Tutorial:Good lot making for sharing with others

If you are making lots for just your own pleasure or for your own City Showcase this does not apply to you. It is aimed at people who intend to share their creations with others and wish to avoid a number of problems.

Skill level: Intermediate

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• First of all check this tutorial

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• It is recommended that you start lotting with the minimum amount of custom content in your plugins folder. Only add prop packs if you need to for some specific props and then try to use more than one prop from a pack.

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• Try to keep to easily available props. People may be put off if you choose props from foreign, particularly Japanese, sites as they may be intimidated if they do not speak the language.

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• The lot should only be big enough to present the building with suitable, relevant and attractive surroundings.

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• Choose the correct type and level of basic lot when starting. For example if you are making a landmark start with a Landmark lot and change the building. If making a growable, choose the correct type and wealth level for your building.

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• Props should be used as sparingly as possible to keep the count down. Use grouped props whenever possible and use prop families for variety. Too many props not only affect game performance but can also give a cluttered look to a lot.  There is also a limit to the number of lot objects allowed in LE. Lot objects include base textures, overlays as well as props. If you exceed the limit you may find things disappear in game. In general, less is more.

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• Transit enabling should only be used for rail lines unless it is vital to the lot. Although aesthetically pleasing, it is not recommended for normal usage and never for growable lots as they do not upgrade if transit enabled.

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• Recycle available buildings by making new exemplars in PIM. When making exemplars, name them appropriately so you can find them in LE. Check the values given for properties as PIM tends to skew values too high. Remember that you may not include the original models in your upload and so should note any you make new exemplars for as dependencies.

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• Make the appropriate building in the PIM. For a hospital, make a hospital exemplar then change the building on the lot with the one made. Do the same for any lot that you want to use a building on. This is much better than making a park or landmark lot and using a prop instead of a building or placing a larger prop over an existing building. Make a note of which building you used as it will not show in a dependency report but is a dependency. If the model is not present, a big brown box will appear.

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• When choosing base and overlay textures, be aware that the fifth digit of the IID of the texture relates to wealth level of the lot. This is quite a complex issue; I recommend reading the first page of posts in the BSC Texture Index thread at Simtropolis or SimCity 4 Devotion.
  Basically if you choose a base texture for low wealth from a set (a set has the same first four digits) that also has medium and high wealth textures, for a medium wealth lot the game will display the medium wealth texture from the set. If the texture is not in a set, it does not matter, nor does it matter if the fifth digit is 4 to F.

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• Make sure there is only one base and one overlay per tile. If textures of either type are doubled, either one or the other may show and cause graphic problems in game.

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• When you have finished save your new lot with a suitable name.

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• Use LEProp to adjust some properties of ploppable lots. Do not set the properties at a radical level as this can affect other lots in a city. Check in-game stats with the database available in SC4Tool.

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• Use iLive’s Reader or SC4Tool to adjust other properties especially for growables. Make sure the growable name reflects its type, wealth level and stage of growth and that the same properties match in the LotConfig Exemplar. Further modding is outside the scope of this tutorial and will be covered in another one.

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• For uploading use SC4Tool to make a Readme file. This is very easy to do and will help people know what your lot does and also lists the dependencies. If you can link the dependency list to the location of the required packs.

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• Finally make sure you test your lot in game so that it does not unbalance the game.