Hunger Higher Priority Than Sleep

[Damien Hart]

I'm currently playing a 400x400 map, and as you can imagine, colonists' needs are pushing it after crossing the map and enduring a prolonged shootout with a siege party. When I released them after successfully routing the enemy all of the colonists were at least hungry, and around half were tired.

Hunger being the more pressing issue, and the easiest to satisfy, I allowed some of the raiders' survival meals so that my colonists could feed themselves before they returned to base. The ones who were tired refused to eat however, and insisted on making the trip all the way back to base for a nap. I finished up having to mark all of their rooms for prisoners in order for them to eat. Some of them had higher hunger than sleep requirements, some lower, it made no difference.

Considering that tiredness has lower mood penalties, won't harm the colonist if unsatisfied, and will only be satisfied at the colonist's bed, whereas hunger can be satisfied immediately after a battle, I think that eating should be a higher priority than sleep.

[Captain Meow]

I agree that it's problematic and illogical.
I think that eating and sleeping priority should be influenced by how close to breaking point their mood is. The unhappier, the sooner they eat and sleep. It would make sense, as well as remove an element of frustration for the player.

Also it'd be nice if you could right-click beds/food and order to rest/eat.

[Wex]

I agree that it's problematic and illogical.
I think that eating and sleeping priority should be influenced by how close to breaking point their mood is. The unhappier, the sooner they eat and sleep. It would make sense, as well as remove an element of frustration for the player.

Also it'd be nice if you could right-click beds/food and order to rest/eat.

First time I played, I tought I could force them to eat (when healing someone, and feeding them, WHILE STARVING!!!).

[Nukeman0]

1+

This has caused quite some problems in my games too

[ciditi]

+1  colonists can always sleep on the ground if they have to, but they probably can't eat their bed if they're really in dire straits

[porcupine]

I think maybe the colonists need varried break points.

Maybe the colonist gives up on the fight, doesn't leave the colony, but says to himself "forget this, I'm going to get dinner, you go get shot", before going completely postal/hostile/giving up.

[ciditi]

I usually keep an eye on the mental break notifications, if I see a colonist with the ! by them, i undraft them so they can go about whatever business they need to.

Other times I run into this where colonists are both tired and hungry and they just go to bed.  Then as they sleep they get even more upset because they're getting even more hungry.  They they wake up pissed, but I normally construct food production / dining near the sleeping quarters, so they don't have far to go, but if I don't make it close enough, sometimes colonists will break.  I think that this has been improved in A7 as I do sometimes see the mood bar go below the break threshold so the poor mood must have to stay below the threshold for a certain amount of time before the colonist will break, but as mentioned before, the timer doesn't matter much if they're travelling across map to get back to their beds.

Eating seems to be the least time consuming, most mood improving activity.  Colonists should prioritize it over a number of things (like hauling crap, crafting, growing... pretty much everything) but they should definitely eat before going to bed if they need to.