Saturation

Saturation is the unseen game mechanic that controls Characters' needs for Food. A character with a higher saturation value has eaten recently, and is more full than another character with a low saturation level.

Levels of Saturation

Characters' saturation level is grouped into four thresholds: Fed, Hungry, Urgently Hungry, and Starving. Each threshold exhibits different effects on a character, especially their Thoughts.

For humanoids, the saturation levels are as follows:

Label	Saturation	Mood modifier
Fed	Greater than 30	none
Hungry	20 to 30	-8
Urgently Hungry	0.01 to 20	-15
Starving	Less than 0.01	-25

Saturation caps at 100.

Saturation Changes

Saturation goes down every tick (1/20000 of a game day) depending on the character's current saturation.

Saturation	Change per tick	Change per day
Fed	-0.004	-80
Hungry	-0.002	-40
Urgently Hungry	-0.001	-20
Starving	-0.0006	-12

Starving

Once a character becomes starving they start a clock to take damage from starvation.

After 5000 ticks (1/4 game day) a starving character takes 5 starvation damage and the clock resets.

This means a character with 100 health (full) will die after 5 days of starvation.

Example

Jones recently became hungry. His saturation is 25. He eats a Packaged Survival Meal which restores up to 100 saturation. His saturation caps out at 100.

Jones will become:

Hungry in 17500 ticks (0.875 game days)

Urgently Hungry in 17500 + 5000 = 22500 ticks (1.125 game days)

Starving in 22500 + 19990 = 42490 ticks (2.125 game days)

Dead in 42490 + 100000 = 142490 ticks (7.125 game days)