Testers Wanted: Grow Up Townies (Updated 3/15/2008)

[miros]

One thing I did notice, even the exDormies that the game considers to be graduates still have 1 in their semester field, where playable graduates have 8.

These exDormies, are these ones that you moved in yourself? Or are they ones that you "Growed Up" with this hack?

The Growed Up ones are definitely still at semester 1, even the ones where I said No and they got all the Completed Year and Graduated memories.

Somewhere in another hood, I've got at least one or two exDormies that were just Moved In without being Grown Up.  Let me see if I can find them and check their memories...

[miros]

More info on the "still 1st semester inspite of being a graduate."

I found Martha Matthews, ex mascot, in an old, unused 'hood.  She was moved in even before I got the Move In hack.  She's got all the "autogenerated" memories up to Graduating, but her semester thingie still says semester 1.  I also remember her not having the extra wants and locks, because I had to fix her with TwoJeffs' fixer (there's a thread here somewhere entitled Martha is Borked).  Lot Debugger wouldn't touch her.

Sorry for double post!

[syberspunk]

Ok, I've updated the hack.  I have not altered the acceptance code.  I may or may not decide to do that later.  I've tested this in my game, and so far, it appears to work properly.  Look at the new pics to see what options you get and the memories that are generated.

I also forgot to mention that, as with regular YAs, since they normally get a chance to change aspiration after their sophomore year, I also kept that feature in for Dormies that you ask to graduate.  I hope that isn't too annoying for people.

v1.090- Added options to Drop Out, Graduate.../Without Honors, Cum Laude, Magna Cum Laude, and Summa Cum Laude
   Added proper memories for Dormies/YAs transitioning to Adults to complete years, graduate, or graduate with honors.
    - Sims who drop out will only get a memory of dropping out
    - Sims who graduate cum laude or higher should get a memory of getting on the dean's list
    - Wants for getting on the dean's list, completing years, graduating or dropping out should be satisfied
    - UI Life Stage for YAs should display properly now: Circle with / for Drop Outs, nothing for normal graduates, and stars for honors

Ste

[miros]

Downloading.  Will test tomorrow!

[miros]

Ok, interm progress report. 

1) Sidney Scrapingby asked two Dormies to Grow Up (one plain graduate, one Cum Laude), Major CumLawde asked one to grow up Summa Cum Laude.  Their wants and memories seem to be normal (or like those in played graduates).

2) I decided to age up the 3 borked Grow Up victims to get rid of them with mixed success.  Donna was able to ask Marshall (Grown Up by Donna Dropout, but not moved in) to Grow Up then Say Goodbye Forever.  Major was able to ask Paula (Grown Up by Major as a YA and moved in) the same way.  Neither Dudley nor Donna was able to ask Deloris (Grown Up by Dudly Dropout, moved in) to Grow Up.  Sidney was not able to ask Janice (Grown Up apparently normal graduate) to Grow Up; Major was not able to ask Blanca (Grown Up apparently normal graduate) to Grow Up.

I haven't tried any other Adult->Adult requests, nor any YA->YA requests.

[syberspunk]

Ok, interm progress report. 

1) Sidney Scrapingby asked two Dormies to Grow Up (one plain graduate, one Cum Laude), Major CumLawde asked one to grow up Summa Cum Laude.  Their wants and memories seem to be normal (or like those in played graduates).

That's good to know so far.  See if you can grow them up correctly as well, after making them graduates, without any problems.

2) I decided to age up the 3 borked Grow Up victims to get rid of them with mixed success.  Donna was able to ask Marshall (Grown Up by Donna Dropout, but not moved in) to Grow Up then Say Goodbye Forever.  Major was able to ask Paula (Grown Up by Major as a YA and moved in) the same way.  Neither Dudley nor Donna was able to ask Deloris (Grown Up by Dudly Dropout, moved in) to Grow Up.  Sidney was not able to ask Janice (Grown Up apparently normal graduate) to Grow Up; Major was not able to ask Blanca (Grown Up apparently normal graduate) to Grow Up.

For the problematic ones, where you couldn't ask, is it because:

a. the option is not available

or

b. the option shows up, but nothing happens.

If so, then:

1) Does the interaction just drop out of queue?
2) Or does it not happen at all. You click on it, but nothing happens?
3) Or does it start to happen, and the sims "dock" with each other (that is... they make the motion to stand in front of each other, and the asking sim animates as if they are asking, and the sim being asked animates as receiving the question), but the interaction fails and the sim being asked shakes his head in disapproval?

If the problem is, that the options are not showing up... make sure you are using the proper controller, whatever flavor you were using: noage, notype, or norel.   The default one has all those restrictions, which is the one I personally use, but for testing purposes, I artificially alter relationship scores via debug mode or InSim.  If the controller you are using has a relationship dependency, I think sims have to know and at least be friends with the person in question.


If you do have the correct controller (whatever type you were using) and it isn't giving you the proper options it should, let me know which one it is.  I might have packaged them incorrectly.


If the problem is... that the option shows up, but nothing happens, or something happens but it breaks/stops midway, I will have to take a deeper look into things.  Since I added those things as separate options, I had to plug in several more BHAVs, and I may have not hooked things up correctly for all possible scenarios.


In my own limited testing, I just used a playable college graduate to ask 5 sims to drop out and graduate in all 4 states.  In that simple test, the drop out received the proper memories, life stage bar status on the UI, and did not gain any extra wants/fears (I didn't think to check want locks).  I'm pretty sure the 4 graduates received the proper memories (honors and dean's list for the 3 of them only), life stage bar status (star for only the honors students), and they all had 6 want slots.

I didn't even check if I could grow them up after making them drop out/graduated adults.  If I find time tonight, I'll poke around and do a bit more testing. Once again, thanks for the invaluable feedback!


Ste

[miros]

Option is not available.

If the problem is, that the options are not showing up... make sure you are using the proper controller, whatever flavor you were using: noage, notype, or norel.   The default one has all those restrictions, which is the one I personally use, but for testing purposes, I artificially alter relationship scores via debug mode or InSim.  If the controller you are using has a relationship dependency, I think sims have to know and at least be friends with the person in question.

I'm using the default controller.  In the 3 cases where the option did not come up, both Sims were adults and married, with relationships between 90 and 100. 

In the two cases where it did appear (and I used it): Major and Paula were engaged, but not married when he asked her to die of old age.  I think Donna and Marshall were engaged too.

One quibble about the RTFM in the first post... what's the no-type-check version supposed to do?

[syberspunk]

Option is not available.

<snip>

I'm using the default controller.  In the 3 cases where the option did not come up, both Sims were adults and married, with relationships between 90 and 100. 

Ok... whew.  Then the controller is working as expected.  The default controller does not let you use the option on playable sims.  Since you married them, you effectively made those sims playable i.e. they are no longer "townies" as far as the game is concerned.  Originally, the hack started off as just a way to age up townies without necessarily making them playable.  I was kind of frustrated with the fact that townies were immortal, and that kids and dormies could outgrow their friends.  Then other people wanted to be able to use this on anyone, including other playables.

I had originally thought about figuring out how to use attributes and what not to make them adjustable settings (like ACR and what not), but I was too lazy to dig deep into the code, so to speak, and work it out.   So instead, I made several "flavors" of controllers with different restrictions being lifted in what I hoped was a logical, progressive manner.

In the two cases where it did appear (and I used it): Major and Paula were engaged, but not married when he asked her to die of old age.  I think Donna and Marshall were engaged too.

This would be expected behaviour, assuming that the engaged sims have not been moved in yet.  Since you can be engaged and still a townie, that's why the options still showed up.

One quibble about the RTFM in the first post... what's the no-type-check version supposed to do?

I was lazy.  Surprise, surprise.   In the first post, I linked to a later post, where I explained the details for each controller here.

ETA:  That post is actually old now... I forgot that I rearranged the order again, later as explained here.



Ste

PS.  I lied, as I didn't have time to do any testing yesterday.  Maybe... tonight. Or not...

PPS.  If anyone wants to do any further language translations of the new options, please post here.

The new options are:

Ask to Drop Out
Ask to Graduate/... Without Honors
Ask to Graduate/... Cum Laude
Ask to Graduate/... Magna Cum Laude
Ask to Graduate/... Summa Cum Luade

I would also need:

Be Asked to Drop Out
Be Asked to Graduate

I think that's it for any new strings.  Let me know if I forgot anything.

[miros]

Ah ha!  I'll just have to kill Deloris by other means... she's nasty anyhow and has about 3 enemies, including Donna.  I kind of like Janice and Blanca so I won't burninate them!

[trudy]

just wanted to say, ive been using it with seasons. Worked fine with a kid who became a teen. But when i tried with a YA they just jump out of the animation and nothing hapens.

[miros]

Could you specify who was asking the YA, another YA or an adult?  Are you using the latest version of the hack or an older one?

Gah, I was almost ready to buy Seasons, but if GrowUp is broken again...

[trudy]

newest version

adult on home lot and AY at dorm lot, same result.. or lack of.

[miros]

Do you have an error log?  That would prolly give Ste something to work from.

[miros]

Slight weirdie: My adult Sim proposed to her YA girlfriend during a date on a community lot.  I stupidly figured might as well do the whole thing and Grow her Up too...  Well, the transition never happened. 

No real harm done tho.  The next day, she invited the fiancee over and asked her to Grow Up (complete with the submenu for grade point), and it worked fine.  The only harmful side effect I can see is that she's got two diplomas in her inventory!

Grats on getting your own subforum!

[syberspunk]

How odd... that it worked at your home lot and not on the comm lot...

Questions and suggestions that may help debugging:

1) Did the interaction actually pop on your queue?  Or does it fall of the queue?  If so, does it stay there for some time or does it disappear immediately as soon as it reaches the top (or does it fade away right away and never actually stick on the queue)?

2) Did you have debug mode on (and if so, no error log)?

3) Next time you try this on a comm lot and it fails... temporarily make the townie selectable, and then try the interaction again.  Does the interaction stay on your playable sim's queue (and all the other questions from part 1)?
Also... what about all those same questions but for the townie that you made selectable (i.e. does the interaction actually stick on the townie's queue or does it fall off)?

4) You said the sim got two diploma's... did everything else seem to work except for the age transition?  What type of comm lot were you on?  Were you still on a uni comm lot?  Or a "regular" comm lot in your base hood, downtown, or shopping district?

5) What controller type are you using? regular/default, noage, notype, or norel?

6) When it finally worked on the regular home lot... did that townie get all the other proper stuff (GPA like you said - did it match the one from the asking sim?, diploma, corresponding memories, etc.)?

I suppose you could probably delete one of the diplomas? *shrugs*

Anyways, any further info could help.

Ste

[miros]

How odd... that it worked at your home lot and not on the comm lot...

Questions and suggestions that may help debugging:

1) Did the interaction actually pop on your queue?  Or does it fall of the queue?  If so, does it stay there for some time or does it disappear immediately as soon as it reaches the top (or does it fade away right away and never actually stick on the queue)?

I think Jeanne's queue was empty when I asked.  Maybe an autonomous romantic interaction (they'd just got engaged, after all), but nothing more.  It was there a short time.  I think the animation might have started but don't remember exactly.

2) Did you have debug mode on (and if so, no error log)?

Yes, I always have debug mode on.  However, my game's been throwing weird errors from the dog's grave and from simply having more Sims than my puter can really handle living on a lot.  Will try to find it tho.

3) Next time you try this on a comm lot and it fails... temporarily make the townie selectable, and then try the interaction again.  Does the interaction stay on your playable sim's queue (and all the other questions from part 1)?
Also... what about all those same questions but for the townie that you made selectable (i.e. does the interaction actually stick on the townie's queue or does it fall off)?

Well, my Sims have now founded their own frat house and have their boy and girl-friends move in and become playable, so I doubt I'll be doing this again.

4) You said the sim got two diploma's... did everything else seem to work except for the age transition?  What type of comm lot were you on?  Were you still on a uni comm lot?  Or a "regular" comm lot in your base hood, downtown, or shopping district?

The only changes I can really ascribe to the failed Grow Up is the extra diploma and one lock (she now has 3, didn't notice it before).  Other than that, I can't tell what came from the failed attempt and what came from the real attempt.

Since the inviting Sim was an adult, the Uni comm lots are off limits, and I don't have many Uni comm lots anyhow, since this is a custom Uni hood.

5) What controller type are you using? regular/default, noage, notype, or norel?

Regular.

6) When it finally worked on the regular home lot... did that townie get all the other proper stuff (GPA like you said - did it match the one from the asking sim?, diploma, corresponding memories, etc.)?

Everything seems to be fine except the extra diploma and lock.  Her GPA is the one I picked, she's got 6 want slots (but 3 locks), two diplomas, one set of memories, etc.

I suppose you could probably delete one of the diplomas? *shrugs*

Anyways, any further info could help.

 

Or she could hang one on the wall and move... I'm still debating the future of this family!

[friendlyquark]

I have the visitor control hack and the no gypsy et al hacks, but they are suddenly not working after I loaded the grow up hack. Is that a function of needing to mod this to the Adjust... interaction? Or is it an alphebetical problem? Should I alter first, or play with folders first, is what I am asking.

[miros]

The Visitor Controller has nothing to do with this hack.  Use the Hack Conflict Detector from Paladin's Place (http://www.simwardrobe.com) to see if something else is conflicting with it.  If the "No Gypsy et al" hack is different from the Visitor Controller, that's your conflict right there.

Ste, I have your info...

1) YA Michelle asking Dormies to grow up:
    Randolph (179), in the dorm, asked to Grow Up->Summa Cum Laude.  Aspiration dialog appeared, clicked no, successful transition.
    Joey (209), date on university community lot, asked to Grow Up->Summa Cum Laude.   Aspiration dialog appeared, clicked no, date automatically ended, successful transition.
    Earl (197), date on normal community lot, asked to Grow Up->Summa Cum Laude.   Aspiration dialog appeared, clicked no, date automatically ended, successful transition.

2) Adult Dudley Dropout asking Dormies to grow up:
    Marcia (178), at Dudley's house, asked to Grow Up->Summa Cum Laude.  Aspiration dialog appeared, clicked no, successful transition.

At that point, poor Marshall's ghost managed to scare both Dudley and Donna to death...

3) Adult Sydney Scrapingby asking Downies to grow up:
    Byron (181), date on normal commnity lot, asked to Grow Up->Summa Cum Laude.  Aspiration dialog appeared, clicked no, date continued, no transition.  Looking at Byron in SimPE, he seems to be at some intermediate state.  His age is adult in the SDSC, he has 8 wants, his character file has 3 Property Sets for Teen, YA, and Adult, but he still uses his YA portrait (in SimPE) and appearance (in the game).

What files or screenshots would you like to see?

ETA: To remove double post (syberspunk)

[friendlyquark]

I used Paladin's program, no conflicts, yet here comes the damn gypsy again. I have settled for using in the InSIm to "delete" her when she comes on lot.

[syberspunk]

Which version of the Visitor Controller are you using?  The latest version was re-written for Seasons and I believe it no longer bans any sims by default.

Ste

[purple]

I think there is something wrong with the growuptowniescontroller-norelchecks file.
I am tried to use the growuptowniescontroller-norelchecks . When I had Angela a YA ask an other YA dormie to graduate and it won't even queue but when I made them best friends then it queued and the YA graduated and grew up.

[friendlyquark]

I downloaded the latest one before I started complaining. LOL I always assume that the MATY crowd is way ahead of me. I am going to take out all my hacks and start testing again. BRB

[syberspunk]

Ok, I've updated.  Hopefully I've fixed all the controller bugs this time around.  Heh.  Thanks for pointing it out.   Please redownload and let me know if you're still having any problems.

@miros:

In the majority of these cases, did you get the results you wanted?

With regards to the date ending... that seems to kind of be wiggy.  I am not quite sure just how to prevent this.  I don't know what exactly it about the code that would force a date to end.  But it seems to be that, if a transition succeeds, it will force the end of any dates.  Since I am uncertain how to fix this... what I could do is add a check to see if either sim is on a date and then prevent the option from even showing up if that is the case.  So basically, you wouldn't ever get the option if either sim is on a date.  It may not be an ideal solution, but perhaps it would prevent bugginess, since who knows if the date might be contributing to the failure of age transitions?

Unless you would rather have the option available even tho it seems to be forcing dates to end?  Personally, I would rather have the option turned off so it doesn't do unexpected things.  Let me know how you feel, I will think about it.  For now I will leave it in, but I am probably leaning towards disabling the option when sims are on dates.  At least until I ever find time or feel like digging through code and can figure out how to safely enable the option and have it not forcibly end dates.

One thing that you could check is... if your playable sim is on a date, and they happen to go through an age transition automatically on their own, does this also force the end of a date?  If that is the case, then it would seem that it is just default Maxian EA behaviour.


In the single unsuccessful case, it looks like something wobbled and instead of the transition occurring and the date ending, the interaction kinda broke halfway through.  Now... is this because the sims were on a date, and the date broke the transition?  Or... is it that transitions normally break dates... but since the transition failed (for whatever mysterious reason), the date continued as if nothing happened?  I am not sure...

I looked at the code... and I made a change that I am guessing might fix the transition failures... but I am not sure.  It definitely requires more testing.  I suspect that... maybe on comm lots... age controllers don't exist (yet... they probably have to be spawned at some point).  So I added a line to create an age controller if it does not find one.  But since I am not sure, I'm sorta just taking a stab and hoping for the best.  Let me know if anything weird(er) happens.  I can easily go back and just remove that one line, if necessary.

Ste

[miros]

Personally, I don't care if the option shows up during dates or not; I just want it to work correctly if it is there!  If you do disallow it, only the "askee" being on a date should prevent the option from showing up.

I'd have to do some pretty contrived stuff to engineer a "natural" age transition on a date, but I'll see if I can manage that.

Meanwhile, here's poor Byron's file...  It kind of looks like his part of the transition was complete; it's just the part that involves the neighborhood files that didn't "take."

Dang, could this be related to the other problems with cross-sub-hood moves?   Although the Townie family is the same as the Dormie family, he might still be marked somehow as living in a dorm still...

[syberspunk]

Personally, I don't care if the option shows up during dates or not; I just want it to work correctly if it is there!  If you do disallow it, only the "askee" being on a date should prevent the option from showing up.

Yeah, that's my feeling as well.  I'd rather not have the option if it's kinda broken.  I'll be conservative first and disable it only if the "askee" is on a date.  But I think I'd still have to check if anything would happen if the "asker" is on a date too, just in case.

I'd have to do some pretty contrived stuff to engineer a "natural" age transition on a date, but I'll see if I can manage that.

I imagine you could have a sim who is close to transitioning invite a potential date over.  Don't ask them on the date yet, just invite them over.  Then... when it is relatively close to the point that your playable is about to transition, ask the invited sim out on a date.  Does the mere fact that your playable sim age transitions during a date cause the date to end?

Even better, do this in a household with two playable sims.  Have either or both close to transitioning.  Have them go on a date.  Does the age transition end the date?


If it does end, in both cases, then... it could sorta be surmised that this is just how things are coded (of course, this isn't conclusive evidence).  If it doesn't happen, then, I couldn't say for sure, either way, whether it's just a flukey thing or something in the way my hack works?  Although, I'm not sure why it would be something specific about my hack, since I basically just took the regular Maxis EA code for age transitioning.  It could be the way that I'm pushing that interaction onto their queue?  But I don't think I know enough to "fix" the problem.

Meanwhile, here's poor Byron's file...  It kind of looks like his part of the transition was complete; it's just the part that involves the neighborhood files that didn't "take."

Dang, could this be related to the other problems with cross-sub-hood moves?   Although the Townie family is the same as the Dormie family, he might still be marked somehow as living in a dorm still...

Hrm... I'm not sure... I assume you had debug mode on and no error logs?  I know that sims who's age transition gets interrupted in the middle and reset tend to end up in a frankensteinish weird hybrid state.  For example, if a child transitions to a teen, but some bug caused them to "jump" out of it, they may have the body of a teen, but will be bent down at the knees so their character model is the height of a child, as well as still having the voice of a child.

One way that you might be able to fix this is using the sim modder object to de-age the sim or set them back to a Young Adult, and then age them back up to an adult.  Hopefully this would fix the model, portraiture, voice, and all those other properties.


Ste