Once Human: the Deviant companion guide — capturing them, managing their mood, and the best ones by use (July 2026)

In Once Human, what stands out first is the shooting, base-building, and exploration of a world ravaged by Stardust. But the system that truly separates a beginner survivor from an efficient veteran is that of the Anomalies: those mutated creatures that you capture, tame, and put to work. In the English version, the word "Anomalies" refers both to the capturable companions and to the hostile sites where you find them. This guide, up to date as of July 2026, sets aside Mementics to focus on the pillar that is too often overlooked: how to catch your Anomalies, manage their mood, level them up, and above all choose the right one for each purpose.

Anomalies: both companions and hostile sites

Before capturing anything, you need to understand the dual nature of the term. An Anomaly is an entity born from contamination by Stardust — a floating cube, a glowing butterfly, an electric beast. On the map, "Anomaly sites" are points of interest marked with a distinctive icon: that's where the creature resides, often guarded by a mechanism or a small trial. Once captured, that same Anomaly becomes a companion that you carry in your dedicated inventory, deploy in combat, or install on your territory. This duality explains why the official English terminology keeps a single word: the original Chinese source (异常) makes exactly the same choice.

Specifically, each Anomaly has an active effect (what it does when deployed) and usage conditions. Some only work outdoors, in close proximity to you; others require being placed on a base installation. Reading an Anomaly's info sheet carefully before capturing it avoids unpleasant surprises.

Combat or Territory: the two main families

All Anomalies fall into one of two families, and this is the most important distinction to remember.

• Combat Anomalies: they follow you in the field and trigger during action. Area healing, automatic fire on enemies, damage aura, temporary shield… You can only deploy one at a time, which makes this choice a genuine build decision, on par with your main weapon.
• Territory Anomalies: they don't move and work within your base. Resource production, watering crops, repairing equipment, purifying water, passive defense. These are the ones that turn a base into a resource factory while you're offline or off exploring.

An optimized survivor constantly juggles both: an active Combat Anomaly in the slot designed for it, and a roster of Territory Anomalies spread across the workstations of their camp.

Where and how to capture an Anomaly

Capturing one almost always follows the same ritual, and understanding it will save you precious time.

1. Locate the site. Anomaly sites appear on the map as you explore, but also from chests, mini-dungeons (Silos, Monoliths), and certain world events. Rare large Anomalies often come from bosses or end-of-zone activities.
2. Solve the trial. Most sites impose a mini-challenge: protecting an energy beam for a few seconds, surviving waves of enemies, or destroying anchors that "lock" the Anomaly. Until the trial is completed, capture is impossible.
3. Contain the creature. Once the Anomaly is weakened or freed, a capture prompt appears. It then joins your Anomaly storage. No consumable resource is needed for basic capture: completing the trial is all that matters.

Good to know: an Anomaly you already own that you recapture generally grants upgrade fragments rather than a useless duplicate. It's therefore worthwhile to revisit Anomaly sites you want to power up.

One last field tip: never neglect vertical exploration and interiors. Many quality Anomalies hide in bunkers, abandoned labs, or atop structures that players walk past without a second glance. Keep an eye on your compass and on unclaimed Anomaly icons: a "map-clearing" session focused on these points often pays off more, per hour of play, than a long side quest. Playing in a group also significantly speeds up capture trials, since protecting a beam or surviving waves becomes trivial with more people.

The mood gauge: managing your Anomalies' Sanity

Here's the mechanic most beginners overlook, and it explains why their companion "stops working." Every deployed Anomaly has a mood gauge — Sanity in the original version. The longer it stays active in the field, the more this gauge decreases. Below a certain threshold, the Anomaly becomes less effective, refuses to activate, or even becomes dangerously agitated.

The solution is simple: rotate your Anomalies. Don't keep the same combat companion deployed continuously for hours. Regularly put it back in its storage facility, where its gauge replenishes on its own over time. Think of it like resting a working animal: a rested Anomaly performs far better than one that's at the end of its rope. For territory Anomalies, the logic is the same: a creature stationed at a post eventually becomes saturated and must be relieved or retrieved before it returns to full output.

The Deviation Repository and leveling up

The heart of Anomaly management revolves around the Deviation Repository, the base facility that centralizes your Anomalies. This is where they recover their mood gauge, where you store them, and where you prepare the ones you want to bring along. Building and upgrading this structure early in a season is a very worthwhile investment.

In terms of power, Anomalies come in increasing rarity grades. The same creature often exists at several tiers, with stronger effects and shorter cooldowns at higher grades. Leveling up an Anomaly requires collecting duplicates and fragments from its home sites. The golden rule: it's better to focus your resources on two or three well-built, versatile Anomalies rather than spreading a half-collection thin at the minimum grade. At the start of the season, prioritize your production Anomaly and your healing Anomaly; the rest will follow.

The best Anomalies by use

Rather than a single ranking, think in terms of need. Here are the key roles and the type of Anomaly to aim for in each case. The names given are those, widely documented by the community, of the most reliable creatures in their category; the English interface may display them under different names.

This table reads like a roadmap: cover production and healing first, then add a reliable damage source, and finally the quality-of-life Anomalies (farming, maintenance) that ease your day-to-day micro-management.

Also keep the notion of synergy in mind: two complementary territory Anomalies — one that produces, the other that speeds up harvesting — are often worth much more than two redundant combat Anomalies. The best roster isn't the one that lines up the highest rarities, but the one that covers the most needs with the least management time.

The Gulping Loot Cube, star of passive production

If there's only one Anomaly to remember, it's this one. The Gulping Loot Cube is a voracious cube: you feed it certain items, and it "digests" them to return resources to you, sometimes more valuable than what you supplied. Installed in your territory, it works while you play or even offline, turning your base into a small passive income machine.

A few tips for making the most of it: keep it fed at all times, don't let it become saturated, and keep an eye on its mood gauge just like with any territory Anomaly. Combined with well-planned storage, the Cube keeps feeding your crafting in a loop without you having to manually farm basic materials. This is exactly the kind of automation that makes Once Human addictive over the long run.

Adapting your Anomalies to the current scenario

A common mistake is dragging the same roster of Anomalies from one scenario to another. But Once Human structures its progression by seasons and modes, and each one slightly reshuffles your priorities. In Manibus, the entry-point narrative scenario, the focus is on exploration and power growth: prioritize a production Anomaly early on so you never run short on materials, paired with a healing Anomaly to withstand the early bosses. In Way of Winter, where cold and cryogenics dictate survival, temperature management comes first: keep a defensive combat Anomaly on hand and design your base around heat as much as production.

On the PvP side, things change again. The historical scenarios Evolution's Call and Prismverse Clash, as well as the RaidZone mode with its three tiers (Casual, Standard, Hardcore), favor combat Anomalies capable of turning the tide of a fight: instant healing, damage auras, area control. In RaidZone Hardcore especially, a well-leveled healing Anomaly can be the difference between a successful extraction and a lost round. So get into the habit of building an Anomaly "loadout" per scenario, just as you adjust your weapon and your Mimeographs.

Integrating your Anomalies into an efficient base

A good base isn't just defensive or aesthetic: it's designed around its Anomalies. Place the Deviation Repository at the heart of your camp, within reach of your workstations. Group your production Anomalies near the chests they supply, to avoid endless back-and-forth trips. Set aside a clear space to quickly deploy and stow your combat Anomaly between outings.

• Prioritize quick access to the Repository: it's the installation you'll open most often.
• Don't overload a single territory Anomaly; spread the workload.
• Adapt your roster to the current scenario — Manibus, Way of Winter, RaidZone: each mode rewards different Anomalies.
• Always keep a healing Anomaly ready before heading to a dangerous site or a boss.

Conclusion: where to start tonight

If you're jumping back into Once Human in July 2026, make this your project for the week: build and upgrade your Deviation Repository, prioritize capturing a production Anomaly (a Gulping Loot Cube will work wonders) and a healing Anomaly, then round things out with a source of damage. Keep an eye on the mood gauge, rotate your companions instead of running them into the ground, and focus your upgrade fragments on two or three key pieces. Properly managed, your Anomalies go from being a mere gadget to becoming the true backbone of your survival.