Difference between revisions of "Guide to Genetics"

From Space Station 13 Wiki
Jump to navigation Jump to search
(→‎Research: Said PR made Radiation Dampeners the tier 1 emitters research, so update its Tier and Requirements columns to match and move it down with the other tier 1 upgrades)
(→‎Research: Update Emitter Coolant System requirements. That PR also made Emitter Coolant System require Radiation Dampeners instead of Radiation Emitters, as the latter is just built-in now instead of a researchable upgrade)
Line 1,576: Line 1,576:
| Emitter Coolant System
| Emitter Coolant System
| 2
| 2
| Radiation Emitters
| [[#Radiation Dampeners|Radiation Dampeners]]
| 180
| 180
| 120
| 120

Revision as of 06:26, 12 September 2024

GeneTek Console

Geneticists have access to GeneTek consoles and scanners. These devices can, with enough patience, reward you with superpowers, crippling disabilities, or just amusing Mutations.

GeneTek Console

DNAConsole.png CloningMachineScannerOffV2-32x32.gif

GeneTek console and GeneTek scanner are machines that help Geneticists activate Mutations. Click the GeneTek console to start.

Research Menu

When you click Research the GeneTek console will show:

  • Statistics - Shows amount of Research Materials you have, number of Mutations researched, number of Stored Mutations (if you have the requisite upgrade), and amount of Auto-Decryptors for unlocking locked base pairs
  • Purchase Additional Materials - Where you buy Research Materials using the Research Budget, strategically placed next to the Statistics scanner. You specify how many you're buying through a dial, and the game shows you how much it'll cost, how much money is currently in the Research Budget, and how much will be leftover in said budget after the purchase. Pro-tip: you can click the dial to enter an exact amount.
  • Available Research - Shows Research.
  • Finished Research - Lists finished Research.

Storage

When you click Storage, you will see the following elements:

  • Stored Mutations - Shows Stored Mutations, if unlocked.
  • Stored Chromosomes - Shows stored Chromosomes.
  • DNA Samples - Click View Record to see the Potential of a crew mate. The strings of letters and numbers next to each person's name are blood DNA strings, which Security sometimes uses to conduct forensics.

Equipment Cooldowns

After the GeneTek console is upgraded through Research it will show:

All cooldowns are measured in seconds.

Scanner Occupant

When the GeneTek scanner is occupied, the GeneTek console:

  • Health - Shows occupant's health.
  • Stability - Shows occupant's Stability.
  • Potential - Where you Scramble DNA and view, research, sequence, activate and reclaim Mutations.
  • Mutations - Lists occupant's activate Mutations.
  • Appearance - Change occupant's skin tone, eye color and top, middle and bottom details.
  • Body - Change occupant's Body Type Mutations.

To insert an occupant, either:

  • Click them with Grab intent and click on the GeneTek scanner.
  • Drag and drop their sprite onto the GeneTek scanner sprite.

To eject an occupant, either:

  • Right click on the GeneTek scanner and choose Eject Occupant.
  • Drag and drop the GeneTek scanner sprite onto the floor.

To lock an occupant inside the GeneTek scanner right click on the GeneTek scanner and choose Scanner Lock. The occupant can sometimes break out by flipping (R). To unlock the GeneTek scanner click Scanner Lock again.

There is a finite amount of air in the GeneTek scanner, so it is possible but unlikely for occupants to suffocate.

Radiation Emitters

Re-roll the pool of all Mutations of an occupant. This will cause severe radiation poisoning that will have to be treated. This can not be used on dead organisms and has a cooldown time of three minutes. You use these via Scramble DNA when you click on the Potential.

Research Materials

Research Materials are a currency shared by all GeneTek consoles.

You gain Research Materials:

  • Passively, 1 every few seconds; you can increase the gain up to 3 if you enable Advanced Genetic Analysis on up to two cloners.
  • 40 for putting a filled DNA Activator into a GeneTek console.
  • 1 for every 50 credits spent from the Research Budget through the Purchase Additional Materials.

You spend Research Materials on:

Potential

Unknown mutation.png

Every organism has Potential, Unknown Mutations, incomplete and inactive. Potential Mutations are randomized each round, but within a round, they will always be the same, even after death. Only changing identity via stable mutagen or DNA Scrambler can change it. The overarching goal of genetics is to research and activate Potential Mutations among the crew.

To view a crew member's Unknown Mutations, you can either:

  • Go to Storage, scroll down to "DNA Samples", and click View Record for a crew member of your choice.
  • Insert an occupant into the GeneTek scanner, click the Scanner tab, and go down to "Potential Genes".

To research an Unknown Mutation select it and click Research required. After several seconds the research will finish. Each Unknown Mutation only needs to be researched once. The base cost of researching Unknown Mutation is 20 Research Materials.

To activate the Mutation either:

  • Create a DNA Activator and inject it into the subject.
  • Sequence the Mutation and activate it.

When you activate the Potential Mutation of a crew member or player-controlled monkey you are rewarded with:

Activating a Mutation on an NPC human or monkey will not give you the above rewards, though the Mutation will still work as normal.

DNA Activators

DNAActivatorFilledV3.png

DNA Activators activate organism's Potential Mutations. You make DNA Activators by clicking the Activator button, which can be accessed through any of the menus below. You can do this every 20 seconds.

  • Record - Go to Storage, scroll to "DNA Samples", and View Record for someone, and click on a Mutation.
  • Scanner - If you have someone in the scanner. The Activator button is in two places.
    • Potential Genes
    • Active Mutations
  • Mutations
  • Storage - Under "Stored Mutations", assuming you have Mutation Storage unlocked.

If a DNA Activator activates a crew member's Potential Mutation the DNA Activator will turn transparent and become a filled DNA Activator (DNAActivatorFilledV3.png). Click on the GeneTek console with the filled DNA Activator in your active hand to put it in and receive the rewards. If the DNA Activator did not activate a crew member's Potential Mutation, you'll get a useless expended DNA Activator (ExpendedActivatorV2.png).

Sequencing

After you Sequence a Mutation, you can activate a Potential Mutation immediately, without cooldown. To Sequence a Mutation you need to find the missing base pairs. You only need to Sequence each Mutation once. Next time you see the same Mutation, an Autocomplete button will appear. Press it to Sequence the Mutation immediately.

Mutations are composed of base pairs. Bases are represented as letters G, A, C or T (Guanine, Adenine, Cytosine or Thymine). Bases always come in pair. G is always paired with C and base T is always paired up with base A.

You can only Sequence Mutations of GeneTek scanner occupants.

Walkthrough - Sequencing Mutations

Mutation with an unknown Sequence.

First, insert an occupant into the GeneTek scanner. Then, select a Mutation you want to Sequence. You don't have to research the Mutation before Sequencing it.

Filling up half-filled base pairs.

Start off by filling up any half-filled base pairs. A goes with T, G goes with C. ?-G becomes C-G, ?-T turns to A-T and A-? becomes A-T.

Filling up unfilled base pairs.

Next, start working on the unfilled base pairs. G-C is different from C-G, and T-A is different from A-T, so each unfilled base pair has four different possible arrangements. Let's try G-C first and work down the list.

Check Stability shows the guess is incorrect.

With a Gene Sequence Checker you can fill out base pairs, click Check Stability and see if your guess is correct. If the base pairs are correct, they will turn green. If they are wrong they will turn red. Make another base pair guess, wait until Check Stability cools down and see if your guess is correct this time.

If you do not have the Gene Sequence Checker Research, you can make the guesses manually by going through all the sixteen base pair permutations. If you have one person with half of the code for the Mutation and another has the other half, you can compare the two and deduce the complete code, or at least part of it.

Correct guess, but a base pair is locked.

After correctly guessing base pairs it is time to unlock the locked base pair.

Unlocking locked base pairs

Notice a little lock? Click on it to begin a game:

 SCANNER ALERT: Encryption is a 2-character code.
 Possible characters in this code: G C 
 1 auto-decryptions available. Enter UNLOCK as the code to expend one.

If you don't want to play the game, you can type "unlock" and auto-decrypt the lock. You gain 2 auto-decryptors after activating a Mutation on a crew member.

Alternately, a specific chain of letters must be entered to unlock the pair of bases. The only possible combinations here are GG, GC, CG and CC.

If your answer is wrong, the machine will show you how close you are to the correct answer. Let's assume we entered GG and this was the result:

 SCANNER ALERT: Decryption failed.
 0/2 correct characters in entered code.
 0/2 characters in correct position.
 Attempts remaining: 1.
Unlocked and correct!

This shows that there is no G in the code, and thus the code must be CC!

Some codes will be this simple, but others will have up to 4 characters. Some genes will even have multiple locked pairs. Most of the more powerful genes have some of their pairs locked, so it can be worth the effort!

Success! Click Activate and to activate the Mutation!

Injectors

DNAInjectorV3.png

Completing the DNA Injectors research allows the creation of DNA Injectors . When you inject an organism with a DNA Injector they will gain the Mutation even if it was not in their Potential Mutations. However, these do not give any Chromosomes, Research Materials, or auto-decryptors as rewards. It is also important to note DNA Injectors change the organism's Stability!

To make an Injector, pick Create Injector from either Stored Mutations or occupant's Mutations. This can be done every 40 seconds for 30 Research Materials. They share a cooldown timer with Activators, so creating a Injector also prevents you from making an Activator and vice versa.

DNA Injectors are administered similarly to DNA Activators, i.e. you click on the subject while you're holding the Injector to use it on them (The subject can also use it on themselves.) Using one always creates a "filled injector"; these do not give any rewards when redeemed, and it is not possible to make them do so.

Genetics Booth

GeneticsBooth.png

Once the relevant upgrade is researched, it is also possible to grant Mutations through the Gene Booth (also known as the Genetics Booth), a machine that grants Mutations in exchange for money. Through the Gene Booth, you can share Mutations without having to stray from the console.

When you access an occupant's Mutations or Stored Mutations and click on a Mutation, you can choose Sell at Gene Booth to send 5 applications of the Mutation to the Gene Booth for 30 Research Materials. It'll prompt you to set a price in credits and a description. It is possible to sell Mutations spliced with Chromosomes, and genes in the booth can be locked or have their price adjusted by swiping a Captain, Medical Director, or Head of Security ID on the booth.

Similar to Injectors, the Gene Booth can give Mutations not in the recipient's Potential. Receiving a Mutation through the Gene Booth changes their Stability. Because of this, it is common practice to splice Mutations with Stabilizer Chromosomes to nullify the Stability change.

Gene Booth sales go towards the Research budget. You can swipe your ID card on the GeneTek console to siphon a portion of the proceeds to your own account.

The Gene Booth normally takes 20 seconds to give someone a Mutation, but this can be reduced with research.

Mutations

Dnahotbar.png

When you activate a Potential Mutation it becomes an active Mutation. There are a wide variety of Mutations, some commonplace and simple, some extremely powerful and rare. Some are beneficial, some are detrimental, some are situational, and some are just wacky and fun. There are more mutations than those listed here, so feel free to sequence and find Mutations on your own!

When you die you lose all your Mutations, but keep your Potential Mutations. For the cloner in particular, you can also enable the Advanced Genetic Analysis option, so clones keep Mutations they had when they were scanned; this is especially handy for those trying to stick with a certain Body Type Mutation.

Clicking the blue ABIL tab on your hotbar will toggle between standard options and your available Mutation powers.

Mutations are different from Traits.

Stability

Debilitating Mutations often increase Stability while beneficial Mutations decrease it. Gaining a Mutation that was already in your Potential causes no Stability loss or gain, e.g. getting Mutations through the Gene Booth and DNA Injectors can change Stability, while getting them via DNA Activators does not.

Stability determines how often your Mutation powers will work as intended. Every organism starts with 100 Stability. At 100 Stability your Mutation powers will work correctly 100% of the time. At 40 Stability your Mutation powers will work correctly 40% of the time. An example of a mutation not working properly is using Optic Energizer and having it burn your eyes instead of firing lasers.

Having less than 41 stability gives a 5% chance for a random passive mutation to degrade into its opposite counterpart. For example, Toxic Resistance degrades into Blood Toxification. Having less than 21 causes you to randomly gain mutations at the same chance!

Having Stability below 50 also garbles your speech, replacing some letters with g's, u's, l's, and b's, and instead of "[name] says [text]", it's "[name] gurgles [text]". This is a telltale sign that it's time to get some mutadone.

Mutually Exclusive Genes

Some genes belong to 'groups'. For each of these groups, you can only have one gene from that group at once. If you already have a gene from a particular group and another gene from that group is added to you, the new gene will replace the old one. There is a unique exception to this: If you have two potential mutations that are within the same group, they will not override each other, allowing you to have combinations such as Fire Resistance and Ice Resistance, or Blindness and X-Ray Vision.

All mutantraces, or body type mutations, are exclusive with each other.

Group Mutations
Thermal Modifiers Thermal Resistance, Heat resistance, Cold Resistance, Thermal Vulnerability
Toxin Modifiers Toxic Resistance, Blood Toxification
Radiation Modifiers Radioactive, Radiation Resistance
Blood Modifiers Hemopoesis Overdrive, Polycythemia, Anemia
Regenerations Regeneration, Super Regeneration, Lupine Regeneration
Fitness Physically Fit, Physically Unfit
Vision Blindness, Short Sighted, X-Ray Vision (though not Night Vision)

Mutation List

For a complete mutation list that contains super rare, antag specific, or admin-only genes, see the dedicated page on Genetic Mutations.

Frontal Gyrus

Mutations that affect speech patterns. These range from funny to miserable, and have no empowered effects.

Mutation Message Danger Level Stability Effect
Frontal Gyrus Suspension You are unable to express yourself. Harmful +20 You become mute. You are unable to speak, and every attempt at talking just gives you the message "You seem to be unable to speak." The *scream emote (Hotkey: Ctrl + S) no longer makes sound and instead does one of a random set of unique messages describing how you have no voice and must scream. The Mime gimmick job starts with an irremovable version of this, as an enforced vow of silence.
Frontal Gyrus Alteration Type-B You feel Swedish, however that works. Tootelly Hermless, bork bork! 0 You speak not like an actual Swede, but the Swedish Chef, Bork Bork Bork! You extend your vowels to long e's and o's, and randomly add "Bork"'s like you add Swedish meatballs. Fun historical fact: the chef used to have a 20% chance to spawn with this accent.
Frontal Gyrus Alteration Type-BT Your breath smells like a fart. Butt +10 You speak like a buttbot. When you talk, some of your words are replaced by "butt".
Frontal Gyrus Alteration Type-C Ye feel like a reet prat like, innit? Hermless, mate 0 You speak like a middle-class English chav. You are the charmingly ugly lovechild of at least ten cultural accents and pack sounds together like black pudding.
Frontal Gyrus Alteration Type-CS You feel great!! Comically Harmless 0 You somehow speak in Comic Sans.
Frontal Gyrus Alteration Type-D You feel like your tongue's made out of lead. Compleffely Harmleshsh 0 You slur your speech like a drunkard.
Frontal Gyrus Alteration Type-DE You can no longer pronounce th for ze life of you! Harrmless 0 You speak like a German, specifically one speaking the Hochdeutsch dialect. You substitute some English words with German ones, e.g. "captain" becomes "kapitaen", "blood" becomes "blut".

In terms of individual letters, there's the expected "v" for "w" (unless the "w" is on the end of a word), but "th" doesn't always become "z". Besides this, there are other transforms:
  • e->eh (at the end of a word, 10% chance of occurring)
  • r->rr (you roll your r's, if it's not a double r)
  • qu->kv
  • s->z (if followed by vowel)
  • th->50% chance of "d", 50% chance of "z".
  • ue->ee

As an example, "the quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog" becomes "zeh kvick brrovn fox jumps overr deh lazy hound" ("zeh kvick brrovn fox jumps overr zeh lazy hound" is also possible).

Frontal Gyrus Alteration Type-E You feel funky. Elvisously Harmless 0 You talk like a king...a king of rock and roll! You extend your vowels the same way Elvis does.
Frontal Gyrus Alteration Type-F Och aye! You feel like a true Scot! Skaithless 0 You speak with a Scottish accent. You do weird things with vowels, and, unlike other accents, you use entirely different words for things. You call a butt a "dowp", a jumpsuit a "carsakie", things like that.
Frontal Gyrus Alteration Type-FI Sauna and birch beatings! Hyvä! Arrmless 0 You speak like the space Finns, the sauna-loving, people-hating neighbors of Sweden. You double up on your i's and r's, pronounce g-vowel pairs at the beginning of words as k-vowel, chop w's into v's, have a peculiar inability to say h's, say sh as ch, and switch up your b's with p's and vice versa.
Frontal Gyrus Alteration Type N Y-you f.. feel a.. a bit n-n-nervous. Porky but Harmless 0 Your speech stutters and falters like Porky the Pig.
Frontal Gyrus Alteration Type-O You feel a bit tongue-tied. Mstly Hrmlss 0 All your vowels get replaced with a random vowel.
Frontal Gyrus Alteration Type-Q You feel that your province is a nation, however that works. 'armless 0 You speak the accent of the space separatist Space Quebeckers of Space Canada. You say "le" instead of "the" and contract h's at the beginning of words. In addition to the stereotypical "th"->"z", you also have:
  • ts->zes
  • st->ss
  • ch->sh
  • tion->sion
  • vowel-t at end of word->vowel-tte
  • vowels at the beginning of a word->h-vowel
  • f at beginning or end of word->ef
Frontal Gyrus Alteration Type-R .sdrawkcab tib a leef uoY .sselmrah, tub gnisufnoC 0 You talk backwards. Pro-tip: Put your ; or :prefix at the end to talk over the radio.
Frontal Gyrus Alteration Type-S You feel like you want to smile and smile and smile forever :) Happily Harmless 0 You somehow say colon parthesis (:)) after everything you say.
Frontal Gyrus Alteration Type-SD You feel like you've got some work to do now. Harmful 0 You speak like Scooby-Doo, a talking dog from the children's mystery cartoon franchise Scooby-Doo. In short, lots and lots of R's. Like Scots, you also have a different vocabulary, which mechanics-wise means you replace some words with different ones. For example, instead of AI, you say "rehrhai".
Frontal Gyrus Alteration Type-T You feel torn apart! Moestly Hahwleess 0 You have Tommy Wiseau's Joisey accent. Your speech is an audio disaster.
Frontal Gyrus Alteration Type-X You can't seem to form any coherent thoughts! Harmful +10 Your speech becomes unintelligible, as every consonant is randomized. Vowels are unaffected.
Frontal Gyrus Alteration Type-Y You feel like you're on Ilkley Moor without a hat. 'armless 0 You speak with the somewhat impenetrable Tyke accent of the Space Yorkies of Space England. Similar to the Scottish accent, you have a different vocabulary, e.g. "arse" for "butt", "gaffer" for "captain", "tha" for "you", "t'" for "the", and many more. You chop off the "g" in "ng", drop the "h" from beginnning of words, transform "ight" to "eet", and a bunch more:
  • ay->ey
  • ade->ed
  • ave->ev
  • ea->eea
  • d, t, f & th at end of word->sometimes contracted to '
  • i->ah when alone or an e comes two letters later
  • it at the start of a sentence->'t
  • ou/ow->ah
  • oar->ooar
  • oa->oi
  • oot & ool->ooit & ooil
  • ole->oil
  • ough->ow

In short, you might not think it's English, but it is. You can fault the Space Danes and their Space Viking raids of the past for this one.

Hemochromia

A reference to an old webcomic, come to Goonstation! These color your blood and give you more blood regen overall. No empowered effects.

Mutation Message Danger Level Stability Effect
Hemochromia Type-U You feel like you're out of breath. Harmless 0 A volatile mutation with 12 known stable alternatives. Will quickly break down into one of them if you exit the scanner.
Hemochromia Type-B You feel a bit less soft. Beneficial 0 Your blood takes on a copper coloration. You also regenerate 2 more units of blood per second while there's less than 500 units of it in you.
Hemochromia Type-C You feel a bit less soft. Beneficial 0 Your blood takes on a cerulean coloration. You also regenerate 2 more units of blood per second while there's less than 500 units of it in you.
Hemochromia Type-F You feel a bit less soft. Beneficial 0 Your blood takes on a magenta coloration. You also regenerate 2 more units of blood per second while there's less than 500 units of it in you.
Hemochromia Type-G You feel a bit less soft. Beneficial 0 Your blood takes on a brass coloration. You also regenerate 2 more units of blood per second while there's less than 500 units of it in you.
Hemochromia Type-I You feel a bit less soft. Beneficial 0 Your blood takes on a azure coloration. You also regenerate 2 more units of blood per second while there's less than 500 units of it in you.
Hemochromia Type-J You feel a bit less soft. Beneficial 0 Your blood takes on a emerald coloration. You also regenerate 2 more units of blood per second while there's less than 500 units of it in you.
Hemochromia Type-L You feel a bit less soft. Beneficial 0 Your blood takes on a chartreuse coloration. You also regenerate 2 more units of blood per second while there's less than 500 units of it in you.
Hemochromia Type-O You feel a bit less soft. Beneficial 0 Your blood takes on a verdant coloration. You also regenerate 2 more units of blood per second while there's less than 500 units of it in you.
Hemochromia Type-P You feel a bit less soft. Beneficial 0 Your blood takes on a lavander coloration. You also regenerate 2 more units of blood per second while there's less than 500 units of it in you.
Hemochromia Type-R You feel a bit less soft. Beneficial 0 Your blood takes on a scarlet coloration. You also regenerate 2 more units of blood per second while there's less than 500 units of it in you.
Hemochromia Type-T You feel a bit less soft. Beneficial 0 Your blood takes on a cyan coloration. You also regenerate 2 more units of blood per second while there's less than 500 units of it in you.
Hemochromia Type-V You feel a bit less soft. Beneficial 0 Your blood takes on a plum coloration. You also regenerate 2 more units of blood per second while there's less than 500 units of it in you.

Powers

Genetic abilities that can be used whenever you wish to. Instead of degrading at low stability, some of these can backfire! Can also be synchronized for safer effects.

Mutation Message Danger Level Stability Effect Empowered Effect Synchronized Effect Failure Effect
Adrenaline Rush You feel hype! Beneficial -15 You get an activated ability that allows you to recover from stuns by putting 20 units of epinephrine, 20 units of salicylic acid, 20 units of methamphetamine, and 5 units of energy drink into your bloodstream. Also one of the only genetic mutations that can be used while incapacitated. You get double the drugs from each use. Rather than always giving 20 meth and 5 energy drink, it will add enough to your bloodstream to make them reach said values. Will give you FOUR TIMES of the drugs, unless it is synched, in which case the synched effect still applies.
Aviornis Rostriformis You feel your mouth and nose become more difficult to move. Beneficial -15 Allows you to peck people for damage on a low cooldown. None No change. Can't fail.
Brown Note You feel mischievous! Harmless (Mostly) -15 You get a "Brown Note" ability that produces a sound that makes up to 7 people fart. Be careful around bibles! The sound is louder, making up to 10 people fart. No change. You instead play a completely random sound.
Chameleon You feel at one with your surroundings. Beneficial -15 When toggled on, you become invisible while standing still ; you'll know you've become invisible because you'll see a faint light blue aura around you. The AI, Cyborgs, people wearing optical thermal scanners, and people with X-Ray Vision can still see you. This can work against you in more ways than one. No change. No change. Can't fail.
Cloak of Darkness You meld into the shadows. Beneficial -15 Activate this ability, and now you're invisible while in the dark. You can tell if it's dark enough if you have a dark grey aura around you; generally ill-lit maintenance sections and rooms where the lights are broken/have been turned off are dark enough to hide in. This does not work in Space or the Seafloor. The AI, Cyborgs, people wearing optical thermal scanners, and people with X-Ray Vision can still see you. Vampires get this power for their Bat Form Mk II ability. No change. No change. Can't fail.
Cryokinesis You notice a strange cold tingle in your fingertips. Beneficial -10 You gain the ability to cool people down significantly whilst also extinguishing their fires by firing a ball of ice at them, and to get on everyone's nerves by creating patches of slippery ice on the floor. Your ice powers now effect a 3x3 area instead of a 1x1, and freezes anyone in that range into an ice cube. The Discount Superhero Spooktober job can sometimes spawn with this variant. You become immune to the effects of your own ability, if you target yourself for some reason. You self inflict the empowered effect.
Dimensional Shift You begin to see a small blue light... Beneficial -15 You can enter a pocket dimension, rendering you immune to any and all outside events, but you're unable to move while within this space until you exit. Basically, an indestructible, incorporeal closet on command. Any effects that are doing damage to you such as a heart attack or damage from poison still happen. No change. No change. Can't fail.
Empathic Thought You suddenly notice more about others than you did before. Beneficial -5 You gain a "Mind Reader" ability that lets you read the minds of others, telling you the following:
  • Two thoughts ("thinking about..."). One is a randomly-selected line of no significance, and the other is the text they have typed into their talk/radio menu (if they're using hotkeys to talk) or the text following say " (if they're using the command bar to talk).
  • Condition: Rough description of their current health.
  • Mood: Clues about their current intent, as in Disarm, Grab, etc., not necessarily the player's actual intent.
  • Numbers: Their PIN number.

If they also have this mutation, they will be aware that you are reading their mind. Chaplains will also be warned, but more vaguely.

No change. No change. You bombard yourself with useless information from the target's brain, stunning you for 7 seconds and making them aware that you tried reading their mind.
Erebokinesis Everything seems too bright! Beneficial -15 You can snuff out all light in an area, akin to a darkness artifact. The field lasts twice as long, and its radius is doubled (meaning the area is quadrupled). No change. This ability can't fail.
Fire Breath Your throat is burning! Beneficial -10 You can exhale fire. Your fire breath travels twice as far, and is 4x as hot. No change. Sets you on fire for 100 seconds.
Healing Touch Your hands radiate a comforting aura. Beneficial -10 You gain an ability that can heal an adjacent human for 25 of each damage type, including brain. If this ability fails due to low stability, you will take the exact same amount as damage. You heal twice as much on each use. No change. You take damage equal to the amount that you heal for, even if they weren't damaged for that type! This means that you will immediately go into crit due to 25 brute, 25 burn, 25 tox and 25 oxy. The empowered effect causes the same, but 50 each!
High-pressure intestines You feel bloated and gassy. Beneficial -15 Blow away your foes with your tremendous farts! Using this while on fire causes you to burst into a fiery inferno (fart powered flames), and using this on top of a bible sends you to a special "hell" area. Has a grody effect when used whilst being unable to fart... You will not just blow away your foes, but also yourself. Using it on the bible will still send you to hell though. No change. Can't fail.
Incendiary Mitochondria You feel like you are burning up. Harmful -10 You set yourself on fire and become a human torch. This is a very bad thing if you don't want to burn alive. If you have Fire Resistance this will instead fizzle and do nothing. Burst into a column of flames, setting everything around you on fire. Also, now works with Fire Resistance. No change. You instead do the opposite, and extinguish all the heat from your body! Makes it so cold, in fact, that you reach 0 Kelvin, which is colder than space!
Ink Glands You feel artistic. Beneficial -2 You gain the ability to paint nearby people and objects a random color. No change. No change. Can't fail.
Jumpy Your leg muscles feel strong and taut. Beneficial -10 You gain a jump that moves you half a screen in no time at all. Just make sure you don't use it while inside a container/vehicle of some sort, or you won't like the result... You jump much farther and higher. No change. You jump a bit too high, and bang your head HARD on the roof of the station. Stuns for 7-10 seconds.
Mass Emesis You feel sick. Beneficial -10 You can expel whatever chemicals were in your bloodstream as a beam of vomit, fully cleansing you. Anyone caught in the beam absorbs the chems if they penetrate skin, and are affected by the chems' on touch effects. The amount of chems in each vomit puddle is the total amount divided by each puddle. Your vomit spew travels twice as far. Do note that each vomit puddle will have less chems in it due to being spread across more puddles. No change. Can't fail.
Matter Eater You feel hungry. Beneficial -5 You can eat many more items than normal, like weapons from disarmed opponents, or even your own body parts! Just remember that you need certain body parts to live...

Items that aren't food will remain in your stomach until they are either puked out or cut out, allowing it to be used as a strange form of storage.

You can eat one additional thing. In all of space. No change. You visiously bite into the item, but fail at eating it.
Midas Touch Your hands sparkle and gleam. Beneficial -5 You gain the ability to turn certain items into solid gold! This includes your own butt (and other limbs). Just don't expect to get super-rich from selling your transmuted gold bars; the traders can tell that it wasn't originally genuine gold. You can also transmute large objects into gold- not walls or floors, but things like tables and chairs. No change. Turns whatever you transmuted into flesh, instead of gold!
Ophidentis Vipernox You become oddly aware of your canines and they feel different. Beneficial -15 Allows you to bite people and inject them with 5 units of hemotoxin. None No change. Can't fail.
Optic Energizer Your eyes ache and burn. Beneficial -10 You gain an "Eyebeams" ability that fires laser beams from your eyes. These are different from the ones used by energy guns and their ilk; these do only 20 BURN and only very slightly heat up objects they pass over (they can still ignite plasma though). Also, if you fire them while wearing something that hides your eyes (e.g. a blindfold, a space helmet), instead of firing, the lasers burn up whatever it was that was covering your eyes. Your eye beams now do 45 BURN and sound much more menacing. No change. Your eyes spark with a little light, and then they burn for a moment, dealing 5 eye damage.
Photokinesis Everything seems too dark! Beneficial 0 You can create a radiant point of light. The point of light is twice as bright and lasts twice as long. No change. No change.
Scorpiocauda Vipernox You feel aware of something strange around your tail bone. Beneficial -15 Allows you to bite people and inject them with scorpion poison. Needs confirmation. None No change. Can't fail.
Self Biomass Manipulation Your skin and joints feel loose. Harmful -5 You can turn yourself into a liquid that can phase through walls and other solid objects, sort of like a genetic version of the wizard's Phase Shift. Your clothes won't come with you however, so you come out naked! No change. Your clothes come with you! You drop a random organ, including the heart. If it was synchronized, you instead drop one a random clothing item, or something out of your pockets.
Polymorphism You don't feel entirely like yourself somehow. Beneficial -15 You can take on the appearance and name of a crewmember by touching them. No change. No change. You touch the crewmember... And nothing happens.
Telepathy You can hear your own voice echoing in your mind. Beneficial 0 You gain the ability to communicate telepathically anonymously, unless the recipient also has this, or the Empathetic Thought gene. Telepathic messages show up to the recipient as "A psychic voice echoes, "[TEXT]"" in hotpink. Don't use this to impersonate the admins. No change. No change. You stare at your target really hard and comedically say your message out loud like a dork.
Telekinetic Pull You feel your consciousness expand outwards. Beneficial -10 You can send unanchored items flying from afar by click-dragging them from one tile to another. You can also perform a Telekinetic Smash, which throws a random amount of unanchored objects near a location, into it. This doesn't work on items of "gigantic" size or larger, e.g. pianos, TTV bombs. Works great with X-ray vision. You throw more things on average when using the Smash ability. No change. The items fling at you instead of the target!
Trichochromatic Shift Your hair itches. Beneficial 0 Gives a Trichochromatic Shift ability that switches your hair colors around; this works even if you only have one piece of hair, because it looks at all three colors you set in your Character Preferences. Due to how it shifts colors around, three uses of the ability sets your hair colors back to normal.

More specifically, the color you set for Bottom Detail becomes color for Top Detail, Middle Detail Bottom Detail, and Top Detail Middle Detail. For example, if you had grey Einstein hair for Bottom Detail, white Twirly mustache for Middle Detail, and black Eyebrows for Top Detail, you'd then have white Einstein hair, a black Twirly mustache, and grey Eyebrows.

No change. No change. Can't fail.
Vestigial Ballistics You feel intense pressure in your hip and shoulder joints. Harmful +15 Lets you launch a limb of yours at someone in a specific order, dealing a fair chunk of brute damage. This order is: Left Arm -> Right Leg -> Left Leg -> Right Arm. Your limbs will also occasionally pop off on their own, and intentionally ejecting them hurts you a bit. Explosions also have a higher chance to delimb you. Being a skeleton causes the limb to boomerang right back to you and reattach itself! Your ejected limbs deal double the damage. Your limbs no longer eject on their own and do no damage to you when ejecting purposefully. However, the Mutation gives no Stability. Can't fail.

Beneficial

Good mutations that will most likely tax your stability. Don't take too many, or make sure to stabilize them!

Mutation Message Stability Effect Empowered Effect Degrades Into
Alcohol Resistance You feel unusually sober. 0 You do not suffer most of the effects of alcohol, e.g. the blurred vision and mistepping, though you'll still have drunkenly slurred speech. You can also drink Bo Jack Daniel's without passing out.

Additionally, it's much harder for you to become addicted to alcohol; you'll need to consume at least 200 units for addiction to become possible instead of the usual 50. Even then, the chance that you do become addicted is cut by three quarters, from 1% per life cycle to only 0.25%.

At the start of the round, the Detective, Head of Security, and Bartender get the Professional Drinker trait, which gives them this mutation.

You can shoot with full accuracy regardless of how drunk you are. Ethanol Production
Anaerobic Metabolism Your lungs feel strangely empty. -30 Prevents you from taking any damage from lack of breathable atmosphere, essentially allowing you to breathe anywhere. You gain complete immunity to OXY damage and atmospheric gases. Note that you will still inhale and be touched by chemical smokes. Frontal Gyrus Suspension
Chitinoarmis Durescutis You feel your skin harden. -5 Your skin hardens, giving you 2 melee protection to both head and body. For comparison, security body armor gives 6 melee protection. Gain doubled (4) melee protection instead. Cannot degrade.
Cold Resistance You feel warm. -10 You are immune to low temperature and ice. While your body temperature can still drop to freezing and below (allowing you still benefit from cryoxadone), you won't be slowed down. You have a noticeable blue aura. You are additionally immune to slipping on ice. Dermal Glitter
Fire Resistance You feel cold. -10 You are immune to fires and atmospheric heat. You gain a 50% resistance to all BURN damage. Blazing Aura
Gamma Ray Exposure You feel your muscles swell to an immense size. -25 Your skin turns green, and your punches have a chance to knock people away from you as well as do 5 to 10 more damage. Your fists can instantly break tables, asteroid rock, wooden doors (but not any other doors), and grilles if they've fairly low health, and they can break windows, unreinforced walls, and clown cars with enough time. You can pull corpses, people you've grabbed, people who aren't on Help intent, and things that contain either with no slowdown. Watch your health; if you get too hurt, your muscles will shrink back down. Your muscles no longer shrink when significantly damaged. Musculature Enhancement
Hemopoiesis Overdrive You feel like being stabbed isn't such a big deal anymore. -5 When you have less than 500 units of blood in you, you regenerate blood faster than usual at around 4 units per second. Stacks with filgrastim's blood regen. Blood gain is doubled. Cannot degrade.
Lateral Undulation You feel like you could propel yourself on your belly with a good wiggle. -5 Move faster when laying on the floor. Not faster than walking, however. None Cannot degrade.
Lipid Stores You feel like you can store away some food and drink for later. -5 RP only effects. Whenever you are at your full food and/or water motive, drinking/eating more will store the excess. Whenever those motives would go down, use the excess instead. None Cannot degrade.
Manusclavis felidunguus Your arms start to feel strange and clumsy. -5 You get critter claws, and their benefits / detriments. More to be added. None Cannot degrade.
Manuschela Crustaceaformis You feel like your arms are oddly firm. -5 You get pincer claws, and their benefits / detriments. More to be added. None Cannot degrade.
Meta-Neural Antenna Your head is full of odd chatter. -5 You can hear the general radio channel (145.9) without a headset. You can hear all radio channels without a headset. Or rather, almost all, since there some channels you still won't hear, namely the ones used by Gangsters, Nuclear Operatives, and (if they spawn somehow) Conspirators. The machinetalk used by AIs and Cyborgs are not radio channels, so this mutation doesn't give you access to it. Spatial Destabilization
Meta-Neural Enhancement Your mind feels closed. 0 You cannot be mind-read or telepathically spoken to. Doesn't affect the admin's telepathy, obviously. You become immune to the psychic blasts of certain hostile space creatures. Paranoia
Musculature Enhancement You feel buff! -5 You gain a slight strength bonus to mining. Also negates the speed penalty from pulling objects somewhat. Maybe it has other uses... You feel less pain, being able to move as though you were 50 HP points healthier. Cannot degrade.
Natural Anti-Toxins Your pulse seems to relax. -10 Purges 3.3u of all chemicals in your bloodstream each tick. Note that this is not exclusive to poisons; it affects all chemicals, and the chemicals are outright removed, not metabolized. Note: This mutation cannot be removed with mutadone. Doubles the rate of chemical purging to 6.6u per tick. Blood Toxification
Night Vision Everything suddenly appears oddly lit. -15 Darkness is greatly reduced in an area around you. Pitch-black areas will still appear dim, though not enough to significantly reduce visibility. The area around you in which you can see in darkness is increased, allowing you to functionally see your entire screen even in pitch blackness. Diminished Optic Nerves
Noir You feel chromatic pain. 0 Your whole body, including any held and worn items, becomes completely grayscale. Your vision also becomes grayscale. Cannot degrade.
Physically Fit You feel slightly more energetic. -5 Your max stamina is increased by 30, and your stamina regen is increased by 2. Stamina increases are doubled. Cannot degrade.
Radiation Resistance N/A -15 You gain a 75% resistance against radiation. You are almost entirely immune to ionizing radiation. While you'll still get the Irradiated status effect, you don't suffer the majority of the resulting mutations or the associated TOX and BRUTE (in the case of neutron radiation) damage. They still occur though Radioactive
Regeneration Your skin feels tingly and shifty. -25 Every few seconds, you slowly heal 1 BRUTE and 1 BURN and have a 0.4% chance to a regain a lost limb. If you are missing both a leg and arm, regeneration prioritizes the arms and won't regrow legs until you have two arms again. You heal twice as much, and have double the chance to regrow a lost limb. Mutagenic Field
SMES Human Your hair stands on end. -15 You are protected from electrical energy. Useful when the AI is shocking everything or a malicious Engineer has hotwired the engine and you are lacking insulated gloves. This also prevents you from gaining a magnetic field in the Bio-Magnetic Field event. You also gain 40% disorient resistance, making you more difficult to stun. Motor Neuron Signal Enhancement
Thermal Resistance N/A -10 You gain a 50% resistance to heat and cold and also gain immunity to space damage, allowing you to spacewalk without a suit. You gain the full fire immunity of fire resistance and the full cold immunity of cold resistance Thermal Vulnerability
Toxic Resistance You feel refreshed and clean. -30 You take 66% less TOX damage from all sources. You are completely immune to TOX damage. Blood Toxification
X-Ray Vision You suddenly seem to be able to see through everything. -20 Basically wearing Optical Meson Scanners, as it lets you can see through walls. Doesn't decrease or remove darkness, but it also doesn't increase the darkness of areas beyond your normal line of sight, unlike mesons. You are also capable of wearing things that normally obstruct your sight without it doing so, such as blindfolds. You additionally gain the power to see organics through walls, similar to wearing Optical Thermal Scanners, and see through the invisibilty cloak from cloaking devices, Chameleon, and Cloak of Darkness. Diminished Optic Nerves

Harmful

Bad mutations that will most likely give stability. If you want to be a true stability freak, you'll have to pick your poison.

Mutation Message Stability Effect Empowered Effect
Anemia You feel lightheaded. +10 Your body can now accommodate only 400 units of blood, and if it goes over that, it quickly loses it. As a result, you'll often be at risk of entering shock, and bleeding out is more dangerous. No change.
Blindness You can't see anything. +20 You no longer see action messages about what you and other people are doing and cannot see anything beyond a very small distance from you, but are immune to most forms of eye damage. You can still interact with things via right-click menu, and you can click on pills/patches/auto-injectors in-hand to use them on yourself, but you otherwise can't do much. To fix this without modifying DNA, you can equip a pair of VISOR Goggles. No change.
Blood Toxification You feel really sick... +15 You occasionally (25% chance every few seconds) suffer one unit of toxin damage. No change.
Chronic Cough You feel an irritating itch in your throat. +5 You occasionally cough, dropping anything in your hands. No change.
Chronic Sneezing You feel an irritating itch in your nose. 0 You sometimes sneeze, causing you to drop whatever you where holding. No change.
Deafness It's quiet. Too quiet. +20 You can't hear anything and are immune to most forms of ear damage. Blessed silence may come as a relief once you've gotten sick of the regular radio chatter. To fix this without modifying DNA, you can equip an auditory headset. No change.
Diminished Optic Nerves Your vision blurs. +5 Your vision becomes blurred, and darkened outside a small radius. Can be counteracted with Prescription Glasses. No change.
Dyspraxia You feel kind of off-balance and disoriented. +15 In short, you're clumsy. Several actions have a flat chance to comically backfire, often harming you or causing extra damage. For example, you might accidentally start cuffing yourself when cuffing others, jab yourself while using a fork, and shoot yourself when firing a gun. Conducting surgery and handling grenades and guns become particularly dangerous. One upside: this lets you put crayons in clown shoes to crayon-walk!

The Clown spawns with a variant of this mutation that cannot be cured. Different from the "Dyspraxia" caused by the Wizard spell Clown's Revenge.

No change.
Deuteranopia Everything starts looking a lot less green. 0 You can't tell the difference between red and green, and everything else looks a lot more amber. No change.
Electromagnetic Field None. +10 Tiny, 1 tile, EMP bursts occasionally occur within a 2-tile radius around you. These EMPs can and often do hit the tile you're on, and they cause the same effects as the EMP grenades (radios malfunctioning, batteries draining, etc.) No change.
Ethanol Production You feel drunk! +5 You constantly produce ethanol in your bloodstream, slowly making you extremely drunk. No change.
High Decay Digestion Your stomach grumbles unpleasantly. -10 Your farts create clouds of toxic gas, which turn into compost when inhaled by anyone without this gene. Your farts contain additional toxin. Gross. You will also inhale this without internals or Anaerobic Metabolism.
Motor Neuron Signal Enhancement One of your limbs feels a bit strange and twitchy. +20 A random limb, chosen upon mutation acquirement, proceeds to strangle you, kick you in the head, and do various other harmful actions. No change.
Meta-Neural Haze N/A -5 Your character can't be examined unless the examiner is adjacent to you. Your character can't be examined at all.
Mutagenic Field Your flesh begins to warp and contort weirdly! -35 You occasionally spontaneously mutate, with a 25% chance of receiving a bad mutation, and a 5% chance to receive a good one every life cycle (4 seconds). No change.
Narcolepsy You feel sleepy. +15 You randomly to fall asleep. No change.
Nectar Perspiration Your guts are rumbling +10 A swarm of tiny lil' bees surrounds you. These bees sometimes sting you at any time, giving you histamine. Wearing either an apiculturist's suit or hood halves the chance of getting stung by your own bees; wearing both prevents it entirely. Otherwise, wearing armor (or any other form of protection) does not prevent from being stung. Sadly, the bees can't sting others. No change.
Pseudonecrosis N/A -5 You are recognized as dead by all medical scanners and machinery. You appear visually dead when laying down. (This means anyone examining you will see *[Your name] is limp and unresponsive, a dull lifeless look in their eyes.*)
Physically Unfit You feel slightly less energetic. +10 Your max stamina is reduced by 30, and your stamina regen is reduced by 2. No change.
Polycythemia Your breathing quickens. +10 If you have less than 600 units of blood in you, you regain blood at an accelerated rate (3 units per second, compared to just 1 per second), until you reach 600 units. Doesn't seem too bad, until you starting developing hypertension from your heart having to pump to all that blood... No change.
Protanopia Everything starts looking a lot more yellow. 0 You can't see the color red and, to some extent, green. Instead you see yellow. Werewolves have this when transformed. No change.
Radioactive You feel a strange sickness permeate your whole body -10 You suffer from radiation sickness and cause the same to nearby people. May also give you more bad mutations. Roachpeople are fully immunity to these effects. No change.
Spatial Destabilization You feel a bit out of place. -10 You hiccup and teleport at random. Fortunately you can't teleport onto space tiles. Unfortunately you can teleport onto things covering space tiles, like catwalks. No change.
Stupefaction You twitch. +10 You will occasionally be stunned for a few seconds and be knocked down to the floor. No change.
Tinnitus You hear a ringing in your ears. 0 Occasionally, you hear a ringing sound in your ears, similar to that of a phone ringing. It persists even if you are deaf. No change.
Tritanopia Everything starts looking a lot less blue. 0 You can't tell the difference between blue and green, and everything else looks a bit more desaturated. No change.

Harmless

Silly mutations that have no effect other than making you look or act funny.

Mutation Message Stability Effect Empowered Effect
Achromia N/A 0 Your skin becomes completely grayscale. No change.
Apocrine Enhancement You feel sweaty. 0 You get a serious case of the stinks, causing people nearby to get wonderful messages about how nice the room smells. No change.
Apidae Metabolism You feel buzzed. 0 Doesn't seem to do anything at first. However, if sugar is put into the bloodstream through any means, it has...interesting effects. No change.
Cranial Keratin Formation A pair of horns erupt from your head. 0 You look (more) like a doofus. No change.
Constricted Larynx ...you feel like being quiet... 0 Your text becomes really, really small. No change.
Coprolalia You can't seem to shut up! 0 You randomly shout random swear words. The maptext (aka flying chat or floating chat) for your outbursts is bolded. Maptext for normal speech remains the same.
Chronal Additive Inversement You feel as if you're impossibly young. 0 Flips the sign of your age, essentially making it negative if it was positive or positive if it was somehow negative, e.g. 30 becomes -30. (In fact, "additive inversement" is just a fancy way of saying sign change). If removed, flips it again, hopefully setting you back to normal. This causes some...interesting effects on the pitch of your voice clips. No change.
Dactyl Crystalization Your fingers and toes turn transparent and crystalline. 0 Changes your snap and slap noises. This doesn't mean you can't still snap your fingers off! No change.
Dermal Glitter Your skin looks all blinged out. 0 You sparkle as if you're carrying an item made of gold. No change.
Dwarfism Did everything just get bigger? 0 You are shorter. More specifically, the games cuts off a couple of rows of pixels in your sprite's leg area, so you should mostly look alright. This can combine with Body Type Mutations, so you have dwarf monkeys, dwarf lizards, etc. You also get an extra 10% heat and cold resistance. You're even shorter. Thermal resistances don't change though.
Glowy Your skin begins to glow softly. 0 You permanently emit a light with a random color and intensity. You glow brighter.
High-Pressure Larynx YOU SUDDENLY FEEL LIKE SHOUTING A WHOLE LOT!!! 0 YOUR TEXT IS ALWAYS CAPITALIZED No change.
Irritable Bowels Your guts are rumbling. 0 You automatically and intermittently fart. No change.
Paranoia They're out to get you! 0 You automatically and intermittently scream. No change.
Temporal Displacement You feel as if you're impossibly young. 0 Every few seconds, sets your age to random number between -80 and 80, indirectly shifting the pitch of your voice clips. No change.


Body Type Mutations

Body Type Mutations cosmetic Mutations that change your Body, Appearance or even Race. You can only have one active at a time. You can activate these through the Body menu or just like any other Mutation.

Even if you are not a Human, you are still protected by the Rules.

Mutation Message Effect
Bioluminecent Overdrive Your skin begins flashing! Your skin begins to rapidly flash different colors, similar to GBS' symptom but without any of the deadliness.
Melanin Stimulator N/A Turns your skin and hair EXTREMELY dark.
Melanin Suppressor N/A Turns your hair and skin to an extremely light shade and makes your eyes red. Essentially albinism.
Melanin Eraser You feel oddly plain. Turns your hair and skin EXTREMELY light. Essentially vampire/pale look. Mime always spawns with a version of this mutation that cannot be removed.
Saurian Genetics Your skin feels oddly dry. You turn part lizard/reptile. You have special eyes, literally! They can read messages written by infrared pens, their vision in the dark goes 1 tile farther than humans, and they can see through the invisibility cloaks created by chameleon, cloak of darkness, Grinches' Cloak ability, and Vampires' Bat Form MkII ability (but not cloaking devices).

You have a tail like a T-rex too, and if it dies or goes missing, you become clumsy until you get a new tail. Luckily, you can regrow your tail via, naturally, the Regrow Tail ability, if you've eaten enough of certain organs to afford it. If you already had a tail, Regrow Tail makes you snap if off and regrow a new one. The ability has a five minute cooldown, i.e. once you use it, you need to wait 5 mins to do it again.

In addition, your thermoregulation is significantly slower, at 20% the rate of normal humans (0.025 Kelvin for humans vs 0.005 for lizards). This doesn't mean fire or whatever heats/cools you less; rather it means that your body readjusts its internal temperature in response to those stimuli at a slower pace. You might shiver at room temperature, but wearing a winter jacket (or anything with 45% Cold Resistance) will stop that.

The colors for scales, tail, a belly spot, and/or head crest are inherited from your hair colors, and are typically somewhat less saturated. Top detail color influences scales and tail color, the middle detail the belly spot and tail underside, and the top detail the crest. These colors can be changed through genetics, and the belly/head spots can be changed via hair dye. You also extend every 's' into a hiss, like a snake. You are also able to change your colors through two abilities fueled by eating the organs of humans and monkeys.

Note: Don't steal peoples' organs unless you're an antagonist, they're okay with it, or they're dead. Crimes in the name of fashion are still crimes!

Ossification You feel kinda thin. All your meat and organs squish into your bones, turning you into a very spooky living skeleton who can make certain hotdogs hop. Drinking milk also heals a little bit of BRUTE and BURN. Your eyes look like tiny skulls, which is very strange. You also bleed calcium. Yes, you can drink calcium to restore lost "blood", but stuff like filgrastim and similar chems still work as normal. Don't think about it too much, and try not to get addicted to the satisfaction that comes with making spaghetti.
Aquatic Genetics You feel wet and squishy. You turn part squidperson/ithillid/starspawn. Your skin turns purple-pink, your eyes turn yellow, and you grow mini-tentacles and fins on your head that allow you move through liquids without slowing down. And, yes, you can breathe underwater.

Also, you love brain food, literally. You can gradually repair brain damage by eating brainburgers (and their variants) and "fleshy" brains (e.g. one from a human or a synthbrain plant, but not a flock brain or neural net processor), since eating them gives you a unique Brain Food buff, though this is rather situational. Also, you don't have to worry about space kuru, because if you get infected, the disease immediately becomes asymptomatic.

While you might be a brain-eating purple humanoid with a faceful of tentacles, you still need to observe some common courtesies. You should avoid brains that will be used for making cyborgs, and you definitely shouldn't go around murdering people to eat their brains, unless you're an antagonist.
Blattodean Genetics You feel like crawling into somewhere nice and dark. You turn part cockroach, though some say it's more like those ants from A Bug's Life but not as blue. You become mostly immune to most forms of radiation and can see a tile further in the dark than usual and can read messages written by infrared pens, their vision in the dark goes 1 tile farther than humans, and they can see through the invisibility cloaks created by chameleon, cloak of darkness, Grinches' Cloak ability, and Vampires' Bat Form MkII ability (but not cloaking devices).

The catch is that sources of blunt and crushing damage (e.g. a fire extinguisher or a door closing on you but not a welder or kitchen knife) do 1.5 times more damage, making you considerably more vulnerable to blunt-force trauma.

The color of your exoskeleton is based roughly on the skin tone you chose for your profile in your character setup, with a fair amount of saturation. Similarly, the color of your scelera matches what you set for eye color on your profile.

Speaking of color, your blood is a bright blue-green, because it's actually hemolymph. Blood-related chems like filmgrastim work as normal, and Vampires and other bloodsuckers can still gain nourishment from you.
Primal Genetics You go bananas! You become a Monkey. See that page for more details.
Bovine Genetics You feel like you're ready for some Cow RP. You become a cowperson. Specifically, you look like a Holstein Friesian cow, complete with horns and hooves that change color depending on the color you set for Bottom Detail and Mid Detail in character preferences, respectively. You also have special cow eyes with horizontal pupils, which you can set the color of in the character setup menu. You have funny *screams, extend your m's a lot, and say "human" instead of "cow", because deep down, you truly think you are one.

As a cow, your blood is milk; all the other blood-related chemicals still function as normal, and drinking milk does restore blood. Speaking of blood, you start with hemophilia, so you tend to bleed more often when it's possible. You can also *milk (no hotkey, so you must do say "*milk or similar, like other emotes) to produce milk into a container you're holding or onto the floor, if you aren't holding one. Yes, this means you're actually pouring out your blood, so milking too much can kill you, and the game won't try to stop you until you have absolutely no blood/milk left.

Because of your sturdy hooves, you cannot be tripped by glass shards, even plasmaglass ones. Said hooves also make you do an extra 4 damage when kicking. However, they can't fit shoes, so be extra careful when playing Janitor or Clown. You can set the color of the bottom of your hooves using the second hair color option in the character setup menu. You also have a tail, and if you lose that, you lose your balance too until it's restored.

You are also capable of eating shrubs and plants around the station for nutrition, just how a human would.

Canine Genetics You feel like barking up the wrong tree. You become a pugperson, a challenging mutantrace based around your favorite adorable pets. You take double oxy damage and are deathly allergic to chocolate (carry spaceacillin if you don't wanna die!), but you carry some benefits as well! You can sprint right up until you're out of stamina, where you'll fall on your face dramatically and hilariously. You also jump at things people throw around you, giving you the fastest (albeit possibly most misdirected) reflexes out there.

The real benefits come from pugs' natural detective abilities. You are able to sniff out a very large amount of information from people, using the *sleuth emote.

1. Using *sleuth on a mob will tell the pug what color the mob smells like.

2. Using *sleuth on an object will tell the pug the color of one of the people that interacted with it and a general idea of how long ago.

3. Using *sleuth over and over on the same object will uncover all the colors of the people that interacted with it

However, you cannot use this ability if you are poisoned by chocolate! Dying pugs can't be playing detective, but if they are in need of assistance, they can eat the bone that they start with, which is filled with buffs.

Booster Gene

Booster Genes are a group of mysterious Mutations that, on their own, do absolutely nothing. However, they interact with other Mutations in various and interesting ways.

Mutation Effect
Booster Gene X Activates every Potential Mutation in the organism.
Booster Gene Y Randomizes the organism's Potential Mutation and removes all active Mutations. This mutation can remove job-enforced mutations, such as a Mime's muteness, creating a cursed scenario.
Booster Gene Z Removes all Potential and active Mutations in the organism.
Booster Gene Q Has random, unpredictable effects on the organism. Not obtainable naturally.

High Complexity DNA

This is a rare mutation which cannot be researched or activated using a DNA Activator, it can also only be Sequenced which means the occupant must be in the GeneTek scanner. When activated and stored in Mutation Storage, it serves as a wildcard for combining Stored Mutations, so you can very easily get some fascinating and rare Mutations this way. When activated it unlocks powerful Research. If a mutation is used in multiple combinations, then it will prioritize one of the combinations over the others when combined with High Complexity DNA.

Chromosomes

Chromosomes are Mutation modifiers. They can be be spliced with Mutations. Each mutation can only be spliced once. Each time you activate a Mutation you gain 2-5 random Chromosomes. Each GeneTek console has its own Chromosome storage.

To splice a Chromosome with a Mutation, click the Storage tab, scroll down to Stored Chromosomes, pick a Chromosome and click Splice. Find an active or stored Mutation which you want to splice, and click the Splice button next to it.

There are different types of Chromosomes:

  • Stabilizer - Removes the Stability penalty from the Mutation. Can't be added to Mutations which have no Stability penalty.
  • Synchronizer - Makes the Mutation less dangerous to the organism. This has multiple different effects depending on the Mutation it's spliced with. Unfortunately, has an effect with only 6 mutations total.
  • Weakener - Makes the Mutation more Reclaimable and doubles the amount of Research Materials you gain from Reclaiming.
  • Reinforcer - Makes the Mutation mutadone-proof, meaning that the only way it can be removed is through the GeneTek console.
  • Power Booster - Makes the Mutation more powerful!
  • Energy Booster - Halves the cooldown of any usable powers the Mutation grants.
  • Camouflager - Hides the message associated with gaining a Mutation.

Research

You can buy extra features and upgrades through Available Research. Research is shared between all GeneTek consoles.

In return for slowing down the cloning process with Advanced Genetic Analysis enabled on the cloner all Research cooldowns are reduced by 5%. Up to two active cloners will reduce the cooldown.

Research Tier Requires Time (sec.) Cost Effect
Gene Sequence Checker 1 Nothing 90 50 Checks how many base pairs are stable. It has a cooldown of one minute. Correct DNA pairs will turn green and incorrect pairs red.
Gene Booth 1 Nothing 60 50 Lets you sell Mutations at the Gene/Genetics Booth, a machine that lets you give out Mutations without leaving Genetics (for the most part). More on that here.
Radiation Dampeners 1 Nothing 180 80 Halves the amount of harmful radiation caused by Radiation Emitters.
Advanced Mutation Research 1 Mutations Researched: 20 90 50 Halves the base cost and time of researching a mutation and enables the ability to see, research, and activate advanced mutations. Advanced mutations are generally very powerful and/or unique.
Biotic Cooling Mechanisms 1 Fire, Cold and SMES Resistance 90 150 Halve the cooldown times for all equipment.
Complex DNA Research Efficiency 1 High Complexity DNA 120 50 Research costs and time decrease by 15%.
Complex DNA Mutation Storage 1 High Complexity DNA 120 50
Adds five saving slots for storing mutations.
Complex Material Storage 1 High Complexity DNA 120 50 Increases maximum materials storage by 50.
Complex Gene Booth Acceleration 1 High Complexity DNA, Gene Booth 120 150 It normally takes 20 seconds for the genetics booth to give someone a gene, and this upgrade lowers it by 5 seconds. This stacks with additively with Gene Booth Injection Speedup and Biotic Gene Booth Injection, meaning that with all three upgrades, receiving a mutation from the gene booth only takes 5 seconds.
DNA Reclaimer 2 Gene Sequence Checker 240 100 Allows unwanted genes to be converted into research materials. It has a two minute cooldown and has a chance to fail depending on what gene is being reclaimed. If you are at or above the materials cap, you can still reclaim genes, though you won't get materials.
DNA Injectors 2 Mutations Researched: 20 240 120 Allows the manufacture of Injector syringes that can insert Mutations into other subjects. More on those here.
Emitter Coolant System 2 Radiation Dampeners 180 120 Reduces the amount of time required for Radiation Emitters to cool down.
Gene Booth Injection Speedup 2 Gene Booth 120 75 Decreases the time it takes for the genetics booth to give someone a mutation by 25%. This normally takes around 20 seconds, so 25% means it saves 5 seconds.
Mutation Storage 3 DNA Reclaimer 300 100 Allows for storage of up to three genes in each GeneTek console's Stored Mutations for the purposes of combination or transference into new recipients. The Mutations must be researched and activated before storage. Combining Stored Mutations can produce rare or unique mutations! Experiment!
Precision Radiation Emitters 3 Radiation Dampeners, Emitter Coolant System 300 150 Upgrades the Radiation Emitters in the scanner so they can target single Mutations at a time. The Mutations must have been researched first, and doing this has a longer cooldown and greater irradiation amount than regular DNA scrambling.
Improved Material Storage 3 DNA Reclaimer 300 125 Increases the maximum number of research materials to 150.
Biotic Radiation Dampeners 3 Radiation Dampeners, Radiation Resistance, Radioactive 250 100 Completely removes the harmful effects of the Radiation Emitters.
Biotic Gene Booth Injection 3 Gene Booth Injection Speedup, Gene Booth 180 100 Lowers the time it takes for the genetics booth to grant a mutation by 25%, or about 5 seconds. This stacks additively with Gene Booth Injection Speedup, so with both upgrades, the genetics booth takes only 10 seconds.
Expanded Mutation Storage 4 Mutation Storage 450 120 Adds two additional saving slots for Mutations.

Here is the Genetics Research tree, with arrows indicating requirements, in case you want to focus on, say, Precision Radiation Emmiters. Genetics-Research-Tech-TreeV2.png

Combining Mutations

Once you have researched Mutation Storage, active Mutations can be stored and combined to yield new and more useful Mutations. Some of these are only available via combination, whereas others may appear (rarely) as Potential Mutations. There isn't any penalty to getting an invalid combo, so feel free to experiment and see what results you get! Mutation combinations are not considered secret content, so if you discover one, you aren't required to ask for permission, preface it as spoilers, or otherwise take extra precautions to share it.

If you want to skip the discovery part and go straight to learning the combos, you check out this unofficial guide.

Lesser-Relevant Menus

Alongside Potential, these menus appear when you have someone in the scanner. Compared to Research and Potential, there's not much to say about these. They still have a purpose, mind you, but they do far less than the other ones. and are way less important.

Mutations Menu

This shows mutations which are active. If you have the Mutation Storage or Gene Booth upgrade, this is where you go to store or sell them. While you have the same 'Potential after getting cloned, you lose any active mutations after getting cloned, so people coming out of the cloner usually have this empty, unless the cloner had Advanced Genetic Analysis enabled.

Body

This lets you change the occupant into a variety of lovely forms depending on what mutations you've researched, such as a lizardman or a giant cockroach. By default, Human and Primal Genetics (monkey) are available.

Appearance

This one opens up a menu just like the one in the Character Selection screen, where you can change the hair style (s), hair color, skin tone, eye color, and various other cosmetic things about the occupant. If you want to give people obnoxious Sailor Moon hair or colorful Rainbow Afros, this is the place (and the only place at that, as this is pretty much the only way to get those unique hair styles). Only appears if whoever's in the scanner is a race that can accept these appearance options, namely humans.

Supplementary Videos


Department Guides
Engineering Making and Breaking · Construction · Gas · Power Grid · Thermoelectric Generator · Singularity Generator · Geothermal Generator · Catalytic Generator · Nuclear Generator · Mining · Materials and Crafting · Wiring · Hacking · MechComp · Mechanic components and you · Control Unit · Ruckingenur Kit · Reactor Statistics Computer · Cargo Crates
Medsci Doctoring · Genetics · Robotics · Telescience · Plasma Research · Artifact Research · Chemistry · Chemicals · ChemiCompiler · Decomposition
Security Security Officer · Contraband · Forensics · Space Law
Service Foods and Drinks · Botany · Writing · Piano Song Dump · Instruments
The AI Artificial Intelligence · AI Laws · Chain of Command · Guide to AI · Humans and Nonhumans · Killing the AI
Computers Computers · TermOS · ThinkDOS · Packets