Wanting a harder game.. Which mods would you remove or add?

[KittKitt]

You don't really need to "get rid of" smart milk, it's an item you aren't required to purchase.

True that, and speaking back to the skills/intelligence == grades bit..  Meh.

In a way, it does sort of work like that, since really, it's the player who decides just how smart any given sim is.  If left to default maxian anti-logic, they're about as sharp as a spoon.  We direct them in order that they do show some minor signs of intelligence (or we use JM's awesome and shiny macros that just make the stupid sim do what we'd otherwise be micro-managing them to do in the first place).

Their skills do play some part however.  There's a hidden homework skill that comes into play to a degree, and of course personality traits can mean a large difference as well.  Take two sims.  Make one a pleasure or romance or whatever sim and let 'em be on the lazy but outgoing side.  Have the other a knowledge sim that leans towars a more active but introverted (shy) persona.

If you leave them completely alone, they'll both flunk out, granted.  But without going out of your way to fix things, you'll have an easier time of keeping good grades on the knowledge sim while still not letting them die out of sheer misery than the other.

Sure, it's not ideal, but it does play some part...  Though admittedly, a comprehensive mod similar to the romance mod that actually made sims autonomy reflect their likes and interests and skills and personas and whatnot would be very awesome and shiny indeed.  Frankly, I tend to think such a project would be incredibly daunting however, and possibly even impossible within the limitations of the hard code.

Good thing we have macrotastics. 

-Kitt

[J. M. Pescado]

Their skills do play some part however.  There's a hidden homework skill that comes into play to a degree

The homework skill isn't really hidden. If your sim has the "learned to study" memory, he has the homework skill and completes homeworks at twice the rate. Otherwise he doesn't. A CAS YA can acquire this skill only during the first semester, after which it becomes impossible to get.

and of course personality traits can mean a large difference as well.  Take two sims.  Make one a pleasure or romance or whatever sim and let 'em be on the lazy but outgoing side.  Have the other a knowledge sim that leans towars a more active but introverted (shy) persona.

If you leave them completely alone, they'll both flunk out, granted.  But without going out of your way to fix things, you'll have an easier time of keeping good grades on the knowledge sim while still not letting them die out of sheer misery than the other.

Well, that's obvious: Any active sim ALWAYS outperforms ANY lazy sim in basically any situation, simply because in order to take any action, you need energy, and you need to be able to get there. Since it takes a lazy sim several hours to reach a place an active sim can reach in only a few minutes, anything which requires that your sim go anywhere will take forever on any lazy sim. All other personality factor are nearly entirely irrelevant, active is the key to everything.

[KittKitt]

Aye.  True enough.

I wasn't aware of the exact mechanics of the homework skill, though admittedly my bits about other factors was probably a bit of a stretch.

Again... sims who actually behaved a bit more like their various scores and stats would be shiny, but getting them to do it in such an encompassing capacity would be incredibly daunting and time consuming to say the very least.

I'll stick to macrotastics rather than even dream of holding out for it. 

-Kitt

[Sagana]

If you leave them completely alone, they'll both flunk out, granted.

No they won't. Unless you put them in situations where they can't, or they're miserable all the time, they'll go to class, and going to class fills the meter up enough they won't just flunk out. They'll occasionally do homework autonomously too, so some of them will do decently. They just won't write their term papers, which doesn't really matter all that much unless you want good grades.

[jrd]

I have tested that before, and my Sims typically graduate Cum Laude or even Summa Cum Laude if left alone during uni, provided they have enough skills to fill the performance meter (which all my playables have due to the long child/teen skilling period).
The autonomous going to class and assignment making ensures a good grade, since nothing except bad interactions with professors or missing final exams will lower the grade.

Uni is absolutely no challenge. The only Sims of mine that flunk are those I play to do so.

[Avalikia]

I've always wanted a mod that halves the benefits of all grade increasing elements of Uni.  The amount of time and effort it takes my sims to completely fill their grade meter seems to be about the same amount of time I think they should realistically pass the class with, and filling it entirely would actually be hard on Sims that like to party, at least for me.

[jsalemi]

The homework skill isn't really hidden. If your sim has the "learned to study" memory, he has the homework skill and completes homeworks at twice the rate. Otherwise he doesn't. A CAS YA can acquire this skill only during the first semester, after which it becomes impossible to get.

I wasn't aware that CAS  YAs can develop the home work skill.  How is it done?  By asking for help with an assignment?  Or by having another sim tutor them?

[Avalikia]

Both of those work.  It takes 1 1/2 assignments with help for a YA to learn to study.

[jsalemi]

Cool!  I've learned something new.

[J. M. Pescado]

Note that this is normally only possible first semester, after which the option to try to get tutored disappears entirely.

[Fish Dude]

I thought the only time in which it disappears is when the person who offers to tutor has a lower GPA then the person whos being tutored.

[travellersside]

To be tutored, you need to have a lower GPA than your tutor does. Since you don't get a GPA until the end of your first semester, you can be tutored, no matter how well or badly you're doing. However, since you're almost certainly getting perfect scores, once the first semester is over, you can't find a tutor with a better GPA than you, therefore you can't be taught.
If you've got a GPA of 4 and you still want to be tutored, the only way would be if you didn't get a perfect score one semester (thus reducing your GPA below 4) and you are then eligible for tutoring. However, your GPA will now suck and you'll never graduate with top grades. Bad move - your sim will be forever relegated to second-class citizen status and all the other sims will laugh at him. Or something

[syberspunk]

I actually tried this today. I am wondering... would you be able to ask college profs for tutoring even if you still have a great GPA? I had never noticedt his before until recently. I could have sworn that, one time I clicked on a prof and it had a ask for tutoring option or what not. Or at least I thought so. I didn't think anything of it at the time.

However, last night, while I was playing, I called a prof over just for the heck of it and try it out, just to see what would happen. I clicked on the prof, but no option showed up. So... maybe I imagined it. But when I clicked on my assignment, the ask for help/be tutored option did show up. In my previous gameplay experience, before I rebooted my hood, I had never seen this option before. I guess this is because I had only done assignments usually via the College.../Do Assignment option or using influence. And I rarely ever needed to click on the assignment itself unless my sim stopped doing it because of a drop in their fun meter. This time, it was my sims first semester. When I get a chance, I'm going to check my other sims who have progressed further.

Quick question tho... this memory is basically the same as the learned how to study memory right? So... I guess sims who started in the regular hood wouldn't get a second memory of it if they already had it? And... does being tutored increase the speed of doing an assignment as it does with homework?

Ste

[Fish Dude]

So... I guess sims who started in the regular hood wouldn't get a second memory of it if they already had it?

Nope, you cant learn to study twice  (Unless you forget....but thats just weird)

And... does being tutored increase the speed of doing an assignment as it does with homework?

I think so, but all of my sims learn to study, so i dont notice a difference.

[Sagana]

I thought the sim tutoring just had to be higher grade than the one being tutored. Or if they aren't higher, then maybe a better student? I dunno, usually only my playables tutor someone else and they tend to have good grades, so maybe I just didn't realize. I've never bothered to set a knowledge sim up going to the library and getting money to tutor the townies, but it could be a fun thing to do.

Also some things work differently/better if they're in the same major - I didn't realize for the longest time that research together was different if they're in the same major and they can have conversations about it and stuff.

Yes learning to study is exactly the same for kids, teens, and young adults and the faster work rate is the same. It's the same memory and you can't get it twice.

[J. M. Pescado]

I thought the sim tutoring just had to be higher grade than the one being tutored. Or if they aren't higher, then maybe a better student?

They have to have a better GPA, and the tutoring option is completely unavailable if the learn-ee already has max GPA, both explicitly, and because you obviously can't get better than a perfect score. But since you ALWAYS get one, unless you deliberately shoot yourself in the foot, for all practical purposes, it can't happen after first semester.

[KevinTMC]

It's news to me that asking a professor for tutoring might actually accomplish anything. I tried it for the first time recently; tutoring item came up in the queue, it seemed to be executed when my sim talked to the professor and professor seemed pleased...and that was it. I just wrote it off as a socializing interaction, another way of buttering up the faculty.

Mmm...butter...

[seelindarun]

It's news to me that asking a professor for tutoring might actually accomplish anything. I tried it for the first time recently; tutoring item came up in the queue, it seemed to be executed when my sim talked to the professor and professor seemed pleased...and that was it. I just wrote it off as a socializing interaction, another way of buttering up the faculty.

Mmm...butter...

I think that clicking on a prof to ask for tutoring is different from asking to be tutored on an assignment.  Clicking on the prof gives a small boost to the grade meter, which I use sometimes if their relationship is already maxed, but the meter isn't full.  Normally, my popularity and romance sims fill up their grade meters as much as they can by socialising with their profs first.

Matter of fact, even woohooing the prof doesn't boost the meter much if they already have a great relationship.  Is it supposed to be this way?