It’s been kind of a running joke in the game that there’s a mad chef running around who really, really wants to find a decent culinary use for bloodstone dust.
I was thinking about it, and it seems like the game has gone far enough out of it’s way to make sure most of the playerbase is aware of the existence of bloodstone food and the fact that eating it has negative effects with little to no benefit; since it crops up as part of the living story and also the last Wintersday event. What if it’s not just a running joke but actual plot-relevant foreshadowing?
So then, what could be the actual potential culinary application for bloodstone dust?
Using Mawdrey as evidence, what if it turns out consuming bloodstone dust somehow works to counteract Mordremoth’s influence? (She eats bloodstone dust yet is essentially a tame mordrem)
A lot of people have been wondering how the Sylvari player characters are going to resist Mordremoth’s influence. A commonly accepted answer is that the pale tree will do the heavy lifting to protect player characters, or just simple plot-armor, but what if the real answer for protecting player characters (and npcs) is simply copious amounts of bloodstone pot pies?
So, here’s how I see this working as an actual potential gameplay thing. There would be some area deep in the jungle where modremoth’s influence is so strong that nobody can safely approach, not just Sylvari but all player characters. While under the effects of bloodstone foods, you’d be able to resist it and explore the area, but bloodstone foods have debuffs (and also prevent the use of actual food buffs) so you’d have to choose a food debuff that you can live with. (I assume different foods would have different debuffs) If the food buff runs out, you’d start taking heavy damage while remaining in the area, kind of like agony damage. Or there could be hallucinations similar to the ones from toxic spores, that will appear to attack players and do insane amounts of damage to players not under the influence of a bloodstone food.
Level 500 chefs would be able to cook bloodstone foods that have less potent debuffs, or maybe even ones that have no debuffs or foods that can buff as normal but still provide the mordremoth corruption resistance. That would allow raising the level cap of cooking to 500 and give grandmaster chefs something useful to make, without having food buff power-creep, since food buffs are already very strong. Otherwise you’d be able to buy “Entry level” bloodstone foods from NPC vendors (Like you can currently by tracking Sous-Chef Seimur down) and deal with the side effects.
It might be a potential annoyance like having to gear up for agony resistance is, but I think something like that might fit the lore well while providing some gameplay challenges. The bloodstone debuffs might force players to play differently and could be an interesting gameplay consideration. Kind of like a self-inflicted mistlock instability.
Though really, it would just be funny to see Seimur Oxbone become the head chef of the mess hall at the pact’s base in the jungle as everyone begrudgingly eats his lovingly made bloodstone waffles while he beams with pride over his achievements.
