Spoilage and crafting

[Supified]

Spoilage is a thing that happens to food now in this game. 

Crafting is also a thing that happens in this game.

Arm does not have a system for giving you hints on how to craft something or what you can craft with something except analyze and looking at physical descriptions.  This works mostly because items we want to craft usually do and while sure you can guess, that process is tedious at best.

With the advent of spoilage though this becomes in my view a bit of a problem, cooking crafts, now that those crafts will spoil, cannot be used as easily for example pieces for analyze and thus will be easier forgotten.

I've brought up before how I think the game should really give us more hints with code on what we can craft and how, but I think now that cooking crafts will spoil this is a bigger thing.  Those crafts (and the objects they make) are positive for the world and I would hate to imagine that some or many even are simply forgotten because no one remembers how to craft x or y and it simply effectively ceases to exist.

[Lizzie]

The "craft" command works for raw materials. Combine that with physical descriptions, and you should be able to figure out MOST cooking crafts through *educated* trial and error (rather than wild guessing).

A stuffed belshun fruit - main description suggests some kind of meat, and savory spices.

So you know it needs a belshun fruit.
Type "craft belshun" and you don't see that stuffed one.

So how about looking into common meats (since it's a fairly common recipe and therefore wouldn't need rare meats).

craft belshun carru
craft belshun gurth
craft belshun tembo
craft belshun (don't bother with spider - consider the source. It's a gellid mass of nastiness. Totally not suitable for stuffed anything).

While you're working on it, it's very likely you'll find all kinds of recipes you never would've thought of. So maybe you won't find THAT recipe - but you might find the "savory tembo-stuffed belshun pastry" that you wouldn't have discovered, if you hadn't been trying to look for something else.

This discovery is part of what makes it fun, at least for me.  Of course if your boss says "I need a stuffed belshun fruit and it better be the right one because someone is paying us for it" then yeah it could be a bit of a downer. However you could also RP out a frustration in not knowing the recipe and see if the boss's customer can give you a hint on what KIND of meat is in the stuffing.

[Supified]

Thanks Lizzie, but this does bring up part two of our crafting system and what I wish was different.

The fact everything is based on item id, as in exactly that item and no substitutes.  Not a terribly realistic system when some things should absolutely be substitutable.

Granted, now we're wandering in to the realm of probably unrealistic expectations of code, if we weren't there already (well overhaul anyway, I know some games do allow for substitution in their crafting).

[solera]

For food, the north/south grocer could occasionally have a craftable food item on offer. Not very often, because it is fun to learn a new recipe from a PC, but I assume there have been some that have not been known for a generation?

[Harmless]

Guessing what magic item id is the key ingredient for a recipe really kills the fun of crafting for me, but being able to analyze objects is a nice feature. I wish I had started a recipe book, I would have a bunch of (boring) recipes stored if I had over my last five or so crafters.. but is that a gameplay mechanic that we want or should crafters be able to (perhaps) see more recipes possible with some form of research ability?

[bardlyone]

I prefer crafting systems where anything in your inventory and/or the room parses as what can be crafted from it, when you type 'craft' by itself, like on the now-defunct Dark Isles and how it did with tailoring at least. It's not like you wouldn't be able to use 'analyze' on the item later to see what it used to make it.

[Lizzie]

I prefer crafting systems where anything in your inventory and/or the room parses as what can be crafted from it, when you type 'craft' by itself, like on the now-defunct Dark Isles and how it did with tailoring at least. It's not like you wouldn't be able to use 'analyze' on the item later to see what it used to make it.

I agree, to some extent. Given the limitations of the game code though, there'd need to be a way to include objects in specific containers. The code doesn't allow for the inclusion of any items INSIDE containers. If it was possible, and the code just dumped you a list of every possibility of every craft you are able to do, with every item in the room including every item in every container...

You'd probably freeze your own screen and never bother to try it again if you were a crafter in a location where there were trunks and chests and boxes and bins and crates and bags and packs filled with raw materials.

However if you could type something like:

Code Select Expand

craft *me.linen + 2.crate

and get every combination of things you can craft using any/all linen in your own personal inventory, plus anything contained inside "2.crate" - that might be pretty sweet.

[Armaddict]

Spoilage kind of ruined a lot of things based around cooking and food as it pertains to character behaviors in the game.

I haven't really seen much of the benefit of it, yet, but I've been assured it's there every time I bring this up.

[bardlyone]

Spoilage kind of ruined a lot of things based around cooking and food as it pertains to character behaviors in the game.

I haven't really seen much of the benefit of it, yet, but I've been assured it's there every time I bring this up.

This. I was opposed to it before it went in. I'm still opposed to it.

I'm curious if any single person, at all, has any positive stories or anecdotes about it. Or if it is simply negative and not enjoyed by most as it is by myself.

I had a perfectly preserved flower which was carefully dried and preserved to last indefinitely ffs that spoiled and disappeared. A dried flower.

And that's not to get started on special food items in clan halls for certain noble houses that you can't get from the clan cook that just spoil and you're out of the chance to use/have them until the next time the game reboots.

[nauta]

Adding to the feedback:

I've also noticed that, at least in the clans/roles I've played in since the code was implemented (rinthers, indie hunters, delves, and human tribal) there is still more than enough meat/food. It is just specialty RP treats that have become rare. 

So, assuming one of the goals here was to make it more challenging to survive, I'm not sure it has had this effect.  (I'm not sure if this was a goal, either.)

I think the other goal was to encourage people to gather ingredients / hire people to gather them, rather than relying on what is stockpiled inside the clan.  This is an admirable goal, which is why I liked the idea of spoilage, but I do think the time-to-rot on items should be tweaked a bit (see below).

Pets used to rot too, but I think that's fixed.  Thank you!

Perhaps its time to tweak it a bit.

My suggestions: 

o Decrease the time-to-rot on most of the non-raw meats by about five-fold (that is, anything that has been crafted into something new, allow it to rot, but have it take 15 days rather than 3, or whatever the number is now), even if this is a bit unrealistic.  Reasoning: specialty food items are often created for an RP scene, and sometimes schedules are such that you'll make the item one week, and not have that RP scene using it until a week or more later.  I've had to just toss my hands up and go virtual a couple of times due to this.

o Increase the time-to-rot on meats left in the sun by about five-fold.  Reasoning: there's a lot of meat out there.

o Less (quantitative) meat: not every skinning yields meat -- frankly, even setting the Vrun chalton aside, there's about two or three times too much meat gathered on an average hunt.  (Sorry Akariel! I love the variety, but I think there's too much meat.)  (This would only be relevant if the goal is to make surviving more difficult, of course.)

o Plants should produce less fruit.  (If our goal is to make surviving harder.)

[bardlyone]

I love a lot of the building/changes/projects lately, but I'm right there with you. If you spend 1k coins on a box of candy, you don't want that shit to rot before you can eat it. And if you have to get it sourced from another settlement, through a third party's hands, then into yours, well, hope it's not a gift for someone you only see occasionally. >.>

[Armaddict]

For me it's been repeated cases of:

"I made this for you." or "I brought this for you."

Followed by a flimsy explanation that breaks down to the OOC communication of "But you didn't log in yesterday, and yesterday was my big day to play, so it went bad and you don't get it anymore."

It's just kind of a waste of a lot of the things we sunk into making the cooking skill about more than 'I cooked a steak!'.  With how it behaves versus how players behave, it results in a lot of wasted time and effort as far as trying to turn it into anything good.  It didn't make hunters sell their food to more PC's.  It didn't make things more interesting.  It didn't make hunters more necessary to clans (where I guess now hunters are gone completely).  It doesn't even increase costs for an indy who doesn't join a clan with a cook; it just makes it so that if you log in, be sure to set aside some time to hunt for your food for the week, which while 'real', makes an involuntary OOC chore.

It just seems like a good trial run that had its live test and should now be rolled back as ineffective towards its stated purpose and non-contributory.

[BadSkeelz]

Well as the old saying goes, "Candy is dandy but liquor is quicker except when it comes to spoilage."

[nauta]

I love a lot of the building/changes/projects lately, but I'm right there with you. If you spend 1k coins on a box of candy, you don't want that shit to rot before you can eat it. And if you have to get it sourced from another settlement, through a third party's hands, then into yours, well, hope it's not a gift for someone you only see occasionally. >.>

Right.  Meant to add: if you assess some candies and food items, you'll notice they've been set to 'norot' or something to that effect.  (My personal preference though is to just make the rot really really high, since I do think its nice to go out and get the ingredients; but there's also a need for an 'exemplar' copy for new clan mates, or at least to have the recipes posted somewhere.)  So another suggestion (which is already in place, to be fair):

o See something, say something.  Ask your clan staff if they can adjust the rot-time on certain items you feel fall into that class of specialty RP food.  Bear in mind, we don't want everything to be no-rot, because I think it's good to hire people to get the ingredients -- but I think some things could be set to take longer to rot to allow for the RP scenes.  I've had success here with a couple items (pets in particular) that I asked staff about.

[bardlyone]

Eh. Honestly? The only time I don't carry every bit of food I have on my person in game now is when I'm playing a hunter and want a meta excuse to go kill something. That sounds like an asshole confession but it's true. While some people may want to feel a coded need to go hunt, I don't. While some people may want to spend all their login hours tending to food and spoilage issues or literally digging shit, I don't. YMMV, but for me and others (ala Armaddict), it hasn't added anything but a pain in the ass. I'd rather see it rolled back or scrapped altogether, or simply see the times made 1-2 rl weeks than spend yet MORE time engaging with that, by using bug or idea on each individual item in game.

Literally, the biggest effect I've seen of this is that now people leave the meat to rot, and the ones who don't are giving shitloads of free food out so it doesn't spoil.

I don't see how this adds anything to the idea of harshness or resource scarcity.

But if you like it, that's awesome. For you.

[Akaramu]

I think some things could be set to take longer to rot to allow for the RP scenes.  I've had success here with a couple items (pets in particular) that I asked staff about.

Wait. Pets now rot as well? 

[tortall]

I think some things could be set to take longer to rot to allow for the RP scenes.  I've had success here with a couple items (pets in particular) that I asked staff about.

Wait. Pets now rot as well? 

They were probably coded as a food item, much like the babies of yesteryer were. Oh, the days when you could have a half eaten baby!

[Hauwke]

I think some things could be set to take longer to rot to allow for the RP scenes.  I've had success here with a couple items (pets in particular) that I asked staff about.

Wait. Pets now rot as well? 

They were probably coded as a food item, much like the babies of yesteryer were. Oh, the days when you could have a half eaten baby!

Wuuuuuuuuuut! O.o

[a french mans shirt]

For food, the north/south grocer could occasionally have a craftable food item on offer. Not very often, because it is fun to learn a new recipe from a PC, but I assume there have been some that have not been known for a generation?

There was a day when me and Albie traded food recipes, that was fun. It was also a little sad because there is literally no other way to learn these 'hidden' recipes than to be so lucky enough to find the creator/one of their friends and be in a position to be able to ask.

[Akaramu]

I think some things could be set to take longer to rot to allow for the RP scenes.  I've had success here with a couple items (pets in particular) that I asked staff about.

Wait. Pets now rot as well? 

They were probably coded as a food item, much like the babies of yesteryer were. Oh, the days when you could have a half eaten baby!

Wuuuuuuuuuut! O.o

This is just wrong. Plz change 

Objective to obtain a pet ingame: suspended

[a french mans shirt]

I love that spoiling happens. What I think should be a thing is a common container which halves the rate of spoilage for Houses/important people holding events, and some way to rediscover recipes that haven't been in circulation for a while. Like that blue and white bread, for example. It was everywhere for a total of three days, and then you couldn't find it anymore.

[Seeker]

Pets absolutely should spoil.  It should be in months (for roaches) to years (for birds and snakes), but they don't get to be immortal.

[Akaramu]

Pets absolutely should spoil.  It should be in months (for roaches) to years (for birds and snakes), but they don't get to be immortal.

That seems fair if their spoiling timers have been adjusted from 'normal' food items.

[IntuitiveApathy]

I also like the spoiling code. 

I do agree that there could be some sort of food-saver container that the super-rich (or more likely their servants) can use to help prolong freshness, but food spoiling leads to the idea that cooked, fresh food is even more of a special thing that should be savoured and valued - a noble that didn't eat their fancy, cooked food that day?  Well, they're so super rich they can afford to leave their food to rot, that's how damn rich they are.

As a commoner?  Well you should be working to get your food - and if you've somehow obtained more than you can eat in the next few days, why are you complaining?

From an OOC perspective, I think the spoilage does help with the mass clutter of skinned items (but agree, there could just be a simple reduction in the chance to get a good cut of meat from a corpse), and I don't see it as needing such a huge adjustment from before that you should just hunt or purchase or cook on a more spread out basis that matches your character's rhythm.  It hasn't seemed to me that spoiling occurs that crazily fast to really be as obtrusive that everyone seems to make it out as being (or either that, some foods rot a lot faster than the ones I see), but maybe that's me.

As for crafting, one idea that popped into my head the other day was to allow master crafters an "Inspiration" command.  You could only use it on a certain interval (once per RL day?  once per RL week?), and it would return a random recipe that your character can craft using the same output as analyze code for the specific craft you had mastered.  It would be nice if the random recipe is one that the crafter hasn't ever crafted before, but I recognize that would be extra code which may not be even possible with the current framework, so that would just be a super nice bonus.  It would also be nice if it would only return results for crafts your character can actually craft (ie. exclude clan exclusive crafts for clans you aren't in).  This command would simulate a crafter figuring out how to make something without the benefit of analyze and/or simply being inspired to come up with something new (to them).  This is basically impossible to play out in-game unless you as the player have played that craft before and have encountered various recipes which you've OOC'ly saved, or unless you're mastercrafting, which in itself is a nice system but a somewhat different idea as the Inspiration command is meant to allow the player and the PC to come up with existing recipes. 

The other way to do this is to allow this kind of thing to be doled out via request commands, but I assume no staffer wants that extra workload.

> inspiration leatherworking
You realize that to make a bitchin' coon hat:
That appears to be made from a bitch and a coon.
You would need a fire to cook that.
Crafting this would be easy.

[John]

At the moment (based on the release notes) we have 54 hours (2 days) before raw food inside in a cool room in a food container spoils beyond use. While we have 74 hours (3 days) before preserved food inside in a cool room in a food container spoils beyond use.

I think this could stand to be tweaked dramatically. I'd easily increase have cool rooms increase the timer by 1.5 and have a mastercrafted food container (easily bought from Kadius or master toolcrafters who know the recipe) that increases the timer by 1.5. Give all noble estates (and MAYBE one or two apartments in Allanak) a cool room to keep food in.

I'd also double the timer on preserved food. That should last MUCH longer than raw food does.