[Basic] Skill of the week: Housekeeping

[Flyndaran]

Originally Posted by evileeyore

Except that you can and sometimes need to put metal into a microwave.

No, for reals legit for cooking and all.

I'm trying to talk about the basics for use, not advanced cooking/housekeeping techniques. Basic default use of microwaves should be able to be conveyed in a single paragraph of information.

How to use an oven is also pretty basic, because I'm not dissing Baking or advanced Cooking.

[Flyndaran]

Originally Posted by Þorkell

Have you tried putting an egg into a microwave?

No, because the concept of rapid extreme heat in tightly enclosed containers is literally medieval knowledge.
But even so, don't put rigid tightly closed containers/food in microwaves would fall into my aforementioned paragraph of default use.

Using one to make delicious amazing complex meals should fall under TL Cooking, not Housekeeping.
I feel like everyone is coming at this thread from different positions, with different goals, and we're not using the same real world, let alone Gurps, definitions even.

[Þorkell]

Originally Posted by Flyndaran

No, because the concept of rapid extreme heat in tightly enclosed containers is literally medieval knowledge.
.

Now that I read your post again I'm unclear about whether "Put non-metal object in box..." means that you put the food in a box and then in the microwave or that the box is the microwave.

Oh, and putting an egg in a microwave could be fun but you'll have to do some cleaning afterwards.

[evileeyore]

Originally Posted by Flyndaran

I'm trying to talk about the basics for use, not advanced cooking/housekeeping techniques. Basic default use of microwaves should be able to be conveyed in a single paragraph of information.

Cooking chicken and turkey legs are pretty basic.

[Bruno]

Originally Posted by Þorkell

Oh, and putting an egg in a microwave could be fun but you'll have to do some cleaning afterwards.

You can boil an egg in a microwave without it exploding. Best done with a (plastic or silicone) mesh to hold it down under the water's surface (must be a mesh to vent steam from boiling water).
Interestingly, eggs are just as prone to blowing up outside of the shell as in though, and if you're "poaching" the egg water free the only way to prevent it is to cook it veeery slowly. At which point you might as well poach it on a stove top.

Now I'm envisioning a character using their Housekeeping skill to time an exploding egg in a microwave as a distraction as they run out the back door.

[Otaku]

Originally Posted by Flyndaran

I feel like everyone is coming at this thread from different positions, with different goals, and we're not using the same real world, let alone Gurps, definitions even.

Has it occurred to you that might be because you're the odd man out? You disagree with something that was suggested, but if so many disagree with you, then have you allowed that you are wrong, or at least have not done a good job of presenting your case?

For recapping purposes:

The discussion on the Housekeeping Skill eventually brought up how the use of the Skill often involves a wide range of what GURPS would classify as "equipment", things that are not available at every Tech Level and which change from Tech Level to Tech Level. This could suggest that Housekeeping ought to be a TL dependent Skill. If a really good objection to this, from anyone, has been voiced in this thread, I've missed it.

To demonstrate that I am attempting to approach the discussion from both sides, I'll give the best reason against Housekeeper requiring you specify TL, as this discussion has me thinking that it (and many other Skills) really ought to, and if there is a problem it is the TL difference penalty rules that may need adjustment:

While it might better reflect real life, it does not make for a better game, as Housekeeping is seldom going to be important enough to require such detail, except in situations so important that a GM determined penalty is warranted and at least has the capacity of being more precise/appropriate. In other words, it is more "gameable" this way.

[Anders]

I never realized the need for a GURPS Microwave Ovens supplement before.

[Flyndaran]

Originally Posted by Otaku

...

For recapping purposes:

The discussion on the Housekeeping Skill eventually brought up how the use of the Skill often involves a wide range of what GURPS would classify as "equipment", things that are not available at every Tech Level and which change from Tech Level to Tech Level. This could suggest that Housekeeping ought to be a TL dependent Skill. If a really good objection to this, from anyone, has been voiced in this thread, I've missed it.
..

I just don't like literally every skill that involves objects to be TL. I guess that's not something anyone else here cares about. Okay, that makes it sound like it would save ink just writing which skills aren't TL.

[TGLS]

I don't know; I think if I ever needed to solve the problem of technologically inept housekeepers (perhaps an Infinite Worlds game), I'd just use Electronics Operation/TL (Domestic) and judiciously apply familiarity penalties. i.e. Frances, the TL5 housekeeper, rolls her unmodified Housekeeping while sweeping with the TL8 broom, because a broom is a broom regardless of whether it is made with nylon or not. However, in the kitchen, she rolls at -2 to work with the TL8 electric oven, and needs to make an IQ roll at -10 to use the microwave to melt butter (-15 from TL difference, +10 because it's ridiculously simple and -5 for the default)!

[malloyd]

Originally Posted by Flyndaran

I just don't like literally every skill that involves objects to be TL. I guess that's not something anyone else here cares about. Okay, that makes it sound like it would save ink just writing which skills aren't TL.

I personally think most of the problem is the one size fits all cross TL penalties. Omit that and apply penalties case by case and it largely stops mattering whether skills /TL skills, or just suffer familiarity penalties for differing equipment and cultures.