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Lab Assistant
Original Poster
#1 Old 17th May 2011 at 2:02 PM
Default Private Rooms in TSM
(Dear Mods, I'm not sure whether the Information category is the right one for the thread, could you please have a look and re-categorize it, if necessary? Thanks!)

Hi everyone,

since I've been trying to collect information on how to make private quarters for the heros in TSM for a while now, I thought I'd put it all together into one new thread so it would be easier to find for anyone else interested in this.

As we all know by now, NPCs access all the rooms in a hero's building, use all their things, and many of us feel this is quite annoying. Especially me. I definitely hate it when I can't even get inside my painstakingly furnished bedroom to lay down for a bit, because the room is overcrowded with strangers reading my books and relaxing in my bathtub. Now, I've been playing around with the game for a while, using cheats and the Debug Enabler. Here are my finds:

Entrance to most of the heros' buildings (except the castle, possibly) by the front door is not regulated by a door at all. I think there is something like a hole or an arch type of thing in the buildings' shells, enabling heros and NPCs to pass through right there, but nowhere else, because at other places, the shell would be in their way. I couldn't find anything else at these entrance spots.

In the castle throne room, there are (in buydebug mode) colored blocks lying around. One at each of the four doors, two at the two sides of the main entrance. These don't have anything to do with access to the actual rooms on the upper floor, it seems. I believe they are markers of entrances to other lots, as from the throne hall, one can also access the knight's rooms and the spy's tower. Also, two of these blocks can be found beside the way leading to the village.

In the hallway behind the throne room and in a small room whose door is hidden beneath the stairs in the tavern, there are other blocks, greyish and hanging in midair, almost attached to the doors. If one removes them in the hidden tavern room, heros are able to enter the room. If one puts them, say, in the main tavern room, heros and NPCs can't interact with any object in this room anymore, and one can also not click on any object. Heros and NPCs then leave this room quickly. So, one could use them to create a private room - but couldn't do anything in it.

Access to rooms inside a building is not connected with the actual doors or the stairways objects (tavern, smithies) at all. When I removed doors (with moveobjects), NPCs simply passed through the walls were the door had been. The only way to block access for good seems to be to completely seal off a wide area around these "entrance spots", so NPCs cannot get anywhere near them. In the throne hall, for example, the whole back of the hall where the throne initially is must be sealed off with paravents or similar. In the tavern, access to the staircase must be completely blocked.

In the castle, things are even more complicated. All three castle lots (monarch, spy, knight) are interrelated, and on both the ground floor and the upper floor. So, if I block access to the knight's quarter, for example, on its ground floor, I can still sometimes find NPCs in the upper room of the knight, which have come through the passages from the throne hall. Therefore, in the castle, every access needs to be blocked. Youn know it is properly blocked if you tell your hero to go into the room and the action immediately disappears again from the queue.

Unfortunately, though this severe blocking does work, it causes problems in gameplay. The game sometimes puts NPCs in the upper castle rooms - mostly for quests. They, of course, are stuck there and can only be transferred outside, to fulfill their missions, via moveojects. Besides, it is somewhat annoying, too, to have to teleport your hero around all the time. Not very realistic.

Right now I'm thinking that we need markers to put right in the access areas (not on the doors, as they are merely decorative), telling NPCs to stay away, like in Sims 3 Appartments. Since NPCs don't usually use a hero's bed, I figure there might be something like such a marker attached to the beds. On the other hand, some people I think have had a look at the beds and have not found anything yet.

Well, anyway, these are my finds so far. Hope they're a bit useful!
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Lab Assistant
#2 Old 17th May 2011 at 3:34 PM
This sounds interesting indeed ! I hope someone does find a way to create private rooms. Now about those markers, shouldnt they have some sort of script attached to it or some data ? Couldnt we just find that with SimPE and change it? Or will we just end up with a lot of HEX data, which is not that helpful for someone who doesnt know that much about it ?

One of the positive things during gameplay and blocking entrances i have noticed is however, that npc dont seem to mind the blockade that much : they just go somewhere else. When i startet blocking of the smith´s house, i thought that now there might be at least 10 or 20 Sims shouting about not being able to enter the building...fortunately though, that never happened.

One more thing : Assuming we could build walls, would there be a way to reenable this automatic wall toggling option ? Because i believe that if there was a fourth wall, like in the smith´s backroom, then it would never hide when that specific room is in use...
Mad Poster
#3 Old 17th May 2011 at 7:06 PM
Tiinii: Concerning the "entrance spots" into the various rooms, marked by doors which aren't really doors, just some weird deco object. Based on your description in the other post on how sims went through barricades and walked through walls and could get to the upstairs rooms anyway, these doors and stairs are most likely marking a teleporting portal. Sim walks in one place and teleports to the other, just like the elevators in Sims3, tust like Teleport Me Here almost. The Constable has several of these portals where he teleports back to the hut beside the stocks when making an arrest. The door/stairs situation is exactly the same, teleport from one spot to another.

MedievalMods and Sims3mods: Dive Cave Reset Fix, Resort Revamp, Industrial Oven Revamp, Will O' Wisp fix, UI Sounds Disabled, No Cars, Gnome Family Planner, Townies Out on the Town, No Martial Arts Clothes, Fast Skilling, etc. http://simsasylum.com/tfm/
Field Researcher
#4 Old 18th May 2011 at 12:05 AM
Quote: Originally posted by Tiinii
...In the castle throne room, there are (in buydebug mode) colored blocks lying around. One at each of the four doors, two at the two sides of the main entrance. These don't have anything to do with access to the actual rooms on the upper floor, it seems. I believe they are markers of entrances to other lots, as from the throne hall, one can also access the knight's rooms and the spy's tower. Also, two of these blocks can be found beside the way leading to the village.


Tiinii - From your description of the locations of these colored blocks in the Throne Room and by the gate to the village, I believe they are the "posts" where the guards stand. The blocks probably let the guards know where their stations are as they rotate from station to station throughout their duty shift. Check the Banquet Hall by the two main doors leading from the Throne Room area into the Hall and the one leading out of the Hall into the Spy's first floor quarters. I'll bet there are colored blocks there as well. The Forest and Docks should have them as well if my guess is correct. Just an observation from an old veteran!
Lab Assistant
Original Poster
#5 Old 18th May 2011 at 10:10 AM
@ mflaha, sounds plausible to me. I haven't checked on the woods and docks yet, though. And what I'd be wondering about in case your guess is correct: Those blocks change color. Like, in my newly started kingdom they were red, but in the buydebug menu they are green, and akbaa, I think, also wrote about green blocks in her game. I assumed they changed color according to whether one has accessed the lots to which they lead yet - or whether they have been built already. If the blocks mark the guards' places, what would the color change indicate, or what would cause it?

@ Shimrod / akbaa, yeah I think, too, these are teleporting areas. Sometimes animated (as in the tavern), sometimes not (where they are supposed to be hidden, like in the castle). But how are they marked? Like, how do the NPCs and the heros know they are there? I agree with akbaa that there must me some kind of script attached to something, right? There must be some hidden object telling Sims "teleport here", or am I completely missing something? In Sims 3, there IS the elevator, for example, but in TSM, there seems to be absolutely nothing at those teleporting spots. Well, maybe at the stair, haven't properly checked that yet, but certainly not at the door entrances. Because, as I said, one can remove them without any effect.
Could it be like, scripts or something attached to the map or to the shell of the building?
Field Researcher
#6 Old 19th May 2011 at 12:09 AM
Quote: Originally posted by Tiinii
@ mflaha, sounds plausible to me. I haven't checked on the woods and docks yet, though. And what I'd be wondering about in case your guess is correct: Those blocks change color. Like, in my newly started kingdom they were red, but in the buydebug menu they are green, and akbaa, I think, also wrote about green blocks in her game. I assumed they changed color according to whether one has accessed the lots to which they lead yet - or whether they have been built already. If the blocks mark the guards' places, what would the color change indicate, or what would cause it?


Tiinii, The different colors could differentiate between the Guards, who have the day shift, and the Town Watchmen, who have the night shift.
Instructor
#7 Old 19th May 2011 at 3:13 AM
I've had the guards actually occupying the blocks, so I'm sure that's what they're for. The colors I'm not sure of.
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