The Sims 4 Writing Skill Guide
There are so many skills in the game and the sims 4 writing skill is one that’s been in the game for a very long time, since launch.
This skill is fun letting your sims write books and publish them for money!
What is Writing Good For?
Writing in The Sims 4 is one of the best ways to earn an income.
You can get royalties every single day for books you write which can add up and let your sims never work a real job again!
Your sims are going to need this skill for things like the freelance writer career as well as the writer career.
Your sims can even use the writing skill and selling books to publishers to gain fame if you have The Sims 4: Get Famous installed.
How to Gain The Sims 4 Writing Skill
Gaining the writing skill is easy with two ways to do it. The first way is to read writing skill books which you can purchase by clicking on a bookcase and choosing purchase books and you’ll find three writing books to buy:
- Writing Vol 1: The Conjugation Conundrum
- Writing Vol 2: The Importance of Punctuation
- Writing Vol 3: Let’s Get Weird
With these books you’ll start by reading volume 1 until level 4, then move up to the next. Then at level 7 you’ll start volume 3.
When you first start gaining this skill you’ll have the option to practice writing or write genre book. You should not practice because there will be no reward for it, if you write a book you can sell the book for royalties and earn money!
As you gain more of the skill your sim will gain more options for writing books like fantasy, poetry and non-fiction. Your sims are able to finish a book and put it in their bookcase, or publish it for royalties.
Best Mood to Practice Writing
The emotions your sim has actually have a huge impact on their ability to gain skills. If a sim has the right emotion they will gain skills more quickly so putting them in the right mood is great.
The best emotion for writing is inspired which is great and makes sense. To make a sim feel inspired you have a few options but the easiest way is just to take a thoughtful shower before starting to write.
Best Traits for Gaining Writing
If you want to make a sim who is a great writer you may want to think about the traits that they have that can help they gain the skill which include:
- Creative: Sims who have the creative trait are going to get inspired moodlets more often which will boost skill gains.
- Cheerful: A cheerful sim will get random happy moodlets which can help to boost any inspired moodlets.
- Muser: This trait comes when you choose a creative aspiration. Sims with this trait get better skill gains when they are feeling inspired.
You should also consider the lot traits you add to your sim’s lot and this one can be helpful:
- Fast Internet: Gives skill boosts to the writing skill
- Home Studio: Homes with this trait will have writing come out better quality
How to Cheat The Writing Skill
Cheating skills is the best way to jump start your gameplay and is so fun to me. The cheat you need to know is stats.set_skill_level Major_Writing 10 if you want to max out the skill.
If you want a different level of the skill you’ll just change the 10 to whatever level you want, for example, stats.set_skill_level Major_Writing 3 would give you level 3 of that skill.
Sims 4 Writing Skill Levels
| Skill Level | Level Rewards |
|---|---|
| Level 1 | Your sim’s newly acquired writing skill will allow them to enjoy the benefits of an expanded vocabulary and grammatically correct sentences. |
| Level 2 | Your sim can now self-publish books. |
| Level 3 | Your sim can now write short stories and write excuse notes for other sims. They can also read non-fiction books for reference and discuss favourite book/author with other sims. |
| Level 4 | Your sim can now write poems. They can also write love emails to other sims. |
| Level 5 | Your sims can now write non-fiction. They also can sell to publisher and recite love poetry with other sims. |
| Level 6 | Your sim can now write screenplays. |
| Level 7 | Your sim can now write fantasy. They can now enthuse about Iambic Pentameter with other sims. |
| Level 8 | Your sim can now write science fiction. |
| Level 9 | Your sim can now write mystery. They can also submit to literary digest. |
| Level 10 | Your sim can now write a biography. |
Excusing School Absences
The first one is kinda silly, at level 3 of the skill your sims can now write excuse notes for sims who are school aged. This lets them skip school without losing any performance for the day which is awesome if you want to throw a birthday party or go on a day trip with your sims.
Writing and Publishing Books
The best part about using the writing skill is how much money you can earn for your sim’s family. Book royalties are wild compared to others like licensing songs because you can sell as many books as you want and gain royalties from these books for a long time.
At level two of the skill your sims can self-publish their books. This is nice, but not worth it in my opinion. You want to save all books you write until you can sell to publisher because this will earn you more money.
The amount of money you earn is based on a lot of things including type of book, skill level when book was written and book quality.
At level 9 of the skill you get the option to submit to literary digest which is the best form of selling but you can only do a few books like this so save your best quality for the digest.
The Book Of Life
The most interesting part about writing is your sim’s ability to write the book of life. You may be asking “what is the book of life?” Well, this book is one of the many options you have to bring sims back to life.
The book of life is available to sims who have the poetic reward trait that’s given to a sim when they complete the best selling author aspiration. This trait lets your sims write the book of life and then bind that book to a sim who is alive.
When this sim dies they are able to use the book they wrote for this sim to call a sim’s ghost to the lot so you can add them to your family. If you have them read the book they can come back to life!
This book can be read by sims who are alive but this doesn’t save them from death. It’s going to refill any needs they have and get rid of negative moods they may be in.
Sims 4 Writing Skill Mentorship
When your sims get to level 10 of the writing skill they have the ability open to them to start mentoring others in writing. This lets the mentee sim gain the writing skill more quickly because they’re being taught by sims who are better at it!
If you have The Sims 4: Business & Hobbies installed you can also earn 430 simoleons per hour and offer paid mentoring services!
Improving Writing With DLC
When you start getting more packs and adding DLC to your game, you’ll find new fun ways to interact with the base game skills!
Parenthood
With The Sims 4: Parenthood your sims are able to write in the private journal and can gain the sims 4 writing skill when doing this. This seems like its just for kids, but any age is able to write in this journal!
Discover University
There are actually three ways for your sims to earn the sims 4 writing skill when yo have The Sims 4: Discover University in your game. The first way is to get your sims to take a skill class for 250 simoleons!
The next way a sim can gain the skill is by taking a writing elective when getting a degree. You’ll want to take the Writing Fiction… Or are we? class! Your sim will gain the skill when in class and when doing their coursework.
The final way your sims are able to get the writing skill is by using the research archive machine. You’ll want to research good writing through feedback and your sim will gain this skill as well as the research & debate skill so you get a two for one.
Life & Death
If you have The Sims 4: Life & Death installed in your game your sims also have the option to write obituaries. This is fun because your sim will gain both the writing skill and the thanatology skill at the same time!
