The Piaget Wonder Child Challenge (Complete!)

[oshizu]

I never mentioned this because you don't either, but what happens with Paxton? He looks adorable!

It must be hard writing this now that you've finished the challenge and have moved onto the Apocalypse Challenge.
But I really hope you write your story to the end, because the rest of us so enjoy reading (and learning!) about how you play!

And a big congratulations on your graduation!

[officialghosts]

@oshizu Thank you! And yeah, I underestimated how much the Apocalypse challenge would pull me in, but I’m trying to push forward with this. I’m glad you all enjoy reading this so much!

Paxton appears periodically throughout the challenge; he basically just acts like another support sim. I try to do some stuff with him, but mostly just let him roam free unless I need him. I might use him for something else later, though.

Sorry it’s been so long! You know when I said in my last post that I’d have more free time now? I lied! Well, not intentionally. But I got a new job, so I’m even more busy than before. I’m committed to finishing this, though, and I think that I can get it done in about 4-5 more updates.

Chapter 5: Formal Operational Stage

Hey guys! Welcome back to the Piaget Wonder Child Challenge!



We'll start this post off with a little intermission from all the skilling to discuss another important aspect of this challenge: going to school. Or not going, more like it. If you want to get anything done in this challenge, your Wonder Child shouldn't step foot in the school again after they've gotten their A. (SPOILER ALERT: I will not take my own advice on this once in this challenge.) There are multiple ways this can be accomplished. The first is vacation days, but there likely won't be enough to cover it. Another way is just straight up skipping, but that puts you at risk of going down a grade and losing the points you earned from getting an A. This can be remedied by getting Professional Slacker, but it's so costly that I wouldn't recommend getting it during childhood, when gaining Reward Points is much more difficult. (I would definitely recommend it as a teen, though.)

The third is writing Excuse Notes. It's definitely a good idea to get a parent sim to at least level 3 in Writing (although honestly, I would get them to level 10, since it's a great moneymaker and then you can mentor the child in it) so that they can write these, giving kids a free day to miss school without using vacation days or lowering performance. It's important to note, though, that these can only be used every few days, and someone can't write them for themselves. Also, you have to actually remember to have someone write them in time  .

Okay, back to skilling!



Philappa returned to the social sphere to max Charisma and afterwards, Mischief. I know some people max Charisma by practicing at the mirror, but I believe doing so through social interaction is faster, if only for the sim and not the player. (That’s how it always seems to go- if it takes more time for the player, it probably takes less for the sim, and vice versa.) Since I have no idea if this is common knowledge, I’ll also mention that you can do 2 of any given interaction before it makes them Bored, and I believe this resets with every 6 interactions, including the ones you're waiting for to reset. (If not 6, 8.) For children, or people with limited Charisma (or other skilling) interactions in general, you can avoid this by doing as many interactions as you can, then ending the conversation (which also resets it), and then starting it again.



Now, on to Mischief! You can tell because the room is red now. I swear that there’s some Angry paintings hanging in there, but they’re apparently out of frame. Unfortunately for those of you who enjoy seeing them, I didn’t take many pictures of my setup at all, and it’s around this point it starts to get a little wonky anyway. But the Charisma/Mischief room was just another half shell, except I closed the walls and roof off for Mischief so that Philappa’s Loves the Outdoors boost wouldn’t get in the way.

One of the biggest struggles of Mischief is getting sims Angry, especially when they’re specifically designed to always be supplied with a lot of Happy moodlets. The clubs are a big boon here, as that 3+ Angry Boost combined with the paintings was more than enough. There’s also memories, but a fairly recent update made them a lot less viable, as you have to scroll through all your screenshots to get to them, and you actually need to be in the required emotion when you take the picture now.



If you don’t have clubs or paintings, and you don't want to deal with memories, you could also try something like I did for the Klepto challenge (got bored and quit halfway through, especially since I was mostly doing it to test out the trait), where I gave my sim the Hates Children trait (which gives an angry moodlet when interacting with children) and had her level Mischief exclusively by interacting with children. Although that works better for a shorter challenge and isn’t something I would suggest long term. Mostly I wanted to share because I thought it was a pretty clever strategy, and I haven’t read through enough of the threads to see if anyone else came up with it.

Like Charisma, I also think Mischief is faster to level by interaction rather than, say, Trolling Teh Forums. One thing to note is that, when leveling these skills, you should consider what age bracket your sim is in vs. what age bracket the sim you’re interacting with is in. This is because certain interactions can only be performed on sims of certain age groups, and it’s often better to be interacting with sims in your age group as more interactions are generally available. This is less important for Mischief, obviously (as shown by my Klepto example and the picture above), but it’s definitely something to consider for Charisma. For example; the only Charisma interaction (besides Heartfelt Compliment, which raises Charisma) that Teens+ can use on Children is Brighten Day, while there are a couple more interactions for adults.



And with that, it’s official; Philappa has maxed every skill a child can in game. Well, every level 10 skill. Philappa maxes Photography in about an hour. It wasn't as important to me, since the 3 point bonus for maxing skills is specifically for ones with 10 levels. Speaking of those, let me use that as a segue to complaining about the skills children can't learn;

• Comedy (You can learn Charisma and Mischief!)
  
• Dancing
• Writing (There’s a “Write Dollhouse story” option when you're Inspired, but it only levels Creative)
• Painting
• Cooking/Baking (These and Painting are mostly because you can learn them as a child in Sims 3)
• Guitar (If you have child violins, why not have child guitars?)

If children could learn even half of these, Philappa would be set for the rest of childhood. But as it is, she has 6 days left until she ages up and not really anything to do. I don't want to age her up, partly in hopes that I’ll find something else to do, and partly because it feels wrong to do so in such a time intensive challenge. So the next few days are spent (with sadly limited success) looking for other things Philappa can accomplish as a child.



The next few days were filled with tedium and unproductivity to a ridiculous extent. It sucked, so I’ll only make you suffer through it for a couple of paragraphs. The first thing I tried to have Philappa do was start writing some songs, so that she could easily finish them as a teen to complete Musical Genius. Of course, when I tried to do this as a teen, all of them glitched out and wouldn’t finish. I then took them all fishing to try and catch a cowplant seed in case I wanted to do Freelance Botanist. Paisley caught one on the first try. Curse my incredible luck! Then, I went to Granite Falls, so I could get the ingredients to later master Herbalism. Around this time, Paisley also started a garden for the aforementioned Freelance Botanist, which I never ended up doing. I never really know how to approach it, partly because I never try because I find Gardening exceptionally boring and too complex to get invested in, personally.



I also had her try to get collectibles for The Curator, which I also didn’t complete because they don’t count when you get them as a child and I didn’t want to use the inventory trick to get them to later. I also had her introduce herself to some sims in preparation for later social aspirations of her adolescence. All this time, I also attempted to have her complete whims, but the only ones she would spawn even after traveling and multiple cache clears and reloads were ones I couldn’t complete, that wouldn’t register, or were fishing related. (In retrospect, I should’ve gotten her in different moods and completed those whims.) Eventually, Philappa just went to school for the last day, because I was out of excuse notes, vacation days, and things to do, and she was worryingly close to losing her A.

Oh, and Paisley and Petre aged up to elders. On to the birthday party!



Thanks, Don. Really appreciate you blocking that nice family shot.

Ah, parties. The true bane of my existence in the sims. Well, apart from gardening. Honestly, parties aren’t that bad in the Sims 4, at least compared to 3, which is just routing error central and an opportunity for serious food waste. But my 4 parties all seem to be glitchy; for example, it took this many people on the dance floor to get the “3 sims dancing” requirement. And it only gets worse when I try to do Party Animal as a teen. Actually, it’s around that point that my file starts to develop some frustrating glitches. But we’ll talk about that later.

In retrospect, I don’t really think throwing the parties are worth it. They’re only worth 5 points, and that time could better be spent skilling or completing aspiration goals. Although, it’s not like I have anything better to do for the child stage. And you should have a teen party for easy completion of Renaissance Sim.







Finally, Philappa aged up! She became Good, and decided she wanted to be a Renaissance Sim. Like with childhood, we’ll be changing around her aspiration so much that it really doesn’t matter; she mostly chose this one for the Quick Learner trait. We’ll get a close-up on her next chapter, once I’d changed her clothes.

Soon after, the party ended with a Gold Medal, and the childhood stage was done. Here are the current stats:

Maxed Skills (10 Pts, Plus 3 Pts for Maxing)
Creative
Social
Mental
Motor
Fishing
Logic
Violin
Piano
Charisma
Mischief
Video Gaming
Photography (Only 5 Pts)

Completed Aspirations (N/A; Counted by Reward Traits)
Artistic Prodigy
Social Butterfly
Whiz Kid
Rambunctious Scamp

Traits (10 Pts Each)
Loves the Outdoors
Creatively Gifted
Socially Gifted
Mentally Gifted
Physically Gifted
Morning Sim
Night Owl
Steel Bladder

A as a Child?: 11 Days (11 Pts)
Gold Birthday Party?: Yes (5 Pts)

For a current total of 244 Points. Not bad, eh?

Next time on the Piaget Wonder Child Challenge, we’ll start off Philappa’s teen stage. Hopefully you like reading about skilling and aspiration completion! Seriously, things only get more intense from here. Thanks for reading, and see you next time! 


Oh, and here’s a couple of bonus images from the party:



Father and daughter chatting up the guests.



Nice moves, Paxton.

[oshizu]

@officialghosts

You achieved soooo much with your Wonder Child! I was inattentive and thought, "Meh, who needs Mischief?" and never leveled Mischief or, later, Comedy at all.
When my AC started, my founder had to spend time to level those skills to write skill books.
About your angry room for leveling Mischief, was Philappa ever at any risk of becoming enraged?

Looking forward to reading about the teen phase of your WCC!

Paisley and Petre remain an extremely attractive couple, even as elders!

[Joria]

*Checks to make sure notebook and pen are handy for taking further notes*  Ok, I'm ready.  On to teen years?  I really am enjoying this very much.  I so suck at strategy so really do enjoy when players share theirs.

[officialghosts]

@oshizu Thank you! I didn't level Comedy, but if I went back I probably would've. But I didn't want to deal with it, especially since I wouldn't be able to complete Joke Star. And it amuses me that you didn't level Mischief, considering how much you would have to later for your Apocalypse Challenge.

And no, she was never at risk. Using Mischief socials never really actually gives Angry moodlets, and since Happy moodlets don't boost it, it was never really a problem.

@Joria Haha! Thank you! I'm glad you guys all enjoy reading about my strategies and playing so much.

And I hope you have your notebook out, because here's another update!

Chapter 6: Crystallized Intelligence

Hello everyone, and welcome back to the Piaget Wonder Child Challenge! At this point I have written out the entirety of Philappa's teen years: AKA, the rest of the challenge. I was originally going to post it all as one, super long chapter. However, I decided against it, because it was like double the length of the rest of the chapters and super dense, and I wanted to give your brains a little break. So this post feels a little short, especially since it mostly just briefly hits all the skills and aspirations, but I think you guys would prefer that to it being twice as long, especially since I'll post the next part tomorrow.

With that, let's move on to the challenge proper, shall we?



Philappa’s first aspiration was complete before her birthday party was even over. Paisley and Petre spent their free time during her childhood creating paintings and bathtubs, respectively, all of which were now sold to complete Fabulously Wealthy. I also tried to complete Mansion Baron, but I just didn't have enough funds for it. It often requires more than 350,000 due to depreciation and, if your luck is like mine, the game glitching and only adding some of the things you put down to the lot value.

Actually, this file was really glitchy. Most of them were harmless, though, if a little tedious. That is, until we get to the end of the challenge. (Mansion Baron gets completed a few days later.)



The next thing on Philappa’s agenda was Bodybuilder. The combination of clubs, mentoring, Morning Sim/Night Owl*, and Physically Gifted made skilling progress incredibly fast- to the point where she was level 8 in Fitness by the time she had completed the first tier of the aspiration.

*Morning Sim and Night Owl are the first traits I recommend you get for your child, besides maybe Steel Bladder. Some people prefer Savant as the skilling bonus is constant, but MS/NO cost less combined, and provide a nice additional 1+ moodlet. They both provide the same skilling boost, too.

The cost difference is especially important for childhood, where reward points are more limited and it takes completing a single aspiration to get 1,000 points. You’re not likely to get Savant until you complete all 4, and that’ll probably be the only trait you're getting. It’s not really worth it. (And, due to MS/NO and Savant not stacking, it might not be worth it in the long run, depending on whether you’ve got aspiration points flowing out the ears.)



After completing Bodybuilder, Philappa started working next on Friend of the World. This aspiration is a breeze* once you have the trait Incredibly Friendly, which I highly recommend for all your friend-making needs. The “Popular Club” perk is the same power as IF, which along with a “Friendly Social Boost” is even more of an instant friend maker. But these can be slightly unreliable, since you can't have club gatherings on residential lots that aren't your own.

*Well, it's a breeze if you've maxed Charisma. Luckily this is also fairly simple, and if your sim is a teen or above, you can get Great Kisser to make it even easier. It pairs well with Serial Romantic and especially Soulmate, but it's pretty costly and I wouldn't recommend it unless leveling Charisma quickly is of the utmost importance, or, again, you've got more reward points than you know what to do with.



Another thing of note; in this challenge, moving other sims into the world is allowed. I’d suggest taking advantage of this, and moving in Outgoing/Gregarious sims to befriend for Social Butterfly/Friend of the World. This way you can just move them into a house, and don’t have to wait and hope they walk by. If you’re aiming to complete Serial Romantic (which I personally think is one of the easier aspirations to accomplish), then I suggest you move in at least 10 teens. (Also, fun fact: the guy being an awkward third wheel in the middle is the brother of my Apocalypse Challenge founder!)

Also, Philappa gets an A with 12 days left, and joins the Retail teen career. I used to go with Babysitting for this challenge due to the longer work periods and work only being on the weekends, but it’s the start of the week and Retail is Tues-Sat, so it makes more sense. One thing to note: Writing Excuse Notes gets you out of BOTH school and work for the day, whether you want them to or not.

(Oh, and Paxton is aged up early, since it's not like I have anything better to do with him. He became an Insider, because apparently teens can't be Family Oriented. Here's a picture, as an extra bonus since this update is so short.)





The next task at hand was Nerd Brain. Philappa had already maxed Logic, but she needed to start on Handiness and Rocket Science. Paisley gladly assisted with the Handiness leveling, and I found out it can also be mentored when you are repairing/upgrading objects.

I mentioned it during Philappa's childhood, but I should've leveled Paisley and Petre's Rocket Science up more. Usually I complete the upgrades instead of doing the rocket missions, and have the other household members help with the upgrades to get them done more quickly, but they weren't high enough leveled to help with most of the upgrades. So Philappa ended up doing the rocket missions instead. I think it was faster than her just handling the upgrades herself, but I couldn't tell you for sure.

Aaaaand that's where we're gonna end it. There's not really any good stopping point, since this is pretty much the rhythm of Philappa's entire adolescence. But get excited, because next time is the finale! (Well, other than a stats and reflections post, but.) We'll finish out Philappa's teen years and age her into a Young Adult, and finally finish up this challenge. Stay tuned, because it should be coming really soon! Thanks for reading, and see you next time! 

[Joria]

*Jots down notes furiously.  Glad she learned short hand so long ago.*  Phew!  That is a lot and so very informative!  This actually is going to help with my RDC as well.  Thank you!

[oshizu]

Thank you! I didn't level Comedy, but if I went back I probably would've. But I didn't want to deal with it, especially since I wouldn't be able to complete Joke Star. And it amuses me that you didn't level Mischief, considering how much you would have to later for your Apocalypse Challenge.

Besides my Journalist with his klepto trait, the Oracle, Boss, and Villain careers all required Mischief but I'd never actually played the Boss or Villaiin careers before and I completely forgot about skill books.
The poor neighborhood (although I must admit that I secretly enjoyed it, haha).

I'd never realized that MS/NO and Savant didn't stack. Still there are those hours when neither MS (5am to noon) nor NO (8pm to 3 am) are effective, so I get MS and NO first in the child stage but always get Savant stage.

Also, if that "awkward third wheel" is your AC founder's brother, I can't wait to meet your AC founder! And I think that the black-haired girl standing behind him is also adorable!
Looking forward to your lovely Wonder Child's remaining teen years!

[officialghosts]

@Joria While a lot of these strategies are more specific to a Wonder Child Challenge, I'm glad you're still learning from it!

@oshizu I'm glad you like my sims, haha! Actually, the blonde that Philappa's talking to in the last non-party picture in Chapter 5 is another one of the founder's brothers (they were Baby Boomer kids). And I might do a little preview at the end of this challenge for my Apocalypse Challenge (don't plan on doing a story, but will do some writing on it), since Philappa mentored the founder in many of his skills.

And here it is! The last chapter! There will still be an epilogue and likely that preview, but this is the end of the gameplay part. I would say that this part is a lot more info-heavy than the last one; my brain hurt after writing it. Thanks everyone for reading!

Chapter 7: Emerging Adulthood

Hello everyone, and welcome to the final chapter of the Piaget Wonder Child Challenge! I'll give you three guesses what we're doing this chapter. Answers that aren't "skilling and completing aspirations" don't count.



Philappa turned back to the Inspired side after completing Nerd Brain to start work on Painter Extraordinaire. I set up a row of easels and had her cycle through them to level Painting, Petre following her to mentor. I had her do small paintings pretty much exclusively, as it makes completing Painter Extraordinaire’s requirements much quicker. I know a lot of people on the forums prefer large paintings, but I don't actually know if they're more cost effective than the smaller ones. I might need to test that, and probably should've last year when I made up that painting list.

(And you can see some of my set up in the background- I eventually switched from the +2 Lights you get from the Painting career to the +4 Sketches, and was finally able to break into a +3 Inspired moodlet for the room. I did this quite a while ago, but I felt like I should mention it.)

After this she maxed Guitar, and then started her ill-fated attempt at Musical Genius. Like I said earlier, none of the songs she wrote during childhood would complete, and it wouldn't be worth the time it’d take to complete new ones. And this brings me to the next skill and aspiration, and something doing this writeup has made me consider.



Philappa’s next task was maxing Writing. She also completed Bestselling Author, which took a couple days, and which brings me to my next point. I probably should have skipped Bestselling Author altogether and just focused on leveling some other skills. It really is too times consuming, especially when you're unlucky with bestsellers like I am.* I was mostly playing this challenge with points in mind, not preparing Philappa for some particular challenge, so I can't really justify it. and a maxed skill is worth more than a completed aspiration. I think I’ll talk about this more in general when I add my final thoughts at the end.

I feel like I should also add that I maxed Painting and Writing and then went back later to complete their aspirations like 5 days later. I think this was to make sure I had time to accomplish certain goals. I wanted to say that I should've just done them with the skills if I did them at all, but that's probably just hindsight bias talking. At the time it was a good call. Smart thinking, past me!

*It seems sims can be “better” at certain genres of books, as with paintings- I was struggling for days to get Petre to write bestsellers, until I had him start writing exclusively Screenplays. In fact, a lot of my sims seem to do rather well with Screenplays. On the whole, though, it seems bestselling books are a lot more rare than masterpiece paintings.



Like in childhood, Philappa handled both Charisma and Mischief at the same time while she worked on Serial Romantic and Chief of Mischief. Chief of Mischief got done first, mostly because when I traveled to other sim's lots, they always seemed to be in bad moods with low needs, and beguiling them wasn't helping. (Beguile is another trait I would recommend situationally; if you're gonna do Serial Romantic, or you've got a healthy supply of aspiration points.)

Serial Romantic is a fairly easy aspiration that a lot of simmers seem to avoid, probably because most don't want any of their sims but their pollinators cheating and WooHooing around so much. I'm personally a fan of it, but I don't think I would've done it if (when, probably) I redo this challenge, simply because of how long the "Kiss 10 Sims" goal takes to complete.

Now, looking at that picture, you're probably asking yourself, "Why the heck is there a door there that's not connected to anything?" Or maybe you're not, and you're actually thinking, "Yes, that seems like a perfectly reasonable place to put a door," in which case, well, I think I have a few questions for you. Since I was having so much difficulty romancing sims at their own houses (and they all live together and it would quickly have turned into a soap opera), I decided to just invite her suitors over. By this point I had made a little house for the rest of the fam so I wouldn't have to deal with them, but I wanted to be able to meet the sims at the front of the lot instead of waiting for them to head to the back where the house was. So I just made a tiny wall, added a door, and set it as the front. Then I'd invite a sim over, have Philappa charm them to the point where she could get a kiss, and then ask them to leave and invite over the next one.

I'm pretty sure at least a few rap songs brag about having so many lovers that you have one leaving while another arrives, but all I get when I google it is inspirational breakup quotes (the literary equivalent of a tub of ice cream), which isn't as fun but feels oddly fitting.



Philappa worked next on Cooking and Gourmet Cooking, which might just be the easiest skills to max in the game. Just make Garden or Caprese Salads ad infinitum and you'll be done in no time. No real attempt was made at Master Chef, since getting to level 8 in the Chef career is about 10 levels of impossible. In this challenge, I didn't really interest myself in stuff I could only do halfway; if I wasn't going to max a skill or complete an aspiration, I didn't even start it. I did that in my first attempt and it was mostly a waste of time. Especially with aspirations, where you only get scoring points for getting the bonus trait. I guess it could be good for aspiration points, but I had more than enough of those.

At this point, Philappa also maxed Herbalism. I set her up in the Focused room with two grills facing each other (so I could replace a dirty one without messing her up) and had her make more Insect Repellent Limitants than any sim would ever need. I chose Insect Repellent Limitants because they were available at level 1 and the ingredients were easy to get. Back when they visited Granite Falls, I had Paisley collect some Noxious Elderberries and Basil and plant them in her garden, so there were more enough by the time I needed them.



I just realized how dense this post had been. Like, we really have gone through a lot. Are we all good? Do we need to take a breather? Well, better do so now, because we're in the home stretch, and here's where my game sort of started to self destruct.

The file had been a little glitchy and slow for quite a while, but things started to really break when I attempted to do Party Animal. My plan was to have Philappa technically be one of the hosts but have little to no involvement in the parties themselves, instead focusing on other goals. However, this quickly went awry when I was hit with some of my common party glitches, and then the real killer: Paisley got kicked out for trying to cook, which ended with Paisley, Petre, and Paxton unable to do anything in their own house. So needless to say, Party Animal didn't happen. (Although apparently, the second thing is supposed to be a feature, not a bug? If so, I don't think it should apply to sims when they're in their own home. And also shouldn't exist in general, because that's really dumb.)

As if that wasn't bad enough, soon after I got hit with the club glitch. You know the one. Probably. (Basically, your sim can't join any club gatherings and thus can't benefit from them.) On Philappa, because of course it was Philappa. I tried a few things without much hope, and was unsurprised when none of them worked. I would've put more effort into trying to fix it, but at this point there was barely a day left of the challenge, and I was mostly interested in getting it done. So instead, I just had Philappa take over as leader from Petre to complete the final requirement of Leader of the Pack (thankfully I had done the others earlier). I had specifically saved it until the end in hopes of avoiding the glitch, but alas.



Philappa's final task in this challenge was maxing Mixology. It's generally one of my least favorite skills to level, but I thought it would be fine if I had the club boosts to help me out. So much for that! Her last day as a teen was spent mixing hundreds of drinks which I quickly got too lazy to throw away and instead just placed on the lawn, closing in the room so she wouldn't get an Uncomfortable moodlet. Occasionally I would go into build mode and delete them all.

At the same time I started the birthday party, hoping it would go better than when I tried Party Animal. It did! I mean, it didn't go well, but my family didn't get kicked out of their own home again, so it was comparatively better. I very quickly gave up and focused on trying to get Philappa to max Mixology before her party ended. She did, but just barely, especially because I didn't think until the end to try having Paisley teleport in and have Philappa use Mixology interactions on her, which ended up going much faster and maxing the skill. In the middle of this, she aged up, became Family Oriented, cycled through a bunch of careers to complete Renaissance Sim, and bought the last few reward traits she hadn't yet.

And then the party was over, and Philappa was a Young Adult, and the challenge was done. Not really the most exciting end. Like her childhood, the last few days of her adolescence were a trudge to get through and honestly possibly the worst part of the challenge, in competition only with that aforementioned childhood part. It sucked just writing about it. I don't even have a picture of her as a Young Adult, because my game stopped taking screenshots at around this point (It was probably an easy fix, but by then I just wanted to finish this.)

I will next time, though, when I give the final stats and post my thoughts and reflections on the challenge! I kind of feel like I'm leaving you  guys hanging, but this post is too long to add all of that onto it. Thanks for reading, and see you next time for the epilogue of the Piaget Wonder Child Challenge! 

[oshizu]

Regarding your Paisley getting kicked out of the party, she needs to be the designated caterer or have the "Always Welcome" trait.
Otherwise, at another sim's home or even in her own home, Paisely cooking during a party is considered "inappropriate behavior."

Did you decide at the very beginning to play this WCC for points rather than in preparation for the Apocalypse Challenge?
My sims' lives would have been so much easier if my founder had completed Bestselling Author and had been able to write Books of Life for the household.

You mentioned Phillapa mentoring your AC founder. Will you explain how they're related in your next post? (I don't want to spoil the suspense!)
Looking forward to the epilogue!

[officialghosts]

@oshizu Yes, this was about points from the beginning. I wasn't even really thinking of doing an Apocalypse Challenge when I started this. Even if I had used Philappa, though, I don't think I would have allowed my sims to use any Books of Life for the first few generations. Probably would've put it under the Author restriction. Personally, I think it'd be too powerful early on.

There is a tangential relation between Philappa and my founder, but that's mostly a coincidence. I needed someone to mentor him, and she was the perfect sim for the job. (I also wanted to try out the Movie Stuff on her.) But you'll see that next update.

The Final Score, Reflections, and Hindsight Bias







Hello everyone, and welcome back to the Piaget Wonder Child Challenge, for it's almost final update! Here's some fancy, not at all staged pictures of Philappa as a Young Adult that I totally didn't take two days ago. Now, this might be my personal bias speaking, but I think she looks gorgeous. It's partly because of the hairstyle, which succeeds at making pretty much every sim look rather glamorous. But that's not what this is about, is it! Let's look at what you've all been waiting for...

The Final Score

Skills (10 Pts, Plus 3 Pts for Maxing)
Creative
Social
Mental
Motor
Fishing
Logic
Violin
Piano
Charisma
Mischief
Video Gaming
Photography (Only 5 Pts)
Fitness
Handiness
Rocket Science
Painting
Guitar
Writing
Cooking
Gourmet Cooking
Herbalism
Mixology
Comedy (Level 3- 3 pts)

22 Skills Maxed (and one at Level 3) for a total of 281 Points.


Completed Aspirations (N/A; Counted by Reward Traits)
Artistic Prodigy
Social Butterfly
Whiz Kid
Rambunctious Scamp
Fabulously Wealthy
Mansion Baron
Bodybuilder
Friend of the World
Nerd Brain
Painter Extraordinaire
Bestselling Author
Chief of Mischief
Serial Romantic
Leader of the Pack
Renaissance Sim

15 Aspirations completed for a total of Well, technically no points.


Traits (10 Pts Each)
Loves the Outdoors
Good
Family Oriented
Quick Learner
Creatively Gifted
Socially Gifted
Mentally Gifted
Physically Gifted
Shrewd
Thrifty
Long Lived
Beloved
Handy
Expressionistic
Poetic
Tormentor
Player
Natural Leader
Professorial
Every Reward Trait Currently in the Game, I'm Not Gonna Make You Read Through All of Them Because Seriously, There's a Lot

49 Traits for a total of 490 Points.


A as a Child?: 11 Days (11 Pts)
A as a Teen?: 12 Days (12 Pts)
Maxed Career as a Teen?: 9 Days (9 Pts)
Gold Birthday Party as a Child?: Yes (5 Pts)
Gold Birthday Party as a Teen?: No (0 Pts)

For a total of 37 Points.

Put that all together, and my final score for this challenge is 808 Points.

That's pretty good, although I should note that it's since been beaten by at least one other person. But it's still one of the highest scores, and was the highest for a while. Also, it's over 250 points higher than my first score, so. That's neat.

You can find Philappa on the Gallery under the name "Piaget Wonder Child" or by searching #WonderChild.

Reflections, and some Hindsight Bias

• I'm glad I took advantage of clubs in this challenge. At first I was worried about using them, since they were so overpowered. Even after Pinstar gave them the OK I wasn't sure. But now I can't imagine doing the challenge without them, and skilling seems so slow in my Apocalypse Challenge in comparison
• One strategy that I was considering for this challenge was having the parents complete Big Happy Family so they could get the Patriarch/Matriarch trait, and give an additional skilling boost to the Wonder Child. However, Pinstar disallowed/disapproved of aging up spares immediately (I can't remember if this was explicitly mentioned as the purpose), so it didn't pan out.
• Doing this explicitly for points, I definitely should've done less aspirations and more skill maxing. The aspirations I would probably cut out are Bestselling Author, Serial Romantic, and maybe Friend of the World. I also wouldn't have spent time as a child trying to do Musical Genius or The Curator. I had so many aspiration points by the end that the loss of a few thousand wouldn't have mattered, and I could've spent that extra time maxing more skills, which are worth 13 points as opposed to 10 points for reward traits.
• If I could've done more skills, I would've gone for Dancing, Wellness, Comedy, and potentially Programming or DJing. In the end, I would honestly try anything but Baking, which would be such a great skill if it had an ideal mood. (I originally considered Dancing pointless to level, but I did so in another file and even without a club boost it took like a sim hour to max, so it's be an easy 5 points.)
• I should test out Gardening and Freelance Botanist more, to see how long they actually take and how difficult they actually are. I should also test out Experimental Cooking, and see how viable that is. In general, I should look at all the skills and see how long they actually take to level.
• When I was doing Nerd Brain, I should've had the fam level Rocket Science while Philappa worked on something else, then went back and did the upgrades. Probably would've saved more time in the long run.
• This was mostly out of my hands, but I wish my file wasn't so glitchy. While most of them were just inconvenient, it still sucked, especially when I got stuck with the club glitch at the end.
• Again, I wish children could learn more adult skills. I'll probably wait to do this challenge again until there are more options for children, aspiration or skill-wise.
• I also wish that parties didn't suck and weren't glitchy for me, and that whoever decided that cooking at one was inappropriate behavior thought, "Wait, maybe we should allow it if the sim lives there, and not have them be kicked out of their own home. That might be bad."
• I'll definitely be doing this challenge again in the future. Honestly, part of me wants to start up my game and start replaying it right now, but I'll try to restrain myself until we get a few more expansion packs and hopefully more skills/aspirations/reward traits along with them. Who knows, maybe we'll get something else as powerful as clubs?

And that pretty much wraps it up, I think. Other than the kinda-epilogue. Thank you guys so much for reading and commenting, and being patient with me in regards to updates. I wouldn't have done this without you.

Hopefully you'll see Philappa soon in the future. I don't have exact plans for her right now, but hopefully I'll find another challenge that lets you use already skilled up sims. (Pinstar does have another challenge of that type, The Immigrant Challenge, but I don't know if I want to use her for that.) It'd feel wrong to have to de-skill her.

Now, some bonus pictures!

First, final pictures of the rest of the family:







Some pictures of Philappa and her various girl/boyfriends being adorable:









(This one's less adorable, and more weird. Is she pretending to be a zombie?)



The lot as it was when Mansion Baron was finally completed. You can kind of see the house I made for the fam, but I guess I deleted my actual pictures of it. There were three doors because glitchiness meant only one person could use them when locked (or I just couldn't lock only Philappa out.)



I forgot to mention during the challenge proper, but I often throw out a bunch of low-quality radios on the lot in a room and leave them on in the hopes they'll break, to help with leveling Handiness and completing Nerd Brain requirements.



Anothe Baby Boomer child/sibling of my Apocalypse Challenge founder. She was a Joke Star. It seems like all of my Joke Star sims (all two of them) rock purple hair.





The family playing games, parts 1 and 2. I'm happy that Paisley and Petre survived to the end of the challenge; their bars had started glowing a few days before.

And that's all, for realsies this time. Thanks again for reading, everyone, and I hope you enjoyed the Piaget Wonder Child Challenge!

[oshizu]

Thanks for detailing your strategies for your WCC. It was a great read!
Your entire family is just gorgeous and I agree that Phillapa is particularly fabulous in the opening shots!
And second highest score? That's amazing!

Some questions:
(1) I thought Pinstar disallowed early ageing for the Apocalypse Challenge but didn't care about it for the Wonder Child Challenge? From Pinstar's replies to questions under the WCC rules.

Yes. You cannot delay age transitions in the challenge, but there is no rule against hastening them.

(2) You maxed Dancing in one sim hour? I recently level Dancing for a challenge and it seemed to take forever. How did you achieve that in a sim-hour?

(3) The "Always Welcome" trait is a must-have. For some reasons, a family member who mixes drinks at a party without being the designated mixologist doesn't have the same issue. Weird.

(4) Locking out one sim. In my IDC, I had a Focused Room club then locked the door to the Focused Room so only club members could enter--this kept the rest of the house off the computers (annoying).
I'm not sure what you meant by the "three doors."

Many thanks for finishing your story! What's next on your agenda? And did you replay the WCC for your current Apocalypse Challenge?

(3) Cooking experimental dishes has, in my case, leveled up Gourmet Cooking. It has its own food prep option but not a separate skill.

(4) Once you reach L5, rows of grafting make Gardening speed by.

[Magpie2012]

I also thought Pinstar didn't have issue with premature aging up (for the same reasoning as Shizu).

@oshizu there were three doors on the rooms that the WC wasn't allowed to have access to but the other 3 members needed to have access to. So each family member had there own door that only they could go through.

[officialghosts]

@oshizu Thanks! I'm happy that I finally got around to sharing some of my play on the forum.

(1) @Magpie2012 Yes, he did allow early aging, but when someone asked him if they could age spares directly to YA in the comments, this was his response:

Aging them to young adult is…yeeesh. I’d say no. You should have only two adult-aged sims in the house while the wonder child is out and about.

(2) One hour might have been an exaggeration, but not by much. My sim was Very Confident the whole time, and I had her using the "Show Off Moves" interaction.

(3) Unfortunately, at the time I ran this challenge, I hadn't played or even looked at much simming stuff in a while, so I didn't know that other sims had started caring about inapropro behavior and Always Welcome actually served a purpose now. In general, though, it's still a rather dumb oversight that that can happen to someone at their own house.

(4) Magpie is right. Whether by glitch or design I couldn't make a door only Philappa was locked out of.

I didn't replay the WCC challenge, but you'll see what I did instead soon enough. I want to really dig into my Apocalypse Challenge, but I've also been eyeing the Room Challenge lately, or the Living Off the Grid Challenge to practice Gardening and Freelance Botanist, so I might take a detour for one of those. Other than that, I've got plenty of other ideas and half-baked plans, mostly other smaller, one generation challenges, though I want to slowly build my way up to bigger ones.

(5) Really? Shows you how much I’ve played with it. Oh well, we didn’t really need another Cooking-type skill.

(6) Thanks, I’ll keep that in mind!

The epilogue should be up later today~

[officialghosts]

Hey guys! Sorry it took this long. I was busy, and I didn't feel well for a week. Also, I've been experiencing like total writer's block on this, which combined with the other factors made it kind of hard to push through and get done. But here it is! It's kind of weird as an epilogue and a sharp shift from how the rest of the story was written, but I like it and think it acts a good connector to my next story/challenge. I hope you enjoy, and thanks for reading! 


An Epilogue, of Sorts

Philappa was of the mind that her Watcher was a little strange.

She knew the typical path of Wonder Children. They were born, grew up, and then either sent to the Gallery to be shown off or immediately shipped to Glassbolt to help with disaster relief. (Assumedly. Philappa had heard reports that it was a lot more bureaucracy and office work and a lot less building shelters and punching mutants.) Her Watcher had assured her that she was already there in many other worlds, rebuilding the region one crappy business report or gourmet meal at a time.

But not her. Instead she had spent her time rotting in the Gallery for months on end, only with the vaguest of excuses from The Watcher as to why. (Who really needed school anyways? She only went like, 4 days at most, and she turned out just fine.)

Anyway. No more complaining. Especially now that she was free, although she hadn't ended up exactly where she expected to.



Theo Fashingbauer didn’t have to do much to convince Philappa to help him out. He had had a whole line of tactics planned to persuade her; appealing to money (which she already had plenty of), the nice location (even though she could’ve traveled the world if she wanted), her good heart (although his wasn’t exactly a noble cause), their past history (he was proud to say he was her favorite ex-boyfriend), and even the possibility of romancing another Fashingbauer brother as a desperation tactic (although in retrospect, that would’ve been a disaster and a half). Little did he know that all he needed to offer was the opportunity to get out of the Gallery and do something.

"Theo!"

"Hey, Phi. How it’s hanging?"

"Good, now that I'm out here. It's nice to not be cramped up in the Gallery anymore."

Theo nodded. He knew the feeling.

"So," Philappa said, suddenly businesslike. She rarely did small talk when she didn't need to. "What do you want me to do?"



The task was pretty simple, all things considered. She just had to mentor Theo's brother, Hunter, in a few skills, to prepare him for-

"He's starting a new job in a few weeks. My sister lives up in Glassbolt, and her husband is the owner of a business of some kind up there. Apparently it's been doing pretty great since the disaster, and they're looking to expand. My sister recommended Hunter for a job."

Well, that all sounded a little worrying. Philappa was no detective (well, not anymore), but she knew the only businesses that profited off of catastrophes like Glassbolt didn't exactly pass certain ethical standards. And moving to Glassbolt? As far as Philappa knew, the only people who did that were trained respondents sent by the government, and the truly desperate. She was fairly sure Hunter was neither. She said as much.

"Yeah, that’s what I thought too. There’s probably some kind of incentive, because, you know, why would anyone move out there otherwise? I think he mentioned a house being set up for him, and something about protection? I mean, there’s no way my sister would let anyone get away with hurting him.” Philappa narrowed her eyes unsurely, because that sounded like a threat more than anythi- “Like, she would totally kill them, probably,” He finished, earnestly chill but still thoroughly serious. Theo didn’t do exaggeration or sarcasm; she’s pretty sure they didn’t even register in his system. Being reminded of that fact almost made Philappa ignore the content of the statement it was attached to. Almost.

“Right.” Philappa added a vague ‘Do not cross unknown Fashingbauer woman’ to her growing list of mental notes. Part of her wanted to just walk away right then, but then she remembered what her other option was. She followed Theo as he started to walk to the beach, matching his easy pace. “So, do you actually know what this business does?”

“Not really. All I know is that the request was for someone with ‘good computer skills and a lacking moral code.’ Not sure what that means.”

Philappa was pretty sure all of the Fashingbauers were insane.

------------------



"Hunter, your line's not going out far enough. You need to cast in more of an arc."

"Yeah, alright." His response was gruff, and those were probably the most words she had ever gotten out of him. At least he had stopped rolling his eyes at everyone she said. Theo had warned, in his casual manner, that Hunter could be "difficult to work with", but she didn't think it would be this bad. Sims had always opened up to her after she got to charm them for a while, but not him. ("He's just shy," Theo had told her patiently, earning himself a punch in the arm from his brother. Philappa had met numerous Fashingbauers by then, but "shy" wasn't a word she would use to describe any of them.)

'At least it seems he's taking my advice,' She thought as she watched him recast his line. For all his needless sass, he actually listened to what she said. She voiced her approval and swore she saw him smile a little bit.



Honestly, it kind of looked like a smirk. But all of Hunter's smiles kind of looked like smirks (it might just be his face), so she'd take it.

------------------



"And then you jump the Rook over the Pawn so she can team up with the Bishop to kill the Queen."

Hunter moved the pieces with a look of serious concentration on his face. To be fair, that's how he looked at everything, if he wasn't smirking at it.

"Good. Remember, you still have to move the King back to your side of the board so you can Double King him."

"Have you ever actually played chess before?" He sounded a little amused. Or bemused? Maybe a little of both.

"Of course! My mother taught me everything she knows."

"Has your mother ever actually played chess before?"

"Hunter Fashingbauer!" Philappa mock-gasped. She was sure she was an actress in another life. "My mother was a bona-fide genius in her own regard! How dare you speak of her that way!"

"Right, how rude of me. I do so apologize," he continued to moved his pieces across the board, smirking the entire time, "But still, I'm pretty sure this isn't how this game works."

"How would you know? Have you ever actually played it?"

"Well, no," he turned back to look at Philappa, and then interrupted her triumphant cry, "but I've watched my siblings play it, and I'm pretty sure 'Double Kinging' and royal coups aren't part of the game."

"Do you want to learn Logic or not?"

He chuckled. "I didn't say I minded," he turned back to the game, "but I don't know why I need to learn how to play chess anyways."

Philappa thought about her answer for a moment. When she had first arrived she had immediately started creating a mental checklist for what Hunter needed to learn, using her limited knowledge of his future career and the situation in Glassbolt. The Watcher, in her own strange way, had helped fill in the details. "Well, you need to master Logic as part of your Nerd Brain application so that you can get your 'Handy' reward trait, and this is how I learned Logic," she knew all that, but the rest of the words seemed to tumble into her head as if she had suddenly remembered them, "also, chess is kind of the national pastime in Glassbolt, now that pretty much every other form of entertainment has been ruined in some way. And you might need to teach it to someone else later."



Hunter nodded thoughtfully for the first part, but looked incredulous at the last statement. "Who would I have to teach Logic to?"

'Don't ask me, ask The Watcher.' Philappa resisted the urge to respond with that, because Hunter had always seemed more than a little uncomfortable with the "controls your whole destiny and has your life carefully planned out" part of being Watched. "Maybe if you met a, um, friend?"

"A friend?" Hunter looked back at her, raising his eyebrows. The stupid smirk was back on his face again. (Had it ever left?)

"Well, yeah," Philappa had the decency to look a little embarrassed, "I mean, I would have said a ladyfriend, with the extra wink and nudge, but, like, I don't know your life. And, if anyone knew how annoying people assuming like that was, it'd be me, so." She gestured vaguely, which was honestly just waving her arms around and shrugging a little, as if it conveyed everything she hadn't said. Hunter laughed a little, but he didn't refute anything she said, and for a moment his smile seemed warmer. Appreciative, even. Then (of course) it turned back into a smirk.

"Wow. You certainly do have a way with words, Philappa. Didn't you master both Charisma and Writing? Aren't you a Bestselling Author?"

"Oh, shut it and use your Pawn to stab that Knight in the back," she said, laughing despite herself.

---------------

"Do you think I need more salt?"

"Hunter, I'm not psychic. I never even earned my Master Chef certification," Philappa looked up from her book and frowned, "but yes."

She could practically hear Hunter rolling his eyes as he added more salt. They sat in companionable silence as he cooked, Philappa occasionally advising Hunter or complimenting him on his work.



"What was it like being a Wonder Child?" Hunter's voice was uncharacteristically soft, as if he expected her to get angry with him for asking. Which was probably a fair assumption. She knew a lot of challenge bred sims were bitter about their childhood (or lack thereof), especially Wonder Children. It was a sensitive subject. She was quiet for a moment while she thought about what to say.

"Busy. There was never really a time when I wasn't doing something, or I didn't have something to work on. I'm sure you know what that's like, being a Baby Boomer and all." Hunter nodded as he placed whatever he had just finished making on the counter. It immediately evaporated into thin air, like every dish before it. "The main difference is that all of the attention was on me, which was nice, sometimes. I kind of felt bad for Paxton, but he never seemed to mind. He got more time with my parents as we got older, so," she trailed off there, her voice more serious than usual.

Philappa anticipated his next question before he could ask. "I don't really regret it. It sucked sometimes, but I enjoyed it for the most part. And I like being so skilled," she set her book down and watched him as he prepped the next meal. He wasn't slicing the carrots thin enough. "Would you change it, if you could?"

He continued chopping. "Yeah, probably. I don't know," he sighed, "I think, if I have kids, I wouldn't want to do the same thing to them, you know? I'd want them to have normals lives."

She nodded, and looked upward like she always did when she was thinking. There was a question that had been nagging at the back of her mind that she had always been to scared to ask. Finally, she decided to go for it. "Then why are you moving to Glassbolt?"

He put down the knife and sighed again. Philappa didn't like this new, always sighing Hunter. "It's only a temporary thing. I don't plan on being there the rest of my life. My sister needed a favor, I was the best one for the job, so I thought, why not?" He continued before Philappa could say anything. "Yeah, I know why not, I just." He shrugged his shoulders uselessly.

"Needed something new?" Philappa suggested. It didn't really make sense, but it was better than something about how The Watcher probably wanted him there.

"Yeah." Silence fell again, and soon Philappa returned to her book.



"You didn't chop your carrots thin enough, by the way."

---------------

Two weeks passed much quicker than they should've, and all of a sudden, Hunter was leaving for Glassbolt the next day.

"So, what would you like to do with your last day of freedom?" Theo asked him. Philippa frowned a little. She still had had some last minute things planned before Hunter left. He probably had time to max Charisma, maybe gain a few levels in Fitness-

"I was thinking we could go over to those "secret" bluffs Nadia kept raving about, maybe just hang out a bit," a sheepish look appeared on Hunter's face, "I'm fine to just chill with you guys."

A break would be nice. She hadn't had one of those in, well, forever.

Philippa found it difficult to believe the ruins or whatever were supposed to be secret, considering she found them on the first map she looked at. They weren't even that far away, which was probably a good thing, since it gave them plenty of time to go there and get back by morning.

The night passed as quickly as the days before it. They swam in the natural pool and lit the bonfire by the shore. They talked, they danced, and they laughed. Selfies were taken and photobombed. They tried not to think about the reports coming from Glassbolt, of the rising rates of crime and poverty and the fact that the water only seemed to be getting dirtier and that the mayor had apparently gone crazy.









And then the night was over. Early the next morning, Philappa and Theo stood outside to see Hunter off.

Theo was first.

"I'm gonna miss you, bro," Theo sounded marginally less chill than he usually did, which might as well as have been a tearful confession for him.

"I'm gonna miss you too." Hunter shuffled his feet. They were both kind of silent for a moment. Philappa knew neither usually said more than they thought necessary (which to them, wasn't a lot), but this was ridiculous.

"Thanks for letting me crash at your place before I left," Hunter said finally.

"S'no problem man. Come visit me any time," Theo patted Hunter's arm, and then pulled him into a hug. "Don't have too much fun out there, alright?"

"Oh, I won't," Hunter responded sardonically, then hugged him back.



"Alright, get outta here before I get too sad, dude," Theo said finally, patting him on the back and releasing him. He moved to the side so that Hunter was face to face with Philappa.

"Hey."

"Hey," Philappa answered, a sad smile on her face. She took a deep breath as if she was building up for something, so Hunter was surprised when instead of some big, emotional speech, she instead asked, "Do you have all your files together?"

Hunter blinked. "What?"



"Your aspiration certifications. The official list all of your reward traits. The forms for your employment. Your passport-"

"Phi-"

"You do have your passport, right? You'll need it to go through the Gallery, which is the only way to get to Glassbolt without losing all of your skill memories-"

"Phila-"

"Speaking of which, do you think you have everything you want? Remember, skills are a lot harder to learn up there, aspiration certifications are almost impossible to get, and reward traits actually are impossible-"

"Philappa!"

She stopped, finally, then sighed. "Sorry. I'm just worried about you. For you. We both are." She gestured back to Theo, who nodded.

"I know, but I'll be fine."

"I'm sure you will, but we- I-" She stopped again and gestured around, ending on shrugging her shoulders. Hunter knew what she meant. He smiled warmly and hugged her.



"I'm gonna miss you and your excellent way with words."

She laughed into his shoulder. "And I'm gonna miss you. Not so sure if I'm gonna miss your endless snark, though."

Hunter pulled away from the hug and looked her in the eye. "Thank you, though," he said seriously, "for everything."

"It was my pleasure," Her smile had returned, even as she tried to discreetly wipe at her eyes, "good luck out there. Don't do anything dangerous, alright?"



"Of course not. Really, why would I do anything like that?"

-------------------------

A few final notes:

• If it's not obvious, Hunter Fashingbauer is my founder. He was the second first born (he was a twin) of my Baby Boomer challenge, the Chief of Mischief, and one of my favorite sims of all time. Here's a close-up, since none of the pictures of the epilogue get a great look at him:
  
  
  
  And here's a picture of him running naked to meet someone to complete Social Butterfly:
  
  
  
  (I feel like a parent showing off embarrassing baby pictures )
  
  
• Theo was the Angling Ace, and I always imagined him as being supremely chill about everything. The mentioned but unnamed sister is Violin, my original Musical Genius that I used for the Traits challenge last year. Nadia is another sister and was originally a Renaissance Sim. You'll probably see her in something sooner or later.
• I had no plans on doing any sort of story with these pictures when I first took them, so it's a miracle I took them at all. That's why they're all a little shoddy. If I was planning a story, they would've been a lot better.

Thank you all again for reading and commenting. I truly appreciate it. For the final time, thank you for reading the Piaget Wonder Child Challenge.

[oshizu]

@officialghosts
What a wonderful way to wrap up your Wonder Child Challenge!
When I started reading, I wondered about the identity of your new avatar and you soon satisfied my curiosity.

I enjoyed how you allowed Phillapa to pass the torch to one of your all-time favorite sims. I look forward to reading about Hunter's new life whenever you wish to share!