Painstopper

A painstopper is a brain implant that will completely eliminate a colonist's pain and any pain-related mood effects.

Acquisition

In the base game, painstoppers cannot be crafted. Instead they can only be obtained via trade or found in ancient shrines.

With the Royalty DLC, Painstoppers can be crafted at a machining table once the brain wiring research project has been completed. Note that this research requires a techprint. Each requires 20 Steel, 4 Components, 15,000 ticks (4.17 mins) of work modified by the general labor speed of the crafter, and a crafting skill of 5.

Summary

Painstoppers multiply pain by ×0%, meaning that a pawn will never have pain and never go through pain shock.

Installation

Installing the part requires 2,500 ticks (41.67 secs) of work, 2x medicine of herbal quality or better, and a Medical skill of 5.

Removing the part requires 2,500 ticks (41.67 secs) of work, 1x medicine of herbal quality or better, and a Medical skill of 5.

If the operation fails, the part will be destroyed.

Analysis

Pain reduces consciousness, which in turn reduces manipulation, moving and talking. Thus, it directly and significantly impacts almost every activity a pawn can perform. It also inflicts a significant mood debuff. Most kinds of pain are temporary and not worth installing a Painstopper for that reason alone. However, pain from scars is permanent, and some painful diseases such as sensory mechanites can linger for long periods of time.

The painstopper can be a huge boon in combat, preventing the Consciousness loss of pain, improving DPS output when injured. As the Pain Shock Threshold is never crossed, the pawn can fight for longer as well. But this carries a significant risk - pawns that don't feel pain will never be downed from it, meaning that pawns will keep fighting until they either win, die or, less likely, become incapacitated from serious leg, spine, pelvis or brain injury. Maintaining high damage output for longer can help end fights sooner, allowing you to win a fight before risking serious injury. However, it is important to keep an eye on them, so you can get them to retreat in time before they receive fatal damage - especially while hunting or in melee. Combination with the Deathless gene, such as on a sanguophage, significantly reduces this remaining risk

Colonists with the Masochist trait or following an Ideoligion with the Pain: Idealized precept gain mood bonuses from pain, which will be eliminated by the painstopper. Psycasters also dissipate neural heat faster while in pain.

Painstoppers are useful for negating the Wimp trait, though with the usual downsides. As the Extra pain gene forces the Wimp trait but adds +2 metabolic efficiency, the two can be combined for free metabolic efficiency for painstopped pawns.

While Ghoul exclusive implants specify that pain is the main reason they cannot be installed in normal pawns, a painstopper does not allow a pawn to to have them installed.

Alternatives

The Painless persona weapon trait is a powerful alternative to a painstopper - offering the same 100% uptime, total pain elimination, but able to toggled by simply equipping and unequipping the weapon and attached to a powerful melee weapon. Finding a persona weapon with the correct trait depends on luck however as the persona weapons are rare and their traits are randomly selected. It obviously also limits the weapon selection of the painless pawn.

Temporary alternatives to reduce pain include Go-juice and the Painblock psycast , which reduces the long term risk. However, these come with their own drawbacks including addiction, chemical damage, short duration and cost. Both of these options reduce pain by 90%, rather than eliminating it completely.

For a full list of pain reductions, see Pain.

Version history

0.12.906 - Added. At this point it prevents pain, but reduces consciousness

Artificial body parts

Arm/Hand: Archotech arm • Bionic arm • Power claw • Prosthetic arm • Wooden hand • Drill arm • Elbow blade • Field hand • Hand talon • Venom talon • Flesh tentacle • Flesh whip
Head: Archotech eye • Bionic eye • Bionic ear • Bionic jaw • Bionic tongue • Cochlear implant • Denture • Aesthetic nose
Head implants: Joywire • Painstopper • Circadian assistant • Circadian half-cycler • Gastro-analyzer • Learning assistant • Mindscrew • Neurocalculator • Psychic harmonizer • Psychic reader • Psychic sensitizer • Venom fangs • Control sublink (Standard, High) • Mechlink • Mech gestation processor • Remote repairer • Remote shielder • Repair probe
Spine: Bionic spine • Revenant vertebrae
Stomach: Bionic stomach • Nuclear stomach • Reprocessor stomach • Sterilizing stomach • Fleshmass stomach
Heart: Bionic heart • Prosthetic heart • Heart • Adrenal heart • Corrosive heart • Metalblood heart
Lung: Lung • Detoxifier lung • Fleshmass lung
Kidney: Kidney • Detoxifier kidney
Organs: Liver
Visceral implants: Death acidifier • Aesthetic shaper • Coagulator • Healing enhancer • Armorskin gland • Stoneskin gland • Toughskin gland • Immunoenhancer • Love enhancer • Ghoul plating • Ghoul barbs
Leg/Foot: Archotech leg • Bionic leg • Prosthetic leg • Peg leg • Wooden foot • Knee spike
Related: Psylink neuroformer • Xenogerm
Deprecated: Scyther blade • Psychic silencer