IllusoryThrall's Sims 4 Hub
- Challenges, Tips & Stories
I started this WordPress Blog back in 2012. At the beginning, I assure you, I had no idea what I was starting. I posted a few things… but it wasn’t for several years that my blogging really took off. I dabbled in a few Sims 3 stories (which are still accessible on this site – just check my retired & completed simlit section). By August 2016, however, I was well and truly hooked on blogging, although at that point, I was still waffling between Sims 3 and 4. The waffling didn’t take too much more time, though, before I was thoroughly addicted to Sims 4. Once I hit this point, I’ve never gone back. I still had (and have) periods of writer’s block and inactivity, but I always come back.
Sometime in 2023, this blog really tripled in traffic. And it did so on a very consistent basis. Which made me really start seriously considering the thoughts and ideas for it that I’d had in the back of my head for YEARS. The host I was on prior to this one, wordpress.com .. was great. It was cheap, it was reliable, and it was easy to use. However, the amount of customization and control I had over the website design and add-ons was, well.. very very low. And even if I doubled the cost of the plan I was on, it was going to remain virtually the same…. which is exactly the opposite of what this growing blog needed. With my challenges gaining in popularity, and my livestreaming, I really wanted to be able to upgrade the graphics, layout, and things that the website offered… By October, it was clear my blog was getting 25,000 to 30,000 hits per month on a very stable basis – so when I noticed that my two year subscription to wrodpress.com was ready to renew on the 26th, I decided, spur-of-the-moment, that there wasn’t going to be a better time to upgrade. So I immediately started looking for a way to pay for a new webhost, and researching where I wanted to go, as well as finding out exactly what upgrades I wanted and needed for the site. Originally, I was going to do a fund-raising stream for the money, but a very lovely friend of mine kindly donated the full amount I needed to pay for the next THREE YEARS of hosting. When that’s almost up, I will certainly be looking for ways to raise the money for the next web-hosting fee, but that’s a problem for future me. (If you’re interested in helping to support this site and my streaming, check out my Support Me page. 100% of donations will go to the website and my streaming.)
All that being said, I do try to be pretty transparent on the effort that goes into this website – the background work, the time for upgrading, the work involved in moving the site, as well as what it takes to keep my challenges updated. I’m also in a long process of adding a knowledge database to this website to share the Sims 4 knowledge I’ve accrued over the years (expect that to start happening by January 2024 – I do have a few other major things on my list before I start devoting a ton of time into the toolsnlinks section, but it’s coming.) This transparency led to the need to have a page devoted to collecting the posts about website news and information…. so that’s where this page comes in. Obviously, there’s no real reason to go back to the news I was posting at the very beginning of the website, but it’s there buried in the archives if you’re ever curious!
You read that right, I’ve updated the Decades challenge for Horse Ranch. The exact changes are listed in the changelog at the bottom of the main rules page, and my reasoning for the restrictions or non restrictions. Next up: Not So Berry.
Continue reading →I am 99.8% sure that everything is updated and working – both on the blog, and on the spreadsheet. So download away and get to playing! That being said, if you notice a typo or an inconsistency, PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE let me know so I can fix it!
Still coming is a page on the spreadsheet to track your sims’ animals – pets, horses, livestock… if you have any other ideas that might be fun to add to the spreadsheet, please comment away and let me know.
If you already have a copy of the old spreadsheet going, save a new copy of the new one, and just copy over your data from the first one. I’m sorry, but there really isn’t an easier way to do it.. 🙁 Hazards of the challenge, I’m afraid.
In the update queue: Decades and Extended Not So Berry. Expect to see those being worked on in the next week!
And, finally, I am putting some thought into making a version of the spreadsheet to track challenges like a normal 10 gen legacy, and/or the 100 baby challenge… and maybe some other challenges. Let me know if you have a favorite challenge you’d love to see a tracking spreadsheet for!
Continue reading →Okay, so after spending most the day working on it, I thought I would have it completed by bedtime, but it turns out I didn’t quite have enough time – simply because I got overzealous and started adding some improvements to the spreadsheet. I will say, the BLOG part of the update is complete. I think. I’ve proofread it several times, but please, if you see that I’ve made a mistake, please let me know. Adding in the two generations did require a good bit of change to the storyline, but.. well, let’s just say, I think it was worth it.
As for the spreadsheet… I should have it done tomorrow. I need to do some testing to make 100% sure my formulas are working since I updated and moved everything around, but it SHOULD work as-is. My advice, however, wait until it’s fully cleared to download a new copy of the spreadsheet. I will post when this is the case. I had some frustrating errors with formulas at the end of the night, and quite simply didn’t have the brain power to suss out why it wasn’t working. Meanwhile, if you are at a point you need to go to one of the new generations (Gen 14 and Gen 25, respectively in a now 39 gen challenge) .. use the blog rules for now. Love to all of you, and will let you know when the spreadsheet is ready again!
Continue reading →I am going to be updating Timeline Adventure Challenge today, so if you see some weird changes or something doesn’t read quite right, rest assured by end of day the challenge will once again be ready to play, and the changelog will show any changes I made for those curious. I also plan to update the spreadsheet today, but that will likely happen after the rules on the blog have been fully fixed and updated. Will leave a note on here when both spreadsheet and blog pages are fully updated for the new packs!!
On a side note, I am re-building my non-CC lots for the Timeline Adventure, and will hopefully also be updating my blank save file to include the new worlds, but I don’t know if either of those will be up today. Will post when they go live and links are active for them in the appropriate places!!
Continue reading →Just a note to say.. I’m sorry I haven’t been posting much lately. I had gotten myself a bit burned out on sims, and stuck in a very nasty writer’s block loop. I would get the gameplay done, get the pictures .. sit down to write.. and despite having most of the plots planned.. I would have absolutely no idea what to write. Just.. no words came. After some (read: lots) of agonizing deliberation and some trust in a couple of tarot card reads that I had done, I decided a big break needed to be on order. So, I honestly should have mentioned that’s what I was doing, but.. hindsight is 20/20 and all that jazz. That being said, I am hoping that I have given myself enough of a break, because this is me saying that I am going to attempt to spend the next couple of weekends trying to finish up some misc. chapters I have literally sitting with all their pictures and no words. After that, I have some catch-up to do on the Tangled Yarn story before I’m ready to start into an actual rotation/writing order.. which I’m still tweaking to try to fit in with the rest of my crazy schedule. Being that I keep adding in more streams during the week… I absolutely don’t have much time for writing other than the weekends. Which is slightly unfortunate, but it ought to help me focus in on what I’m doing. I hope. Suffice it to say, if everything goes well, I should be back to posting story chapters this weekend..
Hopefully I will also be getting to work on updating my big challenges for the new Horses pack this weekend – which I am a big fan of. In fact, on that, I am also thinking of re-doing some of my older Timeline Adventure builds…. and then re-uploading them. But.. back to the Horse pack, it has reinvigorated my interest in Sims, and I think my extended break seems to be mostly over. If you’re curious of what I’ve been doing while on break… I’ve been working on a lot of Planet Zoo, which has once again hooked my brain wholly. I have put MOST, if not all of my “freetime” into updating & adding to a massive Planet Zoo spreadsheet collection (which I will be sharing once I’m happy with it).
Continue reading →Just letting you all know that I have officially updated the “All Things Simlish Checklist” (Cheat sheet) – both on this blog, as well as the google doc checklist that matches (here).
Bsaically, I added High School Years and Growing Together, including all Milestones, Quirks, and other additions to the game.
Obviously, this is just the first of several pages that need updating for the new pack, but those are coming, too. I have them on my “to-do” schedule in the next couple of weeks, and will post each time I get one of my challenges updated to the new pack(s).
One final note: My friend EmilyBlueJaye as extended my already Extended Not So Berry, and now has a 50 generation challenge with a full checklist spreadsheet. If you’re interested, it’s here. (And I will be making sure the NSB checklist for my part of the challenge is complete & updated, without the extras, when I update that page.)
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A blogging friend of mine (Violet_Royale) approached me recently about collaborating on a new legacy challenge, and I jumped at the chance. Now, a few weeks later, we’re ready to reveal.
The challenge, Lunar Lineage, is designed to be an original 10 generation (11 including the prologue) Werewolf Legacy challenge, but at it’s heart, it is a story of a family struggling to belong in their world. The background story reads like this:
Werewolves have been hunted to an apparent extinction in your world. However, you feel that maybe they still exist… and perhaps they are the key to finding out why you have always felt such a connection with the moon. You vow to find out for sure, and to research your mysterious family history. Perhaps you can even bring Werewolves back to the world and start a real legacy of your own.
This challenge is also designed to help you explore Werewolves and their relation to the other occults. This is why the other occult life states are highly recommended as must-have packs. Getting into character and role-playing along or writing a story (either literally or in your head) is highly encouraged, but not required.
The major difference in this legacy when compared to others you will find is that there are banned skills listed for each generation. These are to make it more difficult. Avoid using these skills, with the ultimate goal of keeping them under level 2. If you somehow accidentally get them to 2, it is not a challenge fail, but aim to keep the skill level on them as low as possible.
With all that being said, take a look at the challenge, see if it’s something for you. I hope you all have as much fun playing this as we did writing it! Enjoy!! (Oh, and both of us are doing stories based on this challenge on our blogs, so as soon as the stories go live, their links will be posted at the bottom of the challenge page!)
Continue reading →Use the following table for aging in my Decades challenge rules. Added into the main rules as of today, but for those who have been asking what the new life stage will do to my aging scheme, I wanted to go ahead and post a notice about the change. (Not including Cats & Dogs numbers, those will remain the same.)
| Aging Table | Before 1950 | After 1950 |
| Pregnancy | 5 days | 5 days |
| Baby | 2 days, ages up at approx. 3 months | 2 days, ages up at approx. 3 months |
| Infant | 12 days, ages up at 2 years | 12 days, ages up at 2 years |
| Toddler | 21 days, ages up at 5 years | 21 days, ages up at 5 years |
| Child | 45 days, ages up at 11.5 years old | 45 days, ages up at 11.5 years old |
| Teenager | 45 days, ages up at 18 years old | 45 days, ages up at 18 years old |
| Age of Consent | Teens can marry at 14 years old. (T + 17) | Teens can marry when they’re 16 (T + 31) |
| Young Adult | 84 days, ages up at 30 years old | 84 days, ages up at 30 years old |
| Adult | 84 days, ages up at 42 years old | 175 days, ages up at 55 years old |
| Elder | 35 days, dies at 47 years old | 140 days, dies at 75 years old |
Also, there may very well be other changes coming with the new pack that I haven’t accounted for. I will let you know when and if I need to make more changes!
PS: added the aging tables to the roll reference sheet. Seemed like a good thing to have there.
Continue reading →An additional note on the stuff I already posted (see this post if you missed it):
I’ve taken as close a look as I can at what is coming in the new pack, and I’m afraid I have bad news about Adventures with Jaz. Due to the (in my opinion) MAJOR changes to the way storytelling is going to work in the new update and pack, I’ve done a lot of thinking, and I’m going to have to put Jaz on a more lengthy hiatus. To keep the stress on me as low as I possibly can, I will need more time to “fix” the file after all the new compatibility stuff comes out. Basically, I need to be VERY sure that the new update doesn’t break all the personalities and storylines that I have going in Jaz’s save – and … to do that, I need to manually set preferences and compatibilities for EVERY. SINGLE. STORY-RELATED. SIM. in the entire file. Which amounts to about 170 sims. (172 plus any yet-to be-born-babies I don’t know about or minus some folk who left town – and yes, I literally counted each of them…) To keep the stress on me to a manageable level, I will keep Jaz off the publish docket until the first “posting rotation” is over – which is five weeks’ time, and instead of taking time out of my day to write the story, I’ll be working on the file & or the spreadsheet that needs to be completely re-worked… Expect to see Jaz back in posting action around the end of April. I’m very sorry for those (including me) who love reading about Jaz.. but to be absolutely sure this update doesn’t break my favorite save, I’m going to have to be SUPER careful with the post-update fixes.
As for the other saves? — All should be in the planned five-week rotation (four weeks of posting, one of break and or catch up time) except for the above-mentioned Adventures with Jaz. None of my other files have such an extensive save-file-wide storyline and personalities, and will take only some minor set up and fixing to continue playing. The rotation is planned to start on the 19th of March, and I think I have enough in the way of contingencies for mod breakage from the new patch and pack that it should be able to go on time without any issues.
Continue reading →Just wanted to drop a quick note about what’s going on on my blog as we wait for the next update (INFANTS!!) and the Expansion Pack right after. MOST of my stories have needed to be put on pause in preparation for the new stuff, so don’t expect to see the McPhersons or Foreshadowed Sunset, because they need the infants to continue. As for the other stories, here’s what’s going on….
Adventures with Jaz will be taking a month off to wait for the new expansion – not, exactly, because of the infants and expansion upgrade.. but as a by-product of the new stuff, I’m needing to re-arrange the story a little bit, and adding in some time for each sim (which means a full re-do of the spreadsheet I use for their save!) Being that I don’t want to have to stress about getting that done in a hurry – I’m pulling this story off the publish list until after the update to allow me time to get things sorted.
Broomstick Files will also be coming back right after the update – I’m waiting on it so I can get some other stories caught up while we wait.
Tails of Sulani hit a major writer’s block, but should be getting updates again each Thursday as soon as I solve the writer’s block (which I’m hoping to do this week.)
Island Spirits is going to be getting weekly updates for most of the time while we wait, as it prepares for the beginning of the spin-off story that’s in the works. There will be a few chapters of both Island Spirits and the new story (still tentatively titled The Timeline Children) together as what happens before the spin-off technically starts is important to the beginning of it, so we’ll label those chapters as both the beginning of Timeline Children and Island Spirits.
Another story that is on my “catch up now” list is A Tangled Yarn. The end of the 1890s for them has some rather complicated photo shoots (that will require me to build sets for them), which is why it’s been taking me so long to get back to them. They’re now top priority, however, so expect the rest of the 1890s to be published before the new updates come out.
Hopefully I will be able to start back into my new regular posting schedule the week after the update and expansion pack come out (obviously, subject to when the mods get updates and fixes for the new stuff, because I’m super sure that all of them will likely break with the new stuff). Basically, the new schedule is a four week posting rotation, in which Jaz will get a full 7 updates (Wednesdays and Fridays), mermaids will get one per week (Thursday), Timeline Children will also get one per week (Saturdays) .. and all the other stories will get one update each during the rotation. After each four week rotation, I’ll take a week “off” to catch up on anything that I got behind in and take a mini break, then the whole thing repeats.
So, that’s what is coming. Love to everyone, and make sure you’re taking time for yourself in your busy schedules, too!!
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BIG ANNOUNCEMENT!!
Chapter One – Starting Anew
November 2025 Dev DiarySuperSweetBot Commands for Mods & BroadcastersOctober 2025 Dev DiaryProgress Report!Hacking Situation ResolvedHey all…
Welcome to my new webhost!!
Progress Report on Not So Berry & TimelineExtended Not So Berry 2.0 is coming!!
OMG A Thrall Post?? What?Not So Berry Updating
Jaynie’s Gems: By-The-NumberToday
