IT DIDNT WORK!!!!

[stitchmaker]

I had 5 different openings for the villagers to plot and the villager picked my orchard. At the time I was using a new save file.
To fix this I changed the time with the mayor to 550am and checked the spot. Found a opening for a house. I thought there was enough tiles and might have removed one by mistake when getting a fossil. Save/quit at 559am and waited to make a new player. The villager plotted in on of the 5 spots

I had some problems with amiibo card moving out and letting a new villager in the next day. There is no time to fill in the moved out villager. Jay kept plotting his house in the moved out villagers house. I finally gave up and let him move there. I now wait till a villager asks to move out and than fill their house in with tiles before scanning a card. It makes plot resetting faster.

I've watched a streamer place houses in a row. She had 10 plots opened for villager to move into. She moved some in and than had to move some off stream because it was getting too late. They were all in a row by the next day. A villager did move out when she started the stream a couple of time. Each time she used the card and moved them back into the same spot.

 

[Lanstar]

After checking your map, I found the problem:

In the game, there is an acreage system. Starting from the top upper corner land of your town, an acre consists of a 16x16 space of land, and there are 20 acres in every town. The boundaries of an acre are invisible, but one can measure with path patterns to discover where they are.

One rule of this system is that if a town acre already has 3 buildings in it, a villager cannot plot on the acre, and must chose somewhere else. Three homes there must have been compressed into an acre, so your villager had to move somewhere else - and break through path patterns.

 

[Christy.lee1989]

After checking your map, I found the problem:

In the game, there is an acreage system. Starting from the top upper corner land of your town, an acre consists of a 16x16 space of land, and there are 20 acres in every town. The boundaries of an acre are invisible, but one can measure with path patterns to discover where they are.

One rule of this system is that if a town acre already has 3 buildings in it, a villager cannot plot on the acre, and must chose somewhere else. Three homes there must have been compressed into an acre, so your villager had to move somewhere else - and break through path patterns.

ok this explains what someone was trying to say earlier a lot better. so basically start at the very top left and go right 16 path spots, then down 16 and that will show me where my first acre is? i was wishing i could move most of my villagers in that one spot but i guess not. thanks for this, i think i understand better than there being grey lines over my map. i think next time i can do better now.

 

[Tomoe Hotaru]

After checking your map, I found the problem:

In the game, there is an acreage system. Starting from the top upper corner land of your town, an acre consists of a 16x16 space of land, and there are 20 acres in every town. The boundaries of an acre are invisible, but one can measure with path patterns to discover where they are.

One rule of this system is that if a town acre already has 3 buildings in it, a villager cannot plot on the acre, and must chose somewhere else. Three homes there must have been compressed into an acre, so your villager had to move somewhere else - and break through path patterns.

Thanks so much for explaining it further, that?s what I suspected after hearing the other theory.
It?s nice to finally know the issue!!
and for further reference that?s what I tried to show with the image I linked. You might not be able to see the acres in the actual game, but when you look up screenshots of the save-editor, you will find town maps with a thin, light grey grid displayed above them. That, together with looking at the different acres in the game (the save editor has a list of all of them, there should be pictures of that online or on youtube) can give you a good feeling where your town?s acres are. I personaly find that quite helpful.

 

[Christy.lee1989]

eah i couldnt quite understand the grey lines, i thought they were there i just wasnt seeing them or something. makes sense. already quit game for tonight but tomorrow im going to map out where my acres are in that area so i can plan where i can place houses.

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and i have read about that save editor thing but never used it. i read somewhere it can mess up your game and i have been scared to use it. not even sure how to.

 

[Reginald Fairfield]

Did the gem rock or a fossil spawn in the empty spot? Maybe block it from that with flowers you don't care if you lose?

 

[Tomoe Hotaru]

eah i couldnt quite understand the grey lines, i thought they were there i just wasnt seeing them or something. makes sense. already quit game for tonight but tomorrow im going to map out where my acres are in that area so i can plan where i can place houses.

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and i have read about that save editor thing but never used it. i read somewhere it can mess up your game and i have been scared to use it. not even sure how to.

You need a 3ds with custom firmware (so hacked) I assume. I haven?t tried it either and don?t think I will, but I?m glad that we learn more about the game through hackers. For example we know EXACTLY how dirt paths work in city folk because people looked into the code^^

 

[MapleSilver]

Well, if that acre thing is true, there goes my plans for my second town.

Seriously, why does Nintendo feel the need to create arbitrary rules like this? If I want to have a dense area, I shouldn't have to hack to achieve it.

 

[Khaelis]

Well, if that acre thing is true, there goes my plans for my second town.

Seriously, why does Nintendo feel the need to create arbitrary rules like this? If I want to have a dense area, I shouldn't have to hack to achieve it.

I could look into the game files and coding, but its risky since I had to datamine my own cartridge to do so.. and that can cause problems on my end. s:

But if I had to guess, it's probably to do with anti-crashing with RAM issues. It's why hacked towns can sometimes crash.

 

[Christy.lee1989]

i did it today!!!! it worked!! i got a villager from someone elses town they were selling here and what i did was leave a larger spot. it was at the same spot so im not sure about the whole 3 buildings thing, but at the same spot i wanted tiffany to move in, i left an empty space of 4 up and down, but a larger spot from side to side. so instead of it being 3x3 i did 4x 7 or so. hope that makes sense. anyways i got stitches to move right where i wanted tiffany to move. so im not sure about the whole 3 buildings per acre cause now i have 5 close together.

 

[Tomoe Hotaru]

i did it today!!!! it worked!! i got a villager from someone elses town they were selling here and what i did was leave a larger spot. it was at the same spot so im not sure about the whole 3 buildings thing, but at the same spot i wanted tiffany to move in, i left an empty space of 4 up and down, but a larger spot from side to side. so instead of it being 3x3 i did 4x 7 or so. hope that makes sense. anyways i got stitches to move right where i wanted tiffany to move. so im not sure about the whole 3 buildings per acre cause now i have 5 close together.

They can be close together and still be on different acres. In my game I have a group of 6 and a group of 4 houses. I know there isn?t proof for the acre-rule besides what some members have said, but fitting more than 3 houses close together does not automatically refute it either. At least in my opinion. Did the house move back a one or two spaces or is it exactly where you wanted that other house to be? I checked your map again and the whole area seems to be right around the border of two acres.

 

[Christy.lee1989]

it moved where i wanted the other one to be. let me get on real wuick and get a picture of both screens

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well here is the bottom screen. its in the same spot iwanted tiffany to move

 

[Loriii]

I have 4 villager houses that are close to each other (in both northeast and southeast part of my town) and probably looks like they belong in a single acre but actually in a different acre.

 

[Tomoe Hotaru]

I think we still dont fully know how it works. The acre theory is still the closest we have to an explanation as to why plot resetting sometimes fails even if the other conditions are met.
For example:

• what happens if a house is partially on another acre?
• what if a house if equally on two acres ar the same time?
• Maybe there is some randomness to it?

I still think the theory makes a lot of sense, but I have no idea about the specifics and the answers to these questions. The house is definitely around a border between two acres, thats why i asked if the new house maybe moved up a bit because you left more space. If it used the extra spaces you added in some way, that could be evidence for the acre-theory. If its on the tiles that were free on the first try, the theory could still be true but maybe it depends on some variables that are related to the questions above.

 

[Christy.lee1989]

if i counted right, starting at the very top left and counting a 16x16 square, the very top third of the house is on one acre and the rest is on another. it is in the same spot because i remember i had two empty spaces between the sharis house and where i wanted her to be, then i have a expty space of 4 up and down and 3 across. still weird but i do agree it could have something to do with the acres why it doesnt work sometimes, i just find it weird that tiffany didnt plot there but stiches did.

 

[Tomoe Hotaru]

if i counted right, starting at the very top left and counting a 16x16 square, the very top third of the house is on one acre and the rest is on another. it is in the same spot because i remember i had two empty spaces between the sharis house and where i wanted her to be, then i have a expty space of 4 up and down and 3 across. still weird but i do agree it could have something to do with the acres why it doesnt work sometimes, i just find it weird that tiffany didnt plot there but stiches did.

Maybe there is some chance involved? I could imagine that espechially if its the border-area. Maybe sometimes the game counts a house as part of one acre and sometimes as part of the other? At least that would make sense but it wouldn?t make things any less confusing...

 

[Christy.lee1989]

yeah im not sure. the only thing i changed is before i marked off a 3x4 space and this time going from side to side i left in wide open. i only marked up and down and left 4 spaces because thats where i was hoping he would go. maybe that made a difference? i dunno but it is weird. maybe like u said since it would be in 2 different acres maybe it counted it as being in a different one? im glad it worked this time though. at least i know now to leave more than one spot open next time just in case it doesnt work the way i want it to. that and always make a new save file.

 

[stiney]

I'd imagine that rather than chance, it's more likely that one specific square is designated as the one that gets checked, so like, the center square, or the bottom left square. The two square difference between where the first house failed and the second one succeeded could have moved the "check square" just enough that the game considered the house as being in a different acre.

Actually now that I think about this more, this makes a lot of sense. The game would basically randomly choose a square with no designs, and then check up 3 and right 3 (plus a couple squares to ensure proper distance between PWPs, cliff edges, other houses, etc), and then down 1-2 and left 1-2, and for how many things are within the acre and that all 9 squares of the house don't have designs. If it succeeds all checks, then it plots the house where you wanted it. If it fails, it picks another square at random and runs the test. If none of the squares succeed, it picks another square, and ignores the no-designs rule but follows the ones about spacing and acreage.

 

[Tomoe Hotaru]

I'd imagine that rather than chance, it's more likely that one specific square is designated as the one that gets checked, so like, the center square, or the bottom left square. The two square difference between where the first house failed and the second one succeeded could have moved the "check square" just enough that the game considered the house as being in a different acre.

Actually now that I think about this more, this makes a lot of sense. The game would basically randomly choose a square with no designs, and then check up 3 and right 3 (plus a couple squares to ensure proper distance between PWPs, cliff edges, other houses, etc), and then down 1-2 and left 1-2, and for how many things are within the acre and that all 9 squares of the house don't have designs. If it succeeds all checks, then it plots the house where you wanted it. If it fails, it picks another square at random and runs the test. If none of the squares succeed, it picks another square, and ignores the no-designs rule but follows the ones about spacing and acreage.

Thats a nice theory! The only problem is: how does that explain why the game didn?t deem the area suitable on the first try and ignored the design rule, but then decided the exact same spot was suitable for a plot on the second try eventhough no house was removed?

 

[stiney]

I thought that Christylee said that the other house was in *almost* the exact same spot? Maybe I misunderstood!