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To survive space in RimWorld: Odyssey, prepare a working gravship, protect its pressurized interior with airtight construction and powered oxygen pumps, use vac-barrier airlocks, and equip colonists with vac suits before they leave the ship. Space has no oxygen, temperatures are sub-zero, and a hull breach can be lethal. Treat every destination as a separate survival problem: its food sources, weather, terrain, and threats determine what you should bring and how you should adapt.
What Odyssey adds—and what update 1.6 does not require
Odyssey is RimWorld’s fifth expansion, released July 11, 2025. It adds gravship travel, orbital exploration, quests, and new destinations. The separate 1.6 update is free; Ludeon says players do not need to own Odyssey to get it. The studio also said unmodded 1.5 saves load in 1.6, while noting that some mods had not yet been updated when that release post was written. See Ludeon’s release announcement.
| # | Preview | Product | Price | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 |
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The Odyssey | $11.30 | Buy on Amazon |
The latest dated version note established here is Ludeon’s 1.6.4850 update, published June 8, 2026. It includes fixes affecting gravships and space, including gravship jumps interrupting deathrest and certain pawns spawning with vacsuits. That dated note does not establish which build is live on October 8, 2026. Read the 1.6.4850 notes.
What to prepare before launching a gravship
Ludeon describes a starting gravship with a grav engine, a few rooms, thrusters, and chemfuel. Gravcores, recovered from specified dangerous locations, are needed to expand the ship and travel farther. A ship can grow into a mobile home with bedrooms, labs, hospitals, workshops, and other colony facilities. The announcement does not give fuel quantities, exact room dimensions, gravcore counts, or a universally optimal design. Ludeon’s Odyssey announcement supports the following planning checks, not a tested build prescription.
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- Launch foundation: Confirm the grav engine and thrusters are present and account for chemfuel, the stated launch fuel.
- Living and working space: Decide which rooms and facilities your mobile colony needs. The examples above are possible ship functions, not official minimum requirements or a prescribed build order.
- Range and expansion: Plan to seek gravcores if you want to expand the ship and travel farther. The announcement does not establish a safest route or guaranteed recovery location.
- Life support: Before an orbital trip, make sure the ship can protect colonists from vacuum and cold, and that oxygen pumps have power.
How to survive inside the ship
Space has no oxygen and sub-zero temperatures; Ludeon warns that a single hull breach can be lethal. Airtight walls protect pressurized areas, but oxygen pumps stop if power is lost. The announcement’s short warning is direct: “Keep the power on, or the oxygen pumps will shut down.” It also identifies vac-barrier airlocks as a way to prevent depressurization. The source does not specify oxygen reserves, temperatures, repair times, or a detailed breach-response procedure.
- Protect occupied areas: Use airtight construction around the spaces colonists need to inhabit.
- Keep oxygen pumps powered: Treat life-support power as essential rather than optional ship comfort.
- Use the named airlock protection: Vac-barrier airlocks help limit depressurization when moving through an airlock.
- Respond to a breach as an emergency: Because the official warning is that a breach can be lethal, do not treat hull damage as routine. The cited announcement does not establish an exact repair sequence or response timer.
How to survive outside the ship
Colonists need vac suits before exiting into the void. Check that the pawn making the trip is equipped before exposure; the official material identifies suits as necessary but does not provide suit statistics or exposure timings. Keep this separate from interior protection: airtight walls and powered oxygen pumps protect ship spaces, while a vac suit is the stated protection for a colonist outside.
Choose a destination by its survival constraints
Odyssey adds five biomes with materially different food, weather, terrain, and threat pressures. Ludeon’s preview does not rank them by objective difficulty, and a single “easiest” choice would depend on a player’s settings and play style. Instead, compare what a destination offers for food and foraging, its water and weather risks, terrain and defensibility, environmental hazards, and hostile wildlife or defenses. The descriptions below reflect Ludeon’s June 19, 2025 preview, not independent difficulty ratings. Read the biome preview.
| Biome | Main pressures | Adaptation described by Ludeon |
|---|---|---|
| Glowforests | Permanent darkness, sulfur-choked skies, and spores; ordinary crops do not grow. | Use fungi, biomass-to-chemfuel, hydroponics, fishing, and hunting as alternatives. |
| Lava fields | Mineral-rich soil and exposed obsidian and ores, but unstable terrain, volcanic debris, ash, and eruptions. | Prepare with fireproof walls, barriers to divert lava, and firefoam tools. |
| Scarlands | Poisoned water, toxic rain, scaria among wild animals, limited food and help, old security systems, and dormant mechanoids. | Arrive with supplies and firepower. |
| Grasslands | Fertile land and long growing seasons, but scarce trees, drought, and fast-moving fire. | Space a ranch, pave firebreaks, and build with stone. |
| Glacial plains | Persistent cold, scarce food and fuel, crevasses, and dangerous megafauna. | Fish through ice, hunt, and shelter in glaciers; frozen ruins may hold supplies and cryptosleep caskets. |
Look beyond the biome label
A destination’s local landmark and changing conditions can alter its value as much as its biome. Ludeon reports over 85 dynamic map features and over 45 landmarks, including abandoned colonies, coastal islands and archipelagos, valleys and caverns, oases, and ancient garrisons, launch sites, refineries, and warehouses. These are developer-published counts from 2025. A location may offer shelter or resources while also containing active defenses.
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Weather and water also affect a plan: Ludeon describes water that freezes and melts, spring or torrential rain that can flood areas, and conditions including toxic rain, sandstorms, blizzards, fog, and strong winds. Before committing to a stop, weigh its likely supplies and defensibility against those local hazards rather than assuming that a favorable biome description guarantees a safe landing.
A practical planning sequence
- Establish the ship: Verify the grav engine, thrusters, rooms, and chemfuel needed for the starting gravship described by Ludeon.
- Make the interior survivable: Plan airtight occupied spaces, powered oxygen pumps, and vac-barrier airlocks.
- Prepare for outside work: Have vac suits ready for colonists before they exit into space.
- Choose a destination for a reason: Match food options, weather and water risks, terrain, and threats to the colony’s needs; inspect landmarks as part of that choice.
- Adapt after arrival: Use the destination’s available food, shelter, and materials, and plan future expansion around recovering gravcores when appropriate.
This sequence organizes the mechanics and advice Ludeon has published; it is not an experimentally verified optimum. Ludeon also reports over 40 new animals in the expansion, another reason to assess local wildlife rather than assuming every destination presents the same threats.
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