Difference between revisions of "Nutrient paste dispenser"

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<onlyinclude>
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{{Image wanted|reason=1) Orange version for prisoners and integration of same. 2) Updated images below with current textures}}
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{{infobox main|production|
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{{For|the meal the dispenser dispenses|Nutrient paste meal}}
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|name = Nutrient paste dispenser
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{{Infobox main|production
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|image = Nutrient paste dispenser.png|Nutrient paste dispenser
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| name = Nutrient paste dispenser
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|imagesize = 240px
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| image = Nutrient paste dispenser.png
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|description = Synthesizes nutrient paste from organic feedstocks. It consumes less ingredients and time than any other meal production method - but nobody likes eating nutrient paste. Accepts raw food, but not rough plant matter like hay.
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| description = A machine that synthesizes edible nutrient paste from organic feedstocks placed in adjacent hoppers. It consumes less ingredients and time than any other meal production method - but nobody likes eating nutrient paste. Accepts raw food, but not rough plant matter like hay.
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|type = Production
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| type = Building
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|type2 = Food
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| type2 = Production
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|placeable = Yes
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| placeable = true
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|size = 3|4
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| passability = impassable
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|hp = 350
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| blockswind = true
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|power = - 200  
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| cover = 1
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|buy = {{icon|metal|90}} + {{icon|component|3}}
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| minifiable = false
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|sell = {{icon|metal|45}}}}
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| size = 3 ˣ 4
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</onlyinclude>
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| flammability = 0.5
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| hp = 350
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| power = -200
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| terrain affordance = heavy
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| research = Nutrient paste
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| skill 1 = Construction
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| skill 1 level = 5
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| work to make = 2200
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| resource 1 = Steel
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| resource 1 amount = 125
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| resource 2 = Component
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| resource 2 amount = 3
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}}
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{{Info|The '''nutrient paste dispenser''' is an electrical device that converts [[raw food]] placed in an adjacent [[hopper]] into [[nutrient paste meal]]s.}}
  
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{{info|The '''nutrient paste dispenser''' is an electrical device that converts [[raw food]] placed in an adjacent [[hopper]] into [[nutrient paste meal]]s; the machine accepts all food except [[hay]]. The meals are produced on demand, when a colonist or prisoner uses the machine. No work bills or tasks can be performed at the machine, and no skills are necessary to use it. Animals can not use the machine, but will eat the produced meals if they are fed to them by other means.}}
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== Acquisition ==
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{{Acquisition}}
  
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== Usage ==
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By default, [[New Arrivals]] start with nutrient paste researched.
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The paste dispenser will be used automatically if it is available, accessible and powered up.  Pawns will always prefer a more tasty food, and only use the dispenser if no better option is available.  Colonists will access the dispenser in order to produce food to be fed to prisoners or patients (if no better food is available).
 
  
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It is possible to trick a pawn into producing an arbitrary amount of meals (see below).
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== Summary ==
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{{Stub|section=1|reason= Describe what happens when nutrition of individual feedstock item exceeds required nutrition (Note: see below for order of hopper draw when testing):
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# Only 1 item in hopper, but with too much nutrition. Result: Item consumed, extra nutrition wasted
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# First hopper drawn has item with too much nutrition, second hopper drawn has unitized item that can be consumed without wasting nutrition. Does it consume the larger item and waste nutrition or empty 2nd hopper first?
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# First hopper contains item/s with insufficient nutrition (e.g. 0.25 nutrition, second has large item (e.g. 1 nutrition). Does it use the 0.25 and waste even more of the second hopper item than option 1, or does it just take the large item and save the 0.25
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}}
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[[File:Nutrient paste hoppers.png|thumb|200px|left|All valid [[hopper]] positions.<br/>Gold tile is the interaction spot. Numbers indicate order the hoppers will be drawn from - Note that this order is '''not''' rotated if the dispenser is.]]
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[[File:Nutrient paste dispenser in prison cell.jpg|thumb|An orange dispenser marked for prisoner use.]]
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The nutrient paste dispenser is an impassible object, acting like a wall for [[room]] and [[temperature]] mechanics. Pawns will dispense meals from the interaction spot, the front-center tile indicated by the circle during placement. If this spot is inside a [[prison]] cell, then the machine will change color to orange and only [[prisoners]] will be allowed to use it. You cannot build objects on the interaction spot, nor can you build the dispenser with it blocked. [[Chunk]]s placed there after construction will prevent use until they are [[haul]]ed away.  
  
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At least one [[hopper]] needs to be attached to the dispenser, and the hopper needs to be filled with sufficient raw food to produce at least one meal. All food except ''hay'' is usable by the machine, but only raw food can actually be delivered to the hoppers directly.  Hoppers act like ''storage zones'', and are configured in the same way. Colonists will deliver food to the hopper as a hauling task, just like supplying storage zones with items.
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The dispenser creates {{Icon Small|nutrient paste meal||1}} [[nutrient paste meal]] for 0.3 [[nutrition]] worth of food placed in an adjacent [[hopper]]. Hoppers can be placed in any cardinally adjacent tile, except for the interaction spot. The dispenser will attempt to draw food from the southwesternmost hopper first, regardless of dispenser orientation. If insufficient food is present in this hopper, then it will be emptied of any food inside, and then the process is repeated on each hopper proceeding counterclockwise around the dispenser until sufficient food has been collected to make a meal or all hoppers have been checked. If there is insufficient food to make a meal in all of the attached hoppers, no food will be consumed and no meal will be produced.
  
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'''Note 1:''' ''Unbutchered bodies will be consumed by the machine, and only a single meal will be produced.  The body will disappear without trace''.  If you build hoppers, eg. inside a freezer room, on top of an existing corpse, the corpse will be fed through the hopper into the paste dispenser.  Make sure to clear any space for a new hopper if you do not want this to happen.
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Nutrient paste dispensers can share hoppers, the direction of the hoppers is only visual.
  
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'''Note 2:''' Related to the above, the machine will consume ''any'' type of food (except hay), including all biological corpses as well as [[kibble]], if the food happens to lie on top of a hopper. It is possible to force food on top of a hopper by taking it to a pawn's inventory (form a temporary caravan), and then manually dropping it in front of the hopper (the hopper needs to be directly south of the pawn). This allows for reprocessing meals (removing any ingredient penalties), as well as producing meals out of kibble (which will not carry the usual kibble penalty).  This can safely be considered an exploit of game mechanics, as it is probably not intended for the dispenser to even process these types of food at all.
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Colonists will deliver food as both [[Work#Haul|Hauling]] and [[Work#Cook|Cooking]] tasks. Make sure to set the Priority of the hoppers to be higher than other stockpiles. Only one type of food can be placed into each hopper. Any food except [[hay]] will be used, including [[corpse]]s, but colonists will only load it with [[raw food]]. It is possible to force other foods on top of a hopper by taking it to a pawn's inventory and then manually dropping it in front of the hopper. This may be considered an exploit.
  
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The dispenser will process ''insect meat'' and ''human meat'' at the full nutritional value, but eating the produced meals will incur the same mood effects as if the ingredients were cooked (eg. ''Cooked cannibalism'' for a nutrient paste meal made from human meat).
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Colonists or prisoners will automatically use the dispenser any time they would otherwise look for a meal to pick up and eat, assuming it is powered, accessible, has enough food, the pawn is allowed to eat nutrient paste meals per their [[Menus#Food_restriction|food restrictions]] and there are no preferable unrestricted meals available. No work bills or tasks can be performed at the machine, and no skills are necessary to use it. [[Work#Warden|Wardens]] can also deliver nutrient paste from an external machine to prisoners, and [[Work#Doctor|Doctors]] will do the same for patients. Doctors can use prison-designated dispensers to feed prisoner patients. Animals cannot operate the dispenser but will eat meals if provided. In order to produce meals for storage or animals, you must manually manipulate a pawn - see below for details.  
  
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The paste dispenser acts like a wall that will separate rooms. Usually one will put the rear end (where the hoppers are attached) inside a refrigerated zone, so the raw ingredients will not spoil.  The length of the device even allows for refrigerated and non-refrigerated hoppers on the same machine.
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=== Nutrient paste ===
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Nutrient paste converts 0.3 nutrition of raw food to a 0.9 nutrition meal, tripling your food. But when consumed, nutrient paste gives a {{--|4}} mood penalty ("[[Thoughts#Eating|Ate awful meal]]"). This is at least better than eating raw food. Pawns will always prefer a more tasty food, so unless their Food Restriction is specifically assigned to "Paste" (located at the top of a colonist's Health tab), they will only use the dispenser if no better option is available. The mood penalty is negated if the colonist eating it has the [[Ascetic]] trait, or the [[Ideoligion#Eating_nutrient_paste|Eating Nutrient Paste: Don't mind]] precept in their [[ideoligion]]{{IdeologyIcon}}.
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If the front end of the machine is inside a prison cell, only prisoners will be allowed to use it, just like with food that is stored in the prison cell. This is indicated by the front of the machine turning from green too yellow, like beds do.  If the front of the machine is yellow, it is reserved for prisoner use.  If you want to feed nutrient paste to prisoners, but avoid building a dedicated paste dispenser for the prison room, you can use the manual production method described below, and then deliver the produced meals to the prisoners just like other food.
 
  
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Use of [[human meat]], [[insect meat]], or, if the [[Ideology DLC]] is enabled, [[raw fungus]], in a nutrient paste meal will still apply their regular [[mood]]lets, on top of the one for nutrient paste.
 
<gallery widths="300px" heights="300px" class="center" mode="nolines">
 
<gallery widths="300px" heights="300px" class="center" mode="nolines">
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File:Nutrient paste dispenser no hopper.png|'''When you build a NPD, the game will notify a hopper is needed'''
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Nutrient paste dispenser no hopper.png|'''When you build a NPD, the game will notify a hopper is needed'''
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File:Hopper storage cropped.png|'''Hopper storage menu to select ingredients'''
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Hopper storage cropped.png|'''Hopper storage menu to select ingredients'''
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File:Nutrient paste dispenser with hopper.png|'''Hopper mouse indicator will turn from red to green for correct placement and colonists will pick NP meals from the dispenser'''
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Nutrient paste dispenser with hopper.png|'''Hopper mouse indicator will turn from red to green for correct placement and colonists will pick NP meals from the dispenser'''
 
</gallery>
 
</gallery>
  
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== Strategy ==
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== Analysis ==
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The nutrient paste dispenser is helpful, but not necessary for survival, unless the colony is in an extremely unforgiving environment, such as an ''ice sheet''.
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At 300% nutritional efficiency, Nutrient paste is the most efficient way to prepare a meal. Compared to the next best method, [[simple meal|simple]] and [[fine meal]]s with 180% efficiency, paste gives 66.67% more food. This makes nutrient paste useful in a famine, even if you don't plan to use it indefinitely. In addition, no cooking is necessary. There's no risk of [[food poisoning]], and it can save a lot of time off a cook's hands - cooking is often a full time job in large colonies. Overall, a nutrient paste dispenser can accelerate the development of a colony, and may be necessary in an extreme [[biome]] like ice sheet.
  
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It is ''by far'' the most efficient way to prepare raw food in the game, increasing the nutritional value of its raw inputs by 200%. The nutrient paste dispenser never causes food poisoning, and will always instantly produce food on demand, as long as raw ingredients are available.
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However, nutrient paste meals give a {{--|4}} [[mood]] debuff, which ends up being -9 net mood compared to [[fine meal]]s. It is advised to not give nutrient paste to pawns with a [[trait]] that gives a negative modifier to mental break threshold, because they can push a pawn over the edge. Because pawns prefer normal meals over nutrient paste, you can set restrictions to prevent normal pawns from consuming all of the good meals and leaving none to the volatile ones. In contrast, Ascetics can eat paste without worry.  
  
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Building a paste dispenser early on will speed up colony development substantially.  This is because it not only makes a cook unnecessary, it also uses the raw food far more efficiently than cooking does. Therefore, far fewer work hours will be required to produce the raw food (from hunting animals or growing plants).  Also, early colonies often struggle with ''food poisoning'', especially if no competent cook is available.  This, too, is completely avoided if a dispenser is used exclusively.
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Transhumanist [[ideoligion]]s{{IdeologyIcon}} can eat these meals without penalty, but still miss out on {{+|5}} mood from fine meals. Due to the increased hunger from using [[neural supercharger]]s and [[sleep accelerator]]s, a paste dispenser may be preferred.
  
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However, consuming a nutrient paste meal gives your colonist an [[Thoughts#Ate awful meal|''“Ate awful meal”'']] bad thought, reducing mood by -4 (this is still better than the -7 mood [[Thoughts#Ate raw food|''"Ate raw food"'']] thought). Compared to preparing [[fine meal]]s for your colonists at all times, you will incur a net -9 mood penalty if you only serve nutrient paste; this is a substantial drawback of the dispenser.  Especially at higher difficulties it might not be practical to use only nutrient paste for an entire campaign (this depends on how well colonist mood is managed in other areas).
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*'''Notes'''
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The dispenser has a minor quirk - because colonists have to dispense meals as needed, they will never carry meals in their inventory. By preventing outdoor snacking, it ''forces'' colonists to eat at a nearby dining area, always giving the ''<Impressive> dining room'' [[mood]]lets while preventing {{--|3}} ''Ate without Table''. However, this makes colonists slightly less efficient, as they'll have to travel to the dispenser every time they want to eat.
  
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In any case, having a paste dispenser as a backup food source is highly recommended for most colonies.  Ensuring sufficient food supplies gets more and more difficult in a growing colony, and the food supply chain is easily interrupted. A paste dispenser helps tremendously in these situations, as it can be stocked with slow spoiling food, and the only event that always disables it is the ''Solar Flare''; it is therefore a very reliable food source.
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The paste dispenser also makes it a lot easier to keep animals that need to be fed by the colonists (such as dogs and grazing animals off the growing season). Feeding animals with paste requires occasional micro-management to create meal reserves, since animals cannot trigger the dispenser themselves.
  
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The paste dispenser also makes it a lot easier to keep animals that need to be fed by the colonists (such as dogs and grazing animals off the growing season). Feeding animals with paste requires some occasional micro-management to create meal reserves, since animals can not trigger the dispenser themselves.
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=== Throne rooms ===
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{{Royalty|section=1}}
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With [[Royalty]] active, it is possible to combine a [[throne room]] with a [[Room roles|dining room]]. However, nutrient paste dispensers count as a "Production" building, and are not allowed in the room. Having the NPD very close is still possible, even as close as one [[door]] away.
  
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Be aware that converting human or insect meat to a nutrient paste meal does not mask its origins. Doing so results in all appropriate bad thoughts hitting at once.
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[[File:NPD-Royalty.png|thumb|NPD with interaction cell inside a door to the throne room]]
  
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== Manually producing meals ==
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=== Manually producing meals ===
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Using the paste dispenser is an automatic task that can not be explicitely triggered. It is still possible to make a pawn produce as many meals as you want, until the machine runs out of raw food to process.
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Using the paste dispenser is an automatic task that cannot be explicitly triggered. It is still possible to make a pawn produce as many meals as you want, until the machine runs out of raw food to process.
  
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You need at least one pawn to be hungry enough to demand a meal. This will happen at least once per day, per pawn.
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You need at least one pawn to be hungry enough to demand a meal. This will happen at least once per day, per pawn.
  
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Forcing the pawn to create meals exploits the fact that a pawn stops their current action when they are ''drafted''. We also need to keep the colonist away from any food, so they will be forced to keep producing new meals at the paste dispenser.
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Forcing the pawn to create meals exploits the fact that a pawn stops their current action when they are ''drafted''. We also need to keep the colonist away from any food, so they will be forced to keep producing new meals at the paste dispenser.
  
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=== Method 1: using a special zone restriction (recommended) ===
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==== Method 1: using a special zone restriction (recommended) ====
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The following method uses a 1-tile zone restriction that is placed in the middle of the dispenser. This is the easiest method for producing more than one stack of meals at a time. In detail:
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The following method uses a 1-tile zone restriction that is placed in the middle of the dispenser. This is the easiest method for producing more than one stack of meals at a time. In detail:
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# Create a new '''area''' that covers exactly 1 tile in the center of the main body of the nutrient paste dispenser (as shown in the screenshot). ''The exact location of this area matters'', in order for the pawn to be able to path to the paste dispenser.
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# Create a new '''area''' that covers exactly 1 tile in the center of the main body of the nutrient paste dispenser (as shown in the screenshot). ''The exact location of this area matters'', in order for the pawn to be able to path to the paste dispenser.
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# When one of your colonists (it does not matter which one) becomes hungry, and is about to eat a meal, '''pause''' the game and '''restrict''' the pawn to the area created in step one. You might also have to draft and undraft the colonist so he will stop the current action. '''The pawn will now be unable to do anything except produce meals at the paste dispenser''', due to the zone restriction he is now under. He will even be unable to grab meals that are right on top of him, including the ones he produces from the machine!
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# When one of your colonists (it does not matter which one) becomes hungry, and is about to eat a meal, '''pause''' the game and '''restrict''' the pawn to the area created in step one. You might also have to draft and undraft the colonist so he will stop the current action. '''The pawn will now be unable to do anything except produce meals at the paste dispenser''', due to the zone restriction he is now under. He will even be unable to grab meals that are right on top of him, including the ones he produces from the machine!
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# Wait for the colonist to walk up to the paste dispenser and draw a meal from the machine. '''Pause''' the game again at this point.
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# Wait for the colonist to walk up to the paste dispenser and draw a meal from the machine. '''Pause''' the game again at this point.
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# To start mass producing meals, simply '''draft''' and '''undraft''' the pawn as many times as desired. Each cycle will instantly procure another meal from the dispenser, using up some of the resources from the hoppers. The meal is not consumed by the colonist, because drafting him will make him drop the meal on the floor, where it will be out of reach (due to the zone restriction). You can hold down the ''draft'' hotkey to rapidly mass produce meals.
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# To start mass producing meals, simply '''draft''' and '''undraft''' the pawn as many times as desired. Each cycle will instantly procure another meal from the dispenser, using up some of the resources from the hoppers. The meal is not consumed by the colonist, because drafting him will make him drop the meal on the floor, where it will be out of reach (due to the zone restriction). You can hold down the ''draft'' hotkey to rapidly mass produce meals.
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# When you are finished, simply undraft the pawn a final time and remove the zone restriction from him. Done.
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# When you are finished, simply undraft the pawn a final time and remove the zone restriction from him. Done.
  
 
The entire process will require no in-game time, since the game is paused all the way.
 
The entire process will require no in-game time, since the game is paused all the way.
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''Notes'':
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* If you wait a little to long with pausing the game, after the pawn has produced a meal, they will move away from the dispenser and consume the meal (ignoring the zone restriction). This is not a problem: simply draft and undraft the pawn, they will drop the meal on the ground and you can resume again at step 3 above.
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* Pawns may prefer to eat meals that are already made, and not use the paste dispenser in those situations, depending on several factors that are difficult to control. If you want to protect your bulk-produced meals from colonists, you have to forbid the stacks or exclude the colonists from the area they are stored in. Domesticated animals will not eat from forbidden stacks, so an exclusion zone has to be used to reserve the food for animals.
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* Many pawns want to eat after getting up in the morning. This makes it easier to watch for hungry pawns if you plan to mass produce some meals.
  
 
<gallery widths="400px" heights="400px" mode="nolines">
 
<gallery widths="400px" heights="400px" mode="nolines">
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File:Mass dispense (before).png|The pawn is restricted to a 1-by-1 tile wide area which is placed in the middle of the nutrient paste dispenser. The precise location of the zone is important. The pawn will now produce meals indefinitely when drafted and undrafted in front of the dispenser (while there is material on top of the hoppers).
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File:Mass dispense (before).png|The pawn is restricted to a 1-by-1 tile wide area which is placed in the middle of the nutrient paste dispenser. The precise location of the zone is important. The pawn will now produce meals indefinitely when drafted and undrafted in front of the dispenser (while there is material on top of the hoppers).
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File:Mass dispense (after).png|This is the state after all hoppers are depleted. The pawn is now surrounded by stacks of nutrient paste meals. He is still unable to eat any of them, due to the zone restriction (which can now be removed and the pawn undrafted). Note that none of the meal stacks are forbidden, because that is not necessary with this method.
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File:Mass dispense (after).png|This is the state after all hoppers are depleted. The pawn is now surrounded by stacks of nutrient paste meals. He is still unable to eat any of them, due to the zone restriction (which can now be removed and the pawn undrafted). Note that none of the meal stacks are forbidden, because that is not necessary with this method.
 
</gallery>
 
</gallery>
  
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Now you can have as many nutrient paste meals as your heart desires!
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Now you can have as many nutrient paste meals as your heart desires!
 
Enough to take with you on cold journeys!
 
Enough to take with you on cold journeys!
 
Enough to make an emergency food stockpile!
 
Enough to make an emergency food stockpile!
 
Enough to use as animal fodder!
 
Enough to use as animal fodder!
  
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=== Method 2: manually forbidding stacks (casual use) ===
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==== Method 2: manually forbidding stacks (casual use) ====
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If you do not want to deal with zone restrictions, you proceed as in method 1, but then you have to '''forbid''' any new meal stacks that are created, before continuing to cycle the drafting. This method is a little inconvenient if you want to produce more than a single stack of meals, or if you repeat the process regularly (eg. to produce animal food).
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If you do not want to deal with zone restrictions, you proceed as in method 1, but then you have to '''forbid''' any new meal stacks that are created, before continuing to cycle the drafting. This method is a little inconvenient if you want to produce more than a single stack of meals, or if you repeat the process regularly (eg. to produce animal food).
 
<gallery widths="300px" heights="300px" mode="nolines">
 
<gallery widths="300px" heights="300px" mode="nolines">
 
File:Rimworld Nutrient Paste Start.jpg|The pawn has just grabbed a meal from the dispenser, and wants to eat it. The game is paused at this point. If you draft the pawn now, he will drop the meal on the floor.
 
File:Rimworld Nutrient Paste Start.jpg|The pawn has just grabbed a meal from the dispenser, and wants to eat it. The game is paused at this point. If you draft the pawn now, he will drop the meal on the floor.
Line 89: Line 118:
 
File:Rimworld Nutrient Paste End.jpg|Beyond 3 tiles, you do not even need to forbid stacks any more.
 
File:Rimworld Nutrient Paste End.jpg|Beyond 3 tiles, you do not even need to forbid stacks any more.
 
</gallery>
 
</gallery>
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{{nav|production|wide}}
 
  
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== Version history ==
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* Beta 19/ 1.0 - Now tinted orange when they can be used by prisoners.
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<gallery>
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OldNutrient.png|Old Nutrient Paste Dispenser Texture
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</gallery>
  
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{{Nav|production|wide}}
 
[[Category:Production]]
 
[[Category:Production]]
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[[Category:Food]]
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[[Category:Food Production]]

Latest revision as of 03:50, 24 November 2024

Blindness.png
This page could use some more or updated images. You can help RimWorld Wiki by uploading images to make this page better. Note: 1) Orange version for prisoners and integration of same. 2) Updated images below with current textures.
For the meal the dispenser dispenses, see Nutrient paste meal.

Nutrient paste dispenser

Nutrient paste dispenser

A machine that synthesizes edible nutrient paste from organic feedstocks placed in adjacent hoppers. It consumes less ingredients and time than any other meal production method - but nobody likes eating nutrient paste. Accepts raw food, but not rough plant matter like hay.

Base Stats

Type
Building – Production
Market Value
340 Silver [Note]
HP
350
Flammability
50%

Building

Size
3 × 4
Minifiable
False
Placeable
True
Passability
impassable
Cover Effectiveness
75%
Blocks Wind
True
Terrain Affordance
Heavy
Power
-200 W

Creation

Required Research
Nutrient paste
Skill Required
Construction 5
Work To Make
2,200 ticks (36.67 secs)
Resources to make
Steel 125 + Component 3
Deconstruct yield
Steel 62 - 63 + Component 1 - 2
Destroy yield
Steel 31 - 32 + Component 0 - 1

The nutrient paste dispenser is an electrical device that converts raw food placed in an adjacent hopper into nutrient paste meals.

Acquisition[edit]

Nutrient paste dispensers can be constructed once the nutrient paste research project has been completed. Each requires Steel 125 Steel, Component 3 Components, 2,200 ticks (36.67 secs) of work modified by the construction speed of the builder, and a construction skill of 5.

Once constructed, they cannot be re-installed, they can only be deconstructed.

By default, New Arrivals start with nutrient paste researched.

Summary[edit]

StumpChoppedA (cropped).png
This section is a stub. You can help RimWorld Wiki by expanding it. Reason: Describe what happens when nutrition of individual feedstock item exceeds required nutrition (Note: see below for order of hopper draw when testing):
  1. Only 1 item in hopper, but with too much nutrition. Result: Item consumed, extra nutrition wasted
  2. First hopper drawn has item with too much nutrition, second hopper drawn has unitized item that can be consumed without wasting nutrition. Does it consume the larger item and waste nutrition or empty 2nd hopper first?
  3. First hopper contains item/s with insufficient nutrition (e.g. 0.25 nutrition, second has large item (e.g. 1 nutrition). Does it use the 0.25 and waste even more of the second hopper item than option 1, or does it just take the large item and save the 0.25.
All valid hopper positions.
Gold tile is the interaction spot. Numbers indicate order the hoppers will be drawn from - Note that this order is not rotated if the dispenser is.
An orange dispenser marked for prisoner use.

The nutrient paste dispenser is an impassible object, acting like a wall for room and temperature mechanics. Pawns will dispense meals from the interaction spot, the front-center tile indicated by the circle during placement. If this spot is inside a prison cell, then the machine will change color to orange and only prisoners will be allowed to use it. You cannot build objects on the interaction spot, nor can you build the dispenser with it blocked. Chunks placed there after construction will prevent use until they are hauled away.

The dispenser creates Nutrient paste meal 1 nutrient paste meal for 0.3 nutrition worth of food placed in an adjacent hopper. Hoppers can be placed in any cardinally adjacent tile, except for the interaction spot. The dispenser will attempt to draw food from the southwesternmost hopper first, regardless of dispenser orientation. If insufficient food is present in this hopper, then it will be emptied of any food inside, and then the process is repeated on each hopper proceeding counterclockwise around the dispenser until sufficient food has been collected to make a meal or all hoppers have been checked. If there is insufficient food to make a meal in all of the attached hoppers, no food will be consumed and no meal will be produced.

Nutrient paste dispensers can share hoppers, the direction of the hoppers is only visual.

Colonists will deliver food as both Hauling and Cooking tasks. Make sure to set the Priority of the hoppers to be higher than other stockpiles. Only one type of food can be placed into each hopper. Any food except hay will be used, including corpses, but colonists will only load it with raw food. It is possible to force other foods on top of a hopper by taking it to a pawn's inventory and then manually dropping it in front of the hopper. This may be considered an exploit.

Colonists or prisoners will automatically use the dispenser any time they would otherwise look for a meal to pick up and eat, assuming it is powered, accessible, has enough food, the pawn is allowed to eat nutrient paste meals per their food restrictions and there are no preferable unrestricted meals available. No work bills or tasks can be performed at the machine, and no skills are necessary to use it. Wardens can also deliver nutrient paste from an external machine to prisoners, and Doctors will do the same for patients. Doctors can use prison-designated dispensers to feed prisoner patients. Animals cannot operate the dispenser but will eat meals if provided. In order to produce meals for storage or animals, you must manually manipulate a pawn - see below for details.

Nutrient paste[edit]

Nutrient paste converts 0.3 nutrition of raw food to a 0.9 nutrition meal, tripling your food. But when consumed, nutrient paste gives a −4 mood penalty ("Ate awful meal"). This is at least better than eating raw food. Pawns will always prefer a more tasty food, so unless their Food Restriction is specifically assigned to "Paste" (located at the top of a colonist's Health tab), they will only use the dispenser if no better option is available. The mood penalty is negated if the colonist eating it has the Ascetic trait, or the Eating Nutrient Paste: Don't mind precept in their ideoligionContent added by the Ideology DLC.

Use of human meat, insect meat, or, if the Ideology DLC is enabled, raw fungus, in a nutrient paste meal will still apply their regular moodlets, on top of the one for nutrient paste.

  • When you build a NPD, the game will notify a hopper is needed

  • Hopper storage menu to select ingredients

  • Hopper mouse indicator will turn from red to green for correct placement and colonists will pick NP meals from the dispenser

Analysis[edit]

At 300% nutritional efficiency, Nutrient paste is the most efficient way to prepare a meal. Compared to the next best method, simple and fine meals with 180% efficiency, paste gives 66.67% more food. This makes nutrient paste useful in a famine, even if you don't plan to use it indefinitely. In addition, no cooking is necessary. There's no risk of food poisoning, and it can save a lot of time off a cook's hands - cooking is often a full time job in large colonies. Overall, a nutrient paste dispenser can accelerate the development of a colony, and may be necessary in an extreme biome like ice sheet.

However, nutrient paste meals give a −4 mood debuff, which ends up being -9 net mood compared to fine meals. It is advised to not give nutrient paste to pawns with a trait that gives a negative modifier to mental break threshold, because they can push a pawn over the edge. Because pawns prefer normal meals over nutrient paste, you can set restrictions to prevent normal pawns from consuming all of the good meals and leaving none to the volatile ones. In contrast, Ascetics can eat paste without worry.

Transhumanist ideoligionsContent added by the Ideology DLC can eat these meals without penalty, but still miss out on +5 mood from fine meals. Due to the increased hunger from using neural superchargers and sleep accelerators, a paste dispenser may be preferred.

  • Notes

The dispenser has a minor quirk - because colonists have to dispense meals as needed, they will never carry meals in their inventory. By preventing outdoor snacking, it forces colonists to eat at a nearby dining area, always giving the <Impressive> dining room moodlets while preventing −3 Ate without Table. However, this makes colonists slightly less efficient, as they'll have to travel to the dispenser every time they want to eat.

The paste dispenser also makes it a lot easier to keep animals that need to be fed by the colonists (such as dogs and grazing animals off the growing season). Feeding animals with paste requires occasional micro-management to create meal reserves, since animals cannot trigger the dispenser themselves.

Throne rooms[edit]

RoyaltyIcon.png
This section relates to content added by Royalty (DLC). Please note that it will not be present without the DLC enabled.

With Royalty active, it is possible to combine a throne room with a dining room. However, nutrient paste dispensers count as a "Production" building, and are not allowed in the room. Having the NPD very close is still possible, even as close as one door away.

NPD with interaction cell inside a door to the throne room

Manually producing meals[edit]

Using the paste dispenser is an automatic task that cannot be explicitly triggered. It is still possible to make a pawn produce as many meals as you want, until the machine runs out of raw food to process.

You need at least one pawn to be hungry enough to demand a meal. This will happen at least once per day, per pawn.

Forcing the pawn to create meals exploits the fact that a pawn stops their current action when they are drafted. We also need to keep the colonist away from any food, so they will be forced to keep producing new meals at the paste dispenser.

Method 1: using a special zone restriction (recommended)[edit]

The following method uses a 1-tile zone restriction that is placed in the middle of the dispenser. This is the easiest method for producing more than one stack of meals at a time. In detail:

  1. Create a new area that covers exactly 1 tile in the center of the main body of the nutrient paste dispenser (as shown in the screenshot). The exact location of this area matters, in order for the pawn to be able to path to the paste dispenser.
  2. When one of your colonists (it does not matter which one) becomes hungry, and is about to eat a meal, pause the game and restrict the pawn to the area created in step one. You might also have to draft and undraft the colonist so he will stop the current action. The pawn will now be unable to do anything except produce meals at the paste dispenser, due to the zone restriction he is now under. He will even be unable to grab meals that are right on top of him, including the ones he produces from the machine!
  3. Wait for the colonist to walk up to the paste dispenser and draw a meal from the machine. Pause the game again at this point.
  4. To start mass producing meals, simply draft and undraft the pawn as many times as desired. Each cycle will instantly procure another meal from the dispenser, using up some of the resources from the hoppers. The meal is not consumed by the colonist, because drafting him will make him drop the meal on the floor, where it will be out of reach (due to the zone restriction). You can hold down the draft hotkey to rapidly mass produce meals.
  5. When you are finished, simply undraft the pawn a final time and remove the zone restriction from him. Done.

The entire process will require no in-game time, since the game is paused all the way.

Notes:

  • If you wait a little to long with pausing the game, after the pawn has produced a meal, they will move away from the dispenser and consume the meal (ignoring the zone restriction). This is not a problem: simply draft and undraft the pawn, they will drop the meal on the ground and you can resume again at step 3 above.
  • Pawns may prefer to eat meals that are already made, and not use the paste dispenser in those situations, depending on several factors that are difficult to control. If you want to protect your bulk-produced meals from colonists, you have to forbid the stacks or exclude the colonists from the area they are stored in. Domesticated animals will not eat from forbidden stacks, so an exclusion zone has to be used to reserve the food for animals.
  • Many pawns want to eat after getting up in the morning. This makes it easier to watch for hungry pawns if you plan to mass produce some meals.

  • The pawn is restricted to a 1-by-1 tile wide area which is placed in the middle of the nutrient paste dispenser. The precise location of the zone is important. The pawn will now produce meals indefinitely when drafted and undrafted in front of the dispenser (while there is material on top of the hoppers).

  • This is the state after all hoppers are depleted. The pawn is now surrounded by stacks of nutrient paste meals. He is still unable to eat any of them, due to the zone restriction (which can now be removed and the pawn undrafted). Note that none of the meal stacks are forbidden, because that is not necessary with this method.

Now you can have as many nutrient paste meals as your heart desires! Enough to take with you on cold journeys! Enough to make an emergency food stockpile! Enough to use as animal fodder!

Method 2: manually forbidding stacks (casual use)[edit]

If you do not want to deal with zone restrictions, you proceed as in method 1, but then you have to forbid any new meal stacks that are created, before continuing to cycle the drafting. This method is a little inconvenient if you want to produce more than a single stack of meals, or if you repeat the process regularly (eg. to produce animal food).

  • The pawn has just grabbed a meal from the dispenser, and wants to eat it. The game is paused at this point. If you draft the pawn now, he will drop the meal on the floor.

  • This is how it looks like after a couple of stacks have been produced, simply by drafting and undrafting the pawn. The game remains paused all the way. When a new stack appears, it has to be forbidden for the process to continue.

  • Beyond 3 tiles, you do not even need to forbid stacks any more.

Version history[edit]

  • Beta 19/ 1.0 - Now tinted orange when they can be used by prisoners.

  • Old Nutrient Paste Dispenser Texture

Architect
Production | Neolithic
Art bench • Brewery • Butcher spot • Butcher table • Campfire • Crafting spot • Fueled stove • Fermenting barrel • Simple research bench
Medieval
Fueled smithy • Hand tailor bench • Stonecutter's table
Industrial
Biofuel refinery • Deep drill • Drug lab • Electric crematorium • Electric smelter • Electric smithy • Electric stove • Electric tailor bench • Fabrication bench • Hi-tech research bench • Hydroponics basin • Machining table • Nutrient paste dispenser (Hopper)
Related
Bioferrite shaper • Serum lab

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