Grades in University

"EnkiSchmidt;c-17399811" wrote:
For mod users this one shows your sims' exact course performance: http://modthesims.info/d/637945/quickly-check-course-performance.html

The mod is incredibly helpful, but also left me confused, because skills didn't seem to have an impact at all during my testing. So, exactly the opposite of what my experience so far was.

Details under the spoiler:

Spoiler

- Turned out I was wrong about skills weighing in more than study effort, after all. In fact, during the first semester the skills didn’t seem to have an impact AT ALL. (I still have a hard time believing this, despite seeing the numbers)

Here are a few observations:

- Grades seem to follow real life scales, meaning at least 50% are required for a D (Numbers from my game: 61,9 = D-, 64,2 = D, 72,1 = C-).
That comes with downside of sims lingering in the F range for a long time and then shooting through the rest within a single lecture. As a result the grades are skewed towards the low or the high end, either Fs or A+s. This lines up with my experiences from playing blind.

- Sims can never lose study progress from not attending lectures, only gain it. That explains why missing the finals didn’t have an effect that one sims of mine who missed several lectures as well as the finals but finished with all A+s.

- I haven’t tested cheating yet. Getting caught at cheating SHOULD bring down the grade.

Studying from home, anybody? It’s possible:

- Homework is factored into course performance even if the sim does not attend the lecture.

- Term papers and presentations already add a small amount of course performance (2 pts. per quality stage) while being worked on, even if the paper never gets turned in.

- A single hour of study adds about 5 points to the performance.

- For presentations/term papers the quality levels add ~16/24/32 points regardless of skill. Variations from mood or traits may apply, but not from skills.

- Attending lecture base performance gain: ~16 pts.

- Homework done before lecture: + ~14 pts.

- Taking notes during lecture: + ~8 pts.

- Not attending lecture at all: +0 pts.

- In general performance during lectures can vary. I believe there is a random factor involved besides modifiers for mood and traits. The variance is greater for sims taking notes than for sims attending lectures normally, but not significant (+/- 5 points for taking notes compared +/- 1 point for attending normally).

- Not grades related, but perhaps of note: Sims in the same household with exactly the same major and classes have different schedules. That made my test semester a nightmare when two sims had their C2 class 8:00-9:25, but the other two had the exact same class 11:00-12:45.

- Those numbers apply to first semester students, all copies of the same sim.

- I didn’t finish a semester with my test group so far. Might be that skill rank gets factored in at the very end, after all.

Maybe this is helpful to some of you. Add or correct as needed, please!