How can I get the "On a diet" challenge?

[bobs.unicorn]

I'm really struggling to get enough soybeans to last the winter and also have no clue how I'm going to beat the domains late game if my bourgeoisie's can't have soft bread (unless they can?) What's the strat here?

Also want to say thank you so much for your time and dedication to the game and the community! You've got me truly hooked!

[Imhotep]

I've not played Yugong, but I'd guess making Milk from Soya with the Soy Milk Maker and then making Cheese at the Dairy or Herbal Dairy.

Not sure whether Soft Bread at the Bakery, using Milk and Flour, would be allowed.

[DsnowMan]

I'm not sure you are allowed to eat anything but soy beans, maybe Catman can confirm.

But I did recently get the 'on a diet' achievement on harder by eating only soy and no bougies, so I can help ( I was on fast mode, which might help because the winters are half as long?)

I got up to 30 pips the first year and had a massive plot of soy. You only need some of the plants to be fertile with water, I was harvesting 15 per pip (later even more) and I built enough warehouses and small cellars to get 400 storage. That's enough to get 30 pips through the first (fast) winter.

Then comes the fun part. Had to find the most efficient non bougie buildings for each domain and slowly spam them, while also increasing my pip count to about 50 and building storage up to 1500 or so.

Key professions are watchers, knife masters, healers and herbalists (and whoever works in the gardens). Also lots and lots and lots of parks and gardens.

If you get the alt brick you don't need a bougie to get bricks and you can build the doom tower to call Armageddon early. This means you can skip 2nd winter and need less storage, but have to be extra prepared for final events.

I didn't have bricks and just rode out the winter, but it was probably good I did because you can build up a huge surplus of protection before Armageddon.

[Catman]

Yes, only Soy Beans can be consumed for eating, both by Pips and Animals (so no Bourgeoise, and no animals that cannot consume Soy!)

[BlueFenixR]

Build a ton of Warehouses to stockpile enough for winter (And apocalypse), and go for quantity instead of quality for the later buildings (To not use Bourgeoise).

[robbie.price]

The other option is to also stockpile Herbs, and Hemp. . . . Each herb will add health equivalent to 3.75 or so pips enough to counter the effect of starvation. and each hemp can heal away 1 starvation worth of damage.
If you spend the whole winter with half your colony gathering hemp and the other half turning herbs and hemp into health. . . . you will probably die from something else. but maybe health anyway.

[robbie.price]

ok, to do the math right:

For a standard 50 Pip colony with no blue pips (enough to win the game).
you need 40 days of food or equivalent, or 2000 need satisfactions:

Each food you can store is 1, Each missed food requires 2 points of health to counter.
each pair of herbs heals 15 health, Each health is 0.5 food equivalents.
so each pair of herbs is 7.5 'starvation mitigation'
so each herb is 3.75 'starvation mitigation'
4 food, becomes 8 health, or 4 starvation mitigation, or 1:1`.

so you need 2000 units of food or food substitutes, and each unit of storage gets you (1+3.75+1) units of survival.

so for a colony of 50 pips you need just shy of 350 total storage. and you need Just shy of 7 extra units of storage for every additional pip you bring,

That assumes the Health Domain leaves you alone. . . But to compensate you can harvest hemp all winter . . .

[robbie.price]

The winter I am in is only 20 days long, which makes it easier.