Author Topic: Romance  (Read 4782 times)

Offline Carl

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Romance
« on: November 14, 2014, 10:03:53 AM »
The guide to Romance in The Sims 4 is finished! I'm proud of this one, although I realize it still may need some improvement. I did not intend to list all the interactions or anything like that, merely guide the player toward success in their Sim's love life by sharing some game mechanics. Thanks to DarkWalker, I'd learned a lot about what makes romantic interactions successful and shared that information along with my own notes. If you have any suggestions for improvement, please post them here!

Offline DarkWalker

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Re: Romance
« Reply #1 on: November 14, 2014, 11:40:17 AM »
Great Kisser, according to the tuning file, increases the chance of all kissing interactions by 100% (as in, adds 100% to the success rate). In other words, as long as the sim had a success chance above zero, he should succeed.

BTW, for male sims, the Shine on Men's Suit increases the chance of many romance socials, including kissing, by 35% (and adds a 2-strength Flirty moodlet to boot). It's one of the bonus clothes from the Deluxe version. Not available for female sims, as their equivalent suit (Glitter and Abs) gives a 2-strength Playful moodlet (and increases the success rate of jokes by 100%) instead.



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Offline Carl

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Re: Romance
« Reply #2 on: November 14, 2014, 11:48:58 AM »
I had 0 knowledge of clothing doing that. I really hope they expand on this! I will work those in when I do my next edits. So.. do you see the romantic relationship required for kiss and woohoo in the xml? I'm unable to find this and had to guess based on where the bar was.. I would truly appreciate confirmation on those numbers, when you have the time.

I am currently using Windows explorer to search all folders in my extracted xml. I do not know a better way.

I suppose I should rerun the extraction after a patch so that info is current. Is this always going to be.this way, or do you think SP4E, when further developed, will give me better access to mechanics information?

Offline arcadiana

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Re: Romance
« Reply #3 on: November 14, 2014, 12:51:22 PM »
Hey guys, does anybody know what determines the gender preference of townies/created sims? I have a sim that I have declared a lesbian (but maybe she's not?) and whenever she tries to flirt with her bff she gets rebuffed... hard. I want them to be together darn it!

Offline Carl

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Re: Romance
« Reply #4 on: November 14, 2014, 01:51:17 PM »
I am really curious how that works because when we create Sims, we don't get to select it, no Gallery Sims have one since people don't get to pick this in CAS. It looks like townies are generated with random preferences. It seems that all Sims are open to heterosexual relationships, at least in my experience. Here is the relevant code, which makes it seem that 2/3 of Sims would be heterosexual (40/60 (total weight value)):

<T n="ENABLE_AUTOGENERATION_SAME_SEX_PREFERENCE_THRESHOLD">2</T>
-<L n="ENABLED_AUTOGENERATION_SAME_SEX_PREFERENCE_WEIGHTS">
-<U>
<E n="gender_preference">LIKES_NEITHER</E>
<T n="weight">5</T>
</U>
-<U>
<E n="gender_preference">HETEROSEXUAL</E>
<T n="weight">40</T>
</U>
-<U>
<E n="gender_preference">HOMOSEXUAL</E>
<T n="weight">10</T>
</U>
-<U>
<E n="gender_preference">BISEXUAL</E>
<T n="weight">5</T>

Are you unable to sway her even with other things mentioned in the guide, like charisma, the flirty boosts, etc.? Obviously you have the friendship part covered and should be getting a big boost to success rate.

This is definitely something I will add to the Guide when we have more information, since plenty of people will wonder about this. It seems odd that I have had success with a homosexual relationship once, and if this were a preference you couldn't sway, the odds of that happening were fairly low.

Edit: a further bit of code looks like maybe Sims get a -5 to romantic interactions with the wrong gender preference, and +10 with the right one.  I can't be sure but am thinking with the right boosts it should be possible to get a Sim to be in any type of relationship... It depends what that +10 and -5 really mean. With Very Flirty both Sims have a huge boost to the success rate, and you could try gaining some Charisma.

Offline DarkWalker

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Re: Romance
« Reply #5 on: November 14, 2014, 02:30:20 PM »
@Carl:
I use Window's search for the tuning files too; it works reasonably well for XML files. For the tuning descriptions and the script files, on the other hand, I use the multi-file search of Notepad++, since the Windows search doesn't seem to find things inside those files.

(BTW, I make sure the file name of the extracted tunings include the name, the hex ID, and the decimal ID. Then I can do a far quicker search for the file that defines something by searching for "file:*<name or ID of what I'm searching for>".)

I'm trying to find what makes Woohoo available. From what I'm seeing it's basically having a romantic relationship at 30 or more, having already had the first kiss, the two sims not being linked by blood, and a few other more or less default tests (target sim not being the grim reaper, not being pregnant and in labor, things like that). Simpler than I expected.

For kisses (and other romantic interactions) it's more complicated, and you need to look at each specific interaction file (and tests linked from that file) to get a good idea.

The short version is that it depends on mood (no kissing while angry or sad, for example), relationship (married, engaged, girl/boyfriend, etc), and the score obtained in the file scores_socialoutcomes_romance_availability (similar to the one for the results of romance, which I posted previously in a far more readable format, but with far less things influencing the result). Those scores are such that the test is almost guaranteed to pass if the sims are in a stable relationship (significant other, engaged, or married) or have the romance bar above half, BTW, otherwise you want a romantic conversation (preferably Steamy); all other scores (including for the Flirty emotion) pale in comparison, and you need to pile up a bunch of them for them to have any effect.

The long version is that you need to look for the tag "test_globals" inside each interaction file, there you will see references for many kinds of test, including for a score (test_based_score_threshold tag), relationship tests (i.e., if they have met, are engaged, married, etc), mood (many romantic interactions seem disabled if the sim is angry or sad, for example), buffs, and even whole lists of tests from another files (the tag test_set_reference). Do remember that one or more of those tests can be inside a referenced file; usually the score and relationship tests are grouped like that.

@arcadiana:

Sorry, I don't know. But AFAIK the gender preference is flexible, it will change if the sim keeps having romantic interactions with the not preferred gender (and the sim might even end loving both equally). I would go for romantic interactions that don't get rebuffed for a while, until each sim starts accepting the other's interactions.

Of course, if the two sims are related by blood, you are fighting against the incest block. AFAIK the only way to get two such sims to engage romantically is with mods.

Offline arcadiana

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Re: Romance
« Reply #6 on: November 14, 2014, 05:34:58 PM »
Ah cool, yeah I figured I'd try to level up her charisma some, she needs it for her teen job anyways. Thanks so much for your help!



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Offline _Annika_

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Re: Romance
« Reply #7 on: November 22, 2014, 03:40:34 PM »
The reward trait beguiling is helpful in romantic interactions. I don't know what the boost is, but if you beguile someone, they get a +50 flirty moodlet that lasts for 4 hours. The interaction is cute too - the sim pulls out a little cupid's bow and shoots the other sim with it. It is less helpful once you have achieved the Serial Romantic aspiration that you get it for, but could be useful in pursuing achievements.

Offline Carl

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Re: Romance
« Reply #8 on: November 23, 2014, 12:39:56 PM »
@DarkWalker my response is a little late, but I did get that info and appreciate the detail on how to find these things.

Thank you, also, Annika for the info on Beguiling. I had no idea it was so powerful, and will have to get a screenshot of the interaction for the guide next time I'm writing. It sounds like you're right that it is not going to be as useful once you've completed Serial Romantic, but definitely a fun one to use to influence others at that point.

Offline Ciosa

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Re: Romance
« Reply #9 on: November 23, 2014, 05:32:14 PM »
Hey guys, does anybody know what determines the gender preference of townies/created sims? I have a sim that I have declared a lesbian (but maybe she's not?) and whenever she tries to flirt with her bff she gets rebuffed... hard. I want them to be together darn it!

I had the same experience with a few people ... and also with flirting with married sims.  My suggestion is to use the computer to write a love e-mail; it never seems to fail and it always generates a romantic relationship with the other sim.  Once they have the romance enabled, they don't seem as resistant to romantic interactions.  (Yeah, I'm looking at YOU, Bella Goth.)

Offline arcadiana

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Re: Romance
« Reply #10 on: November 23, 2014, 06:25:49 PM »
That's a great idea Ciosa, thanks!