RimWorld Guide: The Anima Tree [1.3, 2022]

This RimWorld guide / tutorial teaches you everything you could possibly want to know about The Anima Tree. Whether you are brand new to Royalty and the Anima Tree and just want general information, or have specific questions like “Why is my anima tree not growing grass?”, this RimWorld guide has you covered.

[Video Transcript – Rough Draft may contain typos!]

RimWorld Anima Tree

Hey everyone, Adam here with another Rimworld guide. If you’ve watched any of my playthroughs you’ll know that one of the questions I get asked the most is ‘Wait, you can build next to the Anima tree?’

So I’ve decided to finally make a Rimworld guide that goes over everything you could possibly need to know about the Anima tree.

What is the Anima Tree?

The Anima tree is part of the Royalty expansion and was added in a patch after the DLC’s initial release. The goal of this addition was to make it so that players could have access to psycasts without working their way through the ranks of the empire or acquiring psytrainers.

You do not need to do anything special to ensure there is an Anima tree on your map, just make sure you have the Royalty expansion enabled on the main splash screen by clicking the ‘Mods’ button. After doing this your you should see an Anima tree on all non-extreme biomes. 

Which pawns can use the Anima tree? / Who can grow Anima grass?

As I mentioned, the Anima tree was added to the game in order to allow for non-royal pawns to acquire psycasts. However, not every pawn has the ability to link with the tree. Only pawns with Natural meditation will be able to grow grass and link.

There are two main ways to check if a pawn has natural meditation.

First, you can go to the pawns character sheet by selecting the pawn and then clicking the ‘Bio’. On this screen hover your cursor over their childhood background. If you see ‘ Unlocks meditation focus type: – Natural’, it means that the pawn will be able to grow anima grass as well as link with the tree to gain psycasting levels. The other location which displays the types of meditation a pawn can perform is in the information pain. To get here, click the small ‘I’ just below the ‘Health’ button, then check next to ‘Meditation Focus Types’ near the top. A pawn can have more than one meditation type.

Most Tribal background pawns will have the Natural meditation background, but not all! 

How does the Anima tree work?/ How do you grow Anima grass?

The Anima tree will produce Anima grass when pawns with the Natural Meditation background meditate at a meditation spot near the tree. You will need to place a meditation spot for each natural pawn. These are located in the Architect -> Misc building section and cost no resources to place. When placing them, make sure you can see the faint white line connecting to the tree, otherwise it is not in range.

Once you have your spots places, you can assign them to each colonist with a natural background or leave unassigned and they will pick their own.

You will need to assign them some meditation time as well. It is important to note that meditation will also count as recreation. The amount of meditation time is up to you, but I generally like to place at least 3 blocks per natural pawn. It’s also generally better to clump all your meditation time together as it saves on walking time. Just note that the more total meditation time at the tree per day your colony does, the less effective each hour will be. (show in-game reduction chart).

Another important thing to remember is that ANYONE can meditate at the tree, but only those with a natural meditation focus type will actually contribute to anima grass growth. Meditation will recover psyfocus over time regardless.

Once the anima tree has grown 20 or more anima grass you will get a notification that it is ready for an anima linking ceremony. Make sure to use the Anima grass as soon as possible because the plots CAN die of old age!

You can then start the event one of two ways. Either click on the anima tree, then click ‘’Begin Anima Tree Linking’ or select the pawn you want to link to the tree and then right click on the tree.

Once in this menu just be sure that the pawn who you want to add a psycast to isin the ‘Linker’ slot, then hit ‘Begin’.

The ceremony can take some time but can be cancelled early if needed.

Once completed, the pawn who linked to the tree will increase to the next psycaster level, up to a maximum of level 6. They will also receive a random psycast from that level.

Once a pawn is at psycasting rank 6 they will no longer be able to link to the tree to gain more casts. However, you can still use psytrainers to teach them new psycasts. 

can I build next to the Anima tree?

The short answer is ‘yes’. However, building next to the Anima tree will reduce both the psyfocus gain rate and the rate of anima grass growth, but it is usually worth it.

These two reductions both cap out at -30%. Yeah, minus 30 isn’t great, but even so you will generally lose even more by having your pawns venture out far from the base to meditate.

You can even offset the psyfocus gain slightly by putting up to 4 nature shrines or anima stones within the green circle you see when the tree is selected.

Having your base right next to the anima tree also allows pawns to meditate safely. For instance, they can work on their zen vibes while packs of manhunting animals patrol just beyond the walls.

If you do decide to build next to the anima tree. Just be sure to put a ‘remove roof’ zone above the area. If you don’t do this your colonists will cut down the tree to build a roof to nearby walls automatically.

You can do this by going to the architect menu in the bottom right, then clicking zone, selecting the ‘Remove roof area; button, and dragging it across the Anima tree. 

‘Can I move the Anima Tree?

Sort of. You can cut the Anima tree down and it will later regrow in another place on your map. However, cutting down the tree will cause an Anima scream which will cause a negative 6 mood impact for 5 days.

Once you cut the tree down it will eventually grow back in a semi-random tile of unroofed soil. Contrary to popular belief as well as the rimworld wiki, it doesn’t specifically try to avoid regrowing near walls. An area with lots of walls will have a lower chance of having the tree regrow there, though, simply because more of the soil tiles are blocked.

And, of course, as the unofficial motto of RimWorld goes – ‘There’s a mod for that!’ If you are not opposed to using mods then I recommend the one that allows you to uproot and replant the anima tree. 

What happens if a royal also has natural background?

If you have a pawn who has received psycasts from the Empire from the royalty questlines who also has a natural meditation background you can have them link to the tree. This will still increase their level of psycasting to the next level and award them a random psycast from that tier. On the flip side, however, if your natural pawn already has a psycasting level the equivelant royal ceremony will not award them another psycast.  For example, the Knight or Dame ceremony generally gives rank 3 psycasting and awards a tier 3 cast. If your natural pawn already has tier 3 or higher from the tree (or neuroformers) they will not get a new spell from the royal ceremony. 

Why is my Anima tree not growing grass?

As mentioned earlier, make sure that the pawns you have assigned to meditate at the tree have the natural meditation background. In old patches, this was not required, but it is as of this video.

Also, make sure your meditation spot is close enough to the tree to connect.

Anima grass is also like any other wild plant in RimWorld, it requires a certain temperature and level of light even if the Anima tree itself does not. For instance, if you have a sunblocker on your map it will kill the anima grass unless you place a sunlamp nearby. You don’t need to keep the sunlamp on every day, though. Flipping it on for a bit every 6-7 days will keep the grass from dying.

Also be sure to zone any grazing animals away from the tree. They will eat the grass. And no, they won’t gain any psycasting levels. No muffalos with berserk pulse for you. 

Why aren’t my pawns meditating at the tree?

In addition to the things I have mentioned previous in this rimworld guide, make sure your pawns are allowed to go to the zone the anima tree is in.

Another big one, and one I have accidentally messed up before, is to ensure the Anima tree area is not also set as a bedroom or prison. Since I wall my anima tree in, I sometimes throw a temporary prison in there for some quick triage. Your pawns will NOT meditate at the tree if the room it is in is labeled as a prison. 

How do I find maps with good Anima tree locations?

There’s no specific trick to finding good Anima tree maps. I am working on a guide on how to find great map seeds, as well as some videos sharing amazing seeds. They may be out by the time you watch this video. YOu can use those to find great ANima tree maps or, as mentioned before, just use a mod to move the tree where you’’ like. 

Can the tree die to toxic fallout?

No, but it can die to a defoliator ship or mech cluster.

Speaking of toxic fallout, it is a good idea to make a small roofed area over the meditation spots during the event so that your pawns can continue meditating at the tree without risk of contamination.

I put my Anima tree in a room and the pawns think it is ugly?

Unfortunately, Anima grass is considered ugly for some reason. So if you do wall in your tree be sure to also spruce up the room. Filling the room partially with flooring is fine as the anima grass growth will travel to the other side of the tiled area without issue. You can also throw some art, statues, or even Ideology’s guaranlen trees into the room for more beauty. And, luckily, anima grass supercedes the moss from the guaranlen trees.

Conclusion

And that does it! Hopefully this rimworld guide has helped answer any questions about the Anima Tree you might have had. If I missed anything or you have any questions at all be sure to post a new comment down below the video – I do reply to all of them!

I thought about including a guide to psycasting in this video but that would have pushed it a bit long, so keep an eye out for a specific guide covering psycasting! 

If you enjoyed this Rimworld guide or it helped you at all please consider subscribing to the channel, liking the video, leaving a comment down below, and sharing it with others. If you’d like to reference a written version of this guide be sure to head over to my website at adamvseverything.com/guides. 

And, as always, thanks for watching!