The one word answer to your question is Yes. The somewhat longer answer is that romantic interactions are available only between two 12s, or between 24s, 48s, and 72s (?) in any combination. That is, unless one is running the TS4 kitten-killer.

Which of course has been available for a while now.

All that said, I agree that teens seem just like skinny adults that go to school rather than to work. I also fail to see the point (absent a University EP) of distinguishing between young adults and mature adults, which are identical except for subtle changes to the body shape and face.

That all this is begging for an Awesome type TS4 rendition of Pedostalker and Pedobait Sims, complete with jail time, goes without saying.

ETA:
Yes, or 72s. I realized later that I'd screwed that up.

The only oddity I'm noticing since the 10/1 patch (besides those detailed elsewhere about tiny eyes and lantern jaws) is that all of a sudden harvestable plants do not highlight when I hover the mouse over them. All the options show up as usual when clicked on, and work as expected, but no highlight. Yet frogs, diggable rocks, and so on still work fine.

Normally my instinct would be that this is a "personal problem, soldier," and it very well could be. I have heard from only one other person who sees the same problem. I do know that it's not due to mods since the problem is still there with a brand new Sim in a brand new game, with the mods folder removed. So this is the extent of my learnings on the matter.

ETA:
Yes, that's exactly what I meant. It seems most others are not getting this bugged outline thing though.

The answer to that seems to be No. My teen left his homework on the picnic table in the little park next to his house, and though he might have lost some school performance the next day, I didn't get any notifications about it.

Sounds like a feature rather than a bug to me.

It's pretty much pointless to try for elders. Perhaps just like in real life. I also worry that my Sims might die of hunger in the middle of the night. Part of the problem is that the needs bars seem to go from green to yellow very suddenly, giving the impression that things are worse than they are.

There are entire threads on this at MTS, unsurprisingly. I've not found it to make any difference in terms of visual or audio effects, thankfully.

That's good to know and I will have to give it a try. Another thing I've noticed is that the mailbox is broken. The mail carrier will complain he can't reach it, but "somehow managed to throw the mail in, hope you can get to it" or something like that. At such times the mailbox looks to be in a perfectly good location with free tiles in all directions. If I move the mailbox to a place where the mail carrier doesn't complain, then sure enough, my Sim complains of route failure when trying to get the mail.

I've also read about bills not being delivered and the power and water being shut off for nonpayment, which though kind of funny, must be frustrating. I've had the same thing happen, but so far can still pay the bills at the mailbox to turn the water and power back on.

That particular Hand of God works for me, at any rate. Check to see if there are any intervening stairs or other objects between your camera and the fridge, as even if they've gone invisible due to camera distance, I often find they block my Hand of God.

Also, I'm sure I'm not the only one that is really sick and tired of the lack of real edge scrolling.

I propose a mod in the spirit of JMP's TS2 mod "Bathroom Uses You": Dishes Wash You.

I'm seeing an awful lot of inventory stuck-and-brokenness lately. As for the route fails with dishwashing, I read somewhere on the internet that Sims expect a trash can in or near the kitchen, so I added one. It now seems about 10% more likely that my Sims will bring dishes to the sink as opposed to leaving them in the bookcase, on the piano, etc.

You could be right. Although my laptop isn't particularly weak. I've read some comments at MTS about route failure, but not that many. Normally in my case one would want to implicate tight pants, but of course at this point there are almost no pants of any kind.

Anyway, some kind of thermometer indicator for when schoolchildren do their homework would also be nice. Also, along the lines of being able to tell teens from adults, I'd also like to be able to tell young adults from mature adults. Sure, people in their 20s can and do marry people in their 50s, but I'd like to know ahead of time whether I'm setting up something like that or not.

The not-cleaning-up-after-self issue is especially annoying in my opinion. I've seen Sims put dishes down anywhere except the sink, including in bookcases. To get them to clean up, I often have to stack "Clean Up" commands two- or three-deep, as usually they'll complain of route failure at least once. (True, the Hand of God does work, but even in TS3 I use an Always Wash Dishes mod.)

Complaining of route failure when none should exist plagues gardening also. "Water" works OK and the Sim in question will usually water all plants that need it, but then will complain of route failure for "Weed," "Harvest (or Harvest All)", or "Evolve" when there are multiple free tiles surrounding the planter in all directions.

The only thing I find groups useful for would be getting an entire household to a venue with one command -- such as my four-person band living under the same roof.  Once there, generally I have one of them disband the group.  This way, they can go their separate ways after a gig, for example.

Speaking of gigs, I finally managed to get my band as many as six gigs.  It did take a while, though.  My game was on Epic lifespan, and again I'm running base+LN only, without AM.

Gig #1:  Day 15, Waylon's Haunt
Gig #2:  Day 19, Waylon's Haunt
Gig #3:  Day 19, Waylon's Haunt
Gig #4:  Day 23, Eugi's
Gig #5:  Day 26, Eugi's
Gig #6:  Day 26, Bridgeport Sports Zone

These were the days that the call came offering the gig, so each of course took place two days later.  As you can see, my band twice got two gigs in one day.

Strictly from observation, it looks to me like getting gigs requires a combination of patience and celebrity stars.  I didn't go out of my way to have my Sims befriend other celebrities, but I did do things like inviting in paparazzi to snap all the photos they wanted.  Without knowledge of the code or how to read it, I can't make any statements that are more definitive.  In any case, this was the longest I've been able to keep the game going with this configuration, without breaking at least one of my Sims.

I remain rather disappointed with the bands in general, as I know a lot of you are too.  I was hoping that a gig would consist of my band playing, you know, songs.  Instead it seems to be an endless loop of any of four chord progressions (Jam, Blues, Rock, or Jazz).  Granted this may be the limit of what the game can accomplish, given different skill levels on the instruments, which do cause noticeable changes in the way the musicians improvise over any given chord progression.

Still, I wish there were some way to relate songs learned via sheet music to songs performed at gigs.  Even more so, I want to see a vocalist up front.  But even without my being a computer programmer by any stretch, it seems to me that with three different voice types for each gender, plus somehow relating instrument skill level (to say nothing of as-yet nonexistent vocal skill level) to the details of how a given song is played, it may be too much to ask.

So I sent one of my Sims to The Grind to fulfill the dance-for-3-hours opportunity, only to find it was Take Your Sprog To Work Day for the mixologist.  Since I know the way it works around here is Pics Or It Didn't Happen:


Is that a garter, or a skintone fail?  I'm not sure which I'm hoping for more at this point.

In any case, I'm calling this a bug, and possibly also a good time for Child Protection Services to show up.

ETA:  Sorry about that, I should have made it clearer that I am mainly concerned about the mixologist bringing her toddler to work (though I appreciate the heads-up about the garters, which I had missed).  Her loud clothes also reminded me of the comments about male mixologists wearing Hawaiian shirts.  Either way, my Sim did his three hours of booty-shaking and hightailed it home.

Now that you mention it, I had that exact thing happen with one of my Sims several days ago.  I also just now had a Sim that would wake up at 4:00 a.m. every morning, regardless of how depleted his Energy bar was.  He slept through until the bar was full without incident when I put him back to bed.  None of his three housemates/bandmates would behave this way.  Beyond eating garlic autonomously once when his Hunger bar was very low, I can't remember anything unusual happening to him.  He does not have the Light Sleeper trait, nor any other that I could imagine would affect his sleep.

I think it started around the time one of his housemates was turned to a vampire, or perhaps when I cured said housemate with the anti-vampirism drink from the Science Lab.  I tried a resetSim on him and it had no effect, nor could I find this mentioned here or in the AwesomeMod area.  My experience is that weird occurrences like this are a sign of not just a broken Sim but a broken game, in danger of becoming a BFBVFS soon, so I will pitch this save and start over.

I've found that doing a Max Motives on every nonplayable at a venue using the NRaasian device helps a lot with the problem of constant needs failures.  That still doesn't help with the aforementioned problem of some of the venues being so poorly designed that the building breaks constantly and needs to be reset, or bulldozed and replaced.  I don't even bother sending my Sims to Plasma 501 any longer as they can't even get in.  It really seems as if EA didn't even playtest some of the buildings.

It for some reason never occurred to me to try using the NRaasian device for that purpose.  Although I'm a bit worried that the reason most of us aren't getting our bands gigs very often is that the game is waiting for us to fulfill some condition each time.  So while I will bear this suggestion in mind, I still want to work a little harder at getting gigs without cheating.  Either way, I get the point that this is not a bug, so I'll just keep trying.

That being said, I've noticed another annoyance (though not a true bug either) -- something has to be done about mixologists and how slow they are.  Or at least, how long the lineup of orders can get.  This could even be related to why all the non-playable Sims we find in venues are suffering needs failures -- the mixologist can't get their food to them fast enough (not to mention that wants like Have A Drink and Play Darts are probably so strongly advertised that the Sims literally forget to eat), and the doors to restrooms are clogged by Sim hordes who have given up on waiting for food and now just want to pee.  None of this is conducive to getting audiences for band member Sims (whether jamming, playing for tips, or gigging), so this strikes me as something else that needs tuning.  Which knowing EA, I don't hold out much hope for that.

Sounds like we just need to narrow down what it is that causes that all-important fourth gig to come up.  Number of "stars" each band member has?  Skill level on their respective instruments?  Just letting enough time pass?  I have a four-person band all living under the same roof also, so maybe I'll load up that game and see if I can ever get them that fourth gig.

Suddenly this reminds me of getting those all-important story-continuing quests in Foreignia.  I haven't run WA in months, but I remember complaints about that too.  Patience and luck seemed to be the only solutions.

I wish there were a cell phone interaction of Call Agent And Demand He Get Us A Damn Gig Already, but that will probably happen right after they make the fire from the effects machine deadly (which I would also love to see).

ETA (so as not to spam with too many posts):
I might have used the equivalent NRaas Master Controller function on him, though I'm not sure.  I don't remember LTH rewards disappearing on sending a Sim back to CAS with the Master Controller before, but maybe things are different now.

I would say not to bother, as you got it exactly right -- that's indeed what happened to my Sim, now that I think about it.  Daredevil, Insane, and Party Animal were among the new traits for sure.  Those PG-13 rated non-alcoholic drinks sure do pack a punch!

Now if I could only figure out what I was doing wrong for my bands never to get more than three gigs.  My theories so far are that it was due to life span being on Epic, or that it was due to my Sims having the Band career rather than some unrelated career.

Some have said that the new EP discriminates against teenagers, so I'll see if that's true with my current household consisting of two teenage boys.  I'm more than fine with them not being able to skinny-dip, but if they can't even go to the lounge and play shuffleboard, it will be a really boring life for them until they age up.

I've been seeing several problems already noted, including with the effects machine, as well as Sim traits and even rewards being negotiable (I am absolutely certain I got my test Sim the Long-Distance Friend reward, and after some Sim days it suddenly disappeared; his traits kept changing on me too), the opportunities that can't be achieved because they involve locations in Sunset Valley, and the weird message to the effect that "There is now a sale at !" (with the space).  Oddly, the latter two problems seem to be becoming less common as my neighborhood gets older (I'm running base+LN with no AM but some Anachian and NRaasian mods, as well as some modules of AD85's core mod).

My main studies have had to do with bands, since I was really looking forward to this aspect.  I've run two bands so far, one of which had all the bandmates under one roof and another in which my test Sim added three of his non-playable buddies, and in both cases it turned out the same.  They'd get their first gig (invariably at Waylon's Haunt), then maybe a second gig somewhere, and then I'd wait for two Sim weeks and there would be no third gig.  So I read that I should have my band members Play For Tips.  That had no effect -- they'd get largely ignored either at a "hot spot" or at some other venue (while any Sims present at the venue threw up and/or suffered various needs failures, as previously noted).  Mind you, all this time all four Sims would be advancing well in "fame," getting invited to parties like crazy, and getting all kinds of opportunities for having a drink at this joint or dancing for three hours at that joint, but still no calls from the agent about a gig.

Also, at least without AM installed, it seems to me like the subtitle for LN should be You Can Haz Be Vampier Nao.  My neighborhood is being gradually overrun by them.  I don't necessarily mind, since I am just paranoid enough to enjoy the challenge of making my test Sim befriend a whole bunch of vampires, but not get turned himself (I have yet to find out whether Ask To Turn can be autonomous, but I'm curious).  They are no friends at all, you see:  they are out to get him.

Just now I've kicked out my test Sim, married him off, turned the life span from Epic to Normal, and moved in a teenager, so I have a little longer to watch the hood age at a faster pace.  (The teenager came to me with about 20 cheap cars in his inventory, another interesting bug, which I'm guessing means he was a babysitter before I moved him in, and kept losing his car.)  While he grows up, I'm thinking about what to do with him, since forming a band seems to be a waste of time.  Maybe I'll just give up and let him get turned too.  All the cool kids are doing it.

I've been running base+LN for a while now, no AwesomeMod, and have noticed very few problems beyond the routing and opportunity issues noted above.  This non-default skintone thing worries me, though.  The first culprit seems to have been Rez Delnava's mod, quite understandably since it needs to be updated.  Having removed that, as noted in that MTS thread, I can still use my non-default skintones by scrolling through them with the mouse wheel.  The next problem, as noted both here and at MTS, is that non-default skintones break the muscle definition slider for male Sims.  I haven't checked yet whether they also break the breast size slider on female Sims, as my test Sims are all male at the moment.  I am guessing not, since while I am no modding expert, it seems to me that the muscle definition slider adds an overlay, while the breast size one actually changes the mesh.  I think Claeric has commented on this previously.

This is of concern to me because while many over at MTS are complaining that Rez Delnava's mod broke the muscle definition slider, it seems to me that his mod is exactly what is not the problem.  It can't be, since this slider still only works on the default (replacement) skintone even with his mod removed.  The problem seems to lie in non-default skintones themselves.  Conversely, even if/when Rez Delnava updates his mod, I am pretty sure this will not fix the problem.  Unless somehow he can include something in it that forces the game to apply the muscle definition overlay regardless of whether the skintone is a default replacement or a non-default.  My fear is that all non-default skintones will need to be remade for LN somehow, in order to work with the muscle definition slider -- but I really hope I'm wrong.

Another thing I've noticed is that I haven't seen any Sims yet who vomit at the sight of a vampire.  This is true for both my Sims and NPCs -- my Sims usually get the Hunted moodlet, but that's about it.  I wonder whether this is caused by something in an EP or SP that I don't have installed?  I'll keep watching since I'm running my test household in an emptied Bridgeport.  I am curious as to whether the majority of spawned female Sims will have huge boobs, since like someone else noted earlier, I definitely saw that in the default Bridgeport too.  (EDIT:  I misunderstood on the vomiting issue, see below.  Also, "yes" on the big boobs issue.)

In the meantime, experimentation continues.  It bothers me no end that I cannot have a band with a vocalist, since I've had a four-person band waiting in the bin for months for LN to be released.  I also can't stand that there can be no more than four Sims in the band -- I'm not a big expert on rock music, but I'm pretty certain that it's common for a band to have two guitarists.  Granted, these are annoyances rather than bugs.  I do hope, though, that a future SP or EP will enable vocalists.  (Which will require new songs, all of which can be sung by a male or female Sim with any of the three voice types, etc.)

I think this is where I say BAAAAAAAA.  Lately it seems I mess everything up when I touch anything in my root folder, so this should do the trick.  Base game 1.17 works fine now, so will install LN (is this the officially sanctioned abbreviation?) once AD85's mods are updated.

I also don't have AM, and successfully patched the base game up to 1.17 after a complete reinstall.  With most of what little CC I have back in the root folder like I prefer it (except for AD85's modular core mod, which will be at least a few more days still), the game does work, except that I have to use the CD of course.  This is using one of my famblies from before the patch -- I haven't tried a new game and/or making a new Sim yet.  I have the new EP and will install it eventually, once the rest of my CC is updated for it.  I always like to try the most up-to-date base game before trying out a new EP.

The only issue was on installing FAS's no-CD crack.  With either the original TSLHost.dll file in the Game/Bin folder, or the altered one I got a few patches ago, the game wouldn't start at all.  It was like an immediate CTD.  What I believe to be the relevant part of the error log is:
A Google search made it seem like the file DasmX86Dll.dll sometimes goes missing for other software and games, especially Spore, and the collective response on the issue seemed something like a shrug:  "Sorry dude, your game's broke."

Since I lost my old TSLHost.dll file in the reinstall (and it wasn't working anyway), and none came with the no-CD crack, it looks like my choices are to use AM, to install "Late Night" and hope the Reloaded no-CD crack works with the new TSLHost.dll file that they provide, or to wait for someone else to crack the 1.17 patch and hope they provide a TSLHost.dll file that works.  This is assuming that this file actually matters anymore, which I can't say I know.

I've searched both here and at MTS, but cannot seem to find a way to squash the annoying "Mod Scripts Found" message that one gets when starting the game with core mods installed.  Nor could I find a way to disable this from within the game options, though it's possible I missed it.  Apart from moving all my mods back to the root folder (which is tempting), is there a way to keep them in the new EA-sanctioned location, but prevent this nagging message from appearing?

Also, I agree with this:

I took the plunge and moved my CC to the EA-sanctioned location, with the requisite changes to other files of course.  Everything seems to work so far, not that I have much -- twallan's SuperComputer, Buzzler's mirror, a few of Anach's mods, my skintone blends, and a couple other things that don't come readily to mind.  I have noticed only three other issues:  (1)  Some pretty severe lags reminiscent of the 1:00 a.m. lag from way back when (I think this has been mentioned before), (2) a visual oddity when they're playing that outdoor game with the batons and pawns such that I can't usually see the batons going through the air (it may be like this anyway, but if not, the culprit is likely to be my base-game no-censor mod, which counter to Anach's advice I left in), and (3) a really strange issue in the kitchen.  I had installed two dishwashers in the kitchen, and had made my handy Sim upgrade both to unbreakable.  I have used this setup before in a crowded house, and it works well at mealtimes.  But suddenly my Sims couldn't use the microwave.  They'd pull the frozen dinner out of the fridge, walk up to the microwave, stand there indefinitely like they do when waiting for a toilet that's currently in use, and stomp when I cancelled the interaction.  Once I'd replaced one dishwasher with a sink, the problem went away.  I haven't tried to reproduce this with my mods removed, but I suspect that this is true game behavior, though I have no proof.

But otherwise, the only thing I don't like about the mods being in the new location is that it seems the game will nag me every time about the presence of core mods.  (I know there are core mods.  I put them there.)  I am hoping for a crappy XML tweak, from either here or elsewhere, that will stomp this nagging behavior.

I actually have not put my CC in the EA sanctioned Mods folder, but moved it and the other necessary files to the corresponding places in the Ambitions folder.  So far everything seems to work.  Game loading is longer, especially if I've cleared my caches, but I was expecting that to a degree.  I also expect that the time will come with a future EP or patch when we will be forced to move our CC to the EA sanctioned location.

It is part of the regular game -- I may be one of those people with unmodded story modes whom you remember talking about it.  I am scared to use it too much, though, for fear of causing a BFBVFS.

For what it's worth, I made the 1.12 patch without installing Ambitions (although I have it) because I wanted to see how different the patch made things, and what it took to get a stable game.  This is base game only, no AwesomeMod.  Now that twallan updated his SuperComputer in record time, and Buzzler seems to have done the same with his mirror (though I haven't run the game yet since installing the updated mirror), it seems I've brought my One Fambly from pre-patch to post-patch without problems.  This gives me some hope that I can bring them past the EP2 installation successfully.

I have noticed the following differences, stubbornly continuing on with my research into the unmodded story mode:

1.  The story mode now seems very aggressive about moving new famblies into town.  Until just recently, the game seemed most interested in emptying the town as soon as possible.  But now I get at least one newspaper article per day about some new household moving into town.  I anticipate that if I put houses on some of the empty lots, this behavior would only escalate.

2.  Certain objects (the exercise machines at any rate) suddenly seem pickier about placement.  I ordered one of my Sims to use the treadmill, and he complained that he couldn't reach it.  When I picked it up in Buy/Build mode, it snapped out of place immediately, as though it had been placed by moveobjects.  I was not allowed to place it in ways that would most certainly have been allowed before the patch.  Once I found a permissible location, my Sim was able to use the treadmill.

3.  There are two new items in my Documents/Electronic Arts/The Sims 3 folder:  a file called "tslus.bin," and a folder called "IGACache" containing the following three files:  "radial.cdb," "radial.scb," and "radial.tdb."  I am guessing that these are things that the EP will make use of.

4.  As I expected, I had to leave my mods in their original location.

5.  The tweak to Sims3.ini that allows Sims to walk through each other, absolutely did not work after patching.  The game loaded, but I had mousefail along with everything being frozen except for the plumbbob.  It is possible I did it wrong, but I don't think so.

6.  Some simple and ancient mods that I consider essential, such as no-censor and no-intro, still work in their base game versions.  I anticipate that they will no longer work after installing EP2, even though I don't plan on reinstalling EP1 along with it.

I've just added a few of Anach's mods too, so I'll see whether the result is stable before installing EP2.  I'm a bit worried, particularly about the game logging (mine was on by default, and I had already played a bit before discovering this) and about some of the other bugs I'm reading about here (I think it's 100% certain that there will be another patch within a week, as others have warned me), but I have the EP and there's no turning back now.

That totally makes sense and I should have thought of that.  I forgot about the Forever Will It Rule Your (Sims') Destiny thing.

On another note, I just looked it up and it seems the next L&P EP comes out in a bit more than a week.  I am hoping that this means we won't be surprised with another patch before then....

Since I've never experienced this particular set of bugs before patch 1.11, I thought it was better to post here than to start my own thread.

Somewhere in one of my recent saves of a game that I've somehow managed to keep going for over six Sim months, it stopped notifying me an hour ahead of carpools and school buses.  I have read about problems with work/school pushing, and that is not a problem in my game -- once the bus or car comes, my Sims get pushed to work or school just fine, and stay there like they're supposed to.  It is more of a nuisance than a problem, but whenever I see any kind of consistent bug, I take notice.

I know it isn't a problem with my CC, since I started a new game and the notifications are coming up just fine.  In the other game, I've tried resetSim on all my Sims, the AwesomeMod "fixall" command (I still am not running the AwesomeMod but I do turn the most recent version on from time to time in order to enter that command), and anything that looked remotely useful in the NRaasian Supercomputer, to no avail.

I suspect that this game is just getting long in the tooth and it's time to pitch it before it reaches full-blown BFBVFS status, and in fact I'm shocked I managed to keep it going this long.  It could partly have to do with my style of play, which involves constantly moving Sims in and out of my One Fambly and arranging marriages with the Supercomputer, pollinating Sims at will with Buzzler's mirror, and thus keeping some control remotely over the entire population without ever leaving my One Fambly.  I have also noticed other symptoms that come up whenever I enter "fixall," which I suspect may be because of the patch as most of them I've never seen before.

1.  Whenever I run "fixall," it tells me that every Sim that has ever died has the incorrect dead/alive type.  Apparently they also take on the wrong married status, which the AwesomeMod then also fixes.  I'm guessing that these values then revert when I uninstall the AwesomeMod, which would explain why they then have to be reset again at the next "fixall."  Still, can it really be that in the base game with an unmodded story mode, no Sim ever dies properly anymore?

2.  Speaking of Sims not dying, I occasionally have to go through the population using the Supercomputer, and kill off a bunch of Sims that are really supposed to be dead, as they are well over the normal life span in age, yet somehow still alive.  Often their thumbnails show them as being in some life stage other than elder.  They are never Sims that I have played, nor any relative of theirs.  My guess is that they are former NPC Sims, that for some reason refuse to die like they're supposed to.

In spite of these persistent bugs, I have somehow managed to get all other bugs to go away somehow, until this new one with the buses and carpools.  So if anyone with knowledge of how those work can increase my learnings, and/or suggest a fix, I will be sure to respond appropriately with "thanks, this is grate."    If not, it's no big deal as I really just wanted to see how long I could keep one game going -- and it might be that I've answered that question.

This is a known problem and is discussed in this thread.  From what I recall, there is no solution, apart from picking up the house, rotating it, and setting it back down, which sometimes does the trick.

ETA:  wizard_merlin gives another solution below.