Rotational players - how do you play?

I play with the premades. I do stay in a neighborhood and world until I've rotated through all the families. Usually I focus on one or two of them who will get the majority of my time that rotation. The others I might just check in on for a day or two.

I mostly play with aging off, but every now and then I play with it on for just the current family. I don't have any set amount of time, but I do stay for any pregnancies or a full college term.

I use a list and play through each household for one sim week, switching households on Fridays before 5pm.

Aging is on for current played household only, except for when I rotate back the first household on my list, then I also turn aging on for unplayed households for one sim week so the sims I never play with get a chance to catch up.

I have my seasons set to 4 weeks per season.

I have a huge irregular rotation. I play roughly 30 households or so and I play randomly whoever pleases me. I also prefer to spend longer times, let's say a couple of weeks, with one family at a time. I try to keep friends and relatives aging around the same speed, so that sometimes determines who I play (I have aging on for active household only). Sometimes I pop by to play households that aren't really part of the core rotation. My sims age very slowly, I still play sims that were born in 2016 (aging either on normal or long) but there's still sense of time passing and I really like that.

I play each household until that mini story arc is over whether that be a sim completes a degree, infants/toddlers age up, a specific goal I’ve set is achieved or I get bored and change household. I play with ageing off so sometimes the calendar also dictates which household I play

So many fantastic ways to play! I'm utterly impressed by the sheer work some of you put into this! I could never keep up with playing more than 30 different families (I'm confused at playing, potentially, 3-4).

It seems for me that every time I try to play rotationally I get sucked into one story arch and tend to stay there. I do still do what some of you do, however, and keep other family members and friends close by and play them occasionally (a day or so) whenever there is something important going on.

I am curious about the time you switch. Many of you talk about switching at 5pm or 6pm, why that time? I've always imagined that the best time would be to switch at 6am, right as they are set to wake up so that they don't miss work that day, but I might think about it all wrong. Is there a reason behind your chosen times?

A legacy is how I got into rotational play. I was playing the I'm A Lover Challenge, and I was in the same mindset as you.

As for how I rotate, I usually do weekly rotations when I have a smaller number of households. When the family tree starts to grow, I usually change my rotation to Sundays and Wednesdays of every week. So I play 2 households a week. This way I don't get overwhelmed with the amount of households and I also don't have time to get bored.

I also keep notes of what I was doing with each household. Many simmers use spreadsheets but I just use WordPad. I also have another document for all of the sims' stats (age, career, likes/dislikes, etc.).

I don't have a fixed schedule, I play randomly depending on my mood. I have many households and most of my households are connected to each other: they are family members, relatives or friends. My sims interact a lot with each other: they visit each other and spend time together in many places and in many occasions.

I currently play with aging off, but I definitely like my sims to age and see the children grow etc., but I like to age my sims manually when I think it's time for them to age.
I might, at some point, use the method for the unplayed "Townie-households" (which are not my households, belonging to my rotation) that I temporarily turn the aging on for unplayed households while having the aging on for active household only, so that other sims are aging as well. But sometimes I go to some of the unplayed households to age some sims manually, if they'll be - in some way - part of my played households' lives.

When I switch households, I usually like to switch in early morning, like 5am, to keep their work or school schedules under control.
In special situations, like when there is a pregnancy, I stay in the household until the baby is born; and also if my sim/sims are studying in university, I stay in the household until the current term is finished, but I might keep a little break in between and play other households, and then get back to the household of the university students, to let them start and continue another term, or if they are close to graduate: then stay until they graduate.

For me, playing rotational is the only way to play: I enjoy the variety, to play different households (all different types of households: single sims, couples, families with children, multigenerational families, friends living together, siblings, relatives etc.) and to play in different worlds (some of my households live in the same world, some live in different worlds but my sims are visiting other worlds whenever I feel like it).

I currently have four saves, all of them are rotational with many households that I'm playing in them.
Three of the saves are "normal, realistic" saves where I ignore all the occult stuff
(I only have aliens, spellcasters, mermaids + the paranormal pack -occults in my game, as I don't have the other occult packs).
One save is my "supernatural save" where I play also occult sims.

@JAL I actually switch around 5 a.m. It works best for me. That way most are not caught out of work or school. Baristas sometimes are a tad late, and criminals.

I play with aging on for active household only, and so play every household in every rotation but not in the same order every time. I do a combination of overplanning and acting on a whim. I have a spreadsheet where I track which holidays and festivals and moon phases are coming up in which week and plot out who I'll play each week based on those things. Then while I'm playing a rotation sometimes I will just be in the mood to play or not play a specific household and move things around on the fly.

I switch between 2 and 5 am because it doesn't interfere with any work schedules. It does usually throw off their eating and sleep schedules a little so their needs are wonky the first day. I play every household for one week. I haven't worked any university students into the rotation yet as I'm starting that with a certain generation that is just now starting high school.

Right now I'm at 24 households, building up to a max of 32 as new spares grow up and move out on their own. 32 would be exactly two of every season. I use MCCC for custom aging so that my sims age roughly two years every rotation so having two of each full season sounds like a good goal to work towards. It will take me IRL years to get there though as the oldest spares who could found a new household at this point are infants and I am doing good to get through four rotations in a year with my current schedule. The more households you add the longer it takes to get to all of them so they age really slowly these days.

I switch on Friday at one minute before six p.m. because that is the only time that does not conflict with university. University terms end Friday at 6 p.m. in my game. Switching before that time saves me the hassle of havin
g to reenroll my Sims when I play them again.