Like the OP I have bigger versions and smaller versions of challenges or stories. I play rotational and when I feel really inspired while playing an household I tend to make a challenge for them that suits them and the overall story or theme. Then I write it down in the household-description so that I can continue working toward that goal. Keeping several parallel challenges at a good level isn’t easy, had one rotational save that tanked because I just tried to do to much with each and every household to keep all challenges going. It became a “job” instead of a fun tool. Endless checklists and no play. Now I have a few themes and then several bite size challenges that can be done in a few rotations.
Themes, big overall ideas that cannot be done in one challenge. For example that I should remember that all occult sims are privileged in this save and regular sims are second class. That is to big to fix in one go but I try to make fun challenges that makes that obvious in the world. “Make 3 fun alien celebrities and make them 4-stars or 5-stars”. “Look through the vampires and make one two high ranked politicians”.
This is how I currently play. One main sim who lives in the world and that I follow closely for 2-3 days. She has big challenges. Then follows 2-3 days of rotational play and smaller challenges in the rest of the save. Making my own world building and story progression.
I wish I could have a notepad with info but I misused it earlier so now I keep everything in the game in order to be able to put it down. The notepad was great, so useful for ideas and inspiration. Then I had a severe burnout at work, whee. I found myself repeating earlier bad behavior that got me sick before, thinking about my projects nonstop, not being able to put it away. Was so stubborn that I started to feel sick again before I put the notebook away, I just liked it so much. Still fun to hear about other people’s elaborate plans for their saves but household descriptions is all the info I get to save now.
