Proposed Challenges

[kat]

I like that idea Pam, good way of working in different elements whilst the focus being more family friendly.

[samoht04]

This is a very rough idea, but I thought I'd throw it out there.  There are members who specifically want a challenge that involves romance, having babies, and raising a family, plus adding some of the World Adventures excitement.  The concern has been that deliberately seeking out multiple unwed fathers would feel less than moral.  I thought perhaps the rules could include having the Surrounded by Family Lifetime Wish and requiring that the non-playable parents have to come from the three foreign locations.  For example, you play a female Sim and she goes to China, meets and marries a local, and gets pregnant.  She then has to break up with the local and find another husband in Egypt.  Again marry and get pregnant.  And so on until the Lifetime Wish is achieved.  Ultimately, your Sim would have at least five children and they would be of mixed heritage from China, Egypt, and France.  The scoring could be done a number of ways, but I haven't gotten that far yet.

If anyone has some ideas about how this could work, I'd love to hear them!

THis is a good idea! you could do something like this for scoring

-1 point for every week it takes
+3 point if the sim gets the target sim in 1 day
+2 if in 2 days
+1 if in 3 days
-1 point if it takes mor ethan one trip
+1 point for each child born (twins and triplets count as one)
+5 points if all children are single births
+1 for having a good pregnancy
-1 for having a bad pregnancy
+1 for every skill point earnt (children)
+(job level eg. Music 4) for your parent sims level in their career.
+1 every 10000 your sim has
+1 every 10000 youer sims lot is worth (furnished)
+2 when a child becomes A+ (can only be acheived once by each child)
-5 if social worker appears
-2 if Repoman comes

Again these are just some ideas, feel free to pick some out or get rid of some! 

[Metropolis Man]

This is a very rough idea, but I thought I'd throw it out there.  There are members who specifically want a challenge that involves romance, having babies, and raising a family, plus adding some of the World Adventures excitement.  The concern has been that deliberately seeking out multiple unwed fathers would feel less than moral.  I thought perhaps the rules could include having the Surrounded by Family Lifetime Wish and requiring that the non-playable parents have to come from the three foreign locations.  For example, you play a female Sim and she goes to China, meets and marries a local, and gets pregnant.  She then has to break up with the local and find another husband in Egypt.  Again marry and get pregnant.  And so on until the Lifetime Wish is achieved.  Ultimately, your Sim would have at least five children and they would be of mixed heritage from China, Egypt, and France.  The scoring could be done a number of ways, but I haven't gotten that far yet.

If anyone has some ideas about how this could work, I'd love to hear them!

THis is a good idea! you could do something like this for scoring

-1 point for every week it takes
+3 point if the sim gets the target sim in 1 day
+2 if in 2 days
+1 if in 3 days
-1 point if it takes mor ethan one trip
+1 point for each child born (twins and triplets count as one)
+5 points if all children are single births
+1 for having a good pregnancy
-1 for having a bad pregnancy
+1 for every skill point earnt (children)
+(job level eg. Music 4) for your parent sims level in their career.
+1 every 10000 your sim has
+1 every 10000 youer sims lot is worth (furnished)
+2 when a child becomes A+ (can only be acheived once by each child)
-5 if social worker appears
-2 if Repoman comes

Again these are just some ideas, feel free to pick some out or get rid of some! 

I'll give it some thought, Pam. And no offense samoht04, but that long list of scoring ideas is just too much for my tastes. It needs to be simpler.

[samoht04]

None Taken Metro, like i said they were just some ideas.

[Metropolis Man]

None Taken Metro, like i said they were just some ideas.

Good. And I like some of them.

My idea at the moment for a Baby Boomer II kind of tourney is the Rock Star to SBF transition I mentioned up above a few posts. You would play a Rock Star and then as soon as they would hit Rock Star status they would embark on 3 tours of the WA locations. During the first 2 stops there may be some Woo Hoo and romance, but I honestly don't want to delve into multiple marriages, etc. So, on the final leg of the world tour — whatever city the player chooses — that's the spot where the Rock Star decides to settle down and raise a large family.

EDIT: I guess I should clarify — the final World Tour location is where the Rock Star would choose a husband/wife and return to Sunset Valley/Riverview to raise the large family.

EDIT 2: I just added a 3rd challenge to the schedule, the Handiness World Championships. Pam, I'd like some type of Baby Boomer II / SBF Lifetime Wish challenge to be 4th on the schedule. You and I can work out the details.

[Metropolis Man]

Horkslair, thank you for creating this idea. But, it's just a proposal at this point, that's why I moved it to the Proposed Challenges section. New threads are only created for tournaments that are on the schedule with official dates.

EDIT: This is similar to Eftyen's Happy Hobo idea. Your idea and that one could probably be combined.

[Eftyen]

interesting, hork. 

yes, it's a lot like my "happy hobo" proposal, and yes, they should probably be combined to make something that is accessible to the largest number of players. 

the only points in your rules that i disagree with are...

1A (No Begging/Tips) - both begging and street performances for tips are very realistic sources of income for a jobless person, and we're all on the honor system here, anyway, so the rules can stipulate that any song cued for performance must be fully performed (defeating the exploit);

and 9 (Town Square restriction) - i believe all parks should count as public property and thus they are fair game both for harvesting and camping.

metro, can you estimate how much less effective of a "bottomless ATM" guitar playing would be, if you had to fully play a song every time you cued it for performance?

[Metropolis Man]

metro, can you estimate how much less effective of a "bottomless ATM" guitar playing would be, if you had to fully play a song every time you cued it for performance?

That's a toughie. I've always used the exploit and cut off songs right away. Well, let's throw some numbers. Let's just say it takes a normal song 2 Sim hours to Perform. When I cue up the same song and cancel quickly it eats up only about 15 minutes of game time. So, a full performance is 8 times in length. But, that doesn't necessarily mean 8X the tips. From what I've learned there seems to be a point of diminishing returns. Money gained from 1 - 500 performances affects tip size more than 501-1000. That's my gut feeling.

So, the bottom line is I really can't give you a solid answer on requiring someone to have their guitar player play full performances. I will tell you this — the next time I host a challenge and money is a scoring component, that stipulation will be in the rules. Count on it.

--------

Horkslair and Eftyen — I am asking a favor from the two of you. I would like you both to PM with each other and come up with a combined challenge incorporating both the Happy Hobo and Off the Grid elements. You might even give it a working title of The Happy Hobo Goes Off the Grid. Or whatever you want.

I was talking to Pam today about the importance of still hosting vanilla events because not everyone has World Adventures. I think in 3 or 4 months most players will, but we still need quality challenges that are Sunset Valley-only. Your event seems a perfect candidate and I'd like to schedule it for when the handiness tournament is currently scheduled. That way, there will be 2 WA tourneys in a row — Perfectly Happy and then the nectar one, then your event which will be Sunset Valley only. So, at least there will be a little balance. Obviously players who have WA should be able to participate as well, but your ruleset needs to be structured such that the expansion provides no benefit to the player.

Let me know what you guys think, and please PM me the ruleset when you think it's done.

[samoht04]

metro, can you estimate how much less effective of a "bottomless ATM" guitar playing would be, if you had to fully play a song every time you cued it for performance?

That's a toughie. I've always used the exploit and cut off songs right away. Well, let's throw some numbers. Let's just say it takes a normal song 2 Sim hours to Perform. When I cue up the same song and cancel quickly it eats up only about 15 minutes of game time. So, a full performance is 8 times in length. But, that doesn't necessarily mean 8X the tips. From what I've learned there seems to be a point of diminishing returns. Money gained from 1 - 500 performances affects tip size more than 501-1000. That's my gut feeling.

So, the bottom line is I really can't give you a solid answer on requiring someone to have their guitar player play full performances. I will tell you this — the next time I host a challenge and money is a scoring component, that stipulation will be in the rules. Count on it.

What if you just say, you can only play for so many hours a day?

[Metropolis Man]

'GOOD' Sleep is a difficult proposition. Allowing a level 2 or level 3 tent from World Adventures makes a good nights sleep a non-issue...

As I mentioned in another post, this tournament needs to be vanilla only.

EDIT: I just reread the pup tent part of the rules. That seems to be an integral part of the overall feel to a homeless kind of an event. But, it's also pretty unrealistic to expect a new homeless character to have the resources be able to travel at all. Allowing the purchase of the cheapest bed in the game might be a simple solution.

Sorry if this all sounds very particular in it's execution.  As I said in my original post, I am not too concerned with setting up any specific 'competition' as I fully believe that competition shuts down the free flow of information instead of encouraging it's spread as I believe is the intent of our gracious web-hosts.

Well, I'm never going to hold someone's hand while I am actively engaged in a tournament and tell them everything I know. Why would I do that? However, I've written lots of articles on the Guide. Carl and Pam have written mucho articles on the Guide for tips. That's what the articles are there for. But, the atmosphere in a particular tournament thread needs to be a little more hush-hush just by nature. And even there, I don't mind throwing out a general obvious tip to a newbie here and there.

[Metropolis Man]

I'm glad I did some serious testing on serving nectar at lots of parties before the next challenge started. It's too much of an unknown commodity for me to have players score it. It's wildly irregular. I had some parties where 10 people would show up and several of them grabbed nectar. I had another party where absolutely no one took nectar. If nothing is going on there seemed to be a slight connection to whether or not someone might drink nectar. But, if someone was playing guitar and grabbing everyone's attention or if everyone was dancing, then there was little chance of nectar drinking. So, I found myself getting very frustrated and canceling all the fun everyone was having just to get them to drink nectar. At that point I realized it was stupid and would not be scored in the challenge.

So, it's just going to be an all out war on money made from selling nectar. It will certainly simplify the rules.

[Twinmum]

Just an idea for a possible future challenge. I read the idea of the nicest lot, but was trying to think of something that could be measured on a numerical system. So what about something like what I am calling The Rose Red challenge in my mind.

LOL, now that I actually try and flesh out a few details here, it seems pretty flimsy, but maybe someone could throw in a few suggestions.
Basically, you just keep building and adding to your house over a lifetime with the goal of having the most valuable house

A few things would need to be addressed - possibly everyone starting on the same lot. Moving would be out of the question of course. And the final value would have to be unfurnished to stop people just filling up their house with expensive items.

The idea of Rose Red comes from a Stephen King story of the same name where Ellen Rimbaurer continually had additions made to her house until the day she died. Ellen didn't work, but her husband was a businessman, so maybe it could be that we need to start with a couple but only one of them ever works.

Anyway, it's just an idea... thoughts anyone?

Norma

[Metropolis Man]

I really like that idea, Twinmum. I've kicked around Lot Value ideas in my head as well. It may be interesting to also incorporate square footage. I read on another site that 1 tile basically equals 9 square feet, so it really would not be too hard to figure out. Then again, with a possible 4 floors down and five floors up, there would be lots of room for error. Hmmmm....on second thought.  Simpler is always better, right?

There's a lot on my plate right now, but I like this idea. It's never been done on a really big scale. Painters would rock with this kind of tourney — especially if lots of Masterpieces could be passed down one generation. I'm adding it to the first post list. Pull my chain in a couple months when I'll be scheduling more events.

[Eftyen]

i just read up on the "irreversible transfigurification" option on the display tables.  HOLY CRAP!

how about a challenge where your sim becomes the Universal Ultimate Collector?

you would have to accumulate every collection of relics, every cut of every gemstone (including large/small sizes), large/small ingots of every metal, every kind of meteor (not Huge - finding that many huge meteors would take FOREVER!), fulfill the Perfect Aquarium wish (whether it's your Sim's wish or not), and have a complete perfect garden of every plant, started from FOUND SEEDS ONLY.

i haven't completely thought out the scale of this challenge, but it would be HUGE.  it might be worth it to do this even at a gemstones-only level.

here's the link i found for transfigurification.  see what i mean about the multiple cuts/sizes that would be involved...
http://www.modthesims.info/wiki.php?title=Game_Help:Sims_3_Transfiguration

------

Another idea: what about a complete clear of WA content?

make a sim whose life wish is one of the WA wishes, and spend as little time at "home" as possible.  then go clear all tombs, construct tomb objects in (one of) your vacation home(s) (sarcophagus of the kings, etc.).  have a wine cellar in France and a martial arts studio in China and charm the snake on your front porch in Egypt.  call it the "Supreme World Traveler" challenge, or somesuch. 

the only actions allowable in your "home" town would be recreational or necessities (e.g. reading, watching tv, eating, etc).
i would suggest allowing "passive" skill actions (like reading skill books) at "home" and restrict active skill actions (like gardening) to your home(s) away from home.

can someone take a more thorough look at the WA content to make a reasonably "comprehensive" list of related achievements?

[Metropolis Man]

Yeah, I want to do some kind of collector's tourney. That's already on the list, but I think it's kind of vague. Also, please delete your Ultimate World Adventures post in the tourney thread and edit your above post with that info. Thanks.

[Pam]

here's the link i found for transfigurification.  see what i mean about the multiple cuts/sizes that would be involved...
http://www.modthesims.info/wiki.php?title=Game_Help:Sims_3_Transfiguration

Carl also did a lot of research on this and has a page for it in the guide:  http://www.carls-sims-3-guide.com/skills/collecting/worldadventures/transfiguration.php

[Eftyen]

sorry metro... don't remember what i posted where...

maybe you should PM me with an Idiot's Guide to what you're referring to?

[Metropolis Man]

sorry metro... don't remember what i posted where...

maybe you should PM me with an Idiot's Guide to what you're referring to?

I took care of it.

[sherlockholmes]

Hey all. I had a "happy hobo idea" but a little different from what the previous posters have written. Horkslair's is fine but I'd say its a bit too complicated. Too many restrictions. Not to say that mine isnt long, but there are much simpler rules and scoring.

So cue dramatic music

FROM RAGS TO RICHES

This is a two stage EPIC challenge. The first stage involves completing your lifetime wish, living off the land or off people (rags). Once this is complete, your goal is to become a parter in every business in the city (riches). This is kinda a cross between legacy, trump, and hobo challenges.


Getting started:
Create a young adult sim. Any traits, any lifetime wish. Story progression on or off.
this is a long challenge. therefore TURN AGING OFF
Purchase 15 summerhill road.
use testingcheatsenabled on, then buydebug. Go to the misc. and buy a pup tent. then do testingcheatsenabled off.

Stage 1 : Hobo
God made another bet with the devil. This time, the devil said that happiness comes strictly from material possessions. God however, was sure that people could be happy without having to purchase anything. So he made you, a hobo, and strictly kept you from buying anything. In fact he made life very uncomfortable for you. Now God and the Devil watch to see if happiness can truly exist, when all you have is nothing.

The Rulez:

You cannot enter buy mode, build mode, or edit town.
exception: you may buy a guitar and/or fishtanks.
No cheats.
Playing guitar for tips is fine, but you may not perform songs to make zillions of $. Songs performed must be 0.

No sleepovers, spouses, or move-ins. 15 summerhill road must be your permanent home.
Also no traveling. All must be done in your base city, whether it is sunset valley or riverview.
Everything else is fair game. and by everything I really do mean everything- stealing, jobs, investing, mooching, gardening, library, hacking, skill books, classes, hacking, playing guitar for tips- Its all open. pretty much anything you can do without entering buy mode, build mode, or editing the town.

You may invite yourself over and sleep but you may not officially sleepover.

Lifetime rewards are also all fair game, other than moodlet manager and mid-life crisis.

The goal of this stage is to fulfill your lifetime wish. Simple as that. It may be any lifetime wish that is completable without breaking any rules mentioned above. As soon as it is fulfilled, you enter stage two of the challenge.

Stage two: Riches
By now, your Sim has managed to not only survive, but thrive, with nothing. God is very pleased with you, as your happiness is apparent. The devil sulks and retreats to the darkest depths of hell.
Now God has decided to lift the curse upon you that prevented you from having anything. However, he marks you as a person of God, and prevents you from having children, as your devotion must be to God alone. You may, however, marry (but no divorcing). Also, he wishes that you remain at 15 summerhill road, as that place is now a holy site.
Warren Buffet, the rich investor, hears about your exploits. God sees a saint. He sees a hardworking, determined person. He calls you up. He has a business proposition. He is planning on investing in your city. However, he needs to have someone on the ground to become acquainted with the economy of the city. So he asks that you become partners with every business in town. In return, he says you may keep all the money that is gained from the investment, and he will make you a senior executive of Berkshire Hathaway. Delighted, you agree to the terms.

So begins part two of the challenge.

Rules:
Now that God has lifted the ban on material possessions, buy mode and build mode are open. Edit town is not allowed.
moving or sleepovers are also forbidden.
Performing songs is still forbidden.
No cheats or moodlet manager.
You may, however, get a marriage partner. You still can't have kids, but you can continue to work to becoming partner of all businesses.

The goal is to be a partner in every business of the city. That'll cost you 203,500 simoleans. Ya. Thats a lot.
You can use previously purchased deeds from when you were a hobo.

Ending: Congratulations. You've lived both sides of life- from surviving with nothing to relaxing with everything. Your sim has shown untold perseverance. Your saga has finished now. Having been through such trials, your sim now knows no bounds.

Scoring:
The winner of this challenge is the one who completes it within the least amount of in-game time.  Lifetime happiness, friends, simoleans and all that doesnt matter. This challenge is all about speed.

Thanks for reading. What do you guys think?

[Metropolis Man]

I like it SherlockHolmes. And welcome to the forums as well. I guess the big question is — now there's 3 similar events on the table. Do I combine them all (which you kind of already did)? I don't know. There's so much on my plate at the moment with proposed challenges I feel a bit overwhelmed.

[sherlockholmes]

Hi horks and metro. Metro, haha, I'm not so sure. I guess that's up to you. Maybe we could divide up the work by having us collaborate in groups on different types of challenges. Like everyone who wants to do a hobo-related challenge, everyone who wants to do a career related challenge, etc. Then we could maybe each send our proposals to you and whoever is setting this whole thing up picks the ones to use?

And hey horks. Thanks for the advice. I'll have to see exactly how much $$ a hacker can make, as well as how much $$ a guitar sim can make.
No jobs are excluded from the scenario. Also gardening on your home lot is ok since it does not involve entering buy mode or build mode. you can spend as much time on your home lot as you want, but you can't buy anything for it.

Also, I guess you're right about the businesses. I just didn't want it to take too long. Haha. I'm not very experienced at hardcore moneymaking, so to me 200k simoleans is so much that I think it would be tough to make that much money before you complete your lifetime wish. Should I maybe have the sim buy out all the businesses? If I proposed that, how long in both sim time and real time would that take you horks?

You see, I want the challenge to be a combo of both hobo life and efficient moneymaking. I often try the legacy challenge with multiple types of sims and they generally involve both the hobo life part and the moneymaking part.

I also reread your post about the happy hobo, and I was trying to think of ways to implement other aspects into the scoring, since I guess adding different ways could get rid of the grind of going through the same routine. what do you think?

[sherlockholmes]

Okay so I tried to make a super-rich hacker. I used testingcheatsenabled on and made his needs static. His traits were genius, comp whiz, handy, bookworm, and hates the outdoors.
On day 1, he made 1500 hacking from 9-7, with his logic lvl 2. 150 sph (simoleans per hour).
Day 2 he made 2,379 hacking from 9-7, with his logic lvl 5. 230 sph.
By day 6, he made about 3.5k with his logic lvl 9. 350 sph.
But after that:
Day 7, logic lvl 10. Hacking from 9-7. 3584 simoleans. 350 sph.
So the sph is rather comparative to set careers, but he can work for 10 hours a day. Hm....
Yeah, 3.5k daily is a lot. It would take them around 8 weeks, two days if they did that routine every single day to make enough to partner in every business, not including the return pay from the businesses themselves.
But I guess my idea for this was for the game to be made interesting by changing scenarios. Asking people to make that much money and scoring by time seems to turn it into a grind. I'm thinking of ditching the time-scoring idea. Or I may just ditch the investment idea altogether.

I guess my idea didn't turn out quite the way I was hoping. I think the reason I wanted to make a challenge like this was so I could get out of routines. But I keep trying to play the game like an rpg and I play too success-oriented - like "gotta get that promotion" "gotta max that skill" "I need to grind to make that money" etc etc.

[andthenkaylawaslike]

Hey guys! Metro... whats up?
I'm new but I joined because I have an idea.
The concept is that you would create a new household of just a young adult female. She needs the trait family oriented and maybe great kisser. The second is optional. Then, you hit the town and start flirting. Then, get into romantic interest with as many guys as possible, andn have babies with them. You try to see how many kids you can get without repeating fathers. I am starting the challenge myself. I have a girl with a new baby boy and she is pregnant, but in that stage of about to be nauseous. I will post my results. No fertility treatment, and you cant watch kids tv or listen to kids music with your toddlers because having multiples disqualifies you. If you get a random twin pregnancy, then you could kill one baby by burning it in a fire or something.

[Metropolis Man]

Hey kayla, welcome to the forums. Yeah, sounds similar to Baby Boomer with the exception of having multiple fathers instead of one couple settling down. There's so many of these "lots of babies" ideas going around. What's probably going to be scheduled soon is a mixed heritage Surrounded by Family challenge.

[Eftyen]

Hi guys.

Regarding the multiple hobo/homeless ideas, I think some sort of compromise/combo is what is called for.  My idea was a bit roughly sketched, "Off The Grid" seemed restrictive to the point of impinging on the fun factor (sorry Horks, but that's my honest opinion), and Rags To Riches" seems, if anything, to be just a tad too freeform.


Here's my idea of middle ground, which I call The Good Neighbor Challenge:


 - Buy the most expensive empty lot (either lot)

 - You can use the lot without spending any money on it (gardening is OK)

 - No purchasing of anything anywhere.  If you fish up a guitar, call yourself lucky.

 - If you DO fish up a guitar, no performances allowed EVER; playing for tips without performing is OK.

 - Sherlock came up with an engaging storyline, but the whole "pawn of the powers that be" gimmick
      deserves a few minor restrictions:
       - As a (potential) earthly champion of God's will, you may not partake in illegal/immoral activity.  This
            means no stealing (includes hacking), begging (mooching), or trespassing (inviting yourself over).  If
            you happen to be invited to someone's house, you may go.  If they happen to call a meal while
            you're there, you may attend.  Using their bed/shower/kitchen independently constitutes a "no-no".
       - If you are invited to a friend's house, and you are invited to sleep over, you may do so.
       - Your character must be Good, and must donate to charity (as he/she is able) every time he/she uses his/her mailbox.
            The minimum is fine, but greater sums are encouraged.  Players should be accountable to track their charitable
            donations and submit the total as a component to final scoring.  There is no imposed limit on your generosity.
       - All items owned by your character must be found (until LTW is achieved).  This includes seeds,
            harvestables (public land only, to include all lots with a blue icon), other collectibles, fish
             (and anything else that gets stuck on your hook), etc.
       - Aside from hospitality exceptions (see above), your Sim must sleep, bath, and eat at public facilities (blue icons).

 - Players should become partners with all town businesses within a set time goal (standard 100-day run?).
     Additional investments will count toward final scoring.

 - Since your Sim will be Good, cannot marry, and cannot travel during the 1st stage,
     the following lifetime wishes are incompatible by default:
      - Become a Master Thief
      - Bottomless Nectar Cellar
      - Emporer of Evil   (Duh!)
      - Gold Digger
      - Great Explorer
      - Martial Arts Master
      - Physical Perfection
      - Private Museum
      - Seasoned Traveler
      - Surrounded By Family
      - Visionary
      - World-Class Gallery

Anything not covered above, assume that I agree with what Sherlock laid out.

Feedback is welcome!