Salt

[Bill Tarling]

Salt is surprisingly missing, and could serve a lot of functions...

For meat, it could help slow down the decay...

For hides it could be used to help cure it for fashioning into clothes, warmer hats, boots, etc.

For wounds it could be used to cleanse wounds or help heal burns...

It might help a little in some ice spots (either better footing, or slight melting in cracks if the fishing holes are ever breakable for use later)...

A similar usage like salt tablets...

[Svag]

0. Salt - "water purification tablets" for meat - disinfects and preserves meat.

1. Salted meat - can stored for a very long time.

2. Salted meat - causes intense thirst.

3. Salted meat - with less chance cause poisoning.

a. Salt + Raw Meat = Salted raw meat.

b. Salt + Cooked meat = Salted cooked meat.

c. Salted raw meat + Cooking = Salted cooked meat.

[Beanie]

I like this idea. I was thinking along similar lines for preserving meat, though my thought was about adding an option to the campfire menu to allow you to smoke the meat.

Salt, however, has other uses than just helping preserve meat, so it is probably a better overall option.

[Moose]

No need for salt for curing hides.

Just crack open the skull, scoop out the brains, make a gravy of it, and smear it on the hide. Look up brain tanning.

[elloco999]

Salt could of course be used to preserve meat, but you do need a lot of salt for this purpose. You need a complete layer of salt all around the meat. So if you want to preserve an entire deer (= 9kg of meat), you'd need a lot of salt. Where would you realistically find that much salt in the environment where TLD is situated?

Also, you don't really need to do anything to preserve the meat, other than store it in an outside container (like a plastic/ metal box or a corpse). From what I've seen, raw meat stored in a frozen corpse only loses a few percent per day. Then when it's condition drops to a level you don't want it to (below 30% for me) you can cook it and store it outside again and it will last an equally long time. Outside is just a big freezer and you can use that to keep your meat from spoiling.

[gwishades]

+1 to outdoor freezer (or indoor if you packed a cooler full of snow) and +1 for salt like the idea alot.

[Trandor]

+1 Adding salt would be quite a good idea.

No need for salt for curing hides.

Just crack open the skull, scoop out the brains, make a gravy of it, and smear it on the hide. Look up brain tanning.

Eww. Moose... :mrgreen:

[Burning Bridges]

I have thought of the same thing. Salt and possibly drying meat for increased conservation.

Although elloco already mentioned, one would need quite large amounts of salt.

But that wouldn't go badly for gameplay though, if it was a resource like kerosine fuel that you need in quite large amounts.

Also sugar. It could be used if hot beverages are implemented and also if there was a morale meter, it could restore a bit of morale.

[elloco999]

I wouldn't mind if extra methods of preserving meat where introduced, like salt, drying or smoking. But is it really necessary? Using outside containers as freezers seems to work well enough for me. Shoot a deer, harvest the meat and store it in an outside container. It keeps long enough that it doesn't spoil before I need it.

It's not like I'm trying to build up a supply that could last me a winter, I should have done that in the summer and fall

I would use the mechanism to create an amount of "backup" food storage that will last long, just in case I can't get fresh meat for some time for whatever reason.

[Svag]

2 elloco999

As you rightly said, to salt deer need a lot of salt.

To create large stocks of meat - it is better to keep it in the frozen container.

But if you go away from home, take a little bit salt meat - a good idea.

Also, salt can be used as an antiseptic.