Standardizing Meal Costs

[Karya]

It might be helpful to have a price list for confectioners who want to sell their food at an Istarian tavern and aren't sure how much to charge. So this is what I propose per food item:

T1 - 25c
T2 - 50c
T3 - 100c
T4 - 200c
T5 - 300c
T6 - 400c

These prices could be a base for meals that do not require anything to be purchased from the Confectioner trainers to make the meals. A moderate increase can be put on food items that require bought ingredients. The increase should not be more than the next tier pricing, but can vary depending on cost and number of purchased ingredients and processing time. For example Chocolate in a recipe would give a food a higher cost than say olive oil in a recipe because chocolate needs to be processed twice before adding it to the recipe, while olive oil can just be added to the recipe.

This is just a thought and would welcome any opinions about this concept.

Sincerely,

Karya

[Vaz]

I think those prices are reasonable.

[Justa Mirage]

I only make food for the guild tavern, I didn't want to get into the "economy war" of trying to load up popular taverns with food, lowering the price below what others have tried to establish as the "tier cost" for food.

Most guilds have done the same thing, they have their own taverns for guild members and charge coppers for the food to ease the pain of paying silver for tier VI foods.

I like your idea of setting a price for "common foods" but even though a "common food" does not use special ingredients, some still require "complex" construction of processed food. This also should include "rare bonus drops" as part of the price.

"Kitten Dreams" is my pet peeve. it is an Expert food for 80-100th level characters. It requires tier VI ingredients, including a very hard to get swordfish, which the preparing of that starts at 1100 and optimal at 1325. You get 1 bonus swordfish when you "get" one from fishing Halibut (found only on Draak) and you have to be 100th level confectioner even to fish Halibut. Because Confectioners only get 8 points per level for preparing skill
(unless you level gatherer to 100), you will be at 800 points unbuffed. It took me a few hours to gather 45 swordfish, which at 5:1 turns into 9 fillets, and at 3:1 (at optimal) I was able to make "3" of those dishes.

Complex processed ingredients also are ones that require multiple "simple" ingredients to make: 2 examples (ones I have been making recently)

Chicken supreme: (tier VI advanced main dish food)

1 Smoked Gruok: (trimmed gruok and ground salt) 2:1 from raw gruok and rock salt. (complex)
5 Trimmed Chicken breasts (simple) 2:1 from raw chicken
2 Ground pepper (simple) 2:1 from pepper plants
2 Butter (simple) 2:1 from milk
2 Rubbed rosemary (simple) 2:1 from doing quest to get garnish processing.
1 Beaten eggs (simple) 2:1 from eggs
1 Wheat flour (simple) 2:1 from wheat plants

(total raw ingredients needed: 30 per dish) all easily obtained.


Only 1 complex item that requires multiple simple items

Eggs Augendell: (tier VI advanced appetizer)

1 Sausage (trimmed gruok, trimmed beef, chopped onions) Complex
1 Hot sauce (diced peppers 'bonus item hot peppers', water, ground pepper) Complex
1 Butter (simple) from milk
4 Hard cooked eggs (simple) from eggs
1 Ground pepper (simple) from pepper
2 Chopped onions (simple) from raw onions
1 Wheat flour (simple) from wheat plants

(total raw ingredients: 29 per dish) (hot peppers are a bonus)

Just examples of what it takes to put high end food together and the time it takes to gather all of that. To me... kitten dreams should be 10 silver each

[Arietna]

as a 30th lvl confectioner I was making smoked gruok and sausages for resell - even at 10c a time, it seems no one was interested, but it sure would have saved you a lot of time...

I've gone back to building for the moment though..

I still think a "grocer" type NPC would be great - an NPC who sits in taverns, acecpting foodstuff (not final dishes, but part processed ones). It would enable gatherers to sell fish fillets for instance, and low level confectioners to sell stuff they can make, but can't use for 50+ levels...

and of course for high level confectioners not to have to make some of the "sub" dishes as Justa said above..

[Djanee]

I put up a post a while back with some suggestions on the Order forums. http://community.istaria.com/forum/s...ad.php?t=18151

One thing maybe you can clarify, do you mean those prices for a 4 course / item meal or each item in the meal?

If you mean those prices to be for a complete 4 part meal, I'd ask you to try working with a confectioner where you agree to gather all the raw resources required to make a given meal. Especially in the higher tiers, the shopping list is absolutely maddening as Justa has tried to point out. You'll quickly see that it's a huge time investment. A confectioner's time has to be worth something too. If people want inexpensive food, then I generally tell them they can barter for it in food resources. They quickly agree they'd rather hunt for coin to buy it (or just deal with the DPs, which is another issue entirely). I can make more money in a given amount of time selling raw resources to the pawnbroker. Even with the prices I suggested in my post, it's definitely less profitable than say mining mithril bars and pawning tools, especially due to the travel and juggling so many ingredients and sub combines. However, cooking is fun and a needed resources, so I do try to keep high tier foods available even if it isn't the best use of my time.

If you mean each item in a meal, then flat pricing won't work as well because each part of the meal has different death point reduction values and different difficulty to make. Most consumers would look at the large DP reduction times on main dishes and would just buy those instead of appetizers. Yes, an informed consumer understands that they can eat more often if they buy variety, but in my experience - most aren't that informed. I think DP reduction time has to be a factor in any pricing ideas.

On the topic of recipes that contain vendor purchased items, most confectioners will tell you that unless it's for a roleplay or 'fun' reason, it's just silly the cost involved to make most of those dishes. I can only assume that the devs aren't looking at the balance of what items are being made and used. Perhaps the confectioner changes are "done" and they've refocused on other things. I just know for me that if a recipe contains NPC purchased components, I just won't make it unless it's for my own fun or the customer supplies the ingredients.

[Charys Stormchild]

I use the same pricing method as Kala for all my foods, 10c per minute removed from DP with the last figure of the price indicating the tier of the food. This doesn't take into consideration the porting costs for gathering all the resources or the cost of the ingredients that have to be bought from the trainers. When Kala first started using this pricing method several people told her she should charge more...a lot more.

I do make a lot of money selling food, but since I last restocked Bristugo tavern a week or so ago almost all my in game time has been spent restocking the resources ready for my next cooking session...and I play probably 8+ hours a day so that's a lot of gathering. In that time I could easily have been processing and selling resources to pawnbrokers for as much, if not more, money. But if everyone did that then there would be no food on the taverns for those who want/need it.

I don't have a problem with standardised prices but the figures quoted by the OP are, to my mind, too low to make anyone want to spend the time and effort on levelling confectioner AND gatherer...which is pretty much essential if you want to make some of the higher tier foods.

Just my opinion though, feel free to disagree

[Aaelefein]

I don't have a problem with standardised prices but the figures quoted by the OP are, to my mind, too low to make anyone want to spend the time and effort on levelling confectioner AND gatherer...which is pretty much essential if you want to make some of the higher tier foods.

I have to agree with Charys on this...and I haven't even gotten around to selling anything yet. Now granted, I am probably going about it differently than most: 16s T2 Storehouses I'm getting topped off 4x2000, with garnishes in a nearby guildhouse and rares/bonuses in a couple tents...

That is a LOT of work, and to think I thought Alchemist was time/labor intensive...that is nothing compared to confectioner. Especially when you only get 20-30 pieces of meat from cows, deer, sheep (Think I remember grouks and ruxus are better)...but no matter how you slice it...there is a LOT of running around for a simpe T5/6 food...want to make a whole meal, multiply by four...at least

I haven't tested it yet, but I think the suggested prices for at least T1/T2 is at or below what a person could get just selling the processed ingredient to a PB for.

So when I finally get my storehouses full, I'll see how much food I can actually make, figure out about how much time I spent gathering it all and go from there. I do know for a fact I can do about 280s an hour working mithril into tools, armor, and weapons...I won't even come close to getting a quarter of that making food.

[Mensar]

Solution: Sit and wait for DPs to fall off while you do other things, like crafting and socializing.

Just a thought.

[awdz]

I craft off dp's making food... :-/

[Favoran]

Solution: Sit and wait for DPs to fall off while you do other things, like crafting and socializing.

Just a thought.

Always works for me. I haven't so much touched a food item since the DP revision.

[Summerbreeze]

Those prices IMHO are much too low. The time gathering the many, many resources needed to make each food type are not covered by that cost at all. Not to mention the not so nice mobs one encounters when making the t5 & t6 foods. When you figure in an rare, bonus only or bought items forget it, your way off the mark.

[Unicorn's Lady]

Awdz came up with this for me when I asked her for pricing help (Thanks again Awdz! )
T1 -- 1c per minute
T2 -- 2c
T3 -- 4c
T4 -- 6c
T5 -- 8c
T6 -- 12c


I decided to add to this basic pricing these things:

• If there are purchased items (such as vanilla beans or cocoa beans) the cost is added to the food item.
  
  • So for Sslanisian Chocolate Fudge my price would be: 1c x 8 min. + 500c (10 Cocoa beans) = 508c

• If there are rare ingredients such as a rare meat (squirrel), rare seafood (swordfish, clams), rare veggie (chili peppers), and/or a rare garnish (garlic, fennel) I add the basic tier price per ingredient item as a "Pain in the Posterior" tax.
  
  • So for Anima's Blueberry Fennel Cake my price would be: 6c x 45 min. + 6c x 4 Fennel = 294c

And of course for Kakashi's Swordfish my price would be: 4c x 60 min. + 4c x 16 Swordfish + 4c x 8 Fennel + 150c (1 Olive oil) = 486c




Nellie Lovett, Mad cook of Carmo on Order

[Drakarr]

I, like Charys, prefer Kalas method as it indicates without having to get details on which tier its for. That also puts to rest some peoples complaints on not being able to tell which food they should buy.

[LOVWYRM]

I agree (being a customer^^)- prices are too low
for food as well as for potions.
Provide me with all I need- I pay the price

(atm I need food of all tiers for my tavern- and potions (adv./craft) )

[Mensar]

Potions are quite high enough... 400-800c each for 30 minutes of a medium to low level of bonus is pretty steep considering zero coppers went into it's manufacture beyond portal costs.

Let's not start inflating right after everyone spent their savings on plots.

[Nambroth]

Always works for me. I haven't so much touched a food item since the DP revision.

Same here. I mean no offense to the confectioners by that at all.... I'm just too lazy to seek out a tavern and do the food thing.

[Mensar]

I'll admit, I did a 3 day stint in elite blights and garnered a shameful 5 Dps and that was the first I've ever tried food.

I have 300 Ambrosia VII but from what I understand it's not able to be made anymore.. so I feel bad using that.

[Drakarr]

Ambrosia can still be made, the trouble for many is getting the essence of blight which i'm told can be gotten from blighted thornwood. Also I have gotten it from blighted resources that have been blighted by blight anchors.

You just cant get the formula any more.

[Mensar]

I thought it was some type of oil that was required.. I have lots of EoB, nice

[Drakarr]

yeah, spirit oil, thats EoB and soul frags