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Author Topic: Potentially Borked Neighborhood  (Read 3986 times)
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digni7y
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« on: July 19, 2009, 10:33:06 pm »

Belvedere, my Victorian neighborhood has been having problems lately that are making me go "Hmm..." I've got everything up to BV, all EPs and junk packs up to that time (not nothing after, yeah, I know). I've had these since the neighborhood was new but now, as the neighborhood gets larger they're becoming more of a problem. I want to avoid my computer from becoming a BFBVFS.

I'm currently using default replacement vehicle hacks and default replacement roads to give my neighborhood more of an authentic feel, perhaps this might be part of the problem, I don't know. I'm also using a custom neighborhood, Crater Town from Sims Zone or something, I'd have to double check. It's only this neighborhood that has problems, not one else, custom or otherwise.

List of problems:

1. Headmasters don't show up at all, period. I call one, 5pm rolls around, no show. I've tried deleting the stuck headmaster token using the FFS Lot Debugger, no dice. Tried teleporting a headmaster into a lot to generate a new one, the replacement one has the same problems. Headmaster is an Elder but his timer shows up as "Adult, 15 days from Elder". Headmaster can age down but I haven't tried killing him yet. The headmaster I teleported into a lot has a family going and it'd be a bit cruel to murder him.

2. Similarly, wedding parties at home are borked. I have a default replacement carriage that replaces the limo with a horsedrawn carriage, but even with it out no dice. Groom gets in, bride can't and wanders away. After an hour or so Groom pops up somewhere on the lot and sometimes the timer for the wedding restarts and will repeat the same cycle for hours. Moving them out and in fixes it.

3. Vacations are borked. The sims hop into a carriage, carriage drives off the lot and back into the lot, over and over. This happens in both main and college hoods. Taxis for everything else (dates, going to community lots) work as normal; at least in college. I've not tested the main neighborhood. Will update it when I have, tomorrow.

4. For specific sims-clicking on them to get them to "wake up" when they pass out makes them jump. Perhaps a hack conflict? Will post an error log tomorrow.

List of hacks available on request. (Heh, there's about 150)

I'm wondering if this is fixable. If it isn't, please don't tell me I have to somehow rebuild my entire neighborhood, I think I'm going to scream if I do. It's multi generational, lots of people having met and married and babies and so on.
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rwills
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« Reply #1 on: July 19, 2009, 11:10:59 pm »

Several fast thoughts--

Run HCDU to get a list of potential conflicts. HCDU does not diifferentiate between harmless and harmful conflict (nor does anything other such tool).

Paladin's Hack Conflict Detection Utility (click Sims 2 -- Programs):

http://www.simwardrobe.com

Jump bug is almost always a sign of hack/mod conflicts or incompatible custom content.

Futzing beyond things like basic cosmetic (i.e., mirror-based)( changes with certain key NPCs (Headmaster, Grand Vampire, Gypsy, Mrs. Crumplebottom, etc.) is a 99.9999999% sure path leading to breaking a 'hood. You may not have reached the point of the 'hood being totally unusable yet, but would strongly recommend not trying to do anything more to Headmaster. If you have a back-up of the 'hood from before you began altering Headmaster, would also suggest using that in place of a version since.

Obvious question is if you have yet checked if the 'hood still malfunctions when you have temporarily moved the entire Downloads folder out of the game (don't Save the game when testing this, just Quit). If the 'hood tests O.K., then it is definitivelt something (or things) in Downloads that need to be either removed (due to incompatiibility with your particular EPs/SPs or due to conflict) or possibly updated to function properly.

Would also check (if you can find the original download site) whether the troublesome custom 'hood is listed as perhaps requiring an EP beyond what you have.,
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digni7y
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« Reply #2 on: July 20, 2009, 06:20:38 am »

I doubt the hood is past my EPs, it was created around Nightlife, I think. Maybe it's too outdated? Again, not too sure.

Ran HCDU and came up with 201 conflicts, most of them caused by inteen and by Jokerswild/Chris Hatch's woohoo animations. There's many conflicts with this fix by Squinge and that fix with MATY and so on, but I'm not concerned since the game worked properly.

I say "worked" now because I tested taking out the downloads, picked a family, went in, called the headmaster and sent the husband out to a community lot (because I'm dumb and forgot that leaving saves progress). Now, the game refuses to turn on at all.

Will try restoring the backup I made 2 days ago (phew!) and continue from there.

Edit to add: Backup works but the headmaster problem is still there, even though in the backup all I did was move the headmaster into a house and he didn't know anyone. I deleted him from the simbin in the neighborhood. Tested the headmaster with another family. I did notice he did the same thing that the groom coming back from the honeymoon did-pop briefly onto the lot and disappear, the carriage waited for him and then left. Testing the same family without downloads, the game generated a new headmaster and the scenario works as normal.

I have a sneaking suspicion this is related to the replacement vehicles themselves.

Another edit: Throw that out the window. I've just tried removing all the downloads again and keeping just the redownloaded vehicles in the downloads folder. Same old song-game refuses to start, not even a blip in the Task Manager. Tried running it through window mode in Simpe, tried going through start, added back all the downloads, nothing, nada. What on earth?
« Last Edit: July 20, 2009, 08:14:05 am by digni7y » Logged

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ladymiriam
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« Reply #3 on: July 21, 2009, 04:21:47 am »

I don't know if this helps you, but I'm assuming you're using Hexameter's horse replacement vehicles, as do I.  I don't have them all, the limo for instance, but most of them.  I also use default road replacements from Phaenoh.  I have noticed no probs with the horses but I don't play very much, I like to build.  Anyway, I can try and summon a headmaster in a test scenario or something, see what happens.  I'm concerned these may be the problem, as I adore those replacements.  I'm not sure if I read you correctly but did you age down the headmaster yourself?  I'm not as tech savvy as you but I think I read in Sim Wardrobe's NPC Replacer documentation that when changing some NPCs they had to remain as elder male or adult female.  Hope that's your prob, not the horses.  Sorry, I can't be of any more assistance but let me know if you want me to do a test and how you want it done.
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digni7y
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« Reply #4 on: July 21, 2009, 08:32:28 am »

Oh, no, when I said "age down" I meant he ages along his lifeline normally. So at 6 pm each day he gets another day older, like normal sims.

He's been deleted since by deleting him from the simbin, but the replacement that generated has much of the same problems-I teleported him into my test lot and noticed he's an elder but his lifebar's stuck at "Adult-15 days from elder" and he doesn't teleport in properly. But what's REALLY interesting is that the game always calls upon the borked replacement headmaster when my downloads are in but when the downloads are out, the game generates a new one who comes in with no problems. It's starting to make me wonder whether it's the vehicles themselves or if it's the neighborhood or simply a hack that just doesn't want to work.

I'm using FennShy's Replacements for all carpools, Hexameter's NPC replacements here, here, here, here, here, , [url=http://www.modthesims.info/download.php?t=276714]here, and here, with his horse drawn neighborhood vehicles and steve84's Victorian Cobblestones.

It might be a good idea if you tried testing it, yeah, please. Do you have MATY's Notownieregen and the empty neighborhoods templates? I'd like you to try a completely clean neighborhood, add in a vacation location of your choice, a shopping town, a downtown and a college, move in a family like the ones I tested-dad, child, toddler, baby and mom pregnant. I'd like your downloads folder to be clean of everything except the notownieregen and just the vehicles. Plop the family onto a lot, call the headmaster and have him regenerate. In the meantime, send dad out to a community lot in each of the towns (main hood, shopping and downtown, the lot can be blank, can have stuff on it, whatever), see what happens, then send dad out to the shortest vacation possible. Then in college, create this random sim, test him the same way you've tested Dad and see what happens. If you'd also like, I can give you my copy of my hacks and the neighborhood I have so you can create a 2nd hood with the same terrain and so on, if you'd really like to be anal. I'd have to take out my adult hacks, though, because they are...well...adult. If you'd rather not do this, I'll try it myself, but it really BITES when the game doesn't work properly.
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ancienthighway
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« Reply #5 on: July 21, 2009, 01:43:44 pm »

The replacement vehicles aren't causing your problems.

Quote
Ran HCDU and came up with 201 conflicts, most of them caused by inteen and by Jokerswild/Chris Hatch's woohoo animations. There's many conflicts with this fix by Squinge and that fix with MATY and so on, but I'm not concerned since the game worked properly.

It doesn't sound like your game is working properly.  That's why you're posting here.  It's not.  You really do need to resolve as many of those conflicts, whether by removing one of the mods or verifying the conflict is benign.  All of your problems are coming from these conflicts.

Quote
He's been deleted since by deleting him from the simbin...

This practice is guaranteed to corrupt any neighborhood and sims living in it.  If you make this a common practice, yes, your hood is currently corrupted to the point of unrepairable by someone who is inexperienced with SimPE, and a lengthy fix for those that are experienced with it.  Start over.  If there are sims you don't want in your game, use one of the many mods available to kill the sims in game.  I usually make a sim specifically for this purpose who is played only when I want to get rid of NPCs.  He owns the local cemetary too.

Some NPCs are created as an exception to the rules.  The headmaster is one of them.  While he appears to be an elder, he is made an adult so he doesn't have that elder walk and slouch.  If he's made selectable, just as with the nanny, the internal scripts for him do not run.

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ladymiriam
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« Reply #6 on: July 21, 2009, 03:50:33 pm »

Well, if I were you I'd follow AncientHighway's advice and start over, they know what they're talking about.  I'm no expert, I wish I felt confident enough to use clean templates but I find the instructions I've looked at too daunting, so I couldn't help with the test anyway.  If it was just the game's hoods, it would have been no bother-adult stuff or not.  Anyway, hope you sort it out and Ancienthighway, I'm so stealing that idea for the local executioner owning the cemetary-brilliant.
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digni7y
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« Reply #7 on: July 22, 2009, 08:08:51 am »

Oh, no, ancient, I was hoping you wouldn't say that.

Is there a best way to test the conflicts and see if they're benign or not other than performing a whole song and dance of testing each one in the folder with the hack that says HCDU says it conflicts with?
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caffeinated.joy
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« Reply #8 on: July 22, 2009, 12:06:06 pm »

Well, if your hood is corrupted due to the practice of deleting sims, then no amount of swapping out cc and mods is going to work. The fix with SimPE involves going in to repair the 'broken' memories of those sims who had any association with the deleted one, a long and tedious process not for the inexperienced on faint of heart.

There's not really an "easy" fix for testing the mods, if it's a mod issue. You have to do the whole song and dance, unfortunately. I have all of my mods in a subfolder within my downloads folder. This makes it easier to track them down and test if I have to, because all I have to do is pull one file out rather than sifting through a crapload of other cc.

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digni7y
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« Reply #9 on: July 22, 2009, 01:11:25 pm »

Ah, but see, I restored the neighborhood from a backup so now the headmaster's family no longer exists. The headmaster I restored had no relationships with other people (zip, nada, none) and had only just moved into a house. He was the only one to have been deleted from the simbin.

As it is, I've given up on said hood and created a fresh, new, Maxis made hood with a simple test family of mom, dad, teenage daughter and girl daughter. Same old issues, same old song, headmaster snaps in and takes off, tried taking out the folder, tried restarting game, no fracking dice.

The issues here are now why the headmaster no longer appears at a house with my downloads in and why does my game start once after I remove the downloads and will not start again until I restore everything from said backup.The headmaster thing is obviously a hack related thing, but the no starting thing, with NO downloads in the folder, is highly irritating and makes it so I can't perform the song and dance of testing hacks.
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ancienthighway
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« Reply #10 on: July 22, 2009, 01:57:57 pm »

After removing your downloads, delete the groups.cache and accessories.cache.
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digni7y
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« Reply #11 on: July 22, 2009, 09:50:23 pm »

Am picking through the folder before I boot up the game now, and holy gosh I am an idiot and figured out that about half the conflicts were due to me having the same hacks in there twice (pulling a Ness, as MATY says). I've lowered the list down to 66 conflicts, which is liveable. Now let's see if the game actually works.

Edit: Yeah, it does, yay! And I also reread the thread of the carpool replacements and apparently I'm not the only one who has problems with the headmaster, so it's a problem with the carpool itself. *headdesk* And that is why you learn from my mistake, kiddos. Read the fracking thread.

But, one last question: Do you think that what I did with the headmaster, just deleting him from the bin since he didn't know anyone has borked the hood or no? i hope not.
« Last Edit: July 22, 2009, 10:19:42 pm by digni7y » Logged

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