Till Death Do Us Part and No Single Moms

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Croc
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Till Death Do Us Part and No Single Moms

Post by Croc » April 6th, 2019, 10:27 pm

Hi all.

I'm playing with StoryProgression (just the base mod, without the additional modules) and I was thinking about setting up a rotational caste so I can begin spliting my family of 6 YA as they are starting to getting married. But this might be a bit of a overkill. Forcing couples that I marry to remain married should be enough. So question 1:

1-Is there an easy way to force specific couples to remain married "till death do us part"?

Also, I'm now on the 2nd/3rd generations on this save and I've noticed quite a few single moms on the town. 3 of them were on families I keep track so I moved them with their boyfriends (they all had steady boyfriends; no fiancé or husband). But I don't want to have to keep managing that, so:

2-Is there an easy way to force ONLY married couples (maybe engaged too) to have babies. Or at least force the fathers and mothers to automatically marry and move-in together?
I have already set "Pregnancy: Unexpected Base Chance" to 0 for whole town to avoid babies between random people.

Thanks!

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igazor
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Till Death Do Us Part and No Single Moms

Post by igazor » April 7th, 2019, 1:55 am

1 - Setting Romance: Allow > False and/or Romance: Allow Breakup > False (SP Relationship module required) on a protected Rotations caste should stop SP itself from breaking up coupled sims. No romance means no changes in status, not that sims cannot have fun or "be romantic" with partners whom they already have while they are not actively being played.

Note though that these only gate what SP itself can do. There could be flirty scenarios that can lead to cheating and accusations by way of Woohooer if it's in play and the game itself. If a couple's friendly relationship drops below a very low level, as in they are all the way in the red, sometimes their partnerships and marriages just kind of dissolve quietly with no formal divorce proceedings taking place. For SP to arrange a breakup based on the liking gate alone by default their relationship would need to be below -90, which is pretty extreme.

I mean, they would actually want to do each other physical harm if they had to stay in the same room/house/bed with their partner for long by the time things got that bad and they would be totally miserable together unless they started making up with each other pretty quickly. For most of us, these would not be everyday occurrences at all. "Honey, I love you and everything but must I find you making out and woohooing with your co-workers and the neighbors, a different one each time, every day I come home from work?" :(

2 - Like most (all?) base chances, the Pregnancy: Unexpected Base Chance is further impacted by traits. If you are finding too many oopsie moments happening across town even with this one set to 0, I would set it lower to maybe something like -30 or even -50.

There is also a setting in SP to force unmarried parents to become married, but their traits are checked first for compatibility. That one might be worth checking into.
NRaas > SP > General Options > Options: Pregnancy > Always Marry Unexpected Parents > (default is False)

Croc
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Till Death Do Us Part and No Single Moms

Post by Croc » April 7th, 2019, 10:48 pm

Thanks for the suggestions, igazor!

About marriage:

The SP Relationship module adds way too much stuff that I don't want so I ended up creating a caste called MarriedUntilDeath. On this caste I have changed only Romance: Allow > False and Priority: 5. Then I remarried with MasterController a couple that had just split and put both sims on the caste manually.

When my married YAs start moving out, I will begin adding them to this caste and hope they stay married.

About the single moms:

I changed the Global Options > Unexpected Base Chance to -50 to guarantee that unexpected pregnancies won't happen even with traits into the equation.

The NRaas > SP > General Options > Options: Pregnancy > Always Marry Unexpected Parents was already True (I changed that after I moved the single moms with their boyfriends weeks ago).

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Till Death Do Us Part and No Single Moms

Post by deedee_828 » May 17th, 2020, 9:11 pm

This thread is a little old, and I actually have the opposite problem, but I've recently discovered, in a couple of test games of all things, a couple I used MC>add sim to relocate them to a new town, thinking he wouldn't want to leave his dearly loved GF behind, only to find out that he's deeply in the red with said 'loved' GF!
Now she does have a couple of not-so-great traits, being clumsy and something else, nothing truly horrible, so I'm assuming it's HIS evil trait that's got their relationship in the dumpster. And they didn't even live together in the previous town!

I've not had too many break-ups in my games, usually before they become steadies, but this couple, along with a few other couples I added to towns recently, seem to be perfect candidates. I'm not even sure how they got together when their relationships have turned so sour!
But stuff like that does happen IRL, so I guess it can happen in Sims. :(

I don't want half my town breaking up/divorcing but for couples who have declared each other a nemesis, it doesn't seem fair to make them stay together so, with that thought in mind, I downloaded the Relationship module.

So how would I set things up so that couples like these could break up when they hate each other so much?

And is there a way for them to get 'couples counseling' or try other things to improve the relationship so they don't get to nemesis status?

I really don't want affairs and such either, well, not a lot of them anyway.
Imogen Pelly caused enough of that having three BF's and a child with each of them, but I beleive that was due to her Commitment Issue trait, as well as being Mean-spirited, and Insane.

Edit: Correction: She actually doesn't have Commitment Issues! She's Insane, Flirty, Hot-headed, Mean-Spirited, and has No Sense of Humor!

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Till Death Do Us Part and No Single Moms

Post by igazor » May 18th, 2020, 3:19 am

deedee_828 post_id=74117 time=1589764266 user_id=18684 wrote: I don't want half my town breaking up/divorcing but for couples who have declared each other a nemesis, it doesn't seem fair to make them stay together so, with that thought in mind, I downloaded the Relationship module.

So how would I set things up so that couples like these could break up when they hate each other so much?
The best suggestion I can offer is to navigate to this page and in the search box (not the main site search box at the top, I mean the interior one next to where it says "Story Progression Interactions"), click the gear wheel, and check off Relationship StoryProgression. That will restrict the busy Interactions page to only those commands that the module adds so you can find and read about them. From there, explore and experiment. I never really understood why the OP here wasn't interested in adding the module to their game.
deedee_828 post_id=74117 time=1589764266 user_id=18684 wrote: And is there a way for them to get 'couples counseling' or try other things to improve the relationship so they don't get to nemesis status?
The only form of couples counseling for inactives that I am aware of is the one where the player manually increases the Long Term Relationship score between two sims for them by way of MC Cheats.
deedee_828 post_id=74117 time=1589764266 user_id=18684 wrote: Correction: She actually doesn't have Commitment Issues! She's Insane, Flirty, Hot-headed, Mean-Spirited, and has No Sense of Humor!
Okay, so this sim was loyal and totally committed to making her partner(s) and herself miserable. Sounds lovely. I have some sims who would like to date her, or her brother if she has one with the same traits. They would be totally compatible, and I would expect such a relationship to be remarkably successful for around a sim day or two. :(

But forgive me, I have been amusing myself in between work stress and forum posts by binge-watching tons of Mama's Family sketches from the Carol Burnett Show on YouTube, I had no idea so many of them and the made for TV movie that followed were available for viewing now. You've just described most of the entire family there. (apologies to those who aren't going to get the reference)

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Till Death Do Us Part and No Single Moms

Post by deedee_828 » May 18th, 2020, 8:23 am

Thanks so much for the explanation of where to find the information for the SP Relationship Module! :yes:
I think it will work wonderfully for my struggling couples and it even adds quite a few more options that look great! I especially like the idea of other gatherings and being able to have babies know other family members at birth. Always seemed so odd that only the mother had a decent starting relationship with a newborn.
Too bad there isn't a way to salvage relationships, but hopefully I can set it up so that they don't stay in relationships that are obviously a mistake. Though.....it is possible to repair one even drastically in the red with lots of chatting, especially if it was just set up that way and the two sims involved haven't ever really met!
Well, she should have been totally committed anyway! But....she got her just deserts in the end, her last boyfriend was stolen by my active families YA time machine daughter from the past and stayed in town to marry him and have twins! And her oldest daughter, a beautiful sim, married one of my spares and moved far, far away from her mean, crazy mama!
Oh, she would fit into Mama's Family perfectly! And give Mama and Eunice both a run for their money! I love The Carol Burnett Show and Mama's family, just too funny and fond memories from my childhood. I will definitely have to tell my hubby that they're on YouTube, we love watching old clips like that. I even have a collector's set of CB shows. I'll have to dig it out and watch some of them again.:)

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Till Death Do Us Part and No Single Moms

Post by deedee_828 » May 19th, 2020, 4:35 pm

Okay, so I've been playing around with the SP Relationship module and I'm having way too many couples break up.
They pair up quickly, which is typical of SP, so not an issue, but then they date, become steadies, an unexpected pregnancy occurs, they don't marry, though I have marry unexpected parents set to true, then soon after the baby announcement, they break up!

I left the settings for partnership at 40 and breakup at (-90), the default settings, as I though the (-90) was great enough to have sims stay together for quite some time, assuming that (-100) would be the highest value, meaning a partnership would be deep in the red, but that doesn't seem to be the case.

This happened with the Dreamers in Lucky Palms, so I married them via MC and moved her and their daughter into his house via Edit Town.

Just so you know, I don't have the Woohooer mod, or any other mods that would come into play, at east I don't think so anyway.
I only have NRaas mods, and pretty much just basic ones, along with SP of course, SP Extra, and SP Population.

I'm sure I've overlooked or misunderstood something, but how do I set it up so that only couples that have developed a deep dislike or hatred of each other, break up?

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Till Death Do Us Part and No Single Moms

Post by deedee_828 » May 24th, 2020, 1:47 pm

It's almost time for me to go play my two challenge games again and I would love some parameters or indication of what I was doing wrong with my Relationship module settings or SP settings in general, from my previous post.

The cycle from above: meet, go steady, become pregnant, then break up before the child is even born is not quite what I had in mind!
deedee_828 post_id=74175 time=1589920539 user_id=18684 wrote: I'm sure I've overlooked or misunderstood something, but how do I set it up so that only couples that have developed a deep dislike or hatred of each other, break up?

Or is it better to just set break up to false and then manually break up individual couples once I get notices of them declaring each other a nemesis?

Or is that message just another SP 'story' and not really a true indication of relationship degradation either?

I know I get SP messages about sims in my connected towns dying repeatedly and I'm trying to figure out which messages are really accurate.

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Till Death Do Us Part and No Single Moms

Post by deedee_828 » May 27th, 2020, 2:06 pm

igazor wrote:
May 18th, 2020, 3:19 am
click the gear wheel, and check off Relationship StoryProgression. That will restrict the busy Interactions page to only those commands that the module adds so you can find and read about them. From there, explore and experiment.
I've experimented with it a bit and I'm still having way too many break ups even after increasing the partner liking gate to 55 and decreasing the allow break up to (-100). But should that setting be w/o the parentheses?

In the mean time, I've set allow break up to false so I can manually control break ups, which I think will work better for me anyway.

But does the story message about declaring a partner a nemesis truly mean their relationship is deeply in the red?

If it is, that would help me to go check on the 2 sims in question and determine if I truly want them to break up.

Thanks for any suggestions! Hope everyone is staying safe as they get out a bit more and the world begins to reopen. :)

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Till Death Do Us Part and No Single Moms

Post by igazor » May 27th, 2020, 3:15 pm

I've been playing in Bridgeport for so long now where the pre-mades (not so much the newly arriving immigrant families though) seem to like to change partners about as often as many of us change our socks. I've said this here before, but with a few notable exceptions many to most of them are really just a bunch of losers by almost anyone's standards. It's possible that I'm beginning to forget how more "normal" worlds play out.

But anyway, it may be that you want a slightly higher partnership liking gate than 55. That's not exclusively meant to prevent sims from partnering up quickly, but more so that when they actually do, they kind of have to really like each other first and in theory, in the long-term, lead to more stable relationships. I think in some worlds that are not Bridgeport I use something more like 70 or 80 there; why would I want someone to even be only a Steady let alone a Fiance or Spouse if I don't really know about and like them a lot by then?

A Nemesis is not just based on a very negative relationship score, it's an official designation for the relationship between two sims. Sort of like the opposite of Best Friend. You can see Declare as a Nemesis on the social actions available to us players under Mean if an argument or series of insults goes far enough in the negative direction. I think the relationship icon on the panel, if such a sim were to ever be actively played, changes to a dagger or something like that. But no, it is not exactly a symptom of a relationship brimming full of health and stability.

We're a bit behind everyone else, even everyone else in my US state, where I am and are still under Stay At Home orders for at least another couple of weeks and quite possibly through June at least to some extent. But I'm watching what the rest of the US is doing with great interest. I can't begin to imagine what returning to work, in our office, would even look like for the foreseeable future but speaking for myself am perfectly happy to continue working from home for as long as required. It's the total uncertainty about how long these restrictions will last and what life will really be like a month or six months for now that I think is really driving many of us around the bend. Sort of like if/when we have a power failure, it would be really nice to know if it's going to last a day, a week, or six months so we can plan properly but of course no one really knows what is going to happen locally or globally. :(

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