Mozi's Fav foods n' Buffs concept

[Sundance]

Background:
So there was talk about incorporating foods into the game (meaning chef and botany isn't just a complex gimmick) to actually be useful back in 2013  where alot of interesting ideas were hashed out but unfortunately nothing came of it.

For those interested giving it a read, here's the thread: http://forum.ss13.co/showthread.php?tid=814
Mozi posted a link within this thread outline his idea of favorite foods: http://pastebin.com/6TB1sNVW
(Lets keep the discussion on this idea rather than those links though, as it that would make things a bit messy)

Concept:
My idea builds upon Mozi's idea, which avoids the hunger system entirely. However, I feel health buffs are missing the mark. If people want health buffs, they'd just carry around a medkit which would be far more effective. Instead my idea is that it buffs you to make you better at your job (see buffs below), but balanced in that it's "hey this is useful" rather than "hey that's an unfair advantage"

So what's the general gist?
-Every round the chef spawns with a leather book in his bag titled "today's menu"
-The "menu" is the current manifest, but with the addendum stating each crews favorite food.
-You can check your personal favorite food on the "notes"
-The favorite food is randomized every round. Some may require assistance from botany.
-The chef can cook and then pda/ yell on the radio/ or announce food on a prompter similar to QM/Bridge/etc.
-Eating your favorite food gives you a minor (albeit useful) buff (similar to genetics) that lasts ~20 minutes before wearing off. 
-The buff is visible as an icon beside your health

The Buffs
Please target your suggestions/improvements/angst at these buffs if anything. A lot of buffs i'm still thinking about how to balance them, or change them entirely. Remember that alot of these buffs can be done already (and more effectively) with drugs, genetic/robotic enhancements, etc.
The buffs are job specific, but sometimes the buffs incorporate a bunch of jobs.

Barman, Liquid Gold: Alcohol now acts as a purge similar to Calomel but for less poison damage. Does not purge ethanol however, meaning you'll still get drunk (and poisoned from drink if you drink too much)
Clown, Jesters Boon: Reduces (but does not eliminate) the clumsiness of being a clown.
Engineering/Mechanics/CE, Swelter Shelter: Gives a small buff against burn damage.
Medical Doctor/Director/Roboticist, Black Jack: Gives a small buff against bleeding damage, reduces the amount of bleeding damage done on the medical table.
Mining, Geology Expert: Gives Miners the geology scanner ability by simply examining the rock.
Security/HoS, Combat ready: Gives a small boost to stamina, decreases time to cuff and (possibly) strip a player.
Detective, Carbonated lungs: No addiction against smoking. Blows significant smoke in players eyes, resulting in a short blinding.
Scientist/RD, Chemically Cushioned: Reduces toxin damage. Will not however, reduce the side effects of various poisons.
Staff assistant, Expendable Nobody: Increases running speed to a minor degree.
Captain, Fat bastard: Gives a buff against both burn and brute damage, however with the downside that the captain will become addicted to his favorite food, and will require to eat every ten minutes lest the addictions symptoms kick in. May result in obesity depending on food.
HoP, Corporate cognition: Allows the HoP to view, by observing what previous job (if any) the player had. So if a player had some personal job in the ID, he'd be able to tell by looking what the job the player spawned on as.
Genetics, Genetic suppressant: Turns off one negative random mutation without resulting in genetic destabilization. Will turn back on the mutation when wears off.
Janitor, Elbow Grease: Mopping speed is increased significantly.
Chaplain, Illuminated Touch: Increases/deceases healing/brain damage done by bible.
Botany, Green lungs: Reduces oxy damage + increases quality of crops, so long as there is cannabis in the system
Gimmick Job, Random: Rolls a chance of getting any of these buffs when choosing to a gimmick job.

[Noah Buttes]

This is a great idea, and is a good way to get the ball rolling.

off-topic rant below:
Spoiler!

 I think there are some other issues with botany and the kitchen that this doesn't really address.

For one, most of botany's useful niches have been eliminated. Thanks to the overabundance of most medicines nowadays, you don't have to rely on the botanists to produce medicinal herbs because lord knows chemistry never makes meds. QM doesn't need botany to grow produce because they can just order non-cardlocked hydroponics starter crates. Chemistry only ever interacts with botany to get saltpetre for black powder. Hell, even the chef rarely needs botany anymore since the foodtech vendor got upgraded.Botany has been effectively relegated to explosive bananas, rainbow melons, weed, and ghostlier chilies.

The problem with cooking is that there's absolutely no room for experimentation. The only way to learn recipes outside of looking them up is through trial and error. However, there's no ROOM for error when cooking. If you fuck up even the slightest amount, you get a useless pile of garbage. Not to mention, no matter how much effort you put into a dish, unless you cheat and directly put reagents in it, it will always be worse than just a simple warm donk pocket. The chef is easily replaced by a microwave.

It's even worse for the barman, whose only purpose in life is to get people so drunk they die of alcohol poisoning.


In short,

• Botany CAN be very useful, but it has no niches to fill right now.
  
• The kitchen borders on practical uselessness.
  
• There's a reason why barmen start with a Russian revolver. It's probably the most fun they'll have.
  

[Frank_Stein]

The problem with cooking is that there's absolutely no room for experimentation. The only way to learn recipes outside of looking them up is through trial and error. However, there's no ROOM for error when cooking. If you fuck up even the slightest amount, you get a useless pile of garbage. Not to mention, no matter how much effort you put into a dish, unless you cheat and directly put reagents in it, it will always be worse than just a simple warm donk pocket. The chef is easily replaced by a microwave.

That's definitely something I think needs some tweaking, especially since there's cooking temperatures and times on top of ingredient combinations to be aware of.

One thing I think you could do is, copy the crafting mechanic we have at those tables near the smelter, except populate it with cooking recipes. Some of the spots could be labeled to guide you, but others could be more vague like "Meat" or just "Any object" for burgers or sandwiches.

---

Also, I think the chef, being a trained professional, ought to have some kind of ability similar to the barman drink tasting ability. When they sample food, some flavor text should pop up suggesting things they could have done to what they ate to make it better.

[Sundance]

Also arghh noah I'm aware botany needs more features, but I feel like if we try and take on a massive overhaul,shit will never get done.
In long:
1. Botany needs use for edible crops. This thread idea will tackle that if anything. I'd also be down for giving Chef botany access, because it means he can work with the botanists in their environment or if there are no botanists.
2. I feel like medical is both overstocked and too effective. I feel that it should be somewhat rebalanced, or be given minor drawbacks. Where botany comes in, is instead of commol containing silver sulfidine, it contains commol extract, which has no minor drawbacks and is more effective at treating burn meds. This however is not the thread for discussing this.
3. Botany should have a ton more genetic mutations. Also drugs. Botany should be able to make every drug + drugs that are half/not in code like cocaine, xtc, etc But this is not the thread for it.

In short, this is not the thread for botany.
Nor is it the thread for quality system, which has been discussed prior. The quality system could be introduced to food (and it should) but it's not really intrinsic in this idea. It could be introduced in a quantitative manner, meaning that high quality food would give a longer buff time, but again it's not really essential just yet, as that will take ALOT of work.
Nor is this a thread for the barman. The barman I feel should remain a peddler of alcohol. I think drinking needs flavor texts, similar to chemical reaction texts, drinking a martini should taste "sophisticated", drinking a sex on the beach should taste "tacky and regretful" etc.

[Ed Venture]

I think making food and drinks give you buffs like chems is a great idea. I support it as long as I'm never forced to eat or drink.

[UmmonTL]

I like the idea of having a favourite food that gives you a unique bonus, the same could be done for a favourite drink. I would also give food in general some form of positive effect, a well sated buff that helps with your stamina or something. With better food giving a more potent/longer lasting buff. Something that doesn't force you to eat but makes it beneficial to risk it.

One idea I have is to make all food give off its reagents gradually, kind of how corn syrup metabolizes into loads of sugar or porktonium into cholesterol. In the case of good food this could keep dosing you with positive chems like synthflesh or charcoal healing you from certain types of damage. The benefit of having some small form of heal-effect even if you get knocked out and can't med yourself could be very helpful in a lot of situations.

I imagine it working as you having a reagent "food xyz" in your body that metabolizes into the reagents it is made of. The other option would be that your stomach works as some sort of beaker that stores reagents and slowly releases them into the body. If you also add the option to vomit / get your stomach pumped to purge any food reagents it would also reduce the risk of eating bad food.

A nice side effect would be that more potent plants grown by the botanists would lead to more potent food. Or the botanists could give the chef some horrible hybrid plants to kill his customers.

Lastly an even crazier system would be if the layered foods would give off their reagents one by one. Meaning that at one moment the food could be nice and helpful only to suddenly start knocking you out and poisoning you.

[Boon Yoon]

I really like the idea of food buffs and the menu of the day!

One buff could be from Carrot Cake, which would temporarily give you Cat Eyes, like the trait. Or maybe add more cats to the station. Another could be something Ectoplasm based, which lets you see the dead. For Telesci nerds, perhaps successfully hunting space bears (or other horrors) and having them cooked could give buffs that would help with the expedition. Space hunting for space cooking.

On the subject of Cake, it would be great if cake had the same "naming" functionality as pies. Right now nearly everything comes out as Yellow Cake, so unless I'm missing something, such would be required for a thing like Carrot Cake.

Additionally, and hopefully not too off track, is that cooking should have more secrets. I want to make a space souffle using space time itself as an ingredient.

Also let botany grow rice and let me make sushi, perhaps if space fishing ever works out.

[Ed Venture]

Additionally, and hopefully not too off track, is that cooking should have more secrets.

Agreed one of the things I look forward to if this gets added.

[Erik]

yes to all of this.

[ZeWaka]

yes to all of this.

[Frank_Stein]

Yeah, Sundance is right. Let's start with the menu of the day, favorite foods, and the buffs. Then worry about building it up from there.

[Noah Buttes]

You guys are right. This is neither the time nor the place to discuss botany.

With that in mind, here's a suggestion for the clown buff.

Clown, Jesters Boon: Reduces (but does not eliminate) Increases the clumsiness of being a clown except when doing clownish things. When doing clownish things, such as juggling or peeling bananas, the clumsiness is significantly reduced. 

This maximizes the clown's hilarity potential.

[RAWK_LAWBSTAR]

yes to all of this.

[medsal15]

yes to all of this.

[Grek]

Going to put the breaks on the bandwagon and say that job based food buffs are fucking dumb. The idea of people having favourite foods and getting a buff for eating their favourite food is good (but likely hard to code), but the actual proposed benefits are basically just a bad idea.