suggestion Warly's Bone Bouillon could use a buff

[Owlrust]

30 minutes ago, Evelo said:

I would love an explanation to how he is not in a good place. I feel he is in an amazing spot right now.

Warly is a very unique character in terms of what he can do and provide other allies, but at the same time he has a few things about his kit that make him arguably unbalanced in terms of pros vs cons.

Upsides (pros):

• Warly comes with, and can create, a portable crock pot. Something that can only be used by Warly himself. The crock pot even cooks food faster.
• He can cook a large selection of unique crock pot dishes exclusive to his portable crock pot, many of which have a great number of helpful effects.
• He can season crock pot foods with spices for even more effects such as increased damage or damage resistance, or even increased tool efficiency.
• Warly can create A Chef Pouch, a unique backpack item with 6 slots that can be equipped by anybody and slows spoilage by a small amount.
• Warly also can cook food faster, and has a larger stomach than most characters.

Downsides (cons):

• Warly cannot eat any food that isn't a crock pot dish, and he remembers the foods he has eaten for 2 days. Everytime Warly eats a repeated dish he gradually loses its benefits.
• Warly does not have a favorite food unlike in his debut to make up for the repetition, he is immediately penalized on his first repetition and effectively wastes food if he is not eating very caloric-dense foods, encouraging players to eat the most filling foods instead of the smaller dishes that may be readily available. This makes playing him more wasteful as he would need, on average, more food for his dishes than anyone else unless you're eating the most filling foods possible.
• He has a permanent extra 20% hunger-loss rate that does not stack well with his decreased benefits from repeated foods. Meaty Stew should not have to be the answer to everything.
• His personal dishes and spices require many extra-steps to obtain, and even more to utilize unlike the kit of many other characters aside from perhaps Wurt or Winona. Most of his abilities require farming, and a very select few of his dishes and spices can be made with readily available ingredients found in the forest or caves.
• Despite having a Portable Grinding Mill, Warly can only find and create 2 of the 4 spices in the game (up from just 1).
• To add onto the last point, Warly can only find natural ingredients to make 4 of his 11 dishes, due to the lack of varied vegetables in either shard outside of carrots. He is literally locked out of the best parts of his kit without a Garden Rigamajig or a Wormwood main to steal from.
• The Chef Pouch has only 6 slots and doesn't slow spoilage even half as good as an Insulated Pack does. The Chef Pouch could have more slots than an Insulated Pack but less spoilage reduction or vice versa and it wouldn't make either backpack obsolete but it does neither of that and tends to be dropped the moment a player can get their hands on that sweet-sweet spoils of poaching that is Fur.
• Warly can cook faster than most characters but this trait isn't exclusive to him and is shared by multiple other characters.
• All of his foods can be bundled and stored for any character, this is what makes him an amazing swap character, because you don't actually NEED him to benefit off of his culinary talent. Not a very big deal if swapping isn't up your alley, but the issue mainly culminates in the fact that players tend to not want to stick with him outside of aesthetic or challenge-based personal reasons because of this. He IS valuable, but only for what he can create, not what he does.
• Warly has little, if any, personal perks or interactions that are exclusive to him outside of crafting/using spices or crock pot cooking.

I'm not asking for him to be easier or stronger, as I don't believe that would make him a fun character. I am advocating for him to be more useful not just for allies, but for himself as a character and as a chef. Personal perks that cannot be seen on any other character that plays into his aesthetic as a chef would certainly make him stand out, and he would only need minor perks or additions to do this.

There's many different perks he could have that would make him more unique and worthwhile to play specifically him. These are a few suggestions of my own:

• A chance for an Increased yield of select ingredients such as meats, vegetables, or certain fruits.
• Be able to use a Razor to slice Large Meats into Morsels for better cooking.
• Additional spices that using ingredients that can be acquired from all over instead of just grown.
• A bonus to making foods professionally instead of mediocre like other survivors.
• Create special foods similar to a Winter's Feast oven that can be eaten by multiple survivors at a table.
• Unique dishes made of raw ingredients that can be made straight from his inventory without needing a crock pot such as Sushi or Tartare.
• Special chef's tools or clothing (not structures) that cannot be used by non-Warlys for use in cooking.
• Be able to reheat foods, once, for some more slight freshness.
• Getting a little more out there for this one, maybe even a mechanic similar to Wendy where Warly has to sniff out Legendary ingredients for amazing dishes.

He could have literally anything, the possibilities are endless. Again, I'm not asking for straight buffs, just more interactions that play into his aesthetic more and perhaps encourage players to stay as Warly.

[abrocator]

5 minutes ago, maxwell_winters said:

[snip]

Cool sarcasm but it seemed to me that the topic right now was the Warly-as-a-challenge-character thing.

My point was that the diminishing-return downside specifically (not the crockpot only, as much) is such a Wes-like downside: civilized, cosmopolitan man can't handle the outdoors. Yet people laugh at Wes and compliment Warly? Makes no sense.

Granted this wasn't obvious at all and I probably shouldn't have made it in that context to begin with.

[ArubaroBeefalo]

1 minute ago, abrocator said:

le. It doesn't make him into some gotta-eat-as-varied-as-possible character: you can do fine with a handful of dishes. Even just meaty stew and 2-3 meatballs is enough for a reset! So you what is the real "interesting" downside? Well stacking food for exploration or healing is less viable. So Warly's "interesting" downside makes crockpot cooking more gimped and less useful... funny that, considering crockpots are supposed to be his thing!

i will ignore everything else because i dont care about that in a fantasy game and i will focus on this part. Why people think that warly downside is interesting because hunger? did you know that it affects other stats? have you tried to fight beequeen with low protection armor against beequeen using only 1 healing dish like any other character? have you rushed the ruins as him needing to know which healing items can be done that early in the game using birchnut seeds or eels? have you experience messing FW fight making it last longer which cause that you sanity food isnt enough to keep you sane? have you tried to keep you insane during CC fight? (first time i actually needed mush cake)

it makes you use more variety of dishes not a lot and you know why? because he is so strong that doesnt need that much healing when 40hp dishes exists, with salt surf n turf can heal almost 100hp, there are armors that protect you up to 90% and 95% plus the adition of garlic spice. But that healing and protection works better in other characters because they can spam even blue caps

so pls, bringing all the time how "you can survive by eating 2 meat stews" only shows how little knowledge people have about warly so try a run with him and deal with his downside before saying such weak points agains the most interesting downside after wanda's mechanics

the only uninteresting thing about his downside is that is so weak that you can eat 3 healing dishes and still being healed by a good ammount, they could have done it even more noticeable but then i guess people will cry even more about warly not having a good downside

10 minutes ago, Evelo said:

Honestly, the worst part about Warly is the Salt spice. Not because it is bad. It isn't it is actually amazingly good. The downside is the time and effort for farming Salt. The juice isn't worth the squeeze imo. Not until there are alternative ways to obtain salt compared to Honey, Garlic, and Pepper.

i would increase the effect or add a buff in the spoiling time from the salty dishes because is an interesting spice

i only use it in surf n turf when i plan to fight multiple celestial champions in a row

[abrocator]

17 minutes ago, ArubaroBeefalo said:

can you elaborate because i dont understand what you are trying to say

You are correct -- you, as per usual, don't get it.

Challenge and whatever is fine as long as it makes thematic sense. Wormwood is fine: food doesn't heal, done. Simple. Wurt is biologically unable to eat meat. Warly's though is unacceptable from a lore perspective: his palate is offended by encountering the same taste twice in two days. Therefore it is somewhat easier to starve as him.

Such weakness downsides are Wes-tier: they should be reserved for joke characters that are clearly out of their elements when trying to survive in the wilderness.

[Evelo]

4 minutes ago, Owlrust said:

All of his foods can be bundled and stored for any character, this is what makes him an amazing swap character, because you don't actually NEED him to benefit off of his culinary talent. Not a very big deal if swapping isn't up your alley, but the issue mainly culminates in the fact that players tend to not want to stick with him outside of aesthetic or challenge-based personal reasons because of this. He IS valuable, but only for what he can create, not what he does.

• Warly has little, if any, personal perks or interactions that are exclusive to him outside of crafting/using spices or crock pot cooking.

He could have literally anything, the possibilities are endless. Again, I'm not asking for straight buffs, just more interactions that play into his aesthetic more and perhaps encourage players to stay as Warly.

I appreciate your response. While I agree with the upsides and downsides for the most part. I personally feel the downsides is what makes him fun. I understand the desire for non-farming synergies with natural gathering. (After all making spices from say. Eel would be cool or have a use for Slurper Pelts) Over all though the argument about swap characters falls on deaf ears for me.
The Celestial Portal is an optional thing. Warly should be balanced around himself and characters should be judged according to their abilities and flaws assuming the Celestial Portal never existed. The reason other players can benefit is because he is a team play (and quite useful in solo as well). If you want to use the Portal to swap to and from Warly just for his dishes, more power to you! That should not be a reason alone to change a character.

My favorite perk of the various bonuses that only Warly can do (granted Spicing foods and his signature dishes are more than enough I feel considering ONLY Warly can make them, it's like saying Wickerbottom is nothing without her books, which... Wickerbottom IS her books that's the point) Anyway, my favorite of your suggestions is re-heating foods. (and removing his extra hunger drain no clue why that's still in if Wes's hunger drain was removed and so was Wolfgang's hunger drain. I feel like if Klei does do a re-refresh of some characters Warly is going to have that removed since it is a remnant of the past. Only him and Wormwood (while blooming) have that effect) Being able to re-heat foods would address that issue of wasting food. But just a personal take, there is so much food to going around that wasting it isn't that big of a deal. At least for me I am sure some people run into food issues. (I know I use to.)

[abrocator]

3 minutes ago, ArubaroBeefalo said:

i will ignore everything else because i dont care about that in a fantasy game and i will focus on this part. Why people think that warly downside is interesting because hunger?

"i will ignore everything else" -- Yes, you managed to fail to notice that I also mentioned that stacking healing foods (i.e. like forty pierogies) is not viable as him. So of course you have to use "interesting" workarounds due to the crockpot now being gimped (while playing as the crockpot specialist).

Now I'm gonna ignore the rest of your post since you clearly can't be bothered to read my posts. (Not that I care.)

Maybe the problem was that this game has dozens and dozens of crockpot recipes and they only affect three stats. Doesn't matter if it's meat-based, fish-based, veggie-based, fruit-based, cookie-based, etc. So Klei only managed to do the usual thing: add sundries bonuses like bonus damage, wetness immunity and increased work efficiency. And make the crockpot specialist worse at using the crockpot.

[maxwell_winters]

10 minutes ago, abrocator said:

Challenge and whatever is fine as long as it makes thematic sense. Wormwood is fine: food doesn't heal, done. Simple. Wurt is biologically unable to eat meat. Warly's though is unacceptable from a lore perspective: his palate is offended by encountering the same taste twice in two days. Therefore it is somewhat easier to starve as him.

Wigfrid doesn't eat veggies purely because she doesn't want to. She's not a carnivore, she can digest veggies, but she doesn't want to even for the sake of survival. Warly might even have a better reason not to eat food because he would most likely vomit from how bland it is.

I don't know why we're discussing the realism of funny character quirks in the game where a Canadian man turns into a goose every full moon. 

[Evelo]

8 minutes ago, abrocator said:

Warly's though is unacceptable from a lore perspective: his palate is offended by encountering the same taste twice in two days. Therefore it is somewhat easier to starve as him.

Such weakness downsides are Wes-tier: they should be reserved for joke characters that are clearly out of their elements when trying to survive in the wilderness.

Someone on the forums mentioned finding a study where foods you love give you more nutrients in the digestion process than foods you hate.
Warly is a sophisticated Chef who loves all foods. Eating the same meal multiple times in a row is boring, therefore he doesn't "Love" the food twice, or thrice. He "Loves" to have his taste buds tickled through variety.
Hopefully that is realistic enough of a reason.

[ArubaroBeefalo]

57 minutes ago, abrocator said:

"i will ignore everything else" -- Yes, you managed to fail to notice that I also mentioned that stacking healing foods (i.e. like forty pierogies) is not viable as him. So of course you have to use "interesting" workarounds due to the crockpot now being gimped (while playing as the crockpot specialist).

Now I'm gonna ignore the rest of your post since you clearly can't be bothered to read my posts. (Not that I care.)

Maybe the problem was that this game has dozens and dozens of crockpot recipes and they only affect three stats. Doesn't matter if it's meat-based, fish-based, veggie-based, fruit-based, cookie-based, etc. So Klei only managed to do the usual thing: add sundries bonuses like bonus damage, wetness immunity and increased work efficiency. And make the crockpot specialist worse at using the crockpot.

the f**? i just say that i will ignore the part about his downside not making sense because i dont share your opinion on that so makes 0 sense to argue with you about it. I just focused on the mechanical part but good you ignored the part of the comment that explains that you didnt played warly, well played

1 hour ago, abrocator said:

Interesting is one thing.[1] Thematically appropriate is another.

It fails for two reasons:

1. A specialist being worse than the default character at that thing (eating)
2. Risking death because you are fed up/sick of something: so you put yourself at a disadvantage (mainly hunger and health-wise) because your tastebuds are bored? This makes no sense, lore/realism-wise.

Regarding number 1, imagine if:

1. Woodlegs can only use boats with sails: using an oar is beneath him, he thinks
2. Wigfrid can't use a spear: not a good enough weapon for Wigfrid
3. Walter refuses to make regular fires. Only firepits are good enough for scout boys.
4. Mighty Wolfgang refuses to move heavy items like statues unless there are other playable characters watching: no audience, no feats of strength

55 minutes ago, maxwell_winters said:

Wigfrid doesn't eat veggies purely because she doesn't want to. She's not a carnivore, she can digest veggies, but she doesn't want to even for the sake of survival. Warly might even have a better reason not to eat food because he would most likely vomit from how bland it is.

I don't know why we're discussing the realism of funny character quirks in the game where a Canadian man turns into a goose every full moon. 

basically this

[abrocator]

2 minutes ago, maxwell_winters said:

[BS]

Explained by method acting. She's just an actress that's surprisingly good at what her character does.

[ArubaroBeefalo]

Just now, abrocator said:

Explained by method acting. She's just an actress that's surprisingly good at what her character does.

good work arround buddy

[Mysterious box]

7 minutes ago, abrocator said:

Explained by method acting. She's just an actress that's surprisingly good at what her character does.

So it's ok to die because she refused to eat her veggies purely because she's a method actor but Warly having a emotional bond to proper cooking as shown in his short is silly?

[abrocator]

1 minute ago, Mysterious box said:

So it's ok to die because she refused to eat her veggies purely because she's a method actor but Warly having a emotional bond to proper cooking as shown in his short is silly?

Yes, because she would clearly rather risk dying to meat-starvation rather than risk becoming her true (just the actor) self, probably her warrior-persona is such a beast in the Constant (her actor self has probably no survival skills).

(Okay so the Wigfrid gimmick is a bit silly as well and I only give it a pass because it's so theatrical.)

[Evelo]

41 minutes ago, Owlrust said:

The Chef Pouch has only 6 slots and doesn't slow spoilage even half as good as an Insulated Pack does. The Chef Pouch could have more slots than an Insulated Pack but less spoilage reduction or vice versa and it wouldn't make either backpack obsolete but it does neither of that and tends to be dropped the moment a player can get their hands on that sweet-sweet spoils of poaching that is Fur.

Forgot to address this!

They buffed the Insulated Pack specifically because the Chefs Pouch was implemented. I would like if the Chef's Pouch worked different. Currently we have plenty of backpacks that are all* useful:

• Default Backpack - useful for early game or even mid game depending.
• Piggyback - Extremely useful once you get the Walking Cane or other movespeed benefits so you can carry more.
• Krampus Sack - The final tier of upgrade in the default Backpack line.
• Chef Pouch - Tiny 6 Slot backpack that is available at the start of the game without the need for a Science Machine
• Insulated Pack - The Big Mama of the Chef Pouch - 8 slot and better spoilage reduction.
• Seed Pack-It - Insulated + Krampus hybrid for Seeds.
• Tackle Box - 6 Inventory slots for you Lures, Floats, (And seeds, twigs, and berries)
• Spectacler Box - Same thing as Tackle Box but 15.

So while the Perk of the Chef pouch compared to the other items it seems it's role is to replace the backpack if you want spoilage reduction at least until you get a Thick Fur from Bearger. I would like to see it buffed because I currently never use it. literally ever because 33% spoilage reduction isn't worth losing 2 inventory slots in my eyes.

[abrocator]

49 minutes ago, Owlrust said:

The Chef Pouch has only 6 slots and doesn't slow spoilage even half as good as an Insulated Pack does.

I think this is fine. The chef pouch is just a starter item. It'll be at least a year before you get the insulated pack and the chef pouch will be long left behind by then.

[maxwell_winters]

I agree with your pros and cons, except for the swap character. I'm sorry but I'm just tired of this argument and I've only been active on this forum for a few months. 

55 minutes ago, Owlrust said:

A chance for an Increased yield of select ingredients such as meats, vegetables, or certain fruits.

I can kinda agree with meats but how would extra yield of veggies tie into his character? It seems like a Wormwood thing. 

55 minutes ago, Owlrust said:

Be able to use a Razor to slice Large Meats into Morsels for better cooking.

It would have uses so niche no one would even bother with it. 

55 minutes ago, Owlrust said:

Additional spices that using ingredients that can be acquired from all over instead of just grown.

Honestly, I'm against it. The point of his spices is that they're strong, but require putting in some work. 

55 minutes ago, Owlrust said:

Special chef's tools or clothing (not structures) that cannot be used by non-Warlys for use in cooking.

How would it exactly save him from being a "swap character".  

55 minutes ago, Owlrust said:

Be able to reheat foods, once, for some more slight freshness

Reheating doesn't make food any fresher. A chef can only reduce a spoilage rate of food by adding vinegar or citric acid. But there are already bundling wraps for preservation. There is an actually a concept art of "Freshness Watch" for Wanda. It would have made more sense for her but Klei didn't implement it.

As I said, all Warly needs is longer effects from spices and special dishes. If Wickerbottom reads her books more efficiently than Maxwell, there should be no reason why Warly can't "appreciate the aftertaste" of his food longer than other characters.

[ZeRoboButler]

2 hours ago, Owlrust said:

 

• A chance for an Increased yield of select ingredients such as meats, vegetables, or certain fruits.
• Be able to use a Razor to slice Large Meats into Morsels for better cooking.
• Additional spices that using ingredients that can be acquired from all over instead of just grown.
• A bonus to making foods professionally instead of mediocre like other survivors.
• Create special foods similar to a Winter's Feast oven that can be eaten by multiple survivors at a table.
• Unique dishes made of raw ingredients that can be made straight from his inventory without needing a crock pot such as Sushi or Tartare.
• Special chef's tools or clothing (not structures) that cannot be used by non-Warlys for use in cooking.
• Be able to reheat foods, once, for some more slight freshness.
• Getting a little more out there for this one, maybe even a mechanic similar to Wendy where Warly has to sniff out Legendary ingredients for amazing dishes.

I can not begin to say how much i love these ideas for warly, I already thought he was wonderful myself, but just the idea of hunting for legendary ingredients, raw ingredient dishes, Increased yield for certain ingredients or even more spices! 

Warly is one of my favorite characters in a video game, honestly when I am playing on my own I find myself playing him more than anything, Its nice to care about food. For the longest time, I was playing wx-78 and I would just cram honey ham and move on with what I was doing but when he was put into dst along with wormwood, Man that was like a dream come true.

If any changes where to be brought along like these I would be more than thrilled! 

[AugyBear]

9 hours ago, chaosmonkey said:

My suggestion is to give Bone Bouillon a "very slowly" spoilage time to actually give a reason to spend expensive bone shards to make it.

Forgive me for derailing the conversation, but.. what? Do people consider bone shards expensive?

Bone shards are used to make Rain Hats (1x), Rain Coats (2x), and Eyebrellas (4x). We typically get ~40-60 bone shards with default worldgen, on top of them being renewable through spoiled fish. This is assuming you're not playing on Endless, which makes bone shards infinitely faster to farm. I'm always happy to make Bone Bouillon to take with me when mapping out the caves.

 

6 hours ago, Evelo said:

Honestly, the worst part about Warly is the Salt spice. Not because it is bad. It isn't it is actually amazingly good. The downside is the time and effort for farming Salt. The juice isn't worth the squeeze imo. Not until there are alternative ways to obtain salt compared to Honey, Garlic, and Pepper.

Salty Moqueca/Surf N' Turf is one of my favorite ways to heal. Excuse me as I fully top off all my stats with 2 quick munches.

[Evelo]

53 minutes ago, AugyBear said:

Salty Moqueca/Surf N' Turf is one of my favorite ways to heal. Excuse me as I fully top off all my stats with 2 quick munches.

"Not because it is bad. It isn't it is actually amazingly good."

Yes, Salty Spice is amazing. It is just irritating to farm. I personally don't think the effort is worth it compared to farming Honey Poultice (though I am a wormwood main so probably biased there)

[cybers2001]

1 hour ago, AugyBear said:

Forgive me for derailing the conversation, but.. what? Do people consider bone shards expensive?

Bone shards are used to make Rain Hats (1x), Rain Coats (2x), and Eyebrellas (4x). We typically get ~40-60 bone shards with default worldgen, on top of them being renewable through spoiled fish. This is assuming you're not playing on Endless, which makes bone shards infinitely faster to farm. I'm always happy to make Bone Bouillon to take with me when mapping out the caves.

 

Salty Moqueca/Surf N' Turf is one of my favorite ways to heal. Excuse me as I fully top off all my stats with 2 quick munches.

Bone shards are easy to run out of once you start building a lot of glowcaps. Though, the ocean trawler single-handedly changes this. I have about 10 trawlers set up just along a pier, and they passively accumulate tons of rotten fish even if I barely interact with them. Bone Bouillon is fine, imo. The real tragedy is that crepes are barely better than moqueca.

Really, though, Warly doesn't need any major rework. While many players will see him as a swap character, he can still be rewarding to play for longer periods due to the challenge factor and the fantasy of being a cooking specialist in a game about not starving. The new farming and fishing content both enable Warly to obtain a much broader variety of ingredients easier than before, which makes his weakness much less of a hindrance.

What I would like to see as a buff to Warly, though, is something along the lines of better cooked food preservation. It's hard to stockpile many cooked foods due to shorter expiration times, which means Warlys have to instead lug around all the different ingredients they obtain. The optimal way to play is to basically cook on the fly, which I suppose is the point of a portable crockpot, but it becomes tedious to always drop whatever I'm doing to place a crockpot, and have to sit and think about which recipe would be safe from hitting the boredom debuff. Obviously at this point someone would come and say "just use bundling wrap," but, cmon... bundling wrap trivializes so much about food management that it's boring.

[_bobthekiller_]

Warly’s repeat dish penalty isn’t a wes-like disadvantage: you can literally eat 2 meaty stews while you are starving, and the next time you’ll be starving again more than 2 days have passed and you can eat 2 meaty stews again.
You just have to fill your stomach and don’t eat anything until you are starving again.
For healing you can use salves, poultice or jellybeans and if you eat 2-3 healing dishes the penalty isn’t that terrible.
He is in a great spot atm, he is one of the strongest characters in the game: he can make foods for damage, light, wetness, damage reduction and mining faster. (The heating and freezing ones aren’t that great and they could use a duration buff).

Against a wet target with spicy volt goat jelly he does way more dmg than wolfgang. 
 

[ArubaroBeefalo]

23 minutes ago, _bobthekiller_ said:

(The heating and freezing ones aren’t that great and they could use a duration buff)

with cloths work really well but wont be against a small buff

[AugyBear]

13 hours ago, cybers2001 said:

Bone shards are easy to run out of once you start building a lot of glowcaps.

Ahh that makes sense. I didn't realize they take buckets of poop in the recipe.

I don't bother with Toadstool since lightbugs from the Grotto are so much easier (and more fun to have around the base imo).

[cybers2001]

10 hours ago, AugyBear said:

Ahh that makes sense. I didn't realize they take buckets of poop in the recipe.

I don't bother with Toadstool since lightbugs from the Grotto are so much easier (and more fun to have around the base imo).

I wish I could do more with light bugs, but they tend to just drift off into nowhere. That reminds me, I was thinking it could be fun to hunt down the two I brought to the surface about 1000 days ago in my world.

[Antynomity]

I'd honestly just want warly to have something more special just for himself... maybe a better chef pouch? Or variants of it that would make spoiling slower inside even more or one that works like fire packim baggins from SW, I won't complain if it won't happen though as Warly is really fun to play as either way.