Rotational Gameplay Tips

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Heather
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Rotational Gameplay Tips

Post by Heather »

Having spent a lot of time trying to figure out how to manipulate the game into working for my rotational style of play, I thought it might be helpful to share some tips for anyone else who likes to play the same way. :) If anyone else has any tips to add to this thread, please feel free!

I personally like to play my households for a week, and switch over on Mondays or Sundays. I keep my aging turned off for everyone except the active household, since I find that the premade sims age a little too quickly if I leave aging on for unplayed sims (especially in saves where I'm rotating through 8 households or more!), but keeping it on for the current family + townies works too. :)

MCCC is really great for customizing age spans beyond short, normal, and long, and I find that using week-long increments makes it really easy for me to keep my different families aging in sync. I usually try to time my pregnancies so that sims start them at the beginning of their rotations, and are able to deliver, and spend a little time with the new baby before moving on to the next household. Previously I gave my toddlers 1 week, kids and teens 2, but with the addition of infants, I do 2 weeks for infants/tots, and 3 weeks for kids/teens now! I've laid out my reasoning in this reply below. :)

Young adults are a little trickier now that we can send them off to university, because even with a full courseload, you're looking at a full three weeks of university until they graduate! I've been playing with aging off for my uni students for the time being, until I figure out a good age span to give them. I feel like three or four weeks is too short - if you go to university right after high school, you wouldn't exactly be considered an adult by the time you finish. :lol: I think eight weeks might be a good starting point for uni-bound sims, but before that I would usually play mine for four weeks.

With my university gameplay being a little longer than most now (6 weeks, 2 credits per week), I'd give my young adults at least 10 weeks, but realistically I probably play them closer to 20 weeks!

The adult sim lifespan really depends on their kids (if they have any) for me. I like to wait until their kids have graduated before aging them up to elders, but for childless sims, I would probably give them another four weeks or so.

City Living, Seasons, and University can make playing rotationally a little trickier, so I wrote up a lil section for each of them:

City Living:
Spoiler:
City Living doesn't actually have a huge effect on rotational gameplay, but the festivals run on a 2-week schedule, so if you're playing an even number of households they'll get stuck with the same festivals every rotation. If I am playing an even number, I'll switch the order of my households if I want to play a certain family during a certain festival. Otherwise, playing an uneven number works best.
Seasons:
Spoiler:
When I first started playing seasons I wanted each of my families to enjoy all of the holidays, so I would set my season length to one week, load in all the holidays I wanted, and then reset it for every family by using the seasons.set_season [0-3] cheat at the start of the rotation. This was good for the the first round of seasons, but it very quickly became tiring playing the same holiday for every family, especially when you play a lot of occults who don't get to participate in traditions like the grand feast.

I decided to switch my season length to four weeks, and added the holidays in at the start of the rotation based on what I wanted each family to celebrate. For saves with more than 4 households, I just use the cheat to reset the season once it runs out. For saves with three, I keep the four-week season length, and just manually change it with the cheat when it's time to start the next season.

As for holidays - they end at 2am, and start at 6am, so I like to switch households during that four hour window, to ensure that the family I'm switching to doesn't get a shitty holiday moodlet because they only had one hour to celebrate it. If the random lottery holiday pops up, I'll quickly pop in to some of my other households to let them enter it.
University:
Spoiler:
University really threw me for a loop when it first came out - I wasn't too sure how I was going to be able to move on to playing another family without my students' performance suffering. I found three methods that worked, with the last one being my preferred method:

1) The game does give you the option of waiting to re-enroll your sim in university, so it is possible to delay enrolling them in their next semester until you start their next rotation. However, they will lose any scholarships they've earned, positions on the soccer or e-sports teams, and they will be forced to move out of the dorms if you decide not to re-enroll immediately. (I think they keep club memberships, but I'm not 100% certain about that.) This works for some sims who aren't using scholarships, or are living off-campus, but it's definitely not ideal for all sims.

2) Since I didn't want to lose scholarships or team positions, my next method was to play through my students' entire degree program, from start to graduation. This makes it much harder to keep aging in sync if you have aging on, because you'd need to play the rest of your households for the same amount of time to match. I also found I got burnt out from playing the same household for about four weeks, and then repeating them same process with the next two or more households. (It's actually why I haven't updated my original Paraneighours since sending the first generation off to uni!)

3) Finally, I managed to find a way to game the system after I got fed up with using method two. I noticed that grades were always released around the same time for my sims, which was at 6pm on the last day of the term. Right after you get the grades, it prompts you to re-enroll, or delay enrollement with the penalties mentioned in method one. I decided to try saving right before the grades came in, and switch households at that point. You will miss seeing the grades (but if you can still catch them if you exit without saving after the pop-up), but your sims will be stuck in a university-limbo until you return to their household. (I think it's because the game isn't able to decide how many classes to enroll them in, or pick an elective for them.) They won't lose any performance, since grades are set once they take exams and submit projects, they won't lose scholarships, team positions, or be forced out of the dorms. Upon starting their next rotation, you'll get the option to re-enroll, and you can safely continue their next semester without consequence. As of 2023, I can confirm this method still works like a charm, I've yet to have a sim re-enroll without my say!
And that's my run-down of my rotational gameplay strategies! Hopefully someone else out there will find this helpful. :) Again, if anyone else has some additional tips or tricks up their sleeves, I would love to hear them!
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Re: Rotational Gameplay Tips

Post by Sam »

My style is more or less the same. Ageing is off for everyone but the house I'm playing, and I also play with MCCC. I would advise anyone using MCCC to make sure that it's up and running properly, as my sims ended up making an unexpected baby or two while I wasn't playing them! :lol: That's probably the biggest problem rotational play has thrown at me.

My rotations are seasonal, and I switch household at 6am on Sunday, when the season changes. Although, now I have 7 households, I'm moving towards having the seasons run for 14 days instead of 7, so I'll be switching mid-season for some households. I'm fed up of playing Harvestfest 6 or 7 times! I reset it when the season runs out if I still have households to play. I'm still planning to make the switch at 6am on a Sunday, probably because that's how I've always done it. I currently have an odd number of families, so I'm currently not worried about the same families getting the same holidays season after season.

I also advise having families in different worlds to break up the weather a little - I found that I was getting bored of snow in the winters! Mine did all start in the same place, but they have since scattered, although I never had a plan to move everyone around. Things just kind of went that way. I like having a change of scenery every few households, though.

Starting with the next generation, I'm probably going to look more seriously at population control measures, because I don't want rotations to be really, really long. Generation two is currently at 9 members, and I think it's going to gain an extra member or two. I haven't really decided what I'm going to do, but it'll be along the lines of capping the number of children families can have. Maybe at 2 per couple. Or maybe I'll consider having more childless couples. I'm really not sure yet.

Reading how you do university was really interesting, because I'm still not sure how to approach it! I think that's why I've been dragging my heels with playing the next couple of rotations. I haven't played university with the Culpepper 'hood yet, only with a legacy-style play save where household switching wasn't an issue. I did play university in one sitting last time I did it, but I imagine that would get old fast! :lol: So I'm probably going to use your method (number 3) if that's alright with you - and if EA hasn't broken it by then!! :lol:
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Re: Rotational Gameplay Tips

Post by 108sims »

Thank yo so much for this! I've been trying to figure out how to play rotationally, especially with uni. I had been using the first method, so I'm glad to hear about the third option.
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Re: Rotational Gameplay Tips

Post by ciyrose »

Those are some great tips Heather. I haven't tried any sort of rotational play but have wondered how I would do it, especially uni, so it's great to know how that part works with the grades and the re-enroll. Hopefully it doesn't get broken, but that seems unlikely based on what it is that's causing the "hold up" since I doubt they will just suddenly start enrolled played students on their own. Thanks for taking the time to write that up!
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Re: Rotational Gameplay Tips

Post by Heather »

Sam wrote: I also advise having families in different worlds to break up the weather a little - I found that I was getting bored of snow in the winters! Mine did all start in the same place, but they have since scattered, although I never had a plan to move everyone around. Things just kind of went that way. I like having a change of scenery every few households, though.
This is such an important tip! I love the San Myshuno apartments, but oh my goodness it gets tiring playing in the same neighbourhood/world several times a rotation. And those dang festivals, where you can't super speed through sims sleeping until they end! I'm trying to move everyone around a little more now in my other save, so that I don't fall into the same spice market rut. :lol:
Sam wrote: Starting with the next generation, I'm probably going to look more seriously at population control measures, because I don't want rotations to be really, really long. Generation two is currently at 9 members, and I think it's going to gain an extra member or two. I haven't really decided what I'm going to do, but it'll be along the lines of capping the number of children families can have. Maybe at 2 per couple. Or maybe I'll consider having more childless couples. I'm really not sure yet.
It's super hard keeping population under control in rotational saves! I don't think I ever went past 3 generations in my sims 2 saves, once the kids start moving out there are just so many households to play through it starts to feel like too much. I've also considered playing more childless couples, but I jsut like seeing what the children of my couples would look like. :lol:
Sam wrote: So I'm probably going to use your method (number 3) if that's alright with you - and if EA hasn't broken it by then!!
Please feel free!! I would not have written up a whole ass thread on how I gamed the system if I didn't want other people to use it in their own games. :lol: I am hoping the June patch doesn't break it... I don't see any reason it should, I just know that they usually break a few things trying to fix others. :shifty:
108sims wrote:Thank yo so much for this! I've been trying to figure out how to play rotationally, especially with uni. I had been using the first method, so I'm glad to hear about the third option.
No problem! The first method is fine for single family saves, really, it's just exhausting when you have like four groups of sims you want to play through uni. I was so pleased to discover a third option that let me keep my usual style of gameplay, because I almost never play single household saves.
ciyrose wrote:Those are some great tips Heather. I haven't tried any sort of rotational play but have wondered how I would do it, especially uni, so it's great to know how that part works with the grades and the re-enroll. Hopefully it doesn't get broken, but that seems unlikely based on what it is that's causing the "hold up" since I doubt they will just suddenly start enrolled played students on their own. Thanks for taking the time to write that up!
Thank you! Fingers crossed that nothing breaks my method, and I can keep on gaming the system with my university limbo. :lol: I am just happy that other people have found this helpful!
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Re: Rotational Gameplay Tips

Post by Sam »

Heather wrote:I've also considered playing more childless couples, but I jsut like seeing what the children of my couples would look like. :lol:
I have the same problem, it's just too tempting! I'm going to have to try really hard not to give in! :lol:
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Re: Rotational Gameplay Tips

Post by Mionax »

Thanks for the tips.
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Re: Rotational Gameplay Tips

Post by xiapxls »

I love these tips! I've used similar methods in past rotational gameplays, but then uni came out and I had no idea what to do with it! I have a sim in gen 1 of my planned rotational save so I'm definitely going to try method #3 with her! And I'm thinking maybe six weeks for young adults because eight weeks sounds a little too much for me. I might have to fiddle with the the age spans for toddlers, kids, and teens, though, because I don't really want kids aging up to ya before their parents even become adults.

I agree with trying to limit the numbers of babies in gen 2 and having some childless couples, but I must admit, I also fall victim to curiosity too often. I just want to see all the babies! :lol:
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Post by KatLovesPotatoes »

This are good tips. I want to try rotational gameplay, so we'll see how it goes... probably switch on Sundays.
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Re: Rotational Gameplay Tips

Post by Sam »

Heather wrote: May 21st, 2020, 7:28 pm I decided to try saving right before the grades came in, and switch households at that point. You will miss seeing the grades (but if you can still catch them if you exit without saving after the pop-up), but your sims will be stuck in a university-limbo until you return to their household. (I think it's because the game isn't able to decide how many classes to enroll them in, or pick an elective for them.) They won't lose any performance, since grades are set once they take exams and submit projects, they won't lose scholarships, team positions, or be forced out of the dorms. Upon starting their next rotation, you'll get the option to re-enroll, and you can safely continue their next semester without consequence. I've played a few rotations using this method, and it has worked beautifully so far, so hopefully they won't break it with the next big patch. :lol:
Is this still how you play university, Heather? I'm planning to have some sims enroll in university in a couple of rotations time and I'm trying to mentally prepare myself :lol: I really haven't played with university all that much!
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Re: Rotational Gameplay Tips

Post by Heather »

Yes, and the method still works a charm!

I have noticed it works best when your term start date is on a day of the week like Tuesdays (so have them enroll the day before on Monday) because it won't end until the next Monday rolls around, I think if you enroll during the weekend/Sunday, your term runs Monday-Friday and you may be forced to re-enroll on the Friday, which will mean you lose out on the chance to play through the entire weekend. I play my rotations Monday 6pm - next Monday 6pm for this reason. :lol:
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Re: Rotational Gameplay Tips

Post by Heather »

Okay I'm double posting here, but I shared some of my new age spans with Sam on my story thread, and figured I could share them here as well now that we've gotten a new lifestage!

Infants: 2 weeks - Honestly if I am trying to devote any playtime at all to the parents, the default span is simply not enough time to hit some of the bigger milestones! I have still yet to hit every single on in a two week span unless I am entirely ignoring having the adults work on skills/hobbies/career, but 2 weeks is just right for getting them to the crawling and standing stage. I also like to give them simple onesie outfits for the first week, and switch them over to some more detailed clothes for the second week, just for my own immersion, haha.

Toddlers: 2 weeks - With the added milestones for toddlers I've been trying to max out all of their toddler skills, and adding an extra week gives me more time outside of skilling to take them on cute little outings with parents, and again, devote some attention to letting those parents focus on things besides raising the toddlers! Works particularly well if you have an infant in the house with a toddler, so you can prioritize the infant first, and not run out of time to skill up your tot.

Children: 3 weeks - This may seem excessive, because most of their aspirations can easily be done in a week. However, giving them an extra week in my game means they get to experience one more season, and I can pick a week to give them a spring/summer/winter break off school and just enjoy some family time/social activities.

Teens: 3 weeks - I have found certain aspiration goals are weirdly ordered (like how you can miss hitting the career day goal if your sim hasn't turned in 5 days of homework yet, forcing you to wait until it pops up again!), which can lock you out of finishing the rest of the aspiration in a timely manner, so sometimes that extra week is extremely necessary! Like with my kids, I'll probably pick a week to give them a break off school, and my active school day visits will be limited to 2-3 a week.

Young Adults - Elders ??? - I turn my aging off at this point, and then manually decide when they're ready to enter adulthood. This is mostly because my default skin adds wrinkles to this stage, so I base my decision on when I think they're ready for those wrinkles. :lol:

I also like to give my university students a 2 credit course load, which means their uni experience takes them about six weeks, but for me this really gives them enough time to have a social life and participate in clubs, or hold jobs outside of classes. With six weeks of their young adulthood devoted to uni though, I need to give them quite a long age span for starting careers and raising families, so I'd say roughly 20 weeks (6 for uni 10-14 to raise kids) if I were to give a more specific number.

As for adulthood, I like to keep my sims with families as adults until their young adult kids have finished with university themselves (or the equivalent time length if they didn't go to uni). The reason being, I'm a post-grad adult myself and I definitely do not think of my parents as elders yet!
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Re: Rotational Gameplay Tips

Post by Sam »

Heather wrote: May 31st, 2023, 7:22 pm I have noticed it works best when your term start date is on a day of the week like Tuesdays (so have them enroll the day before on Monday) because it won't end until the next Monday rolls around, I think if you enroll during the weekend/Sunday, your term runs Monday-Friday and you may be forced to re-enroll on the Friday, which will mean you lose out on the chance to play through the entire weekend. I play my rotations Monday 6pm - next Monday 6pm for this reason. :lol:
I'd been toying with the idea of moving my rotations Monday to Monday starting in Autumn 4 anyway, to give my families a weekend rather than the weekend book-ending the rotation week, so this gives me more incentive to do that :lol:

Heather wrote: May 31st, 2023, 7:22 pmI also like to give them simple onesie outfits for the first week, and switch them over to some more detailed clothes for the second week, just for my own immersion, haha.
This is such a cute idea, I love it :heart:


I love hearing how you're working the ages in depth! I agree that some of the teen stuff happens in a funky order, I've only managed to finish a teen aspiration once so far! I also only follow teenagers to school 2-3 times a week - I've still ended up with a few graduating early - and they only go to prom if they have a date, generally. You get kind of sick of playing through prom after a while :lol:

With university, I'm planning to do 2 credits a week so that my sims can have more of a balance between school work & life stuff. Because I do play with the EA ages (it's set on normal) I'm probably going to download a mod that reduces the number of credits needed to graduate - otherwise it would take 6 weeks to graduate and that would take my sims through YA entirely and into adulthood. I'm kind of excited to try and fit university play into my game again after having my disastrous first attempt with Max and Taeko (got overwhelmed and bored -> had them drop out)

With adulthood, I think it kind of makes sense that it's longer now. You spend more of your life as an adult rather than a young adult, right? But I also don't add wrinkles etc straightaway. Often my sims will get a minor makeover around their adult birthday - a new haircut, or glasses, or an outfit change - but I don't add wrinkles, greying hair etc until they're roughly midway through adulthood. Adulthood is such a long stage now it helps add to the feeling that time is passing.


In terms of things I've learned going from generation 2 into generation 3, I think I may have had generation 2 settle down a little too quickly. A lot of the generation had weddings & babies really young, which I think looking back on it I'd rather they'd have spent that time living their own lives for a bit. So I think I'm going to try & do that a bit more now that the oldest sims of generation 3 are approaching young adulthood. I want to have more groups of friends living together going forwards, too - not just to keep down the size of the rotations, but also because most people don't move out of their parents home straight into a detached house with a wife, a dog and a few kids.

I'm also considering randomising the rotation order each season after I finish playing Summer 4, but I'm not sure if I will or not yet. I'll have 12 households come Autumn 4, and I think it would be nice to switch up the order a little bit. I feel like I start to run out of enthusiasm for the season/weather/holidays by the end of the rotation, which means the last few families always miss out because I'm eager to get onto the next season. Randomising the order would also change up which families get which festivals, holidays, etc. But I don't know if I'll make this change just yet.

And I still have no idea how to go about population control :lol:
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Re: Rotational Gameplay Tips

Post by ciyrose »

Heather wrote: May 31st, 2023, 7:22 pm Yes, and the method still works a charm!

I have noticed it works best when your term start date is on a day of the week like Tuesdays (so have them enroll the day before on Monday) because it won't end until the next Monday rolls around, I think if you enroll during the weekend/Sunday, your term runs Monday-Friday and you may be forced to re-enroll on the Friday, which will mean you lose out on the chance to play through the entire weekend. I play my rotations Monday 6pm - next Monday 6pm for this reason. :lol:
I fully need to remember this is the case because I had one of my sims, luckily it was just for something to do, enroll in some uni classes and of course, when we switched households he failed that term. I suppose this is also easier if you have your sims living on campus (or with other uni students.) Since I play 2 sim weeks per family (to ensure I get all the festivals) I'll have to play around with it and decide how I want to handle it.
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