Making Friends

[ClayMask]

My Sim has level ten charisma, and it still takes her hours to make friends.  This is very different from The Sims 3. It does seem to go faster if I use social interactions that don't take a long time.  She's observant and I try to use interactions that relate to their traits if possible, and discuss interests, but I'm not sure if this speeds things up.  I also make sure she's in a confident mood when talking, since I heard this causes the interactions to have a greater impact.  Also, I've noticed that interactions that come up because my Sim is confident, like Propose Crazy Scheme, seem to have a greater impact.  Still, it takes hours.  Anyone manage to do it faster?   

[Dellena]

The fastest I've made friend was asking an NPC to mentor me at the gym.  We hadn't been introduced yet either.  After the workout finished, my sim introduced herself and was immediately friends with the mentor.

[Stormi71]

I haven't found any consistency. For a while it seemed like it took ages to make friends, but she's doing the popularity aspiration so today I made her visit households. She became friends with about six sims within maybe four sim hours? She was in a happy mood because I kept throwing in the heartfelt compliment, which seems to take the level up a bit. Her charisma is level 6, I think. I find the group conversations seem to slow it down somewhat, so I try to get them on their own and talk to them. Like I said, though, other times it seems like it takes forever.
Possibly it raises faster if you have traits in I common, and opposite if you have conflicting traits?

[ClayMask]

I also don't like the group conversations.  When these happen, most of the time I stop seeing plus signs at all, and I also don't see the relationship bar moving. 

The gym suggestion sounds good if you don't care who the Sim wants to make friends with and want to work on your athletic, but I'm having my Sim make friends with specific people.  Maybe I'll give it a try sometime at my Sim's house.

Edit:  I've discovered that the funny interactions start out as ++,but after a while of using them, become +.  It seems like at this point it's a good idea to switch to other types of ++ interactions.

[Playalot]

I've found the gym mentoring a good way but if you need to stay closer to home then I've found that there is a difference between sims. Some I can make friends in about 20 interactions or less other sims it is much harder. I think that using interactions that have the sunglasses are the most effective but also changing the other sims emotions works well. So get them energized or playable etc.

How I make friends is to totally spam them with interactions. I use trait interactions where possible, throw in three jokes, flatter them, trait interactions, few more jokes.... etc etc. And I don't let up until we are friends. My sim is also level 10 charisma and he makes friends very very quickly doing this.

I use group conversations like this... Once I've got the first sim to be a friend then I add in another sim, and do the same, this time I just throw the odd interaction specifically at the first sim. That way the first sim becomes my 'good friend' and the second becomes a 'friend'. Add another sim in and so on and within about 4 sim hours you should have a few good or very good friends and a quite a few just friends.

[Joria]

I'm horrible at making friends being a full time loner in RL, (except for my huge family), so I do what I do here.  I use the internet.  I just make my poor Sim sit and chat at the pc till the friend bar is raised and then finish it off with a face to face interaction. 

[Metropolis Man]

Just wanted to say I agree, ClayMask, friendships seem to be a bit tougher to get than Sims 3. And it's great  to see you again, ClayMask!

[Joria]

Just wanted to say I agree, ClayMask, friendships seem to be a bit tougher to get than Sims 3. And it's great  to see you again, ClayMask!

And even harder to keep!  I really have to work at keeping my little family friends and loved ones.  It's pretty time consuming and even having them all do things together, (eat a meal, watch tv, play a game, dance), doesn't raise the bar much at all.  Of course, whoo hoo helps a lot.

[Playalot]

Friendships are almost impossible to keep unless they're between family members. It seems like chatting on the phone to other sims does nothing. I guess that's why friends keep knocking on your door all day long...

[Devin]

I don't have trouble making friends unless the other sim is mean or evil. It's keeping them that has proven to be a struggle. Right now I'm playing a Popularity Sim and I'm dreading having to maintain twelve friendships at one time without losing any of the older sims (to death) in the process.

[Metropolis Man]

Hey - on a side note (sorry for hijacking your thread, ClayMask) isn't it funny that if you call a friend after 11 PM - or is it midnight I forget - they'll chew you out for always being asleep. BUT...press M to go to a lot in the middle of the night and...bingo...if they are in the list as available it's a clever workout to not being able to call on the phone.

[ClayMask]

I don't have trouble making friends unless the other sim is mean or evil. It's keeping them that has proven to be a struggle. Right now I'm playing a Popularity Sim and I'm dreading having to maintain twelve friendships at one time without losing any of the older sims (to death) in the process.

I just finished this aspiration on my Sim.  Make sure not to make friends with homeless townies, or they are likely to disappear.

It's great to see you here too, Metro   I'm really looking forward to the challenges for The Sims 4.   It is funny how they get mad about the call, but you can visit them and they're almost never asleep.

[Devin]

I just finished this aspiration on my Sim.  Make sure not to make friends with homeless townies, or they are likely to disappear.

Is it allowed in a legacy to move them onto lots via "manage households?" That's one way then to make sure that they don't simply vanish, and it would work for future spouses, etc, as well. I think I read somewhere in the rules that they have to be homeless and members of families, but that's such an incredible restriction that makes it hard to find sims in the right age group that I'm considering ignoring it even if it is in the rules.

How do you find enough non-homeless sims for this challenge, without risking them dying within days of befriending them? The last time I tried this Aspiration, the sims my sim befriended all died very quickly, and since you can't keep up with those relationships, they dropped off the count too quickly

[ClayMask]

Is it allowed in a legacy to move them onto lots via "manage households?" That's one way then to make sure that they don't simply vanish, and it would work for future spouses, etc, as well. I think I read somewhere in the rules that they have to be homeless and members of families, but that's such an incredible restriction that makes it hard to find sims in the right age group that I'm considering ignoring it even if it is in the rules.

I'm not sure about the legacy rules.  It would probably depend on what one you were doing.  I wasn't doing a legacy, and that's exactly what I did.  Had the original people in town still been there, it wouldn't have been an issue, but they had died already.  I do know that I tried it first without doing that and she was losing many friends every day due to them disappearing.  I don't know if I would have ever been able to make it to 12 friends that way.

[_Annika_]

The legacy rules were updated to allow downloading spouses from the exchange, due to the lack of available spouses in the townie pool. I don't think it would be allowed to move them into a lot, because then when you added them to your household, they would bring money with them, which is not allowed for a legacy.

If you find that a spouse is getting old too quickly, you are allowed to give each sim one potion of youth in their lifetime.