Forum Announcement, Click Here to Read More From EA_Cade.

How Many Households Is Too Many?

Comments

  • rosemowrosemow Posts: 163,519 Member
    duhboy2u2 wrote: »
    OP, I don't think its weird at all! I currently have 5 different legacy challenges (each with a different ruleset) one community save where I play all the families rotationally and one save where Its mostly just builds. I don't think there's really a limit for me. I get bored with one house and move to the next. I like having tons of starts and games in different levels of progress. It keeps me guessing which family is on what stage of life.

    Especially right now with my game acting up. Its doing this weird freeze thing where I can't interact with anything or switch characters and when I hit pause the timer keeps moving even though the sims are frozen in place... So I log out after only a few minutes to an hour of game play.

    Hello @duhboy2u2
    I am sorry that you are having this issue.

    Sometimes having a large amount of items in the sims inventories and household inventory can cause issues. Try removing some of the items from the inventories and see if that helpS.

    Repairing the game may help. To do that, right click on the sims 4 picture in Origin and click repair.

    Try resetting your sims 4 folder and see if that helps. To do that, move your sims 4 folder ( that is in Documents -Electronic Arts - then the sims 4 folder is there ) to the desktop. Then start the game, and a new sims 4 folder will be generated. Exit the game and then copy back the "options.ini" file and the "saves" , "screenshots" "tray" "custom music " and "mods" folders from the desktop sims 4 folder to the new sims 4 folder, replacing the new generated file/ folders with the old file/folders from the desktop sims 4 folder

    When it occurs, going to game options and back can help the issue.
    Try pressing the M key and see if that helps.
    Try lowering your graphics settings and see if that helps the issue.
  • rudolpharudolpha Posts: 995 Member
    I've got 16 saves and play 5 families in each one, on long, so that's 80 families. It's similar but not quite the same as in my older games; I've always played many families, so much so that in sims 2 I had very few deaths. Plus I rearrange the lots in all of my saves and every once in a while marry off singles and start families, but then I leave them on their own.
  • EvalenEvalen Posts: 10,223 Member
    I do not play rotation play, I play one family generation, but no one moves out. and the generation keeps going. the elders die off in the same house as the new generation is in and it keeps going like that, Parents, child grandparents, child marries has baby and grandparents die, keep going like that. I get to play with each generation, but they all live together and there is never more then 5 people in the house sometimes six at the most, because they die off, but the generation keeps going, I don't think that I could play all those sims all over town.
  • egwarhammeregwarhammer Posts: 5,752 Member
    MC cuts a pretty wide path through my game. If anybody wants to know about something I mention, ask me in the MC thread. :)

    I have 12 households, all unplayed NPCs (most have NPC jobs), homed in Newcrest. The rest of the lots there are venues.

    The other three worlds I have mixed up between played and unplayed households. I don't play all the ones I mark Played, I mark some if they have careers I want them to keep.

    All culling and decay disabled, except I do use MC's new tailored relationship culling option. I have it set now to work only on NPCs (unplayeds) and to only remove Acquaintance level/lower relationships from them. I was using zero, but decided to kick it up a notch... it reduced my save file size by 10KB when it ran. I think it "ate" about 175 relationships.

    I have one household I play the most, 2 female YA roomies (one human, one alien) and the human's 3 kids (twins with Don Lothario and a daughter from the Pollination Technician). The alien had a kid too, but I moved her in with her dad and his wife (Nina Caliente). 5 in a household is plenty. Four is enough for me, but 5 is manageable. That's about as close to 8 as I want to get in a played household.

    I've played Don some, he's a detective, so I wanted to level that up a little. And usually I like to go with people about to give birth, so I've played several households for at least that long. Sometimes I'll get an idea and follow it up, but really, mostly in this game, I've been with my main household more than the others, probably combined.

    I do cycle through the played households to see if anything's new or different, sometimes. Mostly as far as who a sim knows, pretty much everything else about them, I can find out from either MC or the Show/Search Sim Info mod.

    I don't rotate on a schedule, I mostly bounce from event to event. Pregnancy, age up a child, have a baby, MC midnight alarm... I took my sims to a restaurant to check out a bug in MC (info post here)... etc.

    I've never been an immersion player. Always stopping and starting and saving and setting up. My hood size is 156. I can spend two days flagging all of them, before I let MC do an alarm. I'm a little bit obsessed with this game, with trying to make it do what I want it do to.

    But I'm also one to "plan" going to this lot for 2 hours and the next lot for 3 hours and so on... and I never get off the first one because things keep happening there and I get into watching. :smiley:

    Great question! :)
  • EnkiSchmidtEnkiSchmidt Posts: 5,334 Member
    H_alces wrote: »
    How many Sims do you normally keep in every household?

    I used to play with many sims, often full households or even more than eight sims (with mods). But large households are harder to manage in Sims 4 somehow (there were a few threads about this phenomen around sometime ago), so I prefer to have no more than four sims in a household now.

    And of course that leads to splitting households and new ones getting added to the world again in the process...
  • alan650111alan650111 Posts: 3,295 Member
    Lomelindi7 wrote: »
    It's so funny because I just realized recently that a lot of people play rotationally and I haven't at all in Sims 4. I play one household, that's it. If I want a new one, I make a new save. In sims 2 I used to play about 7 families in a rotation. So I might have to try that again

    Intertwining your Sim's lives in one save is the funnest thing to do! I have probably about 10 households I generally bounce around but I have often moved some sims from one to make smaller households to play out stories I have in mind. I have had the same save since the game came out. I just often use "Save as" so my family trees are so intertwined and I have played out many soap opera stories over the couple years the game has come out!
  • Uzone27Uzone27 Posts: 2,808 Member
    I have I think about...15 to 20 different households all in the same save XD. 6 or 7 in one city, then 5 or 6, in another, and with new crest city I have about 3 maybe 4 households there XD. Not to mention some of my sims I have just in game, "not in world" or house ;).

    I'm weird like that where I want all my sims/households in one save, lol. Though now there's a few I haven't played much because I've focused on other households instead (rotational play) XD. I also play with aging off, and will only age up certain sims when I want to/feel like it XD. Though a lot of them I haven't aged up recently.

    Not weird at all. I'm working toward that myself...if I can't rotate houses Sims 2 style without a freeze on the other houses, at least I'll have a save template which will (eventually) allow me to play through with one family and all my favorite households in the same save file.
  • egwarhammeregwarhammer Posts: 5,752 Member
    H_alces wrote: »
    How many Sims do you normally keep in every household?

    I used to play with many sims, often full households or even more than eight sims (with mods). But large households are harder to manage in Sims 4 somehow (there were a few threads about this phenomen around sometime ago), so I prefer to have no more than four sims in a household now.

    And of course that leads to splitting households and new ones getting added to the world again in the process...

    I've been thinking of moving my alien scientist out of my simself's house, maybe to a lot in the same area... but I'd really like to max out the scientist career with her, and I'm afraid if I split them up, I'll never get around to doing that. So for now, she's staying put.

    MC is doing a fine job of moving sims around for me. Marriages, pregnancies, house moves... you should see me after those alarms, chasing everybody down in their new digs. :smiley:

    Y'know that song, "Who Are You"? It runs through my head as I'm browsing through my sims... LOL!

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PdLIerfXuZ4
  • NShippudenFanNShippudenFan Posts: 3,825 Member
    I personally enjoy rotational play with sims 4 -if only the relationships were fixed completely and I wouldn't have to worry about people becoming enemies/romantic- ;). It allows me to experience different things and interact with different families I've made. Sometimes I "neglect" some households and just play others, but I still like having all my families/households in one save XD.
    LOVER of all things cosplay, anime, cats, Shadowhunters, and Sims 4!

    Origin ID: Sims4Girl202


  • NShippudenFanNShippudenFan Posts: 3,825 Member
    edited October 2016
    @Uzone27 haha cool, I'm not alone then XD. (Kidding).
    LOVER of all things cosplay, anime, cats, Shadowhunters, and Sims 4!

    Origin ID: Sims4Girl202


  • Uzone27Uzone27 Posts: 2,808 Member
    To be honest TS3 posed pretty much the same dilemna...entire fanilys would sometimes disappear, and other times the game would spawn multiples of the same Sim (albeit from different saves) in the same game.

    They could have fixed the latter easily by creating a rule in the code disallowing two Sims with the exact same name to be in the same save file.
    (As far as i know they patched the bit about CAS Sims being culled....it never happened to me)
  • egwarhammeregwarhammer Posts: 5,752 Member
    I personally enjoy rotational play with sims 4 -if only the relationships were fixed completely and I wouldn't have to worry about people becoming enemies/romantic- ;). It allows me to experience different things and interact with different families I've made. Sometimes I "neglect" some households and just play others, but I still like having all my families/households in one save XD.

    Have you thought about giving MC Command Center a try? Those things I bolded are very fixable with it.
  • CourtLuvesSimsCourtLuvesSims Posts: 54 Member
    I usually rotate between about 4 or 5. I'm trying to get into playing with generations of families so anything beyond that would be too difficult considering my goal. And in TS4 this is my first time playing with really big families. In no other game have I just kept getting the mom pregnant and having more and more babies lol. But, the bigger families are actually way more fun in my opinion.
  • NShippudenFanNShippudenFan Posts: 3,825 Member
    @egwarhammer I've thought about it but I'm unsure XD.
    LOVER of all things cosplay, anime, cats, Shadowhunters, and Sims 4!

    Origin ID: Sims4Girl202


  • egwarhammeregwarhammer Posts: 5,752 Member
    @egwarhammer I've thought about it but I'm unsure XD.

    Psh. Jump in. It'll do as much or as little as you set it up for. Mostly comes set for EA defaults, but as with anything, there ARE a few exceptions.

    I'm not taking over this thread (don't anybody faint! :p ) with a wall of text about the virtues of playing with MC (I so could, though! :D ). If you want to chat more about MC (with me and *several* other players who generally won't play without it), come here:

    http://forums.thesims.com/en_US/discussion/837115/need-help-with-mc-command-center-ask-here#latest/

    We'll hook you up. ;)

    "Come to the Dark Side... we have Cookies!!"
    B)


  • hannaaj22hannaaj22 Posts: 685 Member
    At the moment I play rotationally with 4 families and they are all related. I started off with 1 family and as the children moved out to start their own families I decided to join them and continue to play with all of them. I'm only on gen 3 at the moment so it might become too much later down the line. But I will see how it goes!
    Leon Family Tree
    Origin ID: hannaaj22
  • DevilNDisguiseDevilNDisguise Posts: 2,225 Member
    There's no such thing as too much for me. :) I rotate a lot. I don't really have a set routine to how I play between them all, though; sometimes I'll play a certain household for just a few Sim-days, and then the next one I play, I'll stick around for a couple of Sim-weeks instead.

    Currently, I rotate between about 12 households. Of course, once City Living is released, I'm positive that number will increase immensely. :D
  • egwarhammeregwarhammer Posts: 5,752 Member
    This is what I'm playing with... (courtesy of MC's get_pop b command)

    [10/17/16 11:19:27]Total Sims: 156
    [10/17/16 11:19:27]Total Female Sims: 88
    [10/17/16 11:19:27]Total Male Sims: 68
    [10/17/16 11:19:27]Total Grim Reapers: 0
    [10/17/16 11:19:27]Total Babies - Female: 0, Male: 2
    [10/17/16 11:19:27]Total Children - Female: 11, Male: 14
    [10/17/16 11:19:27]Total Teens - Female: 13, Male: 4
    [10/17/16 11:19:27]Total Young Adults - Female: 35, Male: 27
    [10/17/16 11:19:27]Total Adults - Female: 24, Male: 15
    [10/17/16 11:19:27]Total Elders - Female: 4, Male: 5
    [10/17/16 11:19:27]Total Ghosts: 2
    [10/17/16 11:19:27]Total Homeless Sims: 19
    [10/17/16 11:19:27]Total Homed Sims: 135
    [10/17/16 11:19:27]Total Married Sims: 80
    [10/17/16 11:19:27]Total Pregnant Sims: 7
    [10/17/16 11:19:27]Total Sims in Hidden Households: 6
    [10/17/16 11:19:27]Total Aliens: 8
    [10/17/16 11:19:27]Total Special Sims: 2
    [10/17/16 11:19:27]
    [10/17/16 11:19:27]Total Households: 63
    [10/17/16 11:19:27]Total Homeless Households: 11
    [10/17/16 11:19:27]Total Homed Households: 52


    I don't play 52 households. LOL!

    I think about half of them are unplayed, and of the others, I might play half a dozen for more than a game day at a time. Most of them I flip through to do a certain thing, and move on. I don't tie myself to "it's 4am Tuesday, switch!" I'm too much of a space cadet for that. If something interests me, I'll stick around. If nothing's going on, I'll check out another family.

    Although, for the ones I'm working on career levels for, I do tend to see who works or is off, sometimes that matters to who I play on which day. Random things.

    I guess if I had to label my play style, I'd have to pick eclectic. :p

  • JackOnYourBackJackOnYourBack Posts: 1,261 Member
    I have a lot of households in my save. I haven't counted but it's over thirty for sure. I have created most of them although a handful has had kids born in the game. I do have a main household but I play with anyone I want at any time, so I don't have a rotation at all. I enjoy watching my other households on community lots whenever the sim I'm playing travels. I recognise all of them and it makes it seem a small community just like in real life. I also have lots of different types of households which is great because i can get right into playing with whatever.

    If I only had a few households I think I'd get bored to quickly. :blush:
    Gallery ID: JackOnYourBack
  • EnkiSchmidtEnkiSchmidt Posts: 5,334 Member
    I don't tie myself to "it's 4am Tuesday, switch!" I'm too much of a space cadet for that. If something interests me, I'll stick around. If nothing's going on, I'll check out another family. [...] I guess if I had to label my play style, I'd have to pick eclectic. :p
    Me, too! If I had to abide a shedule I couldn't play all those households of mine. I may play one household two days, then something happens and I need to switch to another household to have the sims there react to what has happened. Or to several other households. And it goes on and on like this. I wish there was a mod that charges the bills daily instead of weekly, so I could be sure that my sims do not pay too much (or nothing at all).

    (And I use McCommand, too, but completely in the opposite way than you, for I'd never let the game control who marries whom, moves to another house or gets pregnant without my say so. I've killed almost every last remnant of story progression except for the random relationships which are as often fun as they are annoying.)

  • egwarhammeregwarhammer Posts: 5,752 Member
    I don't tie myself to "it's 4am Tuesday, switch!" I'm too much of a space cadet for that. If something interests me, I'll stick around. If nothing's going on, I'll check out another family. [...] I guess if I had to label my play style, I'd have to pick eclectic. :p
    Me, too! If I had to abide a shedule I couldn't play all those households of mine. I may play one household two days, then something happens and I need to switch to another household to have the sims there react to what has happened. Or to several other households. And it goes on and on like this. I wish there was a mod that charges the bills daily instead of weekly, so I could be sure that my sims do not pay too much (or nothing at all).

    (And I use McCommand, too, but completely in the opposite way than you, for I'd never let the game control who marries whom, moves to another house or gets pregnant without my say so. I've killed almost every last remnant of story progression except for the random relationships which are as often fun as they are annoying.)

    Oh yeah, I realize I *could* use MC to turn off those flirty things that crop up... but I decided to use those as story fodder, instead. If they're flirting anyway, maybe one ends up pregnant... I just did that to Summer H, by way of Jaques V... he's married, she isn't, affairs enabled here, I'm building some pretty interesting (to me) family trees.

    If you'd like to read more, look HERE. (It isn't just MY stuff.)

    It's probably going to bite me later, when Jack and Jill want to get married but can't, because they have some common ancestor. :p But so far I'm having fun seeing who all I can set up to have a kid together.

    Show Sim Info is a Really Cool mod if you're into details. If you're a micromanager, you'll probably like it. I *can* play without it, I just REALLY don't want to! (I can't play without MC.)

  • OMGiLoveIceCreamOMGiLoveIceCream Posts: 603 Member
    I don't do rotational play. I have 3 game saves and I play 1-3 sims on each save.
  • aprilroseaprilrose Posts: 1,832 Member
    Im a rotational/generation style player so the more sims the merrier. Right now I have 8 households but will soon grow to 5 more which will grow even more once 3 out of the 8 and the 5 have children.
    Simming for 19 years!
    Family Tree
    Playing Mod & CC Free



  • NRoweNRowe Posts: 7,877 Member
    I have only quite recently 'rediscovered' the Sims, so there is a lot about Sims 4 that I don't know yet.
    I think it might have taken me a long time to play rotational of sorts in TS3 and probably TS2.

    I have barely begun a story blog that has started with a single YA Sim. However, the story is written as letters to her twin brother -who in the backstory is studying medicine across the country. I would love to create him, move him into town and play the Get to Work active doctor career with him. It would be cool to follow both families that would result when both characters get married.
    However I'm scared that things would happen like Sims:
    -aging up
    -getting fired
    -getting promoted
    -dropping grades (school)
    -getting romantic relationships
    -losing relationships
    -getting skills
    That I didn't control/want to happen.

    So it's interesting to see that rotational play seems to be a big thing for a lot of TS4 players. This thread seemed as good a place as any to ask.
    Please advise ?
  • MarleyTheWizardMarleyTheWizard Posts: 962 Member
    I haven't counted but in one file I'm playing every premade household + some.
    Never been able to just stick to one family in any of the games
    I Sometimes Tweet About The Sims 4
    Gallery ID: MarleyTheWizard
Sign In or Register to comment.
Return to top