Questions About Human Bios

[Sindall]

I've checked out the Bioengineering section of the Wiki and searched older posts on the forums about the topic of bios. There's a lot of great info about how to use them, make them, and even some solid suggestions for gearing them up. However, there seems to be gaps of information in some areas.

Specifically, there seems to be a lot of information about creating ideal non-casting human bios, but not so much on casting types. There also doesn't appear to be much explanation as to "why" some gear is considered the best for a bio. Here are the questions I have:

1 - For the non-casting human bio, why does the mimic DNA sample specifically need to be female, and one of three types (brigand, noble/escort, blood clan slave)? Subquestion - Do savages/necros/witches/etc count as human for bios?

2 - Why are the non-casting types preferred?

3 - Has anyone gone nuts and made a crazy powerful casting human bio? If so, how did you gear them?

4 - Similar to 3, has anyone bothered to relayer their bio's gear to make them super tanky and really high RDP/SDI?

There also seems to be a general suggestion to use a spell channeling weapon, but somehow Aegis is the recommended shield, which isn't spell channeling. Is the spell channeling suggestion only for casters?

Any help is appreciated, and I'll probably be in the market for one soon. I'm nowhere near enough luck to try on my own.

[Sindall]

And while I'm also thinking about it, I saw it mentioned that bios do a power attack (not sure which one(s)) that is similar to whirlwind. Does this proc any hit spells when it goes off?

And, does weapon type matter? As in, can they perform the weapon specials for the equipped weapon?

[Wil]

2. Spells don't do a lot of damage compared to a fighter with a leveled weapon, so if your bio stops to cast a spell it does less damage per second. Basically the same reason nobody uses a mage build for their player character.

3 and 4: yes. Bios are a popular depository for the weps and relayers you didn't build quite right early on.

For #1 I'm curious as well.

[Sindall]

Hey Wil,

I figured that for number 2 that was the reason. A good leveled weapon with multiple spell hits plus the regular swing damage will likely average more than casting alone. Even with SDI boosted, it probably still is better to have a non-caster.