Preventing unwanted lots from growing

[Wizard of ID 1]

I want to build a street of a particular lot of row houses that I've downloaded.  I want the whole street to look the same (as rows of houses tend to), but the only way I can think of doing it is to just demolish anything undesireable that grows, until chance produces what i want.

This strikes me as a real waste of time.  Is there a way I can prevent anything else from growing except the lots I want to?

While I'm at it, is there a way I can apply a mod to certain cities in a region, but not to others?  For example, I like the Painted Desert mod, but I also like lush vegetation -- which looks a bit strange in the southern Utah desert!  Could I have, say, one city using the Painted Desert mod, but not another one.

[His Divine Hand 244]

For your first question you have a few choices.

One) if the lot you are after only grows in one or two tilesets, only have them selected, so as that lets say, only Chicago tileset grows, our only Houston. If it is a custom lot, you can use iLive Reader (it is a bit of complicated program, but can be learned) to see what tileset it grows in, and possibly peg it to only grow in just one tileset if necessary.

Two) if custom content is getting in the way i.e. growing in the desired zones, remove from you plugin file so they won't grow. They will leave behind blank lots if any grew, just don't query these and bulldoze them if you wish. You can return competing buildings after you have what you want.

Three) if all else fails, make an unusually sized lot with the building you want in lot editor. For example, your row house only grows on a 1x2 lot now, but using lot editor you stick six of those on one lot you get a 6x2. Not many buildings in game or custom are 6x2, so that gives you a decent chance of getting the building you want (it may take a few times since the game will break a 6x2 lot into smaller zones, but it greatly increases the chances of getting the building you want).

As for your second question, technically you could. BUT the only way to do this is to play one city with lets say the Painted Desert terrain mod, then save and quit the game, remove the Painted Desert terrain mod, and replace it with a different terrain mod, then play the city you want that terrain mod in. You would have to do this every time you switched cities too. As far as I know, that is currently the only way to do what you are asking.

[GMT 389]

welll

2 things

for you first question, I suggest using the buildingplop cheat. it gives you a list with all available buildings to pic kfrom and simply plop them down.

furthermore, as cheats always come handy, I think you should download the extra cheats dll. it easily manages all the cheats so you don't have to "learn" them or write them down somewhere or whatever...

as for you're second question, I think you desperately need the SC4 Startup Manager. It allows you to pick which plugin / mod you use.

unfortunately, this doesn't work for cities, only for regions...

but you can set up multiple profiles per region so if you want a certain list of plugins in on city and another list in a different city of the same region, just create 2 profiles. but keep in mind which profile you use in what city to prevent ugly flaws.

(this doesn't account for different profiles of different regions, of course)

[Wizard of ID 1]

Oh boy! Thank you so much for the advice on the buildingplop cheat! That's fantastic!

I've yet to check out all the cheats on the download, but I foresee many hours of entertainment, and eventually, massively transformed cities. Thanks again.

I love these forums!

[Wizard of ID 1]

One more question. I've noticed that if you plop a residential lot in this way, the residents don't commute. No unemployment zot appears, and the building doesn't dilapidate or abandon. But the building will tell you it has no commuters, and no commuting path appears when you click it with the traffic query tool.

I guess I can live with that. But do you know if the residents pay taxes as normal? If I were to extensively remodel a city using the buildingplop cheat, would the lack of commuting affect my commercial buildings?

Commercial lots plopped using the buildingplop cheat work as normal

[checoloma 8]

sorry if this sounds dumb, but where is the option for selecting a tileset

[CaptCity 4,915]

Originally posted by: checoloma

sorry if this sounds dumb, but where is the option for selecting a tilesetquote>

It's the top, left blue button on the user interface (the one with the t-square and triangle). Select it, then expand the window by selecting the small up arrow. That will open a window where you can select or de-select the building styles.

Also, it is usually better to start a new topic rather than bumping older threads.

Going to close this one.

-CaptCity