Shielding Certain Sims from Story Progression?

[Gerald-W]

Hello Simmers,

Longtime lurker and first time poster on this excellent website.  I've recently reignited my love of the game and could use some advice on how to proceed with my latest story arcs.

Since the base game first came out a little over five years ago, I've had story progression turned off because I was a bit of an overlord with my little digitized towns.  Now that I'm replaying the game, I'd like to change the experience by turning it back on.  My issue, however, is that I enjoy making and playing multiple families in one town and am worried about progressive situations (career changes, moving in and out, and especially breakups), which will muck up my Sims' stories.

The gist is that I want SP to affect pre-placed Sims, but want my created characters and families opted out of the whole deal, or at least the aspects of SP that will negatively change how I want certain situations to play out.  Is there a feasible way to accomplish this?

As a frame of reference, I have all expansions except Island Paradise installed and I am patched to the latest version.

Thanks,
Gerald-W

[Steellace]

I like to control what's going on in town as well, probably much more extreme that necessary (lol).  However, I never had much luck controlling as much as I wanted until I installed a mod.  If you aren't against mods, I recommend NRaas' Story Progression mod.  It lets you dictate settings per household with lots of options.  Of course, it allows you to make settings for the whole town as well, but per household is especially nice for those of us who micro-manage a little too much.