Cooking: Nourishment/Satiation

Areka

As stated in the Crafting Ideas thread, Nourishment needs a serious go-over with cooking.

Here is a spreadsheet I've put together (ignore the other pages, or make use of them!) that lists the current set-up. 

Let's discuss!

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0AhWfd2KKccgfdGRUUFhyemNkNmNsUWZ6SUVIdUViOGc&usp=sharing

Right now, a steak is as nourishing as a cookie, and lobster is more nourishing than a roast. 

Edit: Woops, didn't see Moi's thread while I was preparing this. Can close this and I can post the link over there. 

Slyphe

This has a nifty spreadsheet so we're keeping this one. Because spreadsheets.

Slyphe

Moirean's original post:

Per Slyphe in the crafting idea thread, here's a new thread to discuss cooking satiation values!

Moirean said:

Unrelated, but could cooking satiation be looked into? Right now, there's really no point from a monetary standpoint to buy or sell anything other than casseroles for actual hunger consumption. All the other designs are just for RP, really, since they are drastically less nourishing (a casserole is 150 satiation, while a stew is like...30). Normalizing these and maybe making desserts and snacks be an outlier would be really nice and would make it feel like less of a waste of space to stock a range of food options.

Moirean

Moirean said:

Unrelated, but could cooking satiation be looked into? Right now, there's really no point from a monetary standpoint to buy or sell anything other than casseroles for actual hunger consumption. All the other designs are just for RP, really, since they are drastically less nourishing (a casserole is 150 satiation, while a stew is like...30). Normalizing these and maybe making desserts and snacks be an outlier would be really nice and would make it feel like less of a waste of space to stock a range of food options.

Areka

Alright!

I think the best approach to this would be to 'group' foods by what type they are, IE snacks/treats, components, sides, and meals, then group nourishment values around those categories so there's a bit more consistency.

Moirean

Well, I think if we have a sliding scale of values, even if they aren't as drastic and wonky as now, it'll still be the same result - people pick the highest nourishment when they are hungry, and only use the others for RP or because they are clueless newbs. Different categories would really only work from an economic standpoint if there was incentive to buy them (ie a minor buff you get from eating one of each meal component), and that sort of thing has been continually shot down. What if that buff was just more satiation overall, though, instead of anything that would effect combat or PK? Ie, if you eat a main dish and a side and a dessert in a 5 minute window, you are more full than if you ate 2 or 3 main dishes. I'm just thinking there needs to be some incentive to buy the other stuff or they'll stay just niche RP things.

Ferrik

So I don't know much about cooking (in game that is, hellooo!) but this may be a bad thought, but why not instead put more emphasis on the ingredients? More ingredients, more nourishment. You can make a carrot cookie with flour, sugar and a carrot. But to make a carrot stew (or casserole if you will) you would need at least 5 carrots and whatever else. Because the stew needs five carrots and five potatoes (or whatever) it is more nutritious than the carrot cookie.

Another thought that occurred to me why not make 'big cooking items' like say a stew, soup or a casserole, instead be an actual 'big dish' in that you can take bites/scoops/whatevers out of it. It allows for more RP function, more creativity, higher prices and whatnot. Each 'bite' would be x nutrition out of y full nutrition, I'm sure we could find a nice median for things. So that way you can still get the higher nourishment and 'dose' your in take (eat until satiated and have leftovers! Or share!) Then you can have platters of cookies, snack samplers and I'm sure people will go nuts with more ideas for 'big dishes' (MOAR BUFFALO) and eeeeverybody will be happy! Yes!

Areka

I don't think they'll be making actual scoopable/servable larger dishes (as awesome as those would be. I made some just for props, for a feast, and then had a plate design that had samplings from all of the prop dishes on it). 

I was thinking nourishment would be focused more on the type of food category it is - IE meal, a component OF a meal (like fish or lobster, etc), a side dish (bread/roll/etc), a snack, etc. 

The 'volume of commodity' could be interesting, but then you risk people going "i'm going to make a biscuit with 15 flour, super filling". 

Edit: Kind of like weapon families, but food families. 

Edit Edit: I've added another page to the spreadsheet with the current array of nourishment, and my current proposal. If anyone else has suggestions or their own proposed spread, just let me know and pastebin it to me and I'll add it!

Haern

Areka said:

The 'volume of commodity' could be interesting, but then you risk people going "i'm going to make a biscuit with 15 flour, super filling". 

Ugh, gross. It'd be like eating a rock.

Areka

Reprisal: 

Moirean

Ferrik's idea makes thematic sense, but it would kill most profitability in cooking. People are used to paying 199 for a dish. To get a profit if you have to include multiple items to make the stuff more satiating, this means you're including like 10 strawberries and a bunch of watercress, because everything else is too expensive to yield a profit (seriously 40g for only a component? These prices are not friendly to actual money making).

I don't know if it's done anymore, but in theory us crafters can adjust satiation in a design. Back years ago, we'd increase satiation if a design had a lot of items in it. The thing is, a customer doesn't know that. All they know is casserole = filling, other stuff = not. So, variable satiation is really not very useful from a seller and buyer standpoint.

Slyphe

Yeah, I do like the idea to an extent, but I personally would rather just rework the nourishment values on things now. I'm perfectly fine with being on the more generous side of things due to food being entirely a roleplay-oriented thing beyond level 80 (see: a large majority of our playerbase), with obvious things like snacks having lower values.

Ferrik

I figured as much, they were just ideas that occurred to me - prices can fluctuate, I was hoping perhaps it would make a push for cooking to become profitable again and put the merchant back into mercantile! Ingredients pricing could be changed or 'bulk packages' could be introduced (that exists and wouldn't be 'too' out there). That said, when I was typing that I also thought of 'Awyis Imma put one million buffalo into this buffalo cookie right heeyah!' but obviously the Crafting Guild Naz- (Nazetu.. I meant Nazetu) people can stamp that out as they do other stuff, right?

However on the flipside I can see how from the coding side it would be probably be a -much- easier solution to tinker with the nourishment of things instead. The platter / scoopable thing was in part an attempt to also make a point (of utility and actual use) for the RP people as I remember that, the making of a prop and then making actual dishes to be eaten. It is fantastic to have a way around but, why not have it actually work mechanically if you can? I try to make erryone happy.

Areka

Playing off of the 'by ingredient' thing, I had a discussion with Ninette and she had a pretty interesting idea too!

Have Nourishment be settable by the designer (and policed by the guild, we'd need a guide for what's reasonable), and be based upon the ingredients used as in the types of ingredients.

Protein ingredients being worth 20-40 nourishment. 

Dairy 5-15. 

Vegetable 1-10, 

Starch/grain 1-10. 

Sugars 1-5, 

Fruit 1-10. Seasonings nothing

I think it would still need to be scaled by the size of meal (cookies not being more nourishing than a roast or casserole, etc). 

Ferrik

Woop woop! Ferrik has at least some ideas that are good.

In that case instead set certain 'ranges' of nourishment for a dish. As an example and not to say "This is how it should be" but Cookies would be 1 - 5, soup could be 10 - 30 (from a light, cold soup for summer to a heavy, warm soup for winter eh?) and stews and casseroles etc. would be amongst the higher range. Wat's more important is that for some dishes you could create an overlap. In that example say soup would instead be 10 - 60 and kebabs could be 40 - 70, stews are 60 - 80 and casseroles/etc. 60 - 100. (I'm just throwing around numbers like it's glitter, flowers and rainbows okay).

Then it is up to the crafter to reach a desirable number of nourishment within the range. If you just want a simple thing you just have to load up on the one ingredient you're concentrating on. Combine this with perhaps more reasonable pricing on ingredients or an acceptance that food will cost a little more (some people overprice already anyway) and it should be on a track towards profitability again!

Moirean

I think that would be a bit of a headache and not a fun change. Stuff would be more frustrating to craft, and sellers would still have no idea what satiation on an item is. At the very least, PROBE would need to be changed to display satiation (and then cooking tools/sources would matter again, but then crafting shelves would become useless for cooking). 

What's wrong with just normalizing everything to 100 and maybe adding some minor extra bonus if you eat a side dish/dessert after something like a plate/stew/casserole, etc.

Aishia

C-c-combo MEAL

Areka

If you normalize everything to 100, then you'd need to normalize all of the costs, otherwise everyone would make just really really filling candy. 

Moirean

Costs? What do you mean? For approvals? That's a one-time fee, I don't see how that would dictate what people would sell. Also, by everything, I meant all the main dishy things. Stuff like candy, cake, cookies, etc, would be lower.

Areka

No, ingredient costs, otherwise it becomes a thing you game. 

Erzsebet

As a note, it's worth pointing out that the cost of a design fee goes up based on your nourishment value, sort've akin to the way old prestige worked. Unless that's not the case anymore?

I'd say establishing an acceptable range based on ingredients, giving the cooks the ability to change the nourishment values themselves instead of having another cook do it, and adding in the ability to see satiation in WARES (sort've like the way weaponprobe shows up?) would work to fix the problem.

I'd suggest simultaneously lowering the satiation value on non-player made things, but they're already pretty ridiculous in that you're eating half a dozen bowls of stew or whatever to make you full. I'd suggest upping it, so people don't have to eat eight casseroles, but then, the crafters have a problem 'cause they'd be selling less.

Maybe lower satiation requirements in general so that it fits a range filled by a main-dish and two sides or a side and a dessert? Like. If satiation is 200, a casserole could sate 130 of that, making it less coss effective to buy two casseroles, and instead they'll buy a casserole and plate of green beans and a roll or something to equal 200?

The biggest problem there being that the numbers are invisible, I guess.

/done rambling.

Irruel

Whatever decision is made, please make sure you consider the people who are less than level 80 and tend to be broke because mobs aren't dropping much gold yet.

Haven

Irruel said:

Whatever decision is made, please make sure you consider the people who are less than level 80 and tend to be broke because mobs aren't dropping much gold yet.

Pre-endgame/80 it's all about them gold quests anyway.

Angwe

Yes, but quests still tend to be cryptic, obfuscating things that those without either prior knowledge or supernatural powers may wish to avoid, though that's being fixed.

Myself? I've never quested in IRE games. Ain't got no time for that.

Piper

Those with the knowledge on how to solve certain quests generally hold it like a thing of prestige without sharing it. I remember once I had to ICly solve a quest for an event reason and the only person that I could get to tell me anything about it charged me IG credits for the item you get at the end and refused to help me solve it.

Quests in a lot of IRE muds generally makes me feel like I'm playing Space Quest III where you're expected to do the most RANDOM things ever that make NO sense, at all. It's to the point where it's no fun to even attempt half of them. This probably belongs more in the Ankyrean Anguish thread.

Moirean

Yeah, it's completely tangential, but I partially agree. The problem-solving, puzzle part of quests shouldn't be trying to solve the basic UI. Having to play guess the keyword/interaction element is incredibly frustrating, since it makes it hard for you to know if you're on the right track, or if the quest is bugged, etc, especially when there's a ton of inconsistency in overall quest design (eg Aerie has you interacting with room descriptions while pretty much nowhere else in the game does). However, the newer quests are pretty great for clearing up the UI, although all the ones I've encountered so far have been basic get/return or kill quests, but that's understandable since it's the newbie experience which is being tackled first. It seems like the admin are aware that questing needs a facelift and they've already done some really nice things to update and vastly improve the outdated design!

Moirean

Back on topic:

- Yeah the scaling price is a bit silly, but that's a one-off thing. I don't think stuff goes much higher than like 2k gold, right?

- Re: normalizing costs, those of us who sell food for satiation already game the system, and that's why I brought the topic up in the first place. As profitable as it is to stock my shelves with liver or strawberry casseroles, it's boring as heck to write my stuff along these lines. I mean, sure, that's "my choice" but it's kinda a choice in the sense that it's your choice to sell herbs at 1-2 gold. You can do other stuff, you just aren't going to really make a profit.

If we don't want to normalize, I'd say making satiation values more visible might help - right now, adding extra ingredients technically does increase satiation, but people buying things can't see that, and even if it was something you could probe for, who wants to sit and probe every item in a shop? Make it EASY. Here are some suggestions:

- Add in a basic command like armaments that you can use to easily compare food in a shop. FOODWARES or whatever. Readout could be something like:

Casserole1234      "a hearty hare casserole"       150

Plate357               "a large platter of seafood"     140

Cake123               "a fluffy angelfood cake"          60

- Add in rough food values to display on wares so people could gauge how filling something would be. Eg, WARES PLATE could show satiation or be RPish like:

Plate123  "a large platter of seafood"   (filling)

Plate456  "a petite dish of pork chops"  (hearty)

Cake346  "a tiny slice of chocolate cake" (bite-sized)

- Show information on probe, if you really want, but I don't think people are going to sit and probe stuff every time they want to eat. For probe, probing a plate could show either satiation or a more immersive option:

This is a plate of food.

It bears the distinctive mark of Bob.

Eating this will bring your hunger down to peckish.

Now the issue with these is that it'll basically kill the convenience crafting shelves have made for cooks, since just dumping stuff into the craft shelf and cache will mean your food will be far less satiating than those using the right tools. It will also mean we'll see a short term flood of the cooking queue since people will resubmit designs to specificy tools and heat sources.

That being said, it's kinda a shame that you can't use craft shelves with crafting artifacts - that kind of disconnect in the design feels wonky and if it could be bridged that'd be awesome, so perhaps the issue detailed above AND the inability to use artis could somehow be tackled in one change, letting people set items for use in their shops. Something like: 

SHOPUSE SET <artifact> - This would let you set your craft artifact to be used in up to, I dunno, let's see 3 shops (so one person can't just share with everyone, but you can still cover a few personal shops).

SHOPOVEN SET <shopname> - This would let you specify an oven you own (ie a house upgrade) to be used for stocking your shop. Have the craft shelf stocking just assume that the proper tool is used. Makes the house oven more attractive (because it's kinda overpriced and meh) and gives people a way to cover satiation boosts from direct cooking. Roleplay-wise...umm...you're operating the bakery from your estate. Runners deliver the food. Sure. That sounds good. Makes about as much sense as the shelves just crafting them on their own :P

Erzsebet

The problem with the artifact thing (though I'd love for it to do something to shops to make craft shelves more worth it for those of us who have them), is the way it works. It makes two of a thing with one of a thing's worth of commodities. But one person is not at all likely to buy TWO of the same skirt/painting/shiny/whatever. So it'd only really be applicable to brewing and cooking, which...isn't at all fair to people with the crafting boons for the other things, because I don't think you'd be able to backlog it to just not use comms the next time someone buys that thing. And you can't really have it -halve- things instead, because most things aren't in even numbers. Indeed, most of the time cooking, and things with smaller things like jewelcraft, have one of everything, for the most part.

Not sure what to suggest for alternatives, though.


Generally, not worried about a brief bump in the cooking craft queue as people re-submit things. We handled it with brewing well enough, it'll just take a few of us keeping an eye on it to mostly keep it cleared, which the crafting guild is usually fairly decent about doing, anyway.