#refreshes

"The LORD is my shepherd; I shall not want. In verdant pastures He gives me repose; beside restful waters He leads me; He refreshes my soul. 

He guides me in right paths for His names's sake. Even though I walk in the dark valley I fear no evil; for you are at my side [and] give me courage."

Because, as per the Chill Save update earlier, I have recently picked up The Sims 4: Werewolves after watching quite a few videos on it from the YouTube Simmers I follow (namely James Turner, who built all the lots for the pack and is rightfully proud of it, and Plumbella, who did an early-access LP of it), and seeing how much care and attention was lavished on the werewolves and their lore really makes me want some sort of refresh for most of the other occults in the game. And since Smiler only got a one-post update today, I figured I could take the time to make a post about what I’d like to see! It boils down to a few key points:

1. Give aliens and mermaids proper power/perk trees -- Yeah, of the occults we have in Sims 4, I think we can all agree that aliens and mermaids got the short end of the stick -- possibly because they’re both occults that came as part of an expansion instead of getting a dedicated game pack like the Big Three of vampires, spellcasters, and werewolves. (Probably doesn’t help that aliens were one of the first occults added to the game in Get To Work. . .) They both desperately need updates to keep them relevant and make them more fun to play without requiring the use of mods. And the best way to do that would be to give them a set of powers/perks you can buy for XP points, like said Big Three. Mermaids already work a bit like vampires thanks to their “Hydration” need powering their innate special songs and whatnot -- why not go whole hog? Have them earn things like the ability to find unique treasures in the deepest parts of the ocean! New songs that affect Sim moods in different ways, or maybe adjust skill-building speeds! Or maybe one to pull water from nearby sources to hydrate themselves if they get too low? Aliens could get their own version of controlling Sim minds (rather than just erasing memories -- oh, and THAT should be an unlockable power THEY CAN’T USE AUTONOMOUSLY -- yes, I AM still bitter about one of my Sims having their relationship with their alien fiance RANDOMLY ERASED BY SAID ALIEN FOR NO REASON) and maybe unlock some sort of special power that allows them to go to space without a rocket? Just -- something more interesting than the handful of powers that we’ve got for either!

(And for what it’s worth, I’d rather like to see the Needs panel UI for them, vampires, spellcasters, and werewolves be standardized, though I’m not sure how the orb would work for vampires and mermaids, who drain a need bar to fuel their powers rather than build up something that needs to be periodically lowered. Maybe have the orb be “upside-down” when compared to spellcasters and werewolves? Aliens could work either way -- drawing on some sort of special alien need to fuel their powers, or building up an alien charge that must be periodically vented, otherwise something weird and potentially dangerous happens.)

2. Give all the occults fun books we can read for lore, special bonuses, or just amusing fluff text -- The pop-ups you get for the werewolf books? They are the best. I love the lore that you can get from reading the history of Moonwood Mill (both the “standard” version and the special werewolf-writings version), I love how you can unlock a secret recipe for the new fish type if you’re lucky, and I even love when it’s just “fluff text” showing an excerpt of the book itself. And now that we have all that, I want more. I know Realm of Magic added a few non-tome books for Sims to read, but I don’t know if any of them have the fun pop-ups or any other special interactions, and I’m pretty certain that Vampires only added the vampire encyclopedias, which do have a couple of pop-ups but nothing along the lines of Werewolves and its books. And we need them! We especially need them now that we have an extremely-complicated history of how vampires and werewolves came to be! I want a secret vampire history of Forgotten Hollow! I want vampire romances! I want a book on blood types that can unlock the ability for vampires to sense who in a nearby area would give them a Divine Drink! I want the book on familiars to unlock new interactions for spellcasters to use with their familiars! (Well, actually, I just want to interact with familiars period -- let me hug and play with them -- but we could also have more interactions you unlock too.) I want the history of Glimmerbrook and the Magic Realm! I want a spellcaster children’s series like Peter Barker! Just -- I want the books to be so much more fun than they are right now! Give me the funny pop-ups to read, darn it!

3. Give us more cross-pack occult interactions, both nasty and friendly -- Werewolves gives us some really great stuff with how werewolves interact with vampires in particular, but -- well, to get the full experience, I think you gotta play as a werewolf. What if I want to do some of those interactions from the other side? And what about different occults interacting with each other? We need stuff like:

-->Vampires get a special angry moodlet from feeding on werewolf plasma -- they now need moodlets for feeding on spellcaster, mermaid, and alien plasma too. (I’m pretty sure this is only a thing in mods!)

-->Those interactions where werewolves can compare themselves favorably or unfavorably to vampires? They should also be available on the vampire side (I couldn’t find them when I had Smiler talk to a werewolf, anyway!). There should also be special interactions for spellcasters and vampires, where they compare themselves favorably or unfavorably, or talk about the origins of vampires.

-->Get mermaids and aliens in the act by giving them special interactions with other occults too -- talking about how mermaid and vampire powers work similarly, or aliens and werewolves sharing stories about the moon.

-->Have a friendly “sparring” version of the Supernatural Smackdown, for those occults who want to brawl without despising the other person afterward. Include mermaids transforming briefly to hit their opponents with their tail XD

-->All occults should be able to ask for sympathy for their occult type, and Sims should be able to feel sympathetic toward multiple occults and be their allies. (How else are you going to have your forbidden romances?)

Stuff like that! Just make the interactions between the various occults a bit more rich, and give them all a good mix of friendly and mean options so those of us who like to do occults getting along AND those who like to do out-and-out supernatural wars can have their cakes and eat them too. :p

4. No, I don’t know what to do about ghosts, Servos, and plantsims -- I’ve never played with any of those life states, so I don’t have enough ideas on how perk or power trees would work with them (particularly Servos, as they’re robots and thus a very unique type of Sim -- don’t they already have specific upgrade paths they can do for themselves?). Though I will say that ghosts should not have normal Sim needs -- I think their needs should be frozen in a way that makes sense for how they died instead (like a Sim who starved is always hungry, one who was eaten by the Mother Plant is always stinky from alien goo, one who drowned always has low energy, etc). I leave it up to you guys to think of good ways to fix them!