More Awesome Than You!

Lately I've been getting an error on the outdoor chess table when two sims are playing, something about "Too many look_at requests in one simulator turn on this sim."  It's happened on a couple different lots. It hasn't been a major pain in the ass but since it's turned up several times, I'm wondering if it's is a real problem, or just EAxis bugginess that other players already know about this. I've got error logs, if anyone wants a look.

And also: How do I know if I've got an invisible sim on the lot?
I've got a lot that's gotten very laggy lately.  The Debugger doesn't admit to any problems on this lot. But I've had the kid bring home a friend from school.  That means there is one (visible) visitor on the lot. But when I click the visitor, on the menu will be Say Goodbye ... (dotdotdot) and then options for Soandso and Everyone.
Why am I getting an option to Say Goodbye to Everyone when there is only one (visible) visitor on the lot?
No error log for this, it doesn't return errors.

Thanks.

edit: Error log attached, per request. 

Post Attach an error log and someone awesome will interpret it for you.

The FAQ sticky has instructions on how to do that, in case of you need them.

If someone is on the phone or chatting on a computer, that sim will count as a sort of visitor too.  It's harmless.

No phone or computer usage at the time. Other sims were queued for going to bed. Since this one lot has gotten so laggy as well, I'm thinking the lot is bugged. It's a nuisance to abandon the house but I think this family needs a new lot.

The "invisible visitor" thing happens to me in dorms - i.e. if a playable invites a non-resident dormie to the dorm, if I want to say goodbye, rather than have the visitor hang about, I get a say goodbye to everyone option, even if there is nobody else visiting.  I've ignored it so far and nothing bad happens.  It may be a result of having a bunch of non-playables that reside onsite, and not an invisible sim at all.  If the lot remains playable, I would not rush to get rid of it (unless you really want to, of course).  I have deleted lots when the resident playables stopped functioning while onsite.

I am more worried about the option I get to "invite over" a sim who lives in the lot - my sims keep getting wants to invite their spouse or child over to the house, when all that needs to happen is for them to get home from work/school.  Very odd.  Again, this does not (so far) seem to cause problems.  Anybody else seen this?

I've never seen this when a Sim is at home, but if they go to a community lot alone I've seen them want to invite a family member/housemate there -- and sometimes I do have them call them on the cell phone and invite them to the community lot, and them do show up.

I got that same error when I paused the game, then started moving the camera around to get just the right camera shot. I thought to myself. "Now there are rules as to how much I can look at my Sim?" Anyway, were you zooming in to see the players or did the error just randomly pop up?

If there is a walk-by (or even a stray?) on the lot, you'll get the 'say goodbye to everybody' option, even though the 'visitor' was not specifically invited.

I think it can count extra visitors even if the phone is only ringing, or if the computer is on but no one is using it. Can anyone else confirm/disprove this?

magicmoon-- No zooming, but several of the times this has come up, the game was running at triple speed. It hasn't popped up on me when the game was paused.  So maybe the chess table error is a speed or camera thing...  ???

notveryawesome and Ellatrue-- I've checked carefully on the goodbye thing because it comes up after 7p.m., when I'm merely trying to get the single guest off lot and get the family to bed. No walk-bys because of the time, no strays 'cause I don't have Pets.  I even checked around for the penguin  ;)  but he wasn't around either.

No phone ringing.  However, the computer was probably on, though nobody was using it. 

jolrei-- I don't have Uni, so I don't have the non-playables residing onsite.  I don't like abandoning the house but the lot is getting close to unplayable. The lag may not even have anything to do with the 'goodbye' thing, but it's just getting out of hand.  It's doubly annoying because I've got larger lots with larger families in the same hood that play much faster than this one.

This is not an error I have ever seen before. I would guess it's some kind of Stupid EAxis problem, like that nonsense "third animation request" error which randomly pops up for no logical reason, and makes you wonder why the hell anyone would care how many times a sim repeats an animation, and why it would call for a fatal error to be thrown.

You might try moving the family out of the house and back to the family bin.  This would remove all their stuff from the house, admittedly, but it might just remove anything that's screwing up the lot at the moment too.  Then try moving the family back in to the vacant lot (very tedious since you'd have to buy all their furniture etc. again, and probably the kitchen counters, fridge, stove..., but if you like the lot and it works, it's no more work than moving the family into a new house.
 

You can get around this by using the 'objects stay at moveout' shrub from Simlogical, but it messes with the resale values of both the house and its furnishings, making them depreciate faster.

Things to try:

Using Insim, first try right clicking on the lawn and choose "extinguish all fires". Occasionally invisible fires happen and they just lag the crap out of any lot.

Go ahead and say goodbye to everyone. It won't hurt.

You can use Inge's teleport to clear off visitors. The worst that it will do is make a Sim get off the phone if talking. Sometimes, if they are on a cell phone, you will have to issue another one.

If that doesn't work, then spawn the selector. Choose 'select all visitors. That should make all the visitors controllable, invisible or not.

With testingcheats off, force an error on everything. Forcing an error on the object an invisible Sim is using sometimes makes them visible. It worked for me yesterday, but I saw the object using itself and knew there was an invisible Sim using it and forced the error on just the one object.

It's probably the invisible fire thing though with the lot lag. Even invisible visitors tend to go home around 2am and usually won't cause lag. I've also never run into anyone with invisible visitors that don't have Uni, although I'm sure anything is possible with Maxis.

Thanks for all the hints.

I took a look at this family again last night.  Nobody brought anyone home, so I didn't get to check on the menu goodbye. And then a REAL thunderstorm happened and the power went out, so...

But the lot still has the lag. I'm definitely going to check for invisible fires and try to make visitors selectable. I hadn't noticed that inSim had an option to 'select all visitors'--but inSim has so damned many options.