Guide to Genetics
Nala Lafonten says: "Welcome to genetics, brother! Are you feeling good? You SHOULD feel good! You are now like a tiny god! Are you prepared to be what you were born to be? Are you ready to save the station? Chin up, buddy. It's not that hard. But before you start grabbing those monkeys from the pen, you should know the basics." |
The Department
Welcome to Genetics. Just across the morgue lies a mystical realm where some of Nanotrasen's greatest minds entertain themselves by toying the Human Genome into knots.
Depending on the map, our department usually has two rooms. The first, the one you walk into as you enter from medbay, is the Cloning room. It has only one Cloning Console, one DNA Scanner, and one Cloning Pod. More on this later.
The second room is the one where you're going to spend the most of your time. This is where things get done, where people go to become hulking super-mutants and where you are going to do your job. This room has two DNA Scanners and two DNA Scanner Access Consoles, along with two diskette boxes, a few lockers and a vending machine. The medicine locker has a syringe box and anti-toxin bottles, which is quite useful as any tampering with genetic code gives radiation damage.
The second room has a pen filled with your test subjects! These monkeys are going to be your guinea pigs. You are going to experiment on them, and make the suffer quite a bit. It's pretty inhumane. But such is life and after a few seconds it will all be worth it. They actually have it pretty easy, it's better than getting gibbed and eaten.
This is going to be your home, buddy. Get used to it. It grows on ya!
Cloning
Cloning is a process of reviving someone who has died. For a cloning process we need a dead body and cloning equipment, which can be found in your Cloning Room.
NOTE BEFORE CLONING: The cloner requires biomass (meat) to be able to properly run a clone. Different meats hold different biomass values, with valid fuel being humanoid meat (50%), synthmeat (34%), monkey meat (25%), and any other meats (20%).
- First of all, you have to know that for all things cloning, the Chief Medical Officer has a final say. He is your boss on this side of Genetics. If he tells you to clone someone and not some other guy, you do it. The only person with higher say than him on these matters is the Captain.
- On to the specifics! First of all, grab or pull a body and stuff it into the DNA Scanner and close the door. If you want to remove someone from a Scanner, click on it to open the door. Unless the Scanner is locked, anyone inside is going to pop right out.
- When the Scanner is occupied, interact with the Cloning Console. You will see a few options. The most important one is "scan". Click it. If they can be cloned, scanning will succeed regardless of whether they're in their body or not. There are several possible errors that can happen when you try to scan. See the section about cloning errors for details.
- If scanning is successful, you will get a Successful Scan message. That means you now have that person's cloning data saved. You can use this record to steal their genetic data at any time.
- After you actually have DNA data from a person, click Check Records, and then click View Record of the person who you want to clone. You will see a list of their UI(Unique Identifiers) and their SEs (Structural Enzymes). These can be copied and pasted with a cloning data disk. Click Clone. You will notice that the Cloning Pod is now fully active, with a shadow inside. That is the new body. You can now take the old corpse out of the DNA Scanner, strip it completely so the cloned person can have their stuff back, and place the old corpse inside a body bag in the morgue. You don't have to worry about the old corpse anymore.
- The cloning process takes about 2 or 3 minutes depending on upgrades. For whoever is getting cloned, it may feel like a very long time. While the person is getting their new body formed, take their belongings and stuff them all into a locker, so they're not scattered all over or stolen. Cloning the captain and leaving their ID or other secure items on the floor is bad.
- Aborted cloning: During the cloning process, it is possible to eject the incomplete clone by unlocking the Cloning Pod with your ID and ejecting the unfinished clone (needs to be >40% done) or by getting an Engineer to unlock the Genetics APC so you can shut off the power temporarily, which also causes the clone to (instantly, no matter how done) eject. Be aware this will usually clone people without limbs or vital organs, making them die quickly.
- The cloned people often have cellular damage. If so, take them to cryo to fix it.
- After the pod is empty, feel free to clone your next patient.
- If R&D has been doing their job, they might upgrade the cloner to a level where it can autoprocess. If this is the case, you only have to press the Autoprocess button on top of the window, and the cloner will scan and clone automatically. This is useful to process a large pile of bodies quickly. Scan them one at a time, and autoprocess will do the rest.
Hark! A Husk!
So you've come across a husk (a grey corpse) on your floor, which means you can't clone that poor sod without upgrades. Before you go throwing that body in the morgue, they can still be helped!
- First off, make sure it's a husk. Throw the body into a DNA Scanner, if it says Subject no longer contains the fundamental materials required to create a living clone, then you have yourself a husk (if your DNA Scanner had been updated to the max by the Scientists, you could clone the husk right now. So if you know they've been doing their R&D, ask them).
- Take the body down to Surgery.
- Pester the CMO or a Medical Doctor to extract the brain, or do it yourself.
- Put the brain in the DNA scanner like you would a body.
If all goes well then your cadaver will be reborn.
Helping the Headless
Sometimes you'll find a corpse whose head is separated from their body. Thanks to the marvels of modern science, this is not a problem!
- If you have a head or a brain, just chuck it into the cloner as normal. This may require the DNA scanner to be upgraded though. To clone a head or brain you must throw it into the DNA Scanner (or walk into the DNA scanner and drop the head/brain). Then click the cloner to close it.
- If you don't have the head, but you have the body, not all hope is lost: take a blood sample and give it to the botanist to make a replica pod, and the deceased guy will be reborn as a podperson!
- If you have neither, he's dead for good.
Cloning Plasmamen
If the patient is a plasmaman, cloning them will be complicated by the fact that the naked patient will burn in the station's atmosphere. This can be dealt with by using showers to keep the patient from catching fire, then dressing them in a plasma envirosuit.
- Put plasmaman into cloning scanner.
- Scan them, start the cloning process.
- Drag their dead body to cloning pod.
- Undress them and leave their clothes in a pile.
- Turn on the shower near cloning pod.
- Once they pop out of cloner, put them under the shower and wait for them to dress up.
If the patient is a naked or beheaded plasmaman, follow these additional steps:
- Once they pop out of cloner, put them under shower and feed them a few Salbutamol pills (if available), or if desperate, keep a syringe of Perfluorodecalin ready in case you need it. Plasmamen suffocate if they don't have plasma to breathe!
- Yell at cargo to order plasmaman supplies. In the meantime, bug Engineering/Atmos for a filled plasma tank.
Empty Cloning
Cloners have the option to "Empty Clone" a record, creating a mindless replica of a person. To complement this function, cloners can do Body-Only scans, which can only be used to create empty clones but not real clones, and bypass the sentience restrictions that ordinary scans have. These body-only entries can be deleted without requiring access.
Cloning Errors
Error message | Cause | Solution |
---|---|---|
Unable to locate valid genetic data. | Whatever you put inside the scanner doesn't have valid (humanoid) DNA. | Stop putting bees in the scanner. |
Subject's brain is not responding to scanning stimuli. | The person inside has suicided or signed an infernal contract. Cloning is impossible. | Let the Cook take care of them or put the body in the morgue. |
Subject no longer contains the fundamental materials required to create a living clone. | You're trying to scan a body that's been husked or smashed by megafauna, but your scanner doesn't have a (tri-)phasic scanning module. | Remove the brain and scan it. Yell at RnD to upgrade your scanner. |
Mental interface failure. | The corpse has no ghost associated with it. | Try again in a few seconds - ghosts get notified when someone attempts to scan their body. No success? Let the Cook handle it. |
Subject already in database. | That person has already been scanned. | Start the cloning process. Want to update the current clone scan? The CMO can delete scan files. |
Insufficient biomass levels. | The cloner lacks biomass. | Insert meat to the cloner until its at 100% biomass. |
Unable to initiate cloning cycle. | Cloning has been disabled in the server config. | Yell at admins and hand the corpse over to the Chef. |
Corpse has no head. | Some asshole decapitated your guy - clone scanning is impossible without a brain. | Draw a blood sample and ask Botany to clone them with the Replica Pod plant. Can't draw blood either? Your patient is out of luck. |
Keep in mind that patching up a corpse with Synthflesh and then reviving it with Strange Reagent bypasses a lot of these issues.
DNA Modification
Your boss here is no longer the Chief Medical Officer. Do not feel forced to listen to their orders, except when it comes to cloning. Regarding the genetic research, listen to the direct orders of the Research Director as well as the Captain. For security reasons allow NO ONE ELSE in the Genetics Lab. Simple as that.
Now, let's get you acquainted with the DNA Scanner Access Console. It has a few things of note. First you need to learn some terms:
Unique Enzymes
- Unique Enzymes (UE) = Your name. Even if you mutate the UE it will have no effect on the name. What you can do however, is to transfer UE from one person to another, copying their name.
Unique Identifiers
- Unique Identifiers (UI) = Your cosmetic details - eye color, skin color, hair style, hair color and gender.
In the DNA scanner access console there is a tab named "Unique Identifiers". This tab can be used to copy both UE and UI between people.
- Click "Save to Buffer" to save a person's UE + UI to the console. You cannot save mutations this way.
- Click "Occupant" to copy the genes of the buffer to whoever is inside the scanner. You can choose between UE, UI and UE+UI.
- Click "Occupant: Delayed" to copy the genes of the buffer to the next person who steps into the scanner and closes it (such as yourself).
- Click "Injector" to print a DNA injector containing the genes of the saved buffer. Injecting this into a person will transfer the UE, UI or UE+UI to that person. Unlike mutation injectors and activators however, these DNA injectors are not permanent, and will only last for a short while after injected.
Structural Enzymes
- Structural Enzymes/Genetic Sequence = Your mutations. They contain data relevant to your genetic structure. This governs your race and mutations. The term "Structural Enzymes" is no longer used by the DNA scanner access console since it was replaced with "Genetic Sequence" (which is the same thing), but the term may still show up elsewhere.
Genetic Sequencer
In the DNA scanner access console there is a tab named "Genetic Sequencer". Here you will alter genes to find mutations. There are four types of blocks: A, T, C and G. Each pair of letters in the boxes are connected. A goes with T, and G goes with C. Order does not matter. Each pair has a correct combination of "AT, TG, CG or GC" that needs to be filled. If you see a an unmodified pair be X-T it means the right combination of that pair is A-T. When all 16 pairs have the right blocks, the mutation will activate and you will be able to store it. Monkeys can only have the "monkified" mutation unless humanized. Once you have found the name of a mutation, that mutation will be permanently identified in all DNA scanner access consoles.
One might want to disable the monkey mutation by replacing one of the healthy pairs with an X. How to do all this will be detailed in the guide below.
Genetic Sequence Scanner
The more difficult mutations will have a lot of unknown (X-X) pairs. You cannot just randomly enter A-T, since it's predetermined what it's supposed to be. Knowing all this, you could whip out the genetic sequence scanner from your pocket. If you're looking for the correct pairs of mutation 39, scan people until you find a person with mutation 39. Then use the scanner in your hand for a menu to pop up. In the menu, select "mutation 39". This gives you a reading which will likely give you more information about which pairs you need to finish mutation 39.
You can use your Genetic Sequence Scanner on a DNA scanner access console to permanently sync the item, which makes you see the names of discovered mutations when scanning people with it.
More info about some of the other tabs can be found in the guide further below.
Mutations and Their Consequences
Before we start splicing, you must know what possible monstrosities can be done to a human.
Mutation Name | Description | Indicators | Message | How/Where to Obtain | Instability |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Hulk | This is pretty obvious. Subject becomes extremely strong, enough to punch through reinforced walls, and is unable to speak without yelling. The subject is also immune to stuns and cannot be pushed past. This mutation is lost when the subject falls to critical health. | Subject turns green and has red eyes. | "Your muscles hurt!" | Combine Radioactivity + Strength | 65 |
Space Adaptation | This makes the subject resistant to cold and lack of pressure, effectively allowing it to survive in space (they still have to wear internals, however). This will not make them immune to fire. | Subject has a pulsating orange-blueish "aura". | "Your body feels warm!" | Genetic | 40 |
Telekinesis | This power allows the subject to control things with their mind from far away. It is the most sought after power, since it allows for incredible deeds and makes a strong robuster nearly immortal. To use it, switch to the Grab intent, switch to an empty hand, and click on an object. A circle symbol will appear underneath the object and in your hand and you can now control the object. You can also use any console from a distance. | Appears as a blue glow around the subject's head. | "You feel smarter!" | Genetic | 40 |
Nervousness | Makes the subject stammer. Annoying at best. | Subject stammers when they speak. | "You feel nervous." | Genetic | 0 |
Epilepsy | Subject randomly falls down and keeps shaking. Horrible and with no easy cure short of fixing the block. | Subject falls down and begins shaking. | "You get a headache." | Genetic | 0 |
Cough | Makes the subject drop small items you're holding, like syringes. Pretty harmless, but has potential to be extremely annoying. | Subject coughs. | "You start coughing." | Genetic | 0 |
Dwarfism | Turns the subject into a manlet, making them unusually shorter than the rest of the crew. Dwarfs can pass over tables without stopping. | Subject looks smaller. | "Everything around you seems to grow.." | Human Species | 5 |
Gigantism | The cells within the subject spread out to cover more area, making them appear larger. | Subject looks larger. | "Everything around you seems to shrink.." | Genetic | 0 |
Clumsiness | Subject has a clown-like clumsiness. For those that have always wanted to be clowns. It makes the subject accidentally drop things they hold, unable to use tasers or handcuffs, and guns explode in their face. | No indicators. | "You feel lightheaded." | Genetic or Clowns | 0 |
Tourette's Syndrome | The subject swears all the time. They may also experience paralysis that takes even longer than seizures. Avoid. | Subject curses out loudly and twitches. | "You twitch." | Genetic | 0 |
Deafness | Makes the subject deaf. Harmless at best, annoying at worst. You just don't hear anything, not even yourself. | No indicators. | "You can't seem to hear anything." | Genetic | 0 |
Blindness | Subject goes completely blind, becoming a part of a usually forgotten minority. How sad. | Subject's eyes don't react to penlight. | "You can't seem to see anything." | Genetic | 0 |
Monkified | Turns the subject into a monkey. | Subject turns into a monkey. | Genetic or Monkeys | 0 | |
Near Sightedness | Makes the subject's screen go hazy at about halfway from the edge of your whole vision. Can be temporarily fixed by using prescription glasses. | "You can't see very well." | Genetic | 0 | |
Wacky | Forces the subject to talk in an odd manner. | No indicators. | "You feel an off sensation in your voicebox." | Genetic | 0 |
Mute | Completely shuts down the speech center of the subject's brain. | No indicators. | "You feel unable to express yourself at all." | Genetic | 0 |
Smile | Causes the speech center of the subject's brain to produce large amounts of seratonin and a chemical resembling ecstacy when engaged. Bad words will be replaced with happy alternatives. | No indicators. | "You feel so happy. Nothing can be wrong with anything. :)" | Genetic | 0 |
Unintelligible | Heavily corrupts the part of the brain responsible for forming spoken sentences, causing the subject to only be able to speak short sentences. | No indicators. | "You can't seem to form any coherent thoughts!" | Genetic | 0 |
Swedish | Forces the language center of the subject's brain to construct sentences in a vaguely norse manner. | No indicators. | "You feel Swedish, however that works." | Genetic | 0 |
Chav | Forces the language center of the subject's brain to construct sentences in a more rudimentary manner. | No indicators. | "Ye feel like a reet prat like, innit?" | Genetic | 0 |
Radioactivity | Subject radiates energy from their skin. They're just as susceptible to it as anyone else. | Subject glows with a green aura. | "You feel it in your bones!" | Genetic | 5 |
Glowy | Gives the subject a faint glow. | Subject glows. | "Your skin begins to glow softly." | Genetic | 5 |
Anti-Glow | Surrounds the subject in darkness. | The area around the subject appears dark. | "Your light around you seems to disappear." | Combine Glowy and Void Magnet | 0 |
Telepathy | Subject is able to broadcast it's thoughts directly to others. | No indicators. | "You can hear your own voice echoing in your mind!" | Genetic | 10 |
Fire Breath | Subject becomes able to breathe concentrated balls of fire. | No indicators. | "Your throat is burning!" | Lizard Species | 30 |
Void Magnet | You have the power to make yourself mostly invincible for a brief period at the cost of being unable to move. You will also enter this state randomly and against your will. | No indicators. | "You feel a heavy, dull force just beyond the walls watching you." | Genetic | 30 |
Strength | Subject feels stronger. Allows you to carry people with no slowdown. | No indicators. | "You feel strong." | Genetic | 10 |
Fiery Sweat | Subject sweats liquid fire and grows slightly more resistent to fire. | Subject will spontaneously combust. | "You feel hot." | Genetic | 0 |
Antenna | The Affected person sprouts an antenna. This is known to allow them to access the engineering, science, medical, supply, and service radio channels passively. | An antenna is visible on the user's head. | "You feel an antenna sprout from your forehead." | Genetic | 10 |
Paranoia | Subject is easily terrified, and may suffer from hallucinations. | Subject screams frequently. | "You feel screams echo through your mind..." | Genetic | 0 |
Mind Reader | The affected person can look into the recent memories of others. This will reveal the true name of the target, the intent of the target, and some snippets of what the target has said in the past. Tin foil is known to block this power. | An antenna is visible on the user's head. | "You hear distant voices at the corners of your mind." | Combine Antenna and Paranoia | 40 |
Insulated | This makes you shock resistant, not unlike wearing a pair of insulated gloves. | The subject does not conduct electricity. | "Your fingertips go numb." | Genetic | 25 |
Shock Touch | This gives you a power that charges your hand with electricity. Use it on somebody to give them a good shock, which will do burn damage and large amounts of jittering and confusion. | No indicators. | "You feel power flow through your hands." | Combine Insulated and Radioactive | 20 |
Transcendent Olfaction | This power lets you track people by scent. Hold something in your hand and use the power to look for a scent on it. Use the power without holding anything and you'll track the scent you previously found. | No indicators. | "Smells begin to make more sense..." | Genetic | 30 |
Acidic Flesh | Subject's skin bubbles due to acid buildup. This is often fatal. | No indicators. | "A horrible burning sensation envelops you as your flesh turns to acid!" | Genetic | 0 |
Spatial Instability | The victim of the mutation has a very weak link to spatial reality, and may be displaced. Often causes extreme nausea. | Subject randomly teleports a short distance away and becomes extremely disgusted as a result. | "The space around you twists sickeningly." | Genetic | 10 |
Spastic | Causes muscle spasms. | Subject suffers from muscle spasms. | "You flinch." | Genetic | 0 |
Two Left Feet | A mutation that replaces the right foot with another left foot. It makes standing up after getting knocked down very difficult. | Subject takes longer to recover from being knocked down. | "Your right foot feels... left." | Genetic | 0 |
Geladikinesis | Allows the user to concentrate moisture and sub-zero forces into snow. | No indicators. | "Your hand feels cold." | Genetic | 10 |
Cryokinesis | Draws negative energy from the sub-zero void to freeze surrounding temperatures at subject's will. | No indicators. | "Your hand feels cold." | Genetic | 20 |
Thick Skin | The user's skin acquires a leathery texture, and becomes more resilient to harm. | No indicators. | "Your skin feels dry and heavy." | Genetic | 30 |
Extendo Arm | Allows the affected to stretch their arms to grab objects from a distance. | Subjects arm hardens and softens at will | "Your arms feel stretchy." | Genetic | 30 |
IMPORTANT: There's also 1 special block which contains the info whether the subject is a human or a monkey!
Guide to finding and using mutations
This guide here shows you step by step how to find the powers from the mysterious blocks!
Genes are distorted and twisted by shooting them with radiation. This can be done with the DNA Scanner Access Console and the computer in your lab.
First Steps
This guide will start with using a monkey, because they're in the pen for a reason.
- Start by taking a monkey from the pen.
- Shove them into a DNA Scanner next to the pen.
- Check the console next to it, you'll see a bunch of option and information. Find Genetic Sequence.
All mutations are randomized every round.
Humanizing a Monkey
Always humanize your monkey first, or their powers won't work.
- You and your buddy share the mutations you've discovered, work together to discover them all.
- Click through the mutations until you find "Monkified". Then break a random pair by changing a letter to X.
- When you get it, you'll see the name on the top has changed from "monkey" to a randomly generated name. Congratulations, you've got your very own monkey-person!
- Mutadone will also clear the "monkified" mutation from monkeys, instantly turning them human. Use a dropper set to 1u to squirt dissolved mutadone into the eyes of monkeys to humanize them without needing any machinery.
- If for any reason you got yourself some bad mutations and have no one to remove them, grab the mutadone pill bottle in your lab. You usually have several 50u pills available. If you want to make a pill last, dissolve a pill by pouring a tiny amount of water into a beaker (by using the beaker on a sink once), then drop a pill of mutadone into it and take a sip. It should instantly clear all your mutations, unless your mutations have reinforcement chromosomes.
Manifesting Mutations
Back to business! Now we'll try to make a mutation show itself to us:
- Find a mutation that has broken pairs.
- Start filling in the X's. This is fairly easy since most of them are connected to an A, T, G or C. So X-T would be A-T.
- You will often find X-X pairs. Make sure the rest is fixed first and then guess it. There's 4 possibilities. AT, TA, GC and CG.
- If there's more than 2 double X-pairs, consider using the JOKER or going out and scanning some people to see if they have the missing pairs.
- If it didn't work, you may have messed up somewhere. Double check and also make sure they're not still a monkey. If all else fails, move on to another mutation or scramble their DNA.
Scramble DNA
Clicking the Scramble DNA tab will blast the subject with radiation, and randomize which discoverable mutations it has.
Activators and Injectors
After manifesting a mutation in the Genetic Sequencer tab, hit store to save it to the "Mutations" tab. You can print activators and injectors from both the Genetic Sequencer and the Mutations tab.
- Activators: An activator will permanently activate the specific mutation in a person who already has the mutation dormant as shown with a Genetic Sequence Scanner . For example, since all humans have the "monkified" mutation dormant in them, a "monkified" activator will always work on humans. Using an activator will not increase genetic instability. Used activators can be recycled into the DNA scanner access console to produce chromosomes.
- Injectors: An injector will permanently manifest a mutation in a person, regardless of if that person has that mutation dormant or not. This may cause genetic instability.
The DNA Scanner Access Console takes time to recharge after producing an activator or injector. The activator has a much shorter cooldown.
Advanced Injectors
After discovering one or more mutations, you have the option to create advanced injectors. Advanced injectors will let you save multiple mutations in a single injector. The amount of mutations in a single "save" is limited to 50 instability or 10 mutations. Unlike activators or ordinary injectors, these can be named anything you want. To create an advanced injector, do the following:
- Go to the "Adv. Injectors" tab. Click "New Selection" and choose a name to create a new slot for mutations to be stored in.
- Go to the "Genetic Sequencer" tab and click on a discovered and active mutation. You can not use mutations from the "Mutations" tab.
- Click "The Adv. Injector" button near the bottom. Select the name of the slot you made in step 1. Repeat with any other mutations you wish to save to the same slot.
- Go back to the "Adv. Injectors". Click Print Advanced Injector. You will print an injector with the name you chose.
Against the Radiation
All that radiation pulsing is not healthy.
- At some point it may be a good idea to visit Chemistry and order some Potassium Iodide for your genetic testing. It's a very useful chem, as it lowers radiation levels quickly.
- Anti-Toxin or Charcoal can cure the toxin damage caused by radiation, but does nothing to the rads themselves.
- Pentetic Acid is another good choice, as it works very well against both rads and toxin damage.
Genetic Instability
When you manifest a power, you may get a message like "It feels like your skin is moving." This is telling you that your genetic instability has gotten higher, and you'll need to be careful not to add too many more powers. All humans can withstand up to 99 genetic instability before they start to bubble and melt. 100 instability would be too much. Negative mutations generally don't give you instability, but powers do. As a rule of thumb, the stronger the power, the more instability it gives. Choose your powers wisely. You can refer to the previous table as a guide on how much instability each mutation gives.
Chromosome 21
Every time you successfully use an ACTIVATOR on another person, the activator becomes filled with genetic data. Recycle/use it on your DNA console to gain a random chromosome from it. The chromosome either appears as an item on top of the DNA console, or it gets stored in its "mutations" tab. Up to 5 chromosomes can be stored in a single DNA console. Clicking on the last chromosome in the mutations tab will eject it into its physical form. Physical chromosomes can only be used by inserting them into a DNA console.
Each active mutation in a person has a single chromosome slot. You can only add chromosomes to people who are inside the connected DNA scanner. Do so by opening the Genetic Sequencer tab. Then click an active mutation, or find one if none is active yet. You should see the line Chromosome status: and a clickable "----"-button. Click that button. If that mutation is compatible with any of the currently stored chromosomes, you will get a list where you can select that chromosome. Select it, and you have now filled that mutation's chromosome slot. To delete the chromosome from that slot, you can deactivate and reactivate the mutation by turning any letter to X and then back.
After you have added a chromosome to a mutation, you can store it to the mutations tab as normal (by clicking store in the Genetic Sequencer tab). Mutations from mutators/activators printed from this stored entry will then contain that chromosome.
These are the currently available chromosomes you can get:
- Synchronizer: Gives the mind more control over the mutation, reducing some downsides by 50%.
- Stabilizer: The rarest chromosome. Reduces instability gained from the mutation by 20%.
- Power: Boosts strength of certain mutations. Experiment with super sneeze or even deadlier fireballs!
- Energetic: Reduces cooldown on action based mutations.
- Reinforcement: Makes the mutation immune to mutadone.
Chromosomes aren't supposed to be addable to mutations that won't benefit from them. For example, you can't use the energetic chromosome on the monkey mutation.
What to do with your powers
- Save your power buffer in a disk, as a backup. There's always the risk of someone overwriting/deleting them.
- Make injectors to give to
the greytideheads of staff or security. You can also sell them for money! - Because injectors exist, geneticists are often asked for powers by randoms. Use your best judgement to decide who gets powers and not, because nothing gets the station down like a herd of assistants with Hulk. Be ready to say "no" a lot.
- Enjoy being the peak of human evolution! Use your powers for the greater good. Remember that hulks are nonhuman to the AI and that when security can't stun someone they'll pass directly to lethals.
The Gene Genie - The Traitorous Geneticist
Sorry for the bad chapter title. I wanted to use that for a very long time.
So, you learned how to do your job successfully, and how to be a credit to the station. You learned how to manipulate genes. Now you want to learn what the hell to do when the syndicate is the one writing your checks! Well, fret not! I will give you some pointers. But these are mostly tips - traitorous objectives differ wildly, and change your actions way too much for me to write a real guide on it.
Congratulations. If you read everything is this guide, you should now be a full-fledged Geneticist.
Rev head
Simple. Flash colleagues. If the RD or the CMO come check on you, say you have a good set of powers, but the replicator is offline. Ask for him / her to strip and get in the Scanner. Lock him/her in, have your way with them, they can't leave nor can they talk. Let them enjoy their slow, painful death. If someone wants to clone the captain, that too is pretty simple. Just don't do it. As soon as the guy leaves, stuff the captain in a locker, take his stuff and call it a day. You could also eat until you get fat, transform people into monkeys and eat them. Fun for all.
Another fun strategy is, if you managed to kill a head of staff, to copy their identity with a DNA scanner and apply it to yourself; impersonating a head of staff during a revolution is easy since they are usually exempt from implanting.
Traitor
Depends on your objective. If it's a hard one, like stealing the AI... well, you're fucked. Keep working on those powers! As soon as you have Hulk + TK, go for it as you wish. No tips here.
If your objective is a simple one, though, like stealing the hand tele, there are more approaches to this. As the above tip, you can just break the walls with TK Hulk, but that is rather crass. There's a more roundabout, but classier way to tackle this. Take a monkey from the pen, transform it in a human. Take it's UI+UEs, make an injector, stuff it in your pocket with a label like "Clean Backup - Alexa White".
Now get your own UI+UEs and name it "Clean Backup - Original" or something. Avoid using your name. Now, go hide somewhere close to the item's location, stick yourself with the monkey injector, spawn emag, stick ID and PDA in your backpack. For added stealth, get a different outfit. Emag your way to the captain's room, get his jumpsuit, RUN RUN RUN. The AI might see you, so it would also be good if you spawned an agent card so you can't be tracked. If anyone sees you, they're not going to see your actual name, only the humanized monkey's name. Hide, stick yourself with your own stuff, change clothes, walk away smoothly.
If you have to kill someone, same stuff from rev.
Also, never forget identity theft. Since you can take someone's complete identity, including looks, you can have some fun with that.
Wizard
Well... Stealth wizard? Several things you can do, mostly involving UI+UE stuff. Not worth it, really. One thing you can do is taking identities and belongings, but you have to expose yourself to mess with the console. Your choice.
Changeling
FUCKING REJOICE, your work is cut out for you! Have fun eating the lifeless corpses you clone. Keep in mind that transformations and transformation stings copy UI+UE. Turn people into horribly disabled freaks, or channel a lot of hulk-TK-cold resisting supermen.