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Advice on High School Pack Please
elanorbreton
Posts: 14,544 Member
All you owners of the High School pack, please can you advise me? My game is currently not updated since before HSY came out so there are some things I need to know:
Which features are annoying enough to need modding and are there mods available?
Is anything broken in it and, if so, is there a mod fix?
Are there any features brought with a game update since this pack which are annoying and is there a mod for it?
All opinions welcome!
Which features are annoying enough to need modding and are there mods available?
Is anything broken in it and, if so, is there a mod fix?
Are there any features brought with a game update since this pack which are annoying and is there a mod for it?
All opinions welcome!
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Comments
-Grades will not go up or down while they are in school. You have to send them to school alone for their grades to go up to a full A, B, C, D or F level.
-Grades are just glitchy in general. My "bad" sim kept skipping class and pulling pranks, and yet he was still getting good marks.
-The social media app is fun, but your sims will just message themselves for some odd reason.
The amount of notifications for it is a bit annoying too, so feel free to deactivate it.
-Certain Wants for skipping class don't go through for some reason.
-Prom is way too short, and it's hard to complete all of the goals in time.
-Sims will just randomly leave class to go talk to themselves in the mirror or eat.
-Fears are repetitive and too frequent. There are too many Wants for listening to music stations on the radio.
-The Loyal trait is buggy.
-The infamous mean bug. Sims without the mean or evil trait will be randomly unkind to other sims.
-Too many sims asking to be your best friend. If you reject them, you get a bad sentiment with them.
I'm sure other people have more to add. The pack is OK, but the pack and the update have made the game a bit too buggy for me.
I haven't looked for any mods yet, since I'm hoping the December update fixes some of these issues.
Im not talking of general bugs now, only related to pack.
I never had the "Sims will just randomly leave class to go talk to themselves in the mirror or eat." bug above, no mod for it either. My sims stay seated till class ends and eat at lunch-hour or after school from vending machines. Exams are different, then my sims have got up sometimes too early.
my mods are
-for more students in school (18)
- for game to pick more likely player made teens to spawn in school than premades. ( I know there is a mod to select your school buddies, but I dont want to micromanage that much)
- longer proms
Bug fix mods:
- few tiny fixes for bugs I have not seen, but took the mods anyway, lol , not remembering now what.
- fix for the grades not rising if in active school all the time.
- no situation clothing (not actual bug, but....)
School will become boring if using default one, and just doing the school stuff.
I have add lots of objects in my own school, teens have so much to do there , often I dont have time to do all.
It was not so my thing before it was released, still is not. but I do like the world, and TOTALLY love cas/build/buy.
Sea may rise, sky may fall, My love will never die..
My heart, my heart, My drowning heart, Oh all the tears I've cried
Oh I may weep forevermore, My love will never die..
Other things that can be good to know:
https://answers.ea.com/t5/Bug-Reports/READ-FIRST-Compiled-list-of-reported-Issues/m-p/11673025#M223852
[NEEDS SAVES] Uninvited Sims entering homes to ask to be best friends (Sixpence2)
[NEEDS SAVES] Facial and Body hair don't grow according to settings (pjmonster16)
[OPEN] Sims come home from after school activity when on another lot (leeb626)
[OPEN] Sims can't ride together (wades_wiilson)
[NEEDS INFO] Can’t follow teen sims to highschool (BreeJean97)
[NEEDS SAVES] Cannot Claim a Locker (GothamSimmer)
[NEEDS SAVES] Randomly Expelled/Teen gets expelled from daily (momomelissa)
[NEEDS SAVES] Sim is stuck on C student despite acing all exams (DopeySims)
[OPEN] Teens don't attend class/White Board shows Career (Sninja96)
[OPEN] Clean Whiteboard not available in interactions (Wndblwz)
[NEEDS SAVES] No option to sneak out on ground/ask permission (JaffaYogini)
[OPEN] NPC relationship questions targets active Sim instead of intended (forensicgeek)
[OPEN] NPCs ask other Sims regardless of age/rel status to become GF/BF/BFF (PositivelySIMful)
[NEEDS SAVES] Relatives ask to marry (digitalblush)
[NEEDS SAVES] Cannot take photo with others at Photo booth on Plumbite Pier (ranmafan)
[OPEN] Teens don't loose acne when aging up to YA/No way to cure (brigidnouveau)
[OPEN] Selfies and Take picture with not centring properly (Roseadoodle)
[OPEN] Cannot plan goaled events on Fridays and Saturdays with teen in household (cosumeu)
[OPEN] Can't 'Dance With Someone' at Prom / Can't achieve 'Gold' Event Rating (BlackHotChocol8)
[OPEN] High School Prom not taking place (myeolchi)
[OPEN] Never invited to parties (RealEstate0fMind)
[OPEN] Prom not appearing in calendar/Prom works anyways (redglasses004)
[NEEDS SAVES] Romantic Relationships with all Sims/ Disregards sexual orientation (Nightside-Rush)
[OPEN] Graduation Not Showing on Calendar - Prom Works (jadbart)
[NEEDS SAVES] No Judge in Chess Science/Sports Fair (Lumiasta)
[NEEDS SAVES] Adult posting on social bunny about teen related events (s65j2f5xgtu9)
[OPEN] Sims sending DMs to themselves on Social Bunny (Henalexandre)
[NEEDS SAVES] Social Bunny app stays on x minutes (kneeshlowe99)
[OPEN] Social Bunny No Followers/Not increasing (juicylucy73)
[OPEN] Social bunny won't let me add contacts (r4lnjdzsfjpd)
[OPEN] Still Yellow Dot on Social Bunny Notifications are turned off (crinrict)
[OPEN] NPCs order from Thriftea and then immediately leave (N0T_RiS)
[OPEN] Can't Sell on Trendi (armp10)
[NEEDS SAVES] Can't Wear Trendi Outfits From Inventory (blushymae)
[OPEN] No Fashion Choice/ Outfit type filters for Trendi Outfits (crinrict)
[OPEN] Video game streamer career: Unable to livestream unreleased game (JaffaYogini)
My Families Via PlumTree App
Does anyone know if there is a mod to stop the best friend requests?
If you deactivate the social media app, does that stop it across the game for all households?
Is there a mod to choose prom day instead of it being every week? If not, does it stop you having events on the same day as prom?
I’m patched up all the way. I even own HSY ‘cause shaving, however, the lads don’t seem to be able to grow back their beards, so we sort of have to “shave” them back on again. "We" as in me and the lads. Then there’s the other end of the bodyhair spectrum, the one where the ladies have this awesome ability to grow magnificent quilts of fur all over their wondersome bodies. I confess, encountering any of these ferocious females startles me at times. But sure look, I’m not here to judge and I did ask for werebeasts.
As for other bugs, I don’t know. I play very little these days…
I explored the high school feature for a bit a while back, but sadly it all turned out to be such an absolute yawnathon, I quit following teens to high school ever since.
Let’s face it kid, I am not your father, do whatever ye want.
The thrift store…hmm…the thrift store is something I keep getting notifications for but I haven’t engaged with any of that Blobba Stuff yet. Not interested. Don’t even know what the bubbla tea tastes like. Captain needs more action and less bubbly fashion.
One might wonder: why did I even get the pack? Shaving and Copperale and the BB & CAS items of course! Pity that’s all there’s to it for me. Let's call it a rather expensive kit, but I'm having kinda fun nonetheless.
I wish we could Try for Spooky Babes whilst having a blast on the Spooky Ride.
Not much of a fan of the wants and fears either. There’s somethin buggy going on with them too. Sims are obsessed with being scared to death about dyin' and we can’t seem to switch off that nonsense. They should be happy to be alive in my game!
Now, the only thing that truly sets me off - in fact, it drives me up multiple walls at multiple heights- is the idle phone situation. I 🤬 it. I have very few mods to begin with and the only fix mod I’ve got installed is one for that idle phone ordeal.
Other than that I don’t have any problems, but as I said, I'm not in game that much.
You know what, I just realized that none of this was very helpful.
Looks like others have plenty more useful info to share!
http://www.getfreeebooks.com/star-trek-original-series-fan-fiction-trilogy/
The Sims 4 hasn't introduced a new musical instrument since 2017
Like yes, your sim sometimes just get up from their desk and goes and sits at another or wonders off to the bathroom. But I think this ties in more with the general sims programming to look for a bathroom when the needs turn yellow than any particular bug with the school.
I can say the school part of the pack can just be a bit glitchy and not run as well as you’d like. There’s things like it not being clear exactly when your graduation is and you can miss the career day and you need to send them to school in the old way to get from a B to an A. I guess these can be called bugs but I’d say annoyances is the word.
There’s probably more specific actual bugs but I just generally encountered small annoying things myself. But I had a good time and I do like this pack quite a bit. It’s just a bit flawed especially around the school experience.
Previously, I was playing offline with game version 1.89 (and was very happy with things the way they were) - Like you, I did not want to patch, due to the amount of bugs being reported from the patch, and held off for that reason.
--I can confirm, without Mods, that my game now has many of the bugs mentioned by others, including the Mean Bug, (which I have since patched, with BossLadyTV's Mod, because my game was completely unplayable after the patch) (Find it on Curseforge)
--I also have the glitch where the Need bars are not functioning correctly. They are going up and down, but the colors are not accurate. (For instance, a full yellow bar? o.0) - that stays yellow..
--I also have the glitch with the high school students grades not going up, despite doing class work, attending classes, taking notes, and doing homework. .
---> These things are all minor, and I have MCC installed, so I can easily cheat these things up, plus the Sims Team announced plans to address them in the upcoming patch. <---
I wanted to share tho, that NONE of these things annoy me as much as what I deem to be a GAME FEATURE. I have Seasons and High School Years. That doesn't even matter anymore, since the Calendar is now base game. With the Calendar System, Holidays and Events can be scheduled, and the player could make their own calendar, changing and canceling and rescheduling and moving things to their desire. For the life of me, I CANNOT understand, why the Sims team made Football night, Cheer Night, and Career Day, festivals that CANNOT be canceled, changed, or scheduled by the player. I play my game with aging off, with each lifestage sometimes lasting a whole Sim year (or longer depending on the lifestage) I like to schedule Summers off, school holidays, birthdays, anniversaries, vacations, etc. Yet, this expansion pack COMPLETELY takes away my ability to do this. Again, I do not see this as an "oversight" I feel the Sims team thought this was actually a good idea. There is a Prom, every single weekend. (Though, if I'm being honest, you're not required to attend, so you can just attend when you want to) - BUT... the Football and Cheer festivals, cannot be changed, removed, or scheduled by you at all. Career Day is in the middle of the Summer! (Kind of puts a complete damper on my Teen's Summer Vacation plans) Especially since I have the Summer Camp Mod, by adeepindigo, and for some of the Summer, my Teens won't even be home.
....If I'm being honest, I would NOT have bought this pack, had I known these things. I guess I just assumed, that we would be able to schedule our own events, and that Prom, Career Day, Foot ball and Cheer rallies would be events that we could schedule when we wanted, like we always have been able to do, and never looked into it before buying. I REGRET buying this pack, even though I got it at a discount. I also hate how the game doesn't recognize the age of your Sim in High School. They do not start out as Freshmen. They do not have any rank or claims to how long they have been there at all, or anything to show you how long they have left. I think this WAS an oversight for sure on their part, and a missed opportunity. As I play with each life stage for so long, Its getting difficult to keep track of how long each student has been in school without a feature like this. It also makes the High School experience mundane and tiring and routine, as I cannot see what I am working toward. I am hoping, that the Mod Community will be able to address these things in the future, as this Expansion is not eligible for the Great Game Guarantee Offer, which is a shame, as I would definitely claim it (and it would be the first time (ever) that I would claim it under a Sim title.
I'm not telling you to not buy it. I'm just letting you know what you can and cannot do with this pack, so you do not also end up disappointed like I am. IF any of these things are actual "bugs" with the patch, someone please let me know, so I can "me too" on the Bug Forum and we can get them fixed ASAP. Thanks for reading.
I am not particularly interested in following sims to high school and would purchase the pack mainly for the world, BB, CAS etc. but it sounds as though there are too many things which would impact my general play, such as the calendar rubbish ( @s_stutler )
@CAPTAIN_NXR7 what is the idle phone thing and which mod do you use? Do you find your game impacted apart from that, since you do not really play the high school aspect?
I have looked around and found the following mods, so if anyone knows of any more useful ones not listed above or below please post!
No constant phone by lazarusinashes
Stop Change Phone Color Obsession by LittleMsSam
High School Spawn Fix by Zerbu
Form Groups at School by MissyHissy
Dress Normal at Thrift Store by NateTheL0ser
Choose High School Classmates by Rex
Fashion Authority by Lot51
School tweaks by ChippedSim
No more fears by TearsofTyr
I have these in addition to the ones by Zerbu and Rex that you listed above:
Makarra - Stop T-posing please! Because it 🐸🐸🐸🐸 me off that they made a joke out of a bug and it triggered me every time I saw the students doing it.
ksuihun - More Students and Second Cafeteria worker
Natetheloser - No HS Situation Clothes so my students would wear what I want them to wear. And Thrift Store Dress Normal so my sims won't change into insane outfits when visiting the thrift store and then wear those outfits ALL THE TIME.
I think that's it.
@elanorbreton why did you have to mention those phones again? Are you trying to rile me up?
That was only a joke of course.
I was referring to the idle phone animations, basically sims (autonomously) looking at their phones whenever they think there's nothing else to do except for looking at their phones. It's too realistic for me, and I am now using THIS MOD ( you can find it at the top of the list: sims4me_noautonomousphone) to turn off all that nonsense. It's a compressed .rar document that you'll need to extract files from first. The mod offers a bunch of options that you can pick and choose from, e.g. fame related, highschool related, werewolves related etc. I didn't pick anything in particular because I own all related content, so I just dumped everything into my mods folder and it absolutely works like a *chef's kiss* gem!
Not ONE single sim has used their phone without my intervention since I have this baby installed, making my gameplay sessions up to 70% more enjoyable.
I don't believe the rest of the HSY EP negatively impacts my gameplay much, if at all.
Sure, having to receive 500 daily notifications for city, Finchwick & snow festivals and now also football & cheering contests is bit mental but that's part of a general issue. We should be able to turn these off in the Base Game calendar, which is currently not possible. It is true that due to the inability to organise locked events, the calendar is a big mess right now, although it doesn't bother me personally. I play with aging off (no B-days) and I only use the calendar to check the seasonal weather forecast. Now, none of these things stop me and my sims from doing what we're doing, so I let it be.
Overall I'm pretty content with the pack. I like the fact that teens can get acne and that sims need to shave. Both are optional and that's how it should be. Copperdale is a decent world, situated near the industrial towns of Moonwood Mill, Evergreen Harbor and even Brindleton Bay, at least within the non-boundaries of my own vivid imagination.
CAS is fun for quirky, colourful personalities and try-hards. Like the Build Buy items, these are all gorgeous, high quality meshes, but I personally wouldn't wear any of it as camo out in the woods.
BB content is really quite nice and also include (silent!) megaphone wallspeakers which I now use for every single prison and military base I've built in the past and will build in the future.
Have you decided yet?
I don't mind using extra mods, the only thing left now which may bother me is the calendar. But good ol' CD Keys has the pack at £23 so I may get it soon. I will play my un-updated game for a bit first and see how I feel, as I haven't touched the game at all since about August.
High School Years Mod List:
2 prom Royalty Mod - SimsModelSimm
Body Hair Mods
- No Female Arm Hair - FalseHope
- No Female Back Hair - FalseHope
-No Female Chest Hair - FalseHope
-Merged Chest, Back, and Leg hair for men
Choose Your Classmates Mod - Rex
Clutters - Random Clutter High School Items
Form Groups in HS - MissyHissy
Calendar Tweaks - LMS
Clothing Addons - BlackLily
Ice Cream Ship Overrides - LittleBowBub
Less Random Crushes - adeepindigo
More Discipline Mod - adeepindigo
More Fun Pier Rides - adeepindigo
More High School Students - Ksuihuh
More Locker Notes - adeepindigo
Phone Animation For Teens Only - MissyHissy
School Activities Once Per Week - LMS
Second Cafetaria Vending - adeepindigo
Shop For Prom - adeepindigo <--- Moved to SCRIPT MODS.
Stop Change Phone Obsession <-- NO LONGER NEEDED
... you may or not find a need to include them in your game.
..and I've just added no HS situation clothes, THANK YOU RedShoe for sharing! (That was another peeve of mine, but I wasn't yet searching for a fix) XD XD - You saved me lots of time.
Nice one!
I think it’s good to get the pack at a discount, especially if you don’t plan on using the “main” feature. You could spend the remainder on a kit, perhaps? I don’t have the latest two yet, but apparently they’re popular enough, especially the wonky one with the plump little strawberries. 🍓
@s_stutler many thanks for your mod list, I will definitely be getting some if/when I buy the pack - especially the calendar tweaks!
I think I'm almost at the decision to buy it now lol.
Just a thought - could you dress the Freshmen, Sophomores, Juniors, and Seniors in maybe different versions of the letter jacket (or at least give them to seniors) to show which year they're in? Or any everyday outfit you assign their same-age peer group, just so you can keep a mental note of their high school progression?
You could but the game doesn’t help you in this regard. With aging on some townies will just leave the school and the pack itself doesn’t give any aspect of time or different year groups. Nothing changes from your second day to your last day besides at some point you get prompts to graduate early.
The easiest way you can really do this is just with your sim alone, or you could spend a lot of time making your classes CAS but even then they’re going to just show up in school uniform or after school club stuff a lot unless you edit that too via a mod or something.
You can engineer HS years quite a bit for screenshots or prom or whatever but it takes a lot of work to do so for long term gameplay.
I believe it’s called “Pastel Pop”. It’s wonky because all the items look wonky like a distorted reflection in a funhouse mirror. The plump little strawberries would be part of a wallpaper swatch. One of those strawberries is the kit’s icon.
It’s not as if you don’t have enough decision making to do already, but here you can find the official screenshot thread for the daily clutter & wonky strawberry kits:
https://forums.thesims.com/en_US/discussion/1004658/official-screenshot-thread-everyday-clutter-and-pastel-pop
Go on, get them! Get all of it! 😆