Posted By Talmanes at

Will they factor in all the countless benefits of fasting? The eat much and often thing should make people unhealthy. You can also go weeks without water (under certain conditions). The desert is anti fasting, but the colder or humid areas would both see huge benefits.

The most I know is that it will affect your vitality and may influence your rate of fatigue. It could possibly branch out to affecting your physical abilities, but that would be in the long term.

We know some things like different nutritional values being attached to different foods, i.e. a diet in primarily meat is going to give you different nutritional benefits compared to one with a lot of cereal grains maybe. What would be the benefits to fasting you think?

I can see the benefits of course in not overeating, you'll put on weight which will be disadvantageous in physical activities but I'm not familiar with what benefits fasting could give. I suppose it depends how complex nutrition is in-game whether then fasting would produce emergent benefits.

Well, curing a sickness or ailment should be faster when fasting. Also eating a lot but less frequently (once every day or two) should be the optimal base line. Just want to ensure they get accurate timers on this stuff. Eating 3-8 times a day is thought by many to be needed which isn’t true. Also, would be cool if long term fasting helped with discovering traits. Of course you wouldn’t be able to exert yourself much.

I can't see that being something they'll prioritize. I feel like if something along those lines does happen, it'll be an update after release.

It'd be a fun thing to see though.

honestly don't see it being a thing at all.. it would be like them adding kegels

With such importance in the survival aspect, I think fasting giving benefits would be counterintuitive.

Starvation is a condition that is known to result in visions and even enlightenment in RL. That might be something to explore.

On the whole, however, most people in RL (globally, not in developed countries) are still operating on marginal diets. Starvation, for them, is probably the base condition, and any extra nutrition they get is good. This is probably the base assumption of CoE.

Do you actually have any evidence of the benefits of fasting vs eating a consistent, healthy diet?

Posted By Talmanes at

Will they factor in all the countless benefits of fasting? The eat much and often thing should make people unhealthy. You can also go weeks without water (under certain conditions). The desert is anti fasting, but the colder or humid areas would both see huge benefits.

Where do you think it is okay to go several weeks without water? Also being colder does not mean by any means that you can go without food/water. Cold weather puts lots of stress on the body calorically as it tries to keep your body warm enough and cold air will dehydrate the body just as fast as the deserts (because many arctic places are deserts). Only difference is when you are cold the dehydration symptoms can be hidden so it can actually be more dangerous because it can get really bad before you realize it.

Posted By Talmanes at 5:17 PM - Thu Feb 22 2018

Well, curing a sickness or ailment should be faster when fasting. Also eating a lot but less frequently (once every day or two) should be the optimal base line. Just want to ensure they get accurate timers on this stuff. Eating 3-8 times a day is thought by many to be needed which isn’t true. Also, would be cool if long term fasting helped with discovering traits. Of course you wouldn’t be able to exert yourself much.

Again why do you think fasting will make you heal faster than eating a sensible diet? When people are ill and get an upset stomach, (often times depends on the exact illness or ailment) the stomach feels nauseous because it pulls the blood required for digestion away from that area to extra oxygen can be brought to the affected areas to help combat the problem. This is also the same reason why we feel bad when we are stress and sometimes vomit, the fight or flight response channels everything away from the digestive system so that it can be used in other places. That being said it is still very important to be giving nutrients to the body, if not now, more than ever as it needs the extra material to heal the body. This is why you are told to eat "simple" foods such as soup and toast, because they are simple in the fact that they can be easily processed by the limited blood that is still in the digestive system but still provides the body with the vital nutrients that they need to heal quickly.

So yes, its true you can go a day without water and a day or two without any food without any food and have no poor effects. And yes people can stretch it out for several days without water in bad situation and even a few weeks without food but have you ever seen the end result? People with severe dehydration are in a severely altered mental status and long periods without any food do terrible things the immune system and your body begins to break down its own muscle to stay alive.

Not sure if there would be any in-game benefit to fasting. If there were I would see it being something seen as an emergent strategy for players more than one explicitly pointed out by the game mechanics.

Likely design of the nutritional system is still in very general spaces as opposed to specifics but we don't know too much on it at this time.

Posted By mickdude2 at 10:14 PM - Thu Feb 22 2018

Do you actually have any evidence of the benefits of fasting vs eating a consistent, healthy diet?

There is consistent evidence from animal studies (mice in particular) that a reduced-calorie diet results in a greater life span. I've heard some anecdotal evidence about humans cultures who tend to eat lower-calorie diets having longer average life spans, but I haven't looked into any recent research on it.

all the countless benefits of fasting

xyz should be different when fasting.

Do you actually have any evidence

@all: Can we stay on topic please?

The general forum is meant to be about issues related to the game. Discussion about RL health issues is not quite on topic here. There is a lot of misconception on both sides of the spectrum. This is likely the reason why the posts implying certain health claims got voted down. So let's not go there.

Remember: We're talking about a game that is inspired by real life and meant to be authentic. So we can reason about what might seem plausible but really have no need to discuss the actual thing – nutrition – as such.

In the same vein, a plausible effect of drinking alcohol in the game would be to increase your charisma. Yet, most people will agree drinking alcohol in RL might not increase your chances of convincing someone.

It's more about stereotypes.

That all being said, I agree with others saying there will likely be starvation and associated effects. Personally, I imagine the effect will be chosen to be plausible and to nudge the players towards a certain way of dealing with the situation.

The OP in this thread specifically introduced RL conceptions into a game discussion. This is not bad. Neither is discussing the RL justification of the proposal. In case someone hasn't noticed, the game depends hugely on either RL intuitions or expectations derived from other games, including long-hackneyed fantasy-game stereotypes.

By the way, not all negative effects of substances on individuals can be reduced by acclimatization in RL. Heavy metal poisoning and radiation exposure are examples. In-game, attempted acclimatization might work, but might not. At this point, without specific game lore, any character choosing to attempt it would be relying on assumptions, derived either from RL or from other games.