Apartment life-Spell casting tips

Subject: Apartment life-Spell casting tips Fri Oct 10, 2008 10:09 pm

From this link, here is the tutorial

http://au.guides.ign.com/guides/14258472/page_9.html

Back in Sims 1, the final expansion was Makin' Magic. Its magic abilities practically broke the game, and the magical backfires from miscast spells would be arguably devastating for the lots and families. Magic is far better streamlined this time around, fitting better into the idea of The Sims, and being a much easier set of abilities to deal with.

Becoming a Witch or Warlock

Like with vampires and werewolves, the process of initially becoming a witch will be a bit of a pain, but propagating magic is a relatively simple affair.

To get your first controllable witch, you need to visit a bunch of community lots. The game implies that visiting the same community lot many times, especially one with a large building on it, increases the chances that a witch will randomly appear to interact with. (Specifically, the game states that she pops up more often on a "busy lot.") This, as you might recall from Nightlife, is similar to vampires; you're not limited to just the night, thankfully.

Witches have very distinct clothing. Good witches (we'll discuss alignment in a second) wear white robes and have white pointed hats, and give off a blue glow when they walk as well as having gold freckles on their faces. Evil witches have black dresses, black hats, and a forest green skin tone. They give off a green aura that you might mistake for stinkiness as well!

It doesn't matter in the long-run which witch you encounter, because you can train your Sim out of that alignment. In my game, there were a total of three evil witches and two good witches running around the neighborhood, but your mileage may vary. Again though, don't fret if you want your Sim to be good and all you see are evil witches, because you'll be able to change out relatively easily.

Once you know a witch at all, you simply must befriend them like any other Sim in the game. Call 'em up, invite 'em over for dinner, or if you're so inclined, get them Woo Hooing like there's no tomorrow. You know, whatever it takes.

Eventually around +75/+25 for the relationship score, a simple pie menu option will be "Teach me the ways of the Light" or "Teach me the path of the Dark," depending on the witch's alignment. Hit that, and the witch will immediately grant you magical abilities without anymore fuss. She'll also place a spell book and a cauldron in your inventory. Congratulations, you're no longer a non-magical Sim (Smuggle)!

Your Sim's name will permanently change as a result of being a witch. He'll gain a title that changes based on his alignment. A pure neutral witch is simply called "witch," whereas a purely evil one is something like "indescribably evil." It's rather fun to pick up the phone and call up "Pyro Falkon the Arrogant Mean Warlock." Ha!

Once you have one controllable witch, spreading your magical abilities is extremely easy. Simply study magic until you get a particular spell, and you can then cast it to immediately turn the target into a witch. The target can be a total stranger or your best friend; either way, they'll be able to start casting spells immediately.

Sims regard others being a witch a negative thing for some reason. (Maybe they're afraid of the magic?) That means that if any Sim in a family is a witch, the others will probably have a Want of them being reverted to a Smuggle again. At one point, I had both Pyro and Pete warlocks, and Pyro had a Want that Pete was cured of being one... A self-hating warlock, maybe? Anyway, it's something to be aware of, although if you really want witches (or any of the special statuses), you shouldn't worry about others' opinions of it. Huh... I think there's a life lesson in there somewhere.

To cure your Sim of being a witch, you need to buy a potion from the matchmaker or make it yourself. You can turn any given Sim from a witch to a Smuggle and back again as many times as you want, and they retain their magical knowledge either way.

Note that witches are not immortal or anything. Turning into one only grants you magical abilities, nothing more.

Learning Magic, Changing Alignments

The first thing you need your new witch to do is to pull your cauldron and spell book out of your backpack. You can place them anywhere, though for convenience it behooves you to at least place them in the same room. Pyro wound up building a room with a locked door just for magical stuff, like the Sanctum Sanctorum, if you will. Second, you need to have your Sim "claim" both items via a simple pie menu action. Non-claimed items cannot be interacted with; if a Sim tries to, the item fights back.

Okay, now that that's done, we'll talk about what they do. The spell book shows your Sim's current magic skill and alignment, as well as any spells he knows and any items he can craft. Clicking on a spell gives its description in poetic form, and a list of the reagents required to cast it.

Your cauldron is what you use to make those reagents and crafted items, and it couldn't be simpler. Just grab your witch, click the cauldron, and select the "Make Reagents..." or "Make..." command, and select what you want to craft. Your Sim will stir the cauldron and get an ever-present progress bar; when it fills, you get the item in your inventory! For reagents, leaving them in there is required for casting spells. For crafted items, you'll need to pull them out and place them within the world to do any good.

Let's go back to the spell book for a second... as mentioned, you've got two meters up there: magic skill, and alignment. Magic skill is like a standard job skill. There are ten bubbles to fill, and you can only increase your skill; it will never go down. Skill is gained by studying magic at the spell book, or casting spells and crafting items. The higher your magic skill, the more spells you have access to.

Alignment is a bit more complex. It shifts based on what kind of spells you casts, moving with each cast in the direction of whatever alignment spell you used. Alignment affects what kinds of spells are available to you at any given time, meaning it's impossible to learn absolutely everything.

Let's be direct: there are roughly a dozen spells in every alignment. You'll be able to cast any spell from the neutral alignment regardless of your Sim's alignment, but a purely good Sim can only cast one evil spell, and vice versa. Of course, a purely good Sim will also gain the high-level good spells that all good witches dream about.

Alignments shift in increments, so you may find yourself being able to cast three evil spells and nine good spells, for example. Personally, I don't see much use in not trying to be purely good or purely evil, but you'll have your own ideas on what to cast and why to cast it. Note that as your alignment shifts, so will your added title: you might be "the indescribably evil" one day and "the kind" the next.

To gain skill and shift your alignment, you can cast spells, or you can study at the spell book. You seem to gain faster through actual casting, but studying is free; casting costs those reagents, and of course need targets which may not always be available. My strategy was to just study all night and day to hit 10 Magic Skill (god bless being rich enough not to need a job!), and then study again when I wanted to shift alignments. After that, I cast like crazy to further unlock some of the special items, but that was it. It was the cheapest, most direct route available.

Last edited by Skye on Sun Oct 12, 2008 2:42 pm; edited 1 time in total

The Complete Spell Book

Is found here: http://au.guides.ign.com/guides/14258472/page_10.html

Subject: Re: Apartment life-Spell casting tips Sun Oct 12, 2008 2:34 pm

Feline Familiars
Feline familiars, or what I prefer calling magical non-pooping kitties, are summoned with a magic spell. These cats improve environment meters wherever they go and generally make life a little easier for your Sims, and they are not affected by the time freeze spell. They have seven of the eight meters, never needing to go to a litter box. They will not die, and will merely dismiss themselves back to the astral plane if dissatisfied. You can then summon them back once you get the reagents together.

When the spell is first cast, you'll be able to name your magical non-pooping kitty, which is a unisex animal. Name it carefully, because you can only name it once. After that, any time you cast the spell to summon it, it'll come back with that same name. Well, it's the same kitty after all.

Your familiar generally acts like a standard pet. You can teach it tricks and behaviors, scolding and praising as necessary. However, it can't get a job, and it can't breed or be sold. Further, the instant the caster leaves the lot, the magical non-pooping kitty will disappear as well. Of course, a wave of the wand will get it back if you get lonely.

The pet's personality is somewhat based on your alignment, and it will mimic your alignment even if you shift. If it's a good kitty, it will be nice and ask for hugs. If it's a mean kitty, it will assert its authority more on other pets and Sims. Of course, that might be what you're going for.

Hidden Castles
There are two hidden lots that become available from the moment you get magical abilities. Each one is a castle: one for good magic, one for evil magic. Despite the implication of the lot descriptions, any mage can go to either lot, even if the alignments argue.

At the lot, you will run into the Head Witch of that alignment. Unfortunately, there's not much point to her. She'll sell you reagents if you're too lazy to make them yourself, but otherwise she doesn't do anything special... no quests or anything like the NPCs of Magic Town in Makin' Magic. Still, it never hurts to have a head witch as a friend.

Clothing Changes
After becoming a witch the first time, and anytime you switch alignments, your Sim will change clothes. These clothes are permanently added to your dresser, and can be used by any Sim in the family from then on. Some are pretty cool: I've got Pyro running around with his evil warlock attire with his government agent sunglasses, which is a pretty cool effect.

If for whatever reason you don't like the new clothes, you can switch at will. The game remembers what your original set was, so if you go to a dresser, you can select "Plan Outfit... > Everyday" command, then immediately hit the checkmark button to revert. Same deal with the mirror and its hairstyles, just in case you're not feeling a pointed hat.

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