hat_plays_sims | Invoking the Spirit

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Invoking the Spirit

My favorite expansion pack for Sims 1 is Makin' Magic. There's just so much stuff about it that I miss so much now that I'm pretty well devoted to Sims 2. The spinning wheel that made golden thread, the silly mushroom chase games to get rare spell ingredients, the ability to turn your fellow Sims into frogs, pet dragons that actually set things on fire, the entirety of Magic Town...

And of course Bonehilda, who functioned much like a Servo but was actually a skeleton in a French maid costume.

When Sentate released a Servo dressed as Bonehilda, I squeed in Sims-1-loyalty delight. Awkwardly, I'm kind of a little bit in love with my own wooden Servos, but I got to talking with

faechangeling, and... Well, this happened.

Those that Hobgoblin call you and sweet Puck,
You do their work, and they shall have good luck.

First of all, let me say that all I did here was a) have an idea and b) shove Maxis textures around. The mesh is all Sentate and the defaulting is all Changeling. I'll probably repeat that several times, but I just want to put that out there.

So, in Apartment Life, Sims can be witches and wizards and warlocks again (the thing about the word 'warlock' is that it means 'truth twister' and is technically a term for a malicious wizard. 'Witch' and 'wizard' both derive from 'wise' and are morality-neutral in their etymology), which is awesome, and they get neat outfits and hats and the ability, at the highest skill in either light or dark magic, to summon a spectral assistant. When summoned by the self-interaction Appello Servantus spectral assistant functions a bit like a non-controllable Servo; she cleans things, she fixes things, and if she gets bored she'll have a glass of water that will fall right through her and need to be mopped up before she disappears.

Summoned on another Sim through Sevantus Attackum, the spectral assistant pretty much just functions as a bouncer.

Like Servos, the Spectral Assistants use invisible skin and eyes by default, which makes them excellent candidates for... well. For being Bonehilda.

Your Spectral Assistant will show up in an outfit that coordinates with your mage-Sim's alignment; good witches get a skeleton in a frothy little number sprinkled with floral brocade and gold trim, while wicked witches get a skeleton in a raggedy little dress covered in barbed wire and spider webs. And where the Good Assistant gets a little lace tiara thingie, the Evil Assistant gets a lovely spider-web, because lace just didn't look right on her. Alas, there is no neutral spectral assistant, but...

Back | Portrait

As a bonus, you can grab the original Body Shop files for Good, Neutral, and Evil Bonehilda, so if you want to use Sim Surgery on a Servo or something, you totally can. (I'm also including the Headless Sim and invisible eye files Sentate included with the original Bonehilda Servo; these are from somewhere on MTS and the filename for the invisible eyes is a string of random numbers. I didn't make them, Sentate didn't make them, but if you want to do things like make Skeleton maids with hair (some hairs work okay!) or eyebrows or freaky floating eyeballs, they're handy files to have.) The Bonehilda outfits are categorized as Everyday only, and do not have a fat morph (there's nothing much to GET fat on Bonehilda). I have no idea if they have a pregmorph or not, but you know? I kinda doubt it.

I'm also offering ANOTHER bonus-- K8's Fairy Witch gowns from Parsimonious done up with the Apartment Life witch textures. My game is Medieval (everyone and their monkey's uncle knows this), and while I find the AL witch outfits adorable, they're far too short for my purposes. The Fairy Witch gowns are nice and long and are mapped... similarly. It's definitely a fantasy style, but if I can't have fantasy in my witches, well, where else can I put it?

The FairyWitch mesh has a fat morph, but I don't know if it has a pregmorph or not. If it had a Teen conversion, I would be begging for default replacements. Anyway, the dresses are categorized for Casual, Formal, and Outerwear, and they all have their own bump maps so the brocades look pretty instead of weird.

Okay, so, now comes the time where I give instructions and credit and thanks.

First off, the default replacement file contains everything you need. There is but one file full of meshes and textures and all the voodoo FaeChangeling did in order to un-slave and default everything. Being a default replacement, there can of course be only one... BUT with the bonus that you should be able to use ANY Apartment Life witch defaults you please without breaking Bonehilda. (You may have to ensure the Bonehilda default package loads last, but I doubt it.)

To use Bonehilda as a default Spectral Assistant, you must of course have Apartment Life. The Bonehilda recolors and Fairy Witch gowns will work with just the base game.

Credit must go to Sentate for the mesh and the idea for Bonehilda, and K8 for the Fairy Witch mesh. Second, FaeChangeling for encouragement and for defaulting the crazy things. (I just realized Bonehilda-as-Spectral-Assistant would work and made the textures. All the hard work came from

faechangeling.) As ever, I have to thank Lyn for making sure I had a working copy of Photoshop, otherwise I wouldn't be able to moosh textures around at all, and Quaxi for SimPE, without which nobody would be able to do very much of anything. All the actual textures are by EAxis, including the skeleton.

Naturally, everything has been compressorized, so make sure to clear your cache files after installing.

As far as policy goes on this one, anything with Bonehilda is non-paysite-friendly as Sentate is non-paysite-friendly, and the Fairy Witch witches follow my policy on the sidebar, which I can guarantee is just as legally binding as TSR's TOU. In short, do what you like with whatever you like, just remember that credit where credit is due makes the world go 'round, or something like that.

Okay, so that's that taken care of, have some download links!

DOWNLOAD BONEHILDA SPECTRAL ASSISTANT DEFAULTS
on Mediafire | on Sims File Share (with many, many thanks to

faechangeling)
DOWNLOAD WITCHY BONEHILDA RECOLORS
on Mediafire | on Sims File Share
DOWNLOAD EA'D FAIRY WITCH GOWNS
on Mediafire | on Sims File Share

Hey, you want some MORE download links? Conversions and morphs and defaults happened for the Fairy Witch dresses! Nothing here is my work but the textures.

DOWNLOAD Cynnix's AF mesh with pregmorph and TF conversion (with pregmorph!) SFS link!
DOWNLOAD Cynnix's CF conversion! SFS link!
DOWNLOAD Morganna's default replacements for Apartment Life's afbodywitch and tfbodywitch in Good, Neutral, and Bad! SFS link!

Wanna help me feed my cats?

In case you feel like dropping me a buck or two, should you have a buck or two to spare. Donors get two things at the moment: a) a link to the Super Secret Cat Gallery, full of pictures of the cats you'll be feeding, updated sporadically when the cats do something photogenic and I'm fast enough on the trigger to catch it, and b) a link to the list of content I have done-but-not-screencapped, nearly done, partly done, or in the planning stages, and the option to suggest what ought to be in the next batch of things I focus on.

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OK...I just absolutely adore this...I'm a Sims 1 fan, so this is just amazing to me. I adore it.

Also...I'm just curious...what do you use for a zombie DR? (I can't seem to find any I like.)

Fffff let me go look, I have this written down somewhere.

Aha! I use Navetsea's F-in-EVO 4 zombie, which I have only seen on Sexy Sims 2. I've looked at other zombie skins and that one is still my favorite for looking properly decayed without being gory (nothing against gore, but not the same gore on everybody) and for being dead-guy-gray enough to work nicely with a whole range of skintones underneath.

These are just marvelous! Thank you so much for sharing such lovely things with us again. :D

Thank you, and you're welcome! Seriously, FaeChangeling did the hard work on this one, but I figured I'd been sitting on it for far too long.

This is awesome! Of course all of your stuff is and sometimes I think I need to delete my game just to play a game with all your stuff in it.

Thank you! I'm really pleased with how this set turned out.

You know, you can just re-name your current EA Games folder to something like EA Games MODERN and the next time you start your game, it'll generate a new EA Games folder you can use for themed content.

You'd think I did all the hard work, but it's much harder editing textures than it is to click a few things in SimPE. And now that I want Sherahbim's textures on the mesh and witch hats on her head, I'm seriously still tipping my hat to you, Hat! I'm glad others are liking this so far and that you still have a use for her, though. :D

Hat! This is GreaT!!! Thank you!

Er... while trying to pick up Sentate's original Bonehilda, the LJ page won't load so I can access the DL. Am I doing something wrong?

Sorry to be so late getting back to you! I hope you tried LJ again. They sometimes have issues, but I was able to see the Bonehilda post just fine. It's not you, it's LiveJournal.

Everybody finds different things a challenge. For me the texture-editing was no big, but defaults like that are deep magic as far as I'm concerned. I couldn't even get the hang of regular old mesh defaults. Anything that requires compensating for extra or fewer alpha groups is outside my skill set.

The BEST thing about Bonehilda here is that you can use her with any witch-outfit defaults you like.

It's true! Once I figure out exactly what I want to do with her, she's going to get a full treatment. But now I'm wondering if warlocks use a male spectral assistant, and if we need a Bonemanda to go with her. Hmmmm.

Also, after rereading through a million old emails, I found a message you sent to me AGES ago about an issue with one of the defaults I did for you! It was an AM male coif replacement, and there was an issue with the red hair. Did you ever get it sorted out, or do I need to take another look at the package? I'm on vacation at the moment, but I think I might be able to get SimPE on this laptop if you still need it fixed!

Edited 2013-01-08 21:57 (UTC)

No, wizards and warlocks get the regular feminine spectral assistant, so Bonehilda's what you get whenever anybody casts that spell.

I'm still having the issue, mostly because I can't figure out which red hair is glitched, since all the textures are the same. I know it's the grocery delivery guy, but that's about the extent of what I know. However, don't worry about it if you're on vacation! Go have fun being on vacation. (Unless you want an excuse to stay in and poke Sims files. It's your vacation, you do what's most fun for you.)

The maid default has a problem, too, but I think that's because the game won't look at a multi-binned hair where it's used to a regularly-binned hair. But instead of showing up weird, that one shows up as the longsimple, like if I'd removed the custom hair she was using.

Edited 2013-01-09 13:35 (UTC)

I have returned! If I could have gotten my Deluxe disk to run on my laptop, I would have been poking the ENTIRE time. But, alas, it was not to be! (Which is probably why that was the worst vacation I have ever had. Ugh.)

Okay, I've been thinking about your problem, and check the packages several times. It's just the texture you're having problems with, right? Are you using Ja's texture defaults? If it's just the textures, I'm thinking this might be the issue, because I had the same problems when I first started defaulting stuff. If you have Ja's packages, and you still want to keep all of the other texture defaults for everything else, you'll have to manually go in and delete those textures. Since you're SimPE-savvy this should be an easy fix for the delivery guy! Maybe try that and get back to me?

As for the maid... which mesh did I use to replace that one for you? Was it Milano's wrap? I did something wrong in that one if a game mesh is showing instead of any part of the default. Could you send that one back to me?

Edited 2013-01-28 05:10 (UTC)

Could be I still have Ja's defaults in. I'll check on that tonight.

The maid hair was indeed the Milano wrap. I re-uploaded the package cos even though I found your old links, they don't work, and damned if I can find the original zip file. I really suspect it's because the hair is multi-binned instead of done with one for each recolor that it's messing up.

Yeah, I get really weird about old stuff I can't sort in alphabetical order or by site that I uploaded to and then delete it without making sure I have a backup somewhere first. (Had to spend HOURS the other day trying to figure out which meshes I needed to cram into a folder and upload for my sexyfeet wishes after deleting it from the massacre that is MediaFire. Buh.) Sorry!

But I'm opening it up right now while doing a pile for Zero, so it should be done tonight. If it's the multi-bin issue, I can always use the single-binned recolors you did in your hat dump, yes? Would that work for you?

Edit: Or could you have a hider in your folder somewhere that's interfering with the property set in my package?

Edited 2013-01-28 09:32 (UTC)

See, I know I HAVE the zipped file. Everything I download gets saved to the passport drive. But since I can't remember what the zip file was NAMED and it doesn't appear to be under C or D or N(PC) or F, hell if I can find it.

I've got hiders for everything, but isn't the maid hair hidden by default?

For the life of me I can't remember what I named that thing either now. xD

Huh. It is. Hmmm. The package seems fine from the inside, and I want to say this is the edited mesh that Dicreasy made. Is it not working in both bodyshop and the game? I'm going to take the new recolors you made for your hat dump and try rebuilding the package with those.

How's the delivery guy doin'?

Sorry about not getting back to you sooner, I got bit by the writing bug last night and a wild link-laden essay appeared.

So, I pulled my SOME of my basegame defaults (I left Aquilegia's hair defaults in by accident, but I seem to have gotten most of Ja's) and my massive hair hider file, and everything seems to work fine in Body Shop. I guess I need to clear some things out of my default files. *makes face* Why would the hiders mess them up? Beyond not letting them show.

S'okay! I'm just glad to hear it's working now!

You know, I've been wondering about that very same thing. Since Marja's not around anymore to answer my silly questions, I've come up with a hypothesis: the game reads each line of the property set individually, instead of as a whole. This would explain why it will show some parts of a default properly, but then either the mesh or texture will pick up parts of the game's file, or another default package's pieces. I'm still using a few un-hiders, and every now and again I get weird things happening, like the top of an alpha mesh showing but then the bottom wigging out and displaying things like shoes or textures I know that are not apart of the recolor. But if you know what you're looking for, you should be able to nix those parts of Aquilegia's and Ja's packages! I could quickly do it for you, too. :)

Also, if you'd like me to edit those files for you, would you mind sending me Part 1 of Aquilegia's male mesh improvements? I want her sexyfeet replacements, but MediaFire is being MediaFire. Meh.

I went to upload the sexyfeet replacements, and discovered I'd already done it.

Well, I went and ensured your defaults loaded after the hiders (I forgot to put the texture defaults back in, go me) and they still work fine that way, at least in Body Shop. What helped was ordering my folders as DR Genetics (where the texture default hairs live), DR Hiders and-or Unhiders (which used to just be Unhiders and-or Hiders way down at the bottom), and DR NPC. So far so good! If I need to edit my hiders or texture defaults, I know what to look for, so that's no big.

Wheeeeee! Thank you! Would having her edits for EM be something you'd want? I'm thinking of requesting that someone convert nakedbody/bottom/top edits to EM, and maybe her underwear and swimwear, too.

Awesome! I'm so happy it works now! I kept trying to rack my brain for something that I was maybe not seeing as wrong in the packages, but I really couldn't come up with anything else. And, hell, if that way works for you, yeah, don't worry about having to wade through all the other files trying to hunt down only a few property sets. That's perfectly good time wasted when it could be spent obsessing over other specific details. xD

Yep, I was testing stuff and taking Blind Date pictures, and Kaylynn showed up... in her skimpy skirt, bright red lipstick, and her nice practical headclout. Haven't had a delivery guy show up, but at least the actual maid is perfect!

I just figured there had to be a way to solve it using load order. Last default loaded wins, I do know that much, so the trick was putting NPC hats in the DR NPC folder instead of the DR Genetics folder. ... Although I probably should go pull all the hair defaults that aren't basegame, career, or NPC, anyway-- since I've got them hidden already, why not save the room?

I don't even know what to say! This is just amazing. Finally my evil necromancer witch can have a permanent servant and there's just *so* many possibilities for awesomeness here. A huge thanks to the whole team for making this happen!

You're welcome! I'm so glad you like her.

You can use assorted hacks (my favorite combo is Pescado's Clothing Toll and Jaxad's No Servo Revert) to turn a regular Servo into Bonehilda, as well! Or you could dress a zombie Sim up in her clothes.

First, thanks for this amazing download ! I now have a slight technical question: the neutral spectral assistant does actually exist in game, but you'd have to use mods to have a neutral witch cast the spell.
Which leads me to my question: are there files that could actually be defaulted for the neutral assistant ?

... I... do not know? Not in this download, anyway. If the mesh and textures for the Neutral Spectral Assistant exist in-game, they can be defaulted using Marja's method-- I have a tutorial link somewhere, it's for hair but works for clothes-- and I'd have no objections to somebody taking the Neutral Bonehilda textures and making a Neutral Spectral Assistant. Heck, I'd download it.

I know this is an old post, but I just now found it and love it, but have to ask: why does the default file show up in Clean Installer as an incomplete BodyShop project? I'll probably get around to testing it out myself before you even see this comment, but figured it wouldn't hurt to ask. Thanks!

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Invoking the Spirit

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Bonehilda

Re: Bonehilda

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Incomplete BodyShop Project?