The Potato Conundrum

Gameplay
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Well folks, one of the greatest stonehearth conspiracies to date has finally surfaces. Welcome to the Potato Conundrum, a staggering concept backed up by many sources, and disproved by many others.

In dev stream #83 the question was raised, will potatoes be added to the game. The answer was shocking, Yang (who was conducting that particular stream) said “According to Stephanie: with the age that the game is built in, there actually weren’t potatoes”

Instantly the great minds of the community were working at full steam. What could this mean? The first thing that was done was a full historical check on potatoes.

Solanum tuberosum L. or potatoes originated in the Americas and were later transported to Europe and Asia. This would mean that Stonehearth takes place in the pre-Americas period. A fascinating discovery. But then a problem arose namely corn and pumpkins. The Potato Conundrum has been born.

From that point on the great minds of the community worked at full speed, digging through every possible reference to potatoes, corn, pumpkins, and other time period related material. They even went as far as to as direct questions on future dev streams.

While this frantic search of information was underway a theory revealed itself. Maybe there would be a second stage of exploration in Stonehearth. When you crossed a particularly large ocean you would find the new world, a world with new resources, new opportunities and more. One of the things you would find in the new world would be potatoes. This theory is well supported.

With the biome update immanent we would be seeing oceans and other landmasses, as well as cold climates. potatoes would be the perfect food source for these regions. It would mean that surviving in these frozen lands would not be initially possible.

It would also greatly increase the amount of game-play time a player could expect.

And perhaps the most convincing of all was @Tom’s statement on dev stream #85
"Potatoes will be added later on, I can certainly say that. I’m not sure what your fascination with potatoes is, it is a forlorn love, the love of potatoes." (this is isn’t an exact quote, but it is a paraphrase.)

The way he worded this indeed sounds like potatoes would be a late game discovery.

Then just when the great minds of the community had the proof they needed to make a substantial argument, @sdee happened.

In the latest dev stream #86 Stephanie said two very important things the first one seemed to be the final proof we needed for the Potato Conundrum

“No the hearthlings are, in my perspective, live in about the 1300.” She said in response to the following question “@stonehearth Have the hearthlings gone through the civil rights movement yet?”

And just when we seemed in sight of victory she responded to another direct question “@stonehearth will potatoes be added?”

“that’s an interesting question, there’s no reason for there not to be potatoes, but there is no clear and pressing need for there to be potatoes specifically, maybe they’ll be a cold food.”

After all that…Stephanie absolutely smashed the Potato Conundrum in that simple line.

-Turtlesquish

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There we go. The potato’s a troll after all.

But 1300? Really? That’s far too early for the tech many of us have been discussing/expecting. At this rate, the Engineer’s going to be lucky to have a tea kettle for “steam power”…

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I can share that love of potatoes. aren’t potatoes awesome? not only are they good for the ground, but they can grow in terrain that, even if not for the cold, no other crops could possibly live there. they are what saved ireland (and later caused them a famine, so much for saving), as well as many other countries with climates too cold to support most other crops. their ability to grow just about anywhere proves their reliability as a crop, as well as how necessary they are. as soon as I get my hands on potatoes, nothing shall be grown but the potato! well, aside from pumpkins. I love pumpkins too. JACK-O’-LANTERNS EVERYWHERE! ahem but yes. potatoes, and nothing but potatoes. and pumpkins.

to be fair, we didn’t have geomancers back then either. this might sound odd coming from the guy who wants there to be historical accuracy as far as how equipment works and such, but I see nothing wrong with eventually adding in steam engines and airships. the first hearthling I find with the name “cid” will be saved and promoted to engineer, and he will design all of my airships. bonus points if his last name’s “highwind” lol.

I’m kinda wondering if guns and/or cannons will be added, considering gunpowder was invented around 1000 in china, and it didn’t take long for it to be used in military. in fact, the first instance of gunpowder (or at least cannons) was in the 13th century. the english had cannons in 1327. but if gunpowder is added, it should be a late-game thing, one you would need to heavily research (assuming research is in fact a thing that will exist in the game)

whoops. just realized that’s way off topic. right. potatoes. that’s what we were talking about. the good food. stir em, mash em, stick em in a stew. right. almost forgot. sorry. carry on lol

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Well, all I have to say is that since this is not our world and it has maaaaaggggiiic and all that whatnot, I don’t think we can really score a slam dunk in historical accuracy. I mean, for all we know, the very land hearthlings are settling IS something similar to the Americas, and that the hearthlings came across corn while they were exploring. All I can say is potatoes should be added, for feeding those who live in colder climates as well as the peasant folk.

I have heard that the team may consider the engineer being able to craft guns, but we’re talking very early-age cannons and muskets here.

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I thought this was a fantasy world with Goblins and magic? Does Earth history even translate?

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That’s what I said. But apparently, the mysticism of the potato was too strong for fantasy-world logic to intervene in the conspiracy.

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Potatoes have eyes … the pyramid has an eye … is this some illuminati conspiracy

And I note that the author used the correct spelling of the plural of potato - by including the “e” in potatoes. Can we infer that this agent of the new world order is a follower of the UK rite of the Masonic order!!! But he is trying to assert the dominance of an Americas back-story to StoneHearth so is he really and US rite follower trying some subtle miss-information and redirect… sneaky!!!

Now hold on a sec… there is more… STONEhearth… “Stone”… Masons work with stone. OMG it is real… This game is a brainwashing tool of the Illuminati… they even have us making friends with the green skinned “goblins”, which I for one think they look a lot like some cute Cuthulu proxy…

time to break out the tinfoil hats!!! I want a full refund, but in hemp dollars, not your filthy US currency with the all seeing eye on the pyramid!

I could have gone on longer but I dont want too much of my post to show up in the meta-data analysis tools of the overlords and draw their attention to me now that I am on to them.

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Negative, this is not illuminati inspired…

Indeed, Team Radiant has the capacity to do whatever they wish. However it has been confirmed that @sdee has pages of lore. This along with other quotes (including the 1300s one above) helps paint picture that we can infer certain historical implications.

I would also point out, the original quote

strongly implies that the game does take place in a specific time. And that the time had effects on the gameplay.

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So you deny that you are illuminati!? meh… typical!

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Why the fevered desire for taters? Not like there’s a lot of interesting uses or recipes for them in the setting.

The other staples are there.

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It wasn’t the potatoes that was the thrill here, it was the concept of a ‘new world’ one that would be discovered later in the gameplay.

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sorry, but I’m really only thrilled about potatoes. corn is stupid, it hardly even provides anything to you, and what it does provide never actually gets provided thanks to the shells of the corn. there’s a reason it comes out as a kernel when you poop. a plague was caused by people eating only corn-based foods. screw corn. potatoes are better! hail potatoes!

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Clearly you have never had cornbread.

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I have, and I think it’s disgusting lol

while it’s true I have pretty little respect (if any) for the worthless kernel aside from candy corn (which is currently pretty much just sugar and not corn anyway), my mentioning corn was a joke, as it’s one of the foods NA introduced to europe.

potatoes are still superior in every single way though lol

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since corn come from americas too dont see why potatoes wouldnt make it in the game :wink:

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This is an even bigger conspiracy than the true name of @Steveadamo :frowning:

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The ramifications of finding the new world are actually much greater. When you find the potato, you will also encounter… LLAMAS! Say goodbye to those scratchy yak-hair shirts. Your exploration efforts have just ushered in the age of the comfy sweater…

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precisely why the conundrum was spawned. Yang said that potatoes would not be added! and corn already has been.

good times.

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I didn’t mean to say potatoes wouldn’t be added like ever XD. I only meant to speak about the lore complexities going into consideration when deciding which crops to add to the game.

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OBJECTION!

…

I just wanted to say that.

Anyway. I found another piece of evidence that supports the case for potatoes! Turns out, corn isn’t the only crop already in-game to have came from America. Pumpkins come from America too!

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