oh yeah don't forget Riverview it has some good spots many of the families there are farmers and one actually has a huge farm full of almost all veggies and fruit you could need. also it has a community garden with plenty of items. if that's not enough for you theres two or three more families I don't remember off the back of my hand (I don't even remember that family with the farm right now) that have gardens the size of the community garden and one of the houses has a garden in the back yard though its small only a few plants still worth it if you play it. Also for those who don't know (some don't unfortunitly) Riverview is a free town from the sims developers its in the store go check it out right now it would actually be great for this challenge. you'd have to make your own mini lot though the houses are all bunched together. I'd suggest using the abandoned farm field that takes up a ton of room I didn't think I could camp there before because I thought the barrier was there but I managed to put a lot there and its perfect the hills there perfectly hide your lot from sight especially if its just a one floored 10x10 building. there is a chance normal cercumstances It could be seen from a road but if you look from where I put it its too foggy to see. and theres plenty other places you could put the lot too.

okay thanks I wasn't sure on those types of things because theres no electric system ingame and you could use those items off lot.

So I have only played a few days since last mentioned because my Empty Child(I've taken to calling her that now despite her name being Diana) began stalling out for five hours or more with her hands over her ears whenever there was a crying child in the room and refusing to do anything I say even things pertaining to the fact that she was starving, about to wet herself, and about to pass out. Yes fear my run-on sentence!
Anyways, I became so fed up I was about to send her out to socialize with people at the festival until she died. This is of course hoping she didn't score immunity.
Arturo promptly aged up and so I was worried he might become just as much a problem as her. I came to the conclusion I should take a break from the stress for a while and went off to build and test run my isolation unit.

While I was gone I tried out Relativity. Even on normal speed it seems to help with the lags to my game some --I think it may be acting as a patch to whatever the problem is. This has bolstered my courage and I will now be coming back to take another whack at the Watkins family.

Wish me luck!!!

I absolutely love the layout of Riverveiw for this challenge. Unlike Moonlight Falls, the layout allows you to place yourself MUCH closer to the stores at the beginning and it is easier to place yourself beleivably out of town when you move to your shack/cabin. Although it s lacking that useful Llama traveling system that comes in so handy and I figure never breaks down because it runs on magic.

The only thing that stops me from using Riverveiw most of the time is the fact that it uses the worldcache system, which makes playing difficult for me considering I have so much lagging trouble. My sims quite regularly take three hours to make waffle in the morning because they spend so much time standing around like idiots or out and out freezing. All the while the clock is still running.

It's a bit late this time, but I will have to try the firewood system next time I try this challenge. I am, however; coming up on my trader day, so --if I actually have anything much to trade with-- I may try your trading system there on top of whatever makes sense to me at the time.

That's a real shame about all those twins, it must be disturbing for the poor things. You sure loose a lot without immunity. I don't think that would work for me since mine don't even seem to be getting sick. What I need I think is to try a new dice app.

By the way, I wish I could adopt strays like that. I can't seem to get them to stay on my lot for more then three actions at a time, then they often leave and never come back. I long since gave up on strays. They aren't even coming around anymore. I have to check my Story Progression settings, because I think that might be why.

You have probably already resolved this, but regarding day eleven I will try and add my two cents . On one hand it does kind of require the lost child. On the other hand you did go through the risk of getting her. You could always say Clary is the one who was poking around their old house.

Okay, I have thought about everything in this and I'm glad that you'll try my systems and such (sadly I came up with them too late... Even mostly for me). About the strays, I usually run into town areas when my sims are out gathering and usually they'll find some random animal (cats and dogs only) and if they can interact long enough to take them back to the home lot (after doing a roll for their interactions) I consider them adopted and use testingcheats to add them to the household.
I don't think I have EVER during this challenge since I took immunity off, been able to keep both sets of twins alive! It just doesn't seem to work. Also, about your rolls, do you always have it set to 20 when you roll? My number generator is always resetting so I just thought I should check.
Thanks about day eleven and I actually am just now reaching day eleven (I haven't been playing much) and I think that's what I'm going to do! Thanks Kindred!

I feel better about my inability to adopt strays now. Unicorns are easy and I have managed horses, because while they run off a lot they are easy to find again, you just have to be stubborn. Maybe for realism in transport I should try adopting horses next time. They're easy to feed because they graze and can dig up random veggies --although it takes time-- and they can drink from bodies of water. Well, except in winter when all the water freezes over.

And I am using a dice app rather then a random number generater and it is definitely set to a twenty sided die. I think it has decided to prove me wrong because they have started dropping off like flies. And of course they waited till my game was more manageable to do it.

I believe I left off like just before day 22, so we will start there. It's trader day today and the family excitedly trades one crib(no more favoritism accusations about what kid gets to sleep in it. Lol) for one "pantry"(Pride and Joy Refrigerator painted in wood. They are not allowed to store meals in here because it is just a pantry), 20 scrap(I just don't have the food so I'm substituting scrap. I'm sure the trader can either use it or trade it to someone else.) for one counter, and 15 scrap for a battery operated radio. We can have meals as soon as we get hold of some non-honey related food. The twins finally age up today! Toddlers mean sleep!

My game is still lagging badly after two days with relativity in on normal speed. Apparently I was wrong about it helping without changing the speed, so I put it on half speed. Sorry guys.
Colin ages up on day 20 so I am now one teen, three kids, two toddlers, the parents, and my game running much smoother thanks to this and relativity. Quin builds a chin-up bar from scrap for the family and a few days later a telescope.
During this time mom begins taking the kids out scavaging, you know to make sure they have the skills necessary to survive(plus gotta put some risk in somewhere and there are so many of them after all). My dice has been so lucky so far I don't expect anything to come of this and the weather has been so bad I never run into anyone anyways. I was wrong. On day 20 Mom scores immunity when Samuel Goth passes to close. Then Miriam Hoppcraft passes by Arturo and Diana. Arturo rolls a twelve and is safe, but Diana rolls a 7 and 6. Goodbye lost child, you will be --okay no ones really going to miss you since they barely knew you...

Day 19 brings spring, but temperatures hold cold so no thaw.

On day 18 bandits strike. My poor as of yet unfruitful and still dormant garden is destroyed. Due to my seasons snafu I allow the Watkins family to keep 5 plants instead of 3. There is nothing in the yard that can be stolen besides the tent Else and Quin are currently sleeping in(how come my brave athletic patriarch who is sleeping in the yard doesn't wake up and stop these bandits? Sheesh Quin)... Else's immunity is lost today, but somehow Collin is the one who dies today(I don't recall why). Goodbye sweet boy, I think you were my favourite...

Day 17 Arturo has the germy moodlet and rolls a six and a two. I am having real bad luck with these kids now man. Remmy meanwhile --unaware of the tragic loss-- slips of to the festival grounds to meet a friend, the lovely Sally Zeno(?).

Day 16, still no crops why won't the temperature rise?! Collin returns for the first of many visitations. Even in her sleep toddler Maggie seems to find him creepy.

Day 15, still no crops. -_-
It's love day today, and Quin scores immunity while dumpster diving (not that these two have anything to do with each other). Remmy goes rummaging in the neighbors trash and scores a candle. Luckily he wasn't caught because it turns out this is Sally's house! (Okay so I cheated and moved her there for easy acces. Shhh...) She invites him inside and they get to be friends. On the way home Remmy is abducted by aliens! Oh my! Poor kids mood is tanked.

Day 14 and the trees have finally thawed! No plants though.
Quin wakes early to see the relief chopper and runs into town. There is a ridiculously huge guy at the drop site who picks a fight with Quin over one of the packages. Quin has full athletic though so he wins pretty easily. In the package there is an immune booster, quite a lot of food , a water pump, and a sprinkler. Our first meal is had for dinner tonight!
Remmy uses that booster when he slips over to Sally's again. He decides being best friends forever just isn't enough and plants one on her.
Mom spends all day tutoring the kids only to pop out another one later that night. Little Mallory.

Day 13 and the plants are all dormant again this is the worst spring ever!
Remmy and Sally decide to go steady and in celebration have maybe a little too much fun in a leaf pile. Looking forward to summer tomorrow Remmy ages up to an adult!

New update here!

what about if the sim is pregnant? That makes them nasios. Do i have to roll for that?

Do you make more than one person?

I would recommend the no fridge shopping mod for this.

Hey... Guess who's actually back! I have been a bit tired of the sims after a while of playing it a LOT. I thought a bit of a hiatus was necessary, but now I'm back! I have played a few days of this so far and I'm sad to say that the last day I've played so far, we lost 3. But they only died after the newest 2 additions to the family. Justice had her pup whom we named Jason after Jace's lost brother. And Clary had their new baby Johnson. Sadly Clary only got to hold her child but once, before she was taken by the virus. Justice had been an old pup when they found her so she lost her life that way, before the virus could reach her. And lastly, Patches, the female cat we had, sadly was lost with Clary. Now Jace is left to care for his baby, child sister, and two pets on his own. I am up to day 12... Let's see how much more he can take.

I've thought long and hard about how to make the apocalyptic half of this challenge easier. Having spent the last 2 years in a very isolated rural community actually made it that much easier.

Firstly, how to collect & retain water? Since I'm going to be building a shack anyway, why not have rooftop water storage? The technology has existed for millenia! Figure 1 square per sim = 1 day's water storage. Of course you have to keep track of water usage and you need rain to fill it up in the first place, but with enough rain, you've got plenty of water for your extended sim family.

Also, solar panels are great & all, but when you don't have that kind of tech lying about, but you have maxed out inventing/handiness and a toolbox, a trip to the junkyard will provide enough scrap for you to diy your own windmill. It won't generate enough power for your entire household (unless you happen on a particularly windy day) but it will be enough to keep you off the grid if you're frugal with your energy needs.*

Also, if you have the right expansion/stuff pack, there is a fridge that looks like a pantry. So why not build one out of scrap wood that you find at the junkyard? Prior to refrigeration, we used to preserve, salt, pickle & otherwise cure our meats & produce. I reckon by the time you've "built" your pantry, you're going to have made up enough preserved food to keep in it. Just don't keep your leftovers in there - that just attracts vermin.


*Edit - I have discovered that it will take a little over 1000 scrap to 'build' a windmill.

love this challenge! but....

my sim is nauseous, but from pregnancy. do i have to roll for her?

Ended up with four left, all born during the course of the challenge. I rolled at every sniffle and every queasiness, and if they clipped or brushed past an unknown sim, and if they were conversing with or touching someone who needed to make a roll. Out of a total of sixteen sims, eleven of them born during the challenge, I managed to keep a quarter alive. Three of my final survivors had no athletic/fitness due to being children or younger. Day four halved my remaining family. It was very traumatic.

I'm stunned. Nobody starved to death, and one dude died of old age!

I've always taken the word "ill" in the rules to mean germy moodlets as that's what it says shortly after. A lot of people seem to take it the same way, although some people seem to take it to include nausea and allergy moodlets as well. Most people don't seem to include the pregnancy nausea in that, probably because they know the cause and because if you had to roll everytime a pregnant sim had a little upset tummy they'd all die before giving birth. I can't recall if Misty has ever said anything on the matter. I will look and get back to you, but it might take some time.
For now I would say no you do not have to roll.
And sorry it took so long for one of us to get back to you with some kind of helpful answer.

[Edit:] I looked back and she doesn't say anything about pregnancy nausea. Someone did ask if they should doll for nnausea as hell as the very moodlet and Misty seemed ti imply that was left to personal preference.

I am depressed due to this challenge right now. As I think about my storyline this time it's pretty sad. Here it is, in short, from the beginning.
1) Allison and her fiance, Nick have 2 children.
2) Nick dies.
3) Allison re-marries, ends up with 3 more kids, then divorces new husband.
4) Ally loses 3 of the kids, one twin and two of the other three.
5) Ally Re-remarries.
6) Ally has a total of 5 more children along the way
7) Ally dies, leaving her eldest living daughter, Nicole, to care for the other 3 living children.
8) One of the children dies.
9) One of the children finds a woman in town who's family is all dead and brings her in, marrying her.
10) All but 4 of them are dead.
11) 3 of the pets died since they moved from town.
12) His wife dies the day after having a baby.
13) He is eventually left to care for his baby boy, child-age sister, and 2 pets.
14) His sister ages up to a teen and he dies on her birthday, taking the baby with him.
15) The teenage girl is left to fend for herself with her baby puppy and cat.

Oh wait, I never told you did I? Jace and that little cutie just passed on Kimmy's birthday, before she could even blow out the candles on her cake that Jace had just made the night before.

I'm sorry! -random stranger hug- Your poor family has served a purpose however. They have taught us all the valuable lesson of what happens without immunity, and it is not for the feignt of heart.

*hugs for everyone!* Haha, well it seemed too easy for me with it when I tried it last.... That was a horrible idea on my part though.

Okay. Home stretch now!

Day 12, it's summer and guessvwhat has finally happened? A full and complete THAW!!! -does happycdance of joy-
Remmy graduates today as well.

Day 10 and poor Maggie dies from the germs moodlet. Booh, hiss...
Meanwhile Sally fives birth to Rose making Remmy a dead beat dad since we still haven't moved her in.

Day 9 sees the No Shopping mod added, allowing Wade to eat some cereal. We teach Mallory to talk. Elsa also scores immunity while dumpster diving.

Day 8 and the trader comes. Quin is up early and makes a few trades. The family gains a well(water pump) in the front yard, a wash basin(bathroom sink). We now have 4hrs of water a day and a place to wash those dishes. No more "fine China."
The family spends the day setting up the sink and building Chemistry lab station. They also fix up an old stove found dumpster diving.

Day 7 and we loose Quin. I'm gonna miss him, but it was bound to happen at some point in this challenge. I don't seem to have written down what killed him.

Our days fall into a routine involving baths in the morning, Remmy working at the chemistry set, plenty of gardening, and mom training Wade on the chin-up bars. We occasionally tutor Wade and work on other skills and relationships. As I am playing this stretch I am watching The Last Ship on Hulu, which seems appropriate to me.

Day 4 sees the twins -twitch- Logan and Claire(we scraped the bottom of he Sliders barrel for Quin's female double: Logan St. Claire) are born in the wee hours of the morning. Somehow the virus has found its way into the household today and everyone, but Remmy and Wade take ill. Poor Claire does not even live the day as a result. Elsa is understandably still upset.

Day 1 and Elsa crawls out of her tent in the middle of the night to be struck by lightening. O_o

Day 0 and we have 5 sims standing still. Remmy does however decide to too stop being a dead beat dad and marry Sally. This doesn't happen because he is tragic clowned finally from all that Llama usage. Epic fail...

Survivors:
Elsa Watkins(mother and founding sim)
Remmy Watkins(eldest son. Staked out for Isolation)
Wade Watkins(Of the 1st set of twin girls. Devastation Savior)
Mallory Watkins(Youngest boy. Devastation Crime Lord)
Logan Watkins(youngest and from 2nd set of twin girls)

Alrighty then. I have made it to the dreadful day four and I have a bit of a surprise in store... Kimmy went into town yesterday (day 5) and went straight up to some random house, met another teenage girl, and began flirting with her. I decided to continue this (after rolling a virus check) and bring the new teenager into my, excuse me, Kimmy's household. They are now dating. I just rolled for this dreadful day to see what would happen, but sadly, their love wouldn't go far as Kimmy's new girlfriend was unable to fight for her life hard enough on this day. But now Kimmy is once again, alone and afraid of what will continue from this day on. She is starting to wonder if she'll even make it through the night.

Update 2: Day 3, Kimmy was infected again today but still manages to survive well as she has decided to give up her choices of nights out on the streets. She is still mourning her girlfriend, one of the many deaths throughout the family line and even outside of it. She is still worried about when and how this nightmare will end for her.
Edit: Okay maybe cutting herself off from the rest of society isn't working out. A nice teenage guy showed up, walking down the road and was clear of the virus, so Kimmy's whole head just went, "What the hell!" And went out there and chatted him up! They are now going steady and living together in the little old shack.

Update 3: Day 2, Kimmy and George (the outside the house man) are living happily in the shack and it turns out that their birthdays are both today... I wonder how that happened (I might have cheated George out of some of his teenage years but oh well, sorry.) Now they are both YA and something else is brewing around here.

Update 4: Day 1, How sad, how sad. Kimmy has been feeling bad with an upset stomach/ nausea. She was worried she had the virus, especially after finding her new hubby George slumped over the toilet, that foul, blackish liquid piling out of him. He made sure she stayed away so she didn't contract it but was worried she had after their interaction last night and their feelings this morning. Kimmy did fall ill with the virus also, but like past times, has recovered well. George, on the other hand, had never been infected and his was a very, very bad case. He had lied in bed all day feeling sick and only moving to eat or use the bathroom. Kimmy was still out working on her garden and came inside to find her newly wed, husband, lying on the ground. She quickly took him body to the graveyard and buried it through hours of tears and nausea. She went home after 4 hours of mourning and quickly cleaned the house until it was spotless. She slept alone in the half-empty double bed they had shared only once. Later that night Kimmy realized she was actually with child. His child.

Update 5: Day 0, After what feels like months (probably because it has been), I have finally completed this portion of the challenge. This is amazing. I can't believe I actually, finally finished it. And didn't completely fail. Kimmy will be helping me continue into the Isolation portion of this challenge, along with her baby which will be coming very soon and once it does it will hopefully be moved into the colony.

Out of respect (no matter how fake all of these computer creatures were) I would like to name the dead, there are a lot though.
Horses: Red
Cats: Cadeline, Blu, Scratch, Sage, Wilder, Stripe, Spot, Claws, Patches, Mojo
Dogs: Turtle, Justice, Jason
Humans: Nick, Natalie, Pansy, James, Parker, Niko, Jason, Goodwin, Carson, Isabelle, Allison, Clarrissa, Adam, Jacob, Nicole, Clary, Jace, Johnson, Emerald, and George.
That leaves my graveyard with 34 total dead, 1 horse, 10 cats, 3 dogs, and 20 people. I'm sad to be reminded of them, especially the ones I hardly got to know, like all those who died as infants-children. I cannot remember the order though. I'm glad to say I'm moving on though. Good luck to all you other people doing this challenge. Consider my dead as a warning for what happens without immunity to T-12. Thanks!

I apologize in advance for making this take up so much space, I am going to post all of the pictures I have saved up that I really want to share.

Also, if you get 2 cats, they can pounce on each other till they gain hunting skill, then they can hunt for food. It's alot easier to make them fish as then they'd get a fish each time, but I don't know if the fish would be toxic to the cat... and it's really hard when you've just started learning hunting to hunt on land... yea, maybe not as good of an idea as I thought xD :P

I've finally finished setting up my game and I'm about the start this challenge! I have three small questions to ask before I start however.
1. I have all the expansion packs until Island Paradise so my game is only patched up till 1.55. I don't intend to update it until I have reformatted my computer. Therefore, I still have that glitch that resets the lunar cycle whenever I load up the game. I play pretty slowly so I average about 3-5 days before my computer starts lagging up and I have to restart the game. The way I play, I'm probably never going to hit full moon. Is it alright if I play without a zombie day even though I have Supernatural?

2. I have never used Nraas' homeschooling mod before so I have just downloaded it and tested it out. I found out that you need a computer to download your homework or go to city hall to collect it. I was hoping that it would be possible to download it through smartphones but sadly this isn't possible. In a zombie apocalypse/virus outbreak epidermic, I don't think city hall would be too inclined to hand out homework to school children and I don't intend to bring a laptop along. I don't think teachers would want to upload homework either when they're too busy trying not to catch the virus. Is there a way for parents to teach their children with the homeschooling mod without max logic? (I do actually intend to have one of my sims max logic, but I'm thinking of alternatives in case he dies)

3. How do I create the lost child in CAS? It's not possible to have a child all on their own in a household. I don't really want the social worker to give me a kid as I already know what I want her to look like. Can I make her with an adult then move her into the shack and then split them up to represent her brother abandoning her?

Sorry if I'm asking rather obvious questions, this is my second proper challenge so I'm very new to this (I've read a lot of them, I've just never done them).

I think I tried this one on my old laptop, but it bit the dust before I could get more than three days into it. I suppose I'll have to have another go at this, hopefully without something tech related preventing me from finishing.