More Awesome Than You!

I'm wondering what is wrong with the kitchens I build.  As shown in this image, when a butler or nanny tries to prepare food they start to prepare it, then turn around and stomp their feet with this thought bubble above their heads.  They then walk away, leaving half-prepared food on the counter to go off.  I suck at building, which is probably why I can't see what is wrong with the kitchen design.  Playables don't do it - they have no problem using the kitchen, whether I am running FEY/macrotastics or not.

(http://i239.photobucket.com/albums/ff46/Kyna62/kitchenproblem.jpg)

Nope, can't see any problem with that layout. The Butler appears to think he cannot use the bench.  :-\

Force an error right as he does the stomp and attach the log.

I've been having this problem for a few years with nannies, always assumed it was a nanny problem.

During the first few weeks of AL release I played BDC, and the de Bateaus had a butler in their penthouse apartment - that butler had no problem with preparing food.  This is why I assumed it must be a problem with my kitchen designs, rather than the NPCs.  The butler worked in a pre-made kitchen, but not in a kitchen I built or in similar designed kitchens in downloaded houses - i.e. fridge on left, stove on right, one counter between them and no blender.

Hoping this log was caught at the right time.

I also experience this sometimes.  At first I thought that it was from cc cabinets that I downloaded, but it has happened even after removal.  Not always, and not just for the butler. 

It seems to be the same thing happening when I click on teen/child to "do homework" that is sitting on a desk.  They can only get the homework if it is on the floor or placed on a desk/table with chair directly in front of the homework.  So my One Desk is not useful right now in many households.

Looks like your butler's just a spaz, Kyna. I don't see anything wrong with the layout either.

We're gonna have to troubleshoot this live in grah, so I can set a bunch of breaks and see where it trips.

I have had that problem before and it ended up being a kickybag stuck underneath it.  I think it was the same thought bubble too, but I haven't seen it in a while as I have gotten a hack to eliminate it.

I have this since BV. I once made them selectable to see the problem, it is their checks that make them do that. I am not tech savvy so I don't know proper names, but it happens with playables from time to time.  If a playable autonomously start to fix food and it is close to time to go to work, when the que to go to work come up, they will stomp as something is in the way, but there is nothing. It think is EAxis coding phail. Your kitchen is okay Kyna.

Trips? *looks about for a pile of artfully placed rakes*

I get that every single time the cook action is canceled with all sims since BV. Butlers and nannies auto queuestomp, so they do it a lot.

Yes. All my sims do it too. You cancel the cooking, they put down the tray and then stomp and complain that they couldn't put down the tray. If the butlers or nanny's are being queue stomped by something else they may just be acting out this bit of eaxis stupidity the same as other Sims do, so it's an effect not a cause.

I can confirm this; I'd actually been doing some tests on it for a while. This post basically sums it up.

Heh, I've gotten the same image several times. Unable to figure out the problem, I finally assumed my counters were too 'cheap'.  :P

Although I was hoping it was something simple that could be fixed by better kitchen design, I am somewhat reassured to learn from all the responses that this isn't a Stupid Kyna problem.  Just typical EAxis stupidity.

I noticed that it does seem to occur at the point at which I expect the sim to reach into the cupboard and pull out some utensil.  I had assumed there was some kind of problem with NPCs accessing the counter that they were standing right in front of, although playables that are directed to cook can access the counter with no problems.


Faafy if your tests result in a solution, I'd be interested to hear it.

Unfortunately, the only one I've come up with so far is "Don't interrupt Sims while cooking".

My teens/children do the exact same thing, though I haven't noticed the kitchen problem -- but they are so similar that it makes me wonder if they are related.  The One Desk is useful only in that it causes 12s and 6s to place their homework on the floor nearby.  On coming home from school, the 6 or 12 will place the homework on the half of the desk where the chair isn't in front, but when instructed to do said homework, complain they can't get it.  They will not put it on the half of the desk where the chair is, even if you block the other half of the desk with a lamp or other object, but will instead put it on the floor.  I have yet to try this with Young Adults at Uni, which would require cancelling the action while they're in the middle of an assignment, picking up the assignment and putting it on one or the other half of the desk, and instructing them to continue doing the assignment.  I may try these things with a 6/12/YA and see if I can generate an error log.  Also I believe Inge has made some interesting desks/tables with assignable homework spots that may solve the problem.

I realize this is not directly related, and I apologize.  :)  If I get an error log with the desk thing and it doesn't appear to be due to tight pants, I'll post about it in an appropriate spot rather than in this thread.

Is there a space on the right side of the desk?  If the right side of the desk is next to a wall or furniture/decorative object (such as a plant), the kids can't put anything on the desk.

Back to my kitchen/butler problem, I used Inge's cat to make the butler selectable when he started preparing food.  I noticed "empty potty" came up in his queue, so I cancelled the "empty potty" task, and he finished cooking.  YAYzors, no half-prepared food left to rot on the kitchen counter.  Once he'd done cooking, I made him unselectable again.  I used Inge's cat rather than using debug mode's "make selectable" as Inge's cat doesn't turn off the NPC code.

Very true, but the problem is that once the kid puts the homework on the left side of the desk (which in my experience they do unless there is a lamp or something there), they complain they can't get it.  This appears to be the problem Bliss was noticing also.

I just checked this with debug mode on and got error logs, so I'll post them in another thread.  I have a feeling that this is only a bug in the sense of being something Maxis overlooked.  But I will stop hijacking this thread since I think I'm in danger of being macroed.  I am certain I'm on the verge of getting the pancake/bunny one at least.  :-\