PC Cooking has now become obsolete

The problem is when it comes to stacking those items with those timers. If you add to the stack, it will change all of the spoilage rates to that new pristine item that was just gathered OR your newly gathered item is now at the spoilage rate of the oldest item. So, if you then make every food item non-stackable to deal with resetting timers, you are bloating up inventory. At that point, you just eat all food you find immediately thus negating any inventory woes or spoilage.

We had a great "bug" back in the day on EQ where people would vendor items that wouldn't stack normally but had charges just to replenish them since the vendor inventory would stack non-stackable items and set the charge count for all of them.

For the record, it is a non-trivial task to make individual items in a stack keep their individual charge counters or timers running.

 
So, i like the food spoilage mechanic too. What I see is that this thread is drifting away from the core topic. In my opinion, it's ridiculous that a 5-star master chef cook gives spoiled food to teammates. Cooking has become less interesting compared to the previous Alpha's. The spoilage mechanic only puts the cherry on the cake.

 
but even they as a team are divided about food spoilage with some all for it and others against it.
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Well, I think they have to decide what's the endgame. There's three possibilities: you're inevitably overrun and slaughtered, the arms race never ends and you eternally battle the zeds as you both get stronger, or you have some hope of pulling ahead, the zeds can be reckoned with and mastered if you're good enough.

The second of those, the race-never-ends loop, looks like madmole's favorite obsession/goal, whatever path you choose it's all you can do to make enough ammo to kill the next onslaught, and it just keeps getting harder. Devil-Daggers-in-a-voxel-world. With pie. You can delay the ramp-up, but that's how the world ends.

I think a lot of people have this fantasy where if they're clever enough they can dominate. Where they'll never be allowed to just endlessly build in peace but they _will_ be allowed to build and explore despite the increasing danger if they git gud enough. Where horde combat turns out to be a learning-about-fortress-tactics phase, just as the early game is a nightmare voxel-world grimdark survival phase, and once they've finally mastered defense they can protect the world or some corner of it for non-warrior players.

Or at least, they want to be inveigled into _believing_ that's possible, whether or not it really is.

Mechanics that are useless impediments in the onslaught-defense grind could be a hint that that's the intent, that the battle is in aid of something larger. It might be that Unity's just not lean-and-mean enough to support that endgame and the zombie wars too. Maybe that's 7DtD2 territory, and maybe it'll never happen. But that's the dream.

 
You can sit there aghast and scratch your head at my unbelievable stupidity for thinking the design is a good one. I recognize it isn't the only design and there are other good ones as well. But I like this one. I like the anxiety it evokes in me when I eat a cooked dish. I like when it does happen that my plans get disrupted and my next objective is to get back to status quo. I think it is great that there are mechanics that punish the player with a random bad event and instead of the player feeling special and improved at the end of it all they are is just back to normal. There is definitely room in a game such as this for random bad events and punishing mechanics.
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Having mechanisms in game that cause disruption in players' plans is a good thing, it creates challenge. But the food poisoning mechanic in game right now is boring, simplistic, and easily circumvented in multiple different ways.

The mechanic, as it is right now (sudden loss of a chunk of food bar), is only anxiety provoking and disruptive to plans in early game, when food is scarce. Once food isn't an issue you just pound down a few more meat or veggie straws and go about your business.

Vitamins are basically useless in mid to late game when you have a stack of stews.

If the mechanic was more like dysentery it would have more impact in mid to late game, and would be less punishing in early game.

The problem with this game is that its difficulty curve is weighted to the early game, with the mid to late game getting easier.

 
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Having mechanisms in game that cause disruption in players' plans is a good thing, it creates challenge. But the food poisoning mechanic in game right now is boring, simplistic, and easily circumvented in multiple different ways.
The mechanic, as it is right now (sudden loss of a chunk of food bar), is only anxiety provoking and disruptive to plans in early game, when food is scarce. Once food isn't an issue you just pound down a few more meat or veggie straws and go about your business.

Vitamins are basically useless in mid to late game when you have a stack of stews.

If the mechanic was more like dysentery it would have more impact in mid to late game, and would be less punishing in early game.

The problem with this game is that its difficulty curve is weighted to the early game, with the mid to late game getting easier.
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I completely agree with this. with level 4 iron gut i had crates of food. With an understanding of food poisoning a new player will just avoid eating cooked food(which they do anyway because they can't cook) until they are ready.

Maybe a delay with the mechanic? You don't get the results until 2 in game hours? Also why stick to just food poisoning? why not other illnesses? Instead of losing stamina an illness will cause a debuff until you either recover from it or take medicine. These can be caught not just from eating but from zombie damage, trap damage, and from animals.

The issue with the food is that they want to add a risk to it. You have all these players talking about how easy the game is with hyper bullet sponge zombies, but the moment they get a small chance to vomit they spaz out. You have better odds with some of the scratch lotto tickets then you do with the getting food poisoning in this game. Spoilage won't impact this because players will simply not harvest their crops until they are ready to eat. like in emperyon.

So how do we balance this out for end game? How do we balance this out for mid game? I hate to say it, but they might need to nerf canned food. Either that or tone down it's abundance in the world. I guess one way to do it that would not destroy low level players is to add a negative water percentage to most canned food. You eat canned food? well you better drink a lot of water.

Another nastier method is a diminishing return for eating too much of the same food over a period of time. This forces you to eat other things. Make canned food count as the same so the more you eat the less benefit you get. This makes farming and cooking important.

Then again maybe food poisoning is meant to be more of an early game challenge?

 
TFP is very happy with the game's recent 94% approval rating on Steam and to add a feature that they know will result in angering a good portion of the player base is going to be a hard sell.
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I'm going to skip the bashing for once and just gonna say: I have not seen ANYONE in this thread say they disliked food spoilage.

Maybe I overread it... but even though I'm to lazy to check, its probably 10:1 or higher.

THIS would be a nice idea for a poll.

"I want food spoilage!"

"I want food spoilage , but not like *insert game here* (I only know arks version of the top of my head)"

"I want food spoilage , but not like *insert game here* (I only know arks version of the top of my head)"

"I don't want food spoilage!"

And four more options after (seperate)

"I want both food spoilage and food poisoning!"

"I want only food spoilage!"

"I want only food poisoning!"

"I don't want any. Remove it please!"

Because I am pretty sure, that it would be overwhelmingly pro spoilage and disproportionate (60+%) anti poisoning.

Would you do that? :)

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Having mechanisms in game that cause disruption in players' plans is a good thing, it creates challenge. But the food poisoning mechanic in game right now is boring, simplistic, and easily circumvented in multiple different ways.
The mechanic, as it is right now (sudden loss of a chunk of food bar), is only anxiety provoking and disruptive to plans in early game, when food is scarce. Once food isn't an issue you just pound down a few more meat or veggie straws and go about your business.

Vitamins are basically useless in mid to late game when you have a stack of stews.

If the mechanic was more like dysentery it would have more impact in mid to late game, and would be less punishing in early game.

The problem with this game is that its difficulty curve is weighted to the early game, with the mid to late game getting easier.
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+1 from me, perfectly recapped

 
The first thing I did was install a mod that stops food poisoning in cooked foods.

Raw ones still have their vanilla chance of giving you food poisoning.

 
Having mechanisms in game that cause disruption in players' plans is a good thing, it creates challenge. But the food poisoning mechanic in game right now is boring, simplistic, and easily circumvented in multiple different ways.
The mechanic, as it is right now (sudden loss of a chunk of food bar), is only anxiety provoking and disruptive to plans in early game, when food is scarce. Once food isn't an issue you just pound down a few more meat or veggie straws and go about your business.

Vitamins are basically useless in mid to late game when you have a stack of stews.

If the mechanic was more like dysentery it would have more impact in mid to late game, and would be less punishing in early game.

The problem with this game is that its difficulty curve is weighted to the early game, with the mid to late game getting easier.
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Wholely disagree. The reason early game is difficult is because you have nothing. Late game is 'easier' because of the diligent work put in to stock enough food in the first place.

I would grudgingly say that loot is slightly unbalanced, but not make the mistake that late game you can now rush through larger POI vs early game taking it careful through even small POIs.

Everyone considers late game 'easyness' with unbalanced game design. The whole point is to have goals and earn them. If you complain too much, next thing you know the devs start making recipes with items that cannot be harvested or crafted, and can only be found via RNG. And start filling POIs with glowing zeds. And to top it off, make a nuke zombie for horde night to destroy everything you built. All in the name of 'making seven days great again'.

Now, spoilage would not destroy the game. It would force the player to maintain a little discipline. Dont make 20 stews at once. Make one stew a day. That is a mechanic that doesnt punish early game, but lasts through to late game.

 
I'm going to skip the bashing for once and just gonna say: I have not seen ANYONE in this thread say they disliked food spoilage.Maybe I overread it... but even though I'm to lazy to check, its probably 10:1 or higher.

THIS would be a nice idea for a poll.

"I want food spoilage!"

"I want food spoilage , but not like *insert game here* (I only know arks version of the top of my head)"

"I want food spoilage , but not like *insert game here* (I only know arks version of the top of my head)"

"I don't want food spoilage!"

And four more options after (seperate)

"I want both food spoilage and food poisoning!"

"I want only food spoilage!"

"I want only food poisoning!"

"I don't want any. Remove it please!"

Because I am pretty sure, that it would be overwhelmingly pro spoilage and disproportionate (60+%) anti poisoning.

Would you do that? :)

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+1 from me, perfectly recapped
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I made a poll. not exactly as you wanted but this should be interesting to see how the poll results turn out.

https://7daystodie.com/forums/showthread.php?136069-POLL-Would-you-like-to-see-food-spoilage-added

 
Now, spoilage would not destroy the game. It would force the player to maintain a little discipline. Dont make 20 stews at once. Make one stew a day. That is a mechanic that doesnt punish early game, but lasts through to late game.
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So you only make 1 stew a day. So that just means your raw ingredients are what spoils instead of your stack of stew. How is that any different or disciplined?

 
So you only make 1 stew a day. So that just means your raw ingredients are what spoils instead of your stack of stew. How is that any different or disciplined?
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In a serious survival situation you'd think you'd want to preserve what food you can if you know it will spoil before you can make/consume it. Hence why it would make sense to add in the option to preserve food by drying/salting some raw ingredients (such as raw meat), and jaring/canning others. Eggs could be come pickled. Raw meat could become salted jerky. Fruit could be preserved, or turned into jams. Stews could be frozen if they added that as a feature for the Fridge? You could make a very dynamic food system that isn't just "oh now it's spoiled, turn it into fertilizer".

If they fixed water in the future and introduced fishing long term, you could set up worm boxes to harvest bait every few days out of composted food. Or make fish Jerky. There a lot of ways to go on this.

 
The reason early game is difficult is because you have nothing. Late game is 'easier' because of the diligent work put in to stock enough food in the first place.
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You know, this actually agrees with what I said and supports my statement that the current way food poisoning works is uninspired and only a burden/anxiety provoking in early game and doesn't even matter in mid to late game.

Example: I started a new game with a friend and got the food poisoning debuff around day 10. It was not "oh my God, what am I going to do", but rather "..... great....*goes to trader and buys more food*.... Okay, back to what I was doing".

I don't think about if I will or won't get food poisoning when I eat cooked food, because it doesn't matter.

 
You know, this actually agrees with what I said and supports my statement that the current way food poisoning works is uninspired and only a burden/anxiety provoking in early game and doesn't even matter in mid to late game.
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I'm sorry to say that you don't need to be Einstein to realize: Early game isn't hard but a challenge.

 
It was not "oh my God, what am I going to do", but rather "..... great....*goes to trader and buys more food*.... Okay, back to what I was doing". I don't think about if I will or won't get food poisoning when I eat cooked food, because it doesn't matter.
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To the maximum extent possible I've been playing traderless. Being forced to _buy_ food feels like a loss, an admission, I can't hack survival. And reducing myself to some NPC's errand-boy? No Thank You. Then, by the time I've lost my RNG religion because my prayers have gone unanswered so long, a run to the trader restores my faith and rebalances my supply situation nicely because I'm getting well paid for what I produced, not for what he told me to play fetch-theres-a-nice-doggie with.

Too bad the poll didn't have a "I don't know yet" option. I kinda like Roland's basic idea, all foods add 1% per day spoilage chance, combine stacks and I think the result should get the max-of-each chance on the one-bad-apple example. But in any game there have to be areas that are left as just raw stubs, stuff where there's no mechanic at all because it just never got to the top of the implement pile. Factorio doesn't do food at all. Warband has spoilage for some foods, not others. I kinda like the notion of salting meat and pickling vegetables and maybe even having cooked wet meals do really good things but spoil very very fast, but at some point you have to stop adding verisimilitude, there will always be a next step they could take and there'll always be plausible-sounding arguments that They Really Should Have Taken It. I mean, in a survival game shouldn't the goal be to make a world in which you can raise children? Why is there no sex and pregnancy and protect-the-children loop?

 
In a serious survival situation you'd think you'd want to preserve what food you can if you know it will spoil before you can make/consume it. Hence why it would make sense to add in the option to preserve food by drying/salting some raw ingredients (such as raw meat), and jaring/canning others. Eggs could be come pickled. Raw meat could become salted jerky. Fruit could be preserved, or turned into jams. Stews could be frozen if they added that as a feature for the Fridge? You could make a very dynamic food system that isn't just "oh now it's spoiled, turn it into fertilizer".
If they fixed water in the future and introduced fishing long term, you could set up worm boxes to harvest bait every few days out of composted food. Or make fish Jerky. There a lot of ways to go on this.
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Well duh..... That however has absolutely nothing with what I responded to... Maybe you should go back and catch what the conversation between he and I was actually about? Or did you just not mean to quote and respond to me?

 
To the maximum extent possible I've been playing traderless. Being forced to _buy_ food feels like a loss, an admission, I can't hack survival. And reducing myself to some NPC's errand-boy? No Thank You. Then, by the time I've lost my RNG religion because my prayers have gone unanswered so long, a run to the trader restores my faith and rebalances my supply situation nicely because I'm getting well paid for what I produced, not for what he told me to play fetch-theres-a-nice-doggie with.
Too bad the poll didn't have a "I don't know yet" option. I kinda like Roland's basic idea, all foods add 1% per day spoilage chance, combine stacks and I think the result should get the max-of-each chance on the one-bad-apple example. But in any game there have to be areas that are left as just raw stubs, stuff where there's no mechanic at all because it just never got to the top of the implement pile. Factorio doesn't do food at all. Warband has spoilage for some foods, not others. I kinda like the notion of salting meat and pickling vegetables and maybe even having cooked wet meals do really good things but spoil very very fast, but at some point you have to stop adding verisimilitude, there will always be a next step they could take and there'll always be plausible-sounding arguments that They Really Should Have Taken It. I mean, in a survival game shouldn't the goal be to make a world in which you can raise children? Why is there no sex and pregnancy and protect-the-children loop?
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Nice that you found a playstyle that works for you. I like to utilize all resources available.

You also do know that food poisoning on cooked food is a newly implemented item, just in the last alpha or two, right? So they found the time to make that change, deemed it worthy....so why wouldn't it be worthy to make the experience of the food poisoning more worth while?

The whole reason they added it to cooked food anyway, and nerfed living off land, was to lead people more towards looting and spending dukes for food rather than becoming self sustaining in early to mid game.

Food poisoning is on cooked food to be a resource drain...nothing else.

 
Food poisoning is on cooked food to be a resource drain...nothing else.
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C'mon, it's much more than that. Run the numbers or just try everything and pay attention, higher-quality cooked meals _dramatically_ cut the danger and loss. Which, I should have noticed, plain old spoilage would not do. A flat per-meal chance does: reduce the number of meals, reduce your losses-per-stamina-cap-point, even if you run minimum-stamina that'll only lower the cap you maintain, not how many meals you have to eat to reach it. Running minimum-stamina might let you live on charred meat and never risk much, I guess that might work for the gunzerkers.

 
Early on putting points into Iron Gut seems like a unlikely choice to bother with until you are level 80 or 100 and the early more beneficial skills are chosen, then that skill would make sense I guess.
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I'd argue it makes no sense at all. Early on you cannot afford to spend point on stuff like iron gut and by the time you could think about it, you have so much food that you couldn't care less about vomiting once.

 
So you only make 1 stew a day. So that just means your raw ingredients are what spoils instead of your stack of stew. How is that any different or disciplined?
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Not to mention that any food still unharvested in your farm should also spoil. I mean if our amazing Farm Plots can grow crops from seed to ripe in 2 days, then by rights they should spoil on day 3 if not harvested, right?

What a PITA spoiling would be if added to the game, huh? I reckon all it would do is push most players towards using canned food predominately (hence getting it from the trader first and foremost) and just skip farming / cooking altogether as they will just no be worth the hassle. That would be a shame.

 
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