Chance card

In The Sims and The Sims 2, chance cards will occasionally appear. These represent random events which could occur as Sims advance through their careers. In both The Sims and The Sims 2, chance cards appear to be tied to the lot a Sim lives on. Normally, a chance card will only appear once for any given Sim, but if a Sim who has received a chance card moves while still holding the same job, that Sim may get the same chance card a second time.

The Sims
At certain levels of a career, a pop-up would sometimes appear when a Sim returned home from work. It would state a situation that had happened during the Sim's workday, and its result. It would either be good, bad, or somewhere in between, but would never result in a demotion or a promotion. When a Sim reached the top of a career track, sooner or later, he or she would be switched over to a middle level of new career track.

The Sims 2
Any time a Sim is at work, a Sim can encounter a chance card. The game presents the player with a scenario in the form of a text box describing a predicament or situation, and a decision a Sim must make. The player can choose one of two options (or press ignore) to complete the scenario. Ignoring a chance card has no good or bad effects. In The Sims 2, chance cards appear during the Sim's workday. If a Sim is promoted, demoted, or fired due to a chance card outcome, he or she will come home immediately. If the Sim took the carpool to work, he or she will return in the carpool for his or her new job. If the Sim is promoted to a job that uses a helicopter as the carpool, he or she may not be able to come home until all service vehicles have left.

With The Sims 2: Bon Voyage, Sims can also encounter a chance card while on vacation. While on vacation, a Sim can go on tour, and chance cards will involve the tour. There are numerous outcomes to all the tours. An example: '''Your Sim is at Twikki Island and has gone on the island flyover in the helicopter- A bee finds its way into the helicopter. Your choices are to kill the bee, free it, or Ignore it.''' One of them probably gets the Sim stung. Once an option on the card has been selected, the Sim returns immediately from the tour.

With The Sims 2: FreeTime, Sims can encounter chance cards related to their hobbies while they are at school or work. As with other chance cards, the can choose one of two options, or choose to ignore the card. While these hobby chance cards usually affect the Sim's level of enthusiasm for that hobby, some chance cards that involve at-work situations can lead to a demotion or promotion. Some may result in the Sim bringing home another Sim who also has enthusiasm in that hobby. That Sim may not be in the same career track, and, if University is installed, may be a young adult. Hobby chance cards which involve at-work situations are the same for all careers, and it appears that they tend to be described as if the Sim were in an office or business context.

Each option (other than Ignore) has two possible outcomes. Generally, one outcome for each option will be positive and one will be negative, though a few options have one outcome that is positive and one that is neutral.

The "good outcome" answer is randomly chosen after the choice is made, weighted towards the moral choice. The amount of weighting that's applied varies from job to job. Depending on the job, the chances of the player's choice having a positive (or negative) outcome can range from nearly 50% to 85%. The exception is with The Sims 2: FreeTime, in which the aspiration benefit Business Instinct can be chosen. With this benefit, all choices for career chance cards have an 80% chance of success. Sometimes, there is a chance of the rare double promotion, as is seen when an Executive in the Business career is promoted to Vice President, skipping the job level of Senior Manager. There are even a few extremely rare chance cards that can bring a Sim from the middle of a career track to the top. For example, one possible outcome of the chance card for the Rogue Botanist (level 6) job in the Natural Scientist track is promotion to Ecological Guru, the top job in that track.

A map of how a result is determined is as follows:

Given choices A and B:
 * User chooses A
 * Computer generates good value
 * Good Result A
 * Computer generates bad value
 * Bad Result A
 * User chooses B
 * Computer generates good value
 * Good Result B
 * Computer generates bad value
 * Bad Result B

The Sims 3 and The Sims Medieval
Chance cards do not appear much in The Sims 3, as they were generally replaced by job opportunities. However, a chance card or two does occasionally pop up. Unlike in The Sims 2, the chance cards don't have that much to do with demotions and promotions, and can only affect Sim's moodlets. They involve less detailed scenarios, and it doesn't really matter what choice the Sim picks. Sometimes, there might be a dialog asking if the player wants to change the Sim's career (for example, from Law Enforcement to Military).

Unlike The Sims 2 and The Sims Stories, there is no ignore button.

In The Sims Medieval, the chance card will also occur if you are shopping at the Shoppe (even if no items were bought or sold), sleeping in a bed, on an Adventure, Hunting or Patrolling the forest.

As in other games, some will have negative effects. For example, when Help Muggers fails, the Sim will be arrested (unless he or she a Monarch) and get a Major Laceration buff. As in The Sims 3, there is no ignore button.

Chance cards can also appear on a quest.

Chance Card Guides

 * Career Chance Card Guide by Megafierce
 * The Sims 2 - A Guide to The Sims 2