Genetics: A discussion

[Nerkson]

The reason I have made this thread is that a change was made today, July 12th :

• Physically Fit mutation stability cost change: -5 -> 5.
  
• Synchronized Vestigial Ballistics stability cost change: -15 -> 0.
  

I wouldn't say this was the last straw or that these changes are unwarranted or anything like that - it has been a constant thought in my head for a while now, but I think this would be a good time to talk about Genetics and what purpose it actually serves.

Genetics is one half of the mad space doctor power fantasy part of "Retro Future Space Adventures": You get to mutate people into epic heroes or powerful monsters, or in rare cases mutate innocent people into barely babbling puddles of goo. It inspires the idea of playing God. There's no real need for Genetics, these concepts are all bonuses to enhance the crews life. I would put genetics in the same category as say, the Chef or Botany. Both departments could be missing and nothing will change to fundamentally impact a round while departments like Engineering or Security can drastically affect a round by their presence or lack of.

Since I've started playing, genetics has undergone lots of changes and I cannot help but feel that Genetics is in a lost spot.

1. It's a complicated department that suffers from massive time gates and resource costs that aren't easily replenished - in many ways I'd say its similar to Botany and the knowledge of splicing plants and properly managing mutations (Except Botany can just use the stations budget while Genetics can't).
   
2. The people who play genetics are often screen-tappers who rarely engage with the crew - beyond screaming for Johnny Stafferman to come by because he has a rare gene they need. (I'm guilty of this as well - its way too easy to get lost in searching for the next gene that 20+ minutes go by and you wonder why there's a bunch of dead people splattered over the halls outside genetics).
   
3. Over time genetics have been nerfed more than anything - Stability went from 125 points to 100 points, and some of the more common genes that granted free stability now are zeroed out or cost stability.
   
4. The cost of engaging with genetics is too high. As a reminder, at 100 Stability abilities work 100% of the time but at 80% stability abilities only work 80% of the time. Below 50 stability, you start to run into issues where your speech is near always garbled and your genes begin downgrading to their harmful variants, and you begin mutating at random. If you don't pick the right genes, you will mutate. Why take these risks? The Director will get mad at you if you sell un-stabilized genes or sell genes considered Antag Bait.
   

Now you might be saying "Nerkson, you silly man! You can just use Stabilizer to remove the risks of stability downsides!" Well, that itself is kind of a weird problem as well. Right now Stabilizer is the most valuable chromosome. It means some genes don't get full benefit of empowered but most of the genes don't need the full benefit of empower to be useful - Anaerobic Lungs and Thermal can both be safely Stabilized and ensure you will never die in space from exposure. The Hulk gene just mutates down to Musculature if your health drops below 50%. You only empower genes that are native to a person because it incurs 0 Stability cost, and the other chromosomes might as well not exist at all. The number of times I've bothered using Weakener, Reinforcer, Energy Booster, or Camouflager can be counted on a single hand. Synch is used slightly more but it has a cost where only 6 total genes can be synch'd on a single person. Stabilizer and Power Booster are the only useful chromosomes, period.

You might also be saying "If you want to use Genes at their full impact, then you need to be willing to accept they won't work 100% of the time or you will have to taken on massive downside genes." My response is plainly that this isn't very fun. No one demands robotics have to blind you if you want to run very fast and be unable to be tripped. Eating a healthy meal from the Chef doesn't make you run slower because you're tired from eating a good meal. To me this feels like if getting 2+ robotic limbs caused them to sometimes try to kill you or if you get 2+ organs replaced you have a chance to suffer organ rejection and have the organs die at random.

As a kind of last point, I'll also argue most of genetics is useless. Dozens of genes to control how people talk, and I have never had a single person ask to be swedish. Another dozen genes that cause you to scream randomly or age randomly. Fun? I guess? But who buys "I always scream randomly" or "My fingers sound like a wind chime" regularly?

So, my question is simple: What purpose should genetics serve, and to what cost should it serve that? As it stands, I see the future of genetics being more nerfs - Anaerobic and Thermals could easily be nerfed in the future because they're just too useful and auto-include. People don't take downside genes because they're not fun to play as, and you're more than likely to earn the ire of people for even offering them.

Should genetics just be less powerful? Should genes have a time gate on them but be allowed to be more powerful as a result? Should the department encourage more interaction with the crew?

If you're asking me what I think might be neat, I wouldn't mind: separating genes you start with vs genes you get from the booth. Make your starting genes more compelling and put limits on what can appear - Seeing a person with five variants of speech genes is crippling when you tell them they're genetically the equivalent of a Hapsburg. Make gene booth genes diminish on a timer that can be refreshed at any time. 10 minutes is a fine number to start with because it encourages people to come back to genetics instead of it being a "Well I got my genes, time to go toss off to whatever else I wanted to do."

Thanks for your time.