THE BIG HORATIO GENESPLICING LIST

>THE BIG LIST OF GENESPLICING BONUSES
F = food, Ind = industry, D = dust, S = science, Inf = influence
i've never actually spliced lumeris, sophons/mezari or cravers, so i could use help finding those out
the penalty for gene splicing, as always, is +5% food consumption for the species; the cost in population to gene splice starts at 2 and increases with each successive splice
>riftborn
+3 IDS
>vodyani
+2 FIDS
>horatio
+2 F, +1 approval
>cravers
+x% FIDSI
>lumeris
+x D
>raian
+1 Inf
>sheredyn
+30 manpower
>mezari
+x S
>sophon
+x S
>unfallen
+4 F

>amoeba
+3 F
>bhagaba
+1 Inf
>deuyivans
+3 F, +1 S
>epistis
+3 F, +1 Ind
>eyder
+4 D
>gnashast
+60 damage done to enemy invaders during ground battle
>haroshem
+3 F
>hissho
+30 manpower
>kalgeros
+3 approval
>mavros
+2 Ind
>niris
+3 F
>pilgrim
+3 S
>pulsos
+3 S, +1 Ind
>remnant
+1 D, +1 Ind
>tikanan
+6 system manpower refill per turn
>z'vali
+2 S, +1 approval

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>Population stats if you manage to splice everyone else as Horatio
+24 Food
+10 Industry
+10 Dust (plus whatever lumeris are worth, i think it's +3/+4)
+12 Science (plus whatever the sophons and mezari are worth together, i think it's +8)
+2 Influence
+x% FIDSI on pop's total yields
+4 approval
+2 approval on hot
+6 system manpower refill per turn
+60 manpower
+60 damage done to enemy invaders during ground battle

each pop would have an extra 120% food consumption malus

you'd have to splice a whopping 552 non-horatio pops in order to splice every single other faction in the game, which jumps up to 600 if you are playing as a custom faction; certainly doable, but the riftborn would have to be one of the first species spliced due to the fact that you can't grow them as a non-riftborn player

in order to do all of this, you not only require every minor faction to spawn in the save file, you also require three united empire players and for all of them to choose a different quest split on the second chapter, as well as one instance of every other empire

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in terms of major factions that you don't want to start near, it's definitely unfallen and cravers. the latter should be easy enough to understand, while the unfallen are that bad because they can actually very easily compete with horatio in nabbing the good systems

the best ones to start near are definitely the riftborn and vodyani. the riftborn would almost be as bad as the unfallen were it not for the fact that they have an insane splicing bonus and they can only be grown by riftborn players, so it's actually beneficial to grab them as soon as possible. horatio empires generally produce a ton of food as well, meaning that vodyani leechers won't be nearly as much of an issue, and you should be able to very easily nab the good systems before their arks start parking there. cravers do get a special mention in that their bonus is also really good, so in the rare case where you're able to get the upper hand over them they are very nice to start next to

all the other major factions are in an amorphous lump based on how well they're doing in the match and how much you want their bonus