The Great ReBuild 2010: Paring things down?

[strangetomato]

I'm struggling with this rebuild. At first I was going to package up all the sims that have been born in the those neighborhoods and share them and then do the same for my edited lots, but every time I load the game to do so, I lose steam fast. I've now settled on only packaging up characters and lots that I absolutely can't do without. So that means any story characters that have already been featured (and one that hasn't — Phi's mystery baby), and maybe some lots (the Summerdream place comes to mind), but everything else will be played through and made over again. That'll take some time, but it'll be far less tedious than piecing it together bit by bit.

I think I'm going to start by playing the fresh megahood to give myself a chance to see what I truly miss from my other game. I'm going to keep my cc (though I'm paring that down quite liberally), but I want to try to use the bare minimum of hacks and things like that. That brings me to my question of the day (and it's a classic one):

If you were going to start over with only a handful of hacks, which ones would you consider essential?

Comments

[hat_plays_sims (from livejournal.com)]

I'm closing in on four hundred hacks myself, but I'm also one of those icky historical gamers who can't function without InTeen.

So there's no need to mention Pescado, evidently (though I'll tout his clothing tool as superior to every other wardrobe hack I've tried-- it's an object mod so it doesn't conflict with anything), but I've been going to Paladin for hacks and programs since Sims 1. Not only is his site the home of the HCDU, it's the home of such useful hacks as "Get the Closest Plate, Stupid," which not only fixes an annoying pathfinding issue, it has possibly my favorite hack name ever. Paladin and Pescado do fix some of the same things, but while Pescado has No Servo Chores, Paladin has the Servo Chore Controller (under objects/robots) that can be used to customize how much you want to nerf Servo behavior. (Although if anyone ever makes 'Servos never cook,' I'll grab that in a damn hurry.)

I have quite a few things by Squinge, although my favorite is easily the Nurse Babies hack, which just enables the hidden Maxis breastfeeding interaction. Normally you can only see it if you have a parent, a hungry baby, and no way to feed the baby on the lot-- a mini fridge and a barbecue instead of a proper fridge. A vital one is Butler No Cooking, because otherwise a butler turns from a useful servant into an annoying cross between a nanny and a Servo. Squinge also does the most well-known Pregnant Sims Wear Any Outfit hacks.

Inge's mods tend to add features more than fix issues, but I personally love the Annoying Games Suite. Your Sims can only start a game of kicky back if they HAVE a kicky bag in their inventory? BRILLIANCE.

Mog Hughson's goodies are more feature-adding than fixing, too, but the features they add are often so logical that they feel like fixes. Autonomous putting-away of leftovers, pets sharing the foot of the bed with kids, the ability to send greeting cards, writing novels without a computer...

I have a couple of Black Spirit's mods, but the fun one is the Plantsim pollen cloud prank as a way to turn other Sims into Plantsims.

Mike_1102 has a few I use, but the one I heartily recommend is Gardeners Have Gold Gardening Badge (why shouldn't they?) and the one I use but feel conflicted over is Plants Stay After Harvest. I mean, picking ripe strawberries doesn't kill the plant...

I also use Waterproof Servos. Because it's only funny the first time repairing the shower makes them go haywire. And because mine keep rolling wants to take bubble baths.

But... yeah, hacks are a matter of personal taste-- it's about how you like your game to run, after all. But you absolutely need the Hack Conflict Detection Utility-- it won't tell you everything (such as ACR not working properly with age duration mods-- aging off, sure, or Inge's No Aging Patch), and sometimes conflicts are harmless (Atavera's custom instrument hack conflicts with... itself), deliberate (InTeen's flavor packs), or a matter of load order (Pescado's creaturefixes should load after Black Spirit's vampire bite hacks), but it's a great help in preventing tight pants.

[hat_plays_sims (from livejournal.com)]

... And if I'd known LJ doesn't let openID users use HTML properly, I'd've logged into my LJ instead. Dammit.