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Villager Trading/Movement Guide

Tetsuya

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Villager Trading Guide/movement guide *all Credit goes to Takarama from Animalcrossing community forums

About:
Nothing bothers me more than people saying: "Can I come over and talk to/send letters to the [insert villager name] so they can move to my town?"
It's not that the people saying it annoy me, it's more the fact that it has been such a huge thing going around since WW.
Hey. My name is Roxie, and I'm a video game developer, High school graduate (going to university next year) and a City Folk Hacker. I used CF to learn the villager trading system and to further delve into it for you guys to use and work on.
Villager movement is much more complicated than a simple variable that we call the friendship of the villagers.
Here, I will show you the TRUE way to get villagers to move into your town from another. I'll explain what I know from each of the previous games and what has been learned from the New Leaf system.
Hold on to your hats guys, because this will be fairly informational.

What is Villager Movement?:
Well, let's start with an example.
Let's say Peanut is in my town. She wants to move. When she leaves, Peanut can move to your town. She can also move to another town depending on many factors... but I'll get into that later.
So in summary, Villager movement is the act of a villager moving from one town to another... Are we following so far?

Villager Movement in Previous Games:

Population Growing:
PG had the easiest system: connect memory cards, and one of the villagers will be selected to move to another town. It was COMPLETELY Random.

Wild World:
This is where things got complicated. Randomly, a villager would pack his or her house up and want to move. You could try to stop them, but if you didn't they would leave.
Even though Villagers were gone from your town, they still lived in the code of your game as 'frozen'. (I'll explain this concept a little later as well) When you wifid with someone, there was a chance they would move to their game. There was also a chance that they would be deleted if another villager moved out before they found a new home.

City Folk:
City Folk was quite different and yet so similar. In CF, villagers would contain the code just as WW did, except now they would not be deleted if another villager moved out... in fact, they would most likely just move through WiiConnect24 which would randomly send them to a different town. They didn't even have to be on your friend list! Oh AC. Why are you so mean to us?

Why Talking and Sending letters DO NOT WORK:

Do you remember when your favorite villager moved away and you were wondering why? Villagers moving are completely random. As complex and you may think it is, the actual logistics of animal crossing is not entirely difficult. It's just a series of conditions that are really easy to replicate.
If a villager likes you less, they are more likely to move out... sure! But someone being nice to them from another town is like talking to a kettle to tell it to boil. Their choice to move is random with the exception of a few factors... like hitting them with a net, pushing them into pitfalls.
Now, a lot of people don't send them letters or talk to them because they think it'll work faster, but rather to raise the friendship with the villager. From what I have witnessed, villagers in another town may not even have a friendship level for a player outside their own town!
This 'Friendship' is a variable... or a counter added and subtracted depending on how you interact with that villager. There's a reason that you cannot do requests for villagers outside of your town, push them, hit them... etc.

Now let's say that you COULD raise the friendship. It wouldn't matter. A villager still stays in the game data after they've moved until they are ready to move to another town.
The information it holds?

-Where they come from
- Their name in all languages
- catchphrase
- Outfit
- What's in their house
- The song that plays in their house
- Their textures (Look... which even if altered is reverted once the villager moves)
- Small details about them.

The Variables do not seem to carry over.
And therefore I conclude, talking to them and sending them letters may make you happy... but in the end it does not influence when or where they move.


Intro to 'Frozen' Villagers:
As I am a hacker for CF, I am all too familiar with this term.
"Frozen villagers" Refer to villagers who are waiting to move either into your town, or to find another.
If a villager has moved out of your town, they will remain in your data as dormant and wait until they can move to another town. This can happen MANY Ways, including Streetpass, Wifi, Local Connection, Best Friends, Regular friends and for CF there was Wiiconnect24

When you manage to get a villager from one of the above methods, they will appear as frozen in your town. This DOES NOT by any means mean that they will be moving into your town.

So... Summary:
-They are packages of Villager information that can be transferred through Streetpass, Connection and much more.
-They transfer randomly
-it is basically a villager trying to find a new home

Frozen Villager Theory:

My theory behind frozen villagers is that if people begin to want to leave on a daily basis, there is a villager that wants to move in. If you believe this, wifi until this stops.
This was an observation to CF.

HOW TO TRADE EFFECTIVELY:
Of course, this isn't 100% accurate as NL's system may be much more complicated. BUT, this worked for my friend and I and in previous games as well... so let's give it a shot.

PLAYER 1= the one giving the villager
PLAYER 2= The one Receiving the villager

NOTES:
-Make sure the villager that moves out of P2's town is not the only one of that personality, and if it is, make sure you are trading for someone of the same personality. It will definitely not work otherwise.
-Make sure to do all of the wifi steps on the same day as P2. P1 can time travel, but P2 cannot go ahead more than by a day.
-Check above for my 'frozen villager theory' before you begin.

Step 1: Make an agreement as to which villager you wish to give the other player.

Step 2: If you are trading one villager for another, choose which villager you want to trade first.

Step 3: Get Player 2 to move out a villager they don't want. If you are doing step 2, make sure it is NOT the villager player 1 is getting in return. If you choose to risk it, please refer to the step 4 BEFORE you continue. The chances of a direct swap working is not a good chance.


Step 4:
Remove all friends from your 3ds, best friends from Animal crossing, turn off streetpass, turn off spot pass and for safety, make sure you do not connect to the internet.
ADD PLAYER 2 TO THE BEST FRIENDS LIST

Step 5:
Get player 1 to move out the desirable villager for player 2. The best way to do this is a day by day time travel. Make sure that you do this on the same day that player two gets their villager to move out, otherwise someone else may move in.

Step 6:
DO NOT WIFI WITH ANYONE once the villager chooses to move. Get them to move out, and the two players should wifi. Get player 2 to go ahead ONE day. If the villager's house is being built, it worked. If not, wifi again.

Step 7:
Continue step 6 until Villager moves in!

Also I repeat all credit for this lovely guide goes to Takarama from animalcrossingcommunity forums
 
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OR! You could do the 100% effective way off...

Having the player receiving the villager have at least one open spot in their town. Then when their friend's villager is all packed up and ready to go, have the receiver come over and talk to that villager until they agree to move into your town. This, of course, is new to New Leaf, and does not happen in the previous versions.

It is so much easier, less time-consuming, and much more effective.
 
I can confirm what Superpenguin said. He came over to my town and all he did was talk to Aurora and she agreed to move into his town. It's a new feature.
 
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