It does seem to be intermittent; further starts have been indicator-free. I'm not going to stress the occasional occurrence; I just wanted to be sure I wasn't Doin' It Wrong.

Those behaviours will always be linked to just those traits, like the idle animations were linked to TS2 personality points, and this makes all traits very predictable in behaviour. Maybe they should have enabled all interractions for all sims, but randomize the chances of sims performing them based on their traits. Like childish sims have a 50% chance to do the goof around animation and all other traits have it on varying smaller degrees based on the trait description, so this would give even a grumpy sim the chance to goof around occasionaly.

That wasn't what I was getting at. I meant that traits that have social interactions are never different between Sims, and I'm pretty sure that's what I said, I guess you just didn't catch that.

And for instance, the Evil trait, they laugh sometimes. Yes, it's autonomous, but it's not an interaction. They just do it for the hell of it.

It's all moodlets, never personality. All Sims talk the same, every action is the same. If two different Sims have the same traits, and pick the same trait specific social action it won't be any different than the Average Joe doing it. Like you said, Excitable Sims don't act excited, they just get a moodlet.

Hmm... was playing w/Robotic Hand of God on for the first time today and it seems to have developed a bit of kleptomania... as when my sims go to make some drinks at their bar... the serving tray lasts long enough for the 4 drinks to be poured... and my sim can start to take a drink and then POOF... the whole thing disappears... not so great for those who are "Legendary Hosts"...      

For one thing, I just saw the post itself, didn't know L&P stood for lies and propaganda, but thanks for belated heads up on that.

Secondly, I didn't latch onto the lie per say, I only saw conflicting information that I was hoping could be clarified, and thought maybe someone had heard something about it being included in an expansion. That's really it.

I'm just glad people continue to be asses instead of just answering an honest question and moving on. I don't agree that ignorance is bliss, but at the same time the uninformed are not universally stupid and in need of public flogging.

hmm First expansion due Nov 2009: The Sims 3: Destination Adventure. Source
Well, I'm not really excited about it...

OFB would make perfect sense. 

I'm not in any way condoning pedophilia and would take a shotgun to any pedophile who got anywhere near one of my kids but in the Sims it just becomes a pain in the ass to have to force a teen sim to age up simply because another teen you matched them up with aged up a few days before and you don't want their relationship to suddenly change overnight because one of them is suddenly too old.

I'm curious what effect, if any, the genre type has on actually reading the books.  I've never quite understood the value in the very expensive books in the book store.  The books with game effects I understand, but not the ones that only increase Fun.

I wonder if we'll eventually get a SimPE-like took that will let us add additional markers.  Since, for example, you can't write Pregnancy books, there are only 2 in the game, and Sims constantly roll Wishes to read them when having kids, even if they've already read both.

 - Gus

What does Tinker actually do, apart from breaking objects?  Just a non-book way of raising Handiness, at the cost of breaking stuff?

I had my Handy sim tinker on things a lot, assuming that it would unlock additional upgrade recipes or something, but didn't actually find anything.

I haven't experienced it yet because my sims live on empty lots and never actually stay home, but sims with the "Brave" trait can apparently be mighty warriors and will fight the burglars, fires, and whatnot, instead of screaming like neurotic idiots that in my family, we would shoot.

So neighbours can fight for you?!?

Sims still can't attack the burglars! This was really irritating to have her standing watching as she was burgled.

From what I can tell, interaction availability is entirely determined by the other Sim's current perception.  You can't woohoo your girlfriend if she currently only thinks you're "okay", can't ask someone to move in with you if they think you're extremely irresistible (because apparently it's just a friendly action, not a romantic one).  In other words, each interaction is sitting somewhere on a tree, and you have to move up that tree EVERY TIME in order to get to it.  Spectacularly annoying.

I may very well be wrong but after deciding that this was how it worked, I've had much more success in shaping relationships the way I want them to go.  There does not seem to be any inherent compatibility system, though, so if you decide a Sim is The One for your Sim, all you have to do is start climbing.

I'm really starting to wish that there was a way to keep collections separate. Containers specifically for all seeds, all rocks, and all bugs would be very useful. Some sort of display for bugs would be neat, too - there's fish bowls for fish, so why not?

I also have a question pertaining to the law enforcement career track: how exactly do you write reports? I've questioned one sim and dug in the trash of two different families, and not once did the option to write a report show up. I checked both my sim's computer, his workplace, and options while he was at work - all nada. Does it require actually finding a sim guilty of something worth reporting on?