Question About the Attraction System and Hair Length

[FzzyDg8]

I'm currently seeing a problem with custom content hair and the Attraction System.  Much of what I would consider to be long hair is not recognized as long, but short.  And, when the hair length preference is set to short in order to accommodate the custom hair, you get every Tom, Dick and Harry townie being extremely attractive.  Is the Attraction System set up to recognize custom content hair or only EA hair?  Might I suggest for a future update, that a special category for custom content hair be an option; no length needed, just the fact that it's custom.  After having thought about it, that probably wouldn't work either, as townies seem to generate with custom content rather than EA clothing and hair.  I'm at a loss on how to work around this, other than only use EA hair.  If anyone else has a suggestion, I sure could use it.

[BatDood]

40 minutes ago, FzzyDg8 said:

Much of what I would consider to be long hair is not recognized as long, but short.

This is an issue with a lot of CC hair because they're not properly tagged.

 

@Scorpio and I both went through personal massive projects to retag all of our CC using Sims 4 Studio. What we both discovered is that we were seeing a huge amount of CC (especially hair) tagged very strangely. Short hair tagged as long. Long hair tagged as short. Some hair tagged as everything. You get the idea.

 

The thing that baffles me is that mod authors go to a lot of effort to create great content but then when it comes to properly tagging that content, they fall very short. Not every mod author. But there are some big offenders. I guess they don't consider tags to be very important but if you take WW out of the picture, tags are used for sorting items making them easier to find. It also cleans up your CAS menu quite a bit because you're not seeing items in categories they shouldn't be in.

 

40 minutes ago, FzzyDg8 said:

Is the Attraction System set up to recognize custom content hair or only EA hair?

If it has tags, it'll be recognized. Whether or not those tags are correct, depends on the mod author as mentioned above.

 

40 minutes ago, FzzyDg8 said:

Might I suggest for a future update, that a special category for custom content hair be an option; no length needed, just the fact that it's custom.

This is not an ideal option as a lot of people use nothing but CC hair and if your entire population is wearing it, you'll be back to having "every Tom, Dick and Harry" being attractive.

[FzzyDg8]

@BatDood  Thank you for your input, I appreciate it.  I guess the best option would be to use only content that is tagged correctly when the Attraction System is enabled.

[BatDood]

7 minutes ago, FzzyDg8 said:

@BatDood  Thank you for your input, I appreciate it.  I guess the best option would be to use only content that is tagged correctly when the Attraction System is enabled.

You're welcome.

Tags are not immediately evident when you download them, unfortunately. CC creators don't make a list of all the tags they've applied. Usually it's just "disabled for random" and that's about it. You won't know exactly how they're tagged unless you verify them in S4S.

 

So basically you have a few of options available to you.

The simplest (and easiest) method is the following: when your sim's preferences are generated, disable any preferences for hair. Of course, this isn't really a great solution because it removes a good portion of the mojo from the Attractiveness system to begin with. It also doesn't take into account that your CC clothing could be tagged incorrectly as well.

 

The other solution is to just disable Attraction altogether but I'm sure that's not an option that you want to do.

 

The last option is to fire up Sims 4 Studio and retag all of your CC. If you don't know how to use the program, there's very good tutorials on the web. Retagging CC is a pretty basic function but beyond the scope of replying here. Be aware that this can be a very time consuming venture. It depends on the amount of CC you have. It took me the better part of a day just to retag my hair alone.

 

 

[FzzyDg8]

@BatDood Thanks again.  It never occurred to me that clothing would drive this problem also, but it makes sense.  I'm not sure how difficult I want to make this to get a true attraction between two sims.  They seem to be perfectly happy with a low visual score and I am not willing to tip the boat at this point of their relationship.  I do have S4S, but have never used it, and I don't know how far I want to take this by retagging all of my content.  I take your caution of time consumption very seriously. ?

[BatDood]

5 hours ago, FzzyDg8 said:

I'm not sure how difficult I want to make this to get a true attraction between two sims.

Totally understandable. But in the long run it's not just about having a well-behaved Attraction system. Having CC properly tagged is just better for your game overall. Having items in the categories they should be in is a big plus. It limits the items in your CAS categories to only the items that are supposed to be there. I've seen bathing suit items tagged as winter wear, if you can believe that.

 

Proper tags also are a big help when you narrow down your search functions for particular items. As I mentioned previously, it can be a lengthy process but it's not one that you have to do all at once. A little at a time adds up. It's all about personal preference. As for myself, I'm glad I took the time to do it.

[Scorpio]

CC also has Archetype tags which are also used by the WW Attraction system.

But since I didn't really know which clothing or hairstyles would be considered Latin or whatever I just un-checked all of them.

Most would likely be considered Caucasian anyway so not really much point for me anyway even though I don't use Archetypes category in my sims Attraction selections.

Although I did make sure the cc clothing like swimwear, sleepware, etc., were not selected for every single outfit in the game. 

 

Hairstyles have a higher value towards sims Attraction as I found before when sims had hairstyles by certain creators my sims would become very unattractive so...

Since these cc hairstyles were not what I would consider ugly I had to fix the tags just because it bothered me.

Color tags I just selected all those I like and use mostly like black, blonde, red, brown, and applied to all swatches rather than doing every single color as that would take far too long for me.

 

Doesn't really take much time depending on how fussy you are and S4S is simple once you've used it a few times, at least for simple tag editing.

It also allows you to see what they look like somewhat in case you don't like something you can just delete it right there in S4S.    

 

[FzzyDg8]

@BatDood and @Scorpio Thank you; I guess I'll be giving the thought of firing up S4S some serious consideration.

[BatDood]

@FzzyDg8 Well if you decide to go ahead with it, best of luck. I would make a backup of your entire mods folder before you start. That'll make it a little less intimidating because you'll always have the originals.

 

If you've never used S4S it might seem a little intimidating. But as Scorpio mentioned, once you get into it, it's really easy to edit tags. Just click off the ones you don't believe should be there (or click on the ones that should) and be sure to click the "Apply To All Swatches" button beside each section you've changed. Make sure to save once you're done with the save button on the bottom right-hand corner and then move on to the next piece of CC.

[FzzyDg8]

@BatDood Thank you for your very helpful advice and direction, I appreciate it.