through the challenges, and realized that what I was doing was matching the guidelines set forth here. XD

Glad to see some solid rules placed though, because I wasn't sure when I would add a downtown or anything.

Tis all starting to go swimmingly well...when I next play I'll look at buying him a community lot to build up and so I can get a CAS point!

Though my population has already gone up to 2 cos he asked a townie friend to move in...handy actually, cos the townie has a gold badge in sales and some other badge in toy making! Not that anyone has much use for toys yet...but he can still work on making some ready for when he moves out and wants his own shop... :D

I have gone down the route of creating a lil Weebly site to keep track of progress too: http://croutonia.weebly.com - shall just go and update it a lil now...

Those townies have some helpful badges sometimes, don't they? It's one of the reasons why I have a strange fondness for the townies, actually. The other is...uh...well, I'm actually kind of fond of their ugliness. It gives subsequent generations more character, IMO.

And yeah, I'm going to put together a site for the new BACC, too. I didn't get anywhere, really, with my other one because my summer was rather unexpectedly hectic with music commitments (which is a good thing for my finances, but not so good for my Sims-playing time! ), but I hope to have more success in that area with this one. Yours is looking good so far.

Played for ages yesterday and although it's going well, it is rather slow progress lol
Though at least I do have a second generation going on now

Good grief. I thought it was a lot to read already. "jotting down the rules" - it must have taken a notebook (the paper sort, not the electronic sort) and an hour.



You must be a kindred soul - I like making life difficult for my Sims, too. They have a tax burden that's so nasty it's almost like real life. Enjoy their suffering! Myself, I'll probably throw in Xenophilia (lots of pretty half-aliens) and the Fisherman-challenge.

Okay, I really hope I don't get in trouble for bumping this thread. So, please don't be mad at me.

However, I have a question about this challenge.

How do you earn a Apartment building, if there any requirements to begin with? I read the rules, and re-read the rules; but still, I don't know. What do I do about those? Please help. Thanks in advance!

If you're looking at my rules...Well, I don't have Apartment Life, so I have no rules relating to it.

I'd say the easiest thing would be to just make a rule up yourself. In the real world, apartments/condos usually exist in areas where the population is fairly high; apartment buildings save space vs. a ton of separate houses. So perhaps set a population threshold that fits with the rate that your city is growing. As in, say that you can build/populate an apartment building with every multiple of 500 in your population. (Or 250 or 1000; whatever suits your play style and/or the rate that your population is growing.)

As far as I know, apartments are not restricted in any way. Realistically, as iCad said, apartments tend to be in high-population areas due to lack of space.

Some people on the thread on boolprop have said that they're personally restricting them: most of them are not allowing apartments until a business district has been earned. Someone has said that they're allowing apartment lots when the population reaches 1,000 (and thus the service restriction denying you to ask the landlord for repairs has already been lifted).

Personally I'm not even thinking of adding in apartments until I start looking like I'm going to run out of space -- depending on SM, a population of 1,000 could look quite packed. Most likely they'd be placed in the business district (because I'd imagine land is at more of a premium there) with some larger, more elaborate apartments in the main 'hood.

I've got back into playing mine after a rather long break (about 4 months?!)... Enjoying it again though

Have updated: http://croutonia.weebly.com/

I lost every bit of EVERYTHING sims 2 related when my laptop bit the dust, but I've since started over. Laurie's Lake, my second attempt, is going very smoothly. I haven't yet restarted any challenges inside of this one (I had a list of about 10 other challenges to do within my last city) but I've rebuilt my spreadsheets, fiddled with my rules (my taxes have gotten even nastier, lol) and am really having a blast.



In my city, there's no such thing as a free lunch...every single lot placed has to be funded by someone (either a private investor or the government) and the government has absolutely no funds without taxes. For me, then, apartments aren't based on a certain population, but rather on expense. I have the lot income hacks from Simlogical (here). Using that, I can have a wealthy sim invest in real estate...either single family homes OR apartments, as the investor's capital allows. This is especially useful for those playing with No 20k handout.

Another option which I intend to explore once needed is government housing - apartments and duplexes ("projects" style) which are paid for entirely out of tax money, and for which the rent returns to the town coffers.

I also saw somewhere a while back that someone was asking about my tax system...I know it was three forevers ago (sorry about that!) but if anyone's still interested, my sims pay the following:

Income tax (paid once per season; based on networth, household size, assets, and deductions)
Property tax (3% of home lot value, once per season; businesses and investment properties currently exempt)
Business License (one time fee)
Adoption fee (OTF)
Birth/Adoption Filing Fee (OTF)
Wedding License Fee (OTF)
Public/Private Burial Fee (OTF)
Social Security (Once per season, per employed sim)
School Tax (per child, per season, once for childless households per season)
Export Tax (10% of sale price of all items sold outside of the "local" economy)
Import Tax (10% of sale price of all items bought which cannot be obtained from a local store, including building supplies)

As further incentive to get businesses built, anything bought from buy or build mode which could be considered a product of a current store (even if that store doesn't carry it in stock) gets the purchase price added to the seller's funds.

For example, say the Baker's open up a local hardware store. Anytime after that, when someone buys something from build mode (or a wired light fixture, or plumbing) they no longer have to pay the import tax, and the amount they paid gets added to the Baker's family funds...we just assume that the Baker's "special ordered" the item in question. I don't really like to play community lots (a throwback to the days before my really awesome, lighting fast laptop), so this keeps me from having to visit them often, but still encourages me to build them.

The government also makes money from the sale of previously undeveloped land - anytime a house is placed, the value of the property itself (I have a list somewhere of the value of each lot size) is added into the government's funds. The same with bills - every time a sim pays their utilities, the government gets the money. Neither thing costs the sims extra, but the little bits of money really do add up.

In exchange for all of these taxes and fees, my sims get things in return - right to representation (and a small stipend for said representatives), welfare, and community programs (job placement, a "further education" program for adults, medicare, a real school system, and life insurance for those not normally covered, as well as a much improved matchmaking service). Once they have the money, they'll also have an active military (I've expanded the rules) and (someday) a university with government funded scholarships (and high tuition to match).

I know it all sounds terribly complicated, but it's really not - I play in windowed mode with my spreadsheet open in the background, and I have nice little formulas set up so that all I have to do is type in the numbers as they pop up. Taxes are paid on the first day of the season, and all other incidentals are calculated over the course of the season by my spreadsheet, and then paid on the last day. I know, I know, I'm a dork - but there's nothing like micro-managing an amount of money so large you'll never see a tenth of it in real life, lol.

I think I'm attempting this, But I still don;t know the rules. XD.
I just stared a 'hoof named Island Dream, and it grew till it had a few familys. (still didn't look very city like.)
But after my computer got borked I had to delete every Sim in Island Dream (D and started over. Now I have two or three main legacy households. The Ride's, The Johnsons, and the Anderson family..

I could really use ya'lls opinions on something...I've backed myself into something of a corner with all of my restrictions; I am getting to the point where I will soon need more "community owned" buildings (a cemetery, for instance) than I have the points for. The city has the money to build them, but I haven't "earned" them yet, and so I can't place them.

I do, however, have a very, very successful family who could afford to purchase one of these lots (and they earned the money themselves - I didn't make them that way). What would you all think of a family purchasing one of these lots, then endowing it to the city, so that it became public property after they passed away? That seemed to me the best compromise, but I wasn't sure if that was because I'd just done a marvelous job of rationalizing to myself, lol. Would that be too cheaty?

While on the subject, does anybody know what happens when the owner of a lot dies? I've always assumed it "reverts" to an unowned business, but I've never let that happen, so I wasn't sure.