malefic

I am the first mayor! woohoo! Actually its fairly obvious if you read all my information on the impact of R$, R$$, and R$$$ on the demands of Sim Society and my tweaks of education and taxes to get the city social scene how I want it. The game really encompasses both but I think I clearly lean towards mayor.

Originally posted by: Shlarin I've noticed on occasion that when I raise the taxes on $ sims, the $$ and $$$ also leave. Maybe it's the effect of a progressive tax system where the "$ portion" of a $$$ sim's taxes also get bumped up. Does anyone know what's the official definitions of $, $$, and $$$ Residential? I've made a city with over $160,000/yr average income yet $$$ sims are about only 2/3 of the population (with a large $ minority and barely any $$'s.)quote> Not sure what you mean by official definitions of $,$$, and $$$ other than R$ = lower class, R$$ = middle class, R$$$ = upper class. When you raise taxes on R$ it reduces R$$ and R$$$ likely because if R$ leaves the commercial and industrial sectors stagnate from lack of proper workforce which inturn creates jobless R$$ and R$$$. To get a city of full R$$$ the easiest way to get this is by tax manipulation and region level building. You need one city with the R$ and R$$ connected to the same work area as your R$$$. In the R$ and R$$ city you should make the taxes desirable for those two groups and spike the R$$$ to 20%. In your R$$$ city you need to do the opposite, Make your R$ and R$$ tax 20% and a desirable tax for R$$$. Finally balance is key. Your region needs to have about 60-40% R$, 40-20% R$$, and 20%-10%R$$$ to run optimumly imo.

If you are not using vanilla, I found the most likely reason for having excessive R$$$ zots is either because the roads are not linked properly to allow the SIMs to return home properly, or you're region's R$$$, R$$, R$ ratio is out of whack which prevents enough CS$$$ Co$$$ and I-HT demand to cover all the R$$$ SIMs

I totally forgot Uni's give hi tech cap relief .. thanks for the reminder. my city college has a ring but like some other places it extends beyond the map, so yeah if you have a city college that has a ring that doesn't go off the map then methinks you have a modded city college

yeah Universities have a few problems. 1) Weird very local desireability effect (maybe because of the crime bug?) 2) Unnecessary (I've had EQs of 197 without them which means you can probably get to 200 without them) 3) Large 4) Causes the den of crime bug (which you can apprently only resolve by having a 200 EQ which is basically impossible to have in a growing city as far as I can tell or a mod) 5) cost per student is higher than city college

forgot this one FTW - For the Win - What this thread is. Thanks!

I'll throw my 2cents in. It appears to me you have a case of imbalance. Just as C$$$, CO$$$ and I-H want R$$$ to work there they need a large % of R$$ and R$ to function properly. You seem to have way too many R$$$ for the amount of work available to them. You need to understand that if a business has 50 C$$$ jobs it means that like only 5 - 10 of those jobs will be for R$$$. The rest is split between R$$ and R$.

Jiust did a test and Sims actually will go beyond the adjacent tile for work.. Here is what I came up with the region you can see I used 3 small tiles. Aptly titled for easy left is Residence only, middle is commcercial only and right is industry only. So as you can see I have three regions stacked in a row now the residence is below: So as you can see I have 562 cars leaving my hastily build village and moving into the Commercial Zone Must have been a little update between pictures but as you can see there are 565 cars going into the commercial sector. Some bleed off to the commercial area while others continue down the highway to industry ville So there we go 435 cars moved on to Industry city which is 2 spaces away from the residential region. Hey lookie there this one was accurate. 435 cars from commerical ville which originated from the residential region are parking their cars in this little city of industry. Voila! Maybe this can better explain what you saw

Originally posted by: Livin in Sim My personal opinion on the role of farms is that the eye candy is worth the effort because of the boost to realism, especially in region view. When I see a map filled in with nicely integrated and variegated farms, I can't help bit think, "Wow..." Then again, I'm one of those odd ones that will drive through farm country, avoiding the freeways and cities. quote> I was going to try this in my region but I started the first farming community and got frustrated with trying to build the country highway things in the NAM but what I think I'll do is just lay out a bulk of the town and farms in one go than to piecemeal it together (and maybe just use the avenue to portray the idea of a country route moving through the region. I think that may make it more fluid. Think the more i think on it versus just throwing it in the more unnatural it becomes.

Ok probably a stupid question but my logic systems are not functioning properly where one aspect of the Z Mod is concerned. okay before I ask the question I should put in some background 1) Because the traffic system in SC4 is based on solo passangers 5,000 bus commuters utilize 5000 buses, so Maxis' fix for it was to not have bus capacity effect road capacity. 2) Z Mod changed it so buses count towards road capacity. 3) except on highways the bus moves slower (and on streets significantly slower) than a car. So why would anyone utilize buses except for to make money on bus faires since buses in the Z Mod clog roadways and move slower than cars? I thought I read subways get used more if a city has a good bus system but otherwise I feel like i am missing the advantage of having bus stops aside from the monetary value. If anyone has any info I would greatly appreciate the input.

I appologize in advance if a mod feels this should be elsewhere but I did not really consider this a "City Building concept" but more an informational to other SC4 players who may not know the power of the R$ Sims. Livin in Sim mentioned once that R$ Sims are great because they can work ANYWHERE. This is more or less to prove he/she is absolutely right and with a little education (a bit more than a little) those R$ Sims create their own demands of ALL the commercial and Industries without a single R$$ or R$$$ present in the region. Here are some pictures to show what I mean. This region has two active cities. One is a city for my R$ Sims. It is also where the industry is located. I also have a second city with only commercial lots in it. First Graph is the current demand. It shows thanks to the education of my R$ Sims they no longer want the ID and IM jobs as well as the CS$ in the other city. However CS$$, CO$$, and CO$$$ are in demand without a single R$$ or R$$$ resident in the region. Now you can see my R$ are not dolts. The education in my little city of 30,000 R$ is reaching that Hi Tech threshold. Now I guess in reality I do not have proof Hi Tech will start becoming in demand but I am sure in a few years when that EQ gets over 120 I'll likely see Hi Tech demand. This graph really just shows what I've been saying. My city only has R$ Sims and they are working anywhere and everywhere in the fields of employment SC4 offers without the need for any R$$ or R$$$. Now I do not plan for this to stay this way forever; infact, I plan to start two more cities soon with R$$ and R$$$ so that they may flourish

Originally posted by: Randomtaskk It was my understanding that CO$$$ required some high wealth/medium wealth residents to work there, ie 5% high, 20% medium and 75% low or something like that. Do CO$$$ buildings actually develop without these sims presents, or is there merely demand for it which will never be satisfied due to lack of building due to lack of right welath distribution of sims?quote> Ask and ye shall receive... Okay I even sparked my own curiosity to this little situation so I decided to put my ideas to a further test. I killed the commercial only city and transplant the commercial zones into the city with the R$ only so there could be no debate to how R$ effect the demand of the various commercial and industry entities. And now I'll open the envelope to reveal the winner *drum roll* CO$$$ DOES live and thrive in a R$ only society *cheers* *applause* *howls* But uh oh .. wait a minute. I am seeing an odd anomoly: If you notice there are two gaps. While yes, CO$$$ are indeed indemand and building and thriving (ok thriving once I put some police stations in since they were being pinched by the local mafia) but no I-H or CS$$$ are even thinking of coming here. Hmmmm .. maybe not enough education? Nope if memory serves thats beyond I-H threshold. Hmmm maybe Randomtaskk is on to something. Maybe the mighty Maxis forgot to put in that special link that prevented CO$$$ when no R$$ or R$$$ are present because CS$$$ and I-H definitely are not setting foot in the city. Lets run this somemore juuuust incase to a EQ of 195. BUZZZZZZ Still NADA zippo el zilcho .. nothing. High Tech and CS$$$ trucks are just not on their way FIIIIIIIIIINE I'll play nice... *grumble grumble* Egor! yesssss massster switch the R$$ valve to 9%! Yesssss masster *crackle crackle crank* *VOOOOOOOOSH* I let slip the dogs of war as you can see... and the result!? (the switch to the following demand chart happened instantly) TADAH!!!!!! *bows*

Yes definitely be careful about education. @ about 40-60 EQ you'll see ID demand drop and IM demand rise. If you allow the EQ of your Sims to get @ about 100-120 you'll see ID tank and IM start to level off as IH starts to creep is ugly head. I have a R$ only city (ie I put R$$ and R$$$ taxes to 20%) and this seems to be what is happening in my little city.

@Jezus53 Oh yeah I totally already understood the realism aspect. I just meant on a SC4 level. As far as I can tell utiliing buses with Z Mod creates longer commute times, and doesn't help congestion. So as far as I can tell the only purpose of buses in Z Mod is to make some extra coin in the city coffers and asthetics. Thanks for the reply!

I would guess given you have a Mayor's House and a large Park you are creating enough desire to attract middle class even though there is not enough education to support a demand on Mfg Industry or C$$. I would recommend if your money allows to build an elementary school. Reduce the bus radius and amount of students to save money. Let the R$ and R$$ educate themselves and then you see demand of I-M and C$$ and thus be able to keep the R$$ in the little village you got. This may also kill your I-A and I-D but such is the will of the simcosmos. Or you can tax the R$$ to 20% bulldoze and let the places rebuild with just R$. Then when you feel able to bring the R$$ back into the city reduce the taxes down to whatever % you want.

Quick questions for anyone experienced with the CAM mod. I downloaded the residential CAMeLot and of course each grouping has its own dependencies. Now some of the dependencies are various buildings like some made by Dusktrooper. When I download that building it has its own list of dependencies. So now two questions: 1) Do I need to download the dependencies for that building or is the Residential CAMeLot mod just using the model for that particular building? 2) Most of those buildings also have ploppable and growable lot files along with the model file. Should I remove those two lot styles since I am assuming the CAM mod is not looking for those particular lot files? Hope those questions made sense. If it needs further clarification I'll have to get screen caps and actual examples. Thanks!

well the Z mod has a 15 speed for pedestrians so thats possibly part of the reason. The speed in vanilla is 3.5, so basically the pedestrians will walk nearly five times as far.

My guess is no since it'd be popular I imagine (or I don't know what I am talking about which is highly likely too!). But is there a mod where you can get additional information on the job breakdown based on wealth. For instance one CS$$ might allow 100 but not all 100 go to R$$$ as you need janitors stock boys etc etc. Is there a mod that breaks it down like instead of just saying 100 jobs it says like 20 R$$$, 30R$$ 50R$$$?

very nice stuff thanks again Mike. It even has a link for info on the CAM mod which is cool cause I was planning to try those Mods

I discovered last night i had the issue briefly. I had an avenue that had 16,000 pedestrians that quickly turned into 16,000 busses (like it should have been) My problem with installing the Z simulator on my already made city was apparently my buses account for part of the road capacity when it never did before so my avenues even though they have more capacity than when I was using my traffic cop edited simulator my streets are turning crimson because 16,000 buses simply will not fit on the avenues lol obviously Z is more realistic in that nature but it definitely means I have to restructure my cities before going to the Z mod um err /unhijack >.> <.<

You need the lower gas price Mod it appears

ooo yeah I browsed that Guide looking for Yimby/Nimby values awhile ago but didn't think to look there for that chart. Danke!

Since I am a fan offering the opprotunity of education to my SIMs they tend to get smart and all want to be millionaires but this has some negative issues as they seem to also increase way faster than new jobs allow. I know this is a common issue and I did various search strings to try to find the information but I was wondering what tax % people tend to use to keep the $$$Res demand under control. In doing google searches I found someone in a gamespot forum used 11% to keep them under control. So in a nutshell what tax % do you use to help keep your $$$Res demand under control? Thanks!

you sir are fantabulous. Thanks for the visual and the idea!

Originally posted by: Livin in Sim Wow, I wonder if R$$ is going up in your first R$ city because of the police stations? But you put them in thinking they would help the commercial, so I can see your reasoning there. And I always thought high education would help lower crime, but maybe you got smarter criminals! Just kidding...I think. It's very challenging to keep the R$ sometimes. At any rate, it sounds like you are rebalancing it with the new R$ city, and sounds like it's higher density right away than the first? I also was thinking of doing a high density R$ as well as a lower one. Again, thanks for sharing, it's a great help. quote> Well if you recall i planned to add the amenities so I guess its not surprising my R$ are turning into R$$ with the higher education. As far as I read (if you want the link for reference I can see if i can find it), crime disappears at 200EQ. I think EQ does effect the amount of crime; however, I get the feeling 190 EQ for R$ has less effect on reducing crime than if the R$$$ have 190 EQ. Thats my guess anyways. But all in all I have no idea why that city is so down on demand; however, I have a feeling it'll show a revival now with my R$ only city but I'll have to wait til I can play again to find out. In the R$ only city I went high density right away yes. My other city where R$$ are now taking over I was much more methodical. It started mostly low density with some medium density and I grew over time.