The Merryweather Dynasty: Part 32 - A Chapter About Myst

[Sutz]

Well, it was inevitable eventually.

Having watched so many people's fantastic Immortal Dynasties even before I arrived on the forum, I wanted to have a go myself. Just a few problems, though:
1) I'd never played more than three generations,
2) I was stupid enough to play the same skills/careers over and over, and
3) I had never played without a good bit of cheating on the side.
I wanted to explore the game a little more, try out some strategies and stick as well as I could with a family as it went down the generations. I also loved the idea of a themed family and creating a museum about them.

Therefore this became more of a personal challenge for me. And because of that, this is in no way an official Immortal Dynasty. I will play without cheats (unless I come across a bug), but when it comes to Ambrosia requirements, if they miss one or two, I won't care. Like I said, I'm not trying to score anything here or get into the Hall of Fame. I will try my darnedest to get all those requirements, but if I don't, I'll carry on. I want to be able to see something through.

So without further ado, allow me to introduce you to my Founder:

Here's my magic girl, Emerald Merryweather. Her traits are Natural Cook, Charismatic, Green Thumb, Loves the Outdoors and Bookworm. Her Lifetime Wish is Culinary Librarian (because I SO want to try out all the awesome recipes instead of just having Mac and Cheese over and over again).

See that star on top of her head? I've no idea why EA decided that was a good place to put tips. Oh well. It looks pretty cool.
I wasn't able to dress her in an exact shade of emerald green because my Create A Style is buggy and keeps freezing up. So I just dressed her in green. She's very down to Earth, anyway. Not really concerned with style. Come to think of it, neither am I. I'm dead lazy when it comes to designing outfits or building houses. The only time I pay it any attention is when I'm designing a specific character for one of my stories. Otherwise I just want to get on with playing, so anything goes.

Merryweather is a surname I've loved since I read it in The Little White Horse (later adapted into a film, The Secret of Moonacre, with Dakota Blue Richards in the title role as Maria). To begin with I thought I'd start out with a Maria Merryweather, like the protagonist in that novel, but then the idea for my Immortal Museum hit me and I scrapped that thought.
In Sims 3 you can collect gems, right? Well, how about having each generation of the family named after a gem you can get in Sims 3 and then decorate their museum room with it?

Genius, I tell you! [/sarcasm]

But first I'll need to find her a spouse. Oh boy. What have I let myself in for?


Actually finding a spouse doesn't prove that hard. I looked up Hidden Springs' eligible bachelors before I even started and noticed Nicholas Riverhawk shared a lot of Emerald's traits. He's also not a bad looker. I know Sebastian Vanderburg is the most obvious choice, but I've cemented pairing him up with Ella Carlisle in my head, so that's out the window.
But anyway, onto Emerald and Nicholas' budding friendship...

And budding romance...


I didn't hang about with Nicholas. The one thing on my mind is SPEED. We need skills and we need them quickly. I added Jessica Willow into the family while I was at it. She's no Agnes, but she's artistic and that's all I need for now.


OK, now for some ACTION.

Emerald is studying Cooking, Jessica has become a self-employed Painter and Nicholas has become a Gardener. I'm hoping Cooking will become Emerald's SuperMax skill, then she can take care of the garden when Nicholas is gone. To stop anyone else getting to Level 10 Cooking, I'll get a butler at the earliest opportunity and he'll cook for the family. Or I'll lock the kitchen and have a dining area where they'll all eat.

Emerald got a job at the Bistro shortly after her wedding with Nicholas. To my fury it said she would then have a couple of days off to get settled in with Nicholas. I need the money and promotions, bother it! However, the trip was not without its perks...

I want to focus on Emerald's Cooking skill, so it looks like for a while Ella Carlilse and Granny Shue are going to be her only friends. She doesn't even have time to strike up a conversation with Jessica, her roommate.

Or get dressed. Busy, busy!
And as for enough money to buy any properties? Forget it.
But I mustn't panic. It's early days, and my Emerald is strong.

[Katluvr]

Welcome to the forum, Sutz!  You're off to a great start on your dynasty - lots of good luck with it!

There are quite a few good ways to make lots of money fairly quickly:

- Adopt an adult dog and train it to hunt.  Use the 'sniff out collectables' or 'locate collectables' options as soon as they are available.  If you are lucky enough to get a tiberium gem you can cut it into a regular spire cut for $6,500 and then leave it on the ground for about 24 sim hours.  It will automatically transform into a large spire cut which sells for around $38,000 - giving you a net profit of around $30,000.  Once you find enough gems to unlock the heart cut you can switch to that - it only costs $1,000 and the tiberium will still transform to a large spire cut if left on the ground for a time.

- Buy a miner from the consignment shop and mine for gems and metals.  This is less desirable than having a dog hunt for a couple of reasons.  First, it will take a sim to run the miner so it uses up time that the sim could be skilling or working on a career.  Second, the sim's relationships will drop because of the noise the miner makes.  On the positive side you can create a tunnel system throughout Hidden Springs that your sims can use to travel from place to place.

- Sell your sims sculptures and paintings at the consignment store.  You can usually get 2 to 3x more for them that way than if you just sold them from your inventory for their face value.  Having the Suave Seller LTR or the Born Salesman trait can help increase profits.

- If you have money laying around, buy up crafted items at the consignment store (paintings, nectar, inventions) and re-consign them.  You can easily get 2 to 3x more than you paid form the items.

[loveSims]

Great start! Welcome to the forum

[ArianaJade]

Great start! I loved The Little White Horse as a child, you've inspired me to go and look for it in the library now.

A good way to make more money with a painter is to hang their paintings up on the wall for a little while before you sell them, as they'll apprieciate over time. Obviously the longer the better, but you can make $20-30 just in a couple of days of hanging them on decent paintings.

[Sutz]

Thanks for the very quick feedback, everyone - especially with the tips on making money! I'm very, very far ahead with my Dynasty right now: Gen 2 is already a Young Adult, so you won't see me taking the advice just yet - but the house is desperate for an upgrade and it's about time everyone had a car so you can guarantee that once I've brought you guys bang up to date I'll start putting those pieces of advice into practice!

...This is what happens when you're so used to cheating yourself through a game.

[Sutz]

I think my Emerald has been getting a little broody...


Well, ask and you shall receive.


Please allow me to introduce Topaz Merryweather, our second generation. Her traits are Artistic and Friendly.

Topaz is a quiet baby (thank God) and her infant days are uneventful. Mostly she's just left in her crib while her parents and their roommate work on their skills. They take her out when she needs affection, feeding and nappy changing but that's about it. Topaz is probably the one who's going to have to roughhouse it, because the family is still desperately poor. I found a good couple of spots for special seeds, and thankfully Jessica Willow is also an Angler, but I'm concentrating on her painting for the moment. We don't have time to hang about.
I think this part of the challenge is probably going to be the hardest because it's such a drag not having very much money and having no fast car to get round the town - and we're quite far out. Once the money really starts rolling in I'll be able to relax a tad but for the moment I'm kinda tense about the whole thing. I won't really be happy until I've got the first part of the challenge under my belt, which is Emerald's portrait. Jessica is working diligently towards it, but since Emerald started the game practically halfway through her Young Adult stage, it's going to be a close call.
Money is also a worry.



Here is the house as it stands now. My architecture skills are pretty lousy, aren't they? They still do a lot of stuff out in the open.

I'd really like to use some of Jessica's paintings to do up the place and make it look pretty but we need the money. Every day when he's done with his garden Nicholas ups and heads off to our special seed places and also to around the criminal hideaway where there are usually emeralds and topazs ready for the museum. Anything that isn't a topaz or emerald gets sold.

Topaz has now aged up well to a toddler and finally both her and Emerald's first portraits are on the wall. Thank goodness!
She's a pretty little toddler.


Daddy teaches her to talk.


Mummy has some time with her when she can. Looks like Topaz has inherited her mother's emerald-green eyes. But her hair's much lighter than both Emerald and Nicholas, so I don't know how that happened.

And no, I didn't make Emerald have a secret fling with the postman.


Topaz is awfully cute when she's asleep.


Jessica was worn out from painting like crazy all this time, so I felt I'd better give her some fun before I started working on her fishing skill. She met up with Charles Winterly and they really hit it off. Unfortunately, though they got to boyfriend/girlfriend status, he's not very susceptible to her plans to WooHoo him, so it looks like Topaz will have to look at school for a future boyfriend once she ages up to child.


And age up well did. She gained the Loner trait.

[Sutz]

This is Kaitlin Carlisle, the daughter of Ella Carlisle and Liam O'Dourke. At least the game was nice enough to give her matching clothes. But where the heck did the black hair come from? And Ella's eyes aren't that dark. I wonder if she was adopted.
Considering Ella and Emerald are best friends I thought it would be fun to make their daughters best friends too. So far the search for a spouse has turned up nought - all Topaz's classmates are girls. She doesn't have a lot of time to socialise with them either, seeing as she paints so much. But no sooner had I got her and Kaitlin up to Friend status then Kaitlin went home. The next thing I knew, Nicholas read in the paper that there had been a fire at the O'Dourke household and Kaitlin had died! Her parents had survived unscathed, though. That's just really sad.


One night I had this little fellow yowling at the front door. Having completely pulled on my heartstrings, he then went to sleep in front of the house. I had had enough. I woke Topaz and got her to come out and give him a bit of fuss.


She only ended up with fleas for her trouble, but that soon cleared up with a good hot shower.


Topaz had only a day or so left before she aged to teenager and though her grade was an A, she was not yet on the honour role. I almost panicked but then, on the day of her birthday, she finally came out with the grade I was after. What a relief! Emerald also completed her Lifetime Wish that day and maxed Cooking. She still has a way to go before she SuperMaxes it, though. And still no Ambrosia recipe.

Topaz celebrated her new grades with a treat at the Ice Cream Van.



That's Davy Cho in the background there. I was hoping to grab either him or Dany for Topaz's spouse but they're both young adults now, and Dany's a vampire. I'm sure it won't be long before Davy follows suit, blast it.
So where was I? Ah yes, little Topaz aged up to Teen and gained the Savvy Sculptor trait.


I think she looked much better as a toddler, to be honest. Those smallish eyes of Nicholas' are becoming more pronounced as she gets older. It doesn't seem like Emerald and Nicholas' genes combined as well as I hoped. She looks half-asleep. Ah well, beggers can't be choosers. Maybe I'll get her some plastic surgery when they have the money for it to make her look a little more bright-eyed.

Next time: Very strange things happen in Hidden Springs!

[loveSims]

I think plastic surgery is against the immortal dynasty's rules. There is nothing a little nice makeup don't fix! Great update.

[VampirePlasma]

I think plastic surgery is against the immortal dynasty's rules. There is nothing a little nice makeup don't fix! Great update.

It is. But I honestly think she looks great  beautiful.

[Sutz]

Thanks for the feedback, everybody! OK, so no plastic surgery for my Topaz. And I have a severe allergy to makeup, honestly (Bad experience in my first ever drama role when I was six. Scarred me for life.) so I don't put it on my Sims. Besides, I've realised that was a dud shot of Topaz. Her eyes aren't usually like that.

A lot of strange things happened in Hidden Springs recently. First I had just finished putting the family to bed and zoomed out when I spotted this:

It was the first time I'd seen a Unicorn in Hidden Springs and boy, was I excited! I'm not planning to adopt one yet (though the ability to bless plants would come in handy), because my equestrian Merryweather won't be around for a good couple of generations. However, I still wanted to look.
I zoomed in, but though I could see and hear the sparkles, I couldn't actually see the unicorn itself! The sparkles seemed to be coming from inside the rocks, so I went into Edit Town mode and moved the rocks from the waterfall. And this is what I saw.

It must have been some kind of bizarre glitch. The unicorn's name was Bolt, and he was trapped! Well, I didn't want this happening again if one of my Merryweathers goes pursuing a unicorn! The Watcher had better intervene! I went into BuildBuy mode on the lot, edited the terrain to make sure there was no way any unicorn was getting stuck there again, and popped Bolt on a nice bit of flat ground.

You're welcome, Bolt. Maybe I'll be welcoming you to the family in a couple of generations - if your kind live long enough, that is.

Later that night, the family also got a visit from a Deer.

Beautiful though it was, the dear deer didn't hang around.

I'm now feeling a lot more relaxed about the family. Both Emerald and Nicholas have maxed their respective skills (Cooking for Emerald, Gardening for Nicholas) and Nicholas has several money trees and they've started producing seeds. I'm getting Emerald going on her dishes for the SuperMax. She makes single portions mostly so there's not so much waste. She's doing well with her job and has bought a partnership in the Diner. Unfortunately we were visited by a burglar who nicked the cheap computer before she could purchase a property (emphasizing once again the importance of a burglar alarm). It also looks like she may have to save up for the Ambrosia recipe, since Granny Shue is long dead and she's unable to invite her best friend over during the day.


Oh Ella. Really? Really? The vampire look does not suit you. Who's going to provide my Emerald with recipes now? You're never there when she tries to call round!

And speaking of annoying vampires, look at this!

This. Is. Ridiculous. How on Earth is Topaz supposed to sell her paintings if the cashier is passed out at her feet? I think I'm safer just selling them from her inventory or straight from the easel.

Going back to Topaz, I was very aware when reading the Dreamweaver Dynasty that Nectarine (the painter) kept trying to sculpt when she wasn't supposed to, as it was her daughter Periwinkle's SuperMax skill. This caused a lot of hassle with locked doors and so forth. To combat having a similar problem with the Merryweathers, I've decided that Topaz will do both jobs: the sculpting and the portraits and probably the Photography too. That way if no one else has the Artistic trait, they're less likely to want to paint/sculpt and cause problems. I'm too scatterbrained to have to keep remembering to unlock/lock doors. I can probably get her spouse to paint her portraits, hopefully.

I'm growing more and more fond of my little Topaz. She's not as much of a looker as her mother, but she's a diligent painter and she enjoys the solitude of it, which is great for me because I can just set her to task and leave her while I make sure the others are doing what they're supposed to and aren't playing in the sprinklers.

The only problems with her are that though she works hard and has help with her homework every night, she's taking a while to reach the honour role, just like when she was a child. Fortunately we've got more time to get there now she's a teen. She's an A so it shouldn't take long.

The other problem is finding her a spouse, or even a few friends. Topaz has spent so much time painting and working hard at school that it doesn't leave any time for a social life. She's a loner so she doesn't care, but I was a little concerned that she was basically living the life of a hermit.

A few of her old classmates aged up to teen right after she did, but as stated before, they're all girls. She met a couple of boys in high-school but one of them's a newspaper carrier so he won't do. The other, Chip, looked promising, but though Topaz was calling him a lot, hoping to strike up a friendship, he wasn't being that receptive.



The game was about to give me a surprise. Topaz headed off to her prom on Sunday. Like most cases when it comes to Topaz, I just left her to enjoy herself while I watched over Nicholas planting some cheese (Emerald likes to help too).

I got a few notices about Topaz, and then it said she'd been crowned Prom Queen! I thought that you were supposed to have lots of friends for that and she wasn't really friends with anyone in her class.
Added to which, though she had initially gone solo, apparently during the night Chip got her by herself and admitted he really liked her. Their relationship rocketed all the way up to Romantic Interest. Topaz came home with a crown, photograph, a nice couple of moodlets and a boyfriend to boot!
I was so thrilled I got up from the computer and did a little happy dance, rather alarming the people around me.

So here's to Topaz and Chip! Already that couple sounds so cute! I don't have any pictures yet, but I'll get them posted up as soon as I do!

[VampirePlasma]

Aw, you weren't allowed to go into Edit Town.  Hopefully you weren't going for HoF. Sorry to have to break the news to you.

[loveSims]

I'm glad Topaz got a boyfriend! And I don't mean she a ugly she is cute and will be a beautful young adult! Great update.

[Sutz]

VampirePlasma, it's OK, I'm not going for the Hall of Fame - but Metro said when someone brought up the subject in the Dynasty rules that we could move the rocks if we needed to. Apparently this always happens to Unicorns in Hidden Springs unless we intervene.

[Sutz]

Here are Topaz and Chip together. Turns out Chip is the son of Gabriella Ornales. His traits are Genius, Brave and Mean-Spirited. I'm a little worried about the Mean-Spirited bit - it certainly explains why it's been difficult to get him to go out with Topaz! However, Topaz knows where he lives now, she's cemented their relationship as boyfriend and girlfriend, and hopefully I'll grab a Midlife Crisis for him soon after I get him in the family. Also, with that almost bald head, I'm very aware of what hairstyle he's likely to have when he ages up and we'll have to apply the hair tonic.



Ah well, beggars can't be choosers! He's not a bad looker otherwise, perhaps a little on the chubby side, but I plan for his offspring to be pretty active so that shouldn't be a problem. I hope the next generation inherits his eyes.
Topaz and Chip's first kiss...



Then, being a Genius, he helped her with her homework.



Going back to Emerald, Ella Carlisle invited her to a party right after work (I still can't invite her round to the house because she immediately passes out on the path and then leaves, leaving Emerald with a bad moodlet). Thinking this would be a great opportunity to have one last fling at getting the Ambrosia recipe for free, I sent Emerald along. Money is tight again because of Emerald purchasing her property, the Faux Dog Park. I'll have to wait for the next round from the money trees before I can upgrade it.



I still really hate it that Ella became a vampire, and that she hasn't produced any more children. I'd have liked to get her good looks in the family somewhere down the line. However, the more positive side of things is that she will live a lot longer and so will definitely count as one of Emerald's six Best Friends unless Fate deals its ugly hand and kills her off early.



Still no luck with the Ambrosia, but before I instructed Emerald to toddle off home and take a shower, I saw this guy pass by.



Look at this hottie! That's Dany Shue as a vampire! For some reason he kinda reminds me of Edward Cullen from Twilight. So girls, if you're making a Twilight-inspired Sims 3 video, I'd say Dany Shue is a good starting point for designing Edward.
I'm reassured that he grows up into such a handsome young man, because he and his brother are nice looking boys as children but I wasn't too impressed with them as teens. I haven't been able to get up close to Davy Cho to see how he turned out. If things with Chip don't work out too well, I'll see if I can get Davy - though he'll probably also be a vampire by that time. Added to that, I don't really want a spouse that'll die early. I'll just have to wait and see what happens.

As will my founding couple. Are those laughter lines on Emerald's face?

[ArianaJade]

Go Topaz! I'm having the same trouble with the Ambrosia recipe - managed to get all the others I've asked for first time but this one's just proving impossible.