Sul sul, everybody.My daughter and I have been playing TS4 for about a year and a half now. We've almost always focused on one household, usually only one Sim. But our current favorite save has several intriguing characters, and we're thinking about giving some simple rotational play a try. We don't think we want to maintain a set schedule; we'll just switch households when we feel like switching. We're curious about what will happen to our other played households when we rotate away from them. 1. Will Sims with jobs continue to go to work and earn Simoleons? I know what happens when I move to a new household while a Sim should be at work--I see a warning about the Sim being late for work. If we don't visit a working Sim at all during their work day, will they report to their job and do their thing?2. Will students attend their classes, either at Foxbury/UBrite or the high school? I'd hate to see a Sim flunk out while I was away from them. 3. Will Sims tend their plants and gardens while we rotate away from them? One of our Sims has a very lucrative side hustle, growing Birds of Paradise. Will she harvest them while we're away from her? (I'm thinking "no," because Sims have several choices about what to do with the flowers they harvest...sell or keep). 4. How likely are Sims to start romances on their own? I've seen them develop acquaintances before, but I've never seen a Sim get a pink romance bar while I was away...even if I caught them flirting at the Romance Festival. We have no problem using mods to end unwanted romantic collections.I'll apologize if the answers to these questions are somewhere on the forum, buried deep below the surface. Thanks, in advance!

1. They don't go earn simoleons or go up or down in work performance, but under some circumstances they aren't available to socialize with the sim you're playing during their working hours.2. They don't go up or down in grade school or high school performance. That's essentially paused. University students on the other hand can do poorly when unplayed, so I prefer either to rotate away from university students on the last day of class after all work is in but before the grades are posted, or else click "no" on the re-enrollment prompt right after grades are posted and then re-enroll them the next time I play them. I like weeklong rotations partly for this reason.3. Nothing happens on lots that aren't the lot you're playing on.4. I think they can, a little bit, but for me so far either the pink bar fades before I rotate back to them or else it never existed.

@mightysprite Thank you so much for taking the time to answer my questions. 1. I'm just fine with working Sims not being available to socialize when they should be working. I've seen too many Sims who should be working or at school at the gym, the park, or the café. Is the same thing true for careers that can be active? I have a Sim who's a Doctor, and I hope his career "freezes" and doesn't suffer when I'm not playing him.2. I thought university students needed to be played actively in order to succeed. I'll have to be careful about rotating a student Sim.3. That's good news. I might swing by in the morning and have the gardener Sim pick her flowers on days when I'm not playing her actively.4. As long as the Sims don't ruin their relationships, angering their significant others by flirting or, worse, making nooboos...

1. Yay! And yes, the active careers do freeze in the same way.2. Right, that's what I mean. I prefer to rotate away before they have a chance to enroll in a new term, so they don't have a chance to go through a new term without me.3. Yay! 4. Oh they can anger their SOs by flirting. It creates that "furious about cheating" sentiment. It happened one time with the Pancakes when I invited them both to a party. I don't even play the Pancakes. Something or other happened at the party and all I saw was the sentiment thought bubble pop up over them. I can say that I haven't noticed that kind of thing happening very often. It would make my large rotational game pretty complicated if it did.

Rotating away from student sims is fine if you do it on Fridays after 5 pm, before they are prompted to sign in for the next term. Then they dont loose any progress while you're away.

Nothing happens in the other households, per se. You may see them walking by the active lot, from time to time. (I always found that fun to see Sims I've created walk by.) I know you can invite them to the active household for an Event, if you wish.No. They don't go to work.No. They don't attend classes, either. They just aren't at a complete standstill as they were in Sims2. Back then, since there was no story progression — at all, when you returned to the other household, you would find your Sims just as you left them. This part I miss.

What happens when I rotate away?

mightyspritesims
Seasoned Hotshot
2 years ago
1. They don't go earn simoleons or go up or down in work performance, but under some circumstances they aren't available to socialize with the sim you're playing during their working hours.
2. They don't go up or down in grade school or high school performance. That's essentially paused. University students on the other hand can do poorly when unplayed, so I prefer either to rotate away from university students on the last day of class after all work is in but before the grades are posted, or else click "no" on the re-enrollment prompt right after grades are posted and then re-enroll them the next time I play them. I like weeklong rotations partly for this reason.
3. Nothing happens on lots that aren't the lot you're playing on.
4. I think they can, a little bit, but for me so far either the pink bar fades before I rotate back to them or else it never existed.
MoonlightGraham
New Scout
2 years ago
@mightysprite Thank you so much for taking the time to answer my questions.

1. I'm just fine with working Sims not being available to socialize when they should be working. I've seen too many Sims who should be working or at school at the gym, the park, or the café. Is the same thing true for careers that can be active? I have a Sim who's a Doctor, and I hope his career "freezes" and doesn't suffer when I'm not playing him.
2. I thought university students needed to be played actively in order to succeed. I'll have to be careful about rotating a student Sim.
3. That's good news. I might swing by in the morning and have the gardener Sim pick her flowers on days when I'm not playing her actively.
4. As long as the Sims don't ruin their relationships, angering their significant others by flirting or, worse, making nooboos...
mightyspritesims
Seasoned Hotshot
2 years ago
1. Yay! And yes, the active careers do freeze in the same way.
2. Right, that's what I mean. I prefer to rotate away before they have a chance to enroll in a new term, so they don't have a chance to go through a new term without me.
3. Yay!
4. Oh they can anger their SOs by flirting. It creates that "furious about cheating" sentiment. It happened one time with the Pancakes when I invited them both to a party. I don't even play the Pancakes. Something or other happened at the party and all I saw was the sentiment thought bubble pop up over them.
I can say that I haven't noticed that kind of thing happening very often. It would make my large rotational game pretty complicated if it did.
Gagea25
Hero
2 years ago
Rotating away from student sims is fine if you do it on Fridays after 5 pm, before they are prompted to sign in for the next term. Then they dont loose any progress while you're away.
GalacticGal
Seasoned Ace
2 years ago
Nothing happens in the other households, per se. You may see them walking by the active lot, from time to time. (I always found that fun to see Sims I've created walk by.) I know you can invite them to the active household for an Event, if you wish.
No. They don't go to work.
No. They don't attend classes, either. They just aren't at a complete standstill as they were in Sims2. Back then, since there was no story progression — at all, when you returned to the other household, you would find your Sims just as you left them. This part I miss.
Simmerville
Seasoned Ace
2 years ago
The family and their cash account will normally be as you left them. If staying away for a while, their relations might be randomized and they might lose friendship even with relatives not living in the household. Also, there might be non-logical changes to cash, I never managed to figure out what causes it. I've played on rotation forever, and I normally write down their cash value when leaving a household, then I can easily adjust the cas when I return. Most times it will not be needed, I suspect retirement pay for certain careers and butler service might cause it. Maybe royalty income as well.
MoonlightGraham
New Scout
2 years ago
@mightysprite @Gagea Thank you both for the advice. My University scholar is currently carrying a high GPA, so I'd hate to rotate away at the wrong time and hurt his progress.
BissenNess
Seasoned Veteran
2 years ago
"Simmerville;c-18211710" wrote:
The family and their cash account will normally be as you left them. If staying away for a while, their relations might be randomized and they might lose friendship even with relatives not living in the household. Also, there might be non-logical changes to cash, I never managed to figure out what causes it. I've played on rotation forever, and I normally write down their cash value when leaving a household, then I can easily adjust the cas when I return. Most times it will not be needed, I suspect retirement pay for certain careers and butler service might cause it. Maybe royalty income as well.

You don't think it's related to shopping or selling things while on a lot with the active sim? That's what I would suspect. For example, if you take the active sim to the park and the other sim that you rotated away from is there buying a burger at a food stall, maybe the cost of the burger is deducted from their household income.
Simmerville
Seasoned Ace
2 years ago
"Eleri;c-18211730" wrote:
"Simmerville;c-18211710" wrote:
The family and their cash account will normally be as you left them. If staying away for a while, their relations might be randomized and they might lose friendship even with relatives not living in the household. Also, there might be non-logical changes to cash, I never managed to figure out what causes it. I've played on rotation forever, and I normally write down their cash value when leaving a household, then I can easily adjust the cas when I return. Most times it will not be needed, I suspect retirement pay for certain careers and butler service might cause it. Maybe royalty income as well.

You don't think it's related to shopping or selling things while on a lot with the active sim? That's what I would suspect. For example, if you take the active sim to the park and the other sim that you rotated away from is there buying a burger at a food stall, maybe the cost of the burger is deducted from their household income.

Could be, but in worst cases the diff is in the tens of thousands... I think too much for spending on food stalls. Not sure how much a NPC sim can make from being the random seller at markets though, but could be that, too. I suspect it is more everyday stuff like getting certain income daily whether being played or not. In my book a novelist should receive royalties only on days being actively played, like most careers. My butlers charged on days when household not being played, resulting in cash account being zero when I returned, because the butler had charged a huge amount. I've learned to live with this though, taking notes and money cheats works for me :) (and I don't care a lot if cash is §15 wrong.
MoonlightGraham
New Scout
2 years ago
@GalacticGal Thanks for your suggestions! I missed TS2; it's the version I really never played. My sister had it, and I might have watched her play a bit, probably when I was home from college. I think I wish my Sims stayed right where I left them when I rotated away, too.

@Simmerville Thank you, too. It's good to hear from people for whom rotation is their natural play style. I don't plan on being away from my rotation Sims long enough for them to have their relationships break that badly. And, if they do, my daughter and I aren't averse to using mods to set things right again. And, with the money, I'm seeing the kinds of things @Eleri is talking about: petty cash being spent. None of my Sims have a butler; they're far from that level of affluence.