What should be done with genetics?

[Mister Grimm]

There is constant talk about what to do with genetics, but until we get actual poll results it is obviously not going to go anywhere, I have put the most common suggestions I have heard in the polls. Happy voting everyone.

[arokha]

Your poll is flipping me off.

[Aces]

Moved to suggestions/feedback.

[Scree]

I had one of those random latenight ideas except it's early morning 'cause I just worked a nightshift and took my car into the garage and I'm staying the fuck up to get back on a day cycle and let's gooooooooooo fuckers it's handy that this thread is here so I don't have to post one

basically cause some of the race stuff is getting streamlined like the annoying messages for "oh noes you are a chilly lizard with your suit rolled down as if somehow nekked lizardchicks is a bad thing" and something was being done like giving all the races the same heat tolerances because they had next to no game effect ANYWAY and most people only use races to "represent" whatever customrace their character is so for all we know your catcritter could be some tropical moggy race that doesn't fit the tajaran "loves cold, hates heat" template.

Which made me think "what if they could choose", which then made me think...

T R A I T S
R
A
I
T
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Some selectable at chargen, maybe even some whitelisted ones you could apply for like custom items.

HEAT TOLERANCE: You can tolerate higher temperatures to a degree, but cold sucks. Same as unathi are now.
COLD TOLERANCE: The opposite.
ECHOLOCATION: a whitelisted one to fling the tesharii-vision onto you, for people who wanna play BATS.
CLAWS: sure a lot of races have this by default, but it's melee damage at the cost of having to snip your damn gloves and wear sandals. (or perhaps your flavour of anthromog has SOFT TOEBEANS and therefore normal non-shreddy hands)

a list of OTHER CRAP which is a bunch of upsides paired with downsides

Genetics would be a matter of dicking around and activating and deactivating these traits, finding which ones you like, mix and matching for the situation rather than just "I will have all the powers and no disabilities please"
Scan people with the trait and without so you can go "hmmmmmmmm the 37th chromosome was HIGH for all the FANGORIOUS TOOTHMONSTERS and LOW for all the NORMAL PEOPLE so I'm going to guess that if I toggle it on this TEST ABOMINATION, it will sprout claws!"
Or just diddle with their DNA completely at random and see what BODY-HORROR MONSTROSITIES you can spawn by PLAYING GOD LIKE THE HUBRISTIC MEDDLER YOU ARE, SPENDING MORE TIME WONDERING WHETHER YOU COULD THAN WHETHER YOU SHOULD.

[Arbon]

While Scree’s suggestion would certainly be a better fix, it still sort of ignores the inherent problems with our current system.

The fact genetics has no benefit whatsoever from working with another player, so you don’t have scenarios like I’ve seen on TG where the geneticist asks an assistant to help them, because each power has a specific message the assistant gets when a gene is activated. And so having a person inside means you can just ask them to tell you when they feel something strange rather than constantly re-open and check for changes directly.

The fact its completely random, to the degree there are multiple layers of randomness with a random thing leading to a random thing with another random thing. All of genetics boiling down to the dull monotony of staring at a screen pressing the exact same button over and over again waiting for the lottery to accidentally fall on the right set of numbers without accidentally changing any of the other numbers. Its strait-up bothersome to play.

And the fact once the work is done and genetics has completed their actual job, nothing actually comes of it. They have 8-10 disabilities they will never use under any condition, 2, MAYBE 3 powers they will use for themselves and no one else, and at least two powers that the captain or security or sometimes the CMO will crack down on them to make sure none of their work is ever used by anyone under any condition. With the admins instantly siding with said decision. One of the powers is borederline useless, the other makes you kill-on-sight, and the last two are things that people get upset if they even see it being put to use.

Nothing they do is ever going to benefit the players or make the station run better or even feel like research, nor is it conducive to enticing further study or further roleplay. All of which just leads to bad scenarios where unless you have the perfect geneticist working alongside the perfect CMO with completely trustworthy heads in all situations who hand out X-ray and emergency hulk injections for that just in case moment (which you aren’t supposed to do but is literally the most good they will ever be used for) or equally bad scenarios where everyone gets free access to all the powers and then the station runs wild with glowing X-ray telepaths, OR you have the worst possible scenario of genetics doing nothing at all and just being dead weight.

Probably the reason so many bay stations remove it outright.

My suggestion comes very close to scree’s and sort of builds on the idea of traits as a template, because you see rather than randomly click at numbers to make them change to another random number, I’d have the code for each result being a specific number in a randomized block, checking a person’s DNA via either direct scans or scan data from cloning lets you see the exact number for any specific powers they have. Give the consoles the accuracy to change one block at a time, by a set amount, so they could check through each number and combination sequentially and narrow down results.

And finally give players access to ONE of every minor power available for the geneticist to find.

Minor powers being defined as things anyone should be allowed to have at any point in any normal shift, and the ONLY powers a geneticist is able to access without finding NPC mobs or dangerous monsters, requiring an away mission or xenoarcheology to capture something they can fit inside a scanner.

Things like:
Having claws or human hands.
Spending nutriment to create the web clothing as a special power.
Echolocation alongside blindness.
Heat tolerance
Cold tolerance.
Gains nutriment in sunlight, but starves in darkness
Can make the ‘squeak’ sound of stepping on an observermouse play as an option in special powers.
Can produce honk noises as an option in special powers, without requiring a horn.
A “Hide” button as per observermice special powers, placing you underneath objects in your tile.
Expanded vision range.
Greater brightness even in low light.
The ability to chomp instead of punch, presumably incompatible with claws.
Trading away nutriment to produce bioluminescence, glow as if a torchlight for as long as you aren’t starving.

MINOR things, stuff that’s neat and you can use to add flavor or customize a character but won’t mechanically tear the game open the way X-ray or TK currently does, and while you can only pick one at character creation the benefit of a geneticist is to allow the application of multiple minor abilities. Things they legitimately can hand out like candy and not have to worry about someone breaking down the hallways because now they eat light, or stripping naked because they can have heat and cold tolerances.

And of course with the distinction between minor and major … existing, game-breaking genetic powers that we already barely get to use would be things you can’t get by scanning normal crew, or asking an assistant to come sit and listen for squealchy noises as you tick through the numbers in their DNA blocks. Major powers:

TK,
Hulk,
Thermal resistance,
The ability to produce web squeares
Ventcrawling
Spitting acid
Xenomorph projectile neurotoxin,

Ect, all being things you have to capture some specific NPC mob for and then scan it’s DNA for things you can replicate and then apply in crewmembers. With each specific type of mob granting it’s own specific ability. Or some not granting any abilities at all. So that large, potent, game-breaking powers would be something you have to gather a team for, gear up, and go on a specific mission to hunt down and capture said creature then bring them back while still in a condition to scan.

If bringing them back alive is required, all the better because it gives Xenoarcheology more of a clear purpose, even linking them to genetics. Suddenly they go from slime farmers to monster ranchers.

[Aces]

Could include a canonical way to get various tails and features, including those normally barred from players like Deathclaw or Xenomorph. Indeed, they could come with minor abilities, like Xenomorph being able to know hivespeak or a Deathclaw having much much higher unarmed damage.

[Arbon]

If there's a 1-item limit on how many genetic traits you can have at character creation then its best to split purely cosmetic features as a separate thing (but still readily changed via genetics) rather than make people choose between having a tail and having ears. If it's on a point buy system the way fluff items are now, that dynamic changes. And suddenly there's more reasonable control on how many silly things you can stack before the character becomes unrealistic, with genetics in-game being the only way to overcome said limitations.

Hivespeak and dealing more damage is clearly not cosmetic mind, but having a xenomorph tail is.

[Scree]

okay, now I've actually slept, I can express this in less... manic terms.

Our current Hulk is an example of a workable genetic trait. It makes you brutal and immune to stuns, but it also makes you unable to do much other than punch things and is IMMEDIATELY obvious. It has pretty massive downsides to go with its upsides (not least of which is that security will bust out the lethals) so it's one that people will use when it's needed and not sit around in the bar with it active.

xray, tk and that glowy spaceworthiness one, in the current code, do not have such downsides, which is why we'll see people in the bar with a glowing head tossing stuff around for fun and the captain storming up to genetics ten minutes into the round demanding to know whether he can be turned into a genetic superman yet.

Arbons list of powers/traits are neat ones. Nothing overwhelming but still cool/interesting/possibly useful stuff, but there's nothing to say that we couldn't put something powerful in there, as long as there's a reason to bust it out for the away missions and combat and not want to sit around in the bar with it.
You want to be telepathic? Sure, but you're gonna have to be a social recluse 'cause hanging out in a bar with a bunch of people is gonna turn into that opening scene in Scanners where the guy gets a migraine just from all the overwhelming mental noise that comes from being near so many people thinking. That sort of thing.

Arbon brought up the RNG minigame, and it's true that it's a pain in the backside and that's something that could probably do with changing too. Cosmetic things like tails and character appearance could be another thing to do, the same way that currently you can change someone's skin tone and so on. The traits thing I'm talking about only covers the superpowers angle.
Essentially there are many many types of superpowers in the game and genetics is only one of them :p

[Aces]

Actually yea we do need negative side-effects like the Hulk gene has. So, here's a few bold suggestions that I'm sure everyone will hate!

What if using telekinetic too often starts to warn you of a 'growing pain in your head' which eventually develops into straight-up brain damage?

The temperature thing, maybe the side effect is a much more ravenous metabolism sapping your nutrition away rapidly in an effort to maintain homeostasis.

Xray vision just occasionally blares your screen with blinding flashes of light that blots out your game screen like a flashbang.

These suggestions suck but you see what I'm attempting to suggest. Down-sides. Stuff to discourage using all these genetic addons BY DEFAULT as a straight upgrade.

[antsnap2]

Actually yea we do need negative side-effects like the Hulk gene has. So, here's a few bold suggestions that I'm sure everyone will hate!

What if using telekinetic too often starts to warn you of a 'growing pain in your head' which eventually develops into straight-up brain damage?

The temperature thing, maybe the side effect is a much more ravenous metabolism sapping your nutrition away rapidly in an effort to maintain homeostasis.

Xray vision just occasionally blares your screen with blinding flashes of light that blots out your game screen like a flashbang.

These suggestions suck but you see what I'm attempting to suggest. Down-sides. Stuff to discourage using all these genetic addons BY DEFAULT as a straight upgrade.

For traits, I'd rather have mostly-beneficial-with-downsides vs. crap-tons-of-disabilities+RNG-for-good-stuff.

We should definitely redo genetics our own way. Make the job itself easier, and allow round start minor powers (e.g. the bat vision, claws etc.).