The allocation of Prims in the building and furnishing of an SL home

*chuckle* that title sounds like the title of a technical document.

If you've seen my other post on this forum you will know that this is kind of the adventures of a newbie land owner. I have bought land (1024m2 with 234 prims) and a building I liked. The few minor problems that occurred during the set up of the prefab house (caused I now believe by the two "visitors" that insisted in using the doors and teleporters while I was in the process of setting up the house) were actually easily resolved.

Having "built" my house I next set out to furnish it. I found nice sets of furnishings in good colors and styles which I bought and with purchases in hand (or in inventory actually) returned home to place the items within the house. I placed the bed in the bedroom with a couple of nice torches in metal stands. I placed an area run in the living room. Placed a love-seat at one end of the rug and tried to place a sofa at the other. It was while trying to place the sofa that I received my first lesson in "prims". It seems that the sofa needed more available prims than I had remaining in the parcel!

So now I have a "few" questions.

Is 234 prims the correct amount for a 1024m2 parcel?
How many prims should I look for in a house?
How many prims should I leave for furnishings?
How many (if any) prims should I leave unused?
Do the prims in my (and my visitors) hair/clothes count against the total on the parcel?
Do the prims in a skybox (if I had one) count against the total?
What about my neighbors tree that seems to be mostly in my yard?
Is there any way to get more prims for my parcel?
Is there an important question relating to this that I have missed?

Thanks in advance for sharing your wisdom and please do correct any incorrect terms so that I can get them right in the future.

Tess

I can answer a few of those.

Do the prims in my (and my visitors) hair/clothes count against the total on the parcel?
Not unless you take them off yourself and drop them on the floor.

Do the prims in a skybox (if I had one) count against the total?
Yes includin the prims for makin the skybox.

What about my neighbors tree that seems to be mostly in my yard?
If the tree is in your yard then its using your prims.


I am a very prim minded person. You can get good lookin furniture with low prims if the maker uses nice textures to compensate. My personal bed that I made has only 5 prims and includes a blanket and sleep script. My table is 1 prim, my chair is 1 prim. My playhouse is 2 prims.

Is 234 prims the correct amount for a 1024m2 parcel?
I don't have my calculator handy but that sounds about right. There are 65536 sq.m. in a sim, and each sim gets 15000 prims, so you a bit less than one quarter your sq.m. in prims.

How many prims should I look for in a house?
How many prims should I leave for furnishings?
On a parcel your size, I'd say you should be looking for a house in the 40-80 prim range, and probably the low end of that range, although you can go higher, but then make sure you're getting some low-prim furniture. IIRC, I used to have a nice 38 prim house from Damani(sp?) that was very nice looking and only cost L$350 or thereabouts...

How many (if any) prims should I leave unused?
How often do you rez other things? If you want to rez a vehicle to ride/fly/sail off in from time to time, you'll probably want 31 prims free.

Do the prims in my (and my visitors) hair/clothes count against the total on the parcel?
No.

Do the prims in a skybox (if I had one) count against the total?
Yes.

What about my neighbors tree that seems to be mostly in my yard?
Check your land settings, it'll tell you how many prims are on your land and who owns them. If your neighbor's tree's "root" location is in their yard, it counts against their prims, not yours, even if it's partially in your yard.

Is there any way to get more prims for my parcel?
Buy more land in the same sim. It doesn't even have to be joined to the same parcel, it just needs to be in the same sim.

Ah Tess...you are a lady after my own heart. I too have fought and sometimes actually won the prim fight. Listed below are my answers to your questions. (Pretty sure they are all correct, and I'm happy to stand corrected should others disagree

Is 234 prims the correct amount for a 1024m2 parcel?
I'm writing this while the grid is down, so I'm not going to rely on my memory, but if you want to check, you can easily check that by selecting About Land, and the second tab from the left is the prim totals.

How many prims should I look for in a house? As few as possible in a house you like. I would get as much house as you can get...for as few prims as possible. I'm kind of crazed about this...my current skyhouse on a 512 lot is 9 prims. For the whole house! I built it myself....I've seen good houses out there in the 30 prim catagory. So if you hunt a bit, you can find ones that are very reasonable. (hint: easier to shop for houses on SL boutique, cause they are all in the same place, however I only find them on SLBoutique, but buy them inworld since many are rezzed and you can see the insides)

How many prims should I leave for furnishings? All the prims that don't go into the house are available for you to use for furnishings and landscaping. But there are couches and then there are couches. Low prim couches can be only a few....5 or 6. I made a victorian fainting couch last night that was 4. (See? I'm crazy for low prims). And don't forget Pose Balls. If you want to add some of your favorites (what would SL be without pose balls?) they take 2 prims for each couple pose. I refer to the ones that are NOT included in furntiure...you know the ones you go to Bits and Bobs and purchase.

How many (if any) prims should I leave unused? I've gone down to one prim, but then if you want to open a nice object that you just bought you might not be able to. Or if one of those fancy wedding invites come, you have to go to a sandbox to open your invite. Bah. I don't know that there is a rule, but I like to have a few left 4-5 for the unexpected. [maybe someone else has insights on this??]

Do the prims in my (and my visitors) hair/clothes count against the total on the parcel? Nope. When they are attached to an avatar they don't count.

Do the prims in a skybox (if I had one) count against the total? Oh yes. If you want to burn up your prims real fast put two structures on your land...one on the ground and one in the air. But if your only structure is a skyhouse, then you don't need landscaping. That's the handy part of landscaping.

What about my neighbors tree that seems to be mostly in my yard? You can look in About Land and see who has prims on your land...the best part is that you can send them back to the owner...just look at the tab. If any prims aren't yours just shoot them right back to whoever left them with you.

Is there any way to get more prims for my parcel? Yes.. but it will cost you. You have to buy another property in the same sim. VERY IMPORTANT. Not just any old sim. It must be the same. So if your land is in Cypa, you have to buy prim land also in Cypa. I have a good friend (really good friend...it's my wife in RL) who now lives on her former prim land. Her house at the beach was such a prim sucker....when she got tired of beach living (and the big land use fees) She dumped all the beach land, but kept the prim land and is very happy in a lovely sky house. The prim land on the ground was dumpy and cheap, but perfect to build in the air. But I digress. Once you purchase another plot IN THE SAME SIM, you make both parcels part of the same group, and voile, you'll have the prims all together. But be sure to set your prim land to "cannot build" status, so no nasty neighbor swipes a few of your precious prims. It's costly tho. The more land you own, the higher your land fees!! See below for my cheapskate solutions:

Is there an important question relating to this that I have missed? Well a few: You asked some really good questions, tho. However: (and you might already know one) Don't buy anything that doesn't attach to your avatar without knowing how many prims it uses. Hit the item, click edit, and you'll see its prim usage. You won't believe how many prims some things are. My wife has a sofa that is 45 prims. Jeez! The good news is that there are some really good furniture makers out there who are fighting the prim fight with you hun. They are making good looking stuff that doesn't fill your prim allocation up so fast. Use the 'search' and look for 'low prim furniture'. There is one designer in world who sells her pieces without poses....you buy them as part of pillow assortments seperately. So if you are really running out of prims, that's a great solution... Or if you are really feeling clever, you can do what I did: Find editable furntiure, then take it apart and take out all the extras. Its amazing how many extras some people (especially lindens)
add in that you can really live without. Example: take off the feet of sofas if you can. Make the bottom prim thicker, and you just shaved 4 prims right off. Look for me or my wife (Lizzario Goodliffe) in world and I'll be happy to share some low prim furniture we've made with you. Cheers! Zay

Oh, is that what they mean by 'prim land' in land ads? I could never figure it out.

234 prims is correct, it's 117 per 512sqm .

I would say you could go as much as 100 prims for a house. To be honest you can get some very nice houses of <100 prims that are suitable for a 1024 plot. In fact the only house I built that was over 100 (excepting larger build's like my Cantina ) was my SLRR railway station entry which was 116 prims ( in that case I had 117 to use to myself so did ). Some of my houses even use a prim heavy feature window ( 13 prims for the wall including the window - single end wall ) or even two of them and still remain a nice size and under 100 prims. The trick is definatly the furniture as it's easy to get furniture with almost as many prims as your house. A friend of mine made some superbly detailed dining chairs.. at 24 prims EACH. great if you have the prims but not for a low prim environment. You should be able to find detailed low prim furniture at < 10 prims per item if you shop around. Remember if the object is on display you can check the prim number too.

Furnishings vary a LOT, so shop around. If you're on a tight prim budget, some of the really elegant stuff is beyond your means. For example, I have two beds with fancy couples animations. One bed is only 4 prims, plus two more for the headboard and stand, and up to 4 for pose balls when in use. So ten prims max, and it does a fair amount of good things. The other bed is stunning in appearance, but it uses up 40 prims, before it generates a single pose ball! And technically it could need as much as 8 to 10 more for pose balls and auto-rezzed 'props', depending on when you tell it to do...

I have two nearly identical dressers that I made. One used prims for legs, drawer fronts, and drawer pulls. It took up 9 prims. I made a low-prim alternate version that used two carefully made textures and just three prims, and in 95% of all situations, the low-prim version serves just as well. A couple of elegant Japanese-style Tansu chest dressers that I have are only one prim each, with several well-done textures that make them look great.

A handy trick regarding prim land, if you have the option in your sim, is to buy land that no one else would usually build on. For example, a steep mountain slope, or land that is under water, or a narrow strip near the edge of a sim. I struck a great deal with my sim owner by buying a 1024 M2 plot that was the bottom of a lagoon, near the edge of the sim. Paid less than he charges for the same space on land, and put a skybox over it, way up high. His other residential customers still get an unrestricted 'ocean view', and I get my extra prims.

As a rule of thumb, I try not to get down to less than 50 to 100 prims free, after all typical furniture is in place, when I am designing a build for a client. That gives them enough slack to add a few new pieces of furniture, or place several pose balls, or rez a vehicle, without worrying about running short. In my experience, it's a good idea to split the prim allocations as 1/3 for the house and landscaping, 1/3 for furnishings, and 1/3 free or other uses. A large house typically uses at least as many prims for furnishings as the house itself takes up.

Having learned some prim basics here I went back and checked the house I had bought. It weighs in at a whopping 145 prims! Add to that several pieces of extravagant furniture and I had used up my 234 prims in no time at all.

So I popped everything back into my inventory and set out to find something less prim-heavy. It turns out there are lots and lots of very nice low prim dwellings available. One of the first I found was this Small Keep (http://www.slexchange.com/modules.php?name=Marketplace&file=item&ItemID=74264) Because of its good looks, low prim count (46) and amazing price ($35L and no that isn't a typo). I bought it on the spot, since, at that price, I had nothing to lose. All my furniture fits and the style is pleasing and nicely detailed so I will stick with this one while I search for something that "might" be better.

I did a ton of pre-shopping at SLboutique and SLexchange. I discovered that some merchant/builders didn't do a good job of saying, in their ads, how to contact and/or view and buy their dwellings in SL. While you could buy from SLboutique and SLexchange directly from their web pages I would not recommend doing that without seeing what you are buying "in world". Several houses that looked good in the ads turned out to be less impressive in the (virtual) flesh.

One thing about the keep that might make it a real keeper (pardon the pun) is that it has a deep 10m foundation. I am thinking that this might be convertible into a "basement" like area. My land is as flat as can be, so right now that foundation is just poking deeply into the ground. Any opinions as to its convertibility into a basement?

I'll keep adding to this thread as I learn anything more useful and eventually do a summation post.

Tess

Such foundations are usually added to make it easier to place your building on land that is not at all flat. An important consideration when some of the newer sims have a mere +/- 4M limit on terraforming land heights. You can easily find in such sims that it is impossible to get a decently uniform building plot leveled out.

Advice from someone who has built several 'basements':

Making a basement requires 'digging' a hole under your build, which requires having terraforming rights. You must own the land or be an officer in a land group that owns the land.

Be aware that the sides of this hole will always have a horizontal slope of at least 0.5 Meters, because the grid points in the terrain are spaced in .5M intervals, and can't move sideways - only up and down. It is not possible to make a hole with vertical walls.

So... For a structure like yours, you want to select an area that is smaller than your actual foundation, so the sloping sides don't show. Then, assuming you can modify the building, you could hollow out the foundation prim, and use a teleporter to get into your new 'basement'.

Selecting land selects 4M x 4M squares, and again, you can't control where the corners of these squares are. It's locked into the terrain grid. So if you had a building with a 10 M x 10 M foundaion, with a single prim for the foindation, you could right click, edit land, select an 8m x 8M area, lower the land there by 3M or so, and then center your building over the resulting pit. Your 10 M x 10 M foundation should just barely cover it, because as the 8M x 8M selected area goes down, the surrounding land gets pulled down with it, like streaching a rubber sheet, to make the sloping sides.

It is certainly possible to make holes in the land that are not locked to those 4M pre-assigned grid points. But doing so with the manual tools requires much more finesse and patience. The smallest land manipulation tool is still a 4M square. My advice is to get the main hole by using the grid and 'lower land', then use the small selection tool to lower the edges as needed. I will warn you in advance that terraforming a hole is not for the easily agrivated soul. The tools for terraforming are quite crude, and it takes time and practice to master them. Remember that "Undo" is your best friend, and all will be well.

A larger foundation will consist of multiple prims. There is no way to hollow out a single open space within such a foundation. You would have to replace the original foundation with walls made of thinner prims.

Can I just get a simple low prime Skybox, place it underground and put a teleporter in it for an instant basement-like-space or would the underground Skybox get filled in with earth? I guess what I am asking is, Is the ground solid or just a surface with emptiness underneath?

Tess

The grund is solid. You can't ever go under teh ground level.