The ages old food problem

Started by ErikMcAwful, May 16, 2019, 11:29:37 AM

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ErikMcAwful

Apologies if this is the wrong place to ask, but I haven't found any better place to do it, and this is driving me bat poo crazy. I'm desperately trying to restrict my food for both colonists, prisoners and wardens alike. I want them to eat that lovely paste that I have such ample supplies of (20.000+ rice should be enough for anyone), but my colonists and wardens will ignore this and steal the precious milk that I'm desperately trying to use for survival meals, or better yet, run halfways across the map to pick up some pemmican dropped from a raider. I've tried Pawn Rules and WM Smarter Food Selection, but none of them does the trick. I can restrict food for colonists and prisoners, but my wardens feels that it is a good idea to feed my prisoners milk and berries, which may even not even be eaten by the prisoners because of said restrictions, and will thus be marked as "fed", starving to the point of medical emergency. I'm aware that a paste dispenser within reach of the prisoners can help this, but some of my prisoners are locked up in holding cells and doesn't have that luxury. All of my focus goes into micromanaging food, forbidding raw materials between cooking, so on and so forth, and I would like to get some actual work done to the place, rather than trying to stop this proverbial army of babies trying to stuff legos in their mouth. Anyone figured out a good way to go about this?

TK3600

Pretty sure this do not happen to me in vanilla.

xDahaka2012x

I use Pawn Rules and just feed them simple meals. Maybe it's a bit different with nutrient paste. You can try to make your colonists create a sh*tton of paste manually and then simply forbid anything aside from paste for prisoners. Other than that, I do not think I had the same problem.

ErikMcAwful

#3
Quote from: TK3600 on May 16, 2019, 02:46:15 PM
Pretty sure this do not happen to me in vanilla.

Do you have a lot of muffalos? I didn't have this problem until mine started pumping out milk on a regular basis, which my wardens prefers to use for pampering prisoners rather than letting me keep for survival meals, which is annoying as it usually stacks up some distance off the base where I keep the muffalos. It's also not a problem with the normal prisoners, who eats paste without a second thought, only the ones that needs wardening. A rather specific problem, you could say.

ErikMcAwful

#4
Quote from: xDahaka2012x on May 16, 2019, 03:12:40 PM
I use Pawn Rules and just feed them simple meals. Maybe it's a bit different with nutrient paste. You can try to make your colonists create a sh*tton of paste manually and then simply forbid anything aside from paste for prisoners. Other than that, I do not think I had the same problem.

I don't think it would work, but I shall try it nonetheless. If it works, it works, and that's all I want. I'm trying to make enough survival meals for an expedition, it's just annoying that my stupider wardens keeps handing the stuff out to the prisoners that's basically just waiting to become spare parts anyway. I can force them into feeding paste by constantly forbidding milk from being touched, but then my cook won't use it either, and it's this micromanagement bit I'm trying to avoid. :)

togfox

I had this same issue. I resolved it with micro management but possibly less than you're describing:
- make one survival meal and have it hauled to your fridge/pantry/storage
- when it is dropped, mark it forbidden

If you have enough haulers I priority 1, they will add the 2nd meal onto the forbidden stack. They will keep doing this until stack size 10.

Repeat for next stack. Is still micro managing but I'm forbidding the output - not the input, by knowing that a forbidden stack can be added to but not taken from.

ErikMcAwful

Quote from: togfox on May 16, 2019, 10:39:57 PM
I had this same issue. I resolved it with micro management but possibly less than you're describing:
- make one survival meal and have it hauled to your fridge/pantry/storage
- when it is dropped, mark it forbidden

If you have enough haulers I priority 1, they will add the 2nd meal onto the forbidden stack. They will keep doing this until stack size 10.

Repeat for next stack. Is still micro managing but I'm forbidding the output - not the input, by knowing that a forbidden stack can be added to but not taken from.

Yes, this is how I would like it to be. This is how it mostly has been as well, up until now. I'm aware that cooks can add to forbidden stacks, and I don't even consider it micromanagement in the same way. Problem here is that it is if my wardens completely ignores my lovely paste machine and steals the input, causing both shortage and diseases in the process. They grab milk, berries, raw meat and whatever ingredients they can find for prisoner feeding (except rice, they leave that alone - at least for now) before they would turn to the paste dispenser. It is as if it's not even there until they have absolutely no other choice. The micromanagement is pretty terrible because of this; I have to either forbid and unforbid raw food between every time my cook completes a meal, which is super ineffective and leaves very little time to pay attention to anything else, or I would have to "stand guard" outside the door and draft everyone who's trying to steal the stuff, which keeps them from doing any other jobs. Or I could manually send them around on hauling jobs to keep them busy, but no matter which option I choose, there is still some terrible micro involved. I believe the problem started recently, but not with the offset of any mods, as I haven't installed any new ones for a while. Pretty damned frustrating, to the extent where I might just have to quit or take a long break from the game if I can't find a good solution, as my loud swearing, shouting and punching of tables terrifies my beloved dogs. I'm a veteran Soulsborne player, but I have never encountered anything even remotely this frustrating in my life. I've almost court martialed my own colonists to involuntary amputations in fury too, but that would only be harming my own cause in the long run. :)

togfox

Ah - I see. I misunderstood. They take your ingredients from 'the field'.

Have you tried putting a 'nutrient paste' stockpile in your prison cell?  Just one square. Put one in each prisoner bedroom - set to super-high priority and then your haulers will move the paste into the cells. That paste is dropped on the ground and instantly tagged as prisoner food.

That might stop your wardens force feeding other foods.

ErikMcAwful

#8
Quote from: togfox on May 17, 2019, 12:28:57 AM
Ah - I see. I misunderstood. They take your ingredients from 'the field'.

Have you tried putting a 'nutrient paste' stockpile in your prison cell?  Just one square. Put one in each prisoner bedroom - set to super-high priority and then your haulers will move the paste into the cells. That paste is dropped on the ground and instantly tagged as prisoner food.

That might stop your wardens force feeding other foods.

No, they actually take ingredients from the freezer room, including the raw meat I've butchered. It's not about distance either, this freezer is directly next to the paste dispenser. If nothing is available in the freezer, they will gladly run a fairly long distance to my cattle and gather milk rather than taking paste. They just seems to hate it, even hate giving it to prisoners. The only food I grow in the field is rice, and that's (mostly) not being taken. I used to grow berries as well, but changed it to more rice since the other, more mobile prisoners kept eating it and got sick. Problem is that most of the prisoners in question can't walk or  feed themselves from a stockpile. Your idea was pretty good, and I might use that trick in some other context where it works, but this is basically death row, last stop before the organ mill. Some lacks legs, some lacks spines, and those who do need to be manually fed by wardens and will not be able to retrieve food themselves, and it is the wardens that has the problem. This also applies when they need to feed anyone who has undergone surgery, colonists and prisoners alike. :)

Canute

Or put a Fridge from Rimfridge at the prison area. Better a 2x2 ones.
Once the next time someone take a nutri paste you need to draft him once he hold the paste at the hand and the paste drop.
Forbid the paste, undraft,draft until you got enough to fill up the rimfridge.
This will free your warden from bring the prisoner food.
Ofcourse a NPD at the prison area work's the same.

For better feeding i suggest the Replimat Mod, it is like an adv. NPD, and even human/insect meat can be used without mood problems.



ErikMcAwful

#10
Quote from: Canute on May 17, 2019, 04:32:23 AM
Or put a Fridge from Rimfridge at the prison area. Better a 2x2 ones.
Once the next time someone take a nutri paste you need to draft him once he hold the paste at the hand and the paste drop.
Forbid the paste, undraft,draft until you got enough to fill up the rimfridge.
This will free your warden from bring the prisoner food.
Ofcourse a NPD at the prison area work's the same.

For better feeding i suggest the Replimat Mod, it is like an adv. NPD, and even human/insect meat can be used without mood problems.

Again, the problem is prisoners that can't get around to feed themselves and need wardens for it, like those without legs or with shattered spines. And even colonists that has undergone surgery and also needs manual feeding.