Oh god, what the hell are you doing? Don't you know that space carps are dangerous creatures? Well think again! Here's the guide to make them friendly.

Carp Growth Baby Carps grow at a extremely fast rate, which is one of the reasons why they're an invasive species. If a baby carp eats anything meat-based, from meatbread to crewmembers, they'll grow up in under a minute. Keep in mind that Carps deal the same damage, regardless of their age. Carps get more nutrients from raw meat than crewmembers. Manually feeding them makes them grow faster.

How is baby formed? Like most animals out there, carps have two genders: Male & Female. You can examine carps at a distance to tell their gender. Females are the ones we're interested in. When you leave a male & female carp together for roughly 3 to 6 minutes, the female carp will be ready to give birth. When she gives birth, she'll explode in a shower of gore and spawn 4 to 6 baby carps. Female carps do NOT drop meat when giving birth. If a horde of carp is distracted by prey it won't mate. Give your carps privacy unless you're covered in pheromones, they are both hungry and shy.

Note: Carpcest is not permitted by the puritans at Central and so carp created through breeding are genderless and cannot mate further.

But why in the high hell would I breed these monsters? One word: Carpotoxin. These fellas produce one of the most valuable chemicals this side of the galaxy. Prized as both a potent neurotoxin and a reagent for more advanced compounds, including but not limited to the one chemical capable of treating genetic damage without cryogenics.

Carp and Carp accessories

Carpotoxin itself is a very potent poison, on the same level as Ironrot and second only to Alpha-Amanitin, the strongest toxin known to the Galaxy.

Rezadone treats Genetic damage from being cloned, shot with a decloner, glomped by a slime or irradiated to the point of cellular decay.

Zombie Powder is one of the strongest paralytics, anyone dosed with some will fall down and appear dead to rudimentary medical examinations (Examine verb, pulse counting, MedHUDs and Health Analyzers); Body Scanners won't be fooled though. It's also mildly toxic.

Carp Pheromones will be both your bread and butter and godsend. While metabolizing Pheromones, adult carps ignore you and baby carps confuse you with one of their parents! They're not dumb though. If they met you without pheromones, they will still attack you even if you consume pheromone afterwards. You can use this as a defense system in case surprise carps come to visit. Alternatively, you can sic your pets on the unprotected crew and be spared from the mayhem.

Aminocyprinidol will, when mixed with nutriment, create a new and breedable baby carp. All will become.

How do I make friends? Like most people, you'll know that Space Carps are aggressive to just about anything. However, there are a few exceptions to this. With a little know-how, you can make Carps passive towards you.

Consume some Carp Pheromones then go into the view of baby/adult carps. As previously mentioned, Carp that were already hostile to you won't become passive even if you take pheromones. Be careful of the pheromones duration, you'll get a notice when you're about to run out. The pheromone range increases with time (+1 radius per 10 life ticks), consuming pheromones and immediately after facing a carp will still make them aggressive to you.

Feed a baby carp. There are two ways to go about doing this:

Have any meat-based food in your hand and use it on the baby carp as it lunges at you. Feed them enough and you'll gain their trust. Each feeding provides a 25% chance to tame the carp. When they are tamed you will get a message about gaining their trust. You'll probably get bitten a few times before taming the baby, prepare some Bicaridine and some bandages just in case.

Be on a non-help intent and click-drag the baby carp to your character's sprite. You'll hold them in your hand. While in your hand or inside any storage, they can't bite you, but you can feed them manually by clicking them with food.

If you've gained the trust of a baby carp and it eventually gives birth, all of its offsprings will trust you, regardless of pheromone status.

Carp will only eat meat foods. You can only feed a baby carp roughly 4 times before it matures and refuses to eat, though it begins growing after the first meal so if you haven't tamed it yet keep shoving that synthmeat at it. If a carp matures without being tamed it will attack you once your pheromones run out. Consider butchering any non-tamed carps, for obvious reasons.

Note: Tamed carp are only friendly toward you. The rest of the crew are still delicious snacks in their fishy eyes. Though this can be of use for some people.

Carp Manufacture You ran outta carps and are freaking out, don't worry, you'll need a few things:

1u Aminocyprinidol per carp to make. See Guide to Chemistry for details and here for manufacturing recipes. 10u Nutriment per carp to make. Consider making a Brewer and 5u Enzyme to make Cheese Wheels (20u Nutriment each). Transfer 1u Aminocyprinidol to your nutriment beaker, tame the carp and repeat or dump all the Aminocyprinidol into the nutriment beaker for a quick (and violent) distraction.

Quick Recipes You can use the following recipes to make Aminocyprinidol. Make sure to follow it to the letter or you won't make the mix.

The fish! They hunger for human flesh! I do too! Carpotoxin is very toxic in its own right, but can be refined into Zombie Powder to instantly paralyze and “kill” whomever gets dosed. Do what you want with the “corpse” while they metabolize the Zombie Powder. You might have noticed that it's not only baby carps that can be held in your hands! Regardless of trust, you can hold adult carps in your hands, but note that you'll need both of your hands for this. You can even put baby carps into your backpack! Keep in mind that baby carps are not only storable but let you use the other hand, making them the better weapon.

You can also make some grenades with 30u Aminocyprinidol on one side and 300 Nutriment on the other side for a surprise 30 fish orgy massacre. Guns make short work of carp babies, they're better suited for distraction or traps against unprepared individuals.