Gourmonger

The Gourmonger is a simple yet powerful “engine”; a living organism that eats food and expels radiation with efficiencies higher than should be physically AND biologically possible. A Gourmonger engine requires little initial setup but a much larger investment in ongoing maintenance than other engines.

Gourmongers are a type of creature/engine that create harvestable radiation by consuming food, and other sources of nutrition. After consuming enough they will split into more of themselves. Gourmongers get hungry over time and need to be somewhat constantly fed to avoid becoming their next meal. Unlike other engines which are primarily based around a complicated setup with little upkeep, Gourmongers require significantly less construction but very high upkeep. There is however no upper limit on the power they are capable of producing, should enough food be available.

At roundstart the Chief Engineer's locker contains a single Gourmonger Cube, and more can be ordered via Cargo. Place the cube where you want to construct the engine, have plenty of food ready, and spray it with water. The ideal 'engine room' is one with many radiation collectors to house them, and ideally methods of shielding to contain them. As Gourmongers are extremely radioactive you will want to wear a radiation suit at all times while ranching them. A method of adding food to their cage without entering it yourself is a good idea: Conveyor belts, disposal chutes, and hacked vending machines are all good options. Get creative. Ideally you'll want their feeding method to have a somewhat controllable timer as to prevent over/under feeding.

Gourmongers generate radiation based on how much nutrition they have banked. They gain nutrition from chemicals in food at the same rate humans do. That means a chunk of meat filled with 100u corn oil will cause a significant bump in radiation. A moderate amount of radiation is emitted at a steady rate from each Gourmonger. They also generate very small amounts when eating and a huge burst when splitting. Essentially more nutrition = more power, with similar logic to a supermatter shard.

Gourmongers reproduce asexually when they eat enough meals. It is important to note this is based on amount of meals, not nutrition of the meals so a platter of Discount Dan chocolate bars will split a gour just as fast as a platter of corn oil filled lobster dinners. These meals will be referred to as “meal points” for clarity.

Gourmongers lose meal points over time. When they hit roughly 20 meal points they split. Their babies will be fed by the parent's body, resulting in no loss of total nutrition.

Gourmongers have an increasing chance to lose a meal point every tick. The chance to lose a meal point is:

(ticks spent fasting + meal points)/10 %

Meaning they have a higher chance to lose a meal point when they are closer to splitting. You will know they're close to splitting as they glow more intensely as they approach the needed meals.

When splitting a Gourmonger will add 10% of its banked nutrients to each child. It will then gib into meat. This meat contains its total banked nutrition converted into nutriment, with enough meat to contain 20u of that nutriment. Their meat also comes with an additional 3u nutriment. This means that splitting effectively multiplies total banked nutrition as the 10% transferred to children is not subtracted from the parent, and more nutrition means more meat means more bonus nutriment. So splitting can be very beneficial for power, as not only do you have another source of radiation but you've multiplied your total nutrition as well as reset the meal count to 0. You do now however have another mouth to feed.

Gourmongers lose nutrition over time. This amount ('ticks spent fasting') begins small but increases the longer they've gone without a meal. There is no upper limit on this amount, however it resets to 0 when they lose a meal point as described above. This means nutrition can be managed by keeping their meal points high enough to keep their metabolism low, filling them with enough nutrition to manage higher losses, or ideally, a combination of both.

Losing nutrition means losing power as radiation generation is linearly based on their banked nutrition. Low enough nutrition drives them to starvation, which you very much want to avoid.

Gourmongers currently eat food and dead/crit mobs. Humans (and other sentients) are consumed one limb at a time, with their arms and legs first then their torso. Heads are not eaten.

Gourmongers take the same amount of time to eat a meal regardless of what it is, how many chemicals it contains, or any other factor.

The corpses of mobs provide 3 meal points rather than 1. This is also true of every individual limb of a human corpse.

Chemicals in food provide their nutritional value equal to the amount in humans.

Mobs provide nutrition equal to their maximum health. Humans provide 1/3rd of their nutrition per limb eaten. This means humans provide more nutrition than they contain if fully consumed.

This means small amounts of nutrient dense foods are best for increasing rad output, and mob/human corpses are best for intentionally splitting quickly. Very fat humans are also a high source of nutrition.

It should be noted that Gourmongers don't share meals. If one finishes consuming a meal before another manages to, the slow one won't receive a single point of nutrition. This can cause a chain reaction where the runt of the litter goes hungry as its siblings feast. As humans are consumed in multiple portions this can help feed a runt. Alternatively splitting large herds of Gourmongers into several separate pens can reduce this risk.

When nutrition drops below a starvation threshold (currently 50) a Gourmonger will enter a feeding frenzy. The nutrition threshold to exit frenzy is much higher than to enter it(currently 500). In this state they are completely uncontainable and will locate and hunt players through scent, they can detect them through walls or other barricades. If a Gourmonger finds another suitable meal along the way it will abandon its current target and devour the meal instead.

Gourmongers are able to smash through walls, machines, and structures that block their path, due to their odd and malleable biology they are able to wriggle through any other obstruction. Nothing but death or a full stomach can stop a starving Gourmonger. Not only are Gourmongers physically intimidating, they also continue to emit radiation which can weaken their prey.

A Gourmonger engine's power output benefits greatly from splitting. Not only does it increase the amount of radiation emitting mobs, but it multiplies your nutrition investment and allows you to feed the engine more often before another split occurs. Any aspiring Gourmonger ranchers must be cautious not to allow the herd to grow too large, either don't over feed them or cull their population somehow, as a single hungry Gourmonger will be more than happy to smash through their holding pen and cause a chain reaction of starvation and consumption.

In short: The failure state of the engine is allowing the Gourmonger population to reach a number you are incapable of keeping fed. If even one goes hungry, it's very likely the rest will follow.