Work

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Work is the various tasks that a colonist can do to keep a colony running, and perform almost all non-combat related tasks. The Work Menu allows the player to set the types of work you want your colonists to perform, though some colonists cannot perform all tasks. For example, nobles can only access research and firefighting whilst a settler can access all skills.

By default, the Work tab can be opened with F1.

Example of work priorities and the different work types.

Manual priorities

The 'Manual priorities' mode toggles the interface between 'standard mode' (red X) and 'manual mode' (green check).

• Standard mode: Colonists only do work types they're assigned to, noted by a green check. Tasks on the left rank more important than tasks on the right.
• Manual mode: Each colonist's work type can be prioritized from 1 (highest priority) to 4 (lowest priority). Blank tasks will not be performed. For tasks with the same priority, tasks on the left will be performed first.

Regardless of mode, all available work of one priority will be done before the next priority. If Hauling is set to 1, then a colonist will haul every single object, even those halfway across the map, before doing the rest of their tasks. They have no regard for efficiency.

Assigning work

An efficient colony depends on colonists doing work they're proficient at. Boxes on the work menu are used to assign work, and each box has a visible outline. The higher the colonist's skill, the brighter the outline, ranging from red (worst), to white, to bright yellow (best). Also, hovering over a skill box displays the colonist's skill level.

Each box will also show a colonist's passion for that skill indicated by one or two flames. This will help you decide who you want doing each task.

It is a good idea to study your colonists' skills and apply them to their strengths. Using the wrong people will slow down your progression. To help keep you from using the wrong colonist for a job, a crunching sound is made when you assign a pawn to a work type which they won't do well due to low skill. Some colonists may not have a box for one or more work types; they are incapable of that work.

Incapable of work types

Some characters are incapable of certain work and/or certain categories of work (i.e. violent, dumb labor). Incapabilities are listed under "Incapable Of" in a pawn's Bio tab. Hovering the cursor over a listed incapability will show its source. Pawns will never perform a task related to their incapability, with a few exceptions. This is distinct from characters with a skill level of 0 in a skill. At level 0, a pawn is still capable of performing the task, they will just be extremely slow, ineffective, inefficient, and have an increased chance of failure. Where an exception exists, pawns incapable of a task are treated as having level 0 in the relevant skill, even if they had a higher skill before becoming incapable. For example, an exception is that characters who are incapable of plant work can still cut down trees - if it is ordered as construction work through the Architect>Orders menu.

What a pawn is incapable of is determined by their traits, backstories, title , status as a slave, or ideoligious role . Typically, incapabilities from multiple sources stack. Though rare, it is quite possible that, given a perfectly wrong combination of backstory limitations, a pawn may be so limited that they are incapable of practically everything. Slavery is unique in this regard, in that it removes all other incapabilities and replaces them with its own. See that page for details.

Occasionally, incapabilities have interactions with other mechanics, such as the limitation of traits; for example, a "non-violent" colonist will never have the brawler trait.

A pawn can be "incapable of":

Work type	Effect
Animals	Prohibits working with animals, including taming wild animals, training tamed animals and collecting materials such as wool from tame animals. Does not disable the ability to hunt wild animals, nor the animals skill which also governs hunting ability.
Artistic
Caring	Prohibits any medical tasks, including Doctoring, Nursing, and Surgery; on humans or animals.
Cleaning
Cooking
Crafting
Dumb Labor	Hauling, Rearming, Refueling, Loading, Cremating, and Cleaning. Does not prevent a colonist from hauling as part of another job such as bringing construction materials to something they're building.
Firefighting
Hauling	Hauling, Rearming, Refueling, Loading, and Cremating. Does not prevent a colonist from hauling as part of another job such as bringing construction materials to something they're building.
Intellectual	Research, Drug Production, Scanning, Computer Hacking, and so on.
Mining
Plants	Growing, Sowing, Harvesting, and Plant Cutting (including cutting trees).
Skilled Labor	Brewer, Butcher, Cook, Constructor and Deconstructor, Miner, Grower, Harvester, Plant Cutter, Crafter, Smith, Tailor, Repairer, Driller, Fabricator, Machinist, Refiner, Smelter, Stonecutter, and Drug Production.
Social	Trading (including while on caravans or at faction bases), Recruiting prisoners, and all Wardening.
Violent	All Ranged and Melee combat, Hunting, Wardening, Slaughtering, and Executing prisoners. An incapable of Violent pawn cannot defend themself from attacks. This includes a prohibition against equipping even "non-damaging" weapons such as smoke launchers or EMP grenades, and weapons equipped only for their buffs, such as the eltex staff . A "non-violent" colonist can still be drafted, use psycasts (except neural heat dump, berserk, flashstorm, berserk pulse, and neuroquake), and order combat mechanoids as a mechanitor. Pawns that are incapable of violence can provoke social fights, but will not fight back during them. However, these pawns are capable of Extreme mental breaks that murder animals or other colonists. These pawns are also incapable of slaughtering tamed animals, but are in fact able to euthanize animals and humans as a medical operation to achieve the same benefits of slaughtering.

Prioritizing a task

A colonist can be directed to immediately perform a task, but only if it's a work type they're assigned to. Select the colonist, right-click a target (such as a blueprint, object, or pawn) and choose an option from the context menu. If no menu appears, then the colonist can't do anything with that target - try another colonist. Multiple tasks can be chained together by holding the Shift key. Queued jobs are shown on the colonist's inspect pane.

Notes

• For improved efficiency, colonists do cleaning and harvesting in batches.
• Colonists will only perform work in their allowed area.
  • If an allowed area is made up of two parts, colonists may still traverse the unallowed area to perform tasks in another zone.

Work types

Note: Within each work-type, there are a number of tasks performed as part of that work type. Tasks higher on the list will be prioritized over tasks lower on the list in the same work-type.

Work type	Description	Relevant skill	Category
Firefight	Firefighters extinguish fires in the home area. Firefighters can't extinguish fires outside the home area.	none	Firefighting
Patient	Patients go to a medical bed to receive treatment for life-threatening health conditions (e.g. a treatable illness). It is not advisable to ever disable this or severely lower the priority. See the 'bed rest' task to set the priority for non-disease injuries.	none	none
Doctor	Doctors bandage wounds, treat the sick, and perform operations. Doctors also automatically rescue downed colonists. Doctors tend to colonists, rescued allies, prisoners and colony animals, but they must be resting in a bed or sleeping spot. Tend to patients with urgent needs. Tend to patients. Tend to self (emergency). Tend to entities. Tend to self. Feed patients. Operate on humanlikes. Administer hemogen. Rescue downed allies to bed. Tend to animals. Feed animals (patient animals only). Operate on animals. Take patients to bed for operations. Visit sick people . Extract bioferrite from entities.	Medical	Caring Social (Visiting only)
Bed rest	Colonists assigned to bed rest will rest in a bed to heal injuries. This is separate from a colonist's need to sleep to replenish rest.	none	none
Childcare	Care for a baby or child of the colony. Teach child. Bring babies to safe temperature. Breastfeed babies. Play with babies. Feed babies. Carry to mother.	Social	Caring Social
Basic	Colonists will complete tasks that are unskilled and easy to complete. Flick switches - toggle power on appliances and switches, or open/close vents. Release prisoners. Open containers marked to open: graves, cryptosleep caskets, and sarcophagi. Change dryad types. Extract skull. * Note: Even when not assigned to Basic work, colonists can still be directed with right-click to open a container not marked to open.	none	none
Warden	Wardens feed prisoners, chat with them, and try to recruit them, as chosen by the player. Wardens also carry out prisoner releases and executions. Interrogate identity Execute entities. Execute prisoners. Execute guilty colonists. Execute prisoners. Emancipate slaves. Release prisoners. Enslave prisoners. Suppress entity activity. Take prisoners to bed. Feed prisoners. Imprison slaves. Convert prisoners. Deliver hemogen to prisoners. Deliver food to prisoners. Suppress slaves. Release entities. Chat with prisoners.	Social	none
Handle	Handlers tame, train, feed, milk, shear and slaughter tamed animals. Handlers also rescue wounded animals. Note: Slaughtering animals is a violent act and will not be carried out by pawns incapable of violence. Take roaming animals to pen. Feed sick animals.(animal patients - sick or injured animals resting in an animal bed or sleeping spot designated as medical) Take to pen. (presumably this one is for moving animals from a hitching spot to a pen) Slaughter animals. Release to wild. Milk animals. Shear animals. Tame animals. Train animals. Rebalance animals in pens.	Animals	Animals
Cook	Cooks butcher animals, prepare meals, and brew beer. Cook meals at stove. Cook meals at campfire. Butcher creatures. Brew liquors.	Cooking	Skilled labor
Hunt	Hunters hunt animals marked for hunting, but will require a ranged weapon to do so (you will be notified via message of colonists with the Hunting job without one).	Shooting and Animals	Violent
Construct	Constructors build things, smooth floors, repair damaged buildings and structures, and fix broken-down equipment with components. Fix broken-down buildings. Uninstall structures. Build roofs. Remove roofs. Construct placed frames. Deliver resources to frames. Deliver resources to blueprints. Fill in. Deconstruct structures. Repair damaged things. Remove floors. Smooth floors. Smooth walls.	Construction	Skilled labor
Grow	Growers plant and harvest domestic crops. Harvest crops. Plant seeds. Replant trees. Sow crops.	Plants	Skilled labor
Mine	Miners dig out marked sections of stone or minerals, as well as operating deep drills. Mine. Drill at deep drill.	Mining	Skilled labor
Plant cut	Plant cutters harvest food from wild plant and cut down marked plants. Extract trees. Prune Gauranlen trees. Cut plants.	Plants	Dumb labor
Smith	Create weapons and tools from raw materials, either as a blacksmith or by machining. Also repair mechanoids, if the colonist is a mechanitor. Make things at subcore encoder. Make things at mech gestator. Repair mech. Make weapons (at smithy). Make things at machining table. Make things at bioferrite shaper. Fabricate things.	Crafting	Skilled labor
Tailor	Tailors craft clothing at a tailor bench (electric / hand tailor bench).	Crafting	Skilled labor
Art	Artists make sculptures at the art bench. Remove paint. Remove floor paint. Paint buildings Paint floor Make things at art bench	Artistic	Artistic
Craft	Craftsman do general low-skilled labor at work like stonecutting and smelting. Make things at crafting spot. Work at refinery. Synthesize drugs. Make stone blocks. Smelt items. Make things at serum lab.	Crafting Cooking (Drug Cooking only) Intellectual (Drug Synthesis only) None (Stone Cutting and Smelting only)	Skilled labor Intellectual (Drug Synthesis and Serums only)
Haul	Haulers do a number of things, including: Capture entity. Rearm turrets. Refuel fuelable buildings (Torch lamps, generators, Fueled stoves etc.). Unload carriers. Load caravan. Bank genepack. Load transporters. Empty waste container. Carry to biosculpter pod. Carry to growth vat. Haul to map. Strip corpses. Haul corpses. Carry to gene extractor. Carry to growth vat. Haul mechs to charger. Carry to subcore scanner. Haul resources to carriers. Haul resources to subcore scanner. Haul resources to wastepack atomizer. Transfer entities. Fill food hoppers. Do cremation bills. Do bills at campfire (such as burning drugs). Take beer out of fermenting barrels. Empty egg boxes. Take bioferrite out of bioferrite harvester. Fill fermenting barrels. Haul general things. Deliver resources to frames. Deliver resources to blueprints. Merge things.	none	Dumb labor
Clean	Cleaners remove filth such as dirt, blood, and vomit, which would otherwise negatively affect the beauty of a room. Clear snow. Clean filth. Clean pollution.	none	Dumb labor
Dark Study	Interact with anomalous entities.	Intellectual	Intellectual
Research	Create xenogerm. Study archotech structures. Research work at a simple research bench or hi-tech research bench to unlock new items and building options. Scanning at the Long-range mineral scanner. Scanning at the Ground-penetrating scanner.	Intellectual	Intellectual

Version history

• 1.3.3066 - Guests with "AllWork" disabled will no longer opportunistically haul.
• 1.4.3563 - Fix: "Tend to self" emergency work giver appears below non-emergency work giver on UI.