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Paralives Hub Forums Gameplay & Simulation Skills for Parafolk

  • Skills for Parafolk

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    What if we had more complex skills for paras? that would branch out into more things to do, which then would have more enhanced gameplay.

    We have many generic skills we’d all to see such as:

    Writing
    Cooking
    Gardening
    Mechanic
    Charisma
    Music

    But what about more specific skills like different skills for each instrument,different cooking styles, fashion related skills,photography,cleaning and so forth

    Example skills:
    Photography skill
    Cleaning skill (less time it takes for them to clean)
    Different Instrument skill (piano,violin,bass,cello,saxophone,clarinet,drums,electric guitar,guitar)
    Business skills (able to run a more successful company/business than others)
    Marketing skills
    Math skill
    Science skills (anatomy,nutrition etc.)
    Writing skill (including ficiton writing,non-fiction,journalism,etc.)
    Connoisseur (paras who are into more cultured arts: paintings,music,history,language learning etc.)
    Language skill (learn another language, which would be cool when traveling to vacation worlds)
    Fashion skills: style , makeup, sewing, stylist,textile creator,model scout,novice designer, fashion designer (10 max)

    If a parafolk maxs out of any skill and keeps practicing the same skills over and over, it then it would allow them to gain extra points on those particular skills which would then title them as either: Beginner (10 extra points), Intermediate (15 extra points), Pro (20 extra points), Expert (25+ extra points). These extra points could not only help them in their career/occupation but would allow more job opportunities and special gifts/events to get or attend.

    List your ideas below I think this would be a interesting topic to see be considered for gameplay if its possible 🙂

    Elrise replied 3 years, 6 months ago 7 Members · 7 Replies
  • 7 Replies
  • I like the idea of more detailed skills, but I think it should work differently. There are base skills, motor, creativity, social, mind, and maybe a few others. Once you reach level 3 of one you get branched off even more. Ex- Mind branches to games(video, board, or card), science and Creativity branches to painting, writing, music, and a few others. Then those branch out to be more specific, writing to research or creative writing. Here’s a map to help understand.
    (level #) = level to level up
    Creative(level 3)-
    Writing(level 5)—
    Research Writing(level 8)
    Creative Writing(level 8)-
    FantasyWriting(level 10)
    Sci-fi Writing(level 10)
    Realistic Fiction(level 10)
    Painting/Drawing(level 5)-
    Cartoony Painting (level 10)
    Realistic Painting (level 10)
    Pop Art (level 10)
    Music(level 5)-
    Piano(level 10)
    Guitar)level 10)
    Violin(level 10)
    Drums(level 10

    Each skill goes up to 10. The more specific skills feed some of their progress into the higher skill.
    Ex: practicing the guitar gives points to music and creativity.

    Posted October 17, 2019 at 1:54 am
  • This might be quite late, yet I do agree the overall skill system for Paralives should be used as made as good as possible to enhance the gameplay.

    The Sims 4 sorta expands the skill with aspirations, sometimes having skill-related aspiration with requirements to reach the next milestone. For instance, I think it felt that the fitness skill in TS4 met its full potential not when reaching level 10 but when accomplished the bodybuilder aspiration (Similar thing for others like Master Chef, Bestselling author, etc).

    However, having this requirement system on a lower level might lower down the value of this system. Like “I randomly gain skill every time I do something.” This breaks the immersion especially.

    In addition, while not a very huge concern, I think there should be an incentive to keep practicing the skill. Two approaches I recognize is to penalize by decaying skill level and additional benefit from the over-maxing skill similar to:
    [quote quote=5383]
    If a parafolk maxs out of any skill and keeps practicing the same skills over and over, it then it would allow them to gain extra points on those particular skills which would then title them as either: Beginner (10 extra points), Intermediate (15 extra points), Pro (20 extra points), Expert (25+ extra points). These extra points could not only help them in their career/occupation but would allow more job opportunities and special gifts/events to get or attend.

    List your ideas below I think this would be a interesting topic to see be considered for gameplay if its possible

    Quote

    [/quote]

    So this is what I propose:
    1. Level gain on lower skill levels with a bar
    2. A cap on a certain level where the effort to raise the skill becomes more deliberate (I am thinking of requirement similar to TS4 aspiration)
    3. Certain incentive to keep pursuing certain skill further after ‘maxing’ it (or at least keep practicing it), penalize and or added benefit
    *In case of using decaying, I think the level where the ‘deliberate’ effort start could be the floor of skill decay

    An issue I see is how the NPC will be able to progress the skill as well. Some thoughts on this will be appreciated.

    Posted December 7, 2019 at 3:03 pm
    • I’d love to see NPCs with slow steady progress on skills generally but maybe based on their personality/job/backstory, they progress slightly quicker in one area. Perhaps if they’re a local chef, that area is cooking, just as an example.

      Posted September 8, 2020 at 3:48 pm
  • I like this!
    To add to the lower skills using a bar: I think to level those up it’d be interesting if they would do more hands on approaches vs just reading a book if that makes sense. Especially for certain ‘advanced skills’ (science,mechanic,etc.)

    I’m not sure how the sims 4 aspirations work do you mind explaining further? I haven’t had much experience with sims 4 beyond building and some sim playing due to my computer took out 😛 But I remember sims 3 aspirations is it somewhat similar or if not the same as sims 4 though?

    If its not a possibility to go this in depth because of the complexity for whatever reason, I hope we as a community or even a few users could collaborate and mod this in the game in the future when mods are supported.

    Posted December 11, 2019 at 10:48 pm
  • I think an interesting concept to look into would be Skill Trees rather than a set of skills like in the Sims games.

    This is (roughly) how I would organize it using a similar system to the Sims life stage:

    Parababies/Paratoddlers would start off with the core skill bases –
    Communication – learning speech
    Creativity – learning colors, music, tastes, etc.
    Logic – learning shapes, numbers
    Motor – walking, potty-training

    To progress to the next stage in life or maybe to just age without any issues to your Parafolk, you’ll need to reach “Level X”

    For children, they can start branching out based on how far you got as a toddler, or maybe it would be better to just assume that all children start off on a clean-slate. Specifically skills will mostly be gained through school and based on the interest level your Parachild has in the subject:

    Communication
    * Speech
    * Literacy – increased through education

    *Speech and literacy would be required as skills before aging up to teen.*
    Creativity
    * Art – increased through education (optional by choosing art or music class)
    * Music – increased through education (optional by choosing art of music class)
    * Culinary

    Logic
    * Math – increased through education
    * Science – increased through education
    * Strategy – increased through education (optional by joining chess club)

    Motor
    * Fitness – increased through education
    * Athletics – increased through education (optional by joining a school team)
    * Manual – these are just basic life skills
    * Bike-riding will be a learned Manual Skill

    Parateens skills will be more directly based off your skills gained as a child but can now almost be completely branched off into the specific skillsets:

    Communication
    Speech
    * Comedy
    * Acting (joining thespian club at school)
    * Romance (helpful with dating/romantic relationships)
    * Lying
    * Negotiation (available after leveling up Strategy Skills)
    * Singing (available after leveling up Music Skills)
    Literacy – increased through education/ joining a book club
    * Poetry (increased through education by choosing poetry club)
    * Journalism (political, sports, entertainment, crime)
    * Creative Writing (writing novels, short stories, or genre books)

    Creativity
    Art – increased through education (optional by choosing art or music class) and specializing in these areas
    * Drawing
    * Painting
    * Sculpting
    * Fashion Design
    * Photography
    * Music – increased through education (optional by choosing art of music class) and specializing in these areas
    * Piano
    * Guitar
    * Bass
    * Violin
    * Drums
    * Culinary
    * Cooking (thoughts on how to branch this out even more?)
    * Baking
    Logic
    Math – increased through education
    * Finance – increasing this skill will result in financial benefits (cheaper prices on items)
    Science – increased through education
    * Agriculture
    * Chemistry
    * Engineering
    * Astronomy
    * Programming
    * Psychology
    * Health
    Strategy – increased through education (optional by joining chess club), increasing this skill can result in learning all other skills at a faster rate.
    * Chess
    * Gaming
    * Billiards
    Motor
    Fitness – increased through education
    * Running
    * Swimming
    * Weight-training
    * Self-defense/Fighting
    * Yoga
    * Dancing
    Athletics – increased through education (optional by joining a school team)
    * Basketball
    * Soccer
    Manual – these are just basic life skills
    * Fishing
    * Handiness
    * Cleaning – increases the speed in which your parafolk cleans things
    * Driving (specific for teens)
    * Theft

    For para-adults and up the skills will be roughly the same (with a couple additions) as parateens. Seeing as most gamers will start in the adult stage of life they will be set at the same settings as parateens with the addition of “Driving” being completed.

    I would also say that some skills would require certain events/tasks to be completed before you’re able to move up. For example: assuming college/universities will be added (eventually or at conception) you’ll need a degree to master a skill, or engineering you’ll need to successfully build a car to level up, etc. This would make it more interesting than just a level 1-10 system (@ the sims).

    And for occult life stages (if that’s ever a thing) they would have their own branch in addition to Communication, Creativity, Logic, and Motor.

    Posted December 30, 2019 at 2:31 am
  • skill trees would be fun and would prevent a para with a lot of skills to have difficulty parcouring through every skill

    Posted January 8, 2020 at 7:29 pm
  • My main thing about more complicated skills, or with skill trees, is that I liked how easy/simple it is to look at all of your skills in ts3. I could click to see more detail about their accomplishments within that skill, but I can also tell at a glance what a sim is good at. (There’s also no wondering how many skill points you can get since it shows the number of points out of 10, and because every skill went up to 10, unlike ts4 where some only have 5 points for some reason.)

    I like the idea of more specific skills, like for different instruments or things like baking, sewing, pottery, and ballet, where they may have been present in the sims games before, but weren’t the same as other skills (i.e. talent badges in ts2, hidden skills, etc.)

    And some of the additional skill ideas that have been presented here sound great, but some get a bit too detailed for me? Like I’ve never felt a need for a running skill? I feel like the athletic skill kind of covers that. I’d also rather have children get the same skills as teens/adults since in ts4 it feels like a waste to get 7 points in creativity, only for it to not mean anything once they’re a teen.

    More detail in-game is great, believe me, I’m a very detail-oriented person, but that also means that I can get bogged down when there’s too much to look at or to play through just for my character to be able to paint, take a decent photo, or be good at chemistry.

    Posted September 8, 2020 at 11:56 pm

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