This issue is now supposed to be fixed.
Marking as solved for now but please, any feedback is welcome.
@I'coolspear wrote:It's a pity is is not working for you. Up until the December patch it was not a problem at all. Bars and barstaff were working "straight out of the box" as intended. In the most part anyway. I'm only assuming it's a problem related to the moveobjects cheat introduction because it is most certainly a problem with otherwise innocuous objects suddenly becoming a route block. The barstaff are throwing a route fail animation when they glitch, it was a logical deduction then that something is blocking their ability to function normally. And so began the process of elimination, to eventually find anything with a green footprint touching the bar area, even cieling lamps, could indeed be the route blocking culprit. In fourteen individual cases, namely all the bars in the two towns suffering the glitch, the removal of contacting objects returned the barstaff to normal service. That was more than just a coincidence. It was a clear resolution, albeit a workaround.
I tried to recreate your success by putting the bar in the middle of a lot totally by itself. Everything else required of a bar was a great distance away. Nothing even close to it at all. Still everyone just stands around waving and Bob Pancake doesn't serve them. It did use to work. Also, I don't get uniform on the mixologist and children frequent th bar. Since the game doesn't appear to even assign the mixologist role to the bartendar, its makes me thnk it is more complicated than route failure. Also note that sometmes it works if you order a drink by using the pie menu. It is the automonous sims trying to order drinks that does not work or if someone in your controlled sim party tries to automonously order drinks. People crowd around and wave their arms never getting served and money flying out of their pockets. Are you only testing it from the standpoint of making your sims order a drink?
Okay, the visiting children issue is its own separate problem. The idiot barstaff wandering off to dance rather than work is, again, its own separate issue. We've had that annoyance in every iteration of the Sims. It's somewhat of a "Tradition" now.
But yes, the problem with autonomous sims continually ordering drinks and getting none is very much connected to your own sim then having a similar problem. When you see the crowd failing to get drinks, order after order, that is exactly when you own sim will order, the money is taken, and the barstaff will attempt to serve. Notice how the barstaff will only attempt to serve your sim. All others, despite their endless demands, and the barstaff does not flinch. But with your sim the barstaff at least tries. They bend down, grab the mixer from below the bar, then go straight into the route fail animation, left hand raised and waving while holding the mixer. Then back to standing there doing nothing. In every instance when this occurs, I go straight into build/buy mode and start pruning away nearby objects. I DO NOT reset the barstaff. I DO NOT reset the bar. I DO NOT replace the bar with a new one. I have learned this can crash the game. I do however grab the bar and any connected counters and move them around, then place them right back where they were.. Then I simply prune away nearby objects and try to buy another drink. Eventually, and in every single case, the barstaff finally is able to serve my sim and all other autonomous sims. Even when I return to the bar on another day, it is working as it should. If and when, of course, when the idiot barstaff stop dancing and chatting and remember they are there to actaully work.
PS I always, always, always click on the bar to order drinks, and eventually, after enough objects are pruned away, it finally works.
