N18 Gene-Smithing

Sump Duck

Ganger
Yak Comp 3rd Place
Mar 9, 2020
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1,337
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Goliath gene-smithing!

Yes you can spam dermal hardening, and I’m sure it’ll win you lots of friends.

However it also seems like a fun way to add some mechanical weight to your gang and character concepts.
Has anyone had any fun with it or had some favourite ideas on how to use it in a gang that aren’t entirely power gamey. . . at least not too egregiously?
 
Honestly, there's more good choices than bad. Like, you could make your entire gang toughness 3, and that'd be bad. But even if you nerf the strength of all your gangers to 3, well they're not really using their str stat that often so it's not a big deal, and it gives you more money to play around with cool stuff.


I think the most fun goofy thing to do would be to take... tyrant's something or other? The thing that buffs your leader, but disallows you from taking champions, and see how far you can get with one super leader and a bunch of scrubs
 
Yeah Tyrants pride looks like it could be a fun one to give a go. One stacked boss and his minions.
I also like the idea of giving some ganger or juve Alphas lineage and having a wanna be leader in your gang.

The ability to have an unborn champion/leader and pick any starting skill outside of muscle seems like an opportunity for some shenanigans.
I'm guessing you wouldn't be able to pick from the new skill lists in the other 'house of' books though?
 
Yeah Tyrants pride looks like it could be a fun one to give a go. One stacked boss and his minions.
I also like the idea of giving some ganger or juve Alphas lineage and having a wanna be leader in your gang.

The ability to have an unborn champion/leader and pick any starting skill outside of muscle seems like an opportunity for some shenanigans.
I'm guessing you wouldn't be able to pick from the new skill lists in the other 'house of' books though?

i mean, unless it has that limitation :p.

Rock that 4 or 5 inch versatile virtuosso renderizer (note this isn't actually a thing)
 
Just had a look and it specifically lists the 7 main skill sets as the ones you can choose from, no house specific skill sets available. Which seems fair. I don't see Goliaths having much in the way of finesse!
 
The Natborn Adaptive Mind seems pretty nice to be able to spend XP on Secondary skills as if they were Primary - seems like a good way to make use of Muscle skills on Leaders & Champs in particular. Being able to choose instead of randomly roll makes them much more attractive.

It would get very expensive, and will be sort of wasted on normal gangers, but I like the concept of an all-Unborn gang. Some interesting conversion opportunities to have them be ex-members of another House.
 
In the HoC topic I posted the concept for a gang I was building before lock down. Let me see if I can dig up the post..
 
It would get very expensive, and will be sort of wasted on normal gangers, but I like the concept of an all-Unborn gang. Some interesting conversion opportunities to have them be ex-members of another House.

I'm sure you could do some interesting conversions, but all I can picture is regular Escher or Delaque models with roided-out Goliath arms slapped on
 
I found it, was in the Spire, not the House of Chains topic.

I'm having fun making my new Goliath gang, The Thunderers. I'm still tweaking the custom fighters and stuff to get it all working with the current tools, but the House of Chains allows you to literally build narrative into your gang!

For example: My leader with the woefully predictable name Maxx Damage is Vatborn with no gene-smithing upgrades. He aims to prove that vatborn are every bit as capable as natborn, and if I ever roll a House favor allowing him to take a gene-smithing upgrade he will have earned his rejuve treatment to prolong his lifespan.

My 2 champions are a Forge Boss and Stimmer pair of unborn brothers named Biff an Boomer Buffwell, Buffwell being their common name given to that batch of unborns who went under the knife together. They are former Orlocks, hence the Savant skills, who were captured in a Goliath slave raid out in the ash wastes while working a convoy. After earning freedom in the fighting pits they became full Goliaths and joined Maxx Damage's ambitious gang. Sadly, Boomer's procedure ran into problems, and his mind can't always differentiate data slug memory implants from his former life, so he compensates with a bad stim addiction. If he ever dies I'll replace him with a 'zerker to represent him going over the edge!

Since this is an Uprising campaign, The Thunderers will be Corpse Guild caravan guards who see to it that corpse starch shipments flow unhindered out of Smith Heel. But when shipments start coming up light, they are tasked with finding out why...

Edit: Here is the gang, still deciding on final equipment and getting custom content woking.

https://yaktribe.games/underhive/gang/the_thunderers.105317/

Shame the campaign never happened.
 
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The Natborn Adaptive Mind seems pretty nice to be able to spend XP on Secondary skills as if they were Primary - seems like a good way to make use of Muscle skills on Leaders & Champs in particular. Being able to choose instead of randomly roll makes them much more attractive.

It would get very expensive, and will be sort of wasted on normal gangers, but I like the concept of an all-Unborn gang. Some interesting conversion opportunities to have them be ex-members of another House.

Does it allow to choose the secondary skill though? I understand this rule that it only changes the xp cost of secondary skills, without changing the way skills are choosen. Would be cool though, randomly determining skills is so bad that I would never take such a skill, the chance is to high to get a useless one.
 
hme
The Quick and the Shred.

Nat-Born Forge Tyrant
- Tyrant's Pride, Tyrant's Own, Prime Specimen, Light Carapace Armour, Combi Weapon (Boltgun/grenade launcher) - 325
Ganger - boltgun - 110
Ganger - boltgun - 110
Ganger - Stub Cannon - 75
Juve - Stub Gun, Smoke Grenades - 70
Prospect - Heavy Rock Saw - 155
Prospect - Heavy Rock Saw - 155
Total: 1,000

Idea would be to use Tyrant's Own and Prime Specimen to increase the tyrant's toughness to 6 from the word go (because if you lose him, this gang is in trouble). The remaining +1 probably goes on BS, but that's TBC - maybe wounds)?

From my thread here.

Uses Tyrant's Pride, Tyrant's Own and Prime Specimen to make the leader an absolute beast - but no champions.

Plus side is you can have super expensive weapons without much difficulty - I've got two 120 credit heavy rock saws in there, plus the combi weapon and starting carapace armour, and still have a 7 gang team...
 
Does it allow to choose the secondary skill though? I understand this rule that it only changes the xp cost of secondary skills, without changing the way skills are choosen. Would be cool though, randomly determining skills is so bad that I would never take such a skill, the chance is to high to get a useless one.

Hmmm. I'd have to look at the exact wording, but I remember it being something along the lines of Secondary skills "counting as Primary skills" when spending XP. So I would assume that allows spending XP to choose one, just as you can do with Primary skills.
 
Hmmm. I'd have to look at the exact wording, but I remember it being something along the lines of Secondary skills "counting as Primary skills" when spending XP. So I would assume that allows spending XP to choose one, just as you can do with Primary skills.

‘This fighter counts their secondary skill sets as primary skill sets when spending xp’ is exactly what it says
 
No - on the thread I pulled that from I had three potential gang set-ups, with that being only one of them. I'm still trying to choose between this one and the first list (a more conventional one)... but I have to say, I do really like the idea of two rock saws...

And the lack of furnace plates was because I couldnt find the credits - after the first game, I think money would be spent on up-armour and an ammo jack.
 
From my thread here.

Uses Tyrant's Pride, Tyrant's Own and Prime Specimen to make the leader an absolute beast - but no champions.

Plus side is you can have super expensive weapons without much difficulty - I've got two 120 credit heavy rock saws in there, plus the combi weapon and starting carapace armour, and still have a 7 gang team...

I missed this in the original discussion, but leaders are limited to two gene-smithing upgrades and/or downgrades, same as champions.