PLANT BREEDING/ GENETICALLY MODIFYING (nature friendly)

[Unsolved_]

Plants can be "combined". You genetically manipulate the seeds and seedlings to get abilitys/traits on the plant that can be transferred to others, when you grow/breed them together. The exact way would be to take wild seeds and grow plants from them that have a 1 in a 100% chance per plant of dropping a manipulated/genetically modified seed. If you take two genetically modified seeds of the same plant and generation, and plant them in a flower pot, you can edit the seedlings: Cut them with a knife and tie with a flax twine after connecting the cut areas. From this grows a genetically manipulated plant that carries the properties of the two seeds combined. The normal seeds of the genetically modified plant have the same properties, so you can grow plants with good abilitys forever, without losing the abilitys or having to breed new ones. If you cross seeds from different plants, Or normal/non-genetically manipulated seeds, the plant dies in the flower pot, during breeding. With each breeding of the seeds with the same generation, the generation of the descendant increases by 1. For that this does not become too OP, the plant starts to have a chance to die at generation 50, this chance grows by +2% with each generation. So that, at Gen 50 the plant dies with 2% in genetic mixing and at Gen 100, it 100% dies. A few abilitys that would be possible would be:

growth speed, cold resistance, heat resistance, water storage, harvest quantity, fruit quality, seed production rate, blah blah... etc etc.

(i made a list with every possible thing you could imagine).

For example, a genetically manipulated seed could have the ability of +10% growth speed but -3° heat resistance. Now, if you mix a seed with 10% growth rate and one with 12%, you get one with 13%. ( If the number that is added (10 and 12) has a zero as the back, you add the front one; 1 +  10 = 2. If not, you add the back and Front added together; 1 + 12 = 4, or something like that. This can also be done differently, but it's that for, the plants do not have properties like growth speed +100000% (that's what the system is for, which at generation 100 no longer lets the plant propagate with others, but only lets it plant as a plant with the same properties)

In short;

plants drop seeds and with chance of 0.01%, genetically modified seeds.

These have random properties.

When you combine two, the properties combine.

With each breeding, the generation increases by 1.

You can only breed plants of the same generation and the same plant species.

At gen 50, the chance of dying while breeding increases by 2%+ with each generation of the seed, so that plants can have max 100 generations.

Bred plants drop normal seeds with the same characteristics as the mother plant, which cannot be propagated with others, but can only be recultivated in order to have the traits permanently.

Plants from normal seeds that have emerged from bred seeds, again have a 1% chance of dropping a genetically modified seed that has the abilities of the mother plant, (which can increase in value), + new random traits.

If you've read through this, you probably have too much time, or are excited about the idea xD. I think a system where you can genetically modify seeds to get abilities on plants is very cool. This was just the best system I could think of at the moment. If you understand something and like this idea, make sure that others see this post so that something like this comes into the game.

Edited June 4, 2023 by Unsolved_
Confusion of others (lol)

[PhotriusPyrelus]

I like the general idea, but I think .01% is waaaaaay too low a drop chance.  I'm also not super clear on the conditions for dying off - does it only apply to the experimental plant, or to the "normal seeds"?  Also not sure on how the property addition works.  What about 11+12?  Is that 13 or 23?

[AdrianNumbers]

emmm you do know that connecting 2 growing plants does not change their genome right ? Its called Grafting you take a part from one plant and add it to another, its kinda like transplanting an organ except plants react very much differently than for example humans. Its precisely the reason why we usually use grafting , we do it because it preserves this genome we want (if you were to trace all "Pinata" apple trees in the world you would arrive at one original tree) so all plants of specific variant are essentially clones of the original. Cross breeding or Hybridization begins with cross polination, that how genome mixing works, mutations are another thing entirelly they can and are technically happening with each cell divide but are ussualy countered by cell with few mechanisms. In essence you have two systems :

1. cross breeding - you can try with any two flowering plants but not all mixes have a chance to work, you cross polinate those plants and wait for fruit, then you plant seeds from that fruit and wait to see if it worked, since mixing genes this way is random plants from hybrid seed can exibit a vide variety of behaviors, from beeing barren, through possitive/negative changes to many different characteristics, to turning into entirely different spiecies that both parents.

2. selective breeding - you let nature try as it does all the time but this time its you who judges what changes are better so for example you start with one tree and it bears fruit, then you plant seeds from those fruits and observe trees that grow, if there are changes you decide whether they are good or bad for you, you pick the best ones or maybe just one and plant seeds only from those to repeat the process, its a very slow process thats the explanation why evolution slips our perception, its simply to streched out in time for us to observe properly since its based on this exact mechanism. Selective breeding is Natural selection where humans replace nature.

Ofcourse i can understand if you made those "errors" intentionally since its intended for game.

Edited June 2, 2023 by AdrianNumbers

[Unsolved_]

On 6/2/2023 at 3:18 PM, PhotriusPyrelus said:

I like the general idea, but I think .01% is waaaaaay too low a drop chance.  I'm also not super clear on the conditions for dying off - does it only apply to the experimental plant, or to the "normal seeds"?  Also not sure on how the property addition works.  What about 11+12?  Is that 13 or 23?

To be precise, when I said .01% I actually meant 1% of 100 (I took 1 as 100%). That's probably just because I confused myself. Now to the questions, I've rethought the system , and the result would now be 14. Why? no idea.. xD. And only the experimental plants start to have a +2% chance for each generation + to die (while breeding), not the normal seeds. but that's all just for example, or to confuse haha

Edited June 4, 2023 by Unsolved_

[Unsolved_]

On 6/2/2023 at 10:04 PM, AdrianNumbers said:

emmm you do know that connecting 2 growing plants does not change their genome right ? Its called Grafting you take a part from one plant and add it to another, its kinda like transplanting an organ except plants react very much differently than for example humans. Its precisely the reason why we usually use grafting , we do it because it preserves this genome we want (if you were to trace all "Pinata" apple trees in the world you would arrive at one original tree) so all plants of specific variant are essentially clones of the original. Cross breeding or Hybridization begins with cross polination, that how genome mixing works, mutations are another thing entirelly they can and are technically happening with each cell divide but are ussualy countered by cell with few mechanisms. In essence you have two systems :

1. cross breeding - you can try with any two flowering plants but not all mixes have a chance to work, you cross polinate those plants and wait for fruit, then you plant seeds from that fruit and wait to see if it worked, since mixing genes this way is random plants from hybrid seed can exibit a vide variety of behaviors, from beeing barren, through possitive/negative changes to many different characteristics, to turning into entirely different spiecies that both parents.

2. selective breeding - you let nature try as it does all the time but this time its you who judges what changes are better so for example you start with one tree and it bears fruit, then you plant seeds from those fruits and observe trees that grow, if there are changes you decide whether they are good or bad for you, you pick the best ones or maybe just one and plant seeds only from those to repeat the process, its a very slow process thats the explanation why evolution slips our perception, its simply to streched out in time for us to observe properly since its based on this exact mechanism. Selective breeding is Natural selection where humans replace nature.

Ofcourse i can understand if you made those "errors" intentionally since its intended for game.

i know it's called "grafting" even if i don't really know much about plants. I just thought that would be the best and most uncomplicated, or by my Bad complicated (with my self confusion thinkable) way to integrate something like that "quite well" into the game. Besides, we already have the grafting for the trees, so something with "skill based" plants would be cool, wouldn't it? (also, if you're looking for the logic, we have something like drifters and temporal things in game xD) but thanks for correcting me!

[Thorfinn]

On 6/2/2023 at 8:18 AM, PhotriusPyrelus said:

I like the general idea, but I think .01% is waaaaaay too low a drop chance.  I'm also not super clear on the conditions for dying off - does it only apply to the experimental plant, or to the "normal seeds"?  Also not sure on how the property addition works.  What about 11+12?  Is that 13 or 23?

The method is too cumbersome for me to bother with. The success rate doesn't sound too bad if you just went with artificial selection, something you could realistically do at any tech level.

On a typical 200 plot garden, 0.01% would mean you'd have about a 2% chance of an improved crop with each and every planting. Giving a full 1% would be about 86% chance per planting of getting at least one mutant. 0.1% would be about an 18% chance, which still seems high. I think you would want to tone down the bonus a bit if you made mutations that common. Particularly if you allowed plants within a few tiles of the improved seed to at least potentially cross-pollinate and become hybrids. Just spit-balling here, but how about the same model that water uses -- tiles adjacent to the mutant have 75% chance of becoming hybrid, tiles 1 space away have 50%, tiles 2 spaces away, 25%?

[Maelstrom]

I would implement an exponential decline curve. Something like 60% on the adjacent block, 30% 1 block distance, 15%, 7.5% and so on to a max of maybe 4 blocks.

[PhotriusPyrelus]

2 hours ago, Maelstrom said:

I would implement an exponential decline curve. Something like 60% on the adjacent block, 30% 1 block distance, 15%, 7.5% and so on to a max of maybe 4 blocks.

That's geometric, not exponential.  ~_^

[Maelstrom]