Flight of the Starship Crescent Wrench: the Upgrade Quadrant

[Alexandria_]

I found that if a toilet needed fixing before it could be upgraded, leave it and go upgrade something else (if time permitted), then come back to it the next day as things that break on public lots tend to mend themselves overnight.

I did this too - everything resets at 3am sims time, so if you left a broken toilet (or any broken object) until 3am, it would automatically repair saving you work.

[malteser60]

I wish I had done a trial run first as I could have done a few things different from the start. Firstly I had them stay at the firestation, then smacked myself in the head as I realised I had enough simoleans to buy them the best beds on the lot, plus toilet cubicles and showers. This was for the SV part as once I went abroad I bought lots of shower in a can and high quality food.

I must admit I did not think of the loner and slob trait. Well, I thought of loner, but I thought that they might get the negative moodlet just by being together in the group of four. However I did work on them getting happiness points without taking up any extra time so that I could buy them them some rewards like steel bladder and jetsetter for one. I also found over-emotional a good trait too.

Although I didn't get a great score there was one trick that I found worked well, which was to coordinate them all so that I didn't waste time flicking between them all to find out if one of them has finished the upgrade. So I would get them all to upgrade the same location together so I could see exactly when one would finish, then pause the game and transport them to the next upgrade. I found if I didn't keep an eye on them and one finished the upgrade, and queued up an indendent action I wasted time having to stop that action, transport them back to where they were, and to queue another upgrade.

[Metropolis Man]

Sunday night as this challenge was winding down, winnow posted her results. I saw them and simply did not believe my eyes at the time. I did some testing with characters with testingcheats on and static needs and her posted times actually beat my times with cheats on. I felt I had a clear cut example of cheating staring at me plain as day and I banned her. But, I went about this in the wrong way and did not originally allow her to defend herself. She emailed me explaining the whole Tinkering process and detailed her whole strategy. I then did further testing and confirmed everything. I profusely apologized, immediately lifted the ban, and I thought life could carry on as usual. Unfortunately the last few days have not been easy. winnow went to Carl and Pam over this and wants a public apology.

So, here it is. I'm sorry, winnow. I apologized to you numerous times already, but if you feel it needs to be public, so be it. Everyone makes mistakes, and I made a biggie. It won't happen again I assure you.

[Carl]

Thank you, Tom. It is rough on a person to admit a mistake publicly. I can't imagine you being called to do any more than admit to all of your participants that you goofed. Change was desired from all of this, and it has happened. Everyone will be more cautious with bans, and I am able to be contacted should anyone be banned undeserved in the future. My email is off the home page where the average person should be able to find it. And now, you've publicly stated you made a mistake.

Case closed. I've got writing to do.

[TheChronicR]

Oh my, Metro, so much trouble.  I thought Winnow's times were normal, just my strategy was bad. And yeah, tinkering does speed up things up much. I found that out only at the end of the challenge... I hope that doesn't keep her from participating in future challenges. I really liked her tips in the Garden of Eatin' challenge thread. Would be pity if she did that because of such a misunderstanding.

[winnow]

Hi, Just to clarify a bit. I wanted people to know what had happened so that they'd understand why I wasn't comfortable posting here anymore. None of the administrators wanted to do that and I wasn't comfortable here at all until that happened. I'm shaking now and I'll probably never be comfortable here but at least now I hope that people understand why. Thank you for finally letting them know, Tom. I know that must have been difficult to do and I appreciate it.

[Metropolis Man]

You're welcome, winnow. I'm glad we can just put this behind us and move forward. I know players are itching to hear all about your strategy for your Hall of Fame entry so you can PM me the details in the next day or two — if that works for your schedule. Thanks, winnow. 

[winnow]

You're welcome, winnow. I'm glad we can just put this behind us and move forward. I know players are itching to hear all about your strategy for your Hall of Fame entry so you can PM me the details in the next day or two — if that works for your schedule. Thanks, winnow.  

Tom, I am not at all comfortable here. I'm much more upset about the pressure to keep this a secret and not let people here know what had happened than I am about the ban. That's really hard on me. It's adversely affected my health in pretty substantial ways. I'll have to see how things go. But I do appreciate you telling people what happened. Thank you.

[Metropolis Man]

That's fine, winnow. Just PM me if you'd like to do the interview. If not, no big deal.

[Chuckles_82]

I know this challenge is finished, but I was wondering if anyone noticed that the fire alarm/s and the woo woo 4000 weren't included in the upgrades for the fire station, and if they were noticed, why weren't they included? I have started a trial-run of this challenge for my own satisfaction (I don't need to post results, unless anyone is interested when I complete it, but it's good to have the results here as a comparison). It's quite a lot of fun! I downloaded some startrek shirts from a well known resource and made Jordi, Riker, DATA and Seven (I know Seven wasn't in NG, but I saw the post of some of the people someone else had made, and she is pretty).

[ClayMask]

I know this challenge is finished, but I was wondering if anyone noticed that the fire alarm/s and the woo woo 4000 weren't included in the upgrades for the fire station, and if they were noticed, why weren't they included? I have started a trial-run of this challenge for my own satisfaction (I don't need to post results, unless anyone is interested when I complete it, but it's good to have the results here as a comparison). It's quite a lot of fun! I downloaded some startrek shirts from a well known resource and made Jordi, Riker, DATA and Seven (I know Seven wasn't in NG, but I saw the post of some of the people someone else had made, and she is pretty).

I don't think that you can upgrade those things unless you're in the firefighter profession.

[Chuckles_82]

That's true, but it's very easy to join for just a few hours while you upgrade. It doesn't seem to be the same as doing tombs, since you are already in the firestation for everything else. Either way I finished it without doing them, with an average score. I didn't bother tinkering my first time through. I gave it a go the second time, but got half way through before deciding that it wasn't speeding things up overall. It may have shaved off a few hours for lvls 2 and 3 until I could upgrade, but that's it. I could have shaved more time off by giving them the tinkering wish so that they got more reward points for completing handy wishes, thus getting prepared traveller earlier, and avoiding wasting the 8hrs at the beginning of the second trip to China. It got too tedious when I started running into the travel bug (game lagging) earlier and earlier though.

Yay for my first ever challenge finished!!!