Tunneler
 | This article relates to content added by Biotech (DLC). Please note that it will not be present without the DLC enabled. |
Tunneler
A heavy mechanoid built for mining in treacherous locations. While intended for excavation, the tunneler's gigantic power claws and ultra-thick armor makes it a dangerous force in combat.
Base Stats
- Type
- Mechanoid
- Market Value
- 1200
- Flammability
- 0%
Armor
- Armor - Sharp
- 80%
- Armor - Blunt
- 40%
- Armor - Heat
- 200%
Pawn Stats
- Move Speed
- 1.9 c/s
- Health Scale
- 150% HP
- Body Size
- 3.5
- Mass
- 210 kg
- Pack Capacity
- 122.5 kg
- Carrying Capacity
- 263 kg
- Filth Rate
- 1
- Comfortable Temp Range
- -100 °C – 250 °C (-148 °F – 482 °F)
Melee Combat
- Attack 1
- Left power claw
22 dmg (Blunt)
33 % AP
2.9 second cooldown - Attack 2
- Right power claw
22 dmg (Blunt)
33 % AP
2.9 second cooldown - Average DPS
- 4.7
Creation
- Crafted At
- Required Research
- Standard mechtech
- Resources to make
150 + 
75 + 
4 + 
1
A tunneler is a mechanoid added by the Biotech DLC.
Summary
As mechanoids, tunnelers are immune to fire, toxicity, and temperature extremes, despite having a Comfortable Temperature. They do not need to eat, rest, and have no mood. They will be stunned by EMP attacks and will "adapt" for 2,200 ticks (36.67 secs), rendering them immune to further EMP strikes. Mechs do not count as a pawn for determining raid points, but still contribute towards wealth.
Work
Tunnelers are a heavy mechanoid, and require High Mechtech to create. They are created from a large mech gestator with 150 Steel, 75 Plasteel, 4 Components, 1 Standard subcore, taking up 3 bandwidth from a mechanitor. They must gestate for 4 cycles to be made. Once made, they recharge in a large mech recharger (50% power/day), creating 15 wastepacks whenever the recharger's waste is filled up.
Tunnelers will do tasks associated with the Mining tab, though are unable to use deep drills. They cannot be manually controlled, except when drafted for combat. They have an effective Mining skill of 10, but with a Global Work Speed of 150%.
Combat
In combat, tunnelers have a shield (equivalent to a shield belt) of 250 power. They can also emit smoke, though with a cooldown of 15 days. They have a melee attack. Its weakness is that each time it takes damage, it slows for a few seconds - this means that when tunnelers attack you, even if you can’t kill them quickly, you can intelligently kite them by falling back from your position to escape the blocking smoke, maintain distance and slowly whittle the tunnelers down.
Analysis
 | This section is a stub. You can help RimWorld Wiki by expanding it. Reason: Incorporate Mining Yield into otherwise good analysis. |
Tunnelers are useful for mass mining operations, whether it is expanding out your mountain base or mining mineral lumps found using a long-range mineral scanner. Mechanoids are not subject to illness or mental breaks, and only recharge for 2 days out of every 12.
Work Speed
The following table summarizes the work speed effects of operating within the influence of a mech booster and having control sublinks installed by the Mechanitor. All values are for 50%+ lighting conditions.
| Control Sublinks | Work Speed | Mech Boosted |
|---|---|---|
| 0 | 150% | 225% |
| 1 | 156% | 231% |
| 2 | 162% | 237% |
| 3 | 168% | 243% |
| 4 | 174% | 249% |
| 5 | 180% | 255% |
| 6 | 186% | 261% |
A colonist's work speed is based on their Mining Speed stat. At about skill 13, a normal colonist with no traits or health conditions will mine as fast as a tunneler operating without a Mech Booster or Sublink bonus. A similar colonist at skill 18 mines roughly 97% as fast a mech-boosted Tunneler with no Sublink bonuses. Installing a Drill arm allows a Skill 5 pawn to mine faster than an unboosted Tunneler.
Mining Yield
Tunnelers appear to have no special modifiers to Mining Yield, meaning that they function identically to a Skill 10 Colonist for this purpose. For maximum resources, leave ores for higher skill colonists, if present, to mine. However, it may be more useful to get a place dug out now then to get a little more ore; the increase isn't very large until very high skill levels (a level 19 miner has +10% yield).
Conversely, a lower mining yield will slightly lower the amount of stone chunks that have to be hauled out of a mountain base. The difference is too small to notice either way.
Health
Specify body type when known.
Version history
- Biotech DLC Release - Added
- 1.4.3531 - Increased armor values from 40/20/200 to 80/40/200
- Mechanoids | Core
- Centipede (Blaster, Burner, Gunner) • Lancer • Pikeman • Scyther • Termite
- Combat
- Centurion
• Legionary • Militor • Scorcher • Tesseron - Command
- Apocriton • Diabolus • War queen (War urchin )
- Labor
- Agrihand • Cleansweeper • Constructoid • Fabricor • Lifter • Paramedic • Tunneler
- Cluster
| Buildings - Condition causer • Count-down activator • Mech assembler • Mech capsule • Mech drop beacon • Mech high-shield • Mech low-shield • Mech node • Proximity activator • Unstable power cell
- Turrets
- Auto charge turret • Auto inferno turret • Auto mortar • Mini-slugger turret
- Creation | Pawn
- Mechanitor
- Buildings
- Mech gestator • Large mech gestator • Mechband antenna • Mechband dish