Non-automatic potato drying?

[the_antisocial_hermit]

I'm just curious why it looks like all the projects on a drying rack are automatic, except for potato drying and one or two other things. Meat is automatic, but potatoes aren't? Just a little confusing to me.. I would suggest that they be made automatic (and I did think they were).

I couldn't find where automatic projects were announced or had been suggested or anything, or I would've put this in there. Didn't see how this was much of a question for General Support nor it didn't seem to quite fit into GD, so I put it here. So.. it's kind of a suggestion and a question.

[Antono Flavio]

The same goes for drying rice.

[the_antisocial_hermit]

Ah yes, that was one of the others I noticed.

[Surly]

Why exactly can you even dry those two? Especially without cooking them first

[SekoETC]

Not all the other projects, look at raspberries. And I would assume other berries as well, exept for grapes. ...Wait, are grapes even considered berries?

[the_antisocial_hermit]

I didn't say all the other projects.. I mentioned there were more that weren't ("one or two other things"; between the rice and raspberries, that's two). I don't understand why any of them are manual. It's the same process, as far as Cantr is concerned.

[SekoETC]

You need to cut the potatoes. And I don't know what you would do to berries to keep them on a drying rack, in real life they would use something totally different. Maybe they're threaded on a straw or a piece of yarn or something, unless they were gathered with the twigs. And you can't make raisins from blackberries irl. So Cantr is not irl, it's something else.

Actually I wouldn't mind all drying projects being automatic but since the rest of the RD seems to think it would greatly disturb the balance... mh, not worth complaining about. The production rates at least for chips are much faster than most cooking projects.

[the_antisocial_hermit]

I'd like to know why RD thinks that it will throw it off balance so much. I really don't see how it disturbs the balance when dried meat is eaten at 22g a day and it's automatic and doesn't require wood. Better than smoked meat. Aren't dried potatoes eaten at a higher rate? And cutting potatoes really doesn't make sense, cuz you don't spend a day cutting them.. you spend a little while cutting them, then lay them out for a day or whatever. And some of the herbs.. wouldn't those have to be cut up too? Or at least broke apart to lay out evenly... and cut up later for whatever they're used for. Meat needs to be cut into sizeable pieces to lay out on the drying rack... then cut into smaller strips, if not cut into the strips to begin with.

I have no clue about the berries..

[SekoETC]

No, herbs are dried in bunches. After drying they are crushed, which is much easier than cutting fresh leaves because they're not sticky. Potatoes lose half of their weight in the drying process (well so does meat actually) but somehow this increases their potential so that if you have 800 grams of potato chips, that will be 10 days of food but if it were raw potatoes then it was only 4 days of food. Also the amount of potatoes you can dry in a day is 8 times the amount of meat that can be dried. Sure we could have a cutting meat project and slicing potatoes project and placing things on a drying rack project but that would be splitting hairs.

Note: This is not an RD opinion, this is just my private opinion. It would be solved if all characters were required to get a certain amount of moisture from their food or from drinking, that would stop people from going on a totally dry diet at least without carrying water containers or finding water from the side of the road.