My one issue with archite genepacks

[Pizzarugi]

So I play the game modded. While I have nothing that affects genes or adds more, I do have mods that make caravan trips more worthwhile in that settlements have more stock and silver. In all of my time spent visiting settlements, having traders and trade ships visit, not once have I found an archite genepack that didn't come with at least one other gene.

Want ageless? You get some floppy ears with it. Non-senescent? Comes with a side of heat resistant and poor social. Archite metabolism? Boom, smooth tail out of nowhere!

They're never just on their own, and it makes creating an ideal xenotype an exercise in frustration. I'll admit that I've barely dipped my toes into creating xenogerms, but from what I've experienced so far, there's no way to pick and choose what you get for genes if the genepack happens to come with extras. If I want to have cat ears on my deathless pawn, I'd rather that be something I choose and not what gets generated alongside it on the genepack I purchase.

This frustration of making a finely-tuned xenogerm has been putting me off on exploring this aspect of BioTech, which is unfortunate, because I was really looking forward to making some pretty neat pawns.

Or am I doing something wrong? I'd appreciate some pointers.

[Tamiore]

I haven't tried it personally, but I'm pretty sure you can implant (a prisoner) with a "mixed pack" and gene-extract them back, potentially one-by-one.

[Pizzarugi]

Originally posted by Tamiore:

I haven't tried it personally, but I'm pretty sure you can implant (a prisoner) with a "mixed pack" and gene-extract them back, potentially one-by-one.

If you're after archite genes, that's not possible as they can't be extracted. Otherwise it'd just be a matter of waiting for a sanguophage or two to farm them for their genes.

[Tamiore]

Originally posted by Pizzarugi:

Originally posted by Tamiore:

I haven't tried it personally, but I'm pretty sure you can implant (a prisoner) with a "mixed pack" and gene-extract them back, potentially one-by-one.

If you're after archite genes, that's not possible as they can't be extracted. Otherwise it'd just be a matter of waiting for a sanguophage or two to farm them for their genes.

Wait, what..?
I was under the impression the limiting factor for archite genes was the archites themselves (you need to spend to apply them), not that they are also impossible to extract.
Ok, that changes things and makes archite genes an actual borderline joke...

[HunterSilver]

I agree on archite genes being a bit too rare. I averaged 1 every 3~4 in-game years and it took me a good 12 or so before I got my first solo archite. The frustrating thing is that you can get duplicates. I got Deathless 2x but never managed to pull Perfect Immunity or Non-senescent.

I understand that they're really good, but realistically you're only ever going to get 1 or 2 of them before you finish up with a colony and the archite capsule cost means that you can really only apply them so many times anyway.

Hopefully the reworked quest rewards and ancient structures will help ease this.

[Tamiore]

Originally posted by HunterSilver:

I agree on archite genes being a bit too rare. I averaged 1 every 3~4 in-game years and it took me a good 12 or so before I got my first solo archite. The frustrating thing is that you can get duplicates. I got Deathless 2x but never managed to pull Perfect Immunity or Non-senescent.

I understand that they're really good, but realistically you're only ever going to get 1 or 2 of them before you finish up with a colony and the archite capsule cost means that you can really only apply them so many times anyway.

Hopefully the reworked quest rewards and ancient structures will help ease this.

I mean, archite genes aren't even that good.
Deathless and +6 metabolism can be amazing, but everything else can usually be achieved faster/easier by conventional genes and other tech. Like, 150% immunity gain genes are already practically indistinguishable from Perfect Immunity. Scars and age can be bio-regenerated away, etc.

[HunterSilver]

By the time you're applying them, you're mostly trying to add small bonuses to specific scenarios anyway. You're not going for Perfect Immunity because Super Immunity is bad, but because Perfect Immunity will completely block disease outbreaks/infections and essentially save you from having colonists doing 1~2 days of bed rest. Ageless means that your tech obsessed colonists will stop spending days in the bio tanks getting younger.

Hilariously, I didn't even want Non-senescent for my colonists, I wanted it for my prisoners. I had a barracks full of blood slaves at 0.5x metabolism and with nuclear stomachs. Non-senescent would have saved me time removing tumors from them.

Each of them potentially saves you a lot of down time and labor, but they are something I'd view as a luxury more than a necessity in any given scenario.

The only one I wanted as a necessity was deathless. Because sometimes lancers really do drop pod down and one shot your lv6 psyker countess through the heart, instantly killing her. And past the early game you just don't get revival serums from quests anymore.

[Tamiore]

Well, that's more-or-less my point: only deathless and +6 metabolism are actually amazing. Everything else is not really competitive enough of an advantage, given how expensive they are.

[Pizzarugi]

Originally posted by Tamiore:

Well, that's more-or-less my point: only deathless and +6 metabolism are actually amazing. Everything else is not really competitive enough of an advantage, given how expensive they are.

Be that as it may, it's not the point of my OP. Even if archite metabolism and deathless are the only archite genes worth gunning for, their genepacks almost always come with a second gene that you most likely don't want included in your future xenogerm. This makes creating a xenohuman of your liking very difficult to manage unless you get lucky in that the genepack has a second trait you actually wanted.

[Swordmouse]

Given the infrequency of archite genes and their usual pairing with a random additional gene, I feel like the intended experience is for them to flavor any given run, rather than add to a perfect genome collection. More "Ah, I guess we're going to have a colony of raging, deathless furries" and less "perfect soldier"

I'm not saying I prefer that, and maybe it'll be tweaked. But as it is, by the time your colony gets a perfect lineup of genes, you're probably swimming in suits of cata, legendary weapons, and a small pile of resurrector serums. Seems like something cool to strive for if you want to, rather than something you're expected to achieve while it's still a massive gamechanger.

[Tamiore]

Originally posted by Pizzarugi:

Originally posted by Tamiore:

Well, that's more-or-less my point: only deathless and +6 metabolism are actually amazing. Everything else is not really competitive enough of an advantage, given how expensive they are.

Be that as it may, it's not the point of my OP. Even if archite metabolism and deathless are the only archite genes worth gunning for, their genepacks almost always come with a second gene that you most likely don't want included in your future xenogerm. This makes creating a xenohuman of your liking very difficult to manage unless you get lucky in that the genepack has a second trait you actually wanted.

Oh, yea, I actually agree on that one as well.
Either archite genes need to be as extract-able as any other gene
or
archite genes should never come bundled up with any other gene.

Because the whole "being bundled up" only makes scene if they ARE, in fact, extract-able via normal means with all the normal drawbacks.

[Metrod125]

OP you are not under any illusion in regards to this.

I played the game for a while on a modless playthrough (currently year 5515)

I had gotten archite genepacks from mostly exotic ship traders, and some from caravaning out to ally faction settlements, mostly to the Empire and Outlander bases (excluding pigskin, cuz screw the grenade spam).
They always come bundled with another bloody gene from what I seen, and if the game was coded based on some RNG number that's less than 1% chance to spawn one without being bundled, its rarer than every other genepack I had bought from settlements and traders over the 15 years that colony of mine had existed.

At best, if there's an archite gene you want but it cames with an annoying side-grade or a total turn off, better find a new variant elsewhere that wont be the same garbage or try to make something useful out of the bad one as you'll likely never see it again.

[Playzr 🐵]

I also wish you could split a gene pack up. As a compromise you'd only be able to take 1 thing from it and the rest would be discarded. Instead you have to just overcome it with sheer quantity and time. It is rather slow to collect all of this stuff and the combination of undesirable features just makes it harder. In some cases you can cancel out one feature with another though, but it means choosing 1 of 2 strange physical features. The whole aspect of the game is just very slow and can't be overcome by having more resources or technology, only coming across traders with this stuff, and where do they get it from? There's no late game ability to manufacture this stuff. I think in future playthroughs we are going to add more mods that let you overcome this slowness. Talking about the archotech features mainly. But obtaining other features by extracting them seems very slow too.

[Kazouie]

Totally agree that archite genes are a total pain at the moment.
I wish could use the remote scanner to search for archite facilities we could then raid to get archite genes and the thingmabobs we need to implant them.
Or pay a faction for info on them would also work for me.
As it stands it's too much of a crapshoot.

[Radi N]

well, there is a legit method to get it. Form a caravan with enough silver to an Outlander settlement (purple faction), after you arrive (or before you arrive), save your game before you start the trade, and open the trade, if you don't find the Archite gene. reload your saved file. repeat until you find one.

Randomization happens when you enter the trade menu for the first time after they restock ( the restock around 15 days).

[Pizzarugi]

Originally posted by Radi Naidra:

well, there is a legit method to get it. Form a caravan with enough silver to an Outlander settlement (purple faction), after you arrive (or before you arrive), save your game before you start the trade, and open the trade, if you don't find the Archite gene. reload your saved file. repeat until you find one.

Randomization happens when you enter the trade menu for the first time after they restock ( the restock around 15 days).

I know the thread is a necro at this point, but damn, I'll have to keep that in mind next time I play. I already use mods that expand trade goods to make settlements wealthier, so this trick would likely help a lot.