Institution: Core — Wiki
The shared foundation of the Institution suite: a set of RimWorld 1.6 mods about what an institution does to the people inside it, and the crime, policing, and justice that put them there.
Core is the engine every other Institution mod runs on. On its own it changes nothing you can see — no items, no jobs, no new menus. It sits completely quiet until another Institution mod is installed on top of it. You install Core only because something else asks for it.
This wiki explains what that hidden engine actually does once a mod above it puts it to work — down to the exact numbers, because knowing how the numbers move is half the fun of running a prison.
The one idea
Every pawn has a criminal propensity on a spectrum — nature (traits) × nurture (circumstance, mood, treatment) — and the colony can police it.
That single sentence is the whole suite. Colonists, prisoners, and slaves drift toward crime on a continuous spectrum; a policing and justice layer discovers, catches, punishes, reforms, or paroles them. Core is where the spectrum itself lives — before anyone is caught, before there is a record to read, before there is a warden to search them.
Why a shared engine
The propensity idea didn't start out abstract. It grew up twice, in two different mods: one deciding which drunk, miserable pawn starts a mess, and one deciding which prisoner whittles a shiv the moment a door opens. Both were asking the same real question — would this pawn do it? — and each answered it its own way, which meant they could disagree about who was dangerous.
Core exists so they stop disagreeing. When the contraband system, the justice system, and the gang system all read one disposition engine, they agree about who is dangerous instead of each judging it separately and drifting apart. The pawn who is "the scary one" is the scary one to every part of the suite at once. That coherence — not any single number — is the point of a shared foundation.
Core carries exactly the three things every Institution mod needs and none should own alone, and nothing else:
| Pillar | Answers | Page |
|---|---|---|
| Propensity | Would this pawn do it? (nature × nurture) | Propensity |
| Criminal record | What has this pawn actually done? (one history per pawn) | Criminal Record |
| Secured context | What kind of hold is this pawn under, and who may search them? | Secured Context |
The distinction between the first two is the spine of the whole design: propensity is suspicion, a record is fact. Propensity says "this pawn seems dangerous"; a record says "this pawn has escaped twice and shanked a guard." Keeping them separate is what lets the colony act on evidence instead of on vibes.
The pages of this wiki
- Propensity — nature × nurture in full: the trait-weight table, the nurture multiplier ladder, the disposition formula with worked examples, and why each pawn's roll is fixed rather than re-rolled.
- Criminal Record — everything a record remembers, who fills in each part, how it persists across saves, and why reform is the pivot of the whole suite.
- Secured Context — the Free / Prisoner / Slave kinds, what counts as "held" versus what counts as "able to hide something," and why the suite keys off this instead of "is a prisoner."
- Treatment Engine — the shared rehabilitation maths: mark a condition treatable, reduce it a little each session by skill and facility quality, and build a recovery track toward discharge. Ward's psychiatric care and Justice's reform run on this one engine.
- Modder API — the "for modders" page: the tools any mod can call to build on Core. Players can skip it.
The suite
Each mod stands alone as an install; together they form one system. Core sits underneath everything else.
| Mod | What it adds | Needs |
|---|---|---|
| Institution: Core (this) | the propensity / record / context engine | base game only |
| Institution: Contraband | concealment, improvised shivs, tunnels, warden search, warden corruption | Core |
| Institution: Justice | classification, deterrence, discipline, parole, regime, and policing (colony crime → weighed arrest) | Core, Harmony |
| Institution: Gangs | gangs as contraband economies: joining, smuggling, rivalry, fights-as-crime | Core, Contraband, Justice |
| Institution: Ward | psychiatric care — a prisoner treated, not punished, on Core's treatment engine | Core, Harmony |
| Foul Play | the vessel + substance + throw framework, home of the "Piss Nuke" | standalone; bridges to Core + Contraband |
Requirements & load order
- RimWorld 1.6. Core needs only the base game — no Harmony, no DLC, no other mod.
- Load Core before any other Institution mod in your mod list.
Part of the Institution suite.