Trait limit... Is there one?

[Godspeed]

I want to preface this by saying, I attempted to search the forums already and the best answer i got was a "probably not" from 2019

Originally posted by Bliraxnil:

As far as i know: No.

I have a Nephelym with 3 Rows of traits.
The only limit you have, is how many traits there are.

Even so I'm having trouble breeding 2 non specific non opposing traits together and there seems to be a hard limit of 8 traits.

I have 7 traits at 3/3 and I am attempting to breed 2 Nephelym together with 8 traits, one has Hornball 1 and the other has Stoic 1.

I know these are only rank 1, but i have Potent 3 on both parents, and no amount of repeated breeding seems to be able to exceed 8 traits, they always get 7/7 of the rank 3 traits they share and EITHER Hornball 1 or Stoic 1

[bi0thief]

Only thing I can think of is i think it was based on your breeder level. Like i never tried to max my level, but the higher your breeder level, the more number traits you could have on your nephs.

[Kidd]

If you mean as in a trait quantity gap, not as far as I know.

[jackofclubsblog]

I have a Bovaur with 10 traits, so I can confirm that the problem is not with a maximum of 8.

Bear in mind that the odds of passing on a set of traits are going to diminish as set gets larger.

According to the wiki: https://breedersofthenephelym.miraheze.org/wiki/Traits

A. The number of Traits a Nephelym can have at once is not inherently limited, although some Traits are mutually exclusive to each-other (e.g. Kindhearted and Hedonist). [There are 2 pairs and one set of 3 traits that are mutually exclusive, so the maximum is 17 out of 21 possible traits. --JoC]

B. After a successful Breeding, each Characteristic Trait owned by the parents has a chance to be passed on to the offspring. It is estimated to be 60% per trait, no matter if one or both parents have the trait (ver. 760.6).

C. The chance of passing on a given Trait depends on how many of the parents have the Trait in question.

So if point B is true, the probability to pass on the common 7 traits, should be 0.6 ^ 7 = 0.02799 which is about 1 chance in 36 pregnancies. To get the 8th trait this would go down to 0.6 ^ 8 = 0.01679 or about 1 :60, and 9 would be .010078 which is just a little over 1 : 100.

But traits 8 & 9 would only have a single parent, so this could be even lower.

[Master Green Fox]

So, in short, it gets exponentially harder and harder to get more traits as the total number of traits increases?

[Godspeed]

Originally posted by Master Green Fox:

So, in short, it gets exponentially harder and harder to get more traits as the total number of traits increases?

Despite all the math Jack offered up, I can't help but feel something obvious is going on in the background im just missing.

For instance

Originally posted by jackofclubsblog:

B. After a successful Breeding, each Characteristic Trait owned by the parents has a chance to be passed on to the offspring. It is estimated to be 60% per trait, no matter if one or both parents have the trait (ver. 760.6).

Originally posted by jackofclubsblog:

C. The chance of passing on a given Trait depends on how many of the parents have the Trait in question

If the chance for a trait to be passed on if both parents have it is increased, why is that chance 60% REGARDLESS of how many parents have it. Doesn't that imply the chance is always going to be 60% and contradict itself?

AND if THAT is the case, why does breeding 2 parents with the same 7 tier 3 traits together produce offspring with those same 7 traits so consistently?

Lets assume there is some kind of fail-safe buffer at work like Point C. Suggests. If both parents have the same trait they are super likely to get it.

Does that not then mean the %chance to get an extra 2 traits is no longer 0.6^8 since 7 of those traits are locked in.

[jackofclubsblog]

I found point B confusing as well. I am betting that the original author is incorrect that the chance is constant regardless of the number of parents with the trait. I included the full quote from the wiki because I didn't want to give the impression that I knew anything about the subject personally. Treat it as a rule of thumb for making educated guesses.

Originally posted by Godspeed:

AND if THAT is the case, why does breeding 2 parents with the same 7 tier 3 traits together produce offspring with those same 7 traits so consistently?

Do you mean that when you breed these pairs together you FREQUENTLY get the 7 traits? That is not my experience at all. I usually get lots and lots of lower quantities of various combinations of the shared traits, with a few of the unshared traits randomly thrown in.

My understanding of your original post is that you don't get an 8th trait in the offspring. Do you ever get six shared traits and one unshared? Or five + two? I would think that would happen at least as frequently as the seven + zero result.

Originally posted by Godspeed:

Lets assume there is some kind of fail-safe buffer at work like Point C. Suggests. If both parents have the same trait they are super likely to get it.

Does that not then mean the %chance to get an extra 2 traits is no longer 0.6^8 since 7 of those traits are locked in.

I think you are exactly correct here. I tried to make this point in the last sentence of my earlier post, but you have said it a bit more clearly.

One thing in favor of this guess is that when the traits are displayed, they are in order of the tiers, not in the usual order. So there is obviously a preference for the higher tier traits (which would necessarily be the shared traits in your scenario) so it isn't too hard to imagine that that preference might extend to the actual breeding chances as well. If the lower tiers have a proportionately lower chance of being included . This is purely speculation of course, but it would explain your frustrating results.

The good news is that the odds of getting the unshared traits are probably greater than 0 at least according to point A from the wiki. It is definitely possible to get 8 traits on a neph, (I have two in my stables plus the 10-trait bovaur I mentioned above). Most of the tiers on my nephs are 1 or 2, but i don't think what you are trying is inherently impossible.

[Godspeed]

Originally posted by jackofclubsblog:

My understanding of your original post is that you don't get an 8th trait in the offspring. Do you ever get six shared traits and one unshared? Or five + two? I would think that would happen at least as frequently as the seven + zero result.

I'm getting the same 7 tier 3 traits and EITHER 1 of the un-shared tier 1 traits a majority of the time.

On occasion I get a magic Offspring with NO traits at all, just a blank slate.

And the other Offspring will LOSE 1 Trait and revert down to 6 with NO un-shared traits

I've never had any other result in close to 200 breeding attempts.

Originally posted by jackofclubsblog:

So there is obviously a preference for the higher tier traits (which would necessarily be the shared traits in your scenario) so it isn't too hard to imagine that that preference might extend to the actual breeding chances as well.

Yeah this is the information i wanted. The wiki completely missed the mark on saying the chance is just a flat 60% in every situation, that's simply wrong. I'm just gonna have to get the other traits to tier 3 to increase their chance weight and keep trying.