Annoying animal attention needs «12...Next Go

MaggieMarley

Does anyone else find the attention need for the farm animals really annoying? It's not realistic at all. In 'real life', chickens, cows and llamas don't need human attention (beyond being fed, kept in clean conditions etc). They probably do need companionship from others of their own kind (which, incidentally, is one thing that the cows and llamas in the game cannot have since you can only have 1 per animal shed) but they sure as heck don't need to be petted/cuddled by humans every day to keep them happy!

It's so frustrating and time consuming. I have to have my sims pet each of their 16 chickens every day or they'll run away? Seriously?

Chazzzy

I didn’t know the farm animals can run away. I only pet them once per day. And their attention always says Content.

DaWaterRat

MaggieMarley wrote: »

Does anyone else find the attention need for the farm animals really annoying? It's not realistic at all. In 'real life', chickens, cows and llamas don't need human attention (beyond being fed, kept in clean conditions etc). They probably do need companionship from others of their own kind (which, incidentally, is one thing that the cows and llamas in the game cannot have since you can only have 1 per animal shed) but they sure as heck don't need to be petted/cuddled by humans every day to keep them happy!

It's so frustrating and time consuming. I have to have my sims pet each of their 16 chickens every day or they'll run away? Seriously?

Try playing with them instead of petting them. Your friendship will go up with all chickens that can see you/in a certain radius (haven't checked what that is). Also use the friendship treats when you can.

To be honest, my chickens are usually fine with twice daily feeding/collecting eggs/cleaning coop. The relationship isn't great, but they only threaten to run away when they get stuck somewhere.

LadyKyn

Sounds like you just want to run an industrial farm of chickens and cows pumping out eggs and milk with no rewards like a head pat. They slaving away for all sims to have their hearty breakfast of milk and eggs.

I'm kidding (Also that's a lot of chickens.). With that many chickens on hand I kinda find that to be the point of things being time consuming for that farm life. With my sim having a cow, a llama, and six chickens they spend the majority of their morning (5 to 10 ) feeding the animals, petting /playing with them about once and cleaning their shed. Can usually go a day without needing attention in my game.

Between that and gardening it's all busy work (which I like). Have a 3 sim household, so two are usually handling the animals and gardening with mom usually making things like breakfast and dinner. Least when there's no time to cook they tend to just drink a bottle of milk or whatever one of the Henford folks give them form a quest or just randomly.

I can imagine one sim doing all the busy work to be more than consuming if you have a lot of animals and more though.

RedDestiny92

haven't noticed, I play rotationally and I think their needs freeze so I can just pop in and if any need falls in red I take care of it all at once and I don't hear from them again.

Chazzzy

I should add that I don’t everrrr interact with my Sim’s chickens, only the cow and llama get personalized attention.

Sharonia

I kind of enjoy it but that's because I think of my sims farm animals more as like pets or friends, I know that sounds weird. I like having my sims interact with their animals and take proper care of them, it's cute and also can make it a bit more challenging to keep them happy.

MaggieMarley

Chazzzy wrote: »

I didn’t know the farm animals can run away. I only pet them once per day. And their attention always says Content.

I got a popup saying they would run away if I didn't improve my care and only their attention need was low takes ages to pet them all when you have a lot of animals though.

logion

littlemssam have made some mods which makes their needs decay slower.

MaggieMarley

logion wrote: »

littlemssam have made some mods which makes their needs decay slower.

Thank you so much will check that out

Kimmer

I like to give my Sim animals attention, I'm weird that way. I like to do it in real life too.
It's never bothered me in the game. I just try to find the balance of how many animals to have. I just found out that maybe a full coop of chickens plus other animals and pets is not the best idea if I want my Sim to have time for other things in her life too.

MaggieMarley

Kimmer wrote: »

I like to give my Sim animals attention, I'm weird that way. I like to do it in real life too.
It's never bothered me in the game. I just try to find the balance of how many animals to have. I just found out that maybe a full coop of chickens plus other animals and pets is not the best idea if I want my Sim to have time for other things in her life too.

I like being able to give the farm animals attention but I just wished that they didn't need it (although I love animals irl and would probably want to pet my chickens if I owned any). It ends up being really time consuming when you've got a lot of farm animals and irl they don't need it so it's not particularly realistic either.

Kimmer

MaggieMarley wrote: »

Kimmer wrote: »

I like to give my Sim animals attention, I'm weird that way. I like to do it in real life too.
It's never bothered me in the game. I just try to find the balance of how many animals to have. I just found out that maybe a full coop of chickens plus other animals and pets is not the best idea if I want my Sim to have time for other things in her life too.

I like being able to give the farm animals attention but I just wished that they didn't need it (although I love animals irl and would probably want to pet my chickens if I owned any). It ends up being really time consuming when you've got a lot of farm animals and irl they don't need it so it's not particularly realistic either.

I do agree that it's a lot of attention that farm animals need.
One thing that kind of annoys me is if I have hatchable eggs in the coop and the hens never come out of there because they're constantly hatching the eggs. Then they keep complaining that they're sad and hungry even if there's food around the coop. I have to make my Sim call the hens out of the coop to receive pets and eat the food and it takes time.

Icewolf

Nope, I enjoy it. They're my pets after all.

DaWaterRat

Kimmer wrote: »

MaggieMarley wrote: »

Kimmer wrote: »

I like to give my Sim animals attention, I'm weird that way. I like to do it in real life too.
It's never bothered me in the game. I just try to find the balance of how many animals to have. I just found out that maybe a full coop of chickens plus other animals and pets is not the best idea if I want my Sim to have time for other things in her life too.

I like being able to give the farm animals attention but I just wished that they didn't need it (although I love animals irl and would probably want to pet my chickens if I owned any). It ends up being really time consuming when you've got a lot of farm animals and irl they don't need it so it's not particularly realistic either.

I do agree that it's a lot of attention that farm animals need.
One thing that kind of annoys me is if I have hatchable eggs in the coop and the hens never come out of there because they're constantly hatching the eggs. Then they keep complaining that they're sad and hungry even if there's food around the coop. I have to make my Sim call the hens out of the coop to receive pets and eat the food and it takes time.

I was once told by people with more experience in the matter than I that IRL, part of the reason to gather eggs even- or especially - if they won't hatch is that the hens will sit on them trying to hatch even if it means starving.

I think the team did a pretty good job with making the animal behaviors fairly close to accurate. Yes, it would be nice if the chickens didn't need actual attention, but again, in my experience with the game, they don't need more than regular feeding and cleaning the coop. I've only ever gotten the "going to run away" notification when either I've missed a set *or* one of the chickens has gotten stuck behind the coop.

Kimmer

DaWaterRat wrote: »

Kimmer wrote: »

MaggieMarley wrote: »

Kimmer wrote: »

I like to give my Sim animals attention, I'm weird that way. I like to do it in real life too.
It's never bothered me in the game. I just try to find the balance of how many animals to have. I just found out that maybe a full coop of chickens plus other animals and pets is not the best idea if I want my Sim to have time for other things in her life too.

I like being able to give the farm animals attention but I just wished that they didn't need it (although I love animals irl and would probably want to pet my chickens if I owned any). It ends up being really time consuming when you've got a lot of farm animals and irl they don't need it so it's not particularly realistic either.

I do agree that it's a lot of attention that farm animals need.
One thing that kind of annoys me is if I have hatchable eggs in the coop and the hens never come out of there because they're constantly hatching the eggs. Then they keep complaining that they're sad and hungry even if there's food around the coop. I have to make my Sim call the hens out of the coop to receive pets and eat the food and it takes time.

I was once told by people with more experience in the matter than I that IRL, part of the reason to gather eggs even- or especially - if they won't hatch is that the hens will sit on them trying to hatch even if it means starving.

I think the team did a pretty good job with making the animal behaviors fairly close to accurate. Yes, it would be nice if the chickens didn't need actual attention, but again, in my experience with the game, they don't need more than regular feeding and cleaning the coop. I've only ever gotten the "going to run away" notification when either I've missed a set *or* one of the chickens has gotten stuck behind the coop.

Oh wow, I had no idea that hens do that in real life too.
I've never gotten "going to run away" message, yet. I've had hens being sad and hungry but none of them have wanted to leave. I guess that day will come eventually when I miss taking care one of them. Roosters are easy because they're outside all the time and are easy to feed and pet.

crocobaura

Kimmer wrote: »

DaWaterRat wrote: »

Kimmer wrote: »

MaggieMarley wrote: »

Kimmer wrote: »

I like to give my Sim animals attention, I'm weird that way. I like to do it in real life too.
It's never bothered me in the game. I just try to find the balance of how many animals to have. I just found out that maybe a full coop of chickens plus other animals and pets is not the best idea if I want my Sim to have time for other things in her life too.

I like being able to give the farm animals attention but I just wished that they didn't need it (although I love animals irl and would probably want to pet my chickens if I owned any). It ends up being really time consuming when you've got a lot of farm animals and irl they don't need it so it's not particularly realistic either.

I do agree that it's a lot of attention that farm animals need.
One thing that kind of annoys me is if I have hatchable eggs in the coop and the hens never come out of there because they're constantly hatching the eggs. Then they keep complaining that they're sad and hungry even if there's food around the coop. I have to make my Sim call the hens out of the coop to receive pets and eat the food and it takes time.

I was once told by people with more experience in the matter than I that IRL, part of the reason to gather eggs even- or especially - if they won't hatch is that the hens will sit on them trying to hatch even if it means starving.

I think the team did a pretty good job with making the animal behaviors fairly close to accurate. Yes, it would be nice if the chickens didn't need actual attention, but again, in my experience with the game, they don't need more than regular feeding and cleaning the coop. I've only ever gotten the "going to run away" notification when either I've missed a set *or* one of the chickens has gotten stuck behind the coop.

Oh wow, I had no idea that hens do that in real life too.
I've never gotten "going to run away" message, yet. I've had hens being sad and hungry but none of them have wanted to leave. I guess that day will come eventually when I miss taking care one of them. Roosters are easy because they're outside all the time and are easy to feed and pet.

They do come off the eggs to eat if you put food in front of them, but it's like 5 minutes and then they go back. Anyway, the hatchable eggs in my game say they hatch in something like 1 day, I don't think the hens will starve in that time. And it also depends on when you collect the egg and place it in the coop for hatching, so you could shorten the time the hen actually sits on the eggs.

BlkBarbiegal

My sims has 2 chickens, a llama, and a cow. They take care of all their needs in the morning. It’s a lot of work. Glad I had them start off with just a few animals. They’re also trying to do a bit of gardening. @MaggieMarley maybe jut take care off less chickens?

MaggieMarley

BlkBarbiegal wrote: »

My sims has 2 chickens, a llama, and a cow. They take care of all their needs in the morning. It’s a lot of work. Glad I had them start off with just a few animals. They’re also trying to do a bit of gardening. @MaggieMarley maybe jut take care off less chickens?

@BlkBarbiegal I ended up selling my llama and cow and putting all the chickens in my household inventory because I got overwhelmed lol. So much more relaxing to play now with no animals! Idk if the chickens needs will go down in the household inventory though.

MaggieMarley

Also: you can get away with giving cats in TS4 ZERO attention and they won't be taken away but chickens need to be petted or they leave? Irl a cat needs human attention much more than a chicken does...

BlkBarbiegal

MaggieMarley wrote: »

BlkBarbiegal wrote: »

My sims has 2 chickens, a llama, and a cow. They take care of all their needs in the morning. It’s a lot of work. Glad I had them start off with just a few animals. They’re also trying to do a bit of gardening. @MaggieMarley maybe jut take care off less chickens?

@BlkBarbiegal I ended up selling my llama and cow and putting all the chickens in my household inventory because I got overwhelmed lol. So much more relaxing to play now with no animals! Idk if the chickens needs will go down in the household inventory though.

lol okay. Give us an update on the chickens/inventory needs when you get a chance.

crocobaura

MaggieMarley wrote: »

Also: you can get away with giving cats in TS4 ZERO attention and they won't be taken away but chickens need to be petted or they leave? Irl a cat needs human attention much more than a chicken does...

Free roaming chickens tend to disappear, they get stolen or they get eaten by stray animals. Sometime they get sick and die. It's not just feed them and they will be fine.

DragonAge_300905

I wonder if the beloved trait works on the animals?

DaWaterRat

MaggieMarley wrote: »

Also: you can get away with giving cats in TS4 ZERO attention and they won't be taken away but chickens need to be petted or they leave? Irl a cat needs human attention much more than a chicken does...

Cats and Dogs in Sims 4 absolutely need attention or they'll run away. I just had my pupper - who was getting lots of attention, just no walks because the bramblewood makes even short walks take half the night - run away last night. (I also think a mod might have been to blame. I've pulled it for now.) The only way they don't run away is if you make them a spellcaster's familiar.

Bluegayle

I like it. The harder the game the better. Its too easy for everything as it is. But at least for those that want that they can find mods.
I just don't want EA to think we need to.

Also growing up amidst a Dairy farm we used to pet the cows while they were in their stanchions being milked, they all had names as per my Uncle and he also had the radio on during milking. Cows seemed to like the music more than the news though. Its a long time ago but I think at that time he would have approx thirty cows standing.
Eventually they went modern and with a computerized system only had to stand two/four (can't remember) cows at a time for same production. Unreal. And I don't know if they continued with the music.

I really miss the old ways. In cottage life we have that small farm feel again which I love.

catloverplayer

Chazzzy wrote: »

I didn’t know the farm animals can run away. I only pet them once per day. And their attention always says Content.

Only chickens can if you don't have a fence up.