Chef Archive
Thread: Is Chef a complicated profession?
The reason I ask is I'm trying to get my gf to get into the game, but she would never take a combat profession, so I was trying to get her setup with a crafting prof that wasnt AS or WS. I read over the FAQ to get an idea of what you all do, and my eyes litteraly glazed over, it seems so complicated! What is the learning curve on your profession? Any feedback would be helpful
In my opinion it is one of the hardest. There are so many different foods and drinks to make. We rely heavily on other professions to craft our items like Bio Engineers (chef tissues), Tailors (trim for casks), and Rangers (creature resources), not to mention the need for resource vendors or the harvestors to get it yourself. It is very very very time consuming and takes a ton of credits before you even start to be a successful chef on your server. You will also need a ton of factories and the power(radiation) to run them. We use every possible flora resource on the server and several of the minerals and chemicals. And the creature resources are even worse. Quality is of the upmost importance on everything we craftso mediocre resources will make mediocre edibles. If you plan on starting up a vendor, it will be hard to compete with the top chefs on your server as they are already established and have a definate edge in clothing attachments and resources long gone. I personally do not recommend chef for the faint of heart but it is very fullfilling if you have the time and patience not to mention the resources to hit the ground running when you start.
So, to answer your question. YES, it is a very difficult profession but very fulfilling if you have the dedication.
Thanks for the feedback, Im thinking the gf may get turned off by the sheer complexity, especially when dealing with factories. Is there a guide on the forums for operating factories?
On a side note, once you are established as a Master Chef how profitable can I expect to be based on your experience? Should I also master merchant?
Message Edited by MeilanEisley on 06-07-2005 07:26 AM
Personally I disagree that it is such a hard proffesion. I took a look at Architect, Droid Engineer and Weaponsmith before taking a look at Chef and I took to it quite easily. I have a good relationship with 3 good BE's on my server in addition to my Guild BE and buy in bulk. At the moment I have probably 5 lots each of the medium and heavy additives on order off 2 BE's and will be keeping them till I need them. Also I picked up Tailor which I founf surprisingly easy and profitable so I make my own Trim.
The one thing I do agree with is the cost. I must have invested 35-40m before I even sold a thing. Its been 2 weeks or so now and i make 1-3m a day and I have orders currently of a further 40m worth of food in addition to what i need to keep my own vendor fully stocked.
I do buy all of my resources which I don't feel push my prices up too much and I also have 12 food factories in addition to the other 13 I have for various other things like Tailor and I don't find them to be enough. I will soon be placing a further 8 to help augment my producing power and expand to a 2nd Mall. I also agree that it is quite tiem consuming.
I guess it depends on you. I have taken quite well to Chef and thoroughly enjoy it and find it both satisfying and profitable.
Who knows, maybe she might like making something else and decide to try architect or tailor or even master artisan itself.
Crafting skills like armorsmith and chef can be daunting at first glance....
However, while Chef has many things to learn...you can be effective as a chef with relatively little experience. Dont get her into a super easy skill...she will tire of it eventually. Get her into Chef and possibly BE at the same time. The learning curve will seem steep...but those two profession offer endless things you can experiment with and many useful items....so it will keep her interested and enjoying the crafting process for a much longer period of time.
...A steep learning curve would be good, since it implies rapid learning vs time
- Gather resources (either through purchase or harvesting your own).
- Combine resources into factory schematics
- Put schematics and resources into factory, run for a day or two.
- Put finished crates onto vendor.
- Repeat as necessary to restock vendor
Voila!
Most of the complication of chef (and really any crafting profession except tailor and most of architect) is in the evaluation of resource quality and experimentation. We certainly don't have to worry about the umpteen-bazillion subcomponents used in armorsmith and DE. Plus, even with our few subcomponents, quality on those doesn't affect the final product, so that's another simplification.
Getting a feel for how resource quality influences item quality is really the trickiest part of SWG crafting, but once that "clicks", it applies to all the crafting profs that deal with experimentation. Even without that, she can take up Tailor or Architect, especially if she's into fashion / home decoration.
Combined with Dancer (or musician) and maybe Image Design I think she should have fun
.Oh and no she won't need Master merchant. 3xxx is handy as it allows her to advertise. x4xx gives you a good discount on maintenance. xx4x allows you to cloth vendors. the last line is for vendors but at novice merchant you should have enough - especially to start with.
Message Edited by menyou on 06-08-2005 01:39 PM
And might I say I LOVE being a chef.