Maxing out sims skills
J. M. Pescado:
Well, if you're after maximum speed (as well as all skills), you may not actually wish to train toddlers to walk. Training them to walk can actually be counterproductive, as it removes their ability to spin "in place" when someone tries to pick them up, or when they try to move to a nearby object: Instead they will stand up, turn around, and then immediately sit down again, somewhat of a waste of time.
I also don't personally exploit the "chain training" bug, because this is basically a deliberate exploit and trivializes the system entirely. Anyone who uses this has effectively invalidated the speed contest.
But other than that, children basically spend all their time gaining skills, because their choices for anything else are fundamentally crippled, and they're basically useless otherwise. Most actions are unavailable to them: Their only real choices in socials are Chat, Play, and Joke, and Hug: They can't really chat with non-children because they only talk about stupid stuff and thus cannot sustain a conversation without annoying everyone almost immediately. The play interactions are slow and not ideal for pure relationship building. Joke pays out badly on all counts, and is mostly useful only as a spacer. Hug requires way too much to be of any real use, since if this interaction is usable without rejection, you're already pretty high up.
There is one interaction that works reliably every time and never annoys the subject: Ask for a training. And so this is the dominant method by which children build relationships with adult family members.
HRH Posie:
Quote from: J. M. Pescado on 2005 July 20, 08:40:37
Well, if you're after maximum speed (as well as all skills), you may not actually wish to train toddlers to walk. Training them to walk can actually be counterproductive, as it removes their ability to spin "in place" when someone tries to pick them up, or when they try to move to a nearby object: Instead they will stand up, turn around, and then immediately sit down again, somewhat of a waste of time.
Interesting, I hadn't thought about that. Maybe I'll stop training just before completion and leave the teach to walk until day 4. As for "chain training", I don't use it either for the reasons you describe but it worked perfectly well when it tested it at the weekend. Children are forever spinning skill point wants and training them in one go wouldn't leave me with much. I agree the play interactions for children take a long time to complete for minimal friendship gain.
veilchen:
That's just about what I do. Starting with toddler, I try to get them as many creativity and charisma points as possible. As children, they can build the logic skill and at the same time gain some relationships by using the chess-table.
Thanks to the IQ tester in the baby-macro I can now find out whether the smart milk stuck, and nine out of ten times it does. I only feed them smart milk once or twice, but it seems to work better for me that way.
I ususally make sure I have the punching bag as a career reward, kids can use that without much trouble, and can be trained on it easily. Mechanical from the book, or, if I was quick enough with the adults career, from the medical reward with training, same with cooking. I don't use the toy oven much, but that's a personal choice; those muffins all over the place drive me batty.
They don't socialize much unless its trough the chess board or training, and its quite enough and much safer than the other socialize interactions. I usually just have them meet/greet visitors for use later on, in the teenage years. Then they have far less skilling to do and can up their relationships with those they have met via the phone or with the macro-socializer.
By the time they are teens, they have most if not all skills almost maxed, those still left can be easily obtained with the thinking cap that they can now use as well. That's why most of mine are knowledge sims; first, I like them best, second, they are easy to maintain, thirdly, I like them best.
G.
J. M. Pescado:
Quote from: veilchen on 2005 July 20, 10:36:46
Thanks to the IQ tester in the baby-macro I can now find out whether the smart milk stuck, and nine out of ten times it does. I only feed them smart milk once or twice, but it seems to work better for me that way.
If you're using the baby macro without turning on "Always Smart Milk", the baby controller automatically detects this condition and will not feed a baby more smart milk if "Always" is set to Off and the baby is already smarted.
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I don't use the toy oven much, but that's a personal choice; those muffins all over the place drive me batty.
It's more than just a personal choice. The skill rate of the muffin oven is insuperior, so even if the muffins were not maddening, it would still be an insuperior, low-value choice.
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By the time they are teens, they have most if not all skills almost maxed, those still left can be easily obtained with the thinking cap that they can now use as well. That's why most of mine are knowledge sims; first, I like them best, second, they are easy to maintain, thirdly, I like them best.
Actually, in the teen stage, you don't need the thinking cap ever if your smart milk stuck during toddlerhood. You will remain smarted even unto teen: In fact, it will last forever until you move out or delete your sim. Note that you will temporarily lose this ability if you go to a community lot (your sim is reinstanced there), but it will resume when your sim returns home. However, if you delete your sim at home and force him to respawn by the mailbox, he will lose it. The bottom line being that thinking caps are no longer necessary at all, and if you wear a thinking cap, you will not gain a cumulative bonus, you will simply lose your smart milk stuckiness and actually learn slower.
The Skillinator autodetects this and bypasses thinking cappage if it is unnecessary.
DaveFlew:
Okay, this is my first venture out of lurkdom here, so hello to you all from chilly Cape Town. 8) Now for my personal experience of skill-building.
I've started getting into the habit of rating my Sims in terms of the skill in which they have the least number of skill points. Therefore any Sim with 6 skills maxed out but only 1 skill point in the 7th discipline would have a skill rating of 1. My normal playing style is utopian (as opposed to a sopa opera-style crisis-filled dystopia), so I like to keep those skill ratings high for all my Sims.
My initial goal for any new-born Sim is to get them through to University with all 7 skill-related scholarships, so skill-building is an important part of the Toddler, Child and Teen phase.
Starting with Toddlers - any new Toddler of mine will spend more time with the Wabbit than with its parents. I regard the Toddler phase as being the ideal time to get up to 8 Charisma skill points, since I don't depend on the Execuputter or the Teleprompter for fun Charisma skill-building. It normally takes two days to get up to 8 Charisma skill points, after which I switch them to building Logic or Creativity.
Child skill-building goes hand in hand with Fun, because Children are low in Fun once they return from school. If they bring a friend home from school, they head to the chessboard. This is good for Logic, Fun and Relationship score (and Comfort if you have a comfy chair). Another cure for low Fun is to gain Cooking skill by watching the Yummy Channel.
Teenage skill-building revolves around getting all skills up to 8 points, in order to earn skill-based scholarships. It's just normal studying, really - nothing unusual. If there's a need for the Teen Sim to have fun, they'll head off to the pool table. Enough trips to the pool table and your Sim will earn the pool scholarship.
I try not to rely on Career Reward Objects for skill-building. The exceptions: Logic (thanks to the Biotech station's glitch which escalates the rate of skill building), Mechanical (the Surgical Training Station just seems "nicer" than reading a book) and Cleaning (if you can find it, the Fingerprint Scanner sure beats studying from a book).
Weekends are serious skill-building time for my Child and Teen Sims. I send a Child/Teen Sim to bed on Friday night, and wake them up as soon as the Energy bar is full - even if it's at 2am or 3am. Then they spend time gaining skills until their Energy bar gets to about say 30% (maybe Saturday afternoon sometime) and send them off to bed again. They wake up on Saturday evening again, and study through the night until Sunday morning. Then they go to bed again, wake up at around noon on Sunday and stay awake studying until about midnight. Then they get a good night's sleep and wake up on Monday morning. This way they maximise studying time and minimise sleeping time - almost like getting three days of studying in a two-day weekend.
Once a Sim goes to University, I plan their skill-building so that it coincides with a career-related Lifetime Want. For example, a Sim whose Lifetime Want is to become a Mad Scientist will focus on maximising Logic and Cleaning, and getting the 9th Cooking point. By rights, any Young Adult Sim who enters University with at least 8 skill points across the board should be able to maximise all 7 skills while at University.
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