#virtualdolls

The in-game lifespans are too short for my liking lol so I edited the Options.ini file (found in your Documents directory) with Notepad to mimic a more realistic lifespan.

1 season = 7 days 1 year = 28 days

My settings (in days) are:

Human

agingstagelengthbaby = 28 (up to 1 year) agingstagelengthtoddler = 84 (up to 4 years) agingstagelengthchild = 252 (up to 13 years) agingstagelengthteen = 140 (up to 18 years) agingstagelengthyoungadult = 224 (up to 26 years) agingstagelengthadult = 1092 (up to 65 years) agingstagelengthelder = 560 (up to 85 years)

Total human lifespan = 2,380 days (85 years)

Cat

agingstagelengthkitten = 28 (up to 1 year) agingstagelengthcatadult = 168 (up to 7 years) agingstagelengthcatelder = 140 (up to 12 years)

Total cat lifespan = 336 days (12 years)

Dog

agingstagelengthpuppy = 28 (up to 1 year) agingstagelengthdogadult = 224 (up to 9 years) agingstagelengthdogelder = 84 (up to 12 years)

Total dog lifespan = 336 days (12 years)

Horse

agingstagelengthfoal = 84 (up to 3 years) agingstagelengthhorseadult = 336 (up to 15 years) agingstagelengthhorseelder = 308 (up to 26 years)

Total horse lifespan = 728 days (26 years)

I also use NRaas Retuner to alter pregnancy length.

Settings > General > By Tunable XML > Sims3.Gameplay.ActorSystems >

Pregnancy > kHoursOfPregnancy > 504 (21 in-game days) PetPregnancy > kHoursOfPetPregnancy > 116 (<5 in-game days)

I use NRaas Story Progression to lengthen maternity leave, enable paternity leave and set menopause age.

General Options > Options: Pregnancy

Maximum Maternity Leave = 11 Near Elder Limit = 401 Paternity Leave = "True"

In my larger rotational worlds I disable inactive ageing TS2-style with NRaas Story Progression. Otherwise I’d miss my Sims' childhoods before completing a full rotation lol.

Caste Options > Non Active Family > Death: Allow Aging > "False"

I also use NRaas Relativity to slow the flow of time. I have it set to 19 so my Sims' days are basically twice as long. They have time in the morning to get up, get bathed, drink coffee, eat breakfast and read the paper before they go to work. Highly recommend this mod if you feel like your Sims' days are too short.

@virtualdolls​ Hi! The links are not broken, please check my original posts (not the reblogs) for any updated links. The original is the only one I am able to edit, while reblogs might still have the old, broken link attached.

Hola!!

It’s been a while since i got one of those asks so i’m gonna use this as an opportunity to go really in depth with things ^_^

How to keep motivated with your OCs

-a guide by the laziest, meanest OC mom on simblr aka me

Motivation

First off, what is motivation? Honestly at this point this just sounds like some magical realm that only some of us have access to, or so at least that’s what many people make it look like.

For me, as an artist in general, motivation is just an excuse. Motivation is the driving force to push further, to get better, to strive for improvement and evolution, right? Well, then you don’t need anything concrete to “motivate” you. IT has to come from within.

For some people ‘motivation’ comes by looking at other people’s OCs, studying them. For some by reading books or stories or fanfiction. For some it’s roleplay! It’s different for every one of us. You just need to find the thing that makes you feel excited about your OCs and wanting to develop them. It’s the same as learning a language, or practicing a hobby. When you sit down to do your favourite activity you don’t think too much about what made you want to practice it. You just do. Does that make any sense? What i’m trying to say is that you don’t need a to be invested in your ocs. You just need to find the force that drives you to do it.

To conclude this part, I want to say that many people use motivation as an excuse to be lazy. “ I have no motivation!! “ - hell i’m guilty of saying this a lot myself. But for me motivation isn’t the same as others see it. It’s what YOU make out of it! Don’t let make you lazy and unproductive.

Character Development

Alright well it’s pretty obvious what i mean by this. Who wants to play a boring character? Nobody.

Studying. STUDY!!! STUDY!!!!!! Study is your best friend. Study everything you can. Psychology, writing, other people’s ocs. Start working on your characters if you want them to be exciting.

Stop limiting yourself in the comfort zone. If you keep making the same characters over and over again it’s all gonna flop. Stop making characters identical to YOU. Make them different. Give them traits you don’t have or hate. You don’t need to have beautiful characters. Not every character needs to be good and pure.

Do not and ABSOLUTELY do not try to imitate characters from big tv shows or popular books. People will catch on it and they won’t like your characters. You like Harry Potter? Awesome. You can try and borrow some things you like from his character and mold them into your OCs personality. But don’t make them a carbon copy!!

I previously made a short guide on how to develop characters a little here. I won’t talk about those tips in here so please go ahead and read that post and start doing some more research on your own! :D

Engage!

Roleplay is really fun, like HELLA! If you’re into it, that is. It really helps you going and motivates you to develop your characters to react in certain situations, make new friends outside of your OCs universe. If you don’t know much about RP i’ll send some links to help you understand it a little better:

What is roleplay?

Tips for roleplaying

Roleplay dos and donts

The simblr community is really active on Twitter and Instagram so you can start from there!

Other

I can’t sadly give you any tips on how to actually play the game. 

I haven’t played mine with any of my OCs yet and the last time i played my legacy was about 4 years ago or so :/ I used a lot of mods and cc and never allowed aging or whatever. It all came naturally and aged them gradually with time on the span of 3-4 years until i eventually got bored of it. 

You should give the nraas mods a try and see how it goes from there! I remember they really made things super fun for me so it may work for you!