Villager NPC Roles Fix

Fixes an issue which causes the villagers with special roles in Cottage Living to be replaced with new random sims, and also fixes the same issue with the Eco Master, Maker and Entrepreneur sims in Eco Lifestyle.

Bug

Since the July 2022 patch for High School Years expansion pack, the villagers with special roles in Cottage Living expansion pack are being replaced with new random sims upon loading into Henford-on-Bagley:

  • The Mayor (Lavina Chopra)
  • The Grocery Store Owner (Kim Goldbloom)
  • The Grocery Deliverer (Rahul Chopra)
  • The Pub Owner (Sara Scott)
  • The Creature Keeper (Michael Bell)
  • The Crumplebottoms (although they get replaced by duplicate clones of themselves)

This is also reported to happen for the special role NPCs from Eco Lifestyle expansion pack:

  • Eco Master (Knox Greenburg)
  • Entrepreneur (Bess Sterling)
  • Maker (Tina Tinker)

The expected sims are being replaced by randoms for the Eco Lifestyle welcome wagons.

You can read more about this bug at EA Answers HQ: NPC sims not filling regular positions. If you have this bug, be sure to visit that bug thread and click the ‘Me Too’ button.

The filters that allow these sims to appear for their roles includes a fame check and this seems to be not passing correctly since the High School Years update, resulting in the game not using them, and generating new replacements instead.

So it’s possible that if you don’t have Get Famous expansion pack installed, you might not be experiencing this bug.

Notes

  • This mod is for people who own either Cottage Living or Eco Lifestyle expansion packs (or both) and possibly also having Get Famous expansion pack installed at the same time, since the July 2022 game update version 1.90.358.1030 for PC/Mac.
  • The mod changes the sim filters for the affected special NPC roles listed above. If you have any other mods which change the same tuning files, they may clash.
  • If the game generated new NPCs to fill the villager roles before you installed the mod, you will need to delete these yourself in Manage Worlds. The mod won’t do this for you.

Downloading and installing the mod

Download the mod package file and place it in your Mods folder for The Sims 4, found in Documents > Electronic Arts > The Sims 4 > Mods.

If you have game update 1.92.145.1030 (or newer) then this mod is no longer required. EA listed this issue as fixed in their game update notes.

You can check the compatibility with the latest game update on the mod status overview page.

Like this mod? You can support me at buymeacoffee.com/galactrix

37 thoughts on “Villager NPC Roles Fix”

  1. Thank you so much for this one! After the update I started playing vanilla in Evergreen Harbor and immediately started seeing random, ugly Sims as Eco Master. Even the bartender was a Maker!

    1. I don’t know. You’ll have to try it for yourself. The mod doesn’t change or affect their roles, it just makes the filter the game uses to summon them work.

  2. For Villager NPC Roles Fix, the Pub Owner is still not Sara Scott, and keep changing every time my sim visit the lot. Please take a look. Appreciate it!

    1. Hi. The mod will stop new random replacements from generating, but it won’t remove ones that appeared before you installed the mod. You’ll need to delete those yourself from Manage Households. Once Sara Scott is the only Pub Owner that exists in the game, she should show up at the pub.

    2. I start the new game, I found the NPC’s are in their proper positions. So does Sara Scott. There’re no multiple NPC’s for a certain position. I think it’s solved. Thank you!

  3. Hi, before I started playing my save, I deleted all the original NPC roles because I wanted the game to spawn new ones (I prefer playing with entirely new worlds instead of EA townies), but they continued spawning more of the same Henford on Badgely roles even when the game already had ones. I thought this mod would fix it, but unfortunately it hasn’t. Will this mod not work for me at all since I deleted all the og EA townies, or should it still be working?

    1. The mod should work for you. It doesn’t care who you have in those villager roles, it just allows them to show up (instead of generating new sims all the time).

      But you have to delete any extra sims the game made yourself in Manage Worlds. The mod won’t delete sims for you. Imagine if mods could delete people’s sims?! How would it know which ones?

      Once all the extra sims are deleted and your sims are the only ones left, they should show up in the roles.

      1. Hi there, thank you for responding. I did do this and the game still seems to be generating new Sims.

  4. So I’m not 100% understanding the “If the game generated new NPCs to fill the villager roles before you installed the mod, you will need to delete these yourself in Manage Worlds”. Idk who or how many I need to delete? I already installed the mod and I have keep deleting NPC’s that was taking the Mayor spot. But it keeps generating new ones. There are so many sims not in homes/households, do I delete all of them?

    1. I didn’t have to, because I never let the game touch my save until the mod was installed and it didn’t generate any new villagers. Even if it did, I know every sim in my game, including all 600 NPCs in manage worlds and what they do. If you don’t care about NPCs or who they are then you can delete them all, but not all of them might be villagers.

      For a more targeted approach, you can check the village board in Finchwick and if the sims it displays aren’t the ones you want, then find them in manage worlds and delete them.

  5. Thank you SO much for this!! I now have the right people back, and in their correct places, so all is right with my sims’ world again!!

  6. Ok, now I have a question. Will/does this conflict with skin overlay mods and body mods? Because mine now won’t ‘stick’ once exiting out of CAS. It’s killing me…

      1. Ok, thank you. I didn’t think so either, but since yours is the only mod installed recently, and everything was fine before, I had to ask. Thank you again for this fix!

  7. Hi. Just wondering, will this work for the Realm of Magic sages? They are also being replaced. Thank you!

    1. No, it’s there’s nothing for sages in the mod. It’s made to fix a specific bug that only started since the HSY update. If sages are being replaced, it’s probably a different issue that has been around for longer. I’d recommend checking EA Answers HQ to see if there is a bug report.

  8. You’re my hero, I’ve spent literal days trying to figure out what the hell happened to HoB and why I couldn’t assign anybody the Cottage Living roles successfully to fix it. I play off of a custom starting save and I thought I was going to have to spend weeks rebuilding it in a new savegame (which apparently ALSO wouldn’t have fixed it).

  9. I deleted all game generated sims. Quit game. Cleared game caches. Deleted the EP11 file from the sims install and then relaunched EA desktop, downloaded the Cottage Living pack then went in game.

    It shows: Agatha, Agnes, Kim Goldbloom and some random sim as the Pub owner. There is no Mayor, Creature Keeper or Grocery Deliverer shown. Mod doesn’t work. 🙁

    1. The mod fixes the filters for those special roles so that the game will stop generating new ones non-stop. It doesn’t have any preference for the original sims or know what sims you currently have in your save game. If the bug replaced your NPCs, you need to check Manage Worlds yourself to see if the originals still exist and you might need to use Zero’s Assign NPC Roles mod if they’ve lost their roles.

  10. Is it possible, that the last patch broke something in this mod? I got it as soon as I found out about it after the major damage from the pre-release HSY patch, and it’s been working fine until today. Now Kim Goldbloom and Lavina (mayor) are again being switched out, and Rahul too. I haven’t changed anything, no new mods or cc. EA REALLY needs more/better QA people working on fixing all the darn bugs!

  11. Hello! Is there a way to get this mod up again? I just started playing in Henford today in new gameplay and random villagers are driving me nuts. I did not update game yet (waiting for other mods I use to be updated first) and I can’t live with 4 pub owners at same time >_<

  12. Hi, I’m not too sure what I am doing wrong. I downloaded the file onto my mac and placed it in the mods folder. I delete all the new NPCs in HoB but the game just creates new ones and does not allocate the HoB sims. This issue started for me when I edited the households for the Scott family, moved the Chopra family and modified in CAS Kim Goldbloom. The townies I have not touched still remain in their allocated NPC role. I’m not sure how to fix it as I’ve deleted and re-downloaded the mod. My mods and scripts are enabled, my game is up to date and I have no other mods or CC. Can I get some help please?

    1. The mod was a bugfix designed to fix an issue where the game just stopped using these NPCs even if they hadn’t been touched. That bug has already been patched out of the game. The mod is not going to help fix cases where the NPC role status has been lost because of player actions – the changes that you’ve made, might have permanently removed their roles. You’ll have to find a mod that can add them back – search for Zero’s Assign NPC Roles mod.

  13. Hello,
    I can not download this mod, the download button is greyed out. Does that mean this mod is not up to date anymore? Any idea if it will be again?
    Thank you!

    1. The mod is old and disabled because it is not needed any more. The note above the download button explains that the latest game patches have fixed it.

      1. I know EA say they fixed it BUT I still have this bug… The download button here doesn’t work anymore, I’m guessing because the bug is supposed to be fixed. would it be possible to make it available again?

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