To expand on what Suncatcher said (I have spent way too much time combing through the game's code, probably more than actually playing it)
- 4 states of drunk is right: sobler, tipsy, drunk and dread drunk. These happen when your alcohol value (not visible in-game) reaches a certain % value of your maximum stamina, so more stamina means you can drink more. These get reached for alcohol per stamina at 20% (Tipsy), 40% (drunk) and 70% (dead drunk).
- The alcohol value per drink isn't fixed and the calculation kinda complicated. It depends on how big of a sip the person takes and there's a modifier on every sip that takes into account the drinker's stamina and endurance as well as the stam / endurance of every other person present, and is different depending on whether Karryn or an inmate drinks. Maybe to simulate the impact of drinking in front of an audience or in a larger gathering?
Anyways. No, water does not add to your alcohol. It's actual water, not Grand Blue Dreaming water.
(Fun fact: when an enemy drinks, they not only take alcohol damage, they also take stamina damage, so they are easier to beat in a brawl)
- Despite claiming the opposite, Karryn will always take two sips of a drink when offered (for comparison, the ales start with 8 sips" and the smaller glasses with 4), unless there's only one left in the glass. When she's saying "OK, but just a tiny sip" she'll chug half of that vodka glass.
- Whiskey is the drink with the highest alcohol amount and lizardmen fucking love whiskey. Every inmate has a randomly generated favorite drink which they're more likely to order than others (and Nerds' favorite drink is water 33% of the time, so kick those fuckers out). But when you get whiskey on the menu, oh boy, do the lizardmen go apeshit for that, two times out of three it's their favorite drink. So if you want to get drunk, load up on whiskeys and loiter around lizardmen.
- Certain enemy types are more likely to ask you to drink if you selected a favorable solution to their "problem": Thugs will ask more often if you opted for no thug labor, lizardmen will ask when you took the Free Drinks edict and orcs will share when you implemented their accessibility edict. (Conversely, if you selected their "slutty" solution, most enemy types are more likely to harass you.)
- To get the title: despite the variable indicating you need to get dead drunk, you only need to get normal drunk (flushed face, three seconds extra on every action) ten times to get the title. Probably because getting dead drunk is kinda hard. So if you just want the title, drink until her face is flushed, then you can stop accepting drinks or do whatever.
- Speaking of time required for actions: Having the experienced waitress title reduces time by 1 second, and actually using it by another 2 seconds. But there's a lot that can increase it: being aroused, being wet and being horny all increase the time by 1 second each. Then being tipsy is +1, being drunk is +3 and dead drunk is +5. So if you're sumbling around dead drunk, being all horny and wet, you're looking at an additional 8 seconds on every action.
- not so fun fact: haven't checked the new version yet, but in 1.0.1k at least, the Bar Enforcer title seems to be bugged (properly throwing out X amount of people). I dunno why, but the counter doesn't increase when kicking out sleeping people like it should. So don't try to grind that until it's fixed.
