More Awesome Than You!

+++ What This Mod Does

This mod increases the duration of the "Good Meal", "Great Meal", and "Excellent Meal" buffs from the default 8 hour duration of AwesomeMod's "MotivePerkRebalance" option to either a 24- or 36-hour duration depending on which package file you install.

You should generally install this mod only if you have already taken (or plan to take ASAP) the "Hardly Hungry" lifetime reward on the Sims that you actively play most often. Nothing bad happens if you don't have Hardly Hungry on a Sim; the net result is an uber permabuff for the meal buffs on every Sim that doesn't have Hardly Hungry.

A weakness in both the EAxis default game code and in AwesomeMod's current "MotivePerkRebalance" option is that the default duration for the meal buffs is not dynamically increased at all when you take the "Hardly Hungry" lifetime reward. The net result is that you suddenly end up with many many MANY hours when you are running around without this very nice buff. So to keep these good meal buffs active most of the time, you must manually feed your sim when they're still practically full, and thereby risk stuffing them to the point of weight gain, especially if you're using the AwesomeMod options that don't allow your Sims to rebound from bodyshape changes.

NOTE: Pescado might eventually update AwesomeMod to compensate his default 8-hour meal buff duration from the "MotivePerkRebalance" option when you give Hardly Hungry to a Sim. This would be useful if he can apply it intelligently on a per-Sim basis. This mod is a blunt instrument workaround to make Hardly Hungry useful and desireable in the meantime. You should remember to yank this mod if Pescado ever updates AwesomeMod as I've described. Remember, your active Sims that don't have the "Hardly Hungry" lifetime reward will essentially be permanently meal-buffed when this mod is installed (but your Sims that do have Hardly Hungry will have useful buff durations).


+++ Which Package Should I Use? the 24-hour one or the 36-hour one?

Once you take the "Hardly Hungry" lifetime reward, your Sim will go for 48 hours before it becomes hungry enough to autonomously eat again. So choose the package that gives you the amount of unbuffed time before your Sim will auto-eat that you feel gives you the best gameplay value. The following list can help you decide:

Decay rates when you have the Hardly Hungry reward:
* By 24 hours after eating, the motive bar for hunger will be at the 66% mark.
* By 36-hour after eating, the motive bar will be at the 50% mark.
* By 48 hours after eating, the motive bar for hunger will be at the 33% mark,
  and the Sim now has a high chance to autonomously eat.


+++ What Might This Mod Conflict With?

This mod is a simple XML tuning of the Cooking_0xdfd048952e802db0 resource from the GameplayData.package. Therefore, it can only conflict with another mod that uses the same resource.

* This mod is compatible with AwesomeMod as of 7-July-2009. Pescado does not not use the same resource, and his
  custom logic to handle the "MotivePerkRebalance" option does not conflict with the XML tuning in this mod.
  IMPORTANT: This non-conflict might change in the future so keep your eye on further changes that Pescado
  might make to MotivePerkRebalance, and yank this mod if he mentions that he's now dynamically compensating
  for Sims that have the "Hardly Hungry" lifetime reward.

* This mod is compatible with Czezechael's "Faster Cooking Slower Eating" mod. None of his packages from
  that mod use the same resource.

* This mod does not conflict with any mod I see listed on ModTheSims as of 7-July-2009


+++ Installing This Mod

Hopefully you know the drill, but just in case:

1. You must have a mod framework for TS3.

2. Copy only ONE of the packages in this zip file to your ../Mods/Packages folder.
   Install both and TS3 go boom.

3. It's always a good idea to delete all four *Cache.package files from
   your ../My Documents/Electronic Arts/The Sims 3 folder when you add
   any new mod to your environment.

The forum software here lies; I cannot actually edit the OP in this thread despite the forum teasing me and making me think I actually can.

So quick correction to the preceding: After further testing, it seems that AwesomeMod is not responsible for the 8-hour default meal buff duration; that's default EAxis behavior, and as with many other shitprogramming/shitQA issues that made it past release and the first game updates, EAxis made the Dirt Defiant reward extend the Squeeky Clean buff from 7 hours to something like roughly 26 hours, but they neglected to make the Hardly Hungry reward extend the Good/Great/Excellent Meal buffs from 8 hours to something reasonable.

If Pescado ever decides to add some intelligent handling of the meal buffs (only Sims with Hardly Hungry get the duration upped) to AwesomeMod, you can yank this mod from your arsenal. In the meantime, I think it makes having Hardly Hungry worthwhile.

I still kind of think that the food system should be revamped so some foods are fattening and some are not. That way you could have a sim re-eat certain foods even if they weren't especially hungry and could get the good meal moodlet again. I mean how silly is that sims can get fat from 'overeating' on atumn salad and fruit salad. :p

Anyway, ranting on a pet peeve aside, it was still dumb for EA to not compensate for Hardly Hungry, I agree, so thanks for this. I do kind of wish there was a way for it to effect only hardly hungry sims, but I guess that would be complicated to do and probably not possible with an xml mod.

Actually, it's not a feature of AwesomeMod to set the duration, the duration is set by EAxis, AwesomeMod doesn't touch the meal buff.

I can look into setting it so that the meal buff actually DOES vary proportionately if you have this trait...

I'll look into it.