Two Deaths, a Second-Death, and a Wedding

Shortly after Alesha died, Hank finally reached the top of the Law Enforcement: Special Agent career, decided he'd had enough of working, and retired. He then devoted himself to working on his skills, and started casually dating a bit again though his interests had mostly moved on from the womanizing of his earlier days. Also not long after Alesha's death, Morganna passed on as well. I had to redo things a bit around her death, because I had let her keep her job in the Medical field so she'd have something to keep her occupied and out of the way, and this resulted in Grim coming for her as she finished her shift at the hospital one day.

I was concerned about losing her grave because she'd died on a community lot and not being able to get her ghost, which I needed to finish Beau's LTW, so I opted to exit without saving and redo (in hindsight I suppose I probably could have fetched her grave from the mausoleum in the cemetery like I had Beau's, but I didn't think of that at the time). Luckily I didn't have to back up that far as I had saved not too long before that. The first thing I did when I started up again was have her retire/quit (I forget which it was) so that she'd be home when Grim came for her. He showed up right on schedule and this time her grave was safely on the home lot.

That night, or the following one, her ghost came out, Beau saw it, and his LTW was completed. Shortly thereafter (a few days I think, I forget exactly), Beau's time as a playable ghost was up and he went back to the netherworld (or whatever they call it in the game). He left his grave on the lot to add to the growing collection of them in the backyard, and contributed 7 points to the challenge, bringing the score to 18.

Beau Andrews' Achievements:
Traits: Couch Potato, Good Sense of Humor, Inappropriate, Slob
Career: (none)
LTW: Gold Digger
Skills: Gardening - Botanical Boss
Paranormal: Have a playable ghost
Miscellaneous: (none)

After Beau was gone, or maybe it was shortly before that, I forget, Grim came for Hank as well while he was working out on the treadmill trying to get an Athletic achievement. He must have been mere minutes away from finishing it when Death made him stop.

Hank contributed 10 points to the challenge, bringing the score to 28.

Hank Goddard's Achievements:
Traits: Charismatic, Commitment Issues, Great Kisser, Loves the Outdoors, Schmoozer
Career: Law Enforcement - Special Agent
LTW: Heartbreaker
Skills: Charisma - Celebrity, Charisma - Personable, Charisma - Super Friendly
Paranormal: (none)
Miscellaneous: (none)

Byron suddenly found himself alone in the house, and also finally the focus of his Sim Goddess's attention. Yes, I admit, Byron was largely ignored by me during his growing up and the early days of his adulthood as I was focused on finishing all of the elder's LTWs and knew that Byron's would likely take care of itself in time anyway. So, while I gave him enough attention to set him on the right course toward his LTW when needed, I'd mostly left him to his own devices until now. But no longer. He was now the man of the house, and with his parents and their housemates Beau and Morganna gone, he (and I) decided it was time for him to look for a wife.

He didn't have to hunt for long, or maybe it's just that I'd had enough of dating around with Hank and just went with the first woman Byron got along well enough with. Whatever the case, within a few days of his father's death, Byron invited Kesha Vargas over and proposed to her outside by the garden.

She accepted and a day or two later they married at his house. They threw a wedding party, but instead of doing their ring exchange out in the garden or at least in the living room where the was room for their guests to gather around, they decided instead to do it in Byron's old bedroom where space was far more limited. (I've not done wedding parties much, so likely was just my inexperience with getting them positioned right before having them do the action that caused the odd location). I made sure to have Byron ask her to move in during the wedding party, and as soon as I was able to afterwards I sent Kesha to City Hall to change her last name to Medina so that their children will have that name as well.

Kesha (Vargas) Medina's Stats:
Traits: Good, Light Sleeper, Neurotic, Perfectionist, Workaholic
LTW: Renaissance Sim (master 3 skills)
Favorites: Classical, Mac and Cheese, Lime Green

I'll end this entry with this picture of an odd event I happened across when I was scrolling across town one day shortly after Byron and Kesha's wedding. I noticed a crowd of protesters outside City Hall, and out of curiosity I zoomed in take a closer look. From their signs, apparently they had gathered there to protest...engagements? Engagement rings? *shrugs*

Next up: Primetime for generation 2 and the birth of generation 3

The Family Expands

The next day after Hank had moved in, Alesha realized that she was pregnant with his child.

She never spun any wishes about wanting to get engaged or married to Hank, which was really just as well since I'd decided to leave them technically unattached while pursuing his LTW anyway. A few days later, her son Byron was born, and he took her last name.

I don't really remember the order in which Byron got his traits as he grew up, so here's what they ended up being once he was an adult:

Byron Medina
Traits: Artistic, Genius, Handy*, Loner, Vegetarian
LTW: Perfect Mind/Perfect Body (max Logic and Athletic)
Favorites: Indie, Cheese Tofu Steak, Red

*All traits are chosen via rolling the die for it/them whenever I'm given the option to choose for a sim. I did roll this trait for him as one of the early ones, perhaps when he aged to Toddler, but for some reason it didn't stick. Probably I hit the wrong button or something and it didn't save. So he went through the better part of his life with only 4 traits until I ended up getting a few hacks to clear up some errors I was getting, one of them being Twallan's Master Controller, and I used it to set the trait on him then. I would have left him as is, but was concerned that his only having 4 traits was causing the odd, small glitches I was getting, so I went ahead and set it.

Byron's infancy passed quickly, and it wasn't long before he aged up to Toddler. Alesha threw him a birthday party and invited some of their friends. Holly Alto (in the orange dress) and the gal sitting at the chess table (forget her name) ended up being two of Hanks' conquests eventually I believe. Though I'm actually not certain now if Holly was or not. Also in the picture is Beau Andrews (elder in blue shirt) who we'll see more of later on. I believe the woman in the bathing suit is his wife, Victoria Andrews, but I'm not certain.

Since Hank didn't have a career-related LTW I let him remain in the Law Enforcement career. Eventually he went into the Special Agent branch of that career because that's the one he'd spun a wish for at some point. Byron's toddler days passed fairly uneventfully, and while he didn't learn all of his skills, he did at least get potty trained and learned to walk (I think). I apparently didn't get a picture of his birthday to child, or any of him as a child. Alesha reached the top of the Business career while he was a toddler. It was during this time that Alesha's friends began dying. First was Nancy Landgraab:

Next was Victoria Andrews.

Not too long after that, Beau Andrews passed as well.

During all of this, Byron was growing and doing well and by the time Alesha became an Elder he was a teenager. She threw a birthday party for herself, and as luck would have it, just as she was blowing out her candles, the Grim Reaper came for her friend Fiona McIrish who was in attendance.

Not too long after that, Hank became an elder as well. He didn't have a party, instead he celebrated his transition while meeting one of his girlfriends, or prospective girlfriends, at the bistro. The gal in the blue shirt and white skirt was his date.

Hank had of course been busy wooing and dumping women during all this time. For the most part he'd only date them, make out with them a time or two, then move on to the next conquest. He didn't really sleep around much, so at least in that respect he was mostly faithful to Alesha. Though I'll admit that this was probably largely because he mostly just met with his various women at the park or at other public places where there wasn't anywhere to woohoo available. One notable exception was Sandi French. He went over to her house one night to try to win her over, and since there were beds available, I decided to have him woohoo her, and on a further whim, had him Try for Baby with her. It worked, and though he'd broken up with her that same night (yes, he was a total cad - he slept with her then dumped her) she gave birth a few days later to his son, whom the game named Rigoberto French. Rigoberto stayed with his mother, and though Hank did have some contact with him, as did Byron eventually, I left him to the time stream to grow up on his own, just keeping tabs on him as best I could so I hopefully would at least not miss it if he died or something. I apparently never bothered to take any pictures of him early on either, so I've none to show of him here.

Sometime after Rigoberto's birth, Byron became a Young Adult.

He had already chosen his LTW sometime during his childhood I think (I decided with him that I'd go with whatever LTW a sim rolled first as a wish, so they get to choose their own and it's as random as it can be). While he was a teenager, I'd had him get a part-time job at the grocery store, and he eventually managed to get to level 3 in it. After he had done that, I had him go into the Sports career since I figured that would go well with his wish to max out his Athletic skill and would help check another item off the list for me. The family was comfortable enough financially by now that he didn't really have to get the full time job, but I figured he might as well.

Another notable event that happened around this time that I sadly don't have pictures of is that Alesha received the opportunity to take a grave to the science center and have that person resurrected. While I wasn't really looking to add to the household at this point, I decided to have her go ahead and do the opportunity. She chose Beau Andrews, whom she'd had a bit of an affair with herself while Hank had been busy womanizing, enough so that he counted as a Romantic Interest for her the same as Hank did. I believe that was something they'd gotten up to on their own during a party, as I don't recall having her initiate anything like that with Beau. At any rate, he seemed like the best candidate for resurrection among her friends that had died, so he's the one she chose. After retrieving his tombstone from the cemetery, she took it to the science center, and a few hours later Beau Andrews joined the household as a ghost.

Beau Andrew's stats:
Traits: Couch Potato, Good Sense of Humor, Inappropriate, Slob, Can't Stand Art
LTW: Golddigger (marry a wealthy sim and see their ghost)
Favorites: Kids music, Cookies, Yellow

Beau's LTW presented a conundrum for me. According to the challenge rules I had to at least attempt to fulfill his LTW since I'd moved him in, but I wasn't really sure if I could get it for him. I did a bit of research, decided that I'd at least give it a shot to stick to the rules, and set about looking for a rich sim that he could marry. Unfortunately, there didn't seem to be many around in Sunset Valley by then. About this time, Alesha had learned that her long time coworker and friend Thornton Wolff was rich, and she got the notice that indicated he was about to die. She went over to visit him one last time, and was there to witness his death - and to meet his wife Morganna.

I had her chat with Morganna a bit to establish a relationship with  her, primarily so she could invite her over so Beau could meet her, given that she was now an available, wealthy widow. Once he'd met her, Beau commenced a rather whirlwind courtship. He got ahead of himself a bit at first and tried to ask her to marry him before they really knew one another well enough, and she turned him down. He persevered, however, and when he invited her over the following day, she accepted.

He didn't waste any time, and they almost immediately exchanged rings and were married. Strangely though, Morganna didn't automatically move in, and I ended up having to ask her to move in a bit later on. I also never made note of her stats because I knew I wasn't going to be able to count her in the challenge. Her LTW was Surrounded by Family (raise 5 children to teenager), which was not doable for her since she was already an elder and close to death when she married Beau. So her only function really was to help Beau achieve his LTW. (Edit: Used Master Controller to check her stats from her ghost after publishing this. Traits: Workaholic, Good, Family-Oriented, Charismatic, Artistic; Favorites: Classical, Spaghetti, Spiceberry)

In the meantime, Hank had finally finished his LTW when he finally asked Alesha to officially be his girlfriend after he'd broken up with his 9th conquest. Side note here: for the first few relationships I'd been having him ask a gal to go steady, then having Alesha ask him to break up with the other woman. While this worked, it also made them become enemies with Alesha as well as with Hank, something that caused her some mild difficulties at one point when she needed to get into a house to speak with one of her friends but the friend's roommate, who happened to be one of Hank's exes and an enemy of Alesha's kept answering the door and wouldn't let her in. I then realized that he could just break up with them himself and leave Alesha out of it so her relationships around town weren't getting tanked as well.

Once he'd finished his LTW and had pledged to remain faithful to her from now on, I decided to have them finally get married. I wasn't sure if he'd go for it given that he has Commitment Issues, but when Alesha proposed, he accepted easily.

They married the next day after Alesha got home from work, deciding to just have their own private ceremony the way Beau and Morganna had.

Sadly, Alesha and Hank didn't get to enjoy more than a few hours as a married couple, for while she was out weeding the garden after their ring exchange, the Grim Reaper came for her.

And so Alesha Medina died, having contributed 11 points to the challenge. Her achievements:

Traits: Ambitious, Can't Stand Art, Good, Neat, Technophobe
Career: Business
LTW: CEO of a Megacorporation
Skills: Gardening - Master Farmer, Handiness- Plumber
Paranormal: Resurrect a Ghost
Miscellaneous: Have a birthday party

Next up: Hank and Beau's twilight days and Byron finally gets his time in the spotlight

Beginnings: Alesha Medina

I started this challenge with a sim that I created and named Alesha Medina. I never got a good CAS shot of her, but here's a shot of her moving into her house:

Alesha's stats were:
Traits: Ambitious, Can't Stand Art, Good, Neat, Technophobe
LTW: CEO of a Megacorporation
Favorites: Classical music, Hot Dogs, and Green
She started as a new Young Adult.

I moved her into one of the pre-existing houses in Sunset Valley. I never can remember the address, but I'm sure those of you who've played SV a lot will recognize which one it is from the picture above. It's my favorite starter house in SV, and the one that I usually end up putting a sim in when I start a new game there.

One of the first things that Alesha did was get a job in the Business career to start pursuing her LTW. She did well there and started getting promotions fairly quickly. She remained single and focused on her career and on gaining the skills she needed for it. There wasn't really much to be taking note of or taking pictures of then, even if I'd been minded to blog it at the time. She also started a small garden, mainly because I never can resist having my sims plant things. Having a supply of good quality produce on hand (at least eventually) is always nice. One amusing thing that happened during this time is that her clothing glitched one morning for some reason and she ended up going out stark naked to tend her garden.

It wasn't until she'd risen through the ranks enough to fulfill her LTW that I really started thinking about the future for her and the challenge. She'd never shown much interest in dating or romance, instead had always struck me as being a very career-oriented sort, so I wasn't sure for awhile if I wanted to get her married and have a kid or kids or not. I debated for awhile between adopting, just having her get pregnant by someone, or moving someone in, and eventually decided to go for a relationship for her. So, with thoughts of trying for the hidden trait from having a child with a cop, I had her go after Hank Goddard, whom I'd seen around town in his cop uniform and whom she knew and got along with fairly well. Though I've played Sunset Valley several times, I'd never paid a lot of attention to all of the premade sims in the game, so didn't realize at first that he was already a "playable" in the town and so wouldn't likely qualify toward getting the hidden trait. Or maybe he could have, I don't know really, since I'm only generally aware of how the hidden traits work. I welcome any tips or advice regarding them. At any rate, she set about becoming friendly with Hank, and once their relationship was high enough, she invited him over for a date one night, and had her first kiss with him. Yes, she had been living a rather cloistered and celibate life up until now.

One thing led to another that night, and soon she was also losing her virginity with him.

I still was mostly just intending to get her knocked up and not bother with moving him in, but after they'd finished, on a whim I decided "what the heck?" and had her ask him to break up with his girlfriend Pauline Wan and to move in with her. He readily agreed, and I soon was somewhat regretting the decision when I saw his LTW. This had been a "Try for Baby" attempt, and it had succeeded, though it would of course be a bit before Alesha realized it.

Hank Goddard's stats:
Traits: Charismatic, Commitment Issues, Great Kisser, Loves the Outdoors, Schmoozer
LTW: Heartbreaker (be the boyfriend of 10 sims)
Favorites: Pop, Fish and Chips, Sea Foam
He was an  Adult when he moved in (I think. He was roughly the same age as Alesha at least.)

Given his LTW, I decided that they would simply live together for now at least, and I didn't have them get any more involved than that to help avoid jealousy issues as much as possible. And really, for most of their lives after this point, they really were more just housemates than lovers, though they did share a bed and occasionally would woohoo. They eventually became more, but not until the very end, and I'll show that later.

Next up: Alesha and Hank have a child.

Welcome!

Welcome to my humble Completion Challenge blog. This will be a chronicle (of sorts anyway) of my attempt at the Completion Challenge for The Sims 3 that was created by Robin in the Sims 3 Challenges Yahoo! group. It is a fairly freeform challenge that allows you to play however you like really, be it with a single family that you follow through the generations, with multiple families in a neighborhood, and even with different families across various neighborhoods. The main idea is that in the course of your play, you're attempting to do everything that can be done in the game, including having every trait in your game on a playable sim at some point, getting a sim to the top of every career, completing every lifetime wish (LTW) in the game, etc. Besides checking off items on the very extensive list, the other important rule is that you can only count items once the sim that's done them completes their LTW, and you must at least try to fulfill the LTW of every sim that you make playable. If a sim dies or moves out before their LTW is completed, nothing they did for the challenge will count.

I've already been playing this for awhile, and have only now decided that, yes, I do want to try to blog it, if only for my own benefit in remembering all the sims that have been a part of it and everything that they did and that happened to them in their lives. So far I've been playing legacy-style (though not by any legacy rules) in Sunset Valley with only the base game installed. While I do own all of the expansions, since I've never really played most of them (many of them not at all), I decided I would start over from the beginning with only the base game, then expansions would be added in order of release only after a certain percentage of the last one added had been completed. For now I'm thinking at around 50% completion, though I haven't made any firm decisions as yet, and I might adjust things as I go depending on what the latest expansion I'm working on is and how much it added. And I might end up getting too impatient to take it slow like this and just go ahead and install everything and figure things out from there. The main thing I'm concerned with is allowing myself ample time to really experience what each expansion has added to the game before I go adding in more so that I don't end up overwhelmed with untried content and with things that never get tried, or at least that don't get tried for a very long time even though they've been in the game since the beginning or near to it. Yes, I'm probably totally crazy for doing this, or at least one of my good friends is always telling me I'm nuts, but oh well. Normal is boring ;)

I'll be honest up front here and state that this may or may not be a story type blog, I'm really not sure yet. Some posts, especially my early ones as I play catch up with trying to get up to date with my playing, will be rather thin on pictures, because really? I'm not much of a screenshot taker. I've gotten better about taking shots of important things like births, deaths, birthdays, etc. in my game, but I don't always remember to do those, or don't always get a good shot. I'll attempt to do better now that I'm blogging it, but no promises. Stopping constantly to fiddle with getting a good shot of something interrupts the flow of playing too much for me and I want to play and have fun, not be constantly worried with watching for photo ops or whatever. Also, what pictures there are will probably be largely unedited, because I simply can't be bothered to do a lot of editing on them. I've learned from past experience that it quickly takes the fun out of it for me and makes me not want to play if I end up having to spend an entire evening editing screenshots then another entire evening writing the blog post, so...yeah. I'm going for simple here this time. Raw screens and hopefully text that's done as I play, or shortly thereafter, without necessarily much attempt at storytelling.

Ok, now that I've talked anyone who's still reading to death, if you're still around and willing to follow along with this experiment in simpler blogging, then stick around and we'll see where this goes together. Comments are always welcome, as are followers :)