Malnutrition

Malnutrition (or starvation) is a health condition that occurs once any pawn hasn't eaten to the point that they starve. Unless forbidden to do so, a malnourished pawn will eat literally whatever they can get their hands on (whether it be a lavish meal, some raw food, or even a human corpse) in order to prevent themselves from further starving to death. Once the pawn has eaten something, the malnutrition will gradually decrease, and until it is gone the pawn will have increased hunger.

Malnutrition increases by 2% per hour, with initial symptoms including a faster hunger rate, slight loss of consciousness, and an increased chance of social fighting. Advanced symptoms include loss of consciousness, and eventually, death. Malnutrition will begin decrease by 2% per hour after the pawn is fed, during which time they continue to suffer from the different stages of the condition.

Malnutrition will affect Consciousness which affects most actions a pawn can take, including trade, movement speed, and shooting accuracy.

Stages

Trivial - Severity: 0 - 0.19

• -5% Consciousness
• 1.5x Hunger Rate
• 1.5x Chance of Social Fighting
• -20 Mood

Minor - Severity: 0.2 - 0.39

• -10% Consciousness
• 1.6x Hunger Rate
• 2x Chance of Social Fighting
• -26 Mood

Moderate - Severity: 0.4 - 0.59

• -20% Consciousness
• 1.6x Hunger Rate
• 2.5x Chance of Social Fighting
• -32 Mood

Severe - Severity: 0.6 - 0.79

• -30% Consciousness
• 1.6x Hunger Rate
• 3x Chance of Social Fighting
• -38 Mood

Extreme - Severity: 0.8 - 1

• Loss of Consciousness (Severity: 0.8-0.99)
• -44 Mood (Severity: 0.8-0.99)
• Death (Severity 1)

Because malnutrition decreases Consciousness, it can be very dangerous to wounded prisoners, recent surgery patients, or others who may already have a Consciousness at 10% or lower and are unable to feed themselves. Dropping -5 or 10% more can kill just that quick.

Prevention

Straightforward: Make sure there's a decent surplus of food in your freezer. Don't take on more prisoners or colonists than your food supplies can handle. Remember that intensive taming will demand a lot of food. Ensure that meals are easily accessible - raw food is significantly less efficient in terms of nutrition than even simple meals.

Don't be afraid to resort to nutrient paste meal (nutrient paste dispenser) in certain circumstances (e.g. toxic fallout, wildfire that wipes out a significant chunk of wildlife, migration); it's the most efficient way to get nutrition from food out of any meal, yielding 0.9 nutrition, the same as a simple or fine meal, from only 6 of any ingredient and you can't get food poisoning from it.

Version history

• Alpha 16 - Malnutrition also increases the hunger rate and likelihood that affected pawns will start a social fight if slighted or insulted.
• 1.0.0 - Minor starvation (below 25% severity) no longer causes miscarriages.