Mutation category expansion

Game Talk The Drawing Board
341

What about some ways to “mutate” that aren’t so Xom/RNGesus based?

Genetically engineering your own genome, where you basically can craft a virus to change your DNA. Of course, actually changing your genome should be difficult and require lots of resources, because if it was easy, the science labs would be filled with gen-tech and not mutation serums.
Or perhaps grafting organs into your body, like an organic implant. It’d add a bit of “clumsy” low-tech customization to the mutation system. Say, you play a medical mutant, saw your arms off and graft a bunch of tentacles onto your stumps. Or become a raptor with a spiked tail. For the slurpasaur fans.

342

The mutations are goo driven so theres your randomness. The targeted mutagen simply guides the blob somehow… just not entirely. organic implants would be a whole new thing. Faszinating as well xD.

Manipulating your own genome would also be different from what we are doing right now i think. afaik the blob mutations do not change your genome… thats why (i asume) you can revert back to your former self with all the traits you had at chargen (which logicaly should only be acomplishable if your dna was eitehr intact or stored in the purifier (which isn t implied by its production… you don t use your blood or anything to make it… you can even find it so any would do))

343

Closest to genome-changing is the threshold and post-thresh stuff that gets non-purifiable.

Implanting limbs would take some doing and pretty well erase the line between CBMs and mutations, so whilst it’s an interesting idea I’m not sold on it. Thanks.

344

I’ve got one! What if rats could see food items through walls?

And how about Trogs getting a morale boost for being in darkness?

EDIT

Brainstorm! What if using mutagen while the player is infected with a parasite has a chance of MUTATING THE PARASITE! Could lead to some very nasty consequences but also be the building block for a mutation line and threshold where the player lives in symbiosis with an unlikely ally? Some mutation ideas, good and bad.

So first thing’s first, I think the mutations leading up to clearing the threshold should all be bad. They should make you want to purge it from your body. That said these are the steps it’s taking to achieve sentience/annex part of your body, so once you clear the threshold they should be replaced by less intrusive variants.

Secondly, because the barter/speaking skills don’t get dusted off enough I think that “Chatting with yourself” should be replaced with a menu where you talk to the parasite as if it were an NPC. While you won’t be able to convince it not to eat when you get hungry you might be able to talk it into waiting till you’re VERY HUNGRY for example. Or to hide/go dormant briefly so you can talk to an NPC.

With one eye open… - Your parasite remains awake while you sleep and will attack any perceived threats that approach. It may also grow restless and cause you to sleep walk.
Idle hands… - Your parasite will on occasion consume drugs, eat food or activate entertainment items within your inventory and adjacent tiles of its own accord.
Fixer-upper - Your parasite has made some renovations. +3 to your lowest stat.
Shared Reader - Activated via the mutations menu ((Or maybe as an option when you attempt to read a book)) Your parasite reads aloud, producing noise but allowing you to gain skill and learn recipes via books while doing something else. Stops upon sighting a hostile.
Comrade in arms - In combat your parasite gets its own turn during which it will lash out at a single enemy within two-tiles of the player.
Understudy - Your parasite will sometimes offer its own insight for a given task, marginally increasing skill gain.
Under Wraps - Your parasite automatically consumes bandages within your inventory if you’re injured
Chatterbox - Mi-go style commentary from your parasite, a grab bag of jokes, question, complaints and compliments that marginally increase/decrease morale.

345

I was rewatching some movies a while ago, and while watching it I kept thinking about some nether-threshold mutation tree. People have talked about nether-mutations before, but I think that was more about psychic stuff and not really something “from beyond” (pun intended). So I’ll just post some short clips of transformations here.
Spoilers ahead if you haven’t watched Altered States or From Beyond. Also, I have a pretty high horror resistance, so if you have a weak stomach, you might not like it. It’s not gory… but it’s certainly weird.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_WjpMsvk-zw
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wkPM4M6bnB4

Like a teleporting brain-eating ghoul with a third eye hopping in and out of dimensions?

346

The stem cell machine could perhaps change your DNA.

Actually this could be quite fun; if you had enough (probably not that high) medicine skill, you would probably be ably to “load” the machine with your own stem cells, which would result in its current heal body parts use. If you just use it without doing this, you end up becoming the last person scheduled for treatment (aka your base attributes get randomized, you get random chargen traits, and perhaps gender) sort of having a character generated randomly when you press play now.

Ehh, actually it may not be a great idea.

347

Like what you’re doing with bristled chitin for spiders KA101, my hopes are now set high for Urticating Hair!

348

now all we need is spidey senses which act like a permanent uncanny doge cbm

ah and projectile webs

349

But…how would you aim them? We know where webs come from.

350

very carphully

351

According to the wiki, insect mutants don’t get the “compound eyes” mutation. This makes no sense to me.

352

JSONs too. I’ll throw that into the spider fixes I’ve got sitting on Git.

353

Remember, spiders -don’t- have compound eyes, just many (or few, or NONE) very simple eyes. Most have very poor vision as a result, but a select few (Namely the jumping spider) possess sight greater than our own. Hunting spiders such as there rely on a division of labor, wherein each pairing of eyes serves a different role (Motion detection, night vision, color vision, etc.) Like most insects and arachnids they also possess a much greater field of view (Some as wide as 360 degrees!) but only see keenly in a narrow slice of it.

All that out of the way it’s almost exclusively webless spiders that see with any real clarity. The great majority of them rely on the acuteness of their other senses, like the minute vibrations their hairy bodies alert them of.

If we ever get to the point where players take penalties by being ‘flanked’ ((Attacked from more than one direction during a turn)) I’d suggest spiders and insects take far less severe penalties ((None for compound eyes)) by virtue of having next to no blind-spots.

354

I had this idea of multiple eyes mutations line for spider category. Basic spider eyes would generally be rubbish, which would be expressed as penalty to perception, but with multiple eye mutations penalty would be evened out, and perhaps turned to a bonus instead as one gets more eyes. What I would like to see most is ability mix multiple eye mutations with eye type mutations from other mutation categories (4 avian eyes or 6 compound eyes). Though more simple solution would be to make multiple spider eyes equivalent to other eye categories instead of making separate eye number and eye type mutation lines.

355

There is already a mechanic that limits dogdes when fighting several enemies at once.

That is probably a good place to add some copound eye code easing or removing the dodge penalty.

356

For what it is worth, ducks also nearly lack a blind spot. What they gain in vision range they lose in binocular overlap though. True of many herbivores.

357

Wings (any kind) should give the ability to “fall softly” when falling down ledges, or at least reduce the damage taken.

358

For what it’s worth here’s my two-cents on wings

-Insect wings: The description says they’re too small to lift you, so slowing a fall sounds a bit beyond their scope. Besides, the speed bonus they offer is already pretty awesome.

-Butterfly wings: Same as above, I don’t think they’re strong enough to work when just plopped onto a human. That said it would be neat if they could distract/frighten/friendzone certain hostile bugs

-Bird wings: This is pretty much their bread and butter, and I can tell you right now not to try taking bread from a bird! Joking aside I could see a beefier version of bird wings enabling true flight once z-levels are in.

-Bat wings: These deserve a better glide than bird wings, given how the description pretty much describes them as turning you into a flesh kite. I’d say give them a controlled glide (i.e. pic a square to land on during freefall) that could come in handy with z-levels. (You could cover half a city jumping off a tall enough structure.) Plus unlike bird wings, which would tire you out during travel, batman style gliding would only eat up time.

359

[quote=“Logrin, post:358, topic:3755”]For what it’s worth here’s my two-cents on wings

-Insect wings: The description says they’re too small to lift you, so slowing a fall sounds a bit beyond their scope. Besides, the speed bonus they offer is already pretty awesome.

-Butterfly wings: Same as above, I don’t think they’re strong enough to work when just plopped onto a human. That said it would be neat if they could distract/frighten/friendzone certain hostile bugs

-Bird wings: This is pretty much their bread and butter, and I can tell you right now not to try taking bread from a bird! Joking aside I could see a beefier version of bird wings enabling true flight once z-levels are in.

-Bat wings: These deserve a better glide than bird wings, given how the description pretty much describes them as turning you into a flesh kite. I’d say give them a controlled glide (i.e. pic a square to land on during freefall) that could come in handy with z-levels. (You could cover half a city jumping off a tall enough structure.) Plus unlike bird wings, which would tire you out during travel, batman style gliding would only eat up time.[/quote]

This ain’t Terraria. Your wings are not powered by the Soul of Flight.

In general, Earth’s gravity and air density make wings pretty impractical for humans: probably around 30-40 ft. (~10 meter) wingspan, minimum, and that’s assuming you don’t mind 'em under your arms (so no fair using your hands for any sort of fine manipulation when flapping your wings). Supplying the muscles and other infrastructure needed to keep 'em flapping is no joke either, especially when you’ve got the wings out of the shoulder area (separate logistics from the arms, implies heavier-duty heart, increased blood supply, etc).

It’s unlikely, but possible, that a nether dimension could have suitable parameters to enable flight.

As for controlled descents & gliding, yeah, I’m in favor of bat wings (perhaps with another mutation to represent getting the neurology down to control 'em) allowing controlled descents. How to code that is the question.

360

I think stretching the reality a tiny bit would be okay. If it required other mutations from some sort of “bird” category, like hollow bones, modified innards, and other usually negative mutations, that only have the benefit of eventually allowing you to use wings (at a huge energy expense). Well, that sounds cool but probably would suck.