What Are Your Merfolk Doing Today 2.0

Update: Thank you to everyone that waited for me to finish the updates. I think this took me an additional 5 hours cause of how much I kept needing to retype. 

My update for 04/27:

The Wayfarer's Grotto

For my MerMay 2025 Build Challenge, I'm turning Admiral's Wreckage, into a residential rental that all my merfolk will live in. I'm calling this Wayfarer's Grotto for the moment. I might change the name of the lot later.

Most of the Merfolk abandoned Mua Pel'Am after the seal was broken on land and Deep-Sea Merfolk drove them away. Only the KeahlohaPod remained to look after the Wayfarer's Grotto while the other merfolk abandoned the island.

The Zalrian Grotto

The Zalrian Pod's growing size has been putting pressure on the pod to return to the Wayfarer's Grottos. The grottos there would make raising a family easier and would offer more safety for merlings to grow up.

The Twins' Grotto

One of the main grottos within the Zalrian Grotto. This grotto will be a nursery for the twin merlings, the child stage of merfolk. Kemps, Calum, and Arihi will be sharing the room with the twins.

I had more I wanted to share but it was lost with the forum glitch and I don't have the energy to retype things like before. I did want to share more background info though.

Alex's Grotto

Alex was born from Calum and Arihi's love and song while the pod was living in the open waters around St. Taz. He's never had the chance to grow up in a grotto and matured into a merboy, the teen stage of mermen, around the open water reefs. 

This grotto will give Alex the alone time he needs to practice telling stories for as long as he has his voice to do so. I've included a desk for writing and a nook for reading. He has a violin and guitar he can practice with in his grotto. I've set skills to take a very long time to develop with MCCC so he will need the space to get better if he wants to play around others.

The Dining Grotto

I expanded this grotto by adding decor. Additional shelves allow for displaying sunken treasure and seashells. This is the grotto where the Zalrian Pod will eat and cook meals. I'm pretending that the "Messages" in a Bottle are another way for my merfolk to store notes they write. In this grotto, the notes in the bottles are the equivalent of human cookbooks and contain mermadic recipes. There are no utilities that use fire because fire doesn't burn underwater. Should also be worth noting that not all merfolk in my story have the power that would make cooking with heat possible.

One of the changes I made leading to this point was recreating my Merfolk in CAS. The adults in the pod no longer have all their mermadic powers unlocked.

In particular, the Zalrian Pod only has one innate mermadic power, Hydrokinesis, or the power to manipulate and control water. Kemps and Calum have mastery of this power. When Arihi was originally a Water Elemental before becoming a Halfling, Half-Mermaid, and Calum's Life partner. Because of her Origins, Arihi only has mastery over Hydrokinesis.

Alex, Dylan, and Zephyr are a bit different. Their Elemental Heritage gives them one additional power while also making them more susceptible to Moonspells. Moonspells cause merfolk to lose control of their powers, and I think this is fitting for merfolk that have more magical power than normal. Alex and the Twins also have the potential to develop sea sorcery because of their innate magical potential.

Alex has both Hydrokinesis and Cryokinesis. He can manipulate water and ice. When they mature into merboys, the identical twins will have identical powers, Hydrokinesis and Aerokinesis. Dylan and Zephyr will be able to manipulate water and wind. 

So, in a way, Alex, could use his magic to preserve food by creating ice to store in a fridge. But, I generally have an easier time justifying a fridge over a stove.

Reef Kailani on the other fin has an orange tail and was adopted by the Zalrian Pod. His power is Thermokinesis, the power to heat and boil water. His son, Kylen, inherited his tail and when he matures into a merboy, he would develop the same power as his father. For Reef, and eventually Kylen, they could cook with heat underwater because of their power.

Sarah Kylani has a yellow tail and can use Electrokinesis, the power to manipulate electricity. 

Lir Maelstren was adopted by Reef and Sarah and has a green tail. The Green Tail merfolk also have an innate talent for Electrokinesis. When Lir matures into a merboy, that will be the power he develops.

The only members of the pod that will suffer from Moonspells in the Zalrian Pod will be Arihi, Alex, Dylan, and Zephyr because they have a greater magical potential. 

Additionally, Alex does look smaller next to his dad because I found a mod for making teens appear shorter. I'm hoping it continues to work without any issues.

The WIP Grottos

I had leftover things from rooms I was transferring over to a new save. I used these to start developing the other grottos. Right now, they are just works in progress.

Alex Practicing his Storytelling

I'm pretty proud of what I accomplished here. I used the T.O.O.L by TwistedMexi to elevate the Mirror to higher spot and debug items from Maxis Island Living for a base. I also used T.O.O.L to elevate Alex so he looks as intended in the mirror. I was able to get him to comfortably use the interactions with the mirror.

I like to think that merfolk wouldn't be limited to the same elevations as normal sims underwater. Merfolk essentially move in 3 dimensions underwater. Merfolk move underwater like Fairies fly in the sky and Aliens space walk in space. It doesn't make as much sense to limit the dimensions of movement for my merfolk if they are intended to be underwater. 

Fun Fact: One of the things that make water levels in video games notorious for difficulty involves the movement that is only possible while swimming, flying, or space walking because the dimensions of movement defy gravity and what we are comfortable with in our everyday lives in real life.

Alex Enjoying Family Time with his Dad

Calum and Alex both have left fins but they don't care. They both share a fascination with the human world and dancing is a human thing. However, dance moves for merfolk are a bit different underwater when you don't have legs.

Damion's Lair Updated

I finally caved and added the Displays from Crystal Creations to Damion's Lair. Sea Witches can collect 4 things from other sims: Souls, Youth, Love, and Voices. With Mods, there are 8 occults in my game, and it's Damion's goal to have all 4 of each thing from every single occult.

I'm imagining that these cases are locked and protected with a ward because the contents within are item greatly prized by Damion because of who it came from.

The Pink Shell in the Case is one of those items. The Shell contains Stevie Maelstren's Love, and unlike the Love he has from Kari Lantana and Ukupanipo Hekekia. The properties of Stevie's Love is different because Stevie himself is different.

Stevie Maelstren's Love: Stevie's Love ripped from his soul. Most reef merfolk are susceptible to corruption without the love inside their hearts. However, Stevie has proven to be more resistant to corruption and darkness and the properties of this resilience can still be found within the light of his love.

Stevie went to Damion because he wanted to see worlds beyond the ocean world. As a natural born reef merman, Stevie was incapable of taking a human form without help. The merman exchanged his ability to find love for the permanent power to take human form. In spite of giving up the love in his soul, Stevie's heart remains pure and he continues to help mer and humans alike. He now lives a life between land and sea.

Ukupanipo Hekekia Cursed

Ukupanipo fell in love with a Half-Mermaid that was reserved about romance. He struggled to get her to open up to him, taking things too slow. Ukupanipo went to Damion for a love spell to jumpstart his romance with Nadia Seran. Damion granted Ukupanipo's wish and the love between him and Nadia ignited when they met again. The price for swaying the heart of the mermaid that caught his eye, a soul.

Ukupanipo had one week to find a soul to give to Damion, but he couldn't deliver on his end of the deal. While Ukupanipo and Nadia were swimming around a reef, Damion appeared and demanded payment from Ukupanipo. When he had nothing to offer, Damion enforced the consequences laid out in his contract. Ukupanipo lost his free will and became Damion's Servant. 

One of the things Damion Covets in his collection is Nadia's Youth.

Nadia Seran's Youth:  Nadia's youth ripped from her body. After Ukupanipo failed to pay for the Love Spell he used to sway Nadia's Heart, Damion used the connection forged from his spell to strip Nadia of her youth as further punishment towards Ukupanipo. After her youth was stripped away, Nadia's life withered away, and she dissolved into seafoam. She passed away feeling betrayed by Ukupanipo's use of a Love Spell to manipulate her feelings. Now, nothing remains of Nadia except the Youth Damion captured.

As Damion's Servant, Ukupanipo has access to the sea witch's lair and will sometimes visit the Blue Shell containing Nadia Seran's Youth. The shell is a constant reminder that he will never find closure with Nadia because her entire being dissolved away. She doesn't even have a ghost he could talk to. After staring at the remains of his former love, Ukupanipo will break into a livid rage. Deep down, all Ukupanipo really wanted was her. He realized now that it was a fleeting crush, and that he never had true love for her. He's only upset that he doesn't have her.

As further punishment for Ukupanipo's own inner darkness, Damion stripped him of the love within his own soul so that he could never feel what he tried to manipulate in another.

In a way, I kinda like the Contrast between Stevie and Ukupanipo the more I think about it. One held onto the good within in his pursuit of his desires, and the other fully succumbed to his own inner darkness. I like to think that generally speaking my reef merfolk are the nicer variant that is more likely to be friendly, but now I have an example of one that proves their innate tendency to be good isn't a guarantee. And that, makes Stevie's good alignment that much more noteworthy. 

Please excuse my internal thoughts. 😅

It's a bit frustrating but I got through. I might need to use a word document if I want to share more info. I think I might keep updates for the builds more minimum moving forward. 

I am sorry that you had the issues with posting your update 🙁It is great though to see the pictures of the grottos and read about them. The design of them are great! They are very nice photos of your merfolk also.

Hopefully today’s update works a bit better.

Internal thoughts are our simple treasures in the mind! 🤓🙂 I''m a geek.

This is wonderful and amazing. 

This is like an underwater building tutorial which is much needed in the community.

Awesome! 😁

This is amazing.  I could never.

I'm super sorry that this was shared late. The last screenshot took way longer than I anticipated.

Update for 04/28:

I didn't do a crazy amount of stuff. I mostly finished transferring the remaining bits from my old save. Moving forward, everything I do with the Zalrian Grotto will be brand new additions.

Additionally, the building progress might start to get a bit limited by the household income, so I had to kinda cheat my way to secure funds. 

To help with future developments, I spent a good chunk of the hour going through the build mode debug, cc, and maxis packs to find everything I could think of to use for an underwater build and I'm sure there's still more to seek out. 😅

However, the end result is a room I saved to the gallery that will make accessing a ton of stuff easier. Debug content can't be copied in build mode so it helps to save a room to the gallery with duplicates of things.

You can't see it, but this room has enough things from build mode to have a value of almost 100,000 simoleans and the debug content does not cost anything.

I also got another update of Mua Pel'Am in decline. Remember the bit about Volcanic Smog? Well, with the Eco Living Pack and some cheats from the EA packs (no cc or mods used to accomplish this!)

I have a version of Mua Pel'Am that looks a bit worse than the standard conservation stages and the sky actually looks like its got something happening from the volcano. Not a pretty view. I guess there was a reason the merfolk in my story left the seas around here.

Now, this is the screenshot that took a long time to do. Using the T.O.O.L by TwistedMexi, I did a build outside of a buildable space. 🤪I do not plan on doing this often cause, man, this was extremely time consuming and almost not worth it, almost. The screenshot I got of the Zalrian Pod in their present-day home turned out super well. And yes, Alex is showing his little brothers and cousins how to use a dinglehopper to care for their hair. I don't think Kemps is super thrilled by this. 😆

I think, I'm finally ready to start the gameplay for my story reboot to begin writing the new chapter 1. Something about doing the building has sparked my inspiration. I wish there were more hours in the day! 😭😓😅😁

I started brainstorming and planning for MerMay all the way back in like February. So, I will do this!🧜‍♂️🧜‍♀️🧜

I also had the forums glitch. The error seemed to be a memory issue. Instead of refreshing the page, I opened a new tab and found everything I was typing saved! 😁 Note to self, do not refresh a page when typing in the forums and always open a new tab and resume from there!