I wanted to hear opinions on an idea I had. I love the "Do Until You Have X" option, but I have one qualm about it. If I have it set to 100, they will obviously make sure I always have 100 meals in stock. However, I feel the cook's time is wasted because as soon as he hits 100, he runs off to do something, then immediately has to go back because it dropped down to 99. It's good to have 100, but I am only really worried about it getting dangerously low, say 50.
My idea is to have an Option called "Keep Between" that lets us set a minimum and a maximum. If the Keep Between is set to 50-100, They will cook to 100, then do other things letting it get as low as 50. As soon as it hits 50 or less, the cook goes back and cooks another huge batch until he hits the 100 mark.
My questions are these: Do you like the idea? Would you use it? Is it, in your opinion, something that would go good in the vanilla game or is it more of a mod idea? On the coding aspect, is this something that is easy to code or would it be difficult?
Thinking as I type this, a more complicated side to this idea would be to implement this for stock items.
You could designate more trees to cut or ore to mine, but set a "keep between" on these. They would only cut the marked trees when you are below the minimum, therefore keeping your colony wealth low.
+1 - I think this is something that we need.
My chef spends all his life just cooking meals, be nice for him to get some air every now and again.
I think 'Maintain' might be a better word for it but essentially I agree. Maybe even something based on the number of colonists so you dont have to keep adjusting for deaths or recruits. Also making it a global value so you dont need to repeat the setting for each stove. In addition I would like to have a 'best meal possible' option, so if you got the skill and raw foods then they make the best they can. Rather than set a minimum of simple meals that usually rot, and a separate job for lavish meals. maybe a 'only make simple during a shortage' toggle.
This would be really cool to see! That's probably one of the more practical ways of making jobs less binary.
It would be nice to have a maximum/minimum meals in storage. I concur.
This would be really helpful for when you have a lot of colonists eating at different times of the day. At this point my cook is pretty much working in the kitchen full-time because there is always someone taking a meal out of the stockpile.
+1 good idea
Or you could build more than one stove and give the same bill to all of them. Having more than one cook also helps.