Chef Archive

Just curious as to why you'd go with merchant 3-0-0-0, since that still leaves you at the same amount of items you can store on a vendor as a novice merchant has. I would think that merchant x-x-x-3 would be much more useful so that you can sell lots of items, and still store all the resources you'll end up accumulating.

Also, trim is used in to make casks. It takes 2 identical pieces of trim from a factory crate (plus some crystalline gemstone) to make one cask. Tailors can make trim at 0-0-1-0 and it comes in real handy to either have a tailor make you a lot of schematics from some resources you provide or to pick it up yourself because you'll find that you're running a TON of casks. I believe tailors generally charge in the neighborhood of 2.5k-3k for each crate (seems to be pretty consistant on most servers, but there are always those that are hyper-inflated and hyper-depressed). I haven't purchased trim since the first week I was a chef because it's just not very cost effective. I would much rather bring a few stacks of inert petrochem and fiberplast to a tailor and have a schematic made. It lasts longer and it's oodles more convenient, however, you'll need a wearables factory to make the trim, so keep that in mind.

The thing about the additives is that they can really increase the production costs of your food if you purchase them from a BE. They can range anywhere from 20k-60k depending on the economy of your sever. I've seen them sell for as little as 12k (for really low-bonus nurtition additives) and as high as 65k (where someone was just completely nuts and had no idea what the going rate was). What you'll find that most chefs do is to run around and find a good, solid, stable BE to make us schematics (Yep, just like we do with the tailors!). Having to only rely on yourself when it comes time to making all your components really affords you a lot more flexibility. If you're constantly trying to hunt down a shop that regularly carries additives and then you're constantly trying to hunt down a tailor that regularly sells trim, you may just run yourself ragged. Schematics are just easier. Pop one in when you need some more, and voila!...there it is. No waiting, no searching. The schematic is already in your datapad ready to go. The only thing different about having schematics for additives is that you're going to need a LOT of meat and flora, and not just any meat and flora...HIGH QUALITY stuff. Stuff you'll want to use in your cooking. Stuff you'll probably pay many, many cpu for. For a full run of 40 crates of 25 intelligent nanonutrient additives (1000 total individual additives), you'll need 20,000 units of meat and 90,000 units of flora. For a full run of broad spectrum nutrients, you'll need 20,000 units of meat, again, and 60,000 units of flora. If you have a surplus of this good stuff then I would 100% recommend having several schematics made at a time and just using them as necessary, however, if you're just starting and you don't have all the supplies yet, it's not going to hurt anything if you go out and buy some ready-made crates of additives from your local BE to get you started.

So, if that's confusing as far as what's needed for what, here's the breakdown for the most common things needed from both tailors and BE's:

Tailor:
Trim = 5 units inert petrochemical
20 units fiberplast

BE (Again, these are just the most common additives that are used. They make up about 90-95% of what you'll be using every single day):
Micronutrient Supplement = 15,000 units meat
25,000 units flora food

Broad Spectrum Nutrient = 20,000 units meat
60,000 units flora food

Intelligent Nanonutrient = 20,000 units meat
90,000 units flora

It looks like a lot, but the only reason I'm giving you the numbers this way is so you can figure out whether you have the resources to start off having schematics made for you or if you should purchase pre-made items from tailors and BE's to begin with.

Wsheew. That was a long post. Did it make any sense at all? lol.

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TheCro wrote:

Ok, so a possible template here could be:

MasterChef

MasterBio-Engineer

Merchant 3xxx

Artisan x442

Which uses exactly 250pts.

Could some explain what Trim is; how it plays in; costs of it. Thanks - just trying to get a good overall idea!

And say I didn't do MBio-Engineer, is buying the additives a pretty big financial burden, if that's the right way to say it. As to leave open the points for something like MDoc or MTailor, whatever might fancy me?

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That is currently my exact template except for the xxx2, I went 3001 merchant. For me the 2 was useless in surveying, I was just spending way too much time so I decided to get 0004 Artisan on my 2nd toon. This may not be an option for you, but it was a huge time saver for me.

As a few have mentioned Trim is from tailors. You can get 0010 Tailor yourself to make it or buy it from vendors. This isn't that hard to get. I can usually order runs of 40 crates for 125k fairly easily from tailors and in most cases they will drop them on my vendor.

MBE is more for convenience. It won't break your bank to buy tissues as long as you have some starting capital and don't mind the investment. Things like Brandy, Canape, Ahrisa will sell fairly quickly. For some of the odder foods it may be questionable as to whether or not the investment is worthwhile. The bigger issue with not having MBE for me is just finding tissues. Selling tissues isn't exactly very profitable and it can be hard for some BEs to get enough resources for them.

You mentioned that you will keep scout. In all likelyhood if you start selling a lot of food, you will be buying meat. I do harvest my own sometimes but the vaste majority of what I use is bought from hunters(95%+).

Chef+Weaponsmith I think would just drive someone insane. Keeping up with resources and finding ways to store them would just be horrible. Then getting all the lots for the harvestors and 2 different types of factories. To make the most money you really have to be close to the best in that profession. Even one average profession I think would be better than playing 2 while splitting time with BH. I just don't believe many people would have enough time to make it work.