I was really bored one day and was tired of using skill sets I knew were going to work even on perma death and going rouge. I also felt a lack of attachment for the characters I made through random skills. So I made things more interesting with……Play dramatic music…..DREDMOR FAMLIY TREE. Basically its skilletics, like genetics but not. You inherit a set of skills from your parents who have also passed on their gorgeous and lush eye brows to you. Here is what you do- Start with to random generated skill sets and write the first six down. Delete the seventh one or a double weapon set. (I find having two skills such as axes and maces to be both pointless and not fun) Have them have four ‘children’ and do the following for each 1 Roll a die for a gender, evens guys odd girls. 2 Then take a die and roll until you get 3 unique numbers per skill set 3 Then make a new character with those six skills and then add one you choose 4 When they die, which is likely, generate a skill set for their partner and repeat. I highly recommend perma death and going rouge. I was so bored I even made other little random things that change the skills you ‘inherit’ from your predecessors and the number of children each parent has, but I wont bore you with those just yet. But make a little family tree and see which side are the black sheep and which side are the losers.
This sounds neat but I am really bad at visualizing these sorts of things. Could you show us how you did it?
I am guessing by show you mean give a detailed example. If you want/need more or are still confused let me know. So I hit the random button for my guy and gal ( and yes i named them that) and get the following skills which I write down on a piece of paper. For Guy- Master of Arms, Fleshsmithing, Astrology, Assassin, Wandlore, Psionic, Rouge scientist So number the first 6 and remove the 7th skill. Sadly in this case I lost Rouge scientist 1 Master of Arms 2 Fleshsmithing 3 Astrology 4 Assassin 5 Wandlore 6 psionics For gal- Vampire, Sword, Pyromancer, Fungle arts, Axes, Tourist, Demonology So I Number the first six but I see that I have both swords and axes so I get rid of axes, giving me- 1 Vampire 2 Sword 3 Pyromancer 4 Fungal arts 5 Tourist 6 Demonology Take 1 die or 4 dice and roll to discover the gender of the kids. I rolled and got 2 girls and 2 guys. Draw a family tree and give them names like so . This can be done when ever but i did it now so you could see the glorious lack of skills i have at Microsoft paint Next ill roll the dice to see which skill Sam inherits. For the first set 1 Master of Arms 2 Fleshsmithing 3 Astrology 4 Assassin 5 Wandlore 6 psionics I roll a 1, 5, 1 again(which does not count so u roll again) and a 2 So my 3 unique numbers are 1,5 and 2 so Sam gets Master of Arms, Fleshsmithing and Wandlore from his dad. For the second set 1 Vampire 2 Sword 3 Pyromancer 4 Fungal arts 5 Tourist 6 Demonology I roll a 3,4 and a 6. Sam gets Pyromancer Fungal and Demonology Sam’s skills are then Pyromancer, Fungal, Demonology, Master of Arms, Fleshsmithing and Wandlore. The seventh one I pick from any skills available. I debated between Potions or blood magic and landed on blood magic. When Sam and his brothers and sisters are all dead, which does not take to long, give them a partner and repeat the process. You don’t need to have 4 kids every round you can have any number. I just start off with 4 just to give you a decent starting size.
Who marries who in the 2nd generation? Does the spouse end up being another random roll with the 7th skill dropped, just like the first 2 parents? And wouldn't this mean playing double the characters each time a generation dies?
I should have covered all of this when I first presented it but I didn’t want people not to have interest because it was too complicated. After the first generation of children I have them pair with a completely random new partner with 6 new skills (seventh or contradictory skill dropped), thus making the next generation somewhat different from the original grandparents. The second generation of children can be how ever many kids you want, I went with 2 thus giving me 8 people in the 2nd generation. Also you could use the reward system below from the very start. You can then continue as before giving each new generation a set number of children or you can use my reward system which is as follows Made it to level 1 or 2- you die alone unloved and unsuccessful, congrats. Made it to level 4- they have 1 child Made it to level 8- 2 children Made it to level 12- 3 children Killed dredmor- 4 children, god knows why you rewarded with 4 tiny brats for killing the lord of dredmor… seems more like a punishment to me. Other random things. You can eliminate shield or dual wield since they contradict. Also if both parents have the same, skill like axes, and you roll both axe traits from both parents you can either re roll one of them or (which is what I do) pick any similar skill as the doubled one. For the example I pick something like dual wield or master of arms since I am replacing a warrior skill with another warrior skill. All these make things a little more complicated but I like them and you don’t have to play with any you don’t want.
I'm trying this out.. Only did 1 offspring so far (I'm using mods so it makes for even more crazy skill variety.. Even tho I was very unlucky with my rolls and got 3 kids out of 4 with the same skills from their "father" .. Radiant Wizard, Big Game Hunter and Dastardly Scoundrel).. 1st kid got to level 4. 2nd and 3rd should get somewhere similar since they both have Leywalker from their mother unless I'm unlucky with an early dragon room.
Wow why didn’t i think of using mods with this, stupid stupid stupid vash. Yeah you can get some very terrible builds out of this but at the same time you can find a single skill that makes the whole tree worth it or a new combo that’s great. I had one with Potions, Smithing, Demonology, R Scientist, Vampire and Communism. So it was kinda a terrible build. 3 magic skills with on offensive spells. Smithing which is worthless to R Scientist. And vampire which prevents food. I was pretty sure I was going down on the 1st level. What i did not know, mainly because i rarely used the skills or wrote them off, is that demonology has the best defensive skill and Communism provides a way to heal vampire while increasing damage. He ended up being an uber tank. Died at level 13 which I though was great for a character I had wrote off
