Never enough duplexes or restaurants, I say. ;)

[InfamousBrad]

300+ people in my first Platinum patch colony. I have concluded that the objective of this game is to clear the site of all old-world debris in order to endlessly build restaurants and duplexes. So, so many restaurants. No matter how many Mess Halls I build, no matter how much raw food and firewood piles up, it's never enough -- time to build another Mess Hall.

(Is there any chance that Mess Hall production speed could get a substantial buff? Like +50%, maybe more?)

 

[Joanna_ifs]

Heya! Thanks for the feedback and request - I'll pass it on! No promises or guarantees though!

 

[MadDjinn]

(Is there any chance that Mess Hall production speed could get a substantial buff? Like +50%, maybe more?)

Start watching the workers at the messhalls, especially after an attack where there is something on the ground to pick up and you've set a work area over it. It could be that the output is below normal.

I was noticing in my game that some mess halls had worse output than others, so I followed some workers. They were not working the mess hall or just going to storage to get food. A vegetable meal messhall had one worker pretending to cook (no firewood nor attempt to get it), one off to sleep and another picking up meal worms.

So something wasn't keeping the workers confined to tasks required for food production/daily life.

 

[InfamousBrad]

Start watching the workers at the messhalls, especially after an attack where there is something on the ground to pick up and you've set a work area over it. It could be that the output is below normal.

I was noticing in my game that some mess halls had worse output than others, so I followed some workers. They were not working the mess hall or just going to storage to get food. A vegetable meal messhall had one worker pretending to cook (no firewood nor attempt to get it), one off to sleep and another picking up meal worms.

So something wasn't keeping the workers confined to tasks required for food production/daily life.

Okay, yeah, I just did that. Managed to pile up a huge supply of all possible ingredients, and then started switching all eight (!!!) mess halls from recipe to recipe. Meat, Veggie, and Insect Meals cranked right out. Mixed Meals took about twice as long. I don't know how much of that is because they require half again as many carrier trips, and how much of that is bugged time-to-cook, but it is functionally near impossible for me to keep a colony fed on Mixed Meals.

 

[MadDjinn]

Okay, yeah, I just did that. Managed to pile up a huge supply of all possible ingredients, and then started switching all eight (!!!) mess halls from recipe to recipe. Meat, Veggie, and Insect Meals cranked right out. Mixed Meals took about twice as long. I don't know how much of that is because they require half again as many carrier trips, and how much of that is bugged time-to-cook, but it is functionally near impossible for me to keep a colony fed on Mixed Meals.

I did some math on that a little while ago and you're better off using 1/2 meat and 1/2 veg, even in the mess halls. But, the simpler issue is:

2 mess halls running one recipe each:

5 meat + 5 veg + 4 firewood = 20 meals.
6 meat + 6 veg + 6 firewood = 14 meals.

Scale that out and the 6 meal difference becomes a large hole in the meal planning.

For your 8 mess halls:

20 meat + 20 veg + 16 firewood = 80 meals
24 meat + 24 veg + 24 firewood = 56 meals.

So you can already see that you're using more food per recipe across the messhalls and a tonne more firewood. Just to get less food.

How many recipes per day get made is where worker efficiencies (and running all over the place) comes in.

 

[Shadowstrike]

Okay, yeah, I just did that. Managed to pile up a huge supply of all possible ingredients, and then started switching all eight (!!!) mess halls from recipe to recipe. Meat, Veggie, and Insect Meals cranked right out. Mixed Meals took about twice as long. I don't know how much of that is because they require half again as many carrier trips, and how much of that is bugged time-to-cook, but it is functionally near impossible for me to keep a colony fed on Mixed Meals.

Is this because each carrier can only carry one kind of thing to one destination (as opposed to multiple different things to one destination, or one thing to several destinations)? Because if that's the case, that might be why mixed meals are harder to produce, since it's three carrier trips (for meat, veg and firewood) instead of just two for the other meal types (for meat/veg/insects and firewood).

 

[InfamousBrad]

Is this because each carrier can only carry one kind of thing to one destination (as opposed to multiple different things to one destination, or one thing to several destinations)? Because if that's the case, that might be why mixed meals are harder to produce, since it's three carrier trips (for meat, veg and firewood) instead of just two for the other meal types (for meat/veg/insects and firewood).

That was my theory, but MadDjinn's math is pretty compelling.

 

[MadDjinn]

Is this because each carrier can only carry one kind of thing to one destination (as opposed to multiple different things to one destination, or one thing to several destinations)? Because if that's the case, that might be why mixed meals are harder to produce, since it's three carrier trips (for meat, veg and firewood) instead of just two for the other meal types (for meat/veg/insects and firewood).

That was my theory, but MadDjinn's math is pretty compelling.

I think it's a bit of both. Even if you just setup 4 meat and 4 veg mess halls, you will likely find (after a few days of everything settling down) that some will produce more than others. That could be for a few reasons, only some of which would be efficiency issues.

Honestly, I'd be interested to see what would happen if the mess halls had fridges and firewood stores. If they had 100% access to food and firewood when they start a recipe, how much more efficient would they get?

Though, I'd be ok with just swapping the cookhouse/mess hall to (2 firewood +1/chef) per 24 hrs. Then give the mess hall a heating bonus for winter and cooks/visitors a small washing bonus each time they go there.

 

[InfamousBrad]

Oh, man. Now you've got me imagining if, once we have Mess Halls, we could eliminate Food Storage and have ingredients delivered straight from the producers to the cooks instead of having to make two trips, one to storage and then storage to cook. Balancing that would be a nuisance, because you could end up with less than optimal mixes of ingredients, but it's a lovely thought.

 

[MadDjinn]

Oh, man. Now you've got me imagining if, once we have Mess Halls, we could eliminate Food Storage and have ingredients delivered straight from the producers to the cooks instead of having to make two trips, one to storage and then storage to cook. Balancing that would be a nuisance, because you could end up with less than optimal mixes of ingredients, but it's a lovely thought.

Food storage would still be needed (200 cabbages don't just fit anywhere). But carriers (or 1/3 workers if no carriers) could do the job to fill up the mess hall storage's. Limit of 20 ish? items would let a few recipes be made per day without interfering with delivery schedules.

What would really be good would be having storage at the mess halls and having the veg/mixed meals food values be dependant on what combination of veg was used.

 

[hippienut]

Just throwing in my 2 cents I'm 205 Pop and have 6 mess halls. Three on Veg meals and three on meat meals. Every once in a while I have to balance out the meals and go 4 and 2 depending on what meals run low in stock. But I will say if I had 7 mess halls with 4 on Veg and 3 Meat I would be all set. I've found mixed meals and insect to be a bit of a waste of time. Also malnutrition seem to be a non issue with just Veg and Meat meals.

 

[InfamousBrad]

At 300ish population and 8 mess halls ... holy crap, switching everything to a mix of Meat Meals and Veggie Meals cleared through the backlog like grass through a goose. I'm tearing down my insect farms, tore down two of my six large fields, converted two of them to flax, and food is still piling up faster than my colonists can eat it.

Whatever the problem is, it's something to do with Mixed Meals.

 

[Joanna_ifs]

Jumping back to the conversation here just to say that this feedback has been forwarded and our designers are looking into the numbers! No promises or guarantees for changes, but we are taking a look at the situation!

 

[matti_ifs]

Heya! I've looked into the Mess Hall food input/output ratios and production speed, and it indeed requires a buff as the main mid-to-late game food production facility. We're adjusting the ratios to be a bit better and considering some other production-boosting ideas as well, for example turning it into a energy-user instead of requiring firewood. It would free more workers for cooking and carrying food items and in turn reduce downtime from the cycle. This, on the other hand, would pretty much phase out Firewood completely from the end-game, so we'll have to consider the pros and cons here. Mixed meals will also receive a separate update to accommodate the increased "logistics cost" compared to other meal types. Insects are also getting buffs across the board as mid-to-late game food sources. The exact nature and timing of these changes is still WIP, so stay tuned

 

[MadDjinn]

Heya! I've looked into the Mess Hall food input/output ratios and production speed, and it indeed requires a buff as the main mid-to-late game food production facility. We're adjusting the ratios to be a bit better and considering some other production-boosting ideas as well, for example turning it into a energy-user instead of requiring firewood. It would free more workers for cooking and carrying food items and in turn reduce downtime from the cycle. This, on the other hand, would pretty much phase out Firewood completely from the end-game, so we'll have to consider the pros and cons here. Mixed meals will also receive a separate update to accommodate the increased "logistics cost" compared to other meal types. Insects are also getting buffs across the board as mid-to-late game food sources. The exact nature and timing of these changes is still WIP, so stay tuned

For firewood getting phased out:

That's ok?

I mean, it's not like we use a lot of firewood now (iRL), given that we have electricity. Housing fireplaces could be a nice use, but we've got electricity for that already in game. Perhaps add some late game 'outdoor spaces' that allow for worker socialization events (once weekly); that use firewood.

Though, I have noticed that the bigger burners (heat source) have better coverage than the radiators. I would not use a radiator given the costs to build it; and the need to revamp coverage. The industrial radiator is a replacement for the boosted burner, and it's main purpose is to also remove firewood/carriers from the game.

 

[InfamousBrad]

Insects are also getting buffs across the board as mid-to-late game food sources.

I don't feel like they're in a bad place right now. Maybe a slight boost to the "veggie nutrition" stat so that they're even more malnourishment-resistant? Maybe?

But their production speed isn't bad (and would get way better with the removal of firewood). Insect Farms plus Mess Halls seem pretty competitive with having multiple meat and veggie producers -- a bit slower, and they do require a tiny bit of electricity, but they make up for the slightly slower productivity by eliminating the boom-and-bust cycle, but not shutting down for castastrophes period. (Except during Lightning Storms, if you don't have enough battery banks.)

But I can't thank you enough for adjusting the Mixed Meal costs/speed. That really screwed me over, glad to hear it's getting fixed.

 

[InfamousBrad]

Although the "immune to castastrophes" part of insect farming reminds me of one balance issue I thought was maybe a little bit off? Greenhouses felt like they were slightly underperforming.

Four greenhouses take up slightly more space than one large field (because of the need for a transformer and a water tower). They also require four employees instead of the large field's three. I get why you wouldn't want them to be exactly one fourth of the food output of a large field, since they don't shut down during any catastrophes except (if you run out of battery power) Lightning Storms. But down time for catastrophes for fields is, what, maybe 10% of the time? So maybe, given the extra employee and the extra infrastructure space/cost, they should be balanced as exactly 1/4th of a large field?

 

[Shadowstrike]

I suggested this in another thread, but combining "wood" and "firewood" and phasing out the logging camp entirely would really simplify things. The distinction between wood and firewood feels really arbitrary - it's obvious that you can burn wood, without necessarily needing another giant building to just chop it into tinier pieces. If the goal was to not waste art assets, then it would make more sense to have the logging camp produce logs, and the lumber-yard turn logs into wood (that serves as both wood and firewood).

I'm not sure if this would make the programming more complicated, but it would be interesting if you could toggle between wood burning and electricity as needed on advanced buildings that use electricity for heating (this would also apply not only to kitchens but also to saunas, heated houses, burners, insect farms, etc.). Like maybe default to electricity, but also allow them to stockpile wood to burn if electricity runs out (or if you want to divert your limited electricity supplies to more important buildings).

 

[matti_ifs]

I don't feel like they're in a bad place right now. Maybe a slight boost to the "veggie nutrition" stat so that they're even more malnourishment-resistant? Maybe?

But their production speed isn't bad (and would get way better with the removal of firewood). Insect Farms plus Mess Halls seem pretty competitive with having multiple meat and veggie producers -- a bit slower, and they do require a tiny bit of electricity, but they make up for the slightly slower productivity by eliminating the boom-and-bust cycle, but not shutting down for castastrophes period. (Except during Lightning Storms, if you don't have enough battery banks.)

But I can't thank you enough for adjusting the Mixed Meal costs/speed. That really screwed me over, glad to hear it's getting fixed.

One curious issue we sort of knew would be coming is the inherent distaste for insect-based food, even though you're not eating them yourself and feeding your polygon-people instead. We therefore have to dangle a slightly bigger carrot (or a cricket more like) to make insects more enticing to try. We'll be testing the buffs to make sure it won't dumpster the food economy, for sure.

 

[MadDjinn]

One curious issue we sort of knew would be coming is the inherent distaste for insect-based food, even though you're not eating them yourself and feeding your polygon-people instead. We therefore have to dangle a slightly bigger carrot (or a cricket more like) to make insects more enticing to try. We'll be testing the buffs to make sure it won't dumpster the food economy, for sure.

My only point on them is 'why bother'? If I can overlap hunting spaces and overlap fishing places with each other and water extraction, why do I need insect farms? It doesn't take more than a few fish/venison production buildings to keep up with meat needs.

The same could be said for soy beans. Or generally any veg, since it doesn't matter what veg goes into the meal.

I think there was some thought put into 'alternate sources of protein' with an eye to mix and match as needed, but we don't have the recipe setup to do that correctly. If we had a 'mixed meal' recipe that took any proteins (venison, fish, insect, soy bean) and some combination of veg to produce a meal, it would make more sense to have the alternates. Then the actual output of the meal would be based upon the source veg/proteins.

As is, we have no reason not to mass fast growing veg with easy to get meat.