Gourmand seems unneccarily bad

[Davetlow]

I picked up a gourmand.  He starved to death beating out a flashstorm fire, another pawn was at malnourished minor.  He died while she was cooking his food.  While I did note he got hungry faster as his mechanic, I did not foresee how difficult that would make him to use properly.  I think if he would just eat sooner than necessary and maybe pick up more food than necessary for .05 nutrition stuff it would be more sensible than being a fatty who gets malnourished without food and then passes out.  I just want to make sure this is what is actually intended by the trait.  Gourmand raiders are going to be going down on the way to the front door.  I mean the chicks overeat, or they used to, by eating a meal but only having room for a tiny bit.  And it's fine, I guess, how it is, but it's a lot more serious of a trait than it sounds in the description, though, again, the mechanic is described properly, I think.

[5thHorseman]

I have yet to have one starve to death simply because of timing, but they do frequently start "starving" just for sleeping through the night. It's very annoying.

That plus the extra food draw (50% is crazy. How about 10% or something more reasonable?) puts the trait in the top tier of bad. Not quite Chemical Fascination Pyromaniac but maybe Chemical Interest level. Top 10 worst easy.

[RawCode]

well, this "trait" is death sentence due to absurd "starving" stuff, it ever worse then pyro.

[bobucles]

Don't forget the regular "binge" mood breaks that will destroy a dozen of your meals or worse. That's enough to destroy an early game colony.

The +50% food penalty isn't so bad, but the big issue is they don't get +50% food storage to go with it. So your gourmand ends up ALWAYS starving like he has tapeworms.

[RicRider]

As a gourmand I can assure you that I've never starved to death or become malnutritioned. I'm just a fatty that goes on mental breaks IRL when I don't get my bacon and this is how it should be in RimWorld too.

[Davetlow]

It was a naked start and he was my first hire, I didn't expect gourmand to be a problem because I was in the forest.  Of course he started a fight with her hurling insults (he was also abrasive).  We had food though, of course then one thing lead to another and the food was almost gone, as she we recovering from the fight in bed and there was a flashstorm as the food was gone.  I know a lot of folks don't put a flash storm out in the forest because why, but was putting it out and it takes a long time minimizing damage until it rains, basically.  So, he goes down with extreme malnutrition and the food gone.  Granny (first play, female warrior 61 great stats no injuries) goes to bed, I wake her up have her hunt, but she doesn't finish the food in time.  Died, yes, at the begining of the game.  Might have survived if not for the pshyic sooth that probably stopped him from breaking earlier.  First death mercilous.  Randi was like here take this dude, then save this girl, (I was like, well I don't have that much food, but, I do have 500 hours experience even if I took more than 6 months off), then he goes off, and then a flashstorm.  Yep, even her substantial food horde didn't protect them.  Well, well, well, she didn't die of course, lol.

[Third_Of_Five]

Agreed. Gourmand is worse than Pyromaniac. I hope there will be a mod out soon that nerfs it, otherwise I'll probably try my hand at making one myself.

[AileTheAlien]

I think you might want to practice more with food production; I've had many games with gourmands in my starting lineup, and haven't starved. Having some gourmands just means you need to grow or hunt more food earlier, and delay other things like making statues, or stone walls instead of wood, etc.

[Davetlow]

Nah, it was just my first one.  Also it was Randi Mercilous.  He dumped a bunch of pawns on me and whilst I had two stacks of meals, they didn't last through the other crap that he also through at me.  I don't think you read well, because, as I said, if he had had a break, I would have likely noticed he was starving, but since there was a soothe he handled it until he was starving 80%.  I was impressed with Randi Mercilous.  Granny was still recovering from getting punched.  There was a whole bunch of stuff that happened in a short period of time, and my first gourmand died.  I'm sure I'll be able to keep him alive in the future.  But I started another game in a harder landscape on Randi Mercilous.

If you read closer, you would see I'm not saying gourmand as is is unplayable, it's just really really bad.  Like dude passed out fighting a fire from starvation bad.  Like you probably should either have food stored in the kill box or not use a gourmand bad.  If he just had like 1.2 pawns worth of hunger storage and ate at like .9 or something or some other solution it would not be so bad.  He can't go on a long walk or sleep through the night without eating immediately before or starving, and I feel like that may not be what was intended.

[bobucles]

just means you need to grow or hunt more food earlier, and delay other things like making statues, or stone walls instead of wood, etc.

See! It's not so bad! Taking a single gourmand merely sets you back multiple tangible game objectives which may cost you days or weeks.

Wait a minute. That's actually pretty damn bad.

[Davetlow]

Yeah, Gourmand is way less desirable to me than many of the things I've just learned to deal with.  I am appalled by the difference between what it sound like and what it does.  I can use a chemical fascination pawn and just wall up the drugs if he goes on a binge.  This dude will starve quickly while drafted, and that really sucks.  He's only good for cooking and research, I had him on research but decided to have him help out with a fire, a decision which lead to his death due to my inexperience dealing with his "condition".  And and, his presence in the colony desensitizes you to the serious starvation flag appearing on the right side of the screen!  But, I've used the scenario editor for a long time to start tribal naked and alone so sometimes people die.  That's just the way it is, I'll try to do better next time.

[RicRider]

Davetlow if I had your issues I would restrict the gourmand to the home area and treat him/her like a non violent pawn. Either a hauler, cook or cleaner. I have a gourmand right now who's actually a really good cook and this is working well. She's been malnourished in some fights and I just undrafted her and let her do her business in home area while the rest of the pawns fight. She's basically like a labrador retriever that can cook and clean and haul more things!

[Davetlow]

Right, I completely agree, but have my doubts that that was the intention of the trait.

[AileTheAlien]

The gourmand only has their starvation time reduced by a third, compared to a normal pawn. That's a penalty, but not enough to bar them from combat entirely.

[Davetlow]

I was definitely negligent in my care for the pawn, I understand that, but the fact that we're saying things like "but not enough to bar them from combat entirely.", is the entire point.  You can totally overcome gourmand and the pawn can totally be beneficial to the colony.  It could totally be solved, I think if his saturation went to 1.2 and he ate at .9.  He'd eat even more than .5 extra, but he could still go on raids or whatever.  This is a pawn that doesn't go out for his dinner, lol, and I am not sure this was intended.