More Awesome Than You!

Recently I have become very annoyed by this thing, I don't know if it's a bug or something. I also don't know if it's a problem caused by another hack, but I don't think I have any hacks affecting toddlers. I would like to know if anyone else has been experiencing this. I think this has become especially bad since nightlife and/or its patch, before that I haven't noticed it that much.

So, I'll try to explain my problem.. when a toddler is tired and gets put into a crib, very often an adult or teen in the household will come and take the toddler out of the crib again, although their energy is very low. Then I tell them to put the toddler back into the crib and when they do that someone else comes and gets the toddler out again. This drives me mad, especially since the action can't be cancelled. Whenever I cancel the action to get a toddler out of the crib, the sim just stands there for a while and eventually takes the toddler out anyway. This way, it can last for hours until a toddler finally gets to sleep and valuable play time has gone to waste.

I'm starting to hate toddlers for that reason although they are so cute and I like to let my sims have many children. Unfortunately, the moveobjects cheat also doesn't work here, whenever I use that to put a toddler into a crib they just reappear on the floor.

When a toddler is getting tired direct one sim to pick it up, go through each household member and cancel any actions they have auto-cued to do with the toddler.  Once your toddler is actually in someones arms no-one else can pick him up, and that should stop them taking it back out of the crib. They take it out of the crib because they'd already cued the 'put in crib' action, so as soon as the toddler is selectable for them they take it back out - stupid sims  ::)

thanks, but I've tried that. I go through every sim, cancel the toddler action and tell them to do something else to keep them occupied, but somehow they still go and take the toddler out afterwards. I have also noticed that sometimes the toddler doesn't go to sleep immediately but stands in the crib and cries for a while before he starts sleeping, and that's probably why the other sims go and get him out because they think he is awake.

And this monitoring is also very annoying, I have to go through all household sims again and again before the toddler finally sleeps and that can last for many sim hours.

stupid sims, indeed.. I wish at least the action was cancellable, that would make it much easier.

I have to agree it seems worse after NL. Or maybe it just seems that way to me because I still haven't installed the hacks that I used to have for stopping this behavior. They did it enough in TS2 and TS2Uni that I definitely wanted those hacks installed.

There is a hack in the Global Patches section at http://simlogical.com/ which pretty much makes most baby care non-autonomous (means sims can't do anything without your command). It is for NL.

JM's nobabyharassment just curbs the unnecessary actions, but it hasn't been specifically updated for NL. It's on the list of hacks that are being updated and will be released eventually. This is why I'm currently hackless. Waiting for this great hack to be updated. It was definitely a must-have before NL, and I'm hoping it will be released soon to stop the madness.

I'm sure you're right and it's buggy.  There's a couple of thiings that could be going on though.  One is that they are tryiing to age transition the baby and the other is that the baby is also hungry and they want to go feed it.  I've cancelled out the first one pretty regularly.... Ooooops

Is there anything in the room the toddler sleeps in that might be keeping him awake?  Perhaps a musical toddler toy or talking rabbit that is being played with, a stereo, excersise machine, t.v...basically anything that makes a noise?  A cellphone or normal housephone ringing in the same room willl do it, as will the doorbell.  You can get a hack here at MATY to stop the doorbell waking up sims though I'm not sure if it's NL compatible.

cwykes has a couple of really good points there too.

Yes, it does work with nightlife :)

Oh yes, I remember using the nobabyharassment before nightlife, I hope it will be updated sometime.

Thanks for the simlogical-link, I might try that hack in the meantime :)

No, I don't think so.. usually I put just a crib and a changing table into their rooms. And the doorbell isn't ringing all the time.

This is what I'm doing until the NoBabyHarrassment hack is updated:

Once you get the kid into the crib, use moveobjects on and put a two-tile object in front of the crib. I recommend having a hack in place that keeps them from throwing a hissy fit when they can't get to the kid to wake him up and hold him.

Simlogical.com has a hacked crib that has an option to lock the kid in so that no one can get it out. I use that sometimes. It's a bit more hassle than I like, since you have to change the settings pretty often, but it works nicely. It's under Reservable Objects if you want it.

I think that the way babies and toddlers work is buggy in general. Pescado has explained in the past, and I'll try and paraphrase, hoping that my understanding is correct. :P Basically, the way baby/toddler needs are advertised, it seems is that whatever need is urgent, the Sim with that similar need seems to get called over. So... if a baby needs to pee, unfortunately, the Sim who needs to relieve their bladder the most is the one that gets "called" over to get the baby out of the crib. In your case, I'm guessing the toddler is really tired, and so your really tired Sims are incorrectly being told to get the toddler, as if they could actually do something to satisfy the toddler's needs. When, in reality, the toddler should just be left in the crib to pass out on its own. ::)

I could be totally wrong about how I've interpreted Pescado's statements. I found the whole mess to be confusing altogether, and I don't quite understand how motives are advertised by objects anyway, but that seems to make sense to me. The way I understand it, objects advertise or "broadcast" to sims what kind of need they are supposed to satisfy or take care of. So a bed would "broadcast" to a sim that it would help with low energy. Since everything in the game is essentially an object, even sims themselves, maybe the baby/toddlers are "broadcasting" in a similar way. Only, when they do this, sims "think" that this object (the baby or toddler) is supposed to satisfy their needs. As a result, it has a sort of backasswards effect on them. ::)

Ste

I've had this happen too and like syberpunk says, I just figured the toddlers have always been buggish and annoying in general so I didn't think anything of it. It is annoying though. :P

Happens to me all the time, and it is really annoying. I did find that having only one cot on the site helps (I used to have two because all that taking them upstairs or leaving the infant on the floor pissed me off even more) so this behaviour is a little better. Stupid simmies... ::)

The only time I've had this happen was with a custom crib. It was like the Sims didn't recognize the crib and kept taking the baby out and putting him on the floor.

I've had a lot of multiple births, and regardless of what I cancelled, the stupid parents would (try to) spend hours putting them in and out of each crib. It did seem much worse with custom cribs but I find this drastically reduced just by using Inge's assignable cribs. (even giving parents 100% autonomy)

I find almost any teen or older Sim that's hanging out near a baby's room will get an urge to pull it out of it's crib, regardless of anyone's needs. This is why I also like to use Inge's locking doors. I usually assign the only key to whichever Sim is least interested and send them in only to drop the toddler in the crib, then queue them to do something in a far away room immediately after.

I wonder if the relationship the adult/teen has with the toddler has any bearing on how often they wish to pick them up.  In some of my families the teens have no interest in their younger siblings and in others,  a teen (who has lots of nice points and has a higher relationship with the sibling) will often go to the toddler.

For me, grandparents are the ones who most often try to get the toddlers (and infants), but as I play the pause button quite often, I can redirect them - usually to the bathroom which seems to always be a priority for elders.

On the other hand, if my toddlers aren't having smart milk or using the potty, they are building skills or sleeping, so they don't offer many opportunities for anyone to interrupt them and I've never had any adult/teen go to a toddler sleeping in a crib.

Isn't it funny that adult sims often go to cribs, wake up sleeping toddlers, just to do something not so important and put them back in? I think no baby harrassment hack or a targetable door system should handle it fine. In my case, what I think most annoying is the age transition from baby to toddler. It takes really long time and make mother sims completely exhausted.

I have JM Pescado's Baby Controller in my game.  It has a painless way of aging babies to toddlers. 

I've had this mod for so long now, I really can't remember what the transition used to be like.  I have vague memories of it failing, buying another cake, faliing again, repeat until it worked, then having to get a sim to clean up the undeletable cakes (back then I didn't really use move objects on a lot, this was back in the days when I thought move_objects on might turn my game into a BFBVFS).

I always have this prob when I use custom cribs.  I don't use them anymore.  I only use recolored Maxis cribs. 

Oh man..this is THE most annoying thing ever.  I need to look into those assignable cribs.  I once watched my sims drag a toddler from one crib to another for 6+ sim hours straight.  Everytime I went to go do something else with another sim they would go back and do it until the other twin was in the their crib as well.

Get the crib, run... it will only take one toddler for you to wonder how you played without it, and if you have twins or more, you will want to start worshipping her. The targettable doors are extraordinarily handy too, I've banned visitors from my nurseries. It's bad enough trying to cancel controllable sims, the last thing I need is some stupid co-worker removing the kid just as I've managed to get the family in line.

If you need more selling, you can also ban toddlers from bathrooms, stop those creepy kids who like to watch their parents woohoo, and of course, just keep everyone on the side of the door you've put them on.

I'm having this problem in my Legacy house. I've NEVER had a problem with elders and adults obsessing over babies and toddlers. But ever since NL, it's terrible. Two elders, two adults, two babies. The E/A have to be watched every second of the day, because even if the baby is newly fed, diapered and napped, the elders will try to take the baby out to feed it repeatedly. It's the same for toddlers- even if they're fed, pottied, bathed and have full fun and social and are napping, they'll try to take the toddler out to bathe it.

I can't even use Power Idle, because the second I turned it on for my elders, they beelined to the nursery and started harrassing the babies and toddlers.

I took out nobabyharrassment because in NL, the ability to talk to toddlers was lost, but I'm considering sticking it back in and losing that ability. I'm at my wits end!

Get the crib, run... it will only take one toddler for you to wonder how you played without it, and if you have twins or more, you will want to start worshipping her. The targettable doors are extraordinarily handy too, I've banned visitors from my nurseries. It's bad enough trying to cancel controllable sims, the last thing I need is some stupid co-worker removing the kid just as I've managed to get the family in line.

If you need more selling, you can also ban toddlers from bathrooms, stop those creepy kids who like to watch their parents woohoo, and of course, just keep everyone on the side of the door you've put them on.
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Downloaded the cribs! Relief at last.  Haven't tried the doors yet..might try those out in the future.  So far I can tolerate  that whole issue..but when the day comes where I can't..I know where to go :D

I've been using JM's baby controller and Inge's autonomous baby care hack with NL, and I haven't noticed them harassing the toddlers.  I was using JM's no baby harassment with Uni, but I took that out since it wasn't compatible yet.  But I tried playing without any baby hacks for a little while and I started going crazy with how much the adults kept wanting to feed the baby, play with the baby, feed the baby, bathe the baby, feed the baby.  Poor thing.  I heard that the baby controller was working in NL with a few minor issues and stuck it back in my hacks folder.  It works well with Inge's hack because the baby controller pushes actions as if you were issuing them instead of them being considered autonomous.

 :D This has only happend to me when thay are babys and ONLY once a toddler! :)

They search for cribs by guids... So probably sims may have some problem in recognizing custom cribs sometimes.. There is no category for cribs..

That's not possible, Power Idle is not programmed to do anything with babies. Sims on Power Idle operate under a rather restricted activity set consisting of eating, peeing, drinking coffee, sleeping, sitting, using the AutoYak, and kicking flamingos. They can't do anything else unless told to.

I'm afraid that's what happened. My elders are both Perma Plat and have maxed all their skills, so I'm at a loss as to what to do with them, and I thought Power Idle would let me stop worrying about them. I turned it on for both of them, and BAM, into the nursery they went.

PI works funny for me anyway. I tried it again last night (all the toddlers became kids, so there's no babies and toddlers to harrass anymore) with Robert, my elder male. Instead of fulfilling his needs, he sat alone at the kitchen table for hours, until his bladder and energy were both in desperate red. I finally had to cancel out PI and rush him to the toilet and bed- both of which were available all night, as everyone else was at work or skilling (or meditating).

Do you have the toilet paper and sleep clock installed and configured properly?

I dont use power Idle but I do use the toilet Paper in select houses and it works Great

Shoot, the TP. I'd heard it was buggy for NL so I haven't put it in, and I've never used the sleep clock, because I don't really understand it. Does it make your sim go to bed at a certain time? Because my sims never go to bed at the same time.

I still don't understand the problem with the baby obsession, but I guess I'll just forget about PI for now.

Power Idle depends on having certain items on your lot.  I have had no problems with using the TP with NL.  The only problem was that it wouldn't rotate, and JM fixed that soon after NL was released, even before he got the game.

As for the sleep clock, I was a little leary of it at first as it seemed a bit complicated, but it really isn't. I read the RTFM, and now I love it.  I don't have to find my sim's bed and send them to it when I want them to go to sleep.  They don't always go to sleep at the same time every night.  You set the time you want the sim to get UP, and then you set the bed type according to the manual (it is preconfigured for the double colonial bed).  Then set bedtime to ON, and the clock will automatically figure when to call your sim to bed based on how tired they are and what time they have to get up.  It will also keep your sim in bed until the desired wake time even if your sim's energy bar is full.  You can always wake them up manually, of course.

As you experienced, Power Idle depends on these things to know when and where to send your sim to the toilet or to bed.  Other things needed for PI to work properly are flamingoes or gnomes for kicking (fun) and at least 5 points in cooking, I believe, with stove and refrigerator, of course.  If your sim has a cell phone, and you have autoyakyak installed, he will use the phone to call his friends during the day if he has no other needs to be met.  That's it, I think.  I don't use it all the time, just when I want certain sims to sit out of the way and be quiet, unless they have skills to learn. :)

Other'n vampires, why would you want to do that? I feel about my sims sleeping, about the same way I do about sleep for myself - it's a huge waste of time so don't do any more of it than necessary and get out of bed and get to work, lazy things :)

I always queue up stuff for them to do when they get up... setting it right after they go to bed, so they'll get up and get started (and be where I can see them and NOT start making the bed or something dumb), and occasionally they go to sleep by themselves, and my queue wakes them up - which is annoying. Go back to bed and reset the list... bleh :p

But I've never wanted them NOT to get up. 'cept for maybe kids whose sleep schedule is off for school and even then... I'd just rather make them dance or something that makes them tired fast.

Well, one reason to keep them asleep until you want them to wake up is if you set them to get up right when the carpool comes, and you send them to bed platinum, then they will not lose their platinum mood before they go to work.  The aspiration meter doesn't decay while they are asleep.  This is what JM suggested, and I've found it works well.  Instead of getting them up to shower and eat, send them straight to work, and they'll get promoted even if their bars aren't all green when you send them to work.  If you don't send them to work platinum, it could take days to get promoted.

If you set the clock correctly, though, they won't be in bed for much longer than it takes them to get their energy filled up because it calculates how much sleep they need based on the type of bed and how tired they are.

I use  the toddler sleep through the night patch and I find that not only do my Toddlers sleep all night so do my new born's and the rest of the family as well. very im portant when you have 2 toddlers and 3 newborn's in one nursery .and 2 school age children that need to go to school in a good mood . Parents that have enough sleep are in a far better mood to deal with the needs of the Babies and toddlers and are less apt to neglect real needs of the little ones. I generally get my family of 16 in bed by 11:00 p.m. with toddler and infants being the first group put to bed around 8:30 p.m. for the night. school age children go next  after bath and bed time stories are read by the adults. they are in bed  by 9:15 p.m. . the next group I get ready to send to bed is the adults that have work the next morning. the last group I tend to is those who have a day off. the crib patch  has some how translated to all beds in the house. the entire family wakes at  6:00 a.m at which point 5 adults head for the nursery and 1 heads for the kitchen to fix breakfast. while the adult making breakfast is busy the nursery group is feeding babies and toddlers and changing diapers while toddlers use their potties. after babies are fed,changed,and played with and returned to cribs two adults remain to dress toddlers and snuggle and play a bit with the toddlers.the rest have gone to the dining room to eat. and by that time  carpoolers and school children have work and school to go to.I couldnt live without the toilet paer and the crib patch in my game along with the always full fridge patch and smart serve.

I don't think the crib patch will affect the regular beds, Bangelnuts.  Are you sure that the sims aren't being woken up spontaneously, or can they hear the toddlers and babies crying when they wake up?  If there isn't a door between them and the nursery, their crying will wake them.  I use the sleep clock, but if the baby is in the same room and wakes up at 6 am, so will the others sleeping in the same room.  Which is why I'll often build a little alcove just for the baby bed, so they don't wake everyone else up.  I've used this patch in my game for a while and played several houses, and everyone will stay sleeping past 6 am even after the toddler wakes up at 6 am. 

nope the nursery is an entirely separate room and my Adults and school kids all wake up at the same time as the babies and toddlers 6 a.m. it could have something to do with the fact that the house is asleep by 11:00 p.m. and no they cant hear the babies or toddlers. this is the only house  that has such a tight schedule. but with 16 people you have to set a bed time . that is workable

dang, I'da been bored with all that scheduling faster than it took you to type it. And this explains why I'm not playing a family of 16 :)

actually its not boring .this is my main family . this family is a lot of fun to play and soon will add #17 as My Sim Rainbow is pregnant in my Game. and is a member of this family she Married the Patriarch's oldest son Jamie.my Sim Brynne is Married to his  younger brother Justin and they Just had twin girls. Justin's Brother Josh and his wife had a girl just 2 hours after My Sim Brynne delivered her twins. Justin also has three sons at Uni so this is a very large family.I play with aging off and it takes  12 sim days before my babies Transition to toddler and  toddlers remain as toddlers in my game for 48 sim days before transitioning and 15  sim days as children.my one little toddler is 1 point away from maxing creativity on his toy xyllophone . he loves that toy. he has maxed his body skill as has his cousin Denise who shares the nursery with him and her newborn sister and newborn cousins. Denise  is still be taught her basic toddler skills but is already potty trained.Jordan has already learned all of his basic toddler skills. My Sim Parent's have great relationships with their kids by playing this way. and they also benefit by never having a nasty nanny and having lots of extended family around. and unlike some families my simm kids have young grandparents so no aching backs to complain about.

How can I have been playing for a year without noticing this!!!  I always get them up asap and get them busy!  I find 7am is a really good time to call friends and/or invite them over(!!!!)

How are you teaching toddlers body skills?  I got crib mobiles from various simmers, which did that, but I took them out because the skill gain was too easy - I don't like cheating

The crib mobiles are the only way that I know of for babies and toddlers to learn body skills.  Like you, I took mine out because it made it way too easy and took the fun out of it for me.  Besides, as Motoki and others have discussed in other threads, the meshes for the crib mobiles are very high in polygon count, so this can contribute to slowing down your game, especially if you have a lot of hi-poly objects.

ditto.
About the high polygons... how can an idiot (me) tell if they're high or not. I mean, I can recognize a high number, but some creators will post a number like 7,000 for something and then add '232 less than the Maxis item'
Just pulling numbers out of my head, but I'm just wondering if there's a way for the common (unawesome) people to tell what's too high for that type of item and what's not. Right now, I have no idea what I should be looking for.

I have lots with almost every custom object on them that are great, then a lot that's pure Maxis which lags like hell. Of course it's a Legacy lot, over 5Mb -I've deleted fences, trees, shrubs, flowers and any custom content, but it's still huge. I'm hoping it's not the dozen or so tombs and ghosts because I can't get rid of them.

This new family i just started today already has 10 kids and the parents are only at 17 days until elderhood. First two times pregnant mom had 3 each. Last pregnancy she had 4. She is knocked up again. Sheesh.

I just created sim and got two of my single ladies married to the newly created men and they are already pregnant. one with twins and the other with a single baby. that brings my total of pregnant women in my hood to 5.my sim Brandi Broke  who married my newly created Sim Grant Tatterton already has  twin sons with the patriarch of my main family and she has 3 grandkids and is pregnant with a single baby now.I'm Glad her twins are grown and married with kids of their own.My other Female that I got married off to her  Hottie newly Created Hubby Allessandro Gupta is pregnant with twins and she has a toddler son with her ex-husband Jacob the son of my Main Family Patriarch. But Jordan's Daddy is raising him and he never see's his Mommy. he was 2 days old when his Mommy and Daddy Divorced.I hope my Female sim doesnt cheat this time around. last time she ha a lesbian fling with ex- her sister in law.

Bangle you make my head hurt just reading that lol.

Large families can be confusing thats for sure. here are the members all in one  House and you'll see utter confusion erupt LOL Joe,Patriarch of My Dan Forth Family,Jamie oldest ,Son of Joe,Josh,twin son of Joe and Brandi Broke,Jacob Josh's twin Brother,Justin,son of Joe and Bella Goth,Colleen Youngest Daughter of Joe and Bella Goth. and thats Just the Biological children of the patriarch that live in the same house.their spouses also live there as do the children of Joe's offspring

I read the entire enormous polygon thread at MTS2. Apparently, Maxis try to work to a rule of 800 vertices per tile. 800 vertices means 800 corners, which is not the same thing as 800 polygons. However, there isn't a simple relationship between vertex count & polygon count - some meshes come in at 1000 polygons, 800 vertices while others do 600 polygons, 800 vertices. My geometry is too rusty for me to work out why ::).

Anyway. SimPE gives both polygon & vertex count, so assume that objects should be as follows:
1 tile - 800 vertices
2 tiles - 1600 vertices
3 tiles - 2400 vertices
4 tiles - 3200 vertices
5 tiles - 4000 vertices
6 tiles - 4800 vertices

In practice, a (6 tile) double bed with 4800 vertices will slow some people's computers down, while other people will be fine with a (1 tile) cupboard with 6500 vertices - but that's a reasonable figure to work to.

No one seems to know what vertex count Maxis use for hair and clothing meshes. At least, if anyone knows, no one's ever piped up with an answer. I tend to assume that anything under 1500 polygons is ok for hair and 2000 polys for clothing. fwiw, Crammyboy's very detailed two hair meshes for men (short messy hair & flat top hair) come in at almost exactly 800 polygons because he's used multiple layers to achieve the spiky effects.

Awesome!
I've been putting the counts into the names of items I've downloaded just in case they ever meant anything to me.
Thank you very, very much!

Thank you Baratron, I've been wondering for ages how you spot a high polygon object and what would be a reasonable poly count for what.   I'd click the thank you button if there was one on behalf of all those simmers everywhere who wanted a "polygons 101"...

Is there ANY relation to file size.  a lot of sites don't give you polygon counts, but you can sometimes see the size of the file.  It would be nice to have a rule of thumb based on file size when you are downloading especially for people on dial up - talking to herself...."oh that's cool! must have it!... "um - file size looks a bit big.... probably a high poly count....  do I really want it?" 

Motoki says there's no relation to file size, and I believe Motoki. Some things like beds are just going to be huge even if they're only recolours.

I have to admit, I tend to look first & foremost for recolours of Maxis items, and then for recolours of meshes I already have. I try to be careful not to get too many high polygon meshes into my game.

I've been doing that lately too.
I like new meshes, but I have so much stuff in my downloads folder now that I just can't justify a new mesh that has one object/article of clothing attached to it unless it's spectacular. Particularly if it's say, a kitchen chair with a 2-3 comfort level or a not so comfy, yet surprisingly expensive piece of living room furniture.