Sims 3 - Gameplay Tips

[WickedSimmer87]

Don't know if this has been mentioned, but if you have a vampire sim you can send them to the grocery store to "raid" and they come out with around 5 - 6 plasma fruits for free! I have never found any negatives with this (like being caught by the police etc..) but maybe I have just been lucky!

Oh the police can and will arrest you  Tried it couple of times, so you were just lucky 

[Lisa46]

If you click the "Ignore Call" button when you are getting a phone call, and it's an oppurtunity, you will get the opportunity without having to answer the phone!

[Odie]

Did you know that if you add books to a book case, you can see that after a number of books. There will be more books on the shelves and the book case will look fuller.

[Sherry]

Oh the police can and will arrest you  Tried it couple of times, so you were just lucky 

Hmm... that's definitely a new thing for me, as my vampy sim never been arrested in any of those 'raids' he did.

If you click the "Ignore Call" button when you are getting a phone call, and it's an oppurtunity, you will get the opportunity without having to answer the phone!

Did'ja kno'? you don't even need to choose ignore, just cancel the action 'answer call' your sim supposed to get, and if it is an opportunity, you can still get it without answering at all.

Did you know? to add a book in the bookshelf, you dont need to click add book, instead, just drag the book and drop it on the shelf and it will get fuller after a few books.

[Sherry]

I did just realized this a few moments ago, but, did you know that Riverview is a town with the most deceased sims number? It like a whole bunch, like... maybe twenty or so.

[Lisa46]

Did you know that if you click on a toddlers "tired" Moodlet, they sleep in the floor. Goodbye cribs! Who needs 'em?

[Sherry]

did you know moodlet manager cannot be used on baby, child or a pet?

[Magz from Oz]

For the Gardeners:

When you need a good mood boost and have the Sunflower (the one with the smiley face that came with the Stones Throw Greenhouse) you can click + drag a sunlight into your Sims inventory to give them a +40 mood boost for the duration of the sunlight (up to 18 hours).  Really useful for the Astronaut Sim or if you're trying to level up a career.

Use 3 sunlights as fertilizer in the composter of the SwiftGro Gardening Station, that will totally fertilize and weed the garden (within the range of the gardening station) instantaneously.  Only do this once a day as it can bug your plants.  Also don't use fairy 'bloom' if you use the sunlights.  That bugs your plants too.

If you have more than one gardening stations, keep them relatively adjacent and you only need to add fertilizer to one compost.  That fertilizes all plants within the range of any adjacent gardening stations.

[Danielle Haydis]

Vampires get a negative moodlet when they encounter the sunlight.

Did you know? Holding down shift while placing an object will create a clone of said object.

[IronicBeauty]

Did you know that if you place the burglar alarm on the outside of your house instead of the inside you'll never have anything stolen? The cops will show up or the burglar will be scared off before he/she ever boosts anything off your lot.

Did you know that the alt key can be used without the 'moveobjects on' cheat and will lift the grid restriction (to a point) from placing an object? This way you can always make sure you have each object place perfectly for routing as the cheat prevents you from knowing if there is enough space between objects.

[Lisa46]

(Requires UL) When you try for baby and aren't sure if the try for baby took, click on the school. Of the sim is pregnant, if you hover over enroll in university the option is greyed out and it says "___ is pregnant." I abuse this trick liberally.

[Trip]

If you have Ambitions, a pregnant sim can't be styled even if she's not showing yet.

[KRae]

Can't age her up with a birthday cake. She won't appear in the list.

[experience]

I know this is an old thread and may have been mentioned, but I just wanted to post this for those of us who still play The Sims 3:

In Seasons when you are asked to go to a party at a friends, if you make a dish, you won't be able to serve it at their house. However, if you go into their inventory and "clean up" the dish and cancel the action once they have taken it out of their inventory, they will place it on a nearby surface, allowing anybody to grab a plate.

[notjustabook]

I recently found out that when I want to plant stuff indoors, I just place a seed/fruit/vegetable/whatever on the floor, click it and select 'plant here' and then there's no need for cheating, deleting walls or anything like that unless I want to move them around in my greenhouse after they've planted. I do play with mods, but I don't have any gardening related mods. Correct me if others can't do this without them.