Many people think alike:
http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=171498.msg7814163#msg7814163
What a bunch of thoughtful like-minded people. ❦
With so many of us in agreement about simple things like strawberry leaves being edible and being thrown into the recipe lists to create anything else they can provide, we could hope to see them implemented soon when Toady finds time for it after the Villains or Magic stuff.
You're welcome.
I've personally never had problems with bogeys appearing if I have a companion but I don't doubt that it happens. You're right about handling bogeys being something outside of novice scope. What I liked to do was roll up a dwarf peasant adventurer, focus on shield and dodge, make sure they spawned with some decent armor and then wander into the wilderness and save before nightfall and a bogeyman ambush. Save-scum until the bogey ambush triggered a martial trance in my dwarf (absolutely required) and then with luck, a lot of dodging and judiciously opportunistic hacking of bogey legs to slow them down, I've power-leveled my peasant. Even with a martial trance you're more likely to die than not at that skill level. I haven't done any serious adventuring since before the speed split changes to combat so I don't know if it's still a workable exploit strategy. As far as whether or not bows are a good choice, just play what you find fun or think fits the adventurer. Roleplay reasons will always give you a better play than min-max reasons (says a person who has done a far bit of min-maxing).
Regarding cabbage leaf in adventure mode, it actually makes sense with the current implementation. The cabbage leaf is modelling the outer green leaves of the head that we all throw away. The problem is that herbalism hasn't been implemented in adventure mode yet. For instance, your adventurer can come across a fisherberry and not be able to do anything more than set it on fire. In fortmode a herbalist can pick the berry and have an edible raw food item as easily as that. Once herbalism is folded into adventure mode you'll be able to pick the cabbage, throw away the inedible outer leaves that are the "cabbage leaf" and eat the deliciously crunchy cabbage head. Until then a vegetarian adventurer needs to make do with things that are completely edible and so don't require herbalism to "pick" the good bits, like lettuce and garden cress etc. That's why I've searched for the purple amaranth to corroborate your findings and see whats up with the leaves. Maybe the fact that you can mill them makes their otherwise edible leaves inaccessible to the adventurer (my current working theory based on nothing).
Are Dwarves the only race that can fall into a Martial Trance? They seem to be the race I read the most about falling into moods and trances, but that may have to do with Fortress Mode since they are the only playable race there, I think. Nevertheless, that is a very interesting and smart idea to train an Adventurer that way, and it may not be possible due to a speed-split change? What does that do in Dwarf Fortress? That is one thing that puzzled me... the precision-based attacks that allow us to choose which part of a creature we want to attack. I don't know if it has to do with my skills or the strength of the creature I fought, but it seems that some creatures are
very good at evading my attacks and
very fast—acting faster than I could possibly act which allows them to consecutively wrestle and harm my Adventurer before it is my Adventurer's turn. My speed was 1.000 at the time, and the creature I fought was called a "Butterfly Monster" in my Human Adventurer's pocket world, so I am hoping not every creature is like that. It gave me the impression that min-maxing (or training to maximize my important skills) is very important in Adventure Mode.
Huh, that actually makes a lot of sense, and I am surprised I did not think of that since I do tend to peel off and discard the outer layers of vegetables—cabbages, lettuces, onions, and sometimes potatoes despite their skin being edible and very nutritious—before I cook them; however, I wonder why that does not apply to lettuces in Dwarf Fortress since they also tend to have filthy and undesirable outer layers. Herbalism not being an attainable skill for Adventurers must be an oversight since it is basically foraging which is something Adventurers do throughout their adventures for sustenance, but perhaps we will see Herbalism made attainable for Adventurers when Toady is able to show Adventure Mode more attention after the Villains and Magic updates. I feel terrible for those who wanted to roleplay a Pacifist Vegetarian, though.
I agree! It would be awesome to see more variety in cooking. Different leaf teas and coffee for dwarves and humans, meat/bone teas for knife-ears, and such.
Also poisonous plants would be FUN! You know, having your adventurer with low skill accidentally misidentify edible berries with poisonous ones, and get a syndrome, which could range from mildly irritating, to permanently crippling, to lethal. That could depend on the plant, and the dose. The lowest dose being licking. And adventurers, that are starving, or have a greedy trait, would automatically/more likely consume a larger dose.
Kind of funny that apricots are edible with their stone included!
Right?! I would love to see those missing recipes be added to Fortress and Adventurer Mode to provide more versatility to certain leaves, fruits, and vegetables. You're getting me hyped up with all of these brilliant ideas. ❦
Poisonous plants would stop us from carelessly picking and trying every vegetable we find, and I really like that idea. They could change the whole "lick" thing to an option we can use to test objects based on taste, and
as DG mentioned, we are missing Herbalism in Adventure Mode, and I believe that could help Adventurers and Dwarves identify what is and is not poisonous based on "l"ooking at their descriptions before picking them (Herbalism will provide more information about vegetables when picked and checked within inventories). Licking the vegetables—or any poisoned item—would have a chance to convey the slightest of their poisonous effects as well as a high chance to resist them, since it is slight dosage after all from merely a lick, and would provide a more detailed description about the item when inspected after being licked.
Oh, and I did see something called an "apricot pit" in the tree, I think, so I believe they are automatically spat out onto the ground when the Adventurer or NPC finishes consuming the edible parts of the apricot; although, I would not put it pass characters in Dwarf Fortress eating the whole thing then potentially dying to asphyxiation due to the pit since deaths seem to be silly in this game, lol.
(E: Fixed spacing, and added a tidbit more information.)