Trait

Traits are special qualities possessed by some heroes that can provide meaningful advantages or disadvantages in either the strategy or tactical portion of the game. They are similar to personalities in that regard, but traits are usually acquired at birth via a genetic system, whereas personalities are typically acquired later and through more varied means.

List of traits

Name			Opposite	Min age	Max age		Description	Ranking	Reasoning
Arthritis	1	1		45		3	Reduced accuracy and movement range in later years.	Terrible	Reduced movement is crippling on the battlefield. It means you can't run, can't get behind cover easily, and can't get in range. Makes old heroes difficult to work with.
Asthmatic	1	1		5		3	Movement is reduced after sprinting in a previous turn.	Terrible	Reduced movement is crippling on the battlefield. It means you can't run, can't get behind cover easily, and can't get in range. Hurts every other turn.
Bear Strength	1	2	Puny			1	Increased strength.	Good	Stat boosts are good but don't have a drastic effect even when they are on the correct type of hero. Casual players might not even notice the difference. Still, it's better than a negative trait.
Bountiful	1	2	Infertile	15		1	Increased chance to have children.	Best	In order to fight, you need heroes. This trait guarantees a good selection and prevent the infertile trait which can quickly wipe out your roster.
Brainy	1	2	Dimwitted			1	Increased Intelligence.	Good	Stat boosts are good but don't have a drastic effect even when they are on the correct type of hero. Casual players might not even notice the difference. Still, it's better than a negative trait.
Clumsy	1	2	Nimble			3	Decreased Dexterity	Acceptable	Like how stat boosts are mediocre stat drops are equally negligible. If you must have a negative trait these are the ones to go with. Anything but slow...
Dimwitted	1	2	Brainy			3	Lower Intelligence.	Acceptable	Same as clumsy and, oh yeah, they have zero impact on a character of the wrong class.
Hawk Eye	1	2	Nearsighted			1	Increased sight range	Best	Underrated gem. It seems innocuous at first but then you realize that your hunters can shoot the enemy without being in sight range. Just pick them off one at a time, or lure them into a trap, or just hang around... all of which you can't do if they can see you. BUT, they can't because you have hawkeye.
Heart Disease	1	2	Longevity	30		3	Reduced lifespan.	Terrible	Shorter lifespan -> less heroes, less babies, not as unmanageable as infertile but it is still going to make things difficult
Hearty	1	2	Sickly			1	Increased Max HP.	Good	This is better than str/dex/int buff because it directly affects the survivability of your heroes meaning overall higher level heroes as they live through more battles.
Impressionable	1	2	Strong Willed			2	Personality is strongly influenced by other heroes in combat.	Good	Can be good or bad depending on your personality roster but I find it is generally good. If you are trying to cultivate good personalities then it will help spread them to this hero.
Infertile	1	2	Bountiful			3	Unable to have children.	Terrible	The worst trait as it has a good chance of ending an entire bloodline on it's own. Since it can be dormant (hidden), it can often crop up a generation or two into the game and suddenly you don't have any heroes that can have children in your keep costing you several years of adopting to fill in the bloodline if you are lucky.
Kingmaker	1	2	Queenmaker	15		2	Increased chance of having sons.	Acceptable	It is actually kind of annoying having too many of one gender. If it spreads too much you will be severely limited in choices on the other gender.
Longevity	1	2	Heart Disease	30		1	Longer lifespan.	Best	This gives longer lifespan to your heroes which means they have more children, are at higher level, and are more resistant to wrinklers if you ever decide to let a wrinkler hit you.
Nearsighted	1	2	Hawk Eye			3	Decreased sight range.	Terrible	You know everything I said about hawkeye? Imagine if the enemy could do that to you. Yeeeesssss, enemies shooting at you from within the fog of war and appearing out of nowhere as you fumble around blindly trying to find them. Get some glasses.
Nimble	1	2	Clumsy			1	Increased Dexterity	Good	Stat buff. As mediocre as the rest.
Ostrich Vision	2	1				1	Increased sight range from interacting with the fabled Passenger Ostrich	Best	It's just hawkeye but from an event. That said hawkeye is one of the best traits in the game. Pass it on.
Puny	1	2	Bear Strength			3	Decreased strength.	Acceptable	Who thought being a puny warrior wouldn't be that bad? It has some detriment but not enough to be concerned about just like the other stat modifiers.
Queenmaker	1	2	Kingmaker	15		2	Increased chance of having daughters.	Acceptable	Same deal as kingmaker.
Quick	1	2	Slow			1	Increased movement range.	Best	Run like the wind. Away from enemies, towards enemies, into cover, into the shadows, this trait is the best combat trait. You can make up for hawkeye by scouting with cloaked hunters but this makes your positioning much more forgiving.
Quick Study	1	2	Slow Learner			1	Increased XP gain.	Best	Great, higher level heroes = better heroes. Falls off when all your heroes are level 10.
Sickly	1	2	Hearty			3	Decreased Max HP.	Acceptable	Coming in at the bottom end of acceptable this one is manageable but it's better not to have. It has a tendency of putting your heroes one hit closer to death and we like to keep our heroes alive otherwise you wouldn't be reading my advice. Still our goal in general is not to get hit, hence hawkeye and quick, so it isn;t the worst.
Slow	1	2	Quick			3	Decreased movement range.	Terrible	Fun fact, an arthritic and slow hero will be able to move a single tile per action. ONE. With just slow, two isn't much better. Your cabers and alchs won't be able to get in melee, your alchs will ahve worse flask accuracy from being far away, and, worst of all, your hunter often won't be able to quite make it into full cover for stealth, limiting scouting and ambush capabilities. Decreased accuracy at least still gives you a chance to hit something.
Slow Learner	1	2	Quick Study			3	Decreased XP gain.	Terrible	Lower level heroes=worse heroes, can be used as backup but don't focus kills on these. The best of awful.
Spry	1	1		55		1	An agile build reduces the effects of later years on stats.	Good	Good but meh. Essentially a conditional stat boost
Strong Willed	1	2	Impressionable			2	Personality is not influenced by parents or other trainers.	Acceptable	Deceptively a negative trait in most cases as you are going to be promoting standards, regents, and partners with good personalities I'd assume. Means that your personality is going to be completely random.
The Bumbles	2	1				3	Decreased Sight, Dexterity, and Accuracy.	Terrible	Nearsighted + additional debuffs. It's bad but it's rare. If you get it from the event just promote the hero to sagewright or standard.

Singularity and duality traits

"Singularity" traits are not paired with any opposite trait. "Duality" traits, however, have an opposite trait. It isn't possible for heroes to have both traits in a duality pair, or to be more accurate, they cancel each other out and are hidden if a hero has both. Most of the game's traits are duality traits..

Common and unique traits

Common traits have no special requirements to appear on heroes, and as such, they can randomly appear on heroes not born in keeps. Unique traits, on the other hand, must be acquired through special means before they can be passed on to children. Currently, the available unique traits are acquired through certain outcomes of some random events.

Minimum and maximum age

Some traits do not activate until the hero reaches a certain age. Note that an inactive trait is hidden and will not be revealed until the hero reaches the minimum age. The hero still carries the trait, however, and can thus pass it on to offspring. Thus far, there are no traits with a maximum age, though such functionality is supported and may be seen in the future.

Acquiring desired traits and eliminating undesired traits

A hero's traits are generally permanent, but as the game is generational and uses a genetics system, a player can manipulate the odds of various traits appearing in new heroes. Pairing heroes together as regent and partner with the same trait can guarantee passing on that trait, though there is a limit of three traits per hero that will sometimes invalidate that guarantee. Having even one hero in a pair with a given trait will often result in that trait being passed on to their children. To avoiding passing on traits, the most effective way is to simply avoiding making any heroes with that trait a regent or partner.

These methods are not foolproof. Just because a hero doesn't have a particular trait does not mean he or she doesn't carry genes for that trait. In fact, for duality traits, a hero could be secretly carrying two genes for both traits in a duality since they cancel each other out. And some traits aren't revealed until the character reaches a certain age, though they do carry both positive genes for the trait. Conversely, a hero without a given trait may carry no genes for it at all and would prevent his or her children from acquiring it except via the very small chance of genetic mutation.

It can sometimes help to bring in new blood through recruiting new heroes or adopting children, as these heroes get a completely random set of genes independent of a player's current heroes. This can result in potential partners with desirable traits not found among current heroes, or more heroes that do not possess undesirable traits, though this is a naturally a gamble and can result in the reverse.