How to Beat Active Matter Anomalies

Anomalies are why Active Matter is not a mil-sim with a fog filter. Distorted sleep in the grass. Flowermen wait in poppies. Gravity lets you run the ceiling of a Shegolskoe house that is no longer attached to the ground. Learn the roster before you take expensive plates into Overgrowth. This page is the bestiary. Extraction rules live in how to extract. Map modifiers live in raid types.

Distorted, Hunter, Hellhounds, Invisibles

Distorted are the basic melee swarm. From a distance a sleeper looks like a rag pile. They wake to gunshots and footsteps, cough out a nasty audio cue, then close with short teleports (about seven meters, not through walls). They chase the operative who woke them. A suppressed pistol to the sleeping head is free. A rock (default X) peels one off a pile. Melee works if you own the timing; a panicked unsuppressed rifle turns one sleeper into six. Loot is jacket-tier small items plus Chronogenes.

Hunter is the Distorted that learned echolocation. The pulse now tags one nearby operative through walls — including a teammate — out to about a hundred meters, instead of painting the whole lobby. If you hear the Hunter ping, assume someone can see a silhouette and stop standing in doorways.

Hellhounds pack. Vertical warp-cuts about a person and a half tall advertise the nest. They are low HP, low damage, high annoyance: they bite, they path through your legs, they wake everything else. Melee one-taps are normal. Keep walking away from the portal they spawn from while you cut them down. Fire and shotguns also work. Do not empty a rifle mag into a pack you can kick.

Invisibles are almost gone from the visible spectrum. Motion throws a delayed particle; standing still is a shimmer you will miss. They are loud when they run, slim, and they prefer your back. Water drops the chase. They appear faster on idle looters and less often on people who keep moving and shooting. They will not head-click a shocked or downed target. Buckshot and tracked melee beat spraying. If you are looting a house, clear corners with the flashlight (V) and do not ADS a window for thirty seconds.

Video guide

Flowermen, Dendroids, Scorch, Shy Girl

Flowermen camouflage in nests of bright plants. Walking the poppies, shooting the wrong bush, or harvesting active matter inside the thicket wakes the group. They strike, break, and re-enter. They rarely roam far from the nest. A human corpse next to a nest can become a new Flowerman. Fire is the counter: flamethrowers, incendiary grenades, Molotovs. African and American variants split by biome after Downtown landed, each with their own lure-bushes, roots, and Alpha minibosses. Park on Dalniy Island is the green tutorial. Downtown’s American set lives in Downtown. Airport’s African set hits harder than new players expect.

Alpha Flowerman is the slow, oversized nest boss. Regular Flowermen bodyguard it. The nest holds ugly amounts of active matter and enriched-signal loot. Alphas can reach rooftop snipers. Do not solo one with a pistol and a dream. Squad it, burn the adds, then dump rifles into the big one.

Dendroids idle on the ground like discarded coats, then beeline with melee tools or the occasional shotgun. Unique footsteps help if you listen. They are extra weak to fire and will turn and flee when they burn. Do not wait for a shock state — that was removed. If a Dendroid is in a doorway with a gun, treat it like a Turned Soldier, not like a Distorted.

Scorch is the fire-and- Distorted hybrid. It lies down, so you see it late. Up close the torso glows orange from the inside. It telegraphs a fireball charge; that charge window is when you dump a magazine or a full shotgun. After the projectile is out, it is vulnerable until the attack returns. New audio makes them easier to hear than they are to see. Do not stand in their leftover fire.

Shy Girl is an audio-first hunter with a reality-smear across the silhouette. She is on Dam’s anomaly list and on the Shelter range after you collect the note. Do not tunnel-vision her face in a corridor. Break line of sight, fight from cover, and do not let her pin you against a gravity drop. If a raid icon lists her and you brought only a shotgun, play wider rooms.

Mimics, Mimic Car, Poltergeist, Turned Soldiers, police

Mimics are tendril clusters that run walls and ceilings and hide in objects of similar size. They look like black smoke until the tendrils harden orange-red for a strike. They dance out of your cone and hit from the side. Fragile: one or two melee swings or a burst ends a single Mimic. Swarms are the problem, especially on Distortion. Alpha Mimics explode on death and take furniture with them. Back up before the pop.

Mimic Car is the vehicle-scale version. It inhabits cars, throws light, and shows on Distortion tiles such as Shegolskoe. Shoot the windshield, keep off the hood, and do not stand next to the gas tank of a car that is breathing. It is a boss, not a loot crate with wheels.

Poltergeist is the noise engine. It rattles unlocked doors and wakes other monsters on purpose. You will fight the Distorted it hired before you fight it. Close doors, do not leave a trail of open interiors, and track audio that has no footsteps.

Turned Soldiers kept the last order. They hold POIs, patrol, use cover, and shoot at range with old but live guns. They will fire at other anomalies. They can flee now, which is new and easy to misread as a reset. They rarely work alone. Headquarters on Dalniy is their home. Treat a Turned with an SKS as a player-shaped problem.

Police and SWAT patrol Downtown. They are not Distorted. They are armed, grouped, and they still think they own the avenue. You can use them as accidental cover against a Flowerman nest. You can also eat a rifle from a school bus you did not clear.

Gravity, Ball Lightning, fire, and Specimen Capture

Gravity surfaces are the friendly anomaly. Walk walls and ceilings, cross inverted lots, and peek a room from the plaster. Shegolskoe hangs houses in the air. Gigastructure is a shifting stairwell maze. Use ceiling routes to skip doorways that Distorted own. Robot Dogs hate this geometry — do not assume the mule follows you onto a roof.

Gravity traps are the unfriendly cousin: a meter of warped ground, black specks, a wub you hear too late. They launch you sideways and stagger. Throw a rock or a bolt (default X) to pop them. Shooting works and wastes ammo. Other monsters can trigger them, so a flash in the grass is not always a player.

Ball Lightning patrols, bobbles, and investigates noise. Collision with you or another anomaly detonates it: fences gone, cars flipped, Flowermen woke, legs often ruined. Spawn distance is tens of meters from you, not on your nose. Shoot from range with something that actually hits a moving sphere; a shotgun is honest, a Mosin is a joke. It trails discharge now. Do not melee it.

Fireballs circle scorched ground and fire-spout patches. They detonate into a fire burst on death. Fire patches themselves are environmental: loud, stationary, and happy to cook a sprint. Dendroids and Flowermen hate fire. You also hate fire if you are standing in it to prove a point.

Specimen Capture and Anomaly Capture contracts issue dedicated traps for Hellhounds, Invisibles, Distorted, Flowermen, Ball Lightning, and Fireballs. Pack the trap, fight the thing into a state the trap accepts, and leave with the cage. That is a loot-and-extract objective wearing a zoo hat. It is not a reason to fistfight an Alpha in a burning greenhouse.

Pack fire for Overgrowth, a suppressor for Distorted tiles, and a plan for gravity on Shegolskoe. Then leave. The bestiary is not a completion list; it is a filter for which raid you queue. New operatives should still finish the beginner guide before hunting Alphas. The rock bind that pops gravity traps is on controls. For kits that survive the filter, use the loadout guide and weapon tier list.