How to prevent ugly townies in new hoods!

[Miros1]

I think the SimBin gets populated from the BWV folder for every Shopping District. Don't think there's the equivalent of "Townies" tho.

[Zirconia Wolf]

Oaky, everyone is safely packed up. Hoods aren't deleted just yet, as I have some final questions:

What- of all that crap Clean Installer lists- should I leave checked? I assume I leave the actual residents checked, but what about the rest of that stuff? Do I need the familysegment file, the house file or both?

Also, since I have already gone ahead & placed both the Katt & Kim famlies/houses (so they no longer are showing up in my Lot Bin) is there any reason I need to delete those templetes?

I "need" Cyd, Porthos, Danny & Sarah (for my own bizzare reasons) so is there anyway to leave them, the roaming Wolves (since they tie into many Sims wants/fears) & the Pet Adoption Pool intact & still prevent the wandering strays? Or should I just stick with letting the default strays generate (but not keep generating as I have nostraysrespawn) & "remove" them via SimPE or adding them into my various Sim's houses like I usually do?

(I have zipped/rarred all the folders you listed in the first post except for the P001 & pet lot files so far. )

If I use the Pleasantview, Strangetown, Sim State University (etc) maps as templetes for any new hoods, do they arrive with or without the pre-made lots?

[Miros1]

"lotsegment" and (possibly) a family or collection resource. I've seen them done both ways.

[Zirconia Wolf]

I don't see a lotsegment file, just the family one & a TON of other crap.

I do see the house file (ie. Victorian Villa 1 Bedroom 1 Bath) so do I need to leave that checked?

If I keep the familysegment file, do I also keep the individual Sims that live there checked?

***EDITED TO ADD***

Well, I've created clean (?) copies of my package files. I kept:

- The Sims who live there
- The "familysegment" file (if present, which it wasn't in all the packages)
- The "lotsegment" file or "name of the lot", whichever was present
&
- The "Roseland" collection file (in addition to Cyd & Porthos files) in the lots he lives on

Will the Roseland "collection" file be a problem at at? (Strangely, the Lycos Collar collection file was NOT left checked when I cleaned up the Lycos lot. )

[Miros1]

I bet those are the collars the owner has bought for the pets... so yes, I suspect you should keep them!

[Zirconia Wolf]

Well, it appears- so far- that things went as I hoped.

All my (cleaned) packaged peeps show up in my Occupied Lots Bin, & I have safely removed my "problem" hoods. (No BFBVFS, anyway! )

All the folders you listed in post 1 (execpt the Pets oriented ones) are nice & empty (with backup zips tucked away on another drive) so it's now just a matter of recreating those hoods & seeing what all happens.

(I am also going to make a point of adding Community lots to all my maps, in case this was part of my "missing" Townie woes. )

Thanks for the help! FYI this thread is awesome, at least for those of us who have grown wearry seeing the same friggen Sims in every hood!

[Miros1]

I figure it's safer (and less intrusive) to simply prevent those ugly stupid Maxis Sims that to use the tacnuke (deleteallcharacters), then have to quit and clean up the resulting mess with SimPE!

I might even take out nostrayrespawn briefly. I did grow up before mandatory leash and license laws, so we always had a few animals wandering around that we couldn't tell if they were wandering pets or homeless...

[Zirconia Wolf]

Don't know if I could stand playing with "re-spawing" strays or not. If there weren't such a high default number of them (like maybe 5 or 6) I may have tried it though.

I wouldn't mind if it was just the owned pets that wandered by (like they could in Sims 1) from time to time...it's just the "abandoned" thing that gets my hackles up!

Speaking of default numbers; is there an "upper limit" to what the game will self generate in the way of Townies & Downtownies, & if so what is it? I know something has been going on- as my numbers for Pleasantview have climbed by a few Sims & I haven't had any births recently- & I want to know how close of an eye I need to keep on my game.

The only "no regenerate" hack I have right now (aside from the "service" NPC anti-redundancy one) is the one for the pets. I'm just wondering how many Townies & Downtownies (or even Dormies for that matter) I can expect to see.

On the subject of SimPE; do you think it would be safe to use it (eventhough it thinks it's out of date with H&M) to remove some of those un-met Townies/Downtownies? I really want to weed out as many of the old Maxis-mades as I can!

**EDITED TO ADD**

I almost forgot: now that I have totally emptied the default files, will this effect me having Grand Vampires show up?

[Miros1]

MikeD said he had a vamp show up on a downtown lot with all the default Maxis-made Sims removed, so I guess if the vamp is "supposed to be there," it will spawn. There's a 15% default chance of a vamp on a downtown lot, with hacks for up to 75%.

I'm pretty sure I have "nostrayrespawn" in -- but I keep getting more strays on downtown lots. Of course, my Sim did adopt one! Then he married the Garden Club lady and had a baby...

[Zirconia Wolf]

Oh gee; I thought I would be- eventually- "stray free" with nostraysrespawn in! So even after I get all the homeless critters moved in, the game will still make more, eh???

@#$%!!!!!! (I guess that's what SimPE is for...once I can use it again, that is! )

I am hoping to make (re-make) some of my "pure custom" hoods later today. It will be nice to know that they will all have brand new Dormies, Townies & Downtownies to play with!

[Miros1]

I'd rather zip up the premade strays and play once without no stray respawn. I did this when I installed GL and decided to try a new hood with custom content disabled (including nostrayrespawn).

I'm looking at my files and just a few strays were made that way... Apparently, the "new" strays I thought I was seeing were actually created in that first session. I'm checking with SimPE now...

Yes, my 15 strays were all created in the first session. Their files are numbered 1-15. What threw me off was that the two wolves were created after baby Magnolia was born, plus a large white dog also in the Service NPC family (not a wolf, his eyes don't glow at night). I'm thinking he might have happened from a visit to the dog park.

So Ezekiel was never "replaced;" his favorite territory, Club Dante, was simply taken over by other strays.

[Greg]

Why are game-generated strays bad?

[Zirconia Wolf]

Originally Posted by Greg

Why are game-generated strays bad?

For me the biggest problem lies with their Maxian personalities: many of them seem pre-disposed to serious agression toward Sims & other pets. This can be pretty easy to fix if you manage to adopt one (which is very tricky without cheating) with InSim, but any "un-owned" pets will still wander by to stir up trouble. (Sim PE isn't an option for me right now since I stupidly installed H&M Fashions.)

Also, the "default" Maxis strays number something like 25 strong at first, which seems like over kill to me. (15 sounds more "do-able".)

I am currently dealing with a bizare rash of crashouts linked to 6 of the pre-made lots in Downtown right now, so I won't be able to try Miros's "zip-n-generate" suggestion for now.

(Will post my problem on another thread so as not to hijack this one more than usual...)

[Miros1]

I've had quite a few repeat visitors with 15 strays -- that's how Patrick managed to adopt Ezekiel!

[Zirconia Wolf]

If I can get my game back on track, I'm gonna have to give the zip option at try.

I would be nice not to always have to resort to InSim to let a Sim adopt a pet!

Too bad there isn't a way I can keep Cyd, Porthos, Danny & Sarah but still lose the defualt strays...

[Miros1]

Let me sort through the G002 folder and see if I can figure out which 4 to keep...

[Zirconia Wolf]

Isn't Cyd & the gang in the P001 folder with the rest of the pets families?


**EDITED TO ADD**

Just outta total morbid curiosity, if I did do a clean install, what would happen in the Pleasantview/Strangetown/Veronaville/Riverblossom Hills hoods if I installed my default templetes & zipped up the files for the Dormies/Townies/Downtownies before I entered any of those hoods?

I don't want to wipe the "in game" famlies, just the NPC ones!

[Miros1]

Duh, yeah, P001. Lol, you want me to go through N001 too! Let me see who is in which file....

[Zirconia Wolf]

Getting (slightly) off subject just for a moment to ask if anyone knows the ball-park maximum number of charcters that a hood can have safely?

I'm assuming it's pretty high, but with all the panic about the BV NPC glitch, now I'm not so sure...

(It will be sooooo nice to have SimPE updated, so when I am finally able to install it I have an easy way to remove any offending NPCs! )

**EDITED TO ADD**

Since it's looking like a re-install (#$%@!) is in my not-so-far future, let me run my current game plan by someone who knows what they're doing!

- Install everything up to the (patched) Pets EP.
- Boot up game without any custom content.
- Open up Pleasantview & give it: Sim State University, Bluewater Village & Downtown.
- Open up Strangetown & give it: La Fiesta Tech, but nothing else.
- Open Up Veronaville & give it: Academie Le Tour, but nothing else.
- Take a moment to get through (to my satisfaction) some of the pre-scrpted crap.
- Place all the SimBin Sims (including UNI Sims) & occupied lots.
- Package up (some of) the College/NL community lots.
- Duck out & use Clean Installer to make safe copies of the lots I packaged.
- Add my set of default name & face replacements.
- Launch game so I can tell it to okay custom content.
- Leave game & zip/empty the folders for the Dormies, Townies & Downtownies.
- Go back in to give Strangetown & Veronaville custom NL & OFB hoods with some of the clean lots.
- Add (patched) Seasons to the mix.
- Launch game, load Riverblossom Hills, place SimBin famlies & give it custom NL, OFB & UNI hoods.
- Get out & clean up the relevent character folders, including whatever stuff got added in the N001 one.
- Update my default replacement files to include the PlantSim templetes.
- Go back & load up Pleasantview, etc. so they all have been "seasoned".
- Start adding my custom content back in stages, to see if I can prevent/cure whatever caused my problems with the NL lots.
- Change the core package files to Read Only.

What I am hoping for is that this will let the pre-mades get placed but still give me less NPC repeting between hoods. Since I will then be able to use SimPE again, I could weed out any (un-met) repetes that way. I will just leave the P001 file (for Cyd & the gang) & controll the strays via nostraysrespawn & SimPE if needed. Also- aside from antiredundancy- the nostayrespan will be the only "spawn stopper" I have.

[Miros1]

As long as you don't install packed lots with the Maxis installer and end up with "half Sims" for all of their acquaintences, you should be safe -- I've heard of people having thousands of Sims.

Which NPC glitch are you talking about? I've only heard of the horrid lagginess and the stuck sandcastles (fix available on the InTeen board).