PC Food Spoilage and Its Effect on Game Play A17 and Beyond

Odetta

Odetta

Tester
With the new way in which food governs our stamina cap it seems that balancing food/stamina drain is nigh impossible.

It's either gonna be swayed towards the late game or the very early game.

- Balanced for late game = terrible early game (b231)

- Balanced for early game = trivial/non existent late game

I used to be against adding food spoilage but I think the time is right for it to be incorporated. In my eye I see it like this:

- Early game with no Chef Perk = No way to preserve food, so finding canned goods and eating fresh are the name of the game.

- Late game with Chef Perks = You can preserve food now; canning, smoking, drying, fermenting and maybe refrigeration to preserve fresh food a lot longer. Preserved food will have a severe nutrition penalty and chance to get you sick but do not spoil. So there is a trade off and food always remains an issue to your survival, as it should be.

Even with a farm, the amount of mats needed coupled with the negative aspects of preserving and you'll always be worried about food. Example 100 blueberries for a jar of preserves with chance to get you sick and only a 15 stamina rating but lasts forever. So when you can you always eat fresh but can stockpile late game to take some of the pressure off.

Lets discuss some of the pros and cons for food spoilage. I could not have a clue so shed some light.

 
Lets discuss some of the pros and cons for food spoilage. I could not have a clue so shed some light.
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Well if it means I lose my 500 stack of snowballs that I keep in my desert base then no :) You'd think I would at least I'd need a working freezer to store snow but nope . It seems snow doesn't melt in the post apocalyptic future, but I have to strip down to my briefs to step outside.

 
I'll say right off the bat, with the new update my character seems to be eating and drinking 2 to 3 times more than before, though I haven't restarted since the update. (I think they are trying to force me into having the metabolism perk)

As for spoilage, I don't see too much of an issue with it as long as the food lasts around 5 real hours at least. My farm is well and truly keeping me fed as well as the 5 stacks of meat (zero points in huntsman). I just went on a snowberry grind and almost have a full stack of those now which would spoil if that was implemented, which would mean I'd only harvest what I need at the time instead of all at once.

 
How would stacking work? If a stack of 5 meat has 1 day to spoil and another stack has 2 days to spoil, what happens when you combine them?

 
How would stacking work? If a stack of 5 meat has 1 day to spoil and another stack has 2 days to spoil, what happens when you combine them?
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Well I'd imagine that they would just spoil in order, no matter how you stack them. Each piece of meat having a timer, like other games do it.

 
Well I'd imagine that they would just spoil in order, no matter how you stack them. Each piece of meat having a timer, like other games do it.
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Are you sure that would be possible? The amount of memory required to handle that, as well as the timed events of ticking down spoilage time for every piece of food in the world would be insane. Not to mention, how do you find the piece that's going to spoil first in a stack of 50? Usually games that have this feature either average the spoilage time for the stack or do not allow stacking. I am not sure either of these options will be good with the current mechanics. What game has spoilage for every single item? I can't think of any.

All I can imagine is a server with 10 people, each with a couple chests full of food... thousands of items, each having their spoilage kept track of. I just can't see that going too well.

If the stack averages, then you could essentially avoid spoilage of meat for example, just by always stacking and restacking.

If they don't stack, we have a much worse situation regarding inventory management than we already have.

A better option might be is that if you stack, the stack takes on the worst value... but I know nobody is going to like that. I would accept it as a valid mechanic in the game though, as long as refrigeration was a thing. I'm ok with complexity, as long as everything makes sense.

I'm not so sure I would want a possibility of food poisoning late game though. After all that time dealing with this, I would enjoy the final goal of never having to deal with it again during the current play. Instead, better preserved items should still spoil, but at a very slow rate... and even slower than that if refrigerated.

 
Are you sure that would be possible? The amount of memory required to handle that, as well as the timed events of ticking down spoilage time for every piece of food in the world would be insane. Not to mention, how do you find the piece that's going to spoil first in a stack of 50? Usually games that have this feature either average the spoilage time for the stack or do not allow stacking. I am not sure either of these options will be good with the current mechanics. What game has spoilage for every single item? I can't think of any.All I can imagine is a server with 10 people, each with a couple chests full of food... thousands of items, each having their spoilage kept track of. I just can't see that going too well.

If the stack averages, then you could essentially avoid spoilage of meat for example, just by always stacking and restacking.

If they don't stack, we have a much worse situation regarding inventory management than we already have.

A better option might be is that if you stack, the stack takes on the worst value... but I know nobody is going to like that. I would accept it as a valid mechanic in the game though, as long as refrigeration was a thing. I'm ok with complexity, as long as everything makes sense.

I'm not so sure I would want a possibility of food poisoning late game though. After all that time dealing with this, I would enjoy the final goal of never having to deal with it again during the current play. Instead, better preserved items should still spoil, but at a very slow rate... and even slower than that if refrigerated.
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Don't starve has a mechanic where once you combine two stacks of food that have different spoil times it simply averages them out which might not make sense realistically but as far as a gameplay standpoint it makes things much easier for the player while still keeping the challenge of spoiled food present. But obviously that game is heavily geared towards survival of that type(as it is in the name), and I don't expect TFP to go that far into depth with this but I think spoiled food in combination with a more balanced early game would fit in nicely and give the game some more depth/challenge.

 
Don't starve has a mechanic where once you combine two stacks of food that have different spoil times it simply averages them out which might not make sense realistically but as far as a gameplay standpoint it makes things much easier for the player while still keeping the challenge of spoiled food present. But obviously that game is heavily geared towards survival of that type(as it is in the name), and I don't expect TFP to go that far into depth with this but I think spoiled food in combination with a more balanced early game would fit in nicely and give the game some more depth/challenge.
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Yeah, I believe Empyrion does it the same way... at least it used to be like that. I haven't played it in a year.

 
I don't think food spoilage will ever be a thing. At any rate I don't think it would improve the situation. What needs to happen is a fundamental rethinking of what food does and how the player gets it. Right now TFP are making food a maintenance cost. It doesn't feel like a survival item; indeed, every individual piece of food is almost worthless, because so much is now required. This was true even before the most recent build, though it has been raised to a level that while comical, also highlights the problem.

Food requirements need to be sharply curtailed (and almost totally divorced from the stamina bar), and food should be much harder to acquire. There would be a hidden value each player has called Health, that governs their general dietary health. Food that is looted should be less nutritious than food the player makes himself, allowing the scavenger to find food but necessitating regular hunting or investing time in a farm (an exercise I have always avoided with no problems). Having an unhealthy diet would cause a malus (less stamina, decreased stamina regen, whatever) that increases over time the lower the players hidden Health stat gets. By the same token, eating healthy food would raise the health stat, preventing debuffs and perhaps bestowing a buff (like more stamina).

Most importantly though, the player would eat LESS FOOD and food would be MUCH HARDER TO FIND. Maybe not junk food, but particularly hunting should provide less meat, and farming should require more time for crops to grow. The entire food system now is geared or "balanced" around needing to eat food all the time. It should obviously be required maintenance, but I shouldn't have to carry a stack of plates with bacon and eggs on them just to stay busy all day. It would make being a farmer/hunter a REWARDING experience, which I think in particular is sorely needed in farming.

 
I'm all for food spoilage.

I think it needs to reflect difficulty level, however, if it's got any chance of working well.

Easiest Level = 5% Spoilage Time

Default Level = 100% Spoilage Time

Hardest Level = 100%+ Spoilage Time

I think you get what I'm saying.

If it's too much, too soon it's going to cause more trouble than it's worth.

 
Yeah, we do have to eat way too much. If you ran marathons on a daily basis, you still wouldn't need to eat that much. 4 to 5 thousand calories should suffice in this situation. The stamina tied to hunger makes sense though. I don't see that as a bad idea. However, being hungry and truly starving are completely different, and in this game, having not eaten in a few hours means you can't run for more than 10 seconds. The stamina drain itself is fine... but the max stamina should not be affected so much... maybe if you haven't eaten all day. If it was more this way, then spoilage becomes a possible feature.

 
Yeah, we do have to eat way too much. If you ran marathons on a daily basis, you still wouldn't need to eat that much. 4 to 5 thousand calories should suffice in this situation. The stamina tied to hunger makes sense though. I don't see that as a bad idea. However, being hungry and truly starving are completely different, and in this game, having not eaten in a few hours means you can't run for more than 10 seconds. The stamina drain itself is fine... but the max stamina should not be affected so much... maybe if you haven't eaten all day. If it was more this way, then spoilage becomes a possible feature.
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Yeah see I like what TFP are doing as far as making food necessary and putting more focus on scavenging.

What I'm not sure I like is how often we have to eat.

Making food more scarce does essentially the same job doesn't it?

I don't mind having to scrounge a little more than A16 to keep full, what I don't want to do is be eating all the time.

Then you're looking at growing a lot of crops and some might complain about this turning into Harvest [blood] Moon.

I actually like farming but.... just saying. Some don't.

 
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I enjoy not having to worry about food spoilage. IF it gets added, maybe those fridges could be put to real use even though I tend to put my food there anyways since it looks better.

 
I agree food spoilage should be a thing, I disagree that it balances it out end game - I've played a similar number of hours in Empyrion as I have for 7 Days to Die - and it doesn't change anything, food is still hugely abundant in the late game as farming is no longer an issue, and fridges are everywhere.

 
This is like every other maintenance routine in the game. Those who actually like survival games will find it a fun mechanic and enjoy it for the added challenge, those who do not like survival games but still want to play this game will call it a grind and monotonous and will hate it claiming "it doesn't really add any challenge. It's just boring."

The game needs spoilage big time--whether it is a deep system or a shallow barely there and highly abstracted system the game needs something that brings entropy to food and water with our infinite gardens and our chests filled with stacks of snow and empty bottles.

Food spoilage makes the early game a daily struggle and the development of preservation tech a milestone in the game that is rewarding. Eventually you do want to reach a point when food and water are not an issue but you want that point achieved by the player's actions.

All of this will, of course, be incredibly boring and tedious and annoying to those who like to race to the endgame-- so buckle up for more tears if and when Joel decides to pull this trigger.

 
The game needs spoilage big time--whether it is a deep system or a shallow barely there and highly abstracted system the game needs something that brings entropy to food and water with our infinite gardens and our chests filled with stacks of snow and empty bottles.

Food spoilage makes the early game a daily struggle and the development of preservation tech a milestone in the game that is rewarding. Eventually you do want to reach a point when food and water are not an issue but you want that point achieved by the player's actions.

All of this will, of course, be incredibly boring and tedious and annoying to those who like to race to the endgame-- so buckle up for more tears if and when Joel decides to pull this trigger.
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All of this well-put and agreed. I thought it would be tedious - even being tha craver of hardened survival - but wit all the food options and always hvin stockpiles, I can see this being a needed feature.

Btw I am drunke posting after passing a pc certification pre-test, I madea request in another post and being drunk for the first time in ages I am compelled to ask here. Gore block prank, return them temp but fill them with 50 or more snakes that explode on the player when attempting to harvest. Trolland away! Okay I am logging ogff the site now.

 
I love how spoilage implemented in terra firma craft, a mod of minecraft.

Stack is replaced with filled % of 1 inventory slot. Kind a degradation. As time passes, small part of slot is damaged/spoiled. If you keep it, spoilage speeds up gradually.

You can stop it by cut damaged portion off the other.

This system solves frequently argued problem.

How the system distinguish new food stack with old one, if those 2 are stacked into 1?

Just sum up new portion and spoiled portion of them individually. Then, recalculate spoilage rate.

Ex)

Stack A : 20% of new portion, 5% of old, the other portion isn't filled.

(Spoilage rate : 20% of max speed)

Stack B : 10% of new portion, 10% of old, the other portion isn't filled.

(Spoilage rate : 50% of max speed)

Stack A with B : 30% of new, 15% of old.

(Spoilage rate : 33% of max speed)

How the system maintain food spoilage every update tick for every stacks? It'll make game super laggy.

Don't update periodically. Just do only on open container. Spoilage is calculated by only time passed and current spoilage rate.

No rng or huge costed calculate is needed.

 
I love how spoilage implemented in terra firma craft, a mod of minecraft.
Stack is replaced with filled % of 1 inventory slot. Kind a degradation. As time passes, small part of slot is damaged/spoiled. If you keep it, spoilage speeds up gradually.

You can stop it by cut damaged portion off the other.

This system solves frequently argued problem.

How the system distinguish new food stack with old one, if those 2 are stacked into 1?

Just sum up new portion and spoiled portion of them individually. Then, recalculate spoilage rate.

Ex)

Stack A : 20% of new portion, 5% of old, the other portion isn't filled.

(Spoilage rate : 20% of max speed)

Stack B : 10% of new portion, 10% of old, the other portion isn't filled.

(Spoilage rate : 50% of max speed)

Stack A with B : 30% of new, 15% of old.

(Spoilage rate : 33% of max speed)

How the system maintain food spoilage every update tick for every stacks? It'll make game super laggy.

Don't update periodically. Just do only on open container. Spoilage is calculated by only time passed and current spoilage rate.

No rng or huge costed calculate is needed.
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I like it

 
DIsagree. I dont think that food and water needs to be balanced for early+late.

Its fine that food and water are only a problem at the start. Later, we should have more important concerns, like improving our base, defending and finding good items.

We still need to eat ofc, but its fine if we have a big food stash, we arent the weaklings of the start of the game, we have more important things to do.

 
I think the farming system should eventually tie into weather and seasons. Crops don't grow in winter, hope you stocked up. Also, are you prepared for a failed harvest? Too much rain will make your potatoes rot. Drought will destroy your corn, frost will, idk, kill some other crop.

 
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