[NEEDS INPUT] [CD] Pet cats can't use the litter boxes

[SimQARobo]

@thefrejamarple 

Thank you

[Kanelbullet]

Oh, maybe this explains why my dog is often hungry? I have all the bowls outside and you need to walk stairs to get inside the house. My cat is often outside playing and exploring and whatnot, so that would explain why the cat is full and the dog is starving. I have several time had my sims to call for the dog by the bowl because it won't eat even though it's sad and when I ask it what's wrong, it's hungry. I have to explore this further.

[Kanelbullet]

I think this is related. My dog won't go outside to pee/poo, it will wait until there's an accident, and I think it's because there's a small staircase to get to the ground. If I have my dog outside, because I've played with it there or whatever, it seem to be willing to take care of it's business by itself. 

[crinrict]

@Kanelbullet Is it a small or a large dog.

There's this thread for your issue: https://answers.ea.com/t5/Bug-Reports/FIXED-CD-Smart-Dog-will-not-go-potty-unless-directed/td-p/6423... but it's supposed to be fixed for small dogs. Maybe it's still happening for large ones or there's something else going on.

Could you please create a new thread ? This one is for cats and bowls/litter boxes. Like to keep stuff seperate.

Thanks.

[SweetVeggieAmai]

@crinrict I’m still seeing this issue as well. Cats won’t eat or use litter box on the upper or lower floor of the main floor. I have locked them up on the roof floor just so I don’t have to keep redirecting them up there (made a cat room pretty much) but they are still having issues even eating and pooping in this room, but what I noticed is the stray I took in is the one with the issue not detecting the litter box and food on the same floor. The one I had made with my sims, that one has the issue of not detecting food or litter box on any floor that isn’t a main floor of the house (can’t route stairs automatically to go find it, I have to call them till the floor, then they find it), but they will eat and poop freely if they are on the same floor as the items.
I am using mods but this issue was here prior to me adding them. Will keep testing since it’s a new save file but so far have been running into so many issues :/

[ravencoal]

@SweetVeggieAmai (not sure why I can't quick reply or remove the tag but oh well)

I currently have a save with 2 cats. One seems fine, but then again is a very active cat so he is always running all over the place. The other cat will get uncomfortable occasionally and it's always because he either needs food or needs the litter box. I have the food bowl with the dispenser downstairs and the litter box is upstairs. The cat is always on the opposite floor to the needed object when it becomes uncomfortable and I have to call him to eat or carry him upstairs to the litter box. I thought maybe he was just dumb till I saw this thread.

[RolandasR1]

I am having the same issue from time to time. As a workaround, I go to the build mode, move a litter box to my family inventory and put it back again. The problem is solved. Similar approach works with the coffee machines when my sims make a coffee and then cannot grab a drink. Moving these objects to the family inventory always helps. Resetting an object from the debug menu doesn't help though. Looks like object meshes shrink in size, or not very good in overlapping with other meshes. I tried to put a litter box farther from the wall and looks like it helps too. But in case of coffee machines there's no other way, because you have to put them on kitchen surfaces. Probably, I found a good place, or the recent updates fixed it... No idea. But I am sure, one should try to put litter boxes without bb.moveobject cheat and find a place at least one tile away from the wall. I haven't tried it yet (do not like too much mods), but there's a mod which fixes this bug: Pets can find Pet Stuff on other Floors.

[Edited by CM] Linking to mod sites is not allowed on AHQ - EA_Charlie

[crinrict]

Does anyone still have this issue except when they're not on the same floor like this: https://answers.ea.com/t5/Bug-Reports/NEEDS-INPUT-CD-Cats-are-unaware-of-Bowls-or-Litter-Boxes-on-th... ?

[SimGuruNick]

I'm hearing that we limited the object picker range for pet bowls and litter boxes because of performance issues. Not to say this is "by design" but yeah, that's why it's happening. 

Detection radius for litter boxes on the cat's occupied floor is about 60 units. If the litter box is one floor away, this shrinks to ~30 units. Cats cannot detect litter boxes that are two or more floors away. 

So yeah, I'm guessing this is primarily an issue for bigger houses/lots. If you place multiple self-care items (litter box or food bowl) on the lot and space them out, does that stop the issue from happening? Thanks much for the reports!

[Laarikin]

My house only has two floors, the ground floor, and the second level. (the ground floor is lifted off of the actual ground btw) and the cat still has an issue detecting it. It will even whine about being hungry when outside when the food dish is on the ground floor. The litterbox is on the second floor and it cannot detect when it has been cleaned and often times cannot find it to use it. Thankfully I've only had one accident so far, but it seems the cat does not go upstairs to use the litterbox, it goes for some other reason then realizes the box is there.