Stairway Edit/Moving

[Qillz]

Call me Q.
I'm a noob to both Sims 3 and this board.

That said, in the PS3 version, I purchased the starting house with short stairways leading up to the front door and the rear-left of the property. As my family has grown, I have expanded the house, but I cannot move those darn stairways no matter what level or tool I change to in build mode.

Additionally, I cannot find a way to make a stairway that short (it's only like 4 steps) to add back to the house if I sledgehammer the existing ones.

I plan to move eventually, but I have a household of 6 with 4 bums leaching off of the only 2 working stiffs, so money is tight. I also built and stocked a pond with high end fishies in the backyard, so I don't really want to leave that behind just yet.

Any help would be... well, very helpful.

[Wendellion]

Hi Q! I've never been able to edit a staircase once it was already placed. I've always had to delete it with the sledge hammer tool and buy another one and place it again. As far as the short set of stairs go, I think you have to have them attached to a deck, not foundation for the game to shorten them. I spent the good part of an hour trying and re trying to attach stairs somehow some way to my houses foundation, but when I used decking the game attached them automatically. Hope this helps you.

[Hosfac]

While you could move staircases in some of the other Sims games, you cannot move them once placed in Sims 3.  Demolishing them completely and installing new ones after the deck is redesigned is the only option.

Likewise, in more than half the houses I build, I use foundations for the deck instead of the decking, since the edges of the decking cannot be restyled.  Likewise, there would be no way to build a stairway to the basement in a house with a foundation if you couldn't attach stairs to foundations.  So, this can indeed be done.  If you're having trouble, place the stairs 1 section at a time, and remove the hand rails in the middle.

[Wendellion]

Hosfac are you talking about the PC version?

[Hosfac]

I was using my experience from the PC version, yes.  I didn't think there would be a great deal of difference in the basic mechanics of building, though.  I sort of lost myself for a moment, however, and didn't realize I was speaking as though it were a confirmed fact.

My bad. 

[DannKeeling]

In console version, you have to use decking if your considering to put stairs, good luck!

[Wendellion]

No worries at all Hosfac. I appreciate your response. Truly! In fact it turns out that you are 100% right!! I don't know what the reason was, but when trying to attach stairs to my already built house with foundation for a porch it would not work. But after reading your post, the fact that you would not be able to have a basement if you could not attach stairs had me thinking twice. You ARE able to build a basement in the console version (I haven't tried yet but googled it and several posts confirm) so there must be a way to attach those stairs, darn it!

Long story short, I put a 9x9 square of foundation in my backyard and tried again to attach stairs and it worked. I don't know why it didn't work before and others obviously have been having trouble as well, but you can attach stairs to foundation guys!

This version doesn't give any options as to HOW to build stairs such as one by one. You pretty much just pick the stairs tool and try to place them where you want and the game will auto shorten them for you if that makes sense. So if the game doesn't let you maybe try with walls, without walls. Like I said I don't know why but sometimes they will attach and sometimes they wont.

AND HOSFAC WAS RIGHT!!


 

[Hosfac]

I had assumed that you could build basements in the console version, but since I didn't have it I had no way to know for sure.  Assuming often makes me say some dumb things, so it wouldn't have exactly surprised me if that's what had happened here lol.  I'm glad to learn that I didn't make myself look stupid (again), so thanks for letting me know. 

In the PC version, stairs can be a little bit obstinate if the ground where they're going isn't level.  I'm not sure if level ground is an issue in the console version, but if it is, it couldn't hurt to try to level the ground off in that area when you can't get them to go in.  Likewise, placing several single width stairways right next to each other and removing the excess railings is another way I've discovered that seems to make it easier when they want to be difficult.

[Qillz]

Thanks for the replies.

I'll play with foundations, decks & stairs when I get home, but not with this save game. I leveled that entire property to the dirt and built a nice big 2-story house without a foundation or deck. The short stairways were just slowing my sims down anyway. 

I'm more about function than form, so I generally leave asthetic concerns aside until after I have verified that the living space has good flow and keeps my sims off each others toes. There comes a time, however, when living in a big box gets very boring. My next hurdle will be to get a roof that fits properly on odd shaped houses without looking like something cobbled together by a 3-year old with legos.