I've been trying to play rotationally, TS2-style for a while. I use Awesomemod (story progression off and with the "chosen" trait for all played sims), which works perfectly except for one thing: it doesn't prevent the inactive sims from gaining skill points. The skills the inactive sims develop seem to be those that they can build in community lots, like athletic and fishing. I've tested without this (or any) mod installed, and it seems to be the normal behavior of the game, even with story progression turned off. The mod just doesn't stop it (what it does is showing you the skill progression above the sims' heads, that's how I noticed).

Basically, I'm looking for a mod that simply stops skill progression for sims you aren't playing. I don't want them to stop going to places like the gym, because I like visiting those places with the sims I'm playing and seeing other sims there.

I specifically mention "no NRaas" in the title because I'm aware that with StoryProgression you can achieve this. But since I already play with Awesomemod and trying to set StoryProgression just for this is too much (is it even possible to use both at the same time?), I'd like to know if there is another mod that only modifies this. I've tried searching a few times but couldn't find anything myself, but maybe there is some "hidden" site that has a mod for this (also, I highly doubt I'm the only person that still plays TS3 rotationally with Awesomemod rather than with NRaas mods).

It is possible to use NRaas SP together with AwesomeMod, but only one story progression replacement can be in control at a time (SP vs. Awesome's Story Mode) so that wouldn't be the solution you are looking for.

There are ways to throttle skill gains across the board without having to use NRaas SP. NRaas Relativity will allow for this. The problem is that you require the throttling to be done selectively so that it doesn't impact the actively played household along with everyone else. Wouldn't mind being proven wrong, but I believe NRaas SP is still the only way to accomplish that.

It would be interesting to hear how other players using AwesomeMod's Story Mode rather than SP for progression work around the inactive skill gains you describe, if they have found a way to do so.

Notice that I'm nout using story progression. I have it off in both the game options and in the Awesomemod's settings. This is vanilla game behaviour when story progression is off. Awesomemod only adds some extra layers to protect the sims you want and other features like TS2-style aging, but you don't have to enable its story progression for them to work.

Having to manually set things is what I'm trying to avoid, but if it's the only option, I think the less tedious way would be taking notes of the skill levels after each round and then using MasterController to set the correct levels after I come back... It won't stop them from getting the memory of maxing a skill (although it can be removed and hopefully they will get it again when I'm playing them) and from completing skill challenges. It's far from perfect, but better than nothing, I guess.

Sorry for misunderstanding, I didn't realize you had story progression (of both kinds) off entirely. Yes, the MC after the fact manual adjustment thing is another way to go.

You may at some point wish to reconsider trying NRaas SP. We have a page devoted to Rotational Play and, if the rotations are meant to be the all of the residents in town, the structure is actually easier to manage because the built-in automatic SP caste Not Active can be used instead of the player-defined Rotations one. TS2 Style Aging becomes the order of the day the same as everything else with the one Death: Allow Aging setting.