Cannot progress without understanding crafting food and drink

[Glarbasaur]

Im now at a point where every new room is going to need 6-9 of an aspect to unlock.
early-midgame Baronial/Curia spoilers
I've got an oven, piano, organ, three shrines, alchemists table, 3 beds, bunch of gardens. Does anyone actually know how to craft potent food or drinks? I still haven't been able to cure my Shell-Crossed Wist because Ive never found a strong lantern drink. Feels like I've read every book I'm remotely near able to. I havent written in the journal yet because I feel like I should have a stronger ink first.
Every time I try, I can't get past prentice level recipes. I can make eigenbraug, tanglebrag, certainty, regensburg balm, perhibiate, etc. I need to make food or drink to cure maladies and buff assistance. How. I dont want ink or ideas or pigments when i put an egg and an herb together.
If anyone has any insight, It'd help.

[somebodybond]

Have you hired any Unusual Visitors? They're an important resource, but the game really doesn't tell you how to get them: At the Inn, slot in any (unfatigued) Soul card & some money. You'll get back a fatigued Soul card, your money (you only had to show it), and a random Unusual Visitor card. Each one usually has rank 4 in three aspects and can be hired for 2 shillings. They make it much, much easier to get into the mid-tier rooms that you're now finding.

Also, when talking to a (hired) assistant, click the open slot to see the different things you can give them to boost their skills. Every assistant can take one Soul card, one Memory, one Beverage, one Sustenance, and one Tool (you get the Tool back immediately) - they stack, so you can find combinations (especially more potent Memories and upgraded Soul cards) that add up to a good amount. Some Assistants can also make use of other cards - the Coffinmaker can use Wood, for example.

[Pandorian]

To cure a malady you don't need a strong drink of that type. You just need the aspect mentioned in an intensity of 5(or higher) AND a drink. So for your example: a Phost, Sunny Day/Revelation, any skill with at least 1 Lantern, and any drink would cure you.
Obviously the stronger your skill the less aspects you need from your soul card and the memory/weather.

[Rai "Apex Legends" Taki]

You can actually boost followers up to 5 times, once each using Food, Drink, Tool, Memory and Elements of the Soul. Additionally each of the 3 people you can hire from their houses in town can use be boosted a 6th time using a specific item category; the blacksmith is boosted by Metal, the midwife by Fabric, dunno what the other guy uses.
- Check your workstations for "Evolve using X" traits and use them if possible to upgrade your EotS so they give a bigger bonuses when used on followers.
- Explore along the bottom floor of the Hush House until you hit the pathway going down to the underground area. There you will find a well that you can use to draw up drinkable well water (+1 to several Principles) without needing to spend anything on crafting.
- Set aside a bunch of books you've already read and remember what memory you get from them. Re-reading them gives you a reliable source of renewable memories you can then give to your followers.
-- Open packages until you find a Yellowing Newspaper. Keep that inventory. Using Consider on it doesn't use it up and gives you a persistent (e.g. doesn't expire at dawn) memory that gives +2 in several Principles.

Between +2 from memory, +1 from tool, +up to maybe 4 from EotS and potential +1 from well water, you can clear out up to maybe like 8-11 from the cheaper hireables from town. Then, you can start tapping the pool of better hireables by using money + an EotS at the same time in the tavern, these guys have 4 in their Principles so that's a couple more levels you can get through. After that is...yep, figuring out which of your skills can craft the good tools/drinks to give your followers.

Edit: Crafting system goes like this:
Each Skill has a list of things it can craft, 6 in total (3 for each of that skill's Principle), though I think in most if not all cases there are multiple skills that can craft the same item.
- The Power 5 recipe is straightforward, get power 5 and you craft the thing.
- The Power 10 recipe requires a specific item category (e.g. Glass, Pigment, Liquid, etc.)
- The Power 15 recipe requires a specific item, which seems to generally be the item you can get from the same skill's Power 10 recipe. The resulting item also tends to be a LOT stronger than the power 10 one.

If you slot in a skill, an EotS and power 10/15 of a correct Principle, the recipe will tell you what specific item category/specific item you need for it if you don't have it slotted in already. You can still craft without meeting that requirement, but the result will just be the lowest tier you meet the requirement for.

[yamidamian]

The aspects of the drink doesn’t have to match the injury it’s healing-you can use any random beverage so long as you can dredge up enough Lantern using your other 3 available slots (Memory, Skill, and Soul)

[Glarbasaur]

I'd known I could boost assistance. I found out you can only do a weather or a memory, not both. I don't know a source for cloths for the midwife, metal for the smith? Ive found wood for the undertaker, but it's never the right aspects for him so I've been keeping it as fuel.
Didn't know about unusual visitors.
Not sure where I find packages? Just from the beach? I just keep getting onions and mackerel.
I will try to progress with unusual visitors boosted by soul and memories until I can find a way to produce food and beverages.
Also rai, the rector is good for lantern and sky, he costs a shilling and a soul.
The midwife is gained by talking with ereb, the undertaker with wist. Same house.

[somebodybond]

Originally posted by Glarbasaur:

I'd known I could boost assistance. I found out you can only do a weather or a memory, not both. I don't know a source for cloths for the midwife, metal for the smith? Ive found wood for the undertaker, but it's never the right aspects for him so I've been keeping it as fuel.
Didn't know about unusual visitors.
Not sure where I find packages? Just from the beach? I just keep getting onions and mackerel.
I will try to progress with unusual visitors boosted by soul and memories until I can find a way to produce food and beverages.
Also rai, the rector is good for lantern and sky, he costs a shilling and a soul.
The midwife is gained by talking with ereb, the undertaker with wist. Same house.

Weathers are memories; that's why you can't use a weather and a memory.

You'll find some packages in the House, but also at the Beach, yeah.

[Rai "Apex Legends" Taki]

6th assistance option for the town dwellers should be a last-resort, since it's not as easy to get more. There's a fair amount of fabric lying around and some tapestries etc around the House can be torn up into more fabric. As for metal...not sure if there's even a decent source of it, the first third or so of the House barely has any. Main source is probably crafting, but again skills that can make metal seem scarce enough that I've only noticed one (Lockworks & Clockworks).

[Glarbasaur]

Originally posted by somebodybond:

Weathers are memories; that's why you can't use a weather and a memory.

Weather and memories are pretty similar, but when you've failed the initial check when reading a book, they are not interchangeable. Opportunity Weather =/= Opportunity Memory.
So I figured they might fill different collaborate slots. They don't.

[Rai "Apex Legends" Taki]

Originally posted by Glarbasaur:

Originally posted by somebodybond:

Weathers are memories; that's why you can't use a weather and a memory.

Weather and memories are pretty similar, but when you've failed the initial check when reading a book, they are not interchangeable. Opportunity Weather =/= Opportunity Memory.
So I figured they might fill different collaborate slots. They don't.

Weathers ARE memories, but not all memories are weather. A lot of stuff have multiple categorical aspects.

[Stim The One]

Okay, so two problems here. Let's deal with them separately.

How to make drinks and food. So far, I have found that the grand majority of them tie into nectar and grail... of which I discovered. You want a starter recipe, Witching Tisane (2 Grail, 1 Heart) - 5 Grail - Leaves and Thorns, Desires and Dissolutions. Yes, I am also mentioning the skill because not ALL skills work for it. I have a few other grail skills and they instead do other results. True, I don't have a lot of recipes so far. Should give a day for that. And note down the recipes.

Followers can be buffed by something else than food and drink. Yes, soul works, then memories (But I don't have renewable memories... yes, you do. Read books again. Note down what memories they give. Though you probably don't need more than one book to tell you the result, unless it's a movie or phonograph record). All those stack to get those big results. And as stated, check for unusual visitors by slotting ready soul AND enough cash (that only makes you look for them, then you need to talk to them to buy the assistance). Unusual visitors have 3 aspects at 4. And maybe if you upgrade soul qualities you get a little more soul to buff them with (check workstations where you can put two soul bits and look at the PATH they say you have to tie it to)

And in the end, don't worry. You can do a LOT even with the stuff you can open with up to 8 of an aspect.

[somebodybond]

Originally posted by Glarbasaur:

Originally posted by somebodybond:

Weathers are memories; that's why you can't use a weather and a memory.

Weather and memories are pretty similar, but when you've failed the initial check when reading a book, they are not interchangeable. Opportunity Weather =/= Opportunity Memory.
So I figured they might fill different collaborate slots. They don't.

As far as I know, every card with the Weather aspect also has the Memory aspect. You should be able to use a Weather card anywhere that you could use a Memory card, as long as it isn't specifically barred.

On the other hand, most cards with the Memory aspect don't have the Weather aspect. So yeah, you won't be able to use non-Weather Memory cards in a slot that specifically wants Weather.

The game's mechanics hinge on those Aspects - the colorful icons that show up in the top-right popup when you click a card or object. You're expected to check everything to know its Aspects & click every open slot to see what Aspects it requires, permits, and prohibits. If you talk to an Assistant, you can click the slot that opens up to see the Aspects they can accept - and if you give them something, you can click the Assistant's card to see how it changed their Aspects. It doesn't just add to their Principles (Heart/Grail/etc.); it also gives them a new Aspect that indicates what kind of thing you gave them.

They don't specifically accept Weather; they just accept Memory. And when you give them a Weather, they get the "has taken a Memory" aspect (however it's phrased; I forget). So your Assistants don't really care that it's Weather at all; they just care that it's a Memory. As you said, there are other slots that do care if it's Weather.

[sadfence]

Following the last reply, put memory in first if you stuck on a book. There are possibilities to put in just *weather* (but not memory) as you go through the additional checks. Sniff a pale wrack washed up by the beach (nectar1) , or pet a scaly creature from the forest for a fairy-ring-like memory (nectar2)is a better option for reading a nectar book than directly get there with rainy weather (nectar 2), especially when there are quite some difference to cover.