I would raise the land the castle is on as a whole not just under the stairs. I'm a sims 2 builder not sims 3 so I'm not sure if it's all the same. But steps going down into the ground gradually going down. I have a very small castle here:http://db.modthesims.info/download.php?t=513130 showing steps into the ground.

Wow, looking good! It's come a long way. I like Pic 7 for the side but keep the terraced stairs in the front. Gives you lots of room for gardens, little buildings, family graveyard, a fancy water feature, etc. Great work!

Looking good- you have made quite a bit of progress.

About the bridge over the moat- I do not believe you can have a path over a pond, on the same level as the pond. I can see a few choices.
1. You can make a bridge over the pond using the CFE cheat (constrain floor elevation false). See tutorial here: http://www.modthesims.info/showthread.php?t=552204 This is tricky, especially if you are not familiar with CFE.

2. You can raise the path with foundation at either end. To do this you may need to indent (move back) just the entrance, by a few tiles. This is the easier solution, assuming it works.

3. You can paint the edges that are along the bridge with pond colored terrain paint, and then use CASt to change the pond color to match the terrain paint. I am not sure how this would look.

4. You can disguise the path edges with rocks, grasses, etc., with the Move Objects On cheat. You can also use the pool tool instead of the pond tool to make a swimmable moat, then disguise the edges.

If the castle is a more modern one, is a moat important?

You mean raising the terrain up to the landing where the front stairs come down from the second floor? I could try that. After making all the changes that I did, I hadn't yet thought about what I'm really gonna do about front of the castle.

Thank you!

I think I will go with the fourth idea. I have a little experience with CFE in making bridges, but I don't feel like tackling that now, besides I don't think it would look good here.

Raising all the terrain under the castle so it's up on a hill, this is how castles usually were, on top of a hill so that enemies can be seen, it also makes it seem grander and plays nicely with stairs-does sims 3 stairs do that, like I was showing? It's been some years since I played sims 3 so not all of my suggestions might be good for it.

The idea is good, but when I think about all the re-building that I would have to do.. And I kind of like the way it is now. Though I could make something interesting in front on either side of the stairs to make that look better.
I don't remember how it was in Sims 2 with the stairs, but I think it is pretty similar (I didn't do much serious kind of building in Sims 2 )

Here I am with another question

Basically, which variant of the three is better?
Version one with the long hedges doesn't very good, the small hedges look better. That leaves one other issue - two or third stories for that side thing.
I like both version 2 and 3, each in their own way, I just can't decide which ones better.

You can raise terrain without rebuilding, just put on CFE.

I just tried it. It did work, and perhaps I liked the way the castle was taller looking (though it was not the terrain that got raised but the foundation), but overall, it just meant to re-make all my stairs, and I actually like those the way they are now.

I like version 2 best. I think adding the extra story detracts from the entrance.

Hey there! I am back with only with a small update, just because...
Just because I've lazy, and on when I was struck with an inspiration on a bad day (a.k.a today), the results were desperation, a lot of cursing the game and well, generally nothing good.

I was trying to fix my roof problem (the fact that it is all flat n boring, and non-castle like), with frieze, but realized that it was not possible because I have maximum levels already for the house. First floor wall placement didn't do miracles either, and then I moved on to the grand staircase which I absolutely love.. and hate at the same time.

It is all that I wished it to be, except maybe for the awesome grandness that I spied in a picture here
That picture there isn't even about the grandness of the stairs, but when I saw it I totally fell in love (yes, with staircase).. But I can't seem to remake that. I was so sure that in the picture the first stairs go up to the second floor, which is skipped to make higher room impression, and then those two side stairs go up to the third floor..

Anyway, see the pictures for what I came up with.

It doesn't seem right or good. I think those stairs might be TOO grand for this build.

Let me know what you guys think, should I make the grand staircase smaller, or perhaps the building bigger? Or maybe a smaller idea?

P.S. doubtful about the last one, because the castle is already too small.

P.S.S. The stairs leading up to the second floor are 3 tiles wide, plus 4 for those useless curved decor pieces. The ones leading up to the third floor are 2 tiles each.

P.S.S.S. There's another thing. I was the most saddened when I realized that there are no working curved stairs in Sims 3. Or maybe someone knows of such?
Here's what I mean:
1) http://www.priceypads.com/chicago-m...million-photos/
2) http://propertyhuntersspain.com/prestige-buyers/
3) http://mansionesycasasdelujo.blogsp...down-court.html

If there really aren't such stairs in Sims 3, perhaps someone is willing to make them for me? (If that is possible, that is) I'd be extremely happy for such stairs.

Alright, guess it's time to go to bed. As we say in my country morning wiser than evening (haven't really heard that in English, so I am not sure, perhaps there is a better translation)

P.S.S.S.S. Also, please suggest something about the roof. I really dislike how boringly flat it is, but I want it higher, at least half of it. The other half could totes be flat for some rooftop chillax time. I dunno, would putting on a simple round or other roof work? Maybe several roofs, like separate for the towers and like another one for the rest of the half-roof? Perhaps there is a way to make that half of the roof higher before putting on a roof? Like those dummy levels? How are those made? Can I make one up there if I already have the maximum floor levels?
Okay, I'm just throwing out ideas, in a sudden rush of creativity, to be confirmed as good-possible/denied as bad-impossible.

Hi KittyCat
Those links are great! I love those grand staircases also.

I feel that your castle is having a bit of an identity crisis. At first you had a garage, so I thought it was going to be a modern day castle. Then you added a moat, and I thought, no medieval castle. Now you are thinking grand staircase, which goes back to modern day. I think you should ask yourself, when in time was the castle built? Who lives there now? Has it been renovated? The answers to these questions will help you make choices. Sometimes a bit of this and a bit of that works. Sometimes it doesn't.

I think the staircase in your screenshots is too big for the space. If it was less wide, and the room was longer, it might work. Have you tried reversing the curved stairs that you are using, as in use the right one on the left and the left one on the right? I think this would give you the shape you want, though it doesn't say medieval castle to me.

Thank you for the answer! I guess you're right about the identity crisis. I didn't thought about it before, but now I realize I really very much went for what others suggested because I had no idea what I wanted to do, and how I could do it.
I will pretty much have to rebuild the whole thing but hopefully it will be worth it, and I'll finally figure out what I want for this build.

Honestly, I hadn't thought about reversing the curved stair pieces. It's not exactly what I want, but I guess it could work.

I actually never planned this castle to be medieval, I was more reaching towards the modern. Now I just have to keep that in mind when I think of what I want to do with it.

Another night, another new question.

Quick update: After trying and failing at making a decent exterior for my castle, I decided to check out in google "modern castles" and look up floor plans for those I liked the best. Turns out, that's been my best idea so far. I got my floor plan, now I just need to make all the adjustments to incorporate the house in the game.
That's why I am here. So far things been going great, meaning that I've had some problems, or no-idea-how''s, but I've surprisingly managed to figure them out on my own.

Now I've encountered a problem a don't know how to resolve (if it can be resolved).

Basically, I have this basement extension (pic1) (they are regular walls, not made with basement tool). On top of this ''extension'', there's going to be first floor terrace, but the problem is with the flooring. Is there a way to align the flooring from that "extension" (pic 2) so it aligns with the terrain? Otherwise now when I place floor, the terrain gets lowered by about one step.

Perhaps there is some kind of building trick that I need to do with the flooring before I place the walls (hmm, note to self to try.. something )?
When I made this "extension" I simply lowered the ground by 16 steps, placed the walls, (doors are actually in the basement that is made directly behind the "extension"), placed the arches, flooring on top etc.

I am gonna go back to the game and try some things on my own, because, as always, while writing the post I got a few ideas to try out

Did you make this with CFE? It gives and it takes away- we have many bald builders, because they tore out all their hair trying to tame CFE.
Did you try using the leveling tool?

I saw in the builders forum that TeeHeeShe answered you. She is, without a doubt, the Master of CFE. Link her to these pictures with a full explanation of what you did, what you want, and what you've tried so far. If she can't help you, no one can. Good luck.

Thank you for the answer! It could work perhaps, because I don't even need floor on the right side, so I wouldn't have to hide any gaps there.

For some silly reason I can't remember if I used cfe here, but I am quite sure that I didn't. I simply lowered the ground with stairs, built walls, built basement etc. Alright, I'll do that, thank you!

Still about those same pictures, I am planning to build my house on 2-step high foundation, and have the terrain raised up for 9 steps.
Underneath the house will be a basement.
Basically, what I did in that picture above is, I uncovered the basement wall (as that's how it is in the IRL house that I am basing my house on).
But those walls are actually made with wall tool, not basement tool (as I couldn't make that work in a satisfying manner). After that I made a basement right behind these walls, connecting them. I put the doors in on the basement level with MOO, and if I clicked on the floor in the basement, a sim actually went through those doors and into the basement.

What I want to know is, would this method, with basement connected to outside walls, work with raised terrain and 2-step high foundation?
As right now, in above pictures, that floor would actually become the first floor of the house.

I have been busy living in my mothers mess trying to sort out her things with my sister and her husband. I should have paid a bit more attention. I have a few tutorials for you.

You were asking about how to make stairs ground to ground:




Planning is quite important in this game. It seems to me you want to do too many things at the same time. What I usually do if I know I will be using cfe is to start building at the bottom, and make my way up. That means making roofs while you're not quite satisfied with the foundation isn't really a good idea.

I have so many tutorials, but they are quite ancient and actually a bit embarrassing. The tutorial underneath is quite complicated, but it seems to me you like doing it complicated, so why not? This building you have started above lends itself very nicely to be built in a foundation instead, then you replace part of the foundation with walls. Dig out the middle of the foundation and keep some walls, they will give you a better transition with the ground around your castle. You can just tuck it in like you do with your kids, if you have any. You can then use moo to stick decorations on the inner walls. Just keep the foundation walls 1 tile wide and make sure you have them the the right height. Look closely on the turorials how I measure height on a wall. Another way is to put up regular walls and then drag the foundation around it. You will then have regular walls on the inside and tuckable walls on the outside.

Your foundation wall needs to be 16 clicks/steps heigh. See how I do that. Then the regular wall will fit. In the regular wall you can put in windows and doors. That's the point in this exercise, the foundations with tucked in walls or regular walls with doors and windows.



The tutorial below is quite embarrassing, but it shows you what I'm thinking of.



Just keep on playing with it, but don't get passed that point where you don't want to demolish it, that's my point. Don't start to love your building until you're happy with it. Keep it fun.

For your staircase Luna has a rather strange curved staircase, but it needs adaptations and I think your animations will turn out a bit on the Vampirous side of walking, that's just my silly words. The trouble with curved staircases in ts3 is the animation of it. You can have staircases, they are just not walkable as such. As insulting English upper class women says "if it fits darling, wear it".



... then I just have to figure out where they are on my computer, because Luna's stuff was killed by Mediafire.

Source: https://lunasimslulamai.jimdo.com/estructuras/

I also found a rather useful series about the high clare castle build I made. I'm talking about planning and how things needs to be this and that. It's a series, but I know the first one has too low sound.

I am actually not interested in making stairs ground to ground anymore, figured I can use foundations and friezes for my needs.

I know that planning is important, and that's what I'm actually doing these past a lot of days. All the questions and things I do/try are just to understand what I can do/how and what I can't do so I know what should my plan for the house look like. Also, I am trying to tackle the floor plans for the house, based on real life mansions floor plans.

Yeah, I do know about the Luna's staircase. Ridiculous, pardon me for saying so. I kind of dislike the concept of decor stairs, especially if they are something that I could use as a real usable thing.

Can't the animation be adapted on them? EA made spiral stairs happen. (although, I think I found recently some curved stairs that were actually said [an shown] to be working)

About those tutorials:
they are definitely useful (good to know that basement could be made higher with raising the terrain) but as for what I did in my picture is probably a lot more simpler, since I only need like one wall uncovered that would seem/look like/work as a basement wall.

Here's the house that serves as my inspiration now:
http://i1152.photobucket.com/albums...zpsxyhcjedc.png

See how it only has two stories above ground.

Now here's what I've been trying to re-make:
http://i1152.photobucket.com/albums...zpsmrnp8zjf.png

That right there is the basement. I didn't saw this picture at first, when I found the floor plans, so I was confused to see that floor plans said "covered terrace" in the basement

Now I think I am quite confident that I can recreate this the way I already did, but also with raised terrain and foundation. I just need to finish my game floor plans.

Yes I guess the tutorials does require a bit of studies on your part.

TS3 is a rather old game now. Inge Jones did make a u-shaped staircase with a creator on tsr with animations, but it still didn't look that good. I guess the answer would then just be no, cannot be done.

Well, that's definitely very sad

Anyway, I am off to bed finally, after a successful failure of drawing floor plans. That thing is so hard! Especially because my inspiration house does not align with the floor plans perfectly and also because of the sizes. When on the outside it looks like it could that amount of sim-tiles, on the inside it looks a different amount. Frustrating!

I am rambling. Never mind. It's very late.

Hey, hey, hey!

So, I just wanted to give you guys a little update before I jump into build-planning again.

Last night after an unsuccessful floor plan drawing by hand, I decided to go straight in game and try to draw-build floor plans there.
That's exactly what I did today, results can be seen in the picture.

That was a very good idea, seeing everything in-game helped me a lot to make the floor plan align correctly, except that I went a little too big, and I run out of space, hence the half walls at the edge of lot

Not worry, I will fix that. (My rich sims will just have to go with smaller one-of-the garages )

So yes, this is something, but not the end version, as the foundation is not here yet, and the ground is still flat, no basements or other stories yet.

I will be back when I have something more to share.