Grom's Cauldron

 is a campaign mechanic for Grom the Paunch, which allows him to cook a dish that gives global benefits to his faction for a time.

How it works
As Grom's campaign progresses, he may fulfill certain requirements to unlock ingredients for his cauldron. Once he has obtained two different types of ingredients, he may combine them in his cauldron and cook them into a specific dish by spending 50 scrap, once per turn. Dishes create a campaign buff that appears on the campaign top bar and lasts for 15 turns.

The specific effects produced by a dish are determined by the individual ingredients used, which produce a variety of buffs for Grom's faction, while the specific dish itself produces effects which buff Grom and may give him new battlefield abilities and attributes.

Each time a dish is made, it is unlocked in the recipe tab of the Cauldron menu, with new recipes unlocked through trial and error cooking, or as a reward for campaign missions or if a new recipe is produced by the Food Merchant.

Recipes themselves are determined by the category of the two primary ingredients used, with all ingredients falling into one of five different categories, and each combining to produce 10 basic recipes. Additional ingredients may be added to the cauldron once it is upgraded by completing Food Merchant cooking requests, allowing up to four ingredients to be used. These additional ingredients add their own effects to the dish, and some further alter the dish to create a new recipe depending upon the specific extra ingredient added to certain recipes.

The Food Merchant herself, is a campaign event that appears periodically on the campaign map and may be interacted with by moving any character to her icon. Interacting with the event will trigger a choice to either buy a random ingredient with faction funds, allow the hag to cook a random recipe for Grom (which may include up to four ingredients and be especially useful early in the campaign in addition to potentially revealing undiscovered recipes), to cook for the hag (which involves interpreting the hag's obtuse request and cooking the specific dish she alludes to) in order to unlock an additional cooking slot, or rob her for funds and scrap (she will still reappear later - apparently the hag is rather forgiving).