Category:Food

Just like all other items, food can be crafted, traded, and found. It is the primary and most efficient way to heal yourself in The Wastelands. However it is very slow to metabolize, and sometimes has inherent risks.

While wearing the game HUD, your hunger will tick away very, very, very slowly. When you're missing some health, food will metabolize quite a bit faster than normal to help you recover that health. To replenish these losses, you simply eat some food. If you look at a game items' object description, and it has the word FOOD in it, it should be edible. Rez it at your feet and click it to eat.

Once you've eaten it, it will slowly apply however much food it's worth to your hunger bar over the course of 30 seconds. Typically the higher the BV a food has, the more food it applies to your hunger bar. If your hunger bar ever runs out of food, you will begin to starve. You'll see this in the hovertext of your HUD. There are three categories of being hungry. None of them are lethal.

Hungry

If your hunger bar is below 30% you will become Hungry, and your maximum health will be reduced by 10%.

Starving

If your hunger bar is below 15% you will become Starving, and your maximum health will be reduced by 30%.

Emaciated

If your hunger bar is at 0% you will become Emaciated, and your maximum health will be reduced by 60%.

Food also affects other aspects of the game. For instance if you have at least 5% food in your HUD and you use the Heal Button, that food will instantly be metabolised so you receive an extra 20% more healing from the Medkit. Food also plays a significant role in the damage output for Pugilistic and Bow weapons. Essentially, staying full is really great for combat. Running around on an empty stomach is misery.

Delicious

If it's not apparent already, I like to use a lot of random in the games here. When you eat food, some of them have a small chance of having a delicious effect. This effect is granting more food than it usually would give, but some foods may have different beneficial side effects.

Throwing Up

On the other side of the delicious coin is throwing up. Throwing up is typically a negative effect where you actually lose food from your hunger bar instead of gaining it, when you eat it. The majority of the time you will throw up only half the foods normal value. Sometimes you will throw up the full value of the food. Very rarely will you throw up double the value of the food. On top of this, if you're extra unlucky you could suffer further detrimental effects.

Types of Food

There are three primary types of food, and all can be identified by looking at an objects description. There's FOOD, BAD FOOD, and PREPARED FOOD. All of them can be consumed to potentially add more food to your hunger bar.

Bad Food

Because this is The Wastelands, not everything is well prepared in a sanitized environment, and sometimes you've got to be willing to risks, if just to fill your belly. Bad food is just that -- risky. On it's description it's labelled as "BAD FOOD". It has a significantly high chance of making you throw up, with little to no chance of a delicious effect. Bad food is probably better used for something other than eating, unless you're really desperate for food. Certain bad foods can be crafted into edible foods with enough effort.

Food

Regular old FOOD typically -- but not always -- has an equal chance of giving you a delicious or throwing up effect. It's an intermediate level of food that is pretty safe to eat, and can usually be crafted into something better.

Prepared Food

Prepared food is exactly the opposite of bad food. It has zero chance of making you throw up, and it has a small of amount bonus food built in to it without the required delicious effect (compared to it's BV). Most but not all prepared food has a reduced chance of having a delicious effect in comparison to normal food, on account that it's safe preparation removed some vital and tasty nutrients.

Acquiring Food

You can find some foods in crates; kill a Turkey Buzzard, Cave Grub, or Leech; or fill your belly up with Cinderblock Stew.