What the hell is wrong with the nanny?!

[Process Denied]

I'm actually quite pleased with my nannies right now.  I used the InSIMenator and the mind control mirror and made them adults and changed their personalities a little and maxed their cooking skill so they might not burn food so much.  I'ts funny cause you can't control what clothes are put on them so they kinda look like teens(one has a raver outfit on)  But, they are a lot faster and they don't pee themselves and they seem to interact with the children more--she went to play with the baby several times--might be annoying when they become tots but I don't use a nanny during the tot years.

[ZephyrZodiac]

Well, if you just want more active nannies that look like nannies, use SimPE to make them into adults.  they'll retain their appearance and clothing, but they'll have an adult body shape and voice, and have more energy and hopefully they won't have creeping alzheimers!  I did it with Mortimer once, and he became the life and sould of every party at Uni, since he got to know so may teens who then went to College and invited him to their parties, and then he got to know even more!  And he could be influenced to clean up before he went too!

[crazi_aboutu]

I solved all my nanny problems by downloading dizz's babysitter hack and now i invite a sitter over who is a playbale sim and of my own choosing.  I love it becasue that's how you would choose someone to watch your own kids. 

[ZephyrZodiac]

Depends - one thing for an evening out, but another on a regular daily basis (after all, teenagers do go to school in RL, you can't get away from that, even if the game is wierd on that score).  There again, in RL we do have things like creches attached to workplaces (occasionally) or options like nurseries for toddlers.  Also, mothers can opt for a longer time off work (at least, they can here) without losing their job.

[aeslis]

And the family can send them some extra cash if they're doing well themselves.

How do you do that?  Is it part of the standard game, or a hack?  Because I'd always thought it would be awesome to be able to do--older families accrue so much money it's ridiculous!  Maybe I missed it somehow?

[ZephyrZodiac]

It's one of JM's very useful little hacks - you can send money to sims in the family bin too.  It's just called moneyorder and it works fine in NL too.

[Kyna]

Since Uni, and being able to "combine households," I've found the best substitute for a Nanny is a CAS Elder with maxed Personality points (with Merola's Multi-painting). She lives in the bin until she's needed, then moved in. I give her a bed in the kid's room, and she's happy ~ and controllable. As soon as the kid morphs to Teen, she's outta there.

She could be an Adult instead of an Elder, but having an Elder au pair just feels more natural to me.

Thanks for the idea Hairfish.  I now have Ermentrude Nanny with one of my families as live-in nanny/maid, and Gertrude & Hildegard Nanny are waiting in the sim bin for the next families in need of nannies.  Since they're elders, I tried to give them elder sounding names. 

I like the idea of sending them back to the sim bin and reusing them for the next generation - even though they're all elders, it's like creating a beloved nanny who was perhaps aged around 30 for the first generation, 50ish for for the next generation, and the third generation will be able to say "Nanny Ermentrude may be getting on a bit, but she's been with our family for 3 generations now."  Maybe after 3 generations I'll allow her to die of old age, and be buried in the family burial plot with her much-loved former charges.

[ZephyrZodiac]

 

Since they're elders, I tried to give them elder sounding names. 

I take exception to that extremely ageist comment!  My generation is now the "elder" generation and we definitely didn't have many Gertrudes or Ermyntrudes!
On the other hand, names like Emma, Emily,Charlotte etc. were considered by us to be very old-fashioned as they were the kind of names OUR grannies had, but just think how many little girls have them today!

[Kyna]

ZZ I wasn't being agist.  While I haven't reached retirement age, I'm hardly a spring chicken.  I'm one of the board members who remembers the 60s - which I guess means I wasn't really there.

When I play my multi-generational 'hoods I try to use names that are currently out of fashion for my earlier generations, names that would have been in vogue a century or so ago.  If these people are hiring nannies then the nannies need even older-sounding names, something that my great-grandmother's maiden aunt might have been called, if she'd had one.  For my nannies I wanted names that sound like they could belong to a maiden aunt, and that no game-generated character is likely to have.

No offense was intended to anyone who is named Trudy or Hilda, either - I have a close friend name Trudy.  In an interesting coincidence, she's in her 40s and has never married or had kids, although she always wanted them.  She does have nieces and nephews ... so I guess she is a 21st century maiden aunt.

[SIMplyLisa]

My Gramma's where Edith (who was a grumpy old lady) and Tressa (who we called Nanny and liked to play cards with us and go to play bingo)!
So maybe in the Business expansion they will do a daycare thing!

[ZephyrZodiac]

ZZ I wasn't being agist.  While I haven't reached retirement age, I'm hardly a spring chicken.  I'm one of the board members who remembers the 60s - which I guess means I wasn't really there

OK, accept you were not being ageist!  Now, the 60's had names like Cilla, Sandy, Dusty, so how about names like that for your nannies?  And your middleaged sims could be Tracey (Trace), Karen, (Kaz) or Sharon (Shaz)!

[Kyna]

Or maybe I could have Petula ... but she'd always want to be Downtown.  On the karaoke machine, no doubt.

But I went to school with people named Karen, Tracey and Sharon.  So those names seem a little young to be nannies from my perspective.

[ZephyrZodiac]

I meant they could be parents not grandparents, though a lot of Kazes and Shazes are no doubt Nannas by now!!!!

[Hairfish]

My best Nanny is N. Abler. Kind of a tribute...

[ZephyrZodiac]

More American humour?  Or a tribute to Numenor?

[Hairfish]

Um...no. That Nanny-loving guy who made the "Elder Enabler" for clothing.

[ZephyrZodiac]

Oh, Motoki!  Of course, I thought too deeply and came up with CEP!

[eamethyst]

I had a nanny abduction just last week also.  I have Uni and NL and the patch installed.  The mom was on maternity leave with a toddler.  The nanny showed up even though the mom wasn't going to work, and when she was dismissed, she picked up the toddler and left with her.  I exited, saving the lot and when I came back in the toddler was lying by the mailbox, but neither the mom or the dad could interact with her and she was behaving like a baby.  I went into SimPE and she was marked as being a baby.  So I fixed it in SimPE.

[Bangelnuts]

I had a nanny abduction just last week also.  I have Uni and NL and the patch installed.  The mom was on maternity leave with a toddler.  The nanny showed up even though the mom wasn't going to work, and when she was dismissed, she picked up the toddler and left with her.  I exited, saving the lot and when I came back in the toddler was lying by the mailbox, but neither the mom or the dad could interact with her and she was behaving like a baby.  I went into SimPE and she was marked as being a baby.  So I fixed it in SimPE.

sheesh I wish Maxis would patch those moronic nannies

[Bangelnuts]

I had a nanny abduction just last week also.  I have Uni and NL and the patch installed.  The mom was on maternity leave with a toddler.  The nanny showed up even though the mom wasn't going to work, and when she was dismissed, she picked up the toddler and left with her.  I exited, saving the lot and when I came back in the toddler was lying by the mailbox, but neither the mom or the dad could interact with her and she was behaving like a baby.  I went into SimPE and she was marked as being a baby.  So I fixed it in SimPE.

sheesh I wish Maxis would patch those moronic nannies

[ZephyrZodiac]

I had that happen with one of Kiernan's alien twins (not the abduction, but the lack of interaction and boolprop etc. just said that the object was faulty or something.) After I'd tried everything, including moving them out and back again, the poor kid was still just lying around or floating in space, so I checked in SimPE and found that the exact same thing had happened to her.  Put her back to toddler and everything was fine.   (And having prsonally turned sims into babies in SimPE, I should have realised what had happened as I've frequently had adult and teen sims doing exactly the same thing!

[dmchess]

Well, the only time I've nearly lost a kid except when John went to work and left Lucy alone (and I didn't save and had Jennifer move her in with her) was when a nanny didn't turn up at 3.00pm! 

One day my Kaylynn Langerak was on the way out to her Celebrity Chef carpool when I noticed that the nanny hadn't arrived yet for the twins (they were just out of toddlerhood at the time).  I had her quick call up and ask for a special one-time Nanny visit, and then run out and stand next to the carpool tapping her foot until the nanny showed up.  She did, just in time, and Kaylynn jumped into the carpool and went to work.  Then the OTHER nanny showed up!  Needless to say they had a fun time ignoring the kids, playing the musical instruments, and harassing visitors (Kaylynn had had Andrea Hogan over that day, and the nannies actually made her cry at one point).  I think that was the day the repair lady started a fire, too...

DC

[ZephyrZodiac]

Sounds like it was a pretty hellish sort of day!  Guess you didn't have the NoBuskers hack in your game?

But if the kids had enough influence, they could have influenced the nannies to fight each other!

[dmchess]

Sounds like it was a pretty hellish sort of day!  Guess you didn't have the NoBuskers hack in your game?

Not at the time.  I do now!

But if the kids had enough influence, they could have influenced the nannies to fight each other!

Rats, I should have thought of that.  *8)

At Gina Raptor's house the nannies have gone entirely mad.  They never show up when it's time for Gina to go to work, but one gets dropped off regularly at half an hour past midnight, and other ones seem to show up pretty much at random.  If I have her call the nanny service the prompt that I get implies that she doesn't have an existing arrangement, even though she does.  It's not unusual to have two or more nannies wandering around, and once there were none around when Gabriel got home from school and I got the ominous "It's not a good idea to leave your child home alone" message. 

Fortunately I don't think Gina has to go to work again before Gabriel's next birthday when he'll turn teenager.  If the nannies continue to appear she can just seduce them all or something.  *8)

(Hm, does the FFS Lot Debugger fix busted Nanny controllers?  I'll have to go look.)

DC

[ZephyrZodiac]

Not that I know of, and use Clear Offworld Loiterers while you have a nanny problem and literally hundreds of nannymobiles start to appear, and sometime nannies sans mobile fly through the air (without an umbrella, though) to all descend on your house at once!  It's like a scene from Mary Poppins directed by the Monty Python team!