Hello simmers!

NOTE: this challenge is not meant to be offensive nor has it been based off anything 100% factual. It is "guided fiction"- I took some realistic points, and adapted it to suit my challenge.

Also, a lot of this challenge is flexible. As not all cults and sects are religious necessarily, they tend to be, so that is what I personally did with my challenge. You can adapt as you see fits-there is no scoring system, just my ideas and opinions.

Much of this could be taken as being sexist. I view a lot of what I said as sexist, but it agreed with my story.

STARTING THE CHALLENGE:

The Story: decide on the name of the cult/sect and what they believe in. Several things to consider are:
is the cult a matriarchy, patriarchy or neither?
What faith are the members of? Are they Christians, Satanists, or something else? Maybe they worship a God that you created?
Do they believe in Modern Medicine?
Do they believe in "living off the land"? Is meat accepted?

The more you build their story, the better and easier it will be to work on the rest of the set up.

The Sims: make your sims. The following is a list of sims to live in your cult. The descriptions are based on my cult.

1) a leader:
If you chose for your cult to be a matriarch, it will be an appropriately female leader etc. Your leader sets the trends: if the leader dresses modestly, so shall the rest of the cult. The leader must also set the tidiness standard; how well everyone is groomed etc. The leader should be charismatic and should not have a career oriented LTW. The rest is up to your story.

My leader was male-it was a male dominated cult. He dressed comfortably but with long trousers and shirts.

2) the cult members:
to begin with, you should make 2 couples, either young adult or adult. They should be heterosexual and married with no children. They should more or less agree with your cult.

My females dressed in long skirts and shirts, although my dress code was "modest"- I had no objections to females wearing trousers, nor showing their ankles. They were not casually dressed, but they were comfortable. The females possessed traits to give them appropriate skills; one was natural cook, one was green thumb. neither were flirty or romantic, both were family oriented and good. neither had a career related LTW.

My males dressed similarly to the leader. The men possessed traits such as handy and workaholic. both had jobs, but not in criminal career or medicine, and not professions.

The Lot: You will need a large lot to build on.
begin by building a fence around the lot. Make sure that only the men, and not the leader(or whatever your cult believes) go out.

Build a gathering place. A church based building is what i built, but any place dedicated to worship. Put sensible seats in and a table at the front. Make sure you can lock people in.

build the separate houses for the families-each couple and the leader will require their own house. I suggest building upwards heavily, building multiple small based but tall houses. Basements are cool too. Each house will need a bedroom for the couple, a bathroom, a bedroom (or more) for the kids and a recreational area. Dining areas can be communal. I avoided music and electronics as much as possible, and made sure they had modest windows.

build the communal dining area if necessary.

build a discipline room: execute your discipline routine when necessary. My discipline routine: if the sim was found playing computer games, slipping grades, studying a subject outside the gender norm of my cult or flirting/kissing(teens) without an adult present I sent them to the discipline room, which had no pictures or windows, just a lamp, a desk and a chair. The sim was allowed their meal (if close to meal time) and a book to read. If a child or teen, they did their homework if not completed.

build a skills room- a place dedicated to study.
- allow an area outside the skills room as the garden.
- I allowed one, basic computer for working purposes-if anyone was caught playing games, I executed a punishment routine.
-I put several couches and big bookcases which I stocked at the beginning of the game, to create a private library for the cult.
-I had a nectar maker
-I had a chess table
- I put the washing machine in here and the washing line outside (no dryer)
-an easel (art is allowed in my cult, but only just)
-no music related objects
-table/desks and chairs for homework and study
etc.

Game play:

stick to the story as much as possible.

play it out. The first cult members should set it all up, and when they have kids, their eldest kids of opposite sex who are close to the same age will get married. move everyone else out. These others have chosen to leave the faith, which was their decision. The cult does not shun these people. The others can dress however they like and if you allow, can still be welcomed onto the lot. They aren't excommunicated in my cult. When at the third generation and beyond, move in spouses, but only those selected by the father. Again, move everyone out. If you would like, you can move in a new couple to continue as generation 1.

On a Sunday (or whatever your holy day is), execute your church routine. have everyone gather and chat in the church. I suggest locking them in. Have the leader serve nectar and possibly a meal and have everyone old enough drink a glass. After the church service, have everyone gather in either a home or in the dining room to share a meal or do something similar. I suggest donating to charity too.

remember when moving in spouses to have them agree with your dress code.

when the leader dies, elect a new leader. This new leader will move into the leaders quarters and continue on as the leader before did.

EXTRAS: WA: if need be, you can go on holiday, but I suggest just cheating to gain debug objects.
LN: I don't have it, but think about it-what aspects of late night fit with your cult? I suggest clubbing is out.
cars: I try not to use cars, but in reality, the convenience is needed most times. I go for the mini van type car.
teenagers: It can be fun to have a family stay-when a teen is nearing YA, move them out, and into a house with an aunt or uncle who used to be in the cult. Based on what traits they roll, you can determine whether or not they have chosen to return to the faith-or if they get a boyfriend/girlfriend outside the cult. Alternatively, just randomize the trait when they age up inside the cult to determine their choice.

Ultimately, just have fun! Remember that any of the stuff I said can be changed, feel free to make the challenge your own.

Oh dude, that's a great idea. XDD Though, it really does remind me of the secret society from Hot Fuzz. I might as well either make a town ruled by a secret society/cult following in those lines. Hey! Maybe something like Children of the Corn~. That'd be an interesting theme!

Excellent idea.
I'll give it a shot.

I was thinking about playing a cult and so glad when I found this challenge. I think the cult psychology is really interesting. It might be difficult to maintain a larger cult though with this game. You certainly can't control the behavior of people outside of your house, but you can only have 8 people living with you.

Unless you have a mod that has no limit on how many Sims can live in one household... D:

I think it would be best to use several lots for this, including a community lot for the church.

I'd like to try this challenge, but I'm way too lazy to build that many lots for it.

Thank you for posting this It gvae me an idea I hadn't had. My friends and I created a fake cult last summer and it had never occured to me to attempt to re-create it in game I will(losely) follow your outline. now I must locate cc that I can decorate my cults lot with and create sims losely based on my friends!

This looks very cool! I've been looking for some challenges to do (besides my own), and this looks REALLY awesome!

I shall try it at once!

I just started this, but for added difficulty I started with only the cult leader, and made her have to convince people to move in and join her cult, instead of premaking them in CAS. Plus, I have cult members steal babies and toddlers whenever they can. And no one gets to leave the cult alive; it's getting pretty packed as the second generation of sims born and stolen grow up. It's been pretty fun so far, and a great way to help pass the time before Generations comes out. :D