mod [mod] Dreadbed - A Fleshbeast Tentacle Seedbed Mod

[doop_lvl]

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Dreadbed - A Fleshbeast Tentacle Seedbed Mod

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The fleshbeast's tentacles look tentacley, so naturally, I made this mod.

 

This mod is based on the Anomaly DLC and requires it to be active. And due to its cosmic horror mystery nature, I will spoiler the mod's explanation. I believe the mod's name gives you a good picture of what it's about.

 

First Minor Spoiler:

Spoiler

I gave the dreadmeld boss the ability to jump onto your colonists and swallow them whole like a devourer and use them as a seedbed.

 

Major Spoilers:

Spoiler

The bulbfreak fleshbeast can do it too, although with a little less range.

 

Being Used as a Seedbed

After being swallowed, depending on the pawn's gender (or genitals, if RJW is on) they will undergo one of two things:

• If the pawn is not a human female or doesn't have a vagina, this will trigger the normal devourer behavior where if you don't interrupt its swallowing in time (by burning or killing the swallower), the pawn is digested and receives a big acid damage (most likely killing the pawn).
• If the pawn is female, the seedbedding will occur.

 

Seedbedding

In case where the dreadmeld/bulbfreak decides to go through with seedbedding, it will heal some injuries to make the seedbed more likely to survive, strip her armor, pants, and hat, damaging the apparels in the process, regurgitate the pawn, and give her seedbed shock which will incapacitate her. It also has a chance to give her a hidden implantation hediff. This chance is based on her fertility.

 

Implantation

At first, this is a hidden hediff. You can perform a surgical inspection to reveal the hediff. I plan to allow removal of the implantation later on, but for now, upon the reveal the victim will get a mood debuff (except if she has inhumanization).

 

Parasitism

If not removed within a day, the implantation will turn into a parasite. I plan to have a remove parasite surgery too later on with a big drawback since you're too late to remove it while its still in implantation form, but for now here are the parasite hediff's behavior:

• The parasite takes 6 days to grow. Once fully grown, it'll harmlessly be born, incapacitating the pawn from labor.
• After a certain stage, the parasite will cause miscarriage if the pawn has any other pregnancy (Biotech and RJW pregnancies both supported).
• While the parasite behaves like a more manageable pregnancy, the game technically does not recognize it as pregnancy. It uses no code from neither Biotech nor RJW. Why? Because I didn't want this hediff to be too complicated and I'm frankly intimidated by pregnancy code to begin with.
• The parasite affects the mother psychologically the whole way it's in the oven, giving her a mood debuff. Its effect will become stronger and stronger as it grows.
• As long as this hediff exists, the mother will only have the humanity break mental break which will give her the inhumanization hediff. This is pretty much the same way the "inhumanization: required" precept work in vanilla.

 

What is Born

The culmination from all this effort is a homunculus. Homunculi are a semi-translucent, slime looking thing that are passive and extremely fragile. They are obligate carnivores and can only eat raw meat like wargs. That means feeding them meals won't work. If downed, you can capture them on holding platforms, but they will starve to death. They are supposed to keep eating and grow to finally reach adulthood where they will metamorphose into either a dreadmeld or bulbfreak. I did give them animal AI, and since they are untameable, they will just go leave the map if they can't find any raw meat, so make sure to stock up.

 

Two Types

There are two types of each implantation, parasite, and homunculus - both corresponding to either a dreadmeld or bulbfreak. Which one your seedbed will get depends on which of either dreadmeld or bulbfreak originally impregnated her:

• Dreadmeld has a very rare 1% chance to give its seedbed a bulbfreak offspring instead of dreadmeld.
• Bulbfreak has a 33% chance to give its seedbed a dreadmeld offspring. Otherwise, the 67% chance is bulbfreak offspring.

These two types look the same from the outside, but you can tell from an extra hediff the mother gets when she gives birth ("dread mother" for dreadmeld and "bulbous birther" for bulbfreak). For now these hediffs are only used to dampen the mood debuff for subsequent parasitism.

 

For What?

Dreadmelds in containment! Once a homunculus reaches adulthood, it will metamorphose and be incapacitated. You have about a day to capture it on a holding platform before it's finished. Once it's finished metamorphosing on the platform, you're left with a whole dreadmeld that's secured, contained, and protected. Dreadmelds are made to die the moment they are downed in vanilla, so you have no way to capture them at all. Since they're designed to be uncapturable, I did have to patch them into giving bioferrite like all the other fleshbeasts, but of all the patches I did, the one vanilla behavior I sure didn't touch is that they are still going to die once downed. Dreadmelds give a huge 10 bioferrite a day, which I think is a worthwhile reward for all the troubles.

And on the side, if you didn't get a dreadmeld, you still have a bulbfreak in its place instead. Bulbfreaks, while they look bulky and big, are actually incredibly fragile. It looks to me that they are designed to pop immediately in battle, swarming the player, so it's very unlikely you'll ever get a downed - not dead - bulbfreak to begin with, so consider them a nice bonus. Bulbfreaks give a competitive 7 bioferrite a day.

 

Inhumanization

Being inhumanized, despite its downsides, is actually a really helpful perk for this mod's context. It alters the mood debuffs into buffs which gets really punishing for the first pregnancy. After the first pregnancy (if you somehow manage to do a great job managing the seedbed's mood and prevent her being inhumanized from having a mental break while carrying a fleshbeast baby), the mood debuffs get less severe and the implantation will show up automatically without needing a surgical inspection.

 

I have an idea of some further plans for this mod, but I'm not really certain about them yet. I made this for the sole reason of it's kinda hot the dreadmelds are uncapturable and I'm annoyed because of it.

 

Dependency

• Anomaly

 

Incompatibility

None that I know of.

 

Links

• This mod's GitGud page.

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• Submitter
  doop_lvl
• Submitted
  03/13/26
• Category
  Rimworld
• Requirements
• Install Instructions

 

[Spearhead-X]

Looks cool, I'll give it a go, thanks!

[annigilatorinator]

it would be possible to make the creature not only able to implant itself in girls, but also to reproduce itself using men. In other words, it doesn't matter what gender the pawn is, both are suitable for reproduction, but the method changes. 

[doop_lvl]

10 minutes ago, annigilatorinator said:

it would be possible to make the creature not only able to implant itself in girls, but also to reproduce itself using men. In other words, it doesn't matter what gender the pawn is, both are suitable for reproduction, but the method changes. 

i built this as a kind of reproductive hijack sort of thing. if i were to include a male reproductive hijack, im not fully certain how that should be implemented. i guess after the reproductive hijack, his semen would fertilize female pawns into having a homunculus baby...? im not entirely sure how it should go, and im especially reluctant to touch heavily on actual Biotech/RJW pregnancy since ive been hearing that that area of the code doesnt pair well with anomaly. all i did in this mod regarding pregnancy code is trigger the miscarry function after the parasite has grown enough

[pyrobladeich]

just a suggestion, what if a pawn that has become a seedbed more than once was compelled to seek out fleshbeasts and be seeded again?

[doop_lvl]

i have thought about that

[greekyman89]

Would also love some sort of extra/permanent changes to the person who becomes the seedbed (or new abilities/transformation for them).  Whatever you choose I'm gonna keep an eye to this mod!

[nuttza1899]

great mod, it will always be in mind anomaly modlist.

also, a few suggestion from me.
would it be possible for you to make an animal that can be only obtain via seedbed birth? so that you can breed it as a war animals instead of just bioferite farm. is it gonna be too hard? i dont know how modding work. all i can do is just give some weird idea.

[游魂Kiss]

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1508850027&searchtext=HUD     Incompatible

[doop_lvl]

14 hours ago, nuttza1899 said:

an animal that can be only obtain via seedbed birth

if you want one, the hardest part for me would be the sprite. i made the homunculus myself, but theres a reason its sprite looks very simple. im not very good at making sprites

 

1 hour ago, 游魂Kiss said:

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1508850027&searchtext=HUD     Incompatible

i dont use it

[manshamer]

It would be nice if the seedbed thing understood gestors/aphrodors from Gender Works.

[doop_lvl]

i keep forgetting the other reproductive organ altering mod for this game. i need to add gender checks for that mod in both my mods

[doop_lvl]

update:

 

## Fixes
- Fixed faulty childbearer checks for pawns whose only reproductive organ is opposite of their gender.

## Other Mod
- Added Gender Works childbearer check compatibility.

[doop_lvl]

update:

 

## New Feature
- Bulbfreaks and dreadmelds now have study progress that they share with each other.
- Once their study progresses, bulbfreaks and dreadmelds that's captured on holding platforms can now have their swallow mechanic be triggered by inserting prisoners and other downed pawns, or by telling an inhumanized pawn to enter voluntarily. Doing this to another faction's member counts as hostile.

 

## Fixes and Other Changes
- Disabled BulbousBirther and DreadMother hediffs from having severity.
- Added new stage for SeedbeddedDiagnosed thought to account for if the diagnosed pawn has given birth to homunculi before.
- Dreadmelds no longer need monolith tier 2 to study.
- Pawns swallowed when casting the seedbed ability now chosen at random if there are multiple pawns on the tile. If chosen pawn's body size is too big, ability will fail.
- Swallowing max body size now factors in the size of the swallower.
- Improved swallowing checks to account for when the mod is installed in mid save.
- Improved age checks to only try implanting on pawns at max life stage.
- Fixed undiagnosed implantation hediffs not automatically diagnose if the pawn has given birth to homunculi before.

[doop_lvl]

update:

 

## New Feature
- Added parasite excision surgery to remove implantation and parasite hediff. There is chance to get a penalty if done on the parasite stage instead of implantation which will give the host an undiagnosed organ decay and spawn a fingerspike chest burster style. The organ decay can target more parts than vanilla organ decay does, which includes the brain, which will be fatal since the brain can't be replaced in vanilla. The chest bursting fingerspike has a 50% chance to drop a shard if the parasite was going to grow into a dreadmeld, but has 100% chance instead if it has terminated a pregnancy.

 

## Fixes and Other Changes
- Parasite birth letter's text and letter def now correspond to whether the birther has birthed to a homunculus before and whether they were inhumanized.
- Added thoughts for when the parasite terminates the host's pregnancy.
- Increased bulbfreaks leap range to 9.9 tiles (bulbfreaks do have a pretty fast move speed).
- The thoughts pawns get after getting seedbedded now stacks up to 7.
- Implantation is now always successful for pawns already given birth to homunculi.
- Added filth and sfx when bulbfreaks and dreadmelds drop their swallowed target.
- Improved syncing of seedbedder study.
- Removed redundant Anomaly DLC checks.
- Added filth ad sfx when parasite birth happens.
- Improved parasite birthing using the same logic vanilla uses for birthing.
- Fixed error trying to affect goodwill of the same faction while inserting one of player's colonists into bulbfreak or dreadmeld on a holding platform.
- Added message when a parasite has terminated pregnancy.
- Parasite severity now increases when it has terminated a pregnancy. It increases by the pregnancy's severity with a minimum of 10% severity increase.
- Added more pregnancy checks for [Intimacy](<https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3498422643>).

[doop_lvl]

## New Feature
- Added living clothes leap ability to fingerspike and trispike.
- Fingerspike and trispike can now be studied to have study notes. Unlocking the study notes allows you to throw any carried fingerspike and trispike by right clicking the carrier, triggering their ability.
- Upon landing on a pawn, they give a living clothes hediff, stating the pawn is wrapped in tentacles. They will incur manipulation, move speed, and rest fall rate penalty as well as trying to take control over the pawn if they "don't have proximity to the void" which means not inhumanized or not have either of the hediffs you get after birthing homunculi.
- To release living clothes, you can select pawns (including the one who has the living clothes) and right click on the one wearing living clothes to tell them to rip the tentacles off. As it's trying to take control, the percentage shown in the hediff rises, scaling with how many tentacles is in (max 9). Ripping off tentacles scales with melee skill, body size, and manipulation. This means a level 9 melee pawn isn't enough to rip tentacles off of a fully covered pawn and can only hold it back from progressing to 100%.
- If you want a pawn without void proximity to benefit from living clothes, you have to down them to turn the tentacles docile, inverting the aforementioned penalties into bonus. There's plan to make docile tentacles start taking control again, but it's unimplemented.
- Being wrapped around tentacles make people unhappy. Unless of course they're inhumanized or if they're a body modder (trait, not ideo precept). Body modders don't mind living clothes for the same rationale they don't mind tentacle arms.

## Other Changes
- Renamed seedbed incapacitate hediff's dibelief stage to dizzy.
- Added thoughts for birthing homunculi.
- Added psychic sensitivity multiplier to thoughts that are psychically induced.
- Seedbeders now prioritize implantable pawns when choosing which pawn it should swallow on the tile it lands on.
- Added null check for the pawn a seedbeder tries swallow.
- Seedbedders can use the ability again if it fails to swallow.
- Seedbedders won't implant on mechanical humanlikes.
- Fixed swallowed pawn teleporting to map edge on game loaded.
- Added null checks on choosing which held seedbedders when trying to insert a pawn into one.
- Arrows pointing to held seedbedders now show when choosing seedbedders to insert into.
- Parasite now grows based on hungriness.
- Removing parasites now always gives penalty. Removing implantation is unchanged.

[ghostfalll]

On 4/10/2026 at 9:06 PM, doop_lvl said:

- If you want a pawn without void proximity to benefit from living clothes, you have to down them to turn the tentacles docile, inverting the aforementioned penalties into bonus. There's plan to make docile tentacles start taking control again, but it's unimplemented.
- Being wrapped around tentacles make people unhappy. Unless of course they're inhumanized or if they're a body modder (trait, not ideo precept).

Does the new llving clothing hediff have some innate % chance to just down pawns per tick, or is downing pawns purely player choice?  Also, any chance of a sub-mod for the Ideo precept?  The game's trait pool is kinda saturated, but I understand why this mod might want to avoid requiring a second DLC...

[doop_lvl]

31 minutes ago, ghostfalll said:

Does the new llving clothing hediff have some innate % chance to just down pawns per tick

no. the hediff doesnt down pawns. they never decrease moving and in fact raises pain shock threshold unless theyre fussy, so pawns are less likely to be downed when wearing them. whenever your pawn who is struggling against being taken control by the tentacles or are already taken control gets downed, the tentacle turns docile, which will stop trying to take control benefit the wearer instead

 

38 minutes ago, ghostfalll said:

Also, any chance of a sub-mod for the Ideo precept?  The game's trait pool is kinda saturated, but I understand why this mod might want to avoid requiring a second DLC...

im not sure what you mean by ideo precept submod. i just havent implemented the thoughts the wearer would have if they have the body modification: approved precept, which i plan to be same thoughts that pawns with the body modder trait would have. i didnt add any trait nor do i have any plans for adding a new ideo precept. im just planning to add precept specific thoughts

[ghostfalll]

On 4/15/2026 at 10:21 AM, doop_lvl said:

im not sure what you mean by ideo precept submod.

It's your mod, do what you want.  Just most modders would generate a derivative mod for integrating the second DLC rather than shove it all together...

[doop_lvl]

oh. youre worried about this mod requiring another DLC when i get around to implementing those thoughts? dont worry, you wont require another DLC. i know how to implement things without making them a requirement

[Rune6]

This mod seems really interesting, are you planning on adding stuff for other anomalies as well? In any case, thank you for your efforts, the anomaly DLC was missing this kind of freak

[LiquidMetalFox]

Really cool mod, nice to see somebody finally doing something with the whole Anomaly thing.  What do you think about adding a super small chance of pawns being parasited from attacks?  Basically it works exactly like the metal horrors, it happens rarely randomly in combat by being hit by attacks from anomalies.  After time passes and the parasite grows the pawn shows some signs which could be mistaken for being pregnant.  That way they only find out when its time to give birth unless the player catches it and checks.  Alternatively you could just have it how you have the current parasite pregnancy where it eventually reaches a point where its obvious they're pregnant with a fleshbeast.

[doop_lvl]

you want a parasite pregnancy that disguises itself as regular pregnancy? thats certainly a really cool idea, but im not sure how to disguise a hediff as pregnancy like that, considering how, especially with RJW, you can have different types of pregnancies depending on your setting. and if the user chooses to use Biotech pregnancy that never hides itself, its gonna be too obvious for the parasite pregnancy. basically, you can only effectively disguise it if the player uses RJW pregnancy

 

on the contrary, i dont want pawns getting pregnant with something as big as a bulbfreak or dreadmeld from just being attacked by smaller fleshbeasts. if getting attacked by fleshbeasts have chance to get people pregnant, the resulting birth are probably just gonna be fingerspike. this would be pretty neat, as that means you can set up a deliberate fingerspike production for more living clothes

[doop_lvl]

update

QoL
- Living clothes that are taking over will now have a progress bar to indicate how far along is it taking over the wearer.
- Added message whenever a pawn who is being told to rip tentacles off either lacks melee skill or isn't strong enough (has enough melee to rip it off on their own, but has impaired manipulation or small body).
- Pawn taken control by living clothes will now undergo humanity break instead of going berserk if the living clothes on the pawn are (somehow) friendly majority wise.
- Changed humanity break mental state to have different description from vanilla's ideology caused humanity break.
- Friendly ghouls can now be commanded to rip living clothes off.
- Friendly mechanoids can now be commanded to rip living clothes off.

 

Other Changes
- Rephrased thought labels for prosthophile and genetically fused thoughts.
- Right click command to carry entity from holding platform is now correctly player forced.
- Fixed bug living clothes hediff not updating the pawn's capacity when the hediff changes state.
- Added debug logging whenever should implant check is done by a seedbedder.