Hey everyone,

As the title implies, what are some objects that preferably should not be placed in the common areas of:

a) Apartment buildings

b) Dormitories

c) Hotels.

And tell us why (I know annoyance is one reason, but tell us (exactly) what happens).

Vending machines. You invite people over and they spend half their time circling the damn things like vultures.

Personally I say grills or anything that untrained cooking skill sims can use that will catch fire. Let all cooking be done by trained professionals on community lots damnit!! Can't begin to tell you how many viable genetic comnbining townies have been lost on community lots because of that.

Definitely radios. My poor simmies always have to run back and forth to shut the damn thing up. Only to have someone come and switch it right back on. Grrrr...

Grills are okay as long as you add a smoke alarm or sprinkler before you move anyone in.

One of my sims had a radio in his dorm room and that still didn't stop someone from coming in and switching it on while he was asleep. DX

Stereos in general are just a terrible idea omfG

Anyway, bubble blowers are definitely not okay, especially in dorms. Most of the dormies died or failed their classes because they couldn't leave the infernal thing alone. I even lost a sim to starvation because of it since I forgot to pause my game when I had to do something real quick and she was there the whole fucking time.

I can't believe no one has mentioned the music instruments from University. Sims flock to them so much that most of them even forget to eat. Same thing with the ballet bar from freetime. If in a dorm and for some reason you don't lock the door (maybe to try to whoohoo someone) don't have a computer in the room. Sims flock to it as much as they do to stereos.

Edit: No fountains either, especially in businesses. Sims will always add soap to it, which will make all sims run over to see it. You can see how annoying this is when you're trying to sell stuff, even worse when you're running a restaurant.

The helicopter or cars....and the toy bears. Sims use them on an apt. lot in the common area and block other sim's path ---and you can't pick it up and move it !!!!! Grrrr !!!

I’m starting to get annoyed with the playground equipment I put on the apartment lot where the Travellers and Gavigans live. I built their apartment building myself. It’s a two flat. The Travellers live upstairs from the Gavigans. Last night while I was playing, Trent Traveller kept going outside to swing on the swings while Tricia was trying to get Toby to grow up from a baby to a toddler. For some reason I had some problems getting Toby to grow up and that was frustrating enough. I must have tried five birthday cakes before it finally worked. I seriously considered killing Trent after the third time I had to wait for him to walk all the way up the stairs to watch his son grow up. I already decided that I am going to move the Travellers and Gavigans into another building on the next rotation. I have another empty building I made, which is similar to the one they currently live in, but I actually remembered to put outdoor lights in the yard of this building. This time, I also left out the playground equipment. The yard has a small garden with a gazebo and a few benches and that’s it. On apartments lots I think it’s better not to have anything outside that will keep the sims out there for long periods of time, especially during the winter season.

Charity322, if you make your college students who live in the dorms lock their doors, nobody else, can get into their rooms and disturb them. It even keeps the annoying coaches and cow mascots out.

Rogue, if you put a counter outdoors, you can put the birthday cake on it and try to grow the baby up outside! You need some surface in the common area that the landlord can dump his pizza on for the weekly party, anyway, or else he'll come into the active apartment and put it there, and nobody wants that!

I like play equipment in apartments, but all the amenities need to be equidistant, and a short distance at that, from all apartments. This business of having things off to one side, or at the top or bottom of a multi-story building, is for the birds.

Exercise bike....

Hot tub.. it's a magnet for sims AND lightning. Although I do like it on some lots anyway.. you know, for "special" dates. Actually, on apartment lots I LIKE lots of things to "bring people out" - chess, dart board, swimming, but not stuff they will obsess over.

This is kind of the opposite, but dorms *must* have a public restroom. I once built a dorm based on one I lived in in college where two dorm rooms (4 people) share 1 bathroom. The only way to access the bathroom was inside one of the two rooms, and none of the dormies would use their own bathrooms.

The instruments in dorms is a nightmare. Not only because dormies won't take care of their own needs, but they hog them so that my playable could never skill build. When they perform instead of practice, it's dang near impossible to shoo them off of those things!

Aw, I really liked it, in the first dorm I ever ran, when Stella kept rolling wants to buy instruments and I put them on the porch of the Oasis Dormitory and all the dormies and walkbys would get together for jam sessions. It was so...collegy. And I just had Stella hog the easel for creativity.

He can just put it on the ground. That's what he does outside one of my apartments where there are no outside counters.



I have come to the conclusion that bubble blowers are not okay anywhere! Restaurants, they swarm it and don't order food, hotels, they swarm it and don't eat or go to bed, apartments, they all hang around clogging it up, dorms, yup everyone is on it until they pass out, pee themself, or die of starvation, residential lot, the whole family hangs out there 24/7. They should be labelled as a health hazard and banned lol.

The soccer/football goal from FT, especially in apartments. That stupid landlord lady in her seventies is constantly, constantly, inviting my Sim to go and play with her. And their relationship is 20/20 towards each other; imagine how it'd be if they were besties! Grrrr

The Landlord/lady is kind of annoying if you do become friends because they want to hang out with your sim every day after work.

The stereos, the hot tub, any television, and anything from SSX2

To comment further on Lord St. Croix who got ahead of me (I can only talk about the base game but I guess, these will also apply to apartments etc.)

Stereos: once they are on, they start to dance. If they're not on, they won't be for long
TV: same here. The more guests there are, the more will watch it. Once you do get someone to turn it off, someone else will turn it back on.
SSX2: you want to make a sim watch TV, maybe to learn cooking? But most times there are already other sims playing SSX
Hot tub (and sometimes swimming pool): guests will switch into swimwear, but there is only space for 4 sims at a time so you'll have to call them to make them get out again
flipper and that other game that seems to be a kind of bingo: very popular and often frequented

I've heard that FT introduced the habit of sims using your sim's computer? So maybe also be careful with that

Well, lazy dormies tend to put books on the floor instead of the bookshelf, so one might actually not want to buy a bookshelf or whatever. I dunno.
Dartboards and arcade machines are a magnet for Sims. I don't like arcade machines much but dartboards are kind of good when you're trying to raise Social and Fun.

Most of these things I happily put into dorms and apartments all the time. Yes, they use them a lot. But that's what they're for. And I do not know how you expect your students to skill up if you don't include bookshelves or skill items in their dorms.

You can always put a bookshelf in the students rooms. Dorms are not like apartments, you can move or even sell, buy mode objects at will.

Having books in the common areas of dorms makes fulfilling "group research" wants effortless. Honestly I think most of these things are fine for common areas, especially in dorms, which ought to be chaotic. If you don't have stuff in common areas you'll never see your neighbors, and what's the point of the common area, then?

Well exactly, I like to see sims interacting. But for those who don't like books left on the floor, in the dorm room seems to be the best solution. I would only avoid killer objects like the exercise bike.

Ok, so, I understand that there are many objects that you should preferably NOT place in the common areas:

- Vending machines
- Grills
- Stereos (that's for sure!)
- Music Instruments
- Bong Bubble blower
- Fountains
- Toy bear
- Exercise machines (that's what we have separate gyms for)
- TV
- Hot tub (we don't want combustion or anything of that sort)
- Computers (I get sick of them playing SSX)
Any more?

And things that you need in a common area are:

- Seats (like benches)
- A table (especially for the Sunday Block parties).
Any more?

Now, what about:

- Bookcases
- Playground items
- etc...? Any more?

P.S. We should definitely create a wiki page for this.