Ably.Saucey
Count your Many Blessings
Hi there,
I frequently see threads started by folks having a real headache with moving villagers out and/or plotting.
To cycle out villagers and plot them isn't too hard, but it isn't exactly intuitive or simple,therefor, I've compiled everything I know on moving and plotting so hopefully someone can glean something helpful.
Placing tiles: taking preventive measures
To prevent a villager from plotting anywhere you don't want, you need to place tiles down. Tiles are located under the pattern tab (the pink pencil) of your bottom screen, tap one and you'll get a few options including 'Display on Ground', tap that option to place a tile.
Now, you don't need to cover every square inch of your town in tiles, however you need to put down enough so that there's no 3x3 spaces available for plotting, I prefer placing one tile every 2 paces while working in a straight line, so there is never more than 2 empty paces between tiles. You may need to cut down and dig up trees and bushes to be sure you haven't missed placing any down.
While I'm talking about the 3x3 plot space, I must clarify that while it is a 3x3 empty spot, you need to leave the middle front pace without a tile, to allow for the door sweep. Like so:
For added security, move special flowers down to your beach if your concerned so they don't get squished and it will leave you more room to place tiles.
Placing tiles is tedious but it's really worth it when you do a lot of cycling or you have set plans on where you want everyone to be.
I would especially do the areas where you definitely don't want someone to be and cover those first, (i.e in front of bridges, beach ramps, gardens, town hall, the train station etc) then really decide where you want them to be and leave a few 3x3 areas open in your chosen spots, it's less time consuming (and saves you from tears) to have more than one preferred spot, sometime one or the other isn't an acceptable plotting location (too close to other house, pwps, cliffs, river, rocks etc) OR the house just won't plot in the one spot you've chosen. A villager will plot on tiles if there are no acceptable spots available.
It's also helpful to invite people over or have them look through your DA (I prefer the Da) to double check tile placement, fresh eyes can spot trouble that we don't see and can offer advice if you need to adjust your plot areas for more successful plotting.
Plot resetting isn't too difficult as long as you:
1. Narrow down where they're allowed to plot,.
2. Have a few preferred spots so there's 2-3 open spots for them to choose from.
3. Be vigilant on your tile placement.
Cycling: Moving Villagers Out
Some info:
- This method is good for villagers you're trying to get back into town after they move out, there needs to be 16 villagers in and out before they can move back in.
-If you're following this guide in attempt to move out a particular villager, just follow the guide but focus on the villager you want out. *moving just one villager out can sometimes be very frustrating, sometimes they are very stubborn but I've had one villager ping to move the next day after moving in, I'm almost certain it's random.
-I've never seen any evidence that abusing, ignoring, making friends etc does anything to affect move out.
- Villagers will only move out once there's at least 8 villagers. (you will get a game generated move in afterwards when this happens, you could also get a voided villager if you've had visitors or have visited someone's town)
-A villager starts the moving out process every 5 days.
- "Pinging" refers to the noise and motion of a villager who wants to talk to you, they also attempt to run up to you, you may have to go to them, they tend to get caught on bushes. They can tell you that someone is thinking of moving or that they themselves are thinking of moving. (or they may want to give a toilet)
-From start to finish, (getting the idea to gone) the moving process takes 10 days.
-They can ping you at any point during the first 9 days, so you could have more or less notice.
-You can use the same plots, you don't have to move everyone out. Pick one or two villagers you're not too attached to and use their plots for your dirty work.
-To get new villagers moved in, you can use villager cyclers here, or your campground.
You will have to time travel (asking Isabelle to change the time), but don't worry, you won't end years in the future because you can stay within the same week!
You have to talk to everyone, the megaphone is a great tool during this, it makes it easier to find everyone.
For those you can't find, either walking around or in houses, that means they're somewhere walking around mainstreet, in the stores (including retail) or the museum wings.
Once you've spoken to everyone, or as many as you can find, and nobody has said anything about moving, save and tt 3 days ahead. ( I do 3 because if gives me a little more time to catch someone I don't want moving and stop them, plus, villagers consider themselves shunned if you don't speak to them within 5 days and might not tell you if they're moving.)
Repeat what you did before and walk and talk to as many as you can find, If no one says anything about anyone moving, (someone should by now, 99% of the time) save and tt 3 days again.
Repeat the walk around.
-If someone tells you that they're moving or someone else is thinking about it, decide whether you want to cycle that villager out or you're keeping them, if you're okay with them leaving, ignore them until they're gone, (10 days at the max, depending how long they were thinking about moving before they told you; you can tt if you want ) if not, tell the not to leave or (in the case of being told that someone else is leaving) find them and tell them to stay.
TT backwards a week or to the date you started, and repeat until you've had 16 villagers move out.
As long as you have at least 9 villagers in town, you shouldn't get a game generated move in, but you could possibly get a moved out villager from someone else's town, so I'd avoid any hosting or visiting during this. the exception being that you're going to pick up a boxed villager, in which case, they usually plot the next day.
Plot resetting: welcome to the jungle
Now where things get tricky, but just pay attention to what you're doing and everything should be fine.
Load up your mayor BUT first, ask Isabelle to change the time before you start so that it's the next day (ie 16th to the 17th) but not after 6 AM.
*-in animal crossing, a new day doesn't start until 6 in the morning, even if the DATE is a new day), set the TIME to say 5:58 AM, and save as soon as you're outside your house.
Now just wait for a few minutes (until it's after 6am). Some people exit completely out of the game to the home screen, but I like watching the camera pan around my town, once I see villagers walking around, I know it's after 6.
Make a new character, run around town and look for a plot, be very thorough, check everywhere. (new plots are sneaky)
If you find the plot in an area you don't like, just quit by exiting the game, there's no need to do anything else to that character, start as a new character to check the plot location until you like the spot.
If you like the spot, complete the new character process until the game saves after you get your town pass card, save, quit and start as your mayor, save again then go delete the new character and fill in the space where the tent was with tiles.
If I wasn't clear on something (which with me, is almost certain) please let me know, I would like to help you you out.
good luck!
I frequently see threads started by folks having a real headache with moving villagers out and/or plotting.
To cycle out villagers and plot them isn't too hard, but it isn't exactly intuitive or simple,therefor, I've compiled everything I know on moving and plotting so hopefully someone can glean something helpful.
Placing tiles: taking preventive measures
To prevent a villager from plotting anywhere you don't want, you need to place tiles down. Tiles are located under the pattern tab (the pink pencil) of your bottom screen, tap one and you'll get a few options including 'Display on Ground', tap that option to place a tile.
Now, you don't need to cover every square inch of your town in tiles, however you need to put down enough so that there's no 3x3 spaces available for plotting, I prefer placing one tile every 2 paces while working in a straight line, so there is never more than 2 empty paces between tiles. You may need to cut down and dig up trees and bushes to be sure you haven't missed placing any down.
While I'm talking about the 3x3 plot space, I must clarify that while it is a 3x3 empty spot, you need to leave the middle front pace without a tile, to allow for the door sweep. Like so:
For added security, move special flowers down to your beach if your concerned so they don't get squished and it will leave you more room to place tiles.
Placing tiles is tedious but it's really worth it when you do a lot of cycling or you have set plans on where you want everyone to be.
I would especially do the areas where you definitely don't want someone to be and cover those first, (i.e in front of bridges, beach ramps, gardens, town hall, the train station etc) then really decide where you want them to be and leave a few 3x3 areas open in your chosen spots, it's less time consuming (and saves you from tears) to have more than one preferred spot, sometime one or the other isn't an acceptable plotting location (too close to other house, pwps, cliffs, river, rocks etc) OR the house just won't plot in the one spot you've chosen. A villager will plot on tiles if there are no acceptable spots available.
It's also helpful to invite people over or have them look through your DA (I prefer the Da) to double check tile placement, fresh eyes can spot trouble that we don't see and can offer advice if you need to adjust your plot areas for more successful plotting.
Plot resetting isn't too difficult as long as you:
1. Narrow down where they're allowed to plot,.
2. Have a few preferred spots so there's 2-3 open spots for them to choose from.
3. Be vigilant on your tile placement.
Cycling: Moving Villagers Out
Some info:
- This method is good for villagers you're trying to get back into town after they move out, there needs to be 16 villagers in and out before they can move back in.
-If you're following this guide in attempt to move out a particular villager, just follow the guide but focus on the villager you want out. *moving just one villager out can sometimes be very frustrating, sometimes they are very stubborn but I've had one villager ping to move the next day after moving in, I'm almost certain it's random.
-I've never seen any evidence that abusing, ignoring, making friends etc does anything to affect move out.
- Villagers will only move out once there's at least 8 villagers. (you will get a game generated move in afterwards when this happens, you could also get a voided villager if you've had visitors or have visited someone's town)
-A villager starts the moving out process every 5 days.
- "Pinging" refers to the noise and motion of a villager who wants to talk to you, they also attempt to run up to you, you may have to go to them, they tend to get caught on bushes. They can tell you that someone is thinking of moving or that they themselves are thinking of moving. (or they may want to give a toilet)
-From start to finish, (getting the idea to gone) the moving process takes 10 days.
-They can ping you at any point during the first 9 days, so you could have more or less notice.
-You can use the same plots, you don't have to move everyone out. Pick one or two villagers you're not too attached to and use their plots for your dirty work.
-To get new villagers moved in, you can use villager cyclers here, or your campground.
You will have to time travel (asking Isabelle to change the time), but don't worry, you won't end years in the future because you can stay within the same week!
You have to talk to everyone, the megaphone is a great tool during this, it makes it easier to find everyone.
For those you can't find, either walking around or in houses, that means they're somewhere walking around mainstreet, in the stores (including retail) or the museum wings.
Once you've spoken to everyone, or as many as you can find, and nobody has said anything about moving, save and tt 3 days ahead. ( I do 3 because if gives me a little more time to catch someone I don't want moving and stop them, plus, villagers consider themselves shunned if you don't speak to them within 5 days and might not tell you if they're moving.)
Repeat what you did before and walk and talk to as many as you can find, If no one says anything about anyone moving, (someone should by now, 99% of the time) save and tt 3 days again.
Repeat the walk around.
-If someone tells you that they're moving or someone else is thinking about it, decide whether you want to cycle that villager out or you're keeping them, if you're okay with them leaving, ignore them until they're gone, (10 days at the max, depending how long they were thinking about moving before they told you; you can tt if you want ) if not, tell the not to leave or (in the case of being told that someone else is leaving) find them and tell them to stay.
TT backwards a week or to the date you started, and repeat until you've had 16 villagers move out.
As long as you have at least 9 villagers in town, you shouldn't get a game generated move in, but you could possibly get a moved out villager from someone else's town, so I'd avoid any hosting or visiting during this. the exception being that you're going to pick up a boxed villager, in which case, they usually plot the next day.
Plot resetting: welcome to the jungle
Now where things get tricky, but just pay attention to what you're doing and everything should be fine.
Load up your mayor BUT first, ask Isabelle to change the time before you start so that it's the next day (ie 16th to the 17th) but not after 6 AM.
*-in animal crossing, a new day doesn't start until 6 in the morning, even if the DATE is a new day), set the TIME to say 5:58 AM, and save as soon as you're outside your house.
Now just wait for a few minutes (until it's after 6am). Some people exit completely out of the game to the home screen, but I like watching the camera pan around my town, once I see villagers walking around, I know it's after 6.
Make a new character, run around town and look for a plot, be very thorough, check everywhere. (new plots are sneaky)
If you find the plot in an area you don't like, just quit by exiting the game, there's no need to do anything else to that character, start as a new character to check the plot location until you like the spot.
If you like the spot, complete the new character process until the game saves after you get your town pass card, save, quit and start as your mayor, save again then go delete the new character and fill in the space where the tent was with tiles.
If I wasn't clear on something (which with me, is almost certain) please let me know, I would like to help you you out.
good luck!
