Rotational Play and University

"83bienchen;c-17358929" wrote:
I've tried for several students and the grades remained the same. I do it a bit different than starcrunch though.
I just enroll the current household Sim(s) on Friday evening as soon as I start to play with the household. They then actively do their term which starts on Monday. Shortly before it finishes (4.59 pm), I save.
I then stay for another hour (6 p.m.) to see their grades, but do not save again. Instead I go to manage worlds without saving (--- This step can of course be skipped if your not too curious to see the grades ---)
and then rotate to the next household. When I come back in the next rotation, the Sim can just start the next term, nothing is lost, they don't have to leave their dorm (if they live in one) and keep their scholarship.
That way, I play all my university Sims actively and control their grades.

Thanks for answering that. It's very interesting.

"83bienchen;c-17358929" wrote:
I've tried for several students and the grades remained the same. I do it a bit different than starcrunch though.
I just enroll the current household Sim(s) on Friday evening as soon as I start to play with the household. They then actively do their term which starts on Monday. Shortly before it finishes (4.59 pm), I save.
I then stay for another hour (6 p.m.) to see their grades, but do not save again. Instead I go to manage worlds without saving (--- This step can of course be skipped if your not too curious to see the grades ---)
and then rotate to the next household. When I come back in the next rotation, the Sim can just start the next term, nothing is lost, they don't have to leave their dorm (if they live in one) and keep their scholarship.
That way, I play all my university Sims actively and control their grades.

Thank you for the clarification. I think the biggest change will be to move my rotation from Monday's at 2 AM to the Friday at 4:59 PM. What happens if you do go over the 4:59 PM time? I'm guessing this is something you have to watch carefully.

"83bienchen;c-17358929" wrote:
I've tried for several students and the grades remained the same. I do it a bit different than starcrunch though.
I just enroll the current household Sim(s) on Friday evening as soon as I start to play with the household. They then actively do their term which starts on Monday. Shortly before it finishes (4.59 pm), I save.
I then stay for another hour (6 p.m.) to see their grades, but do not save again. Instead I go to manage worlds without saving (--- This step can of course be skipped if you're not too curious to see the grades ---)
and then rotate to the next household. When I come back in the next rotation, the Sim can just start the next term, nothing is lost, they don't have to leave their dorm (if they live in one) and keep their scholarship.
That way, I play all my university Sims actively and control their grades.

Not sure we're doing it differently, this is what I do too. Save about 4 or 5 pm see the grades but don't save, and then rotate away is how I do it, though I don't really think seeing the grades changes anything so I doubt it's necessary. Didn't realize it was always 6 pm though - it always has been but I wasn't sure if that was universal.

So, I started playing rotationally shortly before getting DU and just continued playing and learned a lot.

I have continued to switch households between 12 and 6 am on Sundays and I even have my families labeled so that I rotate through them in order. This means that my sims at the university have waited 5 or 6 weeks for me to return to them. I have put about 3 sims through university in this way.

By the time I leave them, they just need to take the final exams on Monday, but I have completed all other course work. All of them have grades of a B or higher. They stay in the dorms until I come back to them and I either get the prompt to re-enroll immediately or to move them out. I have had one sim finish two terms and them enrolled another sim and moved them into the same dorm. When I played, I got the prompt to enroll them both and continued as usual.

Playing this way, however, means I don't see their grades for each class, just an overall grade. And I miss their graduation. Which is fine, I mostly send them to Uni for the storyline and career boost anyway. But from what I am reading switching to a 6pm Friday rotation would correct that for me?

My biggest annoyance is that my sims usually find a spouse while attending university and while those NPCs show as graduated, they do not have the trait. I have had to use Carl's cheat guide to correct that, in the future, I'll try adding them to the household so that both spouses have the skills and traits that come from attending university.

Anyway, hope I added something helpful to the convo!

I am not a big fan of the way any of this works, but one silver lining I have found is that even when students don't re-enroll immediately, you continue to see them around campus.

For example, I started by playing the Best Friends household for one term to test things out. After that term, they did not re-enroll and I moved them out (not into a house, just into the households bin... and I unchecked the heart, so they are in "other households"). Yet as I have played other Sims at Britechester, I continue to see them around campus from time to time... particularly Becca, who even participates in the debate events.

One thing I'm planning to test soon is whether editing sims in CAS is sufficient to make them "played sims" for purposes of pausing their degree progression. CAS edits, even just changing an outfit, always moves them into "my households" and even if I move them back into "other households," in the past this has at least always been enough to keep them from being culled. So I'm skeptical, but it would be nice if it would make the game consider them "played" for this purpose. Fingers crossed!

"starcrunch;c-17359453" wrote:

"83bienchen;c-17358929" wrote:

I then stay for another hour (6 p.m.) to see their grades, but do not save again. Instead I go to manage worlds without saving (--- This step can of course be skipped if you're not too curious to see the grades ---)

Not sure we're doing it differently, this is what I do too. Save about 4 or 5 pm see the grades but don't save, and then rotate away is how I do it, though I don't really think seeing the grades changes anything so I doubt it's necessary. Didn't realize it was always 6 pm though - it always has been but I wasn't sure if that was universal.

As I said, seing the grades is not neccessary. I wasn't sure whether you did it the same way as I do it. You explanation sounded a bit more complicated.

@tehemamma: If you switch households at 6 pm Friday you will still miss the graduation ceremony, which takes place on Saturdays. Also there's a problem with dorms and scholarships when you rotate at 6 pm.

"83bienchen;c-17360347" wrote:

"starcrunch;c-17359453" wrote:

"83bienchen;c-17358929" wrote:

I then stay for another hour (6 p.m.) to see their grades, but do not save again. Instead I go to manage worlds without saving (--- This step can of course be skipped if you're not too curious to see the grades ---)

Not sure we're doing it differently, this is what I do too. Save about 4 or 5 pm see the grades but don't save, and then rotate away is how I do it, though I don't really think seeing the grades changes anything so I doubt it's necessary. Didn't realize it was always 6 pm though - it always has been but I wasn't sure if that was universal.

As I said, seing the grades is not neccessary. I wasn't sure whether you did it the same way as I do it. You explanation sounded a bit more complicated.

@tehemamma: If you switch households at 6 pm Friday you will still miss the graduation ceremony, which takes place on Saturdays. Also there's a problem with dorms and scholarships when you rotate at 6 pm.

No worries it's my fault for not explaining it well, but what I was trying to say was basically the same system!

Also thanks for making your mods - I use quite a few of them in my game!