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Well, that was all from the Blackbirds! Their 5th week has been a veritable rollercoaster of ups and downs, with their luck finally shifting for the better by the end of it. I can only hope that this luck will follow them into the next round... But until then, enjoy this recap of all the (mis)adventures they got up to this week:

• The rotation started off on a sombre note, with a bedridden Gabriel, a very pregnant Annika, and an overperforming, overwhelmed Marcus. Phillip also dropped by from time to time, with his attempts to alleviate the family's burdens with Gladwyn money proving moderately successful.

• Never one to rest, Annika spent most of her last trimester fencing, reaching maximum body skill while doing so!

• Then, the inevitable happened. Surrounded by panicking men, Annika gave birth to her and Phillip's first child: welcome to the world, Godric Gladwyn! 👶

• After receiving an unusual request from the queen, Marcus set out into the Crooked Forest to dismember the slain dragon. Having sold its remains to Her Majesty, he received enough gold to be able to afford a proper house in the city!

• The Blackbirds quickly packed their belongings and moved into their new city home! Their (now ex-)neighbour Dominick saw them off into this new adventure.

• At the new house, little Godric grew up into a happy toddler! No cake or fancy birthday party, but the birthday boy didn't seem to mind.

• Despite Annika's doubts about her parenting style, little Godric has been doted on the entire round! He learned to talk from Annika and was taught how to go potty by grandpa Gabriel. He also became best friends with uncle Marcus!

• And speaking of Marcus: he rekindled his flame with Winona, whose family are now the Blackbirds' next-door neighbors. Winona met Gabriel, but then quickly stole Marcus away for a hot makeout session in his room!

• The infamous dragon eggs Annika brought from the forest finally hatched at the end of the season! The Blackbirds are now proud (and confused) owners of two healthy Draco Major cubs.

• The Blackbirds remembered last minute to submit their taxes! The now-family of four paid a total of §1,000 to the Crown.

#sims 2 #ts2 #sims #gameplay #bacc #wyverns bay #wb gameplay #blackbird #blackbird week 5 #gabriel blackbird #annika blackbird #godric gladwyn #dragon #weekly recap #mine

Welp! With all the chaos that's been going on in the Blackbirds' lives, I almost forgot that their taxes were due!

They're still in the same tax bracket as before (Lower Class - §250/Sim), but now that they have a fourth family member, their total has gone up a bit and they had to pay §1,000 this week. A nice, rounded number!

Fortunately for the family, no extra tax was required for the dragons.

#sims 2 #ts2 #sims #bacc #wyverns bay #wb gameplay #blackbird #blackbird week 5 #gabriel blackbird #annika blackbird #mine

Gabriel ambled about the livingroom, flicking the wand in his hand as though assessing its durability.

He could once again feel magic coursing through his body, as potent as the very life blood in his veins. Not that it had ever left him - it was merely blunted by months of bedrest and disuse. Ever since moving into the new house, though, he'd been steadily sharpening the edge again.

It felt good, doing magic: like finally scratching an itch he'd been desperate to reach. Gabriel closed his eyes, savouring the electrifying sensation rushing through his casting arm as he prepared for his next spell. Energy pooled into his hand and burst from his wand in cracks of electricity when he spoke the incantation.

Tempus Interruptus!

The room shook. Annika and Godric froze where they stood, as still as shop mannequins. Marcus glanced over from his easel and gave his father an approving snicker before turning his attention back to his painting. This was expected: magic users were immune.

With another flick, Gabriel lifted the spell from his non-magical family members. His mouth turned upward: he'd been wondering if he could pull it off.

Temporal magic - notoriously one of the most complex forms of magic to exist.

And he just had.

#sims 2 #ts2 #sims #gameplay #bacc #wyverns bay #wb gameplay #blackbird #blackbird week 5 #gabriel blackbird #marcus blackbird #annika blackbird #godric gladwyn #mine

Marcus spent the better part of the afternoon setting up food and water troughs. Now that the dragonlings had begun to move around, it was evident that they were craving proper food and hydration.

Getting water was easy enough (their new house had a well in the backyard), but Marcus realised with a sinking feeling that he had nothing to feed them. The dragonlings were just as disappointed at the realization, snorting their disapproval and gnawing at themselves in protest. One even dug up an old bone and started chewing on it like a distraught puppy.

According to Gabriel's bestiary, Draco Majors usually fed on deer, boars, and sometimes bears. Unfortunately, none of these were easily available within city limits. Unless one knew a hunter, that is.

Tom Wagamese arrived quickly after being summoned. Gabriel and Annika cornered him near the front gate, making their pitch. Tom was amicable enough... until he caught sight of something pale and winged moving in the hedges. His expression shifted, but he agreed to help.

Not long after, a large wooden crate was hastily delivered to the Blackbirds' doorstep. Inside was fresh venison and a note which simply read: "free of charge". Marcus filled the trough, and the dragonlings practically threw themselves at the meat.

Watching them devour their first dinner felt oddly sentimental, Marcus thought with all the pride of a new pet parent.

#sims 2 #ts2 #sims #gameplay #bacc #wyverns bay #wb gameplay #blackbird #blackbird week 5 #gabriel blackbird #marcus blackbird #annika blackbird #tom wagamese #dragon #mine

The dragonlings had finally begun to move.

Not much, admittedly. A scratch here, a stretch there, but nothing that would betray them as apex predators. Still, Annika watched them with fascination, trying to decide whether they were tame enough to pet.

A delighted babble pulled her out of her draconian daydreams: Godric was crawling straight towards the beasts. They must've looked enormous to the toddler: all teeth, wings, and sharp talons. Swooping down like a hawk, Annika snatched him up before he could get any closer. She may not have been World's Greatest Mom, but that didn't mean she was about to let her only child get eaten by dragons!

Settling him in her arms, she let the curious toddler observe their strange new pets from a safe distance.

#sims 2 #ts2 #sims #gameplay #bacc #wyverns bay #wb gameplay #blackbird #blackbird week 5 #annika blackbird #godric gladwyn #dragon #mine

Me irl watching the progess bar while The Sims 2 Ultimate Collection™ is installing onto my brand new 1TB NVMe SSD.

#text post #kinda sims related #personal #rl #my pc

The two large, scaly eggs Annika had brought from the forest hatched on a cold afternoon by the fireplace.

Two pale creatures sat amongst the broken shells, huge wings folded against their backs and long tails curled around their bodies. Silent, pearlescent, and unmoving, they looked more like statues than live dragons.

Annika was delighted; Marcus was fascinated and slightly alarmed. Together, they broached the news to Gabriel as gently as possible, with all the subtlety of kids asking to keep a stray puppy. Gabriel stared at them with his one good eye, then stared at the dragons. Then he reached for his grimoire.

A quick read of the 'Beasts' chapter provided some much-needed answers:

📖 "The Draco Major: A medium-sized dragon species native to the forests of Wyvern's Bay. Highly intelligent and trainable, Draco Majors have historically been kept as domestic animals by experienced handlers. Newly hatched dragonlings often remain motionless for several hours while acclimating to their surroundings."

So they were healthy. And trainable... whatever that meant.

#sims 2 #ts2 #sims #gameplay #bacc #wyverns bay #wb gameplay #blackbird #blackbird week 5 #gabriel blackbird #marcus blackbird #annika blackbird #dragon #mine

Mini Update (Mostly Re: Game Issues)

Hey, friends! This is just a quick note to let you know two things:

1) I'm going on a 5-day trip to Italy on Wednesday, yay! My queue will be running until Sunday, so I'll be leaving you with some BaCC pics until I get back home. 😉

2) My game issues (more specifically the big lots crashing) were most likely caused by a full C: drive. I'm getting a fancy new 1TB SSD soon so I'm positive that'll solve it.

#text post #kinda sims related #personal #rl #my pc

They plopped onto the bed, breathless and grinning. Neither seemed particularly interested in talking, so Marcus simply watched her instead - grey eyes caught in green ones, like two celestial bodies locked into the same orbit.

By the time they finally parted ways, night had already descended on the Bay. Winona insisted that her apartment was only down the road and she could walk home alone. Marcus let her go, then walked back into his own house. Dropping onto the couch, he began daydreaming.

No matter how hard he tried, he just couldn’t seem to get the image of her odd green eyes out of his head.

#sims 2 #ts2 #sims #gameplay #bacc #wyverns bay #wb gameplay #blackbird #blackbird week 5 #marcus blackbird #winona tanner #mine

Marcus and Winona burst into his room still holding hands, grinning at each other like idiots. He barely had time to close the door before she pulled him into a hungry kiss.

Almost without thinking, he backed her against the wall, hands settling on her chest while hers curled around his neck. Somehow, they made it onto the bed; Winona straddled his lap and kissed him again while the little griffin figurine judged them silently from the bedside table.

They kept at it for a while, a mess of tangled limbs and hot breath, but neither was reckless enough to let things go much further than that. Marcus’ father was still downstairs, after all, separated from them by only a short flight of stairs and an unlocked door!

Not that it stopped Winona from kissing him senseless.

Marcus thought, somewhat helplessly, that he might already be completely in love with her.

#sims 2 #ts2 #sims #gameplay #bacc #wyverns bay #wb gameplay #blackbird #blackbird week 5 #marcus blackbird #winona tanner #mine

picknmixsims

Family Manager - Updated

Family Manager V1.2

Added options to show NPC families

Added detection, reporting and merging of split character files.

episims

Great news for everyone who has character files split by mods and is worried about them!

I highly recommend reading William's notes on the topic, too.

esotheria-sims

This feature is an absolute game-changer! ⭐️ If you were wondering how I was able to save little Godric from a broken and split character file... this is how.

#sims 2 #ts2 #sims 2 download #reblog download #picknmixsims #reblog #resources #split character files

Gabriel had to crane his neck to see the unexpected guest Marcus had brought home. The girl looked about his son's age, dressed in clothes that immediately betrayed her as not being a Bay local. Another arrival from SimCity? Interesting.

Marcus: "Dad, this is Winona, our neighbor."

By the way his ears went red when he spoke her name, Gabriel knew right away. The only question was whether the girl felt the same way.

Winona greeted Gabriel sweetly enough, but her eyes gleamed with the sort of mischief that usually spelled trouble. She seemed to delight in making Marcus blush... which he did, a lot. Gabriel found himself wondering how long this had been going on.

She stayed for dinner. When they got up from the table, Winona leaned into Marcus with a grin that was entirely too pleased with itself.

Winona: "Why don't you show me around the house? Starting with your room..."

Gabriel lowered his head to hide the faint twitch threatening the corner of his mouth.

Ah.

So the crush was mutual.

#sims 2 #ts2 #sims #gameplay #bacc #wyverns bay #wb gameplay #blackbird #blackbird week 5 #gabriel blackbird #marcus blackbird #winona tanner #mine

"My, look who it is!"

Marcus looked up to where Winona Tanner was waving at him, a big grin plastered across her freckled face. He hasn't seen Winona since her birthday outing. The one where they... His ears immediately went hot.

Winona: "So this is where you've been hiding this whole time, huh? Right down the street from me, too! And not once did you think to invite me over to hang!"

Marcus opened his mouth with every intention of apologizing and explaining himself, but something about her easy smile stopped him in his tracks. That was not what she was asking.

Instead, he straightened slightly and returned her grin with one of his own. Feigning confidence he wasn't feeling, he slipped a hand behind his back and bowed theatrically as he motioned towards the door.

Marcus: "How thoughtless of me! Allow me to rectify my mistake. Would you care to come inside?"

#sims 2 #ts2 #sims #gameplay #bacc #wyverns bay #wb gameplay #blackbird #blackbird week 5 #marcus blackbird #winona tanner #mine

Although she’d spent the better part of a year caring for Godric, Annika still felt like she had no idea what she was doing half the time.

Some days she managed well enough; other days, she stared at the piles of toys and tiny clothes and wondered how the hell her world had gotten so small. She loved Godric - there was no doubt about that - but she'd still catch herself mourning the life she could have had, if only things had turned out differently. College. Friends. Freedom. Wild parties and silly mistakes.

Instead, one reckless decision had split her life in two. She felt like she was forced to grow up too soon.

The worst part of it was the fear that, maybe, she simply wasn't cut out for this. The daily drudgery of caring for a toddler wasn't aligning with her at all, and she feared that perhaps she lacked that mythical motherly instinct that everyone else seemed to have.

Yet, all of this was lost on baby Godric. He spent his days passed from arm to arm between family who adored him, blissfully unaware of the worry that surrounded him. If he could talk, he'd probably tell his mom she was doing a stellar job.

#sims 2 #ts2 #sims #gameplay #bacc #wyverns bay #wb gameplay #blackbird #blackbird week 5 #gabriel blackbird #marcus blackbird #annika blackbird #godric gladwyn #mine

Gabriel was making a slow yet steady recovery. The skin on his face was still torn, but his migraines had eased up and his balance was getting better, enough so that he could move around the house and perform basic tasks.

Marcus noticed that his aura had come back, too. Finally, things were starting to feel normal again.

Or, as normal as they could.

Seeing him with only one eye still felt strange. The healers had given up on his eye months ago, proclaiming that he would remain blind on the injured side.

If Gabriel himself was bothered by it, he didn't let on. He remained his cryptic, stoic self, even if Marcus swore he could see a flicker of hurt in his good eye.

#sims 2 #ts2 #sims #gameplay #bacc #wyverns bay #wb gameplay #blackbird #blackbird week 5 #gabriel blackbird #marcus blackbird #annika blackbird #mine

episims

Split Character Files

I was let known that my personality-based witch idles mod causes new sims to have split character files.

It made me look into the issue. Since the information about it is spread across various forum threads and lacked some details too, I decided to gather what I've found in this post.

What does a 'split character file' mean?

Each sim has its own character file in Documents directory. For example, Neighborhoods \ E001 \ Characters \ E001_User00024.package is Samantha Cordial.

When a character file is split, in addition to the usual E001_User00024.package there's also a file named E001_User00024.1.package. It would still be Samantha Cordial, but her data would be stored in two files instead of just one.

What kind of mods cause it?

Mods that edit character templates. That means: TemplatePerson (group 0x7FEDFE16), TemplateCat (0x7F99E646), TemplateDog (0x7F3C1917), and TemplateSmallDog (0x7F593B25). In addition, NPCs have their own character templates too.

These templates seem to get copied whenever a new sim or a pet is created. If you have a mod that includes a part of them, it appears the game creates a second character file and then copies any related BHAVs from the mod into it.

Do split character files cause problems?

In SimPe's neighborhood browser, a split character file might not be displayed properly and it's possible that you won't be able to edit the sim's stats with SimPe if that happens.

The game itself seems to be able to parse the sim together from two character files in most cases. However, it's plausible that it causes the empty/wiped face glitch to appear. As I tested the issue, I was able to replicate this myself multiple times with split character files and others have seen this happening in their games, too.

There are also people in related threads who say they have split character files and haven't noticed it causing problems.

Why do mods edit these templates, then?

I don't think it's been common knowledge what exactly causes the issue. And to be fair, creating new sims and then inspecting their character files isn't probably a part of many modder's testing routines. It sure hasn't been a part of mine.

The unpleasant fact is that if we want to make some things happen through mods, editing the code related to templates might be necessary. Ideally, Maxis would've only used them to create new sims and pets, but that's not the case. Their code gets called in various other situations – when witches idle, for example.

Now that we know which groups are involved, I hope modders can at least alert players when we share mods that cause this issue.

How can I know if the mods I use cause split character files?

It's not that common for mods to edit the templates, so suspecting all mods isn't necessary. Here are some mods that do edit them:

My Personality-based Witch Idles (includes code from TemplatePerson, the NPC witch template, and the NPC servo template) the latest mod update doesn't cause split character files anymore

Object Freedom 1.02 by @fwaysims (TemplateCat, TemplateDog, TemplateSmallDog)

lobonanny by Pescado (the nanny NPC template)

Spectral Cat Variety by @hexagonal-bipyramid (the spectral cat NPC template)

AntiGoodWitchIdleAnims by @paradoxcase (the link is broken and kestrellyn hasn't reuploaded this one to MTS, but assumingly involves the same templates as my witch idle mod)

Landlord Gardens Only Communal Areas by simler90 (the landlord NPC template)

Business Mod by simler90 (the chef NPC template, the reporter NPC template)

Gypsy Matchmaker Fix by simler90 (the matchmaker NPC template)

Buy Build Enabler for BV by cathair2005 (the social worker NPC template)

More points for woohoo with professors by Marhis (the professor NPC template)

No Relationship with Servers by Neder (the server NPC template)

Baby Toddler Mod by simler90 (the nanny NPC template)

Burglar Mod by simler90 (the burglar NPC template)

More Dangerous Burglars by @blueybre (the burglar NPC template)

Butler Asks To Fire by Cyjon (the butler NPC template)

Vacation Mementos LTW (not the special version) by @lamare-sims (the fire dancer NPC template)

Espresso Machine And Barista Improvements by jonasn (the barista NPC template)

Gardening And Cleaning Duties by jonasn (the maid NPC template, the landlord NPC template, the gardener NPC template, the nanny NPC template, the NPC butler template)

Bartender Cleaning Duties by Big Woe (the bartender NPC template)

Realistic Newspaper Delivery by smithycpl (the paper person NPC template)

Gardener Invasion Fix by Lenna9 (the gardener NPC template)

There are probably more but in most cases, only specific NPCs are affected. Quite many people have reported having split NPCs in their games without noticing any issues with them.

Using these mods doesn't affect existing character files, but it will affect any new ones. You can prevent the split from happening by temporarily removing these mods from your game before creating new sims or pets, but you should keep in mind that this also includes spawning townies and NPCs (when their template is involved, that is) as well as born-in-game babies.

Can we stop the character files from splitting altogether?

If we can, it's sadly beyond my skillset as it appears to be hard-coded. I'm interested in testing if split character files can be safely merged back into one but I don't know about that either, yet.

I hope this clarifies the issue for someone! If I missed some crucial info, please comment.

episims

Since this post has gained some attention lately, I kicked myself to finally update it with a bunch of mods that I've confirmed to edit the character templates.

esotheria-sims

Considering my recent simming woes, this is a very valuable resource to have. I learned so much from this and similar posts on the topic of split character files, and feel much better equipped now to prevent any future nonsense!

#sims 2 #episims #split character files #text post #resources #reblog

I wanted to postpone showing off toddler Godric until he joined his dad's household and got a fitting makeover, but as mentioned earlier, I've been experiencing random crashes and it was pissing me off. So I said 'screw it' and went the lazy route. This house is not exactly the best for portrait-taking, but I had to work with what I had.

Godric Gladwyn

- Species: Human

- Gender: Male

- Age: Toddler

- Zodiac: Libra

- Aspiration: Grow Up

- OTH: ?

- Personality: Neat 2; Outgoing 8; Active 3; Playful 10; Nice 9

Godric is a fun-loving little Libra with a whopping 10 Playful points, 9 Nice points, and 8 Outgoing points. He's not too big on cleanliness or strenuous activities, but that's okay - considering his future as heir to House Gladwyn, his personality is just right!

#sims 2 #ts2 #sims #gameplay #bacc #wyverns bay #wyverns bay extras #wb gameplay #wb introductions #blackbird #blackbird week 5 #godric gladwyn #mine

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