Editing Rimworld (section)

==Gameplay==

Just like the ASCII dorfs of Armok, Rimworld has you commanding your colonists (referred to internally as "pawns", which also applies to animals) for day to day activities. Harvesting food, research, production, you name it, and they're even vulnerable to mental breakdowns if they get too stressed out. Colonists also have traits and backstories that determine their specializations and attitude towards others, and coupled with the random generation this can result in some interesting scenarios. Your head chef's ex-boyfriend is the leader of that Outlander Union you are at war with? That refugee you just took in is actually the younger sibling of your middle-aged tailor? Crap like that. They can even tame and befriend animals either as livestock, beasts of burden, guard animals, and pets. (They used do all the hauling in a colony, but recent updates have changed this and most now cannot haul goods, and those that can have a propensity of shitting all over your nice clean floors.)

While not batshit insane like Armok's inhabitants in that they'll (mostly) act in their own interests as long as not stressed out, your colonists still aren't particularly smart and if you're not careful they'll do shit like let injured people bleed to death while playing chess, walk straight into a crossfire to pick up dropped corn, and sleep soundly while a fire burns down most of your colony. Keeping them happy keeps them from going full-on dwarf fortress bonkers, which you can do by keeping them fed and well rested, giving them free time, prettifying their surroundings, nice bedrooms, good meals, controlled temperatures, and the like. Oh, and not traumatising them by exposing them to rotting corpses or [[wat|forcing them to eat without tables]].

Once your planet has loaded up, you basically direct your colonists in gathering supplies, researching, and just generally surviving, via the basics: finding food (and avoiding food poisoning), building shelter, avoiding predatory or rabid animals, fighting disease, defending against forest fires, and trying not to die of hypothermia or heat exhaustion. There are more extreme events such as toxic fallout and volcanic winters, but they trigger more rarely.

Of course, you aren't left alone to deal with these threats in peace, being that you're not the only humans or indeed non-humans on this planet:
*'''[[Bandit|Pirates]]''': (nearly) permanently hostile assholes. Will generally raid your base for shits and giggles, and come in Outlander and Tribe flavors. The more advanced kind can land by drop pods, sometimes set up sieges and mortar your colony from a distance, or just blow their way in through your walls with grenades and rocket launchers. But mostly they just wander dumbly into your killbox and traps, which is just as well as some of these bastards can have as much armour and firepower as you do (though they lack the most advanced guns). They tend to be jacked up on drugs, much like IRL pirates.
*'''Outlander Unions''': Remnants of whatever used to be the dominant ruling power, now fragmented and trying to survive much like you. Will generally use contemporary technology like firearm usage or, if you've really cheesed them off, artillery bombardment and [[Drop_Pod|drop pod]] launches. More or less pirates who aren't quite as piratey and a little less well armed. Some are also set to be hostile... uh, like pirates, but you can befriend them given some effort.
*'''Tribes''': Humans who decided to take a step back in technology for whatever reason. Weak equipment (unless you're dealing with [[Spear#Spears_at_Long_Range|spearthrowers]] or [[Bows_and_Arrows#Types_of_bows_and_arrows|longbowmen]], who can easily take off a limb or vital organ with a well-placed shot unless you're armored up) but make up for it via sheer numbers and propensity of working out ways of getting into/tunnelling into your settlement [[RAGE|avoiding your carefully prepared traps and killboxes]], and once inside being able to easily [[Ork|overwhelm your colonists with lots of stabby]]. Some tribes are friendly, but you won't be trading widescreen TVs with them. Now also come in cannibal and nudist flavours. And nudist cannibals.
*'''Mechanoids''': those above-mentioned killing machines, who cannot be bargained with nor reasoned with, and are heavily armoured with serious firepower. [[Aspect Warrior|Incredibly potent within their chosen combat role]], [[Primaris Marine|but near-helpless outside of it]], and they <i>will</i> fuck up your shit. The DLCs [[RAGE|buff them]] so that every visit is an even greater opportunity for mass colonist limb loss and death.
*'''Insectoids''': A faction known as 'Sorne Geneline', you can't trade with them and they tend to turn up under mountains or deep drill sites, bursting out of the ground to overwhelm you as a [[tyranids|tidal wave of crawling, biting, scratching death]]. (Did you ever think that maybe a deep mountain base would be the safest place in an unsafe world? [[troll|Think again]]!).
*'''The Empire''': [[Imperium_of_Man|A crumbled, degenerate feudal empire, long past their prime but still powerful]]. Introduced in the Royalty DLC, they start off neutral and won't even trade with you unless you have gained feudal ranks with them. Have [[Psyker|psycasts]] and the most advanced technology, so not generally a good idea to piss them off, although they can provide a great source of high tech weapons and armour if you do and know how to handle them correctly. However befriending them also makes for some [[Serious_Business|serious benefits]].

Most of these factions can be friend or foe depending on how you interact with them, and when starting a game you are guaranteed to get a visit from a neutral group. Pirates, savage tribes and rough outlanders start hostile and will generally regress back to hostility in time even if you befriend them.  If you make a faction friendly enough, you can ask for trade caravans or even military support during a raid. When raids do come, it's with the purpose of burning your fields, breaking your equipment, killing or kidnapping your pawns, stealing your stuff, and generally undoing many hours of careful real world management. Insectoids and mechanoids are always hostile, and their sole intent is to kill, destroy, and cause you to ragequit.

Combat looks simple in play but extremely complex under the hood. Your pawns have anatomy: it's perfectly possible for a humble arrow to penetrate your best pawn's brain because the suit of high tech armour they were wearing didn't cover the face. Heart, liver and brain instakills can happen regardless of how well armoured, and loss of toes and fingers is distressingly common in minor fights. And what other game can you have a character's nose shot off, then be dumped by their lover because she now finds them repulsive? [[Wat|(Though having your ears shot off makes you deaf.)]] Melee combat is [[World_Eaters|particularly powerful]], since you [[derp|can't fire any gun in close combat]] and a [[herp|short spear stab does as much damage as a charge rifle]] shot. [[Dune|Personal shields]] also exist to help their bearers get into melee without being Last Samurai'd. Blunt weapons mostly ignore armour, so it's quite possible your terminator-like heavily armed troopers are knocked unconscious by men armed only with clubs and ill-fitting tribal thongs.

Things like blood loss, organ damage, paralysis, ageing dementia and Alzheimer's, and blinding are all handled (with variable levels of realism). Age is not just a number in Rimworld, and young pawns are often more valuable, if less skilled, than older ones. Losing a kidney may not have much effect until it comes to recovering from the [[Death_Guard|plague]]. Sometimes you may be left with difficult choices, such as euthanising your colony's best crafter because they got brain damaged or their spine or pelvis shattered. It's about the story, remember!

Enemy pawns are treated no differently by the game. A glance into any given Rimworld community will discuss frequently about the war crimes they perform on every playthrough, and with good reason. You can capture any person from any faction (either visitors or raiders) and they're completely at your mercy. Working them to death into labor camps is scratching the surface. Using them as guinea pigs for your fledgling surgeons to practice on is a common activity, as is harvesting their organs. Hell, a common tactic for pirate prisoners is to replace a hand or foot with a cheap prosthetic and let them go: in the event they come back, their movement is impaired and they're even more of a burden during an attack. And player can get real creative on how their living quarters are, such as [https://old.reddit.com/r/RimWorld/comments/bbftio/does_locking_my_prisoners_in_the_same_room_as/ filling their prison cells with a hundred cats and oceans of beer], so they're constantly vomited on by inebriated felines, and the overall mess made of vomit, blood, and generic "dirt" will drive them insane several times over. Keep that door locked. There is incentive for treating prisoners nicely though, as releasing a prisoner in good health will improve relations with the prisoner's faction once they leave the map, provided he isn't a pirate as they remain hostile to the bitter end. Alternatively, you can convince a prisoner to join your side, at the expense of a relations hit.

[[Word_Bearers|And now you can justify your evil deeds with religion!]]

Unlike it's inspiration, collapse of your colony is not inevitable. To complete the game your pawns must escape the planet. You can do this by constructing a spacecraft, finding an AI willing to get you off-world, sucking up to an Empire for taking you, or transcending to the [[Omnissiah|Machine God]] (I shit you not). These are not the easiest things to do, and will almost always include great challenges and difficult battles.