I've finished a round in Belladonna, made a few tweaks and have some others in mind that I still need to work out, but it's functional as is, so I'm going to keep going while I continue to ponder those changes. Here's a synopsis of what I've got so far:
--I kept the aging system and am recording ages as actual ages rather than the way the game records them (i.e. a sim is 35 years old as opposed to 19 days to elder).
--I kept the trait system from Sullivan, but fleshed it out a little so that it has more concrete definitions and actions to be taken for each trait.
--I kept the idea of ROS's, but took inspiration from other simmers' ROS lists for a broader range of events.
--I kept the risky woohoo, fertility, and cheating percentages, but also added more correlation to traits with them.
--I modified the depression outcomes.
--I greatly simplified the college/career system.
--I kept a handful of the financial costs, letting the others go because this was the main complication that kept me from playing, since I don't have any mods or hacks in my game to simplify the payments.
--Finally, I'm playing a round as 12 months, switching the season for the whole neighborhood every three months, and each household gets randomly assigned to a month during which they'll be played for one day and age one year. The exception is for pregnancy, in which I play those households during the months that they'll have their "pops' and give birth as well, just with aging off to keep ages in sync. Uni is also played intermittently in between other households, so that it lines up with the way a school year actually works, and so that I don't have to play so long in Uni all at once because I really hate playing Uni for the most part.
All that being said, when I started playing Belladonna years ago, I decided to start them off in the year 2000 and figured all their birthdates/ages accordingly. For the upcoming round, we'll be starting in Jan 2003 with Ms. Jessica Peterson.
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Jan 2003
Jessica Peterson has a rocky history in Belladonna Cove. She was briefly married to Armand DeBateau (a very wealthy businessman), but that ended when she cheated on him and now she lives in the Main Street Mobile Home Park. She doesn't really have any friends in town (I guess everyone heard about the scandal), but she's recently snagged the attention of Carlos Contender, an elderly former athlete who happens to be quite wealthy. Though the relationship is new, it could move quickly due to Carlos' age, which is just what Jessica is hoping for I'm sure. At 36, she's not getting any younger and she needs to secure her future if she doesn't want to be living in a trailer park for the rest of her life.
Justin Cleveland is just starting the Spring term of his junior year at SSU, where he's majoring in history. He lives at the frat house and was engaged to Phineaus Furley until last semester when Phineaus broke things off after a misunderstanding with a cow mascot. Phineaus was expelled shortly thereafter due to poor performance and I imagine Justin was relieved not to have to see him every day (Phineaus was also a member of the fraternity), but I think he misses being in a relationship because he's been goofing off and thinking about finding someone new rather than focusing on his studies. If he's not careful, he could go on academic probation.
Feb 2003
Nathan and Mary Gavigan live in the Sentinel Apartments complex with their two sons, Isaiah, who will be 9 in April and Noah, who is 3 months old. Nathan works as an athlete and is determined to create the perfect family environment, despite Mary's emotional problems. Nathan is always in motion, working, cleaning the house, helping with homework, caring for the baby, and keeping fit. He spends very little time sleeping. Mary struggles with depression and mood swings and is often too tired to do much more than read the paper and take care of Noah's basic needs while Nathan is at work. The couple is holding things together at the moment, but it will eventually have an effect on their marriage if something doesn't change.
Happy Simming!
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