# Food system broken?

**URL:** <https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/t/food-system-broken/19912>\
**Category:** The Garage\
**Created:** [May 1, 2019, 8:42am UTC](https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/t/food-system-broken/19912 "2019-05-01T08:42:40Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 4\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![TheLight](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/user_avatar/discourse.cataclysmdda.org/thelight/32/5712_2.png) [@TheLight](https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/u/TheLight)\
**Post date:** [May 1, 2019, 8:42am UTC](https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/t/food-system-broken/19912/1 "2019-05-01T08:42:40Z")

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I’ve only recently installed the game launcher, so I’ve played on an older version for quite some time. In the most recent(current build: #8880) version of the game I have noticed that either the food and drink status messages either do not accurately indicate the true food and drink values, or that the food system itself does not function properly. In my experience of 10 hours, across 3 playthroughs(I’m a noob, I know), I’ve seen the following: the hunger meter shows nothing for a long time, but displays “hungry” if I eat anything, and then it takes at least 3000 calories to display “full”(one out 3 times, it shows “famished” after just 3 turns. If nothing else seems utterly broken, this should); after drinking 6 units of water, drink indicates “sated”, but , after showing “hungry”, the food indicator also shows “full”; finally, the most distressing, as I said before, it seems that from a yellow status of “hungry”, it takes an upwards of 30 units of food to reach a status of “full”, which, as I’ve mentioned, has a chance to revert back to “hungry” in very short amount of in-game time. If anyone knows for certain, or can surmise something based on more experience and time with the game, I would greatly appreciate it.

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**Author:** ![TheMurderUnicorn](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/user_avatar/discourse.cataclysmdda.org/themurderunicorn/32/5706_2.png) [@TheMurderUnicorn](https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/u/TheMurderUnicorn)\
**Post date:** [May 1, 2019, 9:03am UTC](https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/t/food-system-broken/19912/2 "2019-05-01T09:03:51Z")

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Did you happen to search the forum before you posted this? There have been multiple threads of this exact thing.

It’s a work in progress and definitely is still buggy.

Ultimately, this is the best comment we’ve seen about it on the forum, though I’ll point out that this was before the ‘peckish’ status was implemented:

> [@Getting very hungery with over 60,000 calories](https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/t/getting-very-hungery-with-over-60-000-calories/19704/8):
>
> How this system works:
> 
> - Currently, your survivor needs about 2500 kcals every day.
> - Hunger is different from your physical caloric needs, and is instead based on the volume of food in your stomach - and the time since you last ate
> - If you are hungry, but don’t really need to eat - your hunger display will show `hungry`
> - If you are hungry, but need to eat - your hunger display will show `very hungry`
> - If you are hungry, and have a kcal deficit - your hunger display will show `famished` , and with a severe deficit `starving`
> - Your kcal count is internally measured out of 77000 kcals, and you can see how much in deficit/surplus you are by turning on debug mode.  
> Quoting the person who made it:
> 
> KorGgenT:
> 
> > now that’s done: food goes into your stomach volume-per-volume. water gets separated out, but still takes up volume in the stomach. next, water and food get moved through the stomach at different rates. water moves much, much quicker than food (so if you drink water and see that you get the full status, that’s why it goes away quickly)  
> > how the hunger string on the sidebar _currently_ works, and how i want it to work is that mostly it’s a combination of how full your stomach physically is (water counts! it takes up space too) combined with how long it’s been since you ate, with another variable being if you’re running a calorie deficit (simply put – starving)  
> > all this together is a little complex, but only really behind the scenes. front-facing, it’s just this: you get hungry over time. when you eat food, try to eat a reasonable meal. a reasonable meal being something you’d eat IR in terms of calories. if your character is _still_ hungry after you ate, you either didn’t wait long enough (remember eating in game is currently a little broken, since you can eat in seconds) or just didn’t eat enough volume. the calories are important to hunger, but still actually secondary. there’s a lot more that can be done with this, but it must be incremental.
> 
> ![](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/uploads/cataclysmdda/original/2X/d/d71b6d97e30a8c0c14110caf9035a1788d8e7a84.jpeg) Luce\_of\_fire:
> 
> > with over 60,000 excess calories
> 
> This is probably you mis-understanding the display - if it’s 60,000/77,000 you are in a severe kcal deficit. If it’s 137,000, then yes, you have found a bug, and please report it on [GitHub](https://github.com/CleverRaven/Cataclysm-DDA/issues/new?template=bug_report.md) with an attached save.
> 
> These descriptions are getting [tweaked to be more helpful](https://github.com/CleverRaven/Cataclysm-DDA/pull/29543).  
> But you don’t need to know how the system works - what you need to do is eat when you’re hungry, and get enough kcals to not have a deficit.

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**Author:** ![TheLight](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/user_avatar/discourse.cataclysmdda.org/thelight/32/5712_2.png) [@TheLight](https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/u/TheLight)\
**Post date:** [May 1, 2019, 9:37am UTC](https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/t/food-system-broken/19912/3 "2019-05-01T09:37:00Z")

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I have, but I must have used the wrong keywords. I beg your pardon.

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**Author:** ![TheMurderUnicorn](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/user_avatar/discourse.cataclysmdda.org/themurderunicorn/32/5706_2.png) [@TheMurderUnicorn](https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/u/TheMurderUnicorn)\
**Post date:** [May 1, 2019, 9:48am UTC](https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/t/food-system-broken/19912/4 "2019-05-01T09:48:24Z")

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It was just a gentle rebuke because I see the same things brought up repeatedly. I didn’t really mean anything by it.