I can't believe we didn't have a thread for the ISBI ("I'm Surrounded by Idiots") challenge. It's the chaos of an Asylum + the commitment of a Legacy: you control only one Sim in each generation for as many generations as you can take the insanity. The original rules -- updated through Pets -- can be found here: http://isbichallenge.blogspot.com/2...enge-rules.html

(If anyone knows of an updated rules set, please do post a link. Otherwise, let common sense be your guide for the features introduced in Seasons and later.)

I think I'll have to go with this as soon as I'll finish Nummela Legacy.

Death stalks my ISBI:

I just lost my second-generation spouse to triplet birthdays. She was hungry, tired, stinky, and picking up and dropping babies left and right. It's kind of sad that she had just managed to age one of them up when Grimmy came for her. (Note to self: have the torch holder use cake to age babies midday. Do NOT let the 6 o'clock baby aging dance kill another spouse.)

Meanwhile, two random walkby guests were downstairs having a cat fight in the living room when the founder's ghost scared one of them to death. (I'm guessing it was the loser, but I didn't get to see the fight, since I was with the torch holder trying to age up the other two babies amidst incredible grief.) This is only the second time I've had a townie die in my game. Cool, but I could have done without the extra grave.

It sounds, ummmmm.... interesting?! :-D I may give it a go, though I think it'll drive me nuts pretty quickly...... Is it actually fun, or just annoying (in your opinion)??

For me, it's fun because it's annoying. (Isn't that helpful?)

The ISBI is a test of how well I know the game and how competent I can be managing the needs of Sims outside my control. Now the "call to eat" a served meal isn't about the perfect 50s family dinner hour or keeping up household socials: it's about making sure no one starves. I have to play close attention if I want to catch everyone's hobbies and figure out mystery careers. I thought my founder's spouse was in Business until she finally got a chance card and I discovered she was in Politics. I have to do things I rarely do in my regular game: to keep the kids from flunking out and being taken away, my torch holder has to help them with their homework every night...or do a heavy round of homework catch-up on the weekends.

It's a very different style from my Prosperity neighborhood, and that also makes it fun for me. I still prefer Prosperity style above all, but I don't have birthdays in my rigidly synced Prosperity hood because that would throw off the aging. In my ISBI, it doesn't matter if ages fall out of sync by a day, because all spares are going off to live in happy immortality. If my neighborhood hadn't been glitched at creation (nothing to do with the ISBI; everything to do with the neighborhood I used), then I would be looking forward to playing all the spares Prosperity-style once I ended the ISBI (probably at gen5, because I believe that's how long Sims can hold onto their family ties).

However, if you've never played an Asylum, I would recommend starting with that before doing an ISBI. It will give you a sense of how comfortable you are with resident Sims that are out of your control. It can be incredibly amusing and frustrating to watch the game's AI at work.

I've played an asylum a couple of times, it was kind of fun but of course there were no children or working adults that I couldn't control! I shall give this one a go, I think, it sounds pretty entertaining. And I can always stop playing if it gets too annoying! :-)

Thanks for starting a thread about it, mangaroo.

i remember seeing blogs about this challenge....its pretty kool!

...and I am ending my ISBI at generation 5. Which is technically as far as I've gotten in any multi-generational game. Mostly I'm ending it because the neighborhood I used is borked (the tombstones from generations A and B just vanished), but to answer lauratje86's question a second time: oh, good grief, being surrounded by idiots is annoying!

I saw behavior I have never seen in my better-managed games, and I enjoyed figuring out the most efficient ways to accomplish various goals using only one controllable Sim. However, the Sims' AI continues to disappoint. A starving Sim would rather rage at "god" before stuffing their face for a few measly nutrition points when they are perfectly capable of autonomously preparing a meal from the nearly-full refrigerator. (In a regular game, Grilled Cheese Sims bore me. In an ISBI, they are the only Sims smart enough to keep themselves and the family fed in the absence of the torch holder.) And why is autonomous baby-feeding tuned to like 220% while diapering is at -150%?

I was also too curious about the lives of the Sims I couldn't control. I kept peeking at LTWs and skill panels until I finally had to accept that I like to play all my Sims.

Side benefit: I had a torch holder use the Resurrect-O-Nomitron to zombify the dead townie I mentioned in post 3. Now it's time for the zombie apocalypse.

Hey Mangaroo-

I'm playing an ISBI too. Its mad fun,but terrifically difficult. I haven't decided if I'm going to play all the way to gen 10 yet. I haven't even passed the first torch yet. I don't think its too terrible to peak at the sims LTWs, its not like they are going to reach them anyway. In fact according to the rules you can roll the cursor over their aspiration meter and view that want without open their panel so thats okay. And you can always look at the spares once they are off the lot and such.

Anyway the ISBI is fun and you will see a lot of things you've never seen in a game before.I haven't had any accidental deaths yet, but I've always got at least one child on the lot that seems to have lost their mind and repeatedly jumps their sibs. Its sad when their kids, its kinda funny when they are teens though.

Also this ISBI family is super active they exercise and use skilling stuff all the time, the oldest actually managed to earn two scholarships.I've had great success with taking them to community lots and letting them roam and make friends.

Anyway the ISBI is fun and you will see a lot of things you've never seen in a game before.

This times infinity. I'm a moderately controlling player: freewill is always on and I don't always have interactions queued, but I check in on all my Sims regularly and their mood is always green or better unless they've just had a tragedy. I had never seen a flower-stomping teen tantrum or two siblings that absolutely hate each other. It's rare for me to see quite so many stinky Sims outside of Uni, so many aspiration failures, and (since I was playing with ACR installed) so many booty calls.

So glad you suggested this one, mangaroo. I'm having fun with it, too! I had my first teen temper tantrum that involved smashing children's toys, which was amusing... and speaking of ACR, my third-gen TH just had a second set of twins. I'm not sure I can handle this... I left in my hack to allow more than 8 sims per lot. Surrounded by idiots will be very literal very soon!

Aside from that, it's going surprisingly well. Grandpa (second-gen TH) just died at perma-plat. The only one currently miserable is my third-gen spare... a romance sim who almost never gets to leave the house because i'm too busy taking care of babies.

Wow, I really want to try this. Controlling multiple sims for multiple generations can get boring, I guess, if it's a challenge. But this seems less ... I don't know ... high maintenence? Just control one sim and ignore everyone else.

I'm going to try this. The furthest generation i have got up to in a legacy is generation 3 lol :D
i'm going to download a hack to let me have more than 8 sims on a lot.

It's actually not so much ignoring the other sims as trying to figure out how to manipulate them via the one you are controlling. If you completely ignore them, chances are you'll get a few who starve, or drown in the swimming pool, or repeatedly keel over in the street and never bathe. (But some people enjoy that, so whatever. ) To me this is actually harder than controlling all the sims, because you can't look and find out what's wrong with them before attempting to fix it.

^Aw, but otherwise they wouldn't exactly be idiots, right? It IS the I'm Surrounded by Idiots challenge.

The goal is to manage the household and kept it going through at least ten generations. If you ignore them completely you won't last past so one. So basically my torch holder does what she can and then goes to sleep work etc and the rest is on them. Its such a nice moment when my torcholder goes to sleep for the night. After that I just watch the idiots do what they do.

One of my teens brought home a sim that quickly made enemies with his psycho sister. They spent the evening fighting. When my torcholder came home I considered sending him on his way, but I found their back and forth fighting and slapping too funny. The next day he came home with someone else and the battle raged on.

The joke was on me though. The idiots got the flu which he got and then took home to my traditional legacy house.

I started an ISBI and it was going really well until my founder, who had already had one child, gave birth to unexpected quadruplets.

The first child is now failing out of school, and the neighborhood is haunted with the cries of dirty-diapered children. Everything's always dirty (despite the butler And a maid) and I'm worried about the social worker. Nobody can get in a good enough mood to help the failing kid with his homework.

Scratch that, the social worker just took all my kids :/

If you're going to do this challenge, REMOVE any multiple births hacks you have.

Otherwise, it's actually pretty fun!

Meh' I had two single births and then quads, and while it was hard I managed to raise all the kids to teenage thus far, no one has failed out of school and no social worker visits. I did have a nanny there almost 24/7 until they transitioned to child age,but its definitely doable. Seriously multiple births make and ISBI what it is.

edit- one of the quads is always in aspiration desperation.

I just started this, will let you know how it's going! So far it's just my founder living in the house, so no real issues yet, though it was weird going on dates and not looking at my sim's dates Wants/Fears! Having fun so far, can't wait to move in a spouse and start having kiddies! :-)

I'm trying to figure out whether I should put this in my regular neighborhood or my challenge one... I'm thinking the regular hood right now, the Challenge hood is more for stuff like Yeoman Farmer or Serial Killer.

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Okay, I'm starting! :D

Edit: What exactly are the rules on moving?

My sim Jetta Fire (who I've never played, but decided had good genes) is married and pregnant. I used up her husband Barry's one action for him to get a job - except that he already has one! Oh well.
I'm glad my pregnant sim is my torch-holder - pregnant sims taking care of themselves NEVER ends well.

I decided to use a family i already had for this (i know its cheating)When i opened the game the houe had 7 people, the torch holder piper, her boyfriend nick, their baby Eli, plus piper's brother Henry II, and his children Penney and Henry III. Also, piper is pregnant.

Edit- Henry 2 Penney H3 and Nick were pretty much self sufficient, while Piper took care of Eli. Eli became a toddler and can already walk. Plus penney and H3 hate eachother, this is getting fun

i hope its not cheating if i use the eclectic enigmatic energizer on piper? what if i got it with a non-torch-holders points?

Kaila, I believe the intent is to keep all torch holders and their spouses (past and present and graves) on a single lot. So if you move the family en masse, you're following the spirit of the challenge. If you move just the current torch holder & spouse (and kids), leaving behind the former torch holder or spouse, you're breaking the legacy chain.

I don't build, so I moved my first generation couple + their torch-holding son (just returned from Uni) into a larger home with a more legacy-like capacity (two bedrooms capable of holding a double bed, plus two rooms suitable for children).

For spares, "finding their own place" via the newspaper or computer is considered their one adult action.

I decided to have a shot at this with a male founder - he is now married and his wife Candice is expecting their first child. How I'm going to keep a pregnant sim alive and well without controlling her I have no idea - so far my founder's been serving lots of meals and calling her to eat, she's doing ok so far but is only in her first trimester.

It's driving me a bit nuts already, it's certainly different to how I normally play! I am having fun though :-)

**EDIT** Candice survived the pregnancy - just - and she and Daniel now have a baby boy, Edward. She's going to have to go through it all again though, I may well need a spare! :-D

**EDIT AGAIN** And another baby - a girl this time, Eleanor. Candice is still alive too, wow! No more babies for her though, it's too hard keeping her alive.... Despite all this baby making, Daniel is doing well, has almost reached the top of the Science career and has maximised 3 skills......

**EDIT AGAIN AGAIN** Both kids are teens now, and Daniel and Candice are elders. Daniel spent loads of influence points getting spare Eleanor and uni townie Steven Ternynck to socialise together, as he hopes that they'll get together when Eleanor becomes and adult. Edward became an Overachiever after reaching the top of the Slacker career, and Eleanor is well on the way to the top of the Adventurer career - provided she has the right skills, as I don't know if she does or not! Daniel reached the top of the Science career and has almost maxed 5 skills - one more Mechanical point and he's there! :-) He almost has platinum life aspiration too, I hope he gets it before he passes the torch to Edward.....

**EDIT AGAIN AGAIN AGAIN** Daniel has now passed the torch on to his son Edward. Just before he did so he invited friend Steven Ternynck to move in, and reached platinum aspiration! Edward became an adult and asked his teen love Marsha Bruenig to marry him. Then he adopted a kitten, which he named Alice. Not long after that Candice died of old age (she'd aged into an elder with really red aspiration). Then Eleanor became an adult, and using her and Steven's one action as an adult/elder (Steven's an elder - he aged up with Daniel), as well as an Influence To... from Edward to make them flirt and fall in love, I managed to get her pregnant! By this point Marsha was already one day pregnant. Marsha had twins - eeek! - Frederick and Frank. The next day Eleanor also had a son, Ferdinand. Both sims survived their pregnancies, though it was a close run thing for Eleanor. So it's a full household now, and Candice's ghost keeps scaring people, but it's still a lot of fun to play! :-D Shouldn't be long until Daniel and Steven die of old age too, that will make the household a bit smaller, though I'm not looking forward to having 2 more ghosts around!

**EDIT AGAIN AGAIN AGAIN AGAIN** Steven has now died, but Daniel's hanging in there! The twins grew up into toddlers, but haven't learned any skills yet. Candice's ghost scared Marsha to death twice, but both times Edward pled with the grim reaper and saved her. Edward is a MVP in the Athletics career track, but he needs quite a few skill points before he can get promoted, and he's far too busy looking after the toddlers and Ferdinand to spend time skilling! It's still fun, though the household is waaaay too crowded now - I may move the whole lot, graves and all, to a bigger lot so they can actually have enough space....

Sounds like you're having a great time. It's just about time for me to play my ISBI household again. I'm looking forward to it with joy and dread.

Mine was going great, until the husband glitched so he wouldnt get out of bed (me not figuring out it was a glitch until it was too late )

I'm kinda depressed now and debating giving up the challenge so she can bring him back from the dead and live happily ever after...but I probably won't...

Here's my ISBI challenge album if anyone wants to see it

http://s358.photobucket.com/albums/...eafish123/Isib/