Implementing a favorite food in an RPG?

[Waru]

Cool idea, in an MMORPG every player is randomly generated a favorite food that would heal more to them as a cute little bonus for really thinking about what the character eats, but now here's the catch: how to implement it with new foods being added?

Lets say at the start of the game there's 6 different foods you could eat. Your favorite food is picked from these, but then months later 3 new foods are added, and since your account is old, you still have your favorite food with no chance of getting one of the new items. How would I make this fair for others? Just force them to keep their basic favorite food, give them some way to change it (with or without influence), make a new random food every time more food is added or add some funky system in which you use modulus?

modulus example:

randomly generate a number, mod it by the amount of food items, and then that food is your favorite. The actual food isnt associated with you, only the number that is used. Very odd way to explain it but any help is appreciated

also idk if this in the right section

[Ad Bot]

[The Resonte!]

thought: favorite foods change every month or perhaps if you eat too little of your favorite food in a it changes to another favorite food (or some other system)

thought: favorite food is chosen by if you eat a lot of the same food in a short timespan

this allows for it to change without imbalance

[HellHound]

when an update is released, you could unlock a button that would let a player choose whether or not they wanted to keep their favorite food, or roll a new one.

[Shift Kitty]

Maybe instead of a favourite food, why not like, a favourite tag or combination of?

Like a character that ends up really liking spicy and beef (jalapeno burger, spicy burrito, etc), or another that loves sweet and soft (cinnamon roll, cupcake, etc).

[DestroyerOfBlocks]

Maybe instead of a favourite food, why not like, a favourite tag or combination of?

Like a character that ends up really liking spicy and beef (jalapeno burger, spicy burrito, etc), or another that loves sweet and soft (cinnamon roll, cupcake, etc).

this seems like a good idea

you'll eventually find out there are more foods in the world than mechanics you can reasonably implement so it seems logical to just have food groups that do certain things, with maybe certain foods doing some of the food group's mechanics slightly differently. taste preference seems like a thing you'd want players to change if it has mechanical benefits since i'm pretty sure rp guys would just ignore how mechanically unoptimal liking food is.

another problem with static food buffs is if you ever add new crafting resources into the game. say all foods use some kind of common pool of resources to create; if there is ever an additional resource added to this pool, it will be rather insignificant if there is already a lot of food to make using already implemented resources unless significant recipe changes are made.

[Tudoreleu]

theres some other issues you have to think about too, like the fairness or unfairness of having a certain food as a favorite

say you have food A (fries, heals 10hp) and food B (mashed potatoes, heals 50hp)

if you buff your favorite food by doubling its efficiency, then the characters who like mashed potatoes might have it way better because it now heals a lot more than it used to in one shot. or maybe the characters who like fries have it way better, because the fries are quite a bit cheaper, so now they can buy a larger amount of total heals?

food for thought  

[Darth C3P0²]

are you going to finish that croissant

[Waru]

theres some other issues you have to think about too, like the fairness or unfairness of having a certain food as a favorite

say you have food A (fries, heals 10hp) and food B (mashed potatoes, heals 50hp)

if you buff your favorite food by doubling its efficiency, then the characters who like mashed potatoes might have it way better because it now heals a lot more than it used to in one shot. or maybe the characters who like fries have it way better, because the fries are quite a bit cheaper, so now they can buy a larger amount of total heals?

food for thought 

preferably it would only apply to the mid range of foods, not the best healing in the game, not the worst, etc. but somewhere in the middle

[phflack]

only apply to the mid range of foods, not the best healing in the game, not the worst

but some people do like the worst kinds of food, like cabbage (only heals 1hp in runescape it's so bad)
they're weird, but they exist