[unsupported] riv_rel - genealogy mod for sims 4

thank you all so so much for your support and I'm sorry for my silence - I'm unlikely to ever go back to sims 4 for anything other than CAS and my job has taken all my programming energy. please consider this broken

riv_rel - last updated 22 sep 2021 (gen 7)

This mod in one long sentence: riv_rel calculates and puts the exact bio/in-law relation between two sims into words, adds a friendly interaction to ask a sim exactly what their relation to your sim is, adds a bunch of console commands (enter riv_help to list this in game), adds options for additional incest prevention, and you can create external .json and .gedcom files to keep genealogical information even if sims are culled.

For beginners:

• get the relation between two sims by
  • using the friendly interaction "Ask if Sim is related", or
  • using the cheat console and entering, e.g., "riv_rel Bob Pancakes Iggy Pancakes"
• back up relations by opening the cheat console and entering "riv_auto xyz" - replace xyz by a keyword you want to use for this save, and it'll handle everything for you
  • if your save number changes, just re-enter this command
• by default, romance will be prevented between
  • sims that are second cousins (share a pair of great-grandparents), or at least as closely related
  • sims that are directly related (great-...-great-grandparents/children)
• traits (optional addon): tutorial is here, it can be skipped
• getting help ingame
  • riv_help for the summarised version
  • computer add-on for the "Research on riv-rel.sim..." help menu, which lets you choose a particular command / feature and get a notification with an explanation

It won't mess up your save (it's sizeable, but most of it works with its own framework, though there are some injections), but there are a couple of known conflicts:

•  WW - you can't remove romance restrictions with WW while adding them with my mod (it won't crash the game if you do this accidentally dw)
  • add restrictions - ensure global incest is switched off in WW (this is the default option) and that no sims have the incest trait
  • remove restrictions - edit "riv_rel - overall settings.cfg" (generated when you play) to set consanguinity_limit = 1 and direct_rels_are_incestuous = False
• LMS First Love - my mod currently prevents any first love interactions from appearing (due to me taking a shortcut for performance in checking for eligible couples). Hopefully I've made it efficient enough since that I can fix it for gen 7 should now be compatible!

Packs: You only need Sims 4 base game, though there is a little extra addon to use my family traits with EP02 (Get Together).

Disclaimer + contact: While I am making all efforts to test, some bugs are going to get through, since it's a few thousand lines of code and this kind of thing hasn't been done for TS4 before, as far as I know. If you find bugs or have suggestions, I made a discord: https://discord.gg/C8XHFVB7y3 (no pressure to join, I'll still look at comments here!).

_____________________________________________________

Patch notes: Gen 7 patch notes can be found here - overall the focus was efficiency, less spammy notifications, fixing critical errors (if your trans sims broke the mod, that's now been fixed!), and compatibility with First Love. There's also a new command to export gedcom files!

_____________________________________________________

(big description below; refer back to this if you have questions, and if you can't find what you need, ask me in comments / the #help channel on my discord)

How to use console commands

Console commands for finding relations

Main ones

• riv_help - lists all commands
• riv_rel sim_x sim_y - finds biological, inlaw, and (if you edit the .cfg file) step relationships
• riv_rel_more_info sim_x sim_y - finds relationships line by line with the connecting sims (usually siblings), and shows their consanguinity

• riv_get_parents sim_x - lists parents
• riv_get_children sim_x - lists children
• riv_consang sim_x sim_y - shows the consanguinity between sim_x and sim_y
• riv_is_eligible_couple sim_x sim_y - tells you whether these two sims count as an eligible couple within my mod, as well as whether the game counts this as incest

Others

• riv_get_sib_strength sim_x sim_y - tells you if two sims are full/half/not siblings (if it is unclear due to parents not existing, it'll assume they are full siblings)
• riv_rel_rand sim_x - gives the relation between sim_x and a random sim
• riv_rel_rand_rand - gives the relation between two random sims
• riv_get_direct_rel sim_x sim_y - finds direct relationships only
• riv_get_indirect_rel sim_x sim_y - finds indirect relationships only
• riv_gen_diff sim_x sim_y - finds the ("average", not well defined) generational difference between two sims
• riv_show_relbits sim_x sim_y - lists all relationship bits (not nicely formatted)
• riv_get_ancestors sim_x - lists all ancestors (not nicely formatted)
• riv_get_descendants sim_x - lists all descendants (not nicely formatted)
• riv_rel_all sim_x - lists all relations for sim_x in the current save
• riv_rel_all_all - lists all relations in the current save (huge performance warning)

Social interaction

Added with gen 2, now your sim can ask another sim what their relationship is and a notification will come up! The social interaction is under friendly (available after an introduction) and is no longer autonomous because it got annoying. Sims will react like it's just a casual question, so there's no relationship loss even if they're asking their parent how they're related!

Console commands for using .json files

(here, a 'sim mini-info' is a copy of a little bit of your sim's info - it's one entry in the riv_rel_xyz.json file)

How I use this in my own game (with the Pine family) is entering riv_auto pine, and then it's all sorted unless the save number changes (in which case, just redo the command):

• riv_auto yourwordhere - this command will set up automatic .json updates for the current save ID with whatever keyword you like

The other functions are left in in case you still want to do it manually - riv_load at start of session, riv_update during session, riv_save at end of session - or merge sims/rels from a previous version in the save, which can be done with riv_save.

• riv_save yourwordhere - creates or updates the files riv_rel_yourwordhere.json (which contains a list of sims with their ID, full name, gender, and whether they still exist in your game) and riv_relparents_yourwordhere.json (which contains a list of sim IDs paired with their parents)
• riv_load yourwordhere - imports the sims/rels from .json files, shows you how many sims are in riv_rel_yourwordhere.json, and gives a random entry in the list
• riv_update yourwordhere - runs save, clear, then load (used to update the list both in the .json file and in memory, for when sims are born/culled while you're playing)

And a few debug commands:

• riv_clean yourwordhere - in case i messed something up, this will remove duplicates from riv_rel_yourwordhere.json and keeps only the most recent version of each sim. it can take a while if you have a lot of sims in this list!
• riv_mem - shows how many sim mini-infos are in memory, and gives a random one
• riv_clear - removes sim mini-infos from memory

This feature is completely optional and using it might seem a little daunting at first, so I'm happy to answer any questions in the comments.

Consanguinity + Incest Prevention

Added in gen 6, consanguinity is relatedness as a percentage, and is used within the mod to prevent incest and to display lists of relations better (putting direct rels before indirect rels, and then ordering from closeness within each). My restrictions are added on top of EA's restrictions, so sims with a family relbit (siblings, parents, grandparents, first cousins, ...) will have romance prevented no matter what.

You'll see three new options in "riv_rel - overall settings.cfg" (will be created/updated when you load up the game), which you can edit in Notepad++ or leave as default:

• consanguinity_limit (any value from 0 to 1)
  • if two sims are at or above this consanguinity, they won't count as an eligible couple within the mod, and romance will be prevented between them
  • default is 0.03125 (prevents second cousins or closer)
  • EA default is 1 (no additional restrictions), zero tolerance for incest is 0, and use 2^-(2n+1) for the limit to be n^th cousins, e.g. third cousins are 0.0078125
• show_consanguinity_in_notifs (True or False)
  • toggles whether consanguinity percentage will show up in notifications
  • default is False
• direct_rels_are_incestuous (True or False)
  • toggles whether direct relations will always count as incest, so my mod will always count a sim and their great-...-great-grandparent/child as an ineligible couple
  • default is True

Computer research addon

(riv_rel_addon_computer.package - requires XML injector)

Click on a computer and select "Research on riv-rel.sim...". This pie menu will give you a mod overview, and three more sections:

• .json files - quick tutorials, and definitions for each command relating to .json files
• console commands - definitions for each command relating to finding relations
• relation definitions - a quick overview of definitions such as what an 'nth' cousin is, what 'k times removed' means, and who your in-laws are.
• traits - how to get started and what the commands do

Traits addon

(riv_rel_addon_traits.package and riv_rel_addon_traits.ts4script)

(optionally riv_rel_addon_GT.package - requires EP02 / Get Together)

For designating various members of your family - at the moment, they are very light on actual additional gameplay, but they help a lot to easily keep track of which sims are in your legacy. I hope my system is clear enough!

• Gameplay traits for eight families (A is your main family and has a tiny bit of additional gameplay, and families B to H are just for tracking some others):
  • fam, inc, exc, heir, founder gameplay traits for eight families (main family A, extra families B-H)
  • fam is for your founder and their descendants
  • inc is for included family members not related to your founder (e.g. spouses)
  • exc is for excluded sims, and prevents the sim from gaining any of the other traits (e.g. disowned)
  • heir [of family A] gets interactions to add inc, exc, or heir traits to eligible sims
• commands to add each of the above traits (where sim_x is a sim name/ID, and X is a letter from A to H - leave out the family letter to default to A)
  • riv_include_in_family sim_x X
  • riv_add_to_family sim_x X
  • riv_exclude_from_family sim_x X
  • riv_make_heir sim_x X
  • riv_add_founder sim_x X
• commands to list sims with these traits
  • riv_traits_by_fam X
  • riv_traits_by_name sim_x
  • riv_traits (all sims, all families)
  • riv_show_family X (lists all sims in family X by generation; please note that this command requires your founder to still be ingame)
• commands to remove family traits (this has no effect on the relations, it just removes the extra gameplay traits)
  • riv_clear_fam X (removes traits for family X from all sims)
  • riv_clear_fam_all (does the above for all families)
  • riv_clear_fam_sim sim_x (removes all fam traits from one sim, and gives you the needed commands to re-add any)
• options to automatically add family members / include sims in family
  • default true: child of fam gets fam, spouse/parent of heir gets inc
  • default false: spouse/parent of any fam gets inc
  • this goes to a new .cfg, "riv_rel - overall settings.cfg", which applies to all your saves and can be edited directly; settings will apply next time you load up the game
• non-autonomous social interactions for heir A (the base interactions were made in mod constructor; the commands to add traits are mine)
  • "Invite Sim to be the heir of family A" adds heirA trait to the other sim ( + happy moodlet)
  • "Exclude Sim from family A" adds excA trait to the other sim ( + one of four moodlets: angry if they were an heir, tense if they were fam, embarrassed if they were inc, and bored id they weren't even in the family)
  • "Include Sim in family A" adds incA trait to the other sim ( + happy moodlet)
• I'd recommend getting started by running "riv_add_founder sim_x A" for your founder, as this will add them and their descendants to family A, or run "riv_add_to_family sim_x A" for any of their descendants if the founder has since been culled. then set a sim in your household (that is in family A) as the heir so that you can use the social interactions! please note there can only be one founder for each family, but you can have as many heirs as you want
• club requirements addon to this addon
  • you can set fam/inc traits as club requirements! very useful if you combine with MCCC's auto-fill clubs feature and/or anything increasing the size of clubs
  • an important note: this is scumbumbo's code from https://modthesims.info/showthread.php?t=616866, which I am incredibly grateful for; as per his warning, you'll need to delete any clubs using family traits before you remove the traits addon from the game

Gedcom addon

(riv_rel_addon_gedcom.ts4script)

Added in gen 7, this addon will give you a basic gedcom output, for everyone who wants to put their legacy in an external family tree program but some of the sims are culled. Right now it will do every sim in the file, so you might want/need to edit it afterwards to remove sims you don't care about.

• riv_gedcom yourwordhere (pulls from the json files with that keyword)
• riv_gedcom (pulls from sims+rels loaded into the current save)

Note: if you only want to generate a gedcom file for sims in your save, MCCC's existing functionality is much better!

_____________________________________________________

Direct relations

• great(x[number])-grandparent
• great-grandparent
• grandparent
• parent (mother/father)
• self
• child (son/daughter)
• grandchild
• great-grandchild
• great(x[number])-grandchild

Indirect relations

• great(x[number])-grandpibling
• great-grandpibling
• grandpibling (parent's pibling / grandparent's sibling)
• pibling (aunt/uncle)
• sibling (sister/brother)
• nibling (niece/nephew)
• grandnibling (nibling's child / sibling's grandchild)
• great-grandnibling
• great(x[number])-grandnibling
• (k-tuple) (nth) cousin (m times removed)
• half (any indirect rel) - e.g. half siblings share only one parent, half first cousins share only one grandparent...

In-law relations

• any of the above + in law (your spouse's relative, or your relative's spouse)
• spouse (wife/husband)

_____________________________________________________

Limitations and known issues

Problems I'm currently working on can be found here; problems I'm choosing to just roll with, though I will fix them if I find a way to, are below:

• this won't add any new relationship bits (would get way too complex with the number of possible relations)
• clones should technically have 100% consanguinity, but for now the clone relbit isn't used within the mod
• (riv_auto - lag on update) if you have large .json files or many sims being born at once (e.g. with MCCC), this can cause a bit of lag as the .json files are updated - if it's causing too many issues, go back to manual updates (just use riv_update xyz whenever you notice something needs updating; to turn off automatic updates, edit riv_rel_json.cfg in notepad, and either delete the entry for the save or set auto_update_json = False)
• (riv_auto - addition of parents) when a sim is born, they are automatically added to riv_rel_xyz.json but sometimes their parents are not automatically added to riv_relparents_xyz.json, and the new sim will show up (within the mod) as having no parents until the file is updated again
• step relations ended up being unreliable as hell and a performance concern, so I've limited the checks to only the riv_rel_more_info command for now; you can set include_step_rels = True in the .cfg file if you want it to try this on all relation checks, but i'd recommend leaving it as False
• settings need to be changed by editing the .cfg - I still don't know how to make an ingame options menu rip
• I tried the new gedcom output on a bunch of free/online gedcom viewers, and one thing I noticed is that some of them will only get people related to the *first* sim in the file, because they're expecting a single, connected family tree. The records can be reordered without any problems, so if you're using a viewer where this is the case, then cut and paste your most important sim (from the start of the line "0 @sim_id@ INDI" to just before the next line starting with a 0) at the top of the list of sims (under the line "1 NAME A. /Simmer/")

Credits

•  Zerbu for the Mod Constructor (which I used for making the interactions without the notification/trait addition, the speech bubbles, and the traits themselves)
• the late Scumbumbo for his tutorials which were a MASSIVE help in figuring out how to do notifications and other features, the XML injector, and his code for adding traits to club requirements
• Triplis for keeping the XML injector updated
• Zero for this tutorial (adding interactions with XML injector): https://www.patreon.com/posts/tutorial-how-to-30507700
• Jamjars for fixing my XML when I was losing my mind over passing the actor and target sims to my script
• http://www.genetic-genealogy.co.uk/supp/NonGenetictRelationships.html (for understanding how in-laws work)
• https://cosmosdawn.net/forum/threads/if-1-single-2-double-n-tuple-n-tuples.2735/ (for all the words from single to centuple)
• Frankkulak for some super helpful example code that I used to find where the .ts4script is (so that the mod knows where to put the .json files) and inject into functions
• https://stackabuse.com/reading-and-writing-json-to-a-file-in-python/ (for the riv_save and riv_load commands)
• bug reports: matteshine, luxarcana, johnnydesugar, Nyoleen, YReid, danitygames, Ecchans, Vicki
• https://isogg.org/wiki/Coefficient_of_relationship and https://apps.nolanlawson.com/relatedness-calculator/ for understanding consanguinity
• TURBODRIVER for letting me know how our mods will interact
• http://ged-inline.elasticbeanstalk.com/validate and http://www.drawmyfamilytree.co.uk/gedcom_viewer.php for testing gedcom
• my loving bf for helping me with python even though he has zero interest in sims
• everyone who's donated <3 sadly I can only see email addresses so I can't thank you by username