Inventing

[Leto85]

Welcome to the Inventing topic, which will cover the new skill Inventing from Ambitions. I am about to gather information about the time machine in The Sims 3 Ambitions, but besides that there are a lot of more inventions that can be made in-game. And I wouldn't be surprised if some inventions can work together or are compatible. That's why I have called this topic Inventing, instead of Time Machine. Please put your inventing discoveries here.

A few tips for your inventing sims: Combine inventing with logic and handiness and go up the scientific ladder to get a sim who is not only smart, but also handy in upgrading his or her own inventions and making a scientific experiment on it.

[dannyr783]

Inventing is not really what it is lived up to be  

The problem with it is that there are tons of widgets/toys that serve little use, but only 4 (and simbot) "big" inventions that serve a purpose.

The first is the floor hygienator which gives moodlets like "minty breath" or "nauseous" when walked over. IT can give both good and bad moodlets. IT boosts hygiene by about 10% of the bar when walked upon.

The second is the harvester, which collects collectables/harvestables/spills/messes around you.

The 3rd is the miner, which can be used to make holes to explore, and uncover gems/metal/meteorites.

And then there is the time machine, which going into results in +25 moodlet or -25 moodlet for 4 hours, and sometimes some simoleons, a rare book, or other trinket. You can also return with a child, or as a supernatural life form.

[Leto85]

Interesting info dannyr783!
But what do you mean with supernatural lifeform? A secret way of becoming a superhero, having powers or something like that?

[dannyr783]

I mean mummy, or ghost.

[Leto85]

I mean mummy, or ghost.

Ah of course. By changing the past he changes his history? Just another side effect of timetraveling.

[Pam]

But what do you mean with supernatural lifeform? A secret way of becoming a superhero, having powers or something like that?

Haha!  Leto, you're just not going to get superheroes in Ambitions. Although you're giving it a valiant effort! 

[enigma1717]

Well, I also got a mechanical mysterious Mr. Gnome, but it wasn't an invention, it was something that I created I suppose accidentally while mass producing another widget. It is just the the normal one but with a different model. I couldn't remake it.

[Leto85]

But what do you mean with supernatural lifeform? A secret way of becoming a superhero, having powers or something like that?

Haha!  Leto, you're just not going to get superheroes in Ambitions. Although you're giving it a valiant effort! 

Hehe, I was secretly still hoping though. :$

[The Illuminator]

You really like time travelling and superheroes, don't you, Leto!

[Leto85]

You really like time travelling and superheroes, don't you, Leto!

I can't and will not deny that! But well, I am a huge fan of the old Lois and Clark adventures. And time traveling is something that I have experienced myself, in a way. Not in the way of I travels back in time, experienced a adventure and came back after, but you know that for some people that have lain in a coma it may looks like they have skipped a lot of time when they woke up.
I think that is partly the reason why I am highly interested in time traveling.

[samoht04]

So the new Gnome is a mechanical robot...   

I am a huge fan of the old Lois and Clark adventures

Off Topic: There is a new series called Smallville with Clark and Lois in. 

[Esther1981]

I really love the harvester, miner and simbot! When I first installed it, I got the robot LTRP then I invented one and it was my "daughter" then she invented one who is her "daughter" so my sim has 3 robots! I have 2 of them constantly mining! The neighbors don't like you mining at night, but I fixed that problem. I surrounded the entire yard with fence and locked the gate to everyone but my household. Samoht04 that's not new is it? I don't watch it but I've heard of it before!

[MomOfMany]

No it's not new been on a couple of years now. How and where do you mine at? Or ever harvest? I haven't seen that yet.

[Leto85]

So the new Gnome is a mechanical robot...  

Nice, than we can add that to the gnome collection.

I am a huge fan of the old Lois and Clark adventures

Off Topic: There is a new series called Smallville with Clark and Lois in.  

I know. Thanks for letting me know. But in that series there are different players now.

[Esther1981]

You invent the miner and harvester. Than put the mines anywhere, I even mined at city hall lol The harvester just is a much faster way of harvesting your garden, or even for picking up old newspapers, and trash. Maybe you can do more than that with it too, but those are the thing I know you can do!

[MomOfMany]

Oh thanks I will have to try that out later. I hadn't gotten very far in inventing yet.

[enigma1717]

I didn't know you could use the miner on other lots! Shucks, I've just been digging holes in one spot then filling the hole then re-digging it. I could have been making a strip mine out of that little town   Anyone else notice that you can "travel" through the holes you make sometimes? This would make putting holes on far off lots kind of a cool short cut if you really can drill on those lots. I'll also have to remember the fence thing! All my neighbors hated myself and my little simbot boy  

Also, not sure if it was mentioned anywhere else but since I just figured it out and I was confused, I'll just say that the Simbot is a opportunity that you get when you max inventing, it is a short chain with some pain ingredients that either will require time and effort on your part or possible another sim with the related skills. I'm not sure if the recipe changes or not, but I needed palladium, scrap, a heart-shaped pink diamond, and life fruit.

And boooooy, am I getting sick of gnomes. Between mining and inventing, my house is CRAWLING with mysterious mr. gnomes and mechanical ones, too. Around midnight or one o'clock, it is like musical chairs.

Edit: Pbbth, just noticed we got a new invention guide on the front page that does say that the recipe is the same for the simbot, and how to get it. So, ignore all my confusion, heh.

[Crise]

Regarding the inventing guide on the site... there it says this about the simbot: "It takes 1 palladium, 1 life fruit, 1 heart cut pink diamond and 100 scrap"

That is correct but I could swear that I needed 10 life fruits (at least for the opportunity chain you need to do, didn't really fancy making more than one of those).

[John Allen]

Since progression is based on sales made for this profession, thought it might be helpful to know the best per hour widgets and toys to build.  These numbers are without the 40% boost from master inventor.  Large inventions sell for more per, but on an hourly basis they make a lot less than widgets and toys, so I left them off.

They are also without a comparison too the Salesperson trait, which my first sim had, but not the current one.  Once I get a comparison I'll add that- but i did notice a good difference in consignment sales and the consign something wish comes up quite a bit-adding points for LTR's.

Can't really paste the whole spreadsheet I made, so i needed to cut it back quite a bit. Originally it had more info.    

Scrap cost is based on buying it through the inventors workbench.
                     

Level, Invention, Sell Price,# per hour, hourly sell price, Scrap Cost, hourly net,
               

1 Drinking Llama,    $20.00,    6,      $120.00,      $66         $54.00    
               
1 Smasher             $23.0       8      $184.00      $88         $96.00
               
2 Dog Toy    $27.00    1        $270.00     $110         $160.00
               
2 Rotational Pull     $29.00     7       $203.00      $77         $126.00
               
3 Cow toy             $37.0       9      $333.00      $99         $234.00
               
3 Tenta Wind Up   $53.00     6       $318.00      $66         $252.00
               
4 Whale Toy   $52.00     9       $468.00      $99         $369.00
               
5 Loc Stat Test     $138.00    5       $690.00      $55         $635.00
               
6 Floating Duck   $165.00    4.5      $742.50     $49.5         $693.00
               
6 Robot Toy   $86.00     9        $774.00     $99         $675.00
               
7 Flying Fighters   $172.00    5.5      $946.00    $60.5         $885.00
                  
   

                     

[Metropolis Man]

John — thank you SOOO much for doing this. I was thinking it was Robot Toys after looking at Carl's numbers. But, it's Flying Fighters, eh? You just saved me a bunch of work. I think I mentioned I was going to pen the da Vinci LTW article for the Guide soon and the angle I'm taking is one of pure money making. So, I wanted to know what the best money maker was. Unfortunately, it looks like Inventing still can't hold a candle to Painting. Not sure on Sculpting yet. Haven't touched that one.

[John Allen]

John — thank you SOOO much for doing this. I was thinking it was Robot Toys after looking at Carl's numbers. But, it's Flying Fighters, eh? You just saved me a bunch of work. I think I mentioned I was going to pen the da Vinci LTW article for the Guide soon and the angle I'm taking is one of pure money making. So, I wanted to know what the best money maker was. Unfortunately, it looks like Inventing still can't hold a candle to Painting. Not sure on Sculpting yet. Haven't touched that one.

No problem, Metroplis Man.  and thanks for acknowledging the post. 


So Painting does better?  Never crunched the numbers but on on one sim I could knock out a large painting in a few hours, and they sold for over 3k a piece, but I never really focused on it to much, since it was an NPC wife to one of my early sims.  Any idea how it breaks down per hour?


Sculpting I haven't done much with, since i focused on the thrill of inventing and blowing things up.  But out of 2 items sculpted, both were chairs and the first sold for about 115 or so if i remember correctly.  Not sure how long it took, but definitely a few game hours.  Guessing hourly was maybe around 40 at level 1.  Still better than rabbit hole jobs at that level though.

[Metropolis Man]

I think Painting is definitely better per hour than Inventing. I haven't crunched the numbers yet since i haven't gotten too far into it, but I'm pretty sure small sized canvas is the way to go based on sheer volume output.

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EDIT: Right after I posted I remembered this thread. $862/hour is what I came up with for Painting so it very well may be on par with that rate that you found for making the Flying Fighters. Like you, I have no clue on Sculpting yet. Looking forward to diving into that skill.

[Leto85]

But what do you mean with supernatural lifeform? A secret way of becoming a superhero, having powers or something like that?

Haha!  Leto, you're just not going to get superheroes in Ambitions. Although you're giving it a valiant effort! 

Just wait untill you are at level 10 of the firefighter career. Maybe, just maybe...

[Carl]

Thanks John Allen. I'm going to put maxed out stats in the scrap column to help with that. Note it gets a little better for the robot toy with mastery and lifetime rewards, as you can make the cheap one for just 1 scrap and it still sells for 86. But yeah, fighters still win by about a hundred at max. Heck, I think I need to add some more there overall.

[Leto85]

You can invent everything while on vacation, which is handy for skilling because neither work nor school get in the way there, but robots cannot be invented, nor can they join your family through a LTR.
They can't probably not on vacation to, but that is something that yet has to be confirmed.