Forum:Question about unsafe NPCs

I know that carpool drivers are considered "unsafe" NPCs in the Sims 2, so you can understand why I was surprised when one of my Sims came home from work with a carpool driver. I quickly quit and left it unsaved. I know that it happened partly because the neighborhood is very small in population, so the pool of Sims to bring home from work is small. I have had the same thing happen with Hobby Instructors and Burglars. (Imagine my surprise when the detective came home with the burglar!) At first I was worried about that, but found out that they aren't "unsafe" NPCs because Sims can interact and have relationships with these types. So my question is if I were to allow my Sims and the carpool driver to interact (but not move-in or marry because that is a big no-no), would that cause problems in my game? -- Icemandeaf (talk) 04:52, April 21, 2015 (UTC)


 * First of all you can't interact with carpool drivers in the Sims 2. The carpool driver has to be the one to initiate the interaction, because initiating interactions with the carpool driver has been disabled by default in-game, since carpool drivers aren't intended to be interacted with.


 * Just interacting with the carpool driver can harm your game. I've experienced problems by doing this, but with the base game only. I still wouldn't want to risk messing with them in-case it causes irreversible problems in your game. You should see what I wrote on the Talk:David Thompson page here and here.


 * Apparently messing with carpool drivers is just as bad as messing with the repo men and social workers. I'm surprised that your Sim brought a carpool driver home from work. I'm even surprised that the hobby instructors and burglars were brought home with your Sims from work, since the "bringing home from work and school" thing is strictly done with playable Sims, townies, down-townies and social class townies only.


 * NPCs shouldn't be brought home from work, regardless of population. If it happened in your game, there must be something wrong with it. The only time I've had this happen was with an NPC sales-clerk, but that was because she'd been bitten by a vampire, and been cured of vampirism. In the process, she was automatically changed from NPC to townie, so she was no longer a sales-clerk and thus she was able to be brought home with one of my teenage Sims from school. --  C.Syde  ( talk &#124;  contribs ) 05:57, April 21, 2015 (UTC)


 * I had this happen in one of my hoods recently. I quickly quit without saving when I realized what had happened. A carpool driver should only be driving your Sims home, not hanging out with them later on! --I am  k6ka  Talk to me!   See what I have done  11:23, April 21, 2015 (UTC)


 * I've never had this happen in any of my hoods. If it does happen, then something's not right. How could a carpool driver even be brought home from work? They're not even employed. It seems unlikely that this could possibly happen, unless the game somehow randomly assigned a career for a carpool driver. Or if the player simply assigned them a career with SimPE. --  C.Syde  ( talk &#124;  contribs ) 11:28, April 21, 2015 (UTC)


 * It is either a symptom of corruption, or another unpatched bug in the game. I got the carpool driver through a hobby chance card, which may explain it, since the FreeTime hobby chance cards have been broken in many ways. For example, if you bring a friend home from work via a hobby chance card, the Sim will bring that Sim home from work every single day for the rest of their lives (a fix for this is available here). --I am  k6ka  Talk to me!   See what I have done  11:39, April 21, 2015 (UTC)


 * I'd say that it's probably corruption, although I don't see why it definitely can't be an unpatched bug in the game. --  C.Syde  ( talk &#124;  contribs ) 11:42, April 21, 2015 (UTC)


 * C.Syde, you said here that drivers shouldn't be interacted with unless they start it. How do they start it?
 * K6, I think it was a chance card that made it so the driver came home with my Sim. So if that is because of the chance cards being broken, then I am really glad I left without saving. Hopefully that is the extent of that corruption. Thanks for mentioning about this fix. I thought it was interesting that one of my Sims always brought home his nephew. I guess that is why. And here I thought it was because they were somehow really good friends. Ha! -- Icemandeaf (talk) 14:01, April 21, 2015 (UTC)


 * They start it if you make them spawn on a lot, but if you don't add them to the active household, the only way to interact with them is if they interact with your Sims autonomously. But it can still be risky, to tamper with them outside their designed in-game purpose, which is driving the carpools. The risks of corruption are, or at least appear to be smaller if expansion packs are installed, since the developers seem to have made some modifications to the original game to reduce the chances of some types of corruption happening. But I still wouldn't want to risk treating them like a Sim that isn't known to cause problems in your game. --  C.Syde  ( talk &#124;  contribs ) 23:13, April 21, 2015 (UTC)


 * Just another thought that came into mind. Sometimes safe NPCs can be used if a Sim asks if their "new-found acquaintance" (a.k.a. "friend") can come over, and the inviting Sim says yes. When one of my Sims invited Jessica Ebadi over and she asked if her "friend" could come over, who turned out to be Gordon King. Though this gameplay usage of safe NPCs is uncommon, particularly if multiple expansion packs are installed. --  C.Syde  ( talk &#124;  contribs ) 07:29, June 10, 2015 (UTC)