Borken stuff: toddlers, birthdays, dead spots

[Gus Smedstad]

For the most part, the game has been more stable than TS2.  I've noticed what appear to be resets, but they don't result in endless loops or impossible actions, as with the infamous "jump bug" which was really a generic symptom for TS2 resetting an endless loop.

I did have a Sim get stuck once.  She was trying to put down a book, and the neighbor she was visiting was blocking her with his constant demands to flirt.  She was frozen, and could not move, because she was stuck in mid-motion putting down his book.  Eventually he got tired and wandered off to pee and she returned to normal.

The problems I notice most are adult-toddler docking and birthdays.  An adult and a toddler will be adjacent, and yet the toddler will crawl off 6-8 full tiles before finding an acceptable docking point.

Birthdays are more serious, but more avoidable.  It seems that if you let a Sim age transition to Child, Teenager, or Young Adult without using the Birthday Cake, you get the Trait dialog, but the game discards the result.  I've got a couple of Adult Sims with only 4 Traits as a result.  The first time I just didn't want to bother with the cake, the second time I just forgot it was her birthday.

Personally, I don't like the fact that the Birthday Cake lets you transition well ahead of time.  I understand the convenience feature, but I prefer the idea that Sims age in a natural progression, rather than some Sims aging abnormally fast.  It's inconvenient for me that the Cake dialog shows every Sim on the lot, not just those I consider eligible.

It looks like something like the Hackey Sack problem is back.  I have 4 tiles in one room which will not accept objects, and Sims will not walk on them.  We need Buyable Fire or the Lot Debugger.

Babies also stop the automatic speed-3 transition again.  They fixed that a long time ago in TS2, why did they forget it with this release?

 - Gus

[Roflganger]

The traits error happens when you have the first panel (the one where traits are listed) open when they age up.  Just switch to a different panel before having them blow out the candles and the trait should stick.  It's a bug, obviously, but at least an easy one to work around.

[Ezura]

The problems I notice most are adult-toddler docking and birthdays.  An adult and a toddler will be adjacent, and yet the toddler will crawl off 6-8 full tiles before finding an acceptable docking point.

I have the exact problem, the toddler crawls several rooms away until their "pick up spot", then the family members finally picks them up.
This leads to a lot of accidents on the floor, because it takes so much time to get the toddler from the floor to the potty, even if the toddler sits next to it, it will still crawl away, because during potty training it has to be picked up.
I've tried Awesomemod to teleport the toddler to the spot I know they can be picked up, but usually they crawl into a completely different room to a new pick-up-spot!
I think the house is cursed, because the teenagers will do their homework in spots where they block people from getting out of the room or even out of the bed.

I have really buggy toddlers, when I've taught them to walk, they will at times constantly walk/sit/walk/sit/walk/sit over and over again, especially when they are on a rug, then move one grid and continue the same thing until they cancel what they are doing.
Sometimes they will bug so bad they can't get to the potty, but thanks to Awesome mod I can teleport them there. 

Jump Bug happens a lot with my toddlers, sometimes when they have this sit/walk/sit/walk-thing going on, they keep canceling actions and then POOF they are outside the house!
But it never happens during training/diaper changes e.t.c

I married the Social Worker in my game and one of the daughters trait list bugged when she turned toddler.
She was shown as Loner and when I was going to choose her other trait (as the dialog suggested), the military social command "Salute" was there instead of a trait and couldn't be removed.
When I clicked OK, that trait disappeared and she never got a new one.
(I play the game in Swedish, so traits probably has the wrong name)
He was quite bugged too, he only had the family sim trait and lifetime wish "Raise 5 kids from baby to teenager", so he was VERY easy to please.
His wishpanel was always filled with "Have a baby / Have a Boy / Have a Girl", so he always had 10.000 lifetime points with each birth.
They had twins twice, otherwise he would have a lot more points!

[Process Denied]

I have a problem with the options menu.  I have the biggest screen listed so I picked the right screen and it gave me the timer and I was clicking ok or save (whatever it is) and it wouldn't recognise it.  I kept clicking and the timer finally ran out and it reverted back to default.

[GnatGoSplat]

Personally, I don't like the fact that the Birthday Cake lets you transition well ahead of time.  I understand the convenience feature, but I prefer the idea that Sims age in a natural progression, rather than some Sims aging abnormally fast.  It's inconvenient for me that the Cake dialog shows every Sim on the lot, not just those I consider eligible.

I think they HAD to include that because it's possible to turn aging off completely, and in that case people would need a way to age babies if desired.

[simsdesperado]

I have the same issue with toddlers that need to go to another room so that their parent can pick them up. It seems like they generally need more room than in Sims2 to move around. It's a bit annoying but I've gotten used to it. However, I got a baby that got two traits on birth and no trait upon aging to toddlerhood with the cake. Weren't they supposed to get one trait on each birthday?

[Zazazu]

Nope.
Baby - 2 traits
Toddler - 2 traits
Child - 3 traits
Teen - 4 traits
YA - 5 traits

[Marhis]

She was shown as Loner and when I was going to choose her other trait (as the dialog suggested), the military social command "Salute" was there instead of a trait and couldn't be removed.
When I clicked OK, that trait disappeared and she never got a new one.

That's not exactly a bug. The social "salute" is a sort of hidden trait which is often inherited by the spawn of sims in high ranks of military career. I think it shouldn't be visible when you choose the traits (and this part may probably be bugged), but the fact it doesn't appear in the panel works as intended.

[Gus Smedstad]

The traits error happens when you have the first panel (the one where traits are listed) open when they age up.  Just switch to a different panel before having them blow out the candles and the trait should stick.

You misunderstand me.  I've yet to have a problem when a Sim blows out candles - it's when they age naturally without a cake that they don't get the trait.  If there was a workaround, I'd love to hear it.

 - Gus

[Roflganger]

You misunderstand me.  I've yet to have a problem when a Sim blows out candles - it's when they age naturally without a cake that they don't get the trait.  If there was a workaround, I'd love to hear it.

Either way, if you have the traits panel open when they age up (whichever method they're aging up through), it causes an error with the new trait being discarded.

[anaximander]

The traits error happens when you have the first panel (the one where traits are listed) open when they age up.  Just switch to a different panel before having them blow out the candles and the trait should stick.

You misunderstand me.  I've yet to have a problem when a Sim blows out candles - it's when they age naturally without a cake that they don't get the trait.  If there was a workaround, I'd love to hear it.

 - Gus

He's correct - it occurs whenever a sim AGES that that's the case, regardless of whether it's candles or not. What I found was that I had to restart the game before I used the testingcheats -shiftclick - choose traits, otherwise it would keep "ignoring" that last trait.

[Ezura]

She was shown as Loner and when I was going to choose her other trait (as the dialog suggested), the military social command "Salute" was there instead of a trait and couldn't be removed.
When I clicked OK, that trait disappeared and she never got a new one.

That's not exactly a bug. The social "salute" is a sort of hidden trait which is often inherited by the spawn of sims in high ranks of military career. I think it shouldn't be visible when you choose the traits (and this part may probably be bugged), but the fact it doesn't appear in the panel works as intended.

Thank you for the explanation! 
I started the father in military career before she was born, that explains why she got the trait.
I noticed some of my other kids having that social command thanks to their father being in military, but I never understood why.
But for them, the Salute command never appeared in the trait list, so it must be a bug that it was forced on the toddler.
The other kid that got the command was the son of an astronaut, the father was also a Sim I had created in CAS.
The father of the toddler was ex-social worker, and his trait list was bugged too. (only family trait)

[Nikki]

I actually just noticed a problem with the way babies age in families you are not playing. I'm on my second generation, where I moved out  five of the children of my founders into their own homes when  they aged to young adult. At the time of moving out the last four, my heir had one child and a toddler who had been a toddler for about four sim days. I decided to create them CAS spouses after accidentally marrying off the first two and a day later the townie spouses became elders causing a very quick annulment. I spent about 2 sim days making all four of them get acquainted with their spouses, married, employed and impregnated then moved back to my main family. All was fine and well with the births when lo and behold 2 days later the babies are all toddlers which is fine but then 1 day later 1 of the  toddlers was a child when my toddler was still a toddler and I am playing on the long life span. Very Annoying.

I also noticed something else interesting. When I left my main family for those two days I had sent the child to practice writing skill on the computer. On returning after 2 days he was very tired but still practicing writing and was at skill level 7, the same as his mother who wants to be a writer. He also had the go to park icon in his queue from when I had invited him to his Aunt's wedding. I was wondering why he didn't show up but now I know.

[Gus Smedstad]

Either way, if you have the traits panel open when they age up (whichever method they're aging up through), it causes an error with the new trait being discarded.

I almost never have that panel up.  I'm certain I did not when the Sims aged naturally.

That said, I did an experiment, and allowed another Sim to age naturally.  This time the new trait stuck.  About the only thing I did differently was fiddle pointlessly with the trait-choosing dialog after I'd chosen the trait.

 - Gus

[dramamine]

I'm suffering dead spots involving bookshelves.

I had the Bookshelf Revisited and upgraded to the Penningway Bookshelf. Now, I can't get any sim in my house to put away a book. They complain that they can't get to it. Even if I put it outside near the corner of the lot. Even if I walk them outside within inches of the fuggin' bookshelf, they still whine about not being able to get to it.

I attempted to downgrade back to the Bookshelf Revisited and that didn't work. Anyone else suffering this? And no, I don't have a modded game and this is the first arr'd version, Reloaded I think.

[Nimrod]

dramamine:  I'm fairly certain that bookshelves have a limit to the inventory that they'll hold.  I had that same version and experienced the same process you describe.  I clicked on other bookshelves and they went right to them, I tried pulling a book from sim inventory into the problem bookshelf and it would not go in there.  With no explaination, I assumed the thing to be full and after moving books around, the sims didn't have a problem putting books away in that same bookshelf again.

[Ambular]

I had a very odd problem with the kitchen cabinets.  I was trying to recolor one of the short OverAchieving Overhead Cabinets to more or less match the Counter Culture ones (for use over the stove) and I kept finding that after I moved the Overachiever so it touched the others, I could no longer edit it in Create-A-Design, even if I then moved it away from them again.

[Nikki]

I'm having a problem with a few of my lots in the game that seem to be bugged. I had a family in one and whenever I clicked to visit it said there was no interaction. I couldn't figure out why so I moved them out and then moved them back in but the same issue. I moved them to a different house and was done with it and that family is alright now.

Its now started with another family though, the Bachelors. I can't visit them either. I moved them out, copied the house, because I wanted them to keep it for nostalgia and then bulldozed it. I then placed  the copy and moved them back in and it was fine but after 1 sim day its started again. I have no problem moving them to a different lot but its  annoying if that's going to keep happening to my lots.

[Marhis]

whenever I clicked to visit it said there was no interaction.

Are you sure they were at home? If there's no one at home you can't visit them.

[Nikki]

whenever I clicked to visit it said there was no interaction.

Are you sure they were at home? If there's no one at home you can't visit them.

Yes they were definitely at home when I hovered over their icon but it said no interaction and I even zoomed on their house and saw them inside but it still said no interaction. Usually if no one is home I can still click on it but it'll just tell me that whoever isn't at home.

[dramamine]

I'm fairly certain that bookshelves have a limit to the inventory that they'll hold.

... You know, that thought never crossed my mind. With the sims' inventories being endless and unaware of the impossibilities that is allows (as far as I can tell), I assumed any item that had an iventory similar to them.

However, when I manually placed the books on/in the shelves, I get nothing telling me that there is a problem. It is only when a sim attempts to put the book away. Even when *all* the books are strewn about the home, they still bicth that they can't get to the bookshelf to put their book away.

So what I did, which seems to have fixed the issue, was delete/sold the duplicates of the default books. I had anywhere from 3-6 copies of each of the books (like "Warlock" and "Rayamundo" and skill books). Once that was reduced to one copy of each, they had no issues in returning books to their home. I'm curious if anyone else has run into this weird problem.