Death

Death is a certainly fatal state that can be inflicted to any pawn.

Summary

A dead pawn can no longer act, and creates a corpse if its body was not completely destroyed. No organs or artificial parts may be retrieved, and any apparel items they were wearing will become tainted. Death activates a death acidifier.

Colonist deaths cause various mood penalties. Pawns connected by family or relationship will be especially devastated. Killing a colonist or prisoner through particularly cruel methods, like execution and banishment, incur extra penalties. Animals bonded to a dead pawn may receive a mental break, while a bonded animal dying gives a mood penalty.

Corpses may be buried in a grave or sarcophagus. Leaving a colonist corpse unburied (or not burned, butchered, destroyed...) incurs further mood penalties.

Sources

• Loss of a vital body part. For humans, this is the torso (which represents the entire abdomen), brain, head, neck, heart, and liver. Losing both kidneys or lungs is also fatal.
• Reaching 0% Consciousness.
  • 0% Blood Filtration, Blood Pumping, Breathing, and Metabolism are also fatal, though they require loss of vital organs anyways.
• Having certain ailments reach 100% severity. These include:
  • Blood loss
  • Malnutrition
  • Fatal diseases
  • Hypothermia & Heatstroke
  • Artery blockage & Heart attack
  • Drug overdose
  • Toxic buildup
• Randomly while overdosing or under Luciferium withdrawal.
• Having collapsed rocks from overhead mountain fall on top of them.
• Chance to die when failing certain specific surgeries, such as installing a prosthetic heart (bionic hearts are safe to install) or carcinoma removal

Enemy pawns also have a chance to die when downed, even if the damage wouldn't kill them, with the exception of specific downs like heatstroke. This chance is dependent on storyteller settings and can be adjusted at any time.

Curing

A resurrector mech serum is the only way to treat death, at least without mods, developer tools, or reverting to a previous save. There must be a non-desiccated corpse in order to resurrect. It runs the risk of resurrection psychosis (and other side effects), which will kill the pawn again in 100 days; the chance is reduced by keeping the pawn's corpse fresh and applying the serum quickly.