Properly store stuff?

[rav]

Can i somehow properly place things where i want, like im able to do with the things from the quick menu?
Its not a big problem but i'd like if things looked a bit more sorted than just dropping everything on the ground

Also i've got an excess of canned foods atm, is it advicable to store some in front of my temporary base? isnt canned food the best food in the game since it can warm you up while meat cant?

[25rad]

It's not super-obvious but you can:

You can drop item on the ground and then look at it and click RightMouseButton to drag it and place anywhere, like on a shelf or under the table. Then click LeftMouseButton to confirm positioning.

[rav]

Thanks i have to try this :)

[Explore]

If you right click on an item in the environment you can move it around (where it goes green, then you left click to confirm the move).

Really what makes canned food better than meat is it lasts longer and weighs less - you get the same warming benefit from drinking coffee and you'd probably want to do that too before leaving your base in the morning. Better than canned foods are energy bars, jerky, crackers and MRE. Also cattail stalks are surprisingly good - they contain nearly as many calories:weight as MRE, and they last forever.

[SBlack]

According to the Wiki most canned food has a lower decay rate inside while candy bars and the like are better outside

https://thelongdark.fandom.com/wiki/Decay

[IFIYGD]

Meat and fish will not warm you. But they have 2 decay sessions. They can decay while raw, down to 1%. You can then cook it, and it regains 50% condition. Risky if you don't have a high Cooking Skill level in Survival Mode.

(No Skill levels in Wintermute, so Explore, who has said he only played Wintermute so far... may not know about, and may not understand some things are different between Survival Mode and Wintermute Story Mode. 2 different animals here, and he is ginving advice from a Wintermute-only POV, leaving some stuff out, since he has never played Survival mode...)

So, store meat and fish outdoors, it decays at about 1% / day. Let it decay to 50% condition and cook it, and it is restored to 100% condition. And can be left to decay a second time. So it lasts much longer than most canned foods do. After being cooked, rewarming meat and fish will not restore any more condition, that only happens once. But if you have Cooking Skill Lvl 5, and gain the immunity to food poisoning from that Skill, you can eat 1% meat and fish, COOKED ONLY, and not get food poisoning or internal parasites. Level up that skill asap.

Canned food regains 0% condition when cooked. If it is 20% before cooking, it will be 20% after cooking. It will warm you if you eat it right away, but it may give you food poisoning if you do not have Cooking Skill Lvl 5. If it is cooked and allowed to cool, it will no longer have the added warmth buff.

Each has pros and cons. Canned food has no smell to attract animals, neither do cattails or coffee and teas. Meat and fish do, more when raw, less when cooked. Cattails never spoil, neither do rose hip tea, coffee, herbal tea, and reishi mushroom tea. Rose hip tea and reishi tea have medicinal value if you have the affliction they treat, but they, and herbal tea and coffee, aslo have 100 calories, taken cold or warm, and warming bonus if taken warm.

Personally, In Survival, I eat canned foods first to get rid of them before they spoil away to ruined state. I stockpile meat and fish outside of my bases, and will cook it as needed later on, or cook a bunch up to raise my Cooking Skill level to 5 as quickly as possible. Canned foods too, I cook everything that can be cooked, to raise Cooking Skill Lvl up fast. Once you hit Lvl 5 in Survival, you have food options out the whazoo, even on higher experience modes.