More Awesome Than You!

I have Sims 2 & Uni but no NL yet.

I have one university household that is driving me nuts. I moved them from a dorm to a house they could only just afford, put in 5 money trees, and now the game crashes every other time the money trees reset. Apparently this is a known bug that is fixed in NL, so I'm not terribly worried about that. (Although playing the same day 4 times is a bit like Groundhog Day).

However, because the household is poor and can only afford 1 computer for 4 students, I sent them to the library to write their term papers. For some reason, the 3 students who finished the term paper on the Community lot didn't get the credit for it. Clicking on the computer no longer gives the "Write Term Paper" option, so some part of the game thinks they've already done it. This is particularly annoying because they spent about 5 hours on the Community lot, which means that two of the students will only have 2 classes before the final exam instead of 3, making it even harder to catch up that missing credit :(. It's weird, because whenever I've sent students to the library to do their term papers before, they have got the credit for it.

I know there are hacks that I can use to reset these students' effort level, but why did it go wrong? Is it because only 3 of the 4 students finished the term paper on the Community lot? (all of them would need to for it to work?). Is it an intermittent bug that sometimes students don't get the credit if they do the work on Community lots? Or is it some kind of glitch caused by the household's lot crashing all the time? They have another 3 semesters to go and I'm wondering if I'll have to move them to calm things down.

I had this problem with Uni when I sent one of my sims to the library and he did his term paper while there.  No credit when he returned home and no option to do it on the computer at home.  Another sim influenced one of the secret society members while he was at the SS lot to do his term paper, and when he returned home, the same thing had happened.  So I gave up on trying this and only have them do their papers at home. 

Luckily, I haven't had the problem with the money trees, but some say turning down the sound quality helps.  Others say this doesn't help though.  I think Motoki is one that experienced this, and he says he just uses the counterfeiting machine.  Only problem is it is highly flammable.  Carrigon has a patch for that though. :)

If you're worried about losing the grade points, send your Sims to a community lot a couple of hours before they have to go to class.  Go to class from the community lot.  Return home after class, and it will be the same time you left... so you can go to class again. 

Making friends with professors (except drama professors) gives you a major grade boost.  And if all else fails, do assignments and some group research. :)

I only had one Sim try to have a term paper written away from home.  As I recall, I didn't get credit for it.  So I have 'em do term papers at home now.

Hook

Why not drama professors?

Drama professors, for some reason, do not give a grade boost by making friends with them.  This is the only major I know of that's like that. I guess you have to flirt with them, but I never wanted them hanging around messing with my other dormies.

Hook

Hmm, interesting.  Something else the Prima Guide neglected to mention.  Most of my teens are knowledge and want to study math or biology.

I put two PCs into the gym and my students got there, do their term papers and earn a bit of cash at the same time (I have the Flamingo of Happiness there to keep everyone reasonably full of energy etc.) and I've never had one lose the credit when they get home - and quite often I let them take their exam from there too (even works for an invited sim, but the inviter gets the cash instead!)

Might be worth trying that, it may actually be the library that's corrupted, and another lot may be fine.  Also, I'd get rid of the money trees and get the bedroom 5(I think it is) bed from 4ESF, which you buy for 300 and sell for 1200, and looks good and is energy 6.  If my sims run short of cash, I just sell it in the morning and buy a new one.

None of my students do term papers anymore.  I used to think the bar needed to be full to the top, but then I found out it only needs to be three-quarters full or thereabouts, because they get the rest of it from taking the final exam.  None of mine have any problem reaching that level with just classes and assignments.

Hell, I had to do Special Studies and write essay (and no computer then to make it easy!) so why should my sims get away with the easy stuff?

Aha! That fixed it! Thanks.

The funny thing is that, having turned the sound quality down to medium, I can't detect any difference in the sound. Admittedly my laptop's speakers are not fantastic, but...

Yes I had that horrendous money tree bug.  >:( NL even before the patch seems to have fixed it, but I'm not sure if it really did fix it or it's just because Nightlife keeps defaulting my audio to the lowest setting.  :-\

I'll have to try and remember to switch it back to 5.1 then play one of my money tree farm households.