While at Sims 4 Creator’s Camp, I was able to experiment a bit with the whims of Sims. Below is what I discovered.

Whims are the new wants. Whims are things your Sim wants to do right now. Every Sim can have up to 3 whims at a time. Two of these whims are general whims and will arise from the general situation. They can be generated by situations, traits or one’s career. In fact, mousing over them will tell you exactly what caused them to appear. General whims will stick around until you either fulfill them or cancel them. There is no penalty to canceling them; a new one will take its place pretty quickly.

The third whim is tied directly to the Sim’s current emotion and has been given the nickname a ‘hot whim’. Unlike the two general whims, their hot whim will forcibly change every time a Sim’s dominant emotion changes. Depending on the circumstances, a Sim’s emotion might only last for a few hours. As a result, the aspiration points gained from fulfilling hot whims tend to be higher compared to the effort needed. They can also be chained. If you fulfill a hot whim, it is immediately replaced by another hot whim related to the emotion.

The devs have stated that whims are used as ‘breadcrumbs’ to help guide the player. You might see general whims pop up that arise from a Sim’s career, suggesting an action that will help your career. Or upon meeting someone new, it might spin up a whim to go tell that person a joke, suggesting a way to start building a friendship. The hot whims are a bit different. For generally benefical emotions, the hot whims will generally suggest ways to use emotion. If your Sim becomes inspired, they might get a hot whim to “Propose crazy scheme” to another Sim, an interaction that is ONLY available when your Sim is inspired. For unhelpful emotions, like uncomfortable, hot whims will suggest actions to deal with or get rid of the emotion faster.

The devs have stated that whims are used as ‘breadcrumbs’ to help guide the player.

Fulfilling whims, both hot and general, will give your Sim aspiration reward points. These, along with completing goals related to your aspiration, are how you purchase aspiration rewards. The reward points have been rebalanced and seem a bit more difficult to get in excessive quantitites. While I was not hyper-focusing on whim fulfillment, my Legacy founder made it almost to elder by the time I had to stop playing her and she had only accumulated a bit over 2000 aspiration points. The most powerful and expensive rewards cost 4000. (That said, there are some pretty solid choices available for 2000 points)

In all, I like the new whims system. Having only three possible choices, one of which is very volatile makes the strategy for whim fulfillment a bit more difficult, but in a good way. It rewards strategic planning while suggesting new interactions you might not even know existed. I never knew reaching the fourth level of writing allowed my Sim to write a love letter until a whim suggested that I do just that. It allows strategically minded players to work for their points while providing a trickle of rewards and advice to newer players who might not know all the game’s nooks and crannies yet.