New campfire cooking - some observations


Moonraker

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3 hours ago, cannajan said:

anyone else had a problem getting water on the pot belly stove? I could not get any cooking type choices from the recycled can when I put it on the hot stove, same stove let me cook a can of peaches but no water.

Just tested on the pot belly stove in Camp Office and was able to select Melted Snow to proceed with water process and start it without a problem.

Need to have the fire lit in order to get the Cooking menu, in case it wasn't.

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On 6/14/2018 at 12:42 PM, Cr41g said:

just curious.... anyone try a fire barrel yet for cooking...are they now dead in the new system ?

Yes, I have been using the fire barrel in the gas station and it works, although very clumsy.  They put a grill across the top and that allows for two cooking spots.  so either boiling 1 ltr of water or possibly four if you have two pots.  dont have any pots yet so cant confirm.  Meat takes longer to cook  and the fish vary in times depending on size.  so at best you are juggling two spots as compared to using the stoves in one of the farmhouses.  

So is it just me complaining about the lengthened cooking time as compare to prior to up date or do others feel this way as well?  1 kilo venison now takes 1hr 4 minutes cook time on the fire barrel in game time.  You can cook two steaks at a time.  prior to up date, it took roughly 14 minutes in game time to cook 1 kilo venison.  you had to click a lot and hang out, but i could get 4 kilos cooked in one hour in game time  then as compared to just two now.  I do find it easy to speed that up by either a quick nap or a quick game of cards.  Boiling water feels burdensome and chore like, comparing pre and post update styles.  

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6 minutes ago, piddy3825 said:

Yes, I have been using the fire barrel in the gas station and it works, although very clumsy.  They put a grill across the top and that allows for two cooking spots.  so either boiling 1 ltr of water or possibly four if you have two pots.  dont have any pots yet so cant confirm.  Meat takes longer to cook  and the fish vary in times depending on size.  so at best you are juggling two spots as compared to using the stoves in one of the farmhouses.  

So is it just me complaining about the lengthened cooking time as compare to prior to up date or do others feel this way as well?  1 kilo venison now takes 1hr 4 minutes cook time on the fire barrel in game time.  You can cook two steaks at a time.  prior to up date, it took roughly 14 minutes in game time to cook 1 kilo venison.  you had to click a lot and hang out, but i could get 4 kilos cooked in one hour in game time  then as compared to just two now.  I do find it easy to speed that up by either a quick nap or a quick game of cards.  Boiling water feels burdensome and chore like, comparing pre and post update styles.  

Can confirm that it is 2.0 L of snow/ water per cooking pot, so with two cooking slots it's a maximum 4.0 L of snow/ water per fire barrel.

The new cooking adds another consideration in location choice, with a Stove type fire providing six cooking slots and more cooking per pour than before, with the same fuel, for example. Conversely, pot belly sotves only have one cooking slot so are even less efficient than a campfire, wood stove or fire barrel.

It's also possible to warm cups of drink and canned food next to fire barrels and other fires which takes longer but doesn't require a cooking slot.

It's still possible to pass time as before while cooking by using the Space bar (PC) which passes time until ready, which also avoids the possibility of burning food if the player isn't doing other tasks meantime (kind of the design intent);

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I'm still trying the new cooking out and testing the differences. It's a big change and needs some time to get a real feel of how it really feels in-game. Being able to multi-task is a definite plus as is not having to stare at a fire while cook for long periods. But with 1-2 cooking slots it definitely feels slow.

 

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1 hour ago, Moonraker said:

Can confirm that it is 2.0 L of snow/ water per cooking pot, so with two cooking slots it's a maximum 4.0 L of snow/ water per fire barrel.

The new cooking adds another consideration in location choice, with a Stove type fire providing six cooking slots and more cooking per pour than before, with the same fuel, for example. Conversely, pot belly sotves only have one cooking slot so are even less efficient than a campfire, wood stove or fire barrel.

II'm still trying the new cooking out and testing the differences. It's a big change and needs some time to get a real feel of how it really feels in-game. Being able to multi-task is a definite plus as is not having to stare at a fire while cook for long periods. But with 1-2 cooking slots it definitely feels slow.

 

here's my answer to mass production of food and water using the in game mechanics, in terms of how to best use one hour cooking meat.  considering the flex time before burning to a crisp now I can cook an entire deer in one hour...  water production quadrupled... and for the most part i can take a nap while doing it. even read a book for an hour.   I used roughly the same amount of fuel as compared to just loading up the fire barrel, but boy did i save a tremendous amount of in game time.

Only downside is when that pesky frigid wind starts outta nowhere and blows your fire out...

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Various other initial cooking observations

Cooking EXP

  • Cooking skill EXP is gained only when the cooked food is removed or eaten directly from the pot, can or cooking surface. And not when it finishes cooking.
  • If the food is left and to burn/ ruin, there is no Cooking EXP gain.

Cooking utensil repair

Noted previously in this thread, if the Cooking Pot or Recycled Tin are left too long and the water boils off or food gets ruined, they suffer decay lose. Typically between 5-10 points randomly from initial testing. This has been confirmed officially earlier in this thread.

  • The Tin Can, can not be repaired but there are generally a decent number as world loot or in some containers (Trash Can for example). Plus, every can of food eaten returns a can to the inventory.
  • The Cooking Pot can be repaired with 1 Scrap Metal repairing 25% and requires Simple Tools (or Quality Tools). It takes 1 hour.
  • If the player checks occasionally and doesn't allow the decay to drop too low, then it should last for the playthrough.
  • They do not appear to decay over time except when items boil away or ruin (not tested long term) and no decay occurs if the utensil is simply left on the fire.

General notes

  • As cooking or boiling approaches the end of the cooking period the sound they make changes which gives a warning that time is about up.
  • As food items or boiled water pass the Remaining time towards Boiling off or Ruined this also changes sound as a warning.
  • To avoid boiling away water or burning food, add a few sticks to start the fire then add the food/ snow/ water and check the cooking time. Then add sufficient fuel so the time extends just over the cooking time. Then if forgotten the items wont burn/ boil away.
  • Allow for double the time for processing water. When Melting Snow it is 1h 15m a skill level 1 but will automatically continue to boiling the non-potable water produced.. Allow for the additional time to complete to potable water  so actually 2h 30m.
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18 hours ago, piddy3825 said:

here's my answer to mass production of food and water using the in game mechanics, in terms of how to best use one hour cooking meat.  considering the flex time before burning to a crisp now I can cook an entire deer in one hour...  water production quadrupled... and for the most part i can take a nap while doing it. even read a book for an hour.   I used roughly the same amount of fuel as compared to just loading up the fire barrel, but boy did i save a tremendous amount of in game time.

Only downside is when that pesky frigid wind starts outta nowhere and blows your fire out...

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I was about to bring this up too.  Good thing I read through the entire post.  I've got two campfires in the Riken's wheelhouse and they do speed up the cooking process quite nicely.  The wheelhouse has become a nice little loft apartment with a view.  Got the two campfires, the box for storing my food and water, and a space for my bearskin bedroll.  I'm not sure if the two campfires would fit if one were to try after the update.  -These two were placed before the update.

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Campfire on a slope

It seems harder (probably partly by design) to place the new cooking campfires on slopes, even moderate ones. Partly due to the larger footprint (including the invisible collision area extending out) and not clipping into the terrain?

This makes placement, beyond the larger footprint which has closed off some previously available spots (outside of Camp Office in the covered porch for example), not quite as easy or convenient.

Placement on a slight incline results in a few things;

  • It is hard to find a spot to place food tins or drinks close enough to the campfire to Warm. They also don't place on slopes well and the larger campfire footprint.
  • The cooking pot and the recycled tin also, tend to float above the cooking spot which allows placement of both raw meat or food tins/ drinks to cook as normal (not warming) on the actual stone also.
  • It's possible to cook 2 raw meat items in cooking posts as normal, then add 2 additional raw meat to the stones underneath therefore cooking 4 raw meat at once.
  • The meat on the stones will cook slower than that in the pots so the player needs to be aware of different ending times.

Campfire on a slope then restricts some positioning of food cans and or drinks for Warming (as intended) but allows the (probably unintentional) double cooking on the campfire cooking slots.

I've submitted it as a bug report and posted he as there had been a few reports of it being possible but not repeatable to confirm this.

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Cooking Pot v Recycled Tin cooking times

Cooking the same drink (not snow/ water) item on the same fire source in a Cooking Pot is faster than in a recycled Tin. Example;

Prepared Reishi Mushrooms at Level 1 Cooking (no cooking time reduction).

Cooking Pot = 20m

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Recycled Tin = 25m

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Result is 20% faster in the pot than the tin.

Melting snow and boiling water takes the same amount of time for the same volume in both the pot and tin.

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If your playing Nomad or some other similar low tote weight, living off the land, grazing as your going, two tin cans and a campfire are enough to get you by and that in itself can be some challenging game play.   The changes are welcome but in certain areas feel so burdensome as to ruin the gaming experience.  For one, the count timer moves pretty slow in real time, making the actual wait for task to complete feel long and drawn out.  I would like to see that sped up by double... yeah, yeah, I know clock's ticking. 

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Great to know you can warm things up around a fire, that's very convenient. I'm really enjoying the new cooking system so far, it's so much more immersive and leaves you some extra time to scavenge firewood or fish while you're cooking.

One thing I noticed, it may be a coincidence and it may just be me: Starting a fire seems to have a much higher fail ratio. I mean, the chance is still 75%, but where I normally was able to light a fire in 1 or sometimes 2 tries with those odds, it now often takes me at least 3 tries to get something going. I've been making tinder plugs like a mother****er to keep up with the failed firestarting.

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15 hours ago, Hawk said:

From my experience on the stove in the PV Farmhouse, 1 minute of cooking time equals about 5 seconds of real world time.

I've been utilizing the stop watch feature on my phone and timing certain tasks, (I do miss that radial timer) just to see how long in real time it takes to do these repetative task and how immersive does this make my game play?  It does seem that timer moves slower in the new update.  But I am getting used to it.   Not sure if it is Hinterland's intent to just throw us this bone, but now that it's here, I hope we can still provide good feedback and maybe get some of the players wish lists to be fulfilled.

 

15 hours ago, Hackfleisch said:

Great to know you can warm things up around a fire, that's very convenient. I'm really enjoying the new cooking system so far, it's so much more immersive and leaves you some extra time to scavenge firewood or fish while you're cooking.

One thing I noticed, it may be a coincidence and it may just be me: Starting a fire seems to have a much higher fail ratio. I mean, the chance is still 75%, but where I normally was able to light a fire in 1 or sometimes 2 tries with those odds, it now often takes me at least 3 tries to get something going. I've been making tinder plugs like a mother****er to keep up with the failed firestarting.

Lol, I feel your pain.  Been playing this game for long time and still no where near 1000 fires successfully merit achievement.  This play through found a few living outdoor books which really bumped up my fire making abilities.   But yeah, it's really a numbers game on those percentages, but sometimes if you just switch the tinder, rolled newspaper vs sheet newspaper, birch bark vs cat tail head, and burn those books, burn baby burn!  Disco Inferno!  My personal longest string of failed attempts lighting a single fire is 9.  Now I dont hesitate to break out the accelerant when I hit 5.  O.o

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Yeah I also tend to save the stuff like books and accelerant for 'what if I'm actually 2 seconds away from freezing to death' situations which I never actually encounter since I mostly play on Pilgrim.

Yesterday I migrated from Pleasant Valley to Coastal Highway, and since I'm in CH every fire has started on my first try. Must've just been random probability working against me, and now working in my favor.

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On 6/15/2018 at 4:38 PM, MHDan said:

I literally just found this out myself, I thought I was going mad when my stuff was still warming up. Very nice touch I think!

I just discovered this by accident.  Its so cool!  I almost lost my ever important coffee though :)

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On 6/18/2018 at 12:19 AM, piddy3825 said:

For one, the count timer moves pretty slow in real time, making the actual wait for task to complete feel long and drawn out.

I find its perfect for doing other things though.  Darning my socks by the campfire, etc.  And if I'm just cooking, there is the option of speeding it along.  

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29 minutes ago, Jolan said:

I find its perfect for doing other things though.  Darning my socks by the campfire, etc.  And if I'm just cooking, there is the option of speeding it along.  

I agree with this.

Initially I didn't like the amount of time things took to cook, an hour for a kg of meat is a very long time. But in real time it is about 5 minutes, which gives you time to wander off, go collect more wood, check your traps, survey the area. If the cooking times were reduced to be more realistic in game time you would only have a minute or less to do other things, you'd be forever burning food and be stuck sitting in front of the fire.

I now realise I quite like the unrealistic game cooking times, because you're actually cooking things in real time - 10 minutes to melt and boil 2 litres of snow, 5 minutes to cook a kilo of meat, 2 minutes to make some tea. This gives you time to do other things, just read a book, or just skip time. I have found that I'll just time a fire to burn out when the water is boiled and just go to bed and let it burn out and collect the fresh water in the morning.

It is a new learning curve, which is always a good thing, will just take time to master, which brings new life to the game

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Its a good point about realtime @MHDan! I'm very happy with the cooking mechanic now, and imagine it will get better with tweaks/additions over time (I'd like to see fire temp have an effect, even minor, on cooking times.

My biggest problem/challenge with cooking previously was weather conditions knocking the fire out (I wanna cook outside because: cabin fever). Now when I cook I put a fire place on each side of the camp office so if a storm blows in, at least one aspect is sheltered. The wood that takes all gets used for cooking - that just wasn't possible before.

 

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6 hours ago, Stone said:

My biggest problem/challenge with cooking previously was weather conditions knocking the fire out (I wanna cook outside because: cabin fever).

Caves. Use caves. If you've got a fire just inside the entry way you get total wind shelter plus the low temp bonus to burning time. There's one in a five minute walk from the Camp Office. Not super easy to find but it's there.

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  • 4 months later...

With the new cooking system, you really notice the decrease in time to cook as you go up skill levels.  Also, cooking pots are your friend.

I kind of like setting up in Dave's Quiet Clearing for easy outdoor living (in my imagination, I drag a chair there so I'm not sitting directly on the snow while I cook) :) Its roomy, its a wind break and its convenient to fishing, wood, or the Camp Office.  Unless I'm on Interloper, then caves man, you can't beat caves. :D

 

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On 26. 6. 2018 at 12:30 PM, Stone said:

My biggest problem/challenge with cooking previously was weather conditions knocking the fire out

It is all about where you set your campfire up. Caves are certainly a good idea like @stratvox mentioned. But sometimes the closest cave is too far away to really be convinient.

If you really look around the surroundings of your base, there are places where you can stuff a campfire that will make it decently covered from the wind. I make it my routine to always look for little nooks and crannies like these when I am walking around. You never know when you will be struck by a blizzard and in need of building a campfire that is decently wind-protected.

Sometimes you can hide a campfire under ice floes at the edges of lakes, for example. These are suprisingly well wind protected. Stuffing it into a crevasse of a rocky cliff may also be an option. These sort of places. (But of course, caves are generally better)

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