White Knuckle All Creatures and Hazards Detailed Guide

A detailed guide that explains how all Creatures and Hazards work. Spoiler-friendly, unless you go to the chapters of the things you don't know about. All of the information here is things I've learnt by myself in Developer Playground or the Campaign using godmode, so I might be missing some information that could help. If there is anything that I've managed to miss, tell me and I can add it.

Introduction

Hello!

This is a guide that explains how every single living thing and danger works and its counters, in order of when you discover it. Unlike my other guides, this guide can be viewed no matter how far you've gotten in the game, because it is spoiler-friendly, unless you go to the chapters of things you don't know about. The only spoilers you'll get otherwise is the names of everything if you look at the chapters. I highly recommend beating the game and figuring out how everything works, but if you really don't want to, or you've beaten the game and want to learn more, then use this guide.

You can find my other White Knuckle guides here:
White Knuckle 100% All Achievements Guide
White Knuckle How to Enter the Developer Playground
White Knuckle All Items Detailed Guide
White Knuckle How to Use the Cheat Console
White Knuckle All Perks
White Knuckle All Logbook Unlocks
White Knuckle How to Mod the Game
White Knuckle How to Get Good at the Game
White Knuckle Best Routes For Every Room (W.I.P)

Basic Knowledge

This is some basic universal information you should know. I will update this part each time I remember something I can add.

Your main weapons are:
Hammers, Bricks, Any Rebar, and (Spoilers for the 3rd major region) the Flare Gun.
The guide goes in more detail on how to use these weapons.

There is an advanced technique you can do to kill things with hammers faster. You need both hands open. If you switch the hand your hammer is in, it resets the cooldown for the next hammer swing. So, hit your hammer, swap, hit, swap, hit, and repeat as fast as you can, and you can harm things very fast and easily.

If you are having trouble with enemies in dark areas, turn your brightness to 2. It helps a lot.

The Mass

Also known as Class-7 Fluid.

The simplest hazard in the entire game.

Just climb up. As you progress through the game, it gets faster and faster, capping at 2 meters per second. It only ever gets as fast as 2 meters per second in endless though. If you are on hard mode, it goes much faster than normal mode. Also, all of the achievements in the game that require you to die to a specific thing can be achieved if those specific things push you into it. SPOILERS FOR THE 3RD MAJOR REGION: It does not appear in Habitation Yellow, because the airlock keeps it from coming in.

The best advice that can be given for the mass is to just climb as fast as you can. If the mass is nearby, you will hear the atmosphere change a little, and you will hear liquid sounds. If you slip, and are about to fall into the mass, ready your hands and pray, or do something more effective. A simple way to save yourself if you're falling, is to throw a Rebar under you. If you throw Rebar under you, you get pushed upwards, and have more time to react to see if there's something you can grab, or if you can use another item to survive.

There are break-rooms in the game, and it doesn't move at those spots. It also doesn't move in Interlude Lockdown.

In hard mode, it moves much faster.



That's all there is to know about The Mass.
Don't scroll any further if you don't want to spoil yourself, there is another hazard below. [/b]

Doors

A closed door.

The worst way to die in the entire game.

Exclusively in Silos, whenever you leave a room, the door to it closes behind you. When you go above the door, it will start to close. If the door closes on you, you die... You get the "Crushed Embarassingly" death message if you die to a door. Be careful when leaving Silos rooms, because if you accidentally trigger the door, you have to make it up there QUICK because you don't want to be locked out in the room below and die. This is an incredibly simple hazard. Just be careful leaving Silos rooms.



That's it for doors.

Fall Damage

im fallign

Not dangerous at all.

There really aren't any places where you can actually die to fall damage. You can die to it on purpose pretty easily in very specific places, but other than that you shouldn't worry about it.

While you're falling, you take bits of damage the longer you fall and when you touch the ground you get a heap of damage. If you double jump, grab onto something, rebar boost, or do anything else that stops you from falling, you get that heap of damage immediately. There isn't much to say about Fall Damage, it technically isn't even just a hazard.



That's it for fall damage.

Barnacle

A spot infested with Barnacles.

"Tip: Don't get eaten."

The Barnacle is one of the more common threats in Substructure 17. They all look the same also. They make weird wet sounds, so you'll always know if one is nearby. They always stay stuck in one spot, and frequently move tentacles out. If you hit the tentacle with a hammer, or a brick, the tentacle will go away. If you drag a physics object into a tentacle, the Barnacle will pull it in and eat it. If you walk into the tentacle, you will be slowly pulled towards the Barnacle. Even if the tentacle is attached to you, hit it with a hammer or brick and it'll detach. If you move far away from the Barnacle, it detaches, so you can save yourself even in an item-less run.
These are the ways to kill a Barnacle.
Hammer: 5 hits.
Brick: 2 hits.
Any Rebar: 1 hit.
Spoiler for 3rd major region: Flare gun: 1 hit.

Now that you know the ways to kill it, you should know that killing it just wastes potential on easier travel. You can grab onto it's tentacles to climb, you can grab onto the Barnacle itself, dead or not, if you're holding the tentacle while you break it, you can slingshot yourself, and basically you should focus on using the Barnacle for climbing. The Barnacle is not a hazard, it is a tool.
Also, if you die to the Barnacle you can get an achievement.

There's an advanced technique you can do once you get used to Barnacles.
Let a Barnacle attach it's tentacle onto you.
Since you can climb onto the tentacles, you can grab the tentacle while its on you, jump, and repeat. Just aim at the tentacle, hold left click or right click and spam jump. You can literally fly using a Barnacle. When you're done, hammer it off of you. This technique is better for vertical movement like if you're in Air Exchange, because the Barnacle still tries pulling you if its tentacle is on you, so you can't really move horizontally when doing this.

Another thing that Barnacles can help you with is keeping you safe from fans in Air Exchange. Especially the room with the side-pulling fan or if you have p-binding, Barnacles can be a great help in pulling you away from the fan.

In hard mode, the Barnacles have aimbot. Be careful near them, and have your hammer ready to get the tentacles off of you.



That's it for the Barnacle.

Fans

A fan.

Remove Air Exchange.

Fans are simple hazards found exclusively in Silos Air Exchange. If you touch them at all, you die IMMEDIATELY and get the Hair Cut achievement. Certain rooms in Air Exchange have the fans power on and off. Keep in mind that the on and off powering is not realistic. The moment the fan turns on, if you're touching it you'll die, and the moment the fan turns off, you can touch it and you'll be safe. Some rooms require you to wait for the fan to turn off, some rooms require you to press a button. You'll figure it out, this isn't a complicated hazard to work around.

There aren't many places where this happens, but if you touch a fan with your lower body instead of your head then you won't get killed. You will just bounce off and take a lot of damage.



That's it for the fans.

Crusher

2 crushers in Shattered Chambers.

Wait for 6000 years to get a prize!!!!!

This is a very simple hazard. They crush and go back at the same times in a loop. You also hear a sort of whistling sound right before they crush. It's less of a whistle and more of a balloon losing air. Almost every situation you can skip these, but if you don't want to skip them, just wait for them to crush and go as fast as you can. You can also climb on the crushers themselves, but be careful doing that. It's very risky.



That's all there is to know about the crushers.

Contamination

Also known as Acid.

A rather unhealthy liquid.

You can find this hazard in Silos Shattered Chambers. It looks like pink goop. It disintegrates props and you. If anything is touching it, every second a loud liquid sound plays and it takes damage. Any prop that gets thrown in it requires as many hits as it does with a hammer to disintegrate, and it takes you 6 hits to disintegrate. The death message for this hazard says contaminated.



That's it for contamination.

Bloodbug

A Bloodbug resting on the wall.

One of the most annoying enemies in the game.

The Bloodbug can appear in Silos, but it appears much more commonly in the second major region, Pipeworks.
The Bloodbug will wander around, making a flying sound, sometimes resting, until it notices you. When it notices you, it will fly around you, and occasionally make a whistle sound, which means its about to charge into you. When it charges into you, you get bumped, knocking you off of anything you're holding, and hurting you slightly. This can be incredibly dangerous. I recommend just avoiding them entirely. However, if you want to fight them, this is what can kill them.
Hammer: 3 hits.
Brick: 1 hit.
Any Rebar: 1 hit. You can pierce through multiple Bloodbugs with one Rebar too.
Spoilers for the 3rd major region: Flare gun: 1 hit.

If you don't have time to kill it, you can easily make it lose track of you by running away far enough. You can also get rid of Bloodbugs using the environment. By that I mean things like closing Silos doors, other Bloodbugs, and more. Also, you can get an achievement by dying to the Bloodbug. It's near impossible to die to the damage the Bloodbug does, so if the Bloodbug hits you and you fall into The Mass right after, then you get the achievement.

There is an advanced technique you can do once you're familiar with Bloodbugs. This requires some practice, but it is very helpful. If you stand on a Bloodbug, you can use it as an elevator to go up. You will have to move around a tiny bit to match its random movements, but you can skip entire levels in waste heap in only a few seconds by doing this. This is much harder than using a Barnacle to your advantage though.

In hard mode, Bloodbugs are much more stubborn and aggressive, and also do a lot more damage. Be careful around them, because you could just get beat up by a Bloodbug.



That's it for the Bloodbug.

Explosives

woah

A mostly harmless threat.

The only source of explosives in this game is using the explosive rebar, and touching the rare red roach. The explosive rebar is incredibly helpful because you can rocket jump with it, but it does take some damage. If you're spamming explosive rebar right at you, it takes 6 explosive rebar hits. It's hard to even have this many explosive rebars in the first place, let alone be able to find a spot where you can use 6 fast enough to kill you.

The red roaches can be more dangerous though. They are extremely rare. If you have the Pheromone Glands perk, they only explode if you grab them. Anyways, if you touch a red roach, it explodes, but it is MUCH weaker than an explosive rebar. The red roach is just annoying. It takes 3 red roaches at once to die to it.



That's it for explosives.

Strider

Henry walking around. His name is Henry.

A completely harmless and helpful creature.

The Strider can not kill or be killed. It does nothing but walk around, no matter what. If you repeatedly click anywhere that isn't its legs, you get an achievement for petting it, it makes a silly sound, and your screen vibrates a little. You can climb absolutely anywhere on its body, except the short little dinosaur claws. Those don't have collision for some reason. Getting on a Strider is risky, because Bloodbugs are always around Striders for some reason.



There isn't much to know about the Strider. So yeah, that's it.

Gasbag

A gasbag wandering around.

A helpful boost into the air.

The gasbags can be found around the second major region in the game, Pipeworks. (I will no longer be spoilering this term further in the guide)
The gasbags fly around slowly. If you are near them, they will very slowly fly towards you. If you touch the gasbag, it explodes and hurts you a little. However, if you jump on top of them and they explode, you get a major boost up into the air, and you get the Combustion Architect achievement. If you jump more towards the center you get a higher boost.
If you're not able to get a vertical boost and they're coming towards you:
Hammer: 3 hits.
Brick: 1 hit.
Any Rebar: 1 hit. You can pierce through multiple Gasbags with one Rebar too.
Spoilers for the 3rd major region: Flare gun: 1 hit.

As you can see, they require the same amount of hits per killing method as the Bloodbug does. Although, it's usually not worth it to kill them, because its not that hard to jump on top of them. Something interesting to know, is if you of damage to a gasbag, it says "Turned into a fine mist."



That's basically it for the gasbag.

Steam

Steam blowing.

The most annoying non-creature in the entire game.

The steam only appears in Pipeworks - Pipe Organ, and it is very annoying. If you get blown by steam too much, you get boiled alive and die. If you get blown by steam at all, you also get flung away, which can make you fall in the mass easily if you're not prepared to grab onto something. Basically, you just have to wait. I've heard from people in the discord that the steam is actually coded to be as inconvenient as possible. Even if that's untrue, it's good to keep the mindset that it is true. Honestly, the only counter to this, is to just wait. Also, if you get boiled alive or get pushed into the mass by steam, you get the achievement called A New Hatred.

There is an advanced technique you can do with steam. If there is steam that blows upwards, you can use that to boost yourself to places very easily.



That's it for the steam.

Elevator Cable

Yeowch

If you die to this I think you should stop playing

The cable that the crane uses to hold the elevator in Interlude Ascent hurts you if you touch it. If you grab onto it, your hands immediately retract and you lose some stamina and some health. If you click it as fast as you can you can die to it. There is no special death message to dying to this. There isn't much to say about this hazard. Just don't touch it.



That's it for the elevator cable.

Teeth

Teeth while stunned in fullbright mode.

The scariest enemy in the game.

Teeth is exclusive to the Service Shaft in Habitation Yellow. Your goal is to escape the service shaft while being constantly chased by Teeth. When Teeth is close enough, he starts whacking you. After he hits you 6 times, you die. It's impossible to lose track of Teeth, because he makes a lot of loud sounds and audio cues, and when he hides in the wall, it takes a while for him to come back out, so you don't need quick reaction time. A lot of people are very scared by Teeth. They think the only way to survive Teeth is to hide and use the flare gun, and if it runs out, they have to climb faster than they ever have before. That's not the truth.

Hammer: Stunned in... a LOT of hits.
Brick: Stunned in 1 hit.
Any Rebar: Stunned in 1 hit.
Flare Gun: Stunned if anywhere near the light.

When Teeth is stunned, not only do they get stunned for a while, but they run away, or hide in the wall. While stunned, he also can't hit you at all. So if you're getting beat up, whip out a weapon and hit Teeth and you'll be safe. Also, Teeth doesn't just chase you constantly. He has to know where you are first. If you're not in his line of sight, you can be stealthy and escape him. You can literally do the entirety of Service Shaft without being seen. Also, dying to Teeth gives you the Devoured achievement.

When he is coming out of the wall, he is not looking at you so you can hide. The only way he knows where you are is if you are in his line of sight. While he is coming out of the wall, you have a handful of seconds to hide. If he does not see you he makes a sad whale sound but if he sees you he starts screaming. You can do Service Shaft without being seen with this knowledge. Speaking of the wall, he can only come out of very obvious burrows that all look the same. He can't just come out of the wall anywhere else. You can identify these burrows by pressing F5 twice and if something says "AI_Burrow" then that's a burrow. Or you can just look at it. Not hard to miss.

I don't recommend doing this in any situation, but if you really want to, you can jump to the bottom to be safe. There is an invisible wall in a part of the Service Shaft, and Teeth cannot go below it. The invisible wall is actually obscenely high, much higher than you'd expect.

In hard mode, Teeth is much faster, and kills you in only 3 hits.



That's it for Teeth.

Turret

Two turrets and their de-activator computer thingy.

A complicated hazard.

Turrets are scattered all throughout Delta Labs, and Silos if you're in Hard Mode. You might think that the turrets red line of sight thingy is where they are looking. This is only visual, not functional. The turrets see in a 45 degree area of sight, and the red line thingies only show you what that area is. No matter where they are looking, if you get in their 45 degree area of sight they will start shooting after they make 3 very short staccato'd beeps. If you leave their area of sight, they make a sort of sad tech robot whimper sound? While the turrets are shooting, they have bad aim, unless you are close up. They do a lot of damage, so avoid being close up in their line of sight. If you get shoot, you also fall off of anything you're holding. You might be thinking, how am I supposed to counter this?

Hammer: Quickly falls down.
Brick: Quickly falls down.
Any Rebar: Quickly falls down.
Flare Gun: Quickly falls down.
Your hands: Kills it if head is too close to the ground.

These are the ways to kill the turrets. When they die, they fall over, make a few revenge panic shots, and deactivate forever. But these ways require you be close range, or not be midair, which is pretty hard in the ventilation area of Delta Labs. In the ventilation area, you can use the computer terminal thingy to deactivate all the turrets permanently forever. But the most useful thing in ventilation, is this:

Every once in a while, you will hear a sort of "warning" sound is played and constantly repeating. When this repeats the 6th time, a thud sound happens, and all the turrets turn on. After 10 seconds, the turrets turn off, and so do the lights. after 7 seconds from there, the warning happens again, and 3 seconds after it starts, the turrets turn back on and so do the lights. It's a loop of every 10 seconds the turrets turn on and off, and there's 6 warning sounds before they turn back on.

When the turrets are on, you can hear idle tech sounds. When the turrets turn off, there is no repeating warning sound, but there is a thud that is also drowned out by a sort of static sound coming from the turrets turning off. Again, you can use if the lights are on or off as an indicator.

In hard mode, turrets spawn more frequently and are more powerful.



That's it for the turrets.

High Security Lasers

Uhm guys

A slow temporary mass.

In the blue low gravity room in Delta Labs, and if you're in hard mode, the room with the spinning thing in the center with handholds in Delta Labs, there will be lasers coming up if you go too high. It is very loud and slow, and it really isn't that dangerous. The main danger of this is your panic. Use cheats and study the rooms these lasers are in to find a reliable route, and you'll be good to go. If you touch the laser you will instantly die, and in the room it's in it expands infinitely, touching every corner of the room so the only way is up. It does stop right before it gets to the part with the door though. It never stops making sound when it stops though.



That's it for the lasers.

Vent Thing

Being grabbed by the Vent Thing.

Watch your back...

Vent Thing is actually as simple as Teeth. A Vent Thing is a hand, a White Knuckle if you will, connected to its home with a red string. There are two Vent Things, and their home is some weird mouth on the wall. The Vent Things CONSTANTLY make a very audible sound, and if they are close by, it gets much louder.
There are 3 counters to the Vent Thing:
Your eyes
Your hands
Your hammer
If you look at a wandering Vent Thing, they run away FAST. Knowing they immediately skedaddle if you look at them, and knowing that they make very loud idle sounds should already make it pretty easy. However, if a Vent Thing manages to grab you, ready your hands and hopefully you grab on something. They pull you very fast. If you're safely grabbed onto something, there are two things to do from here. Wait for it to lose stamina, which is indicated by its hand turning red, or hammer the red string. Both give the same results. It is a bit hard to hammer the red string, because when grabbed, your camera is moving all crazy. If you didn't grab something safe in time and you get to a point where you're in the vents and there is only breakable handholds to hold onto and the hand isn't close to losing stamina, you're gonna have to hammer the red string, or you're done. You also get the achievement called The Thing In The Walls if you die to the Vent Thing.

It can be pretty hard to know where to go in the vents of Delta Labs. Thankfully, the Vent Thing leaves a trail of blood and... mold...? on the path to it's home. In 99.9% of situations, don't go in the pathway of blood, and also try not to go downwards either.

In hard mode, the Vent Thing moves incredibly fast and does not stop moving, and makes it incredibly hard to hold on and wait for its stamina to run out. Food is helpful for the Vent Thing in hard mode.



That's it for Vent Thing.



Actually... that's all the hazards already...
Now you know how to counter everything.
If you have any questions, ask me in the comments.

[Sussy Joe Biden]

I don't know if others have encountered one, but there's a red version of the roach that explodes when you step over it. It just happened to me. I though it was a super rare and valuable roach lol.

[Joseph]

i thought i had to get to the mouth first time i got to the vent thing

[skaianDestiny]

I've seen the Mass in Hab Y but only after I took a really long time climbing through the elevator shaft. It made my climb through Haunted Pier way more harrowing.

[NegativeZero]

Okay yeah, just checked in noclip/cheats. It moves up to the first door (likely to stop softlocks there) then stops. My sincere apologies.

[Qwergin]

Nope, it doesn't move at all.

[NegativeZero]

Something to note, the mass is still a threat in hab Y, it just moves VERY slowly. basically not a threat, but still of note.
You can find this if you drop onto the first door in Interlude ascent, once the elevator is about halfway up the brief tunnel.

[NegativeZero]

Okay, thanks!

[Qwergin]

The announcements indicate nothing helpful. In interludes and a couple of other places, the announcements say scripted guaranteed things that appear in red text in the subtitles, but everything else is just there to scare you. And even the scripted announcements don't indicate any new threats.

[NegativeZero]

Sometimes the PA speaker announces something like "you are not alone" or "It is coming" things like that, then I hear a low, loud moaning. Is this actually a threat or just the horror aspect of the game?

[xXmomdestroyerXx]

I've only gotten to the Abyss once and every time I get to vents I die to the turrets </3