We’re releasing RimWorld – Anomaly on April 11, 2024! (That’s 1 week away!) You can read the announcement here.

Check out our previous blog posts below:

• Anomaly expansion and update 1.5 announced!
• Anomaly preview #1: Fleshbeasts, fleshmass heart, pit gate and dreadmeld
• Anomaly preview #2: Containment facilities, creatures, and release date
• [HERE] Anomaly preview #3: Cultists, hate chanters and rituals
• Anomaly preview #4: Coming soon!

🚨 SPOILER WARNING: Read ahead at your own risk! These preview blogs WILL SPOIL some of the surprises in the expansion. 🚨

Today, we’re talking about the new rituals you can perform in Anomaly, as well as the followers of the void.

CULT RITUALS

Rituals were introduced in the Ideology expansion, allowing followers of different ideologies and religions to gather for ceremonies that would have social effects. Rituals in Anomaly are similar but go further, drawing upon the psychic power of a dark archotech to twist the laws of physics.

Your colonists aren’t the only ones who can learn these rituals. A cult has formed that worships the insane machine-mind. They will arrive and perform a number of rituals to attempt to destroy you.

Sometimes they will form a ritual circle and abduct one of your colonists by teleporting the victim to them (called skip abduction). Other times, they will summon a horde of bloody fleshbeasts to assault you.

They may surround the colony entirely, in a massive crowd, chanting in dark tones as they call forth the essence of hatred. These hate chanters will slowly drive your colonists insane until you go out to stop them.

BASIC RITUALS

Players can use these same rituals, and many more. To perform them, you need a ritual spot. If you can surround it with hideous bioferrite sculptures of the void and archotech shard beacons, so much the better. And dressing up always helps – void worshippers tend to wear a ceremonial hood or cultist mask, which seems to increase the effectiveness of your inhuman prayers.

Beyond the two basic rituals that the cultists can perform, the player can perform draw shamblers, draw animals, and void provocation.

REGIONAL RITUALS

These rituals are like listening to a motivational speaker, but even more soul-destroying. These are pleasure pulse, neurosis pulse, and blood rain.

Pleasure pulse is the simplest. Like a region-wide psychic emanator, it makes your psychically sensitive colonists happier. However, unlike the emanator, it also reduces their desire to work.

Neurosis pulse is an inversion of pleasure pulse. It drives your psychically sensitive colonists so that they work faster. However, it also irritates them whilst decreasing their need for recreation, meaning that they’re more likely to have a mental break. Use with caution!

Blood rain is a dangerous ritual. It causes a blood-like psychofluid to fall from the sky that drives exposed animals and humans into a berserk frenzy. Be prepared if you must use this, putting all but the psychically deaf under shelter.

INDIVIDUAL RITUALS

Like skip abduction, many of the more horrible rituals require a living human target. These are imbue death refusal, psychophagy, chronophagy, philophagy and brainwipe.

Imbue death refusal links an individual with the void, preventing their final death. They still need to die for it to work, but it will bring them back near-instantaneously, in good physical condition. It does have side-effects however – notably the psychological impact of having died – and it wears off with use.

The three ‘-phagy’ rituals all have similar cruel effects. With psychophagy, the ritual invoker steals the victim’s psychic sensitivity; chronophagy steals their youth, aging them rapidly, whilst the invoker becomes younger; and philophagy steals their wisdom, giving the invoker their best skill. All three cause brain damage, putting the victim into a coma for several days. Think about what you’re willing to do to a prisoner before using these.

Brainwipe is the final ritual, which erases a person’s memories without giving them to the ritual invoker. Given the many traumas a colonist can suffer in RimWorld, this is sometimes a blessing. They will forget them, alongside any allegiance they had. This will also make any prisoners with it easier to recruit, even unwavering ones. However, like the -phagy rituals, it can induce a long coma if the brainwipe ritual goes poorly.

TO COME

It’s almost time… Anomaly and update 1.5 is only 1 week away! We have one more blog post before then – see you there!

In the meantime, chat with us on Reddit and wishlist Anomaly so you’re emailed when it’s out!

Bye bye,
Tia