A Rules Question [Archive] - Wizards Community

A Rules Question [Archive] - Wizards Community

Post/Author/DateTime Post
WizardlyFriend
08-16-05, 03:17 PM Okay, this is outlined no where in the rules and basically the rules will probably not help you at all. Some of the people I game with are wondering, exactly how long would it take to eat someone. I came up with the following, but I don't know much about the subject so if someone has some more information or I have made any mistakes please correct me. Thanks:

Let's say the person weighs around 170 lbs. The average males has hte following body weight percentages:
15% bone (25.5 lbs)
15% fat (25.5 lbs)
45% muscle (76.5 lbs)
25% skin, blood plasma, connective tissue, tendons, organs, hair, etc. (42.5 lbs)

This is all for humans of course, some of the other races are inedible and some are composed of different percentages. So you're not going to want to eat bone and you're not going to want to eat the miscllaneous 25%. Leaving only 102 lbs of actual food.

Water accounts for about 70 percent of the total body weight of an average person. Muscle is roughly 75 percent water, 20 percent protein and 5 percent minerals and other matter. Body fat and bones are roughly 50 percent water.

The human body is roughly 70% water. Muscle is about 75% water, 20% protein and 5% minerals and other stuff. Fat is about 50% water. Meaning of the 102 lbs you're eating the following is true:
75% of muscle is water (57.375 lbs)
50% of fat is water (12.75 lbs)

Meaning of your 102 pounds of food 70.125 is only water, leaving 31.875 lbs of food. However, any food you eat basically has some water in it so you're going to end up consuming most of the liquid. A lot will probably be lost when you kill him and then when you savagely pig out, but for the most part you have around 102 lbs of stuff to eat, which even for a troll is quite a lot.

Okay so let's for convenience group what you're eating as one lump sum of 102 lbs, 70.125 of it is water. So therefore 68.75% of what you're eating is water.

An apple which probably has a higher pecentage of water weighs about 2 lbs and you can probably eat an apple in around a minute. However, you aren't going to end up consuming the entire body as you can't logically eat that much and won't be able to search around for all the parts you need. So with all this in mind I'd say that it would take you around 60-90 minutes to eat another person.

Thanks for any help you can provide. Please don't post replies like "I don't know". However, if you do know what you're talking about I would appreicate replies like "looks right" or whatever. My calculations are based half on actual scientific data and half on eyeballing it.
Norhg
08-16-05, 03:37 PM Exactly?

A couple of weeks I had bet.
Try eating a pig all at once.

And why does it matter?

Are you going to feed a troll?
Remember that Trolls eat faster and can't get full.

Ugh, seems like It is I who am feeding the troll now.
WizardlyFriend
08-16-05, 03:40 PM Exactly?

A couple of weeks I had bet.
Try eating a pig all at once.

And why does it matter?

Are you going to feed a troll?
Remember that Trolls eat faster and can't get full.

Ugh, seems like It is I who am feeding the troll now.

I know it would take a while. It is indeed something that doesn't ever get full, not neccesarily a troll. And it's eating it all in one sitting nonstop. Actually, we're probably talking about a troll, but none the less how long would it take? Less than an hour?
AlexVADnD
08-16-05, 03:56 PM I know it would take a while. It is indeed something that doesn't ever get full, not neccesarily a troll. And it's eating it all in one sitting nonstop. Actually, we're probably talking about a troll, but none the less how long would it take? Less than an hour?

Well, what is doing the eating? A purple worm could do it in one round (see: Swallow Whole.) Other Collossal/Gargantuan Creatures could probably do it equally fast.
WizardlyFriend
08-16-05, 04:01 PM the creature is either medium or large. for all intensive purposes let's say it's a troll.
fallabel
08-16-05, 04:12 PM What's an "intensive purpose"?
murderbike
08-16-05, 04:17 PM I think the biggest problem you're going to have isn't speed but capacity. No human could eat a hundred pounds of food in one day, no less ninety minutes. And seventy pounds of water is more than eight gallons, which would be three or four times more than enough to kill you by way of water intoxication. Even a troll would probably balk at consuming a third of his body mass (three hundred pounds for a troll might even be a bit much, they're pretty gangly) in such a short span of time. The MM says they're ravenous eaters, but not that they have bottomless stomachs.

The best competitive eaters in the world can take in something like fifteen pounds of hot dogs in ten or twelve minutes (and they only weigh 110 or 120 pounds) but at that point their stomachs are basically stuffed. In fact, according to my hasty research, mammals generally only consume 3-10 times their body mass annually. Even giving some leeway for them being fantasy creatures and all, a single troll probably couldn't eat a whole human in one sitting. That said, I'd imagine three or four trolls could probably strip the same carcass to the bone in ten minutes or less.
WizardlyFriend
08-16-05, 04:21 PM What's an "intensive purpose"?

it's a mispernounciation of a very old unused cliche:

"for all intents and purposes" i have hte habit of typing it not how i should. excuse me, but i don't see how this related to the topic at hand.

so for all intents and purposes assume the creature doing the eating is a troll
fallabel
08-16-05, 05:25 PM I'm sorry for interrupting your conversation about eating humans. Continue.
WizardlyFriend
08-16-05, 05:54 PM I'm sorry for interrupting your conversation about eating humans. Continue.

thankyou.
HidroliX
08-16-05, 06:41 PM just use a monster that hase the following ability!

SHALLOW WHOLE! :D
WizardlyFriend
08-16-05, 06:52 PM it's not about that though. it's about a player who want to play something that can eat a lot (example: troll), he wants ot know how long it would take to eat a person.
Champion_of_Tyr
08-16-05, 07:19 PM then he should try to be a anaconda... these snakes can eat a human as a dessert !! well, it's an animal but he could be a thing like that. :OMG! They can open their mouth as big as the purple guy...
Traevanon
08-16-05, 08:21 PM When a party giver plans a meal they usually plan on 1 pound of main course food per person. Assume a large creature eats 4 times as much, and assume that if you are stuffing yourself you can probably triple that. If your race specifies that you to eat alot, double all these numbers. So...

1 pound meal for a medium creature
4 pound meal for a large creature
12 pounds if the big guy stuffs himself
24 pounds if they are a troll

Just off the top of my head
karrde723
08-16-05, 11:27 PM From my own findings, I have found the average person to weigh 157.5 pounds according to random weight generation in the PHB and this is taking into account both men and women (whether this is accurate or not I don't know). Fat is about 1.91 pounds per quart, so the average person would have 12.4 quarts of fat on their body. Muscle is 2.2 pounds per quart, so the average person would have 32.1 quarts of muscle on their body. The grand total is 44.5 quarts of consumable flesh on your average human. Now the average human stomach can hold about 1 quart of food so it would take a human 45 sittings to eat an entire human. Considering that food takes 4 hours to leave the stomach, it would take at least 174 hours or 7.25 days for a human to consume another human and even then he'll have a full stomach. But since we're talking about a troll (or any large creature), the dimensions for stomach capacity double and therefore make a troll's stomach able to hold about 8 quarts of food. This means that a troll would still require five or six sittings to consume a human or (assuming the troll's digestive system passes food at the same rate as a human) 18.25 hours. Now a huge creature with a stomach capacity of 27 quarts could eat a human in two sittings and a gargantuan creature could eat a human in a single sitting and have some room for desert (maybe a tender halfling). As for rate of consumption, I'd probably say that a troll could eat his fill in about ten to fifteen minutes. Anyways, that's my two cents about the whole matter.

Karrde

Post/Author/DateTime	Post
WizardlyFriend 08-16-05, 03:17 PM	Okay, this is outlined no where in the rules and basically the rules will probably not help you at all. Some of the people I game with are wondering, exactly how long would it take to eat someone. I came up with the following, but I don't know much about the subject so if someone has some more information or I have made any mistakes please correct me. Thanks: Let's say the person weighs around 170 lbs. The average males has hte following body weight percentages: 15% bone (25.5 lbs) 15% fat (25.5 lbs) 45% muscle (76.5 lbs) 25% skin, blood plasma, connective tissue, tendons, organs, hair, etc. (42.5 lbs) This is all for humans of course, some of the other races are inedible and some are composed of different percentages. So you're not going to want to eat bone and you're not going to want to eat the miscllaneous 25%. Leaving only 102 lbs of actual food. Water accounts for about 70 percent of the total body weight of an average person. Muscle is roughly 75 percent water, 20 percent protein and 5 percent minerals and other matter. Body fat and bones are roughly 50 percent water. The human body is roughly 70% water. Muscle is about 75% water, 20% protein and 5% minerals and other stuff. Fat is about 50% water. Meaning of the 102 lbs you're eating the following is true: 75% of muscle is water (57.375 lbs) 50% of fat is water (12.75 lbs) Meaning of your 102 pounds of food 70.125 is only water, leaving 31.875 lbs of food. However, any food you eat basically has some water in it so you're going to end up consuming most of the liquid. A lot will probably be lost when you kill him and then when you savagely pig out, but for the most part you have around 102 lbs of stuff to eat, which even for a troll is quite a lot. Okay so let's for convenience group what you're eating as one lump sum of 102 lbs, 70.125 of it is water. So therefore 68.75% of what you're eating is water. An apple which probably has a higher pecentage of water weighs about 2 lbs and you can probably eat an apple in around a minute. However, you aren't going to end up consuming the entire body as you can't logically eat that much and won't be able to search around for all the parts you need. So with all this in mind I'd say that it would take you around 60-90 minutes to eat another person. Thanks for any help you can provide. Please don't post replies like "I don't know". However, if you do know what you're talking about I would appreicate replies like "looks right" or whatever. My calculations are based half on actual scientific data and half on eyeballing it.
Norhg 08-16-05, 03:37 PM	Exactly? A couple of weeks I had bet. Try eating a pig all at once. And why does it matter? Are you going to feed a troll? Remember that Trolls eat faster and can't get full. Ugh, seems like It is I who am feeding the troll now.
WizardlyFriend 08-16-05, 03:40 PM	Exactly? A couple of weeks I had bet. Try eating a pig all at once. And why does it matter? Are you going to feed a troll? Remember that Trolls eat faster and can't get full. Ugh, seems like It is I who am feeding the troll now. I know it would take a while. It is indeed something that doesn't ever get full, not neccesarily a troll. And it's eating it all in one sitting nonstop. Actually, we're probably talking about a troll, but none the less how long would it take? Less than an hour?
AlexVADnD 08-16-05, 03:56 PM	I know it would take a while. It is indeed something that doesn't ever get full, not neccesarily a troll. And it's eating it all in one sitting nonstop. Actually, we're probably talking about a troll, but none the less how long would it take? Less than an hour? Well, what is doing the eating? A purple worm could do it in one round (see: Swallow Whole.) Other Collossal/Gargantuan Creatures could probably do it equally fast.
WizardlyFriend 08-16-05, 04:01 PM	the creature is either medium or large. for all intensive purposes let's say it's a troll.
fallabel 08-16-05, 04:12 PM	What's an "intensive purpose"?
murderbike 08-16-05, 04:17 PM	I think the biggest problem you're going to have isn't speed but capacity. No human could eat a hundred pounds of food in one day, no less ninety minutes. And seventy pounds of water is more than eight gallons, which would be three or four times more than enough to kill you by way of water intoxication. Even a troll would probably balk at consuming a third of his body mass (three hundred pounds for a troll might even be a bit much, they're pretty gangly) in such a short span of time. The MM says they're ravenous eaters, but not that they have bottomless stomachs. The best competitive eaters in the world can take in something like fifteen pounds of hot dogs in ten or twelve minutes (and they only weigh 110 or 120 pounds) but at that point their stomachs are basically stuffed. In fact, according to my hasty research, mammals generally only consume 3-10 times their body mass annually. Even giving some leeway for them being fantasy creatures and all, a single troll probably couldn't eat a whole human in one sitting. That said, I'd imagine three or four trolls could probably strip the same carcass to the bone in ten minutes or less.
WizardlyFriend 08-16-05, 04:21 PM	What's an "intensive purpose"? it's a mispernounciation of a very old unused cliche: "for all intents and purposes" i have hte habit of typing it not how i should. excuse me, but i don't see how this related to the topic at hand. so for all intents and purposes assume the creature doing the eating is a troll
fallabel 08-16-05, 05:25 PM	I'm sorry for interrupting your conversation about eating humans. Continue.
WizardlyFriend 08-16-05, 05:54 PM	I'm sorry for interrupting your conversation about eating humans. Continue. thankyou.
HidroliX 08-16-05, 06:41 PM	just use a monster that hase the following ability! SHALLOW WHOLE! :D
WizardlyFriend 08-16-05, 06:52 PM	it's not about that though. it's about a player who want to play something that can eat a lot (example: troll), he wants ot know how long it would take to eat a person.
Champion_of_Tyr 08-16-05, 07:19 PM	then he should try to be a anaconda... these snakes can eat a human as a dessert !! well, it's an animal but he could be a thing like that. :OMG! They can open their mouth as big as the purple guy...
Traevanon 08-16-05, 08:21 PM	When a party giver plans a meal they usually plan on 1 pound of main course food per person. Assume a large creature eats 4 times as much, and assume that if you are stuffing yourself you can probably triple that. If your race specifies that you to eat alot, double all these numbers. So... 1 pound meal for a medium creature 4 pound meal for a large creature 12 pounds if the big guy stuffs himself 24 pounds if they are a troll Just off the top of my head
karrde723 08-16-05, 11:27 PM	From my own findings, I have found the average person to weigh 157.5 pounds according to random weight generation in the PHB and this is taking into account both men and women (whether this is accurate or not I don't know). Fat is about 1.91 pounds per quart, so the average person would have 12.4 quarts of fat on their body. Muscle is 2.2 pounds per quart, so the average person would have 32.1 quarts of muscle on their body. The grand total is 44.5 quarts of consumable flesh on your average human. Now the average human stomach can hold about 1 quart of food so it would take a human 45 sittings to eat an entire human. Considering that food takes 4 hours to leave the stomach, it would take at least 174 hours or 7.25 days for a human to consume another human and even then he'll have a full stomach. But since we're talking about a troll (or any large creature), the dimensions for stomach capacity double and therefore make a troll's stomach able to hold about 8 quarts of food. This means that a troll would still require five or six sittings to consume a human or (assuming the troll's digestive system passes food at the same rate as a human) 18.25 hours. Now a huge creature with a stomach capacity of 27 quarts could eat a human in two sittings and a gargantuan creature could eat a human in a single sitting and have some room for desert (maybe a tender halfling). As for rate of consumption, I'd probably say that a troll could eat his fill in about ten to fifteen minutes. Anyways, that's my two cents about the whole matter. Karrde