Probably Stolen DNA Manipulator Guide: How to Get It, Use It and Edit Plant Traits

The DNA Manipulator is the machine that edits plant genetics in Probably Stolen. You unlock it with the Plant Genetics upgrade in Wild's Network, extract traits from seeds onto DNA Data Disks, and install them on other seeds. It sells for 1,000 credits and draws 12 power a night.

Every number below comes from the game's own data, version 1.0.0.6. Where the in-game behavior could not be confirmed it says so.

How do you get the DNA Manipulator?

Open Wild's Network, find the Hydroponic Farmer section and buy Plant Genetics. It costs 1,250 and the Retired Farmer upgrade (350) is its prerequisite. On purchase you immediately receive:

• a DNA Manipulator
• a Gene Scanner
• four blank DNA Data Disks

From then on Dr. Jackson stocks DNA equipment, so spare machines, disks and modules show up in his shop. Each of his DNA items is only a chance on any given visit, so there is no guarantee of a particular one on a given day.

You also need a working hydroponic setup to have anything to edit. See the Hydroponic System and the machines page for power and module basics.

How does installing and extracting a trait work?

The machine has an input slot, an output slot and a target slot. The game's own instruction sheet describes two jobs.

1. Install. Put a written DNA Data Disk in the input slot and the seed in the target slot. The target gains the trait. Installing a trait the target already has stacks one rank. Every successful install uses one charge of the disk.
2. Extract. Put a blank DNA Data Disk in the output slot and the seed in the target slot. One random trait is copied onto the disk and the seed is lost, unless a Genetic Stabilizer Module is installed. A disk that already holds a trait the target carries can be used instead of a blank one, and the extraction adds uses to it.
3. Collect the disk. After each operation the disk is ejected to the output tray. Toggle the machine to keep disks in their slots instead.

• 
  DNA Manipulator
• 
  DNA Manipulator (working)
• 
  Blank disk
• 
  Trait disk
• 
  Gene Scanner

A disk's number of uses depends on where the trait came from. An innate trait gives as many uses as the seed has ranks of it. A trait that was installed earlier gives one use.

What are heat, complexity and success chance?

Every edit heats the target's genetics. The next edit then runs slower and fails more often until the plant matures. Switch a Gene Scanner on to read a target's genetics.

• Heat per operation: 2 plus the absolute complexity of the trait, added whether the edit succeeds or fails.
• Effective complexity: the target's genetic complexity plus its current heat. New seeds from a harvest start at zero heat.
• Work needed: 20 + 4 × effective complexity (never less than 20). The machine itself provides 10 work a night, and Performance modules speed that up.
• Success chance: 95 − 5 × effective complexity + half the machine's Quality, clamped between 5% and 100%.

For example, an effective complexity of 4 gives a 75% chance plus half your Quality, and needs 36 work. At the machine's base 10 work a night that is roughly four nights before any Performance modules. The data does not say how leftover work is rounded, so read the scanner and the machine's progress bar in game rather than trusting that count.

Traits carry a complexity value, and positive traits cost more than negative ones: good traits run from +2 to +5, bad traits from −1 to −3. Per the game data, the Simple Genome and Complex Genome traits shift a target's complexity by −4 and +4 per rank.

What do the plant traits do?

There are 26 traits in the game data: the 23 in the table below and three production traits described under it. Effects are at rank 1; higher ranks scale by rank to the power 0.75, not linearly, so rank 2 is about 1.68 times rank 1.

Only traits in the same group exclude each other: a plant cannot hold Nutritious and Nutrient-Poor at once, or Fast Grower and Slow Grower. The scanner shows "Exclusive with" and "No effect on" for each trait. Some traits do nothing on some crops, and the machine refuses to install them.

The three production traits are Caffeine Production (complexity 3), Coffee Bean Mush Production (complexity 2) and Dream Cap Mush Production (complexity 4). Each infuses every product of the plant with a liquid: 2 ml of Caffeine, 10 ml of Coffee Bean Mush or 2 ml of Dream Cap Mush at rank 1, scaled by rank^0.75. The game data marks Dream Cap Mush as contraband level 2.

A few details from the data:

• Purifying removes every filterable contaminant except minerals, each night, at the larger of 1 ml or 10% × rank^0.75 of the amount, up to 95%.
• Polluting converts 0.1% × rank^0.75 of the water into waste each night: half organic waste, 35% microbes and 15% debris.
• Perennial has no exclusive group, so it stacks with the other trait families.

What do the four DNA modules do?

The DNA Manipulator takes its own module type and the universal Quality, Performance and Efficiency modules. Quality and Performance each count at half strength on this machine.

If both filter modules are installed nothing can be extracted. Without a suitable trait the machine tells you what is missing, for example that the target has no positive trait to extract.

What should you do first?

A few habits save seeds:

1. Scan before you edit. The Gene Scanner is how you read complexity and heat before spending a disk.
2. Fit a Genetic Stabilizer Module before you extract from anything you want to keep. Without it the seed is gone.
3. Extract innate traits. An innate trait gives you as many uses as ranks. An installed one gives one.
4. Plan the order of edits. Each edit adds 2 plus the trait's complexity in heat, so put the traits you care most about in while the target is still cool.
5. Use the Precision Extraction Module when you need one specific trait. A random extraction can hand you a trait you did not want.

Stay away from the Infertile and Sparse traits on seeds you plan to replant. The default Nutrifruit seeds from the game's story already carry Infertile at a high rank, which is why most of their harvested seeds are lost.