Reaper

Reaper in-game.

The Reaper is one of the four types of support aliens. In missions with their participation, they will not be as numerous as the main alien species. Usually reapers accompany sebelians, but in rare cases it is possible to being with other species. They appear in the middle of the game, and continue to encounter until the end of the game, including the last mission. The features of the reapers are that they attack only in close combat with deadly attacks that make zombies from those they kill.

In-Game

Reapers are fast-moving creatures that use melee-based attacks only, they are capable of moving extremely long distances and their attacks are capable of killing virtually any soldier in a single swipe. Reapers are intelligent as they will do anything they can to avoid ending their turns within range of a human target, meaning they will often hide in areas and wait for an opportunity to strike, making urban combat situations against Reapers extremely difficult.

Anyone, civilian or soldier, that is killed by a Reaper will eventually become a zombie. If the zombie is killed or left alive long enough, it will give birth to a reaper. This allows the reapers to increase their population right on the battlefield. This feature makes the Reapers a truly terrifying unit, inspiring fear even for experienced players.

Tactics against reapers

There are several important things to consider in the fight against the reapers.

First, you need to carefully move around the map - a reaper suddenly running out from around the corner is a deadly danger. Therefore, the most important doctrine in the fight against reapers should be to keep as much distance as possible from places where reapers can potentially hide. Do not rush into the fog of war. Go around all corners at a long distance. Try to cover your scouts with other soldiers. Stay away from buildings where reapers may be hiding. A good solution may be the deliberate destruction of buildings in which reapers can hide, but at the same time buildings can act as barriers, separating your soldiers from the reapers, not allowing for rapid movement and attack, so make this decision depending on the tactical situation. In a later game, you can use jetpacks to rise above the ground, where you will become completely inaccessible to reaper attacks. Also, if you are very pragmatic or desperate, you can kill potential victims of the reapers by yourself to prevent the appearance of zombies.

Secondly, usage of explosives against the reapers is a very good solution- the bodies of the reapers are of no value, and therefore they can be safely blown up using a rocket launcher, grenades, etc. It can also cause a fire, which can block the reaper's path to your soldiers.

In the third - use the vehicles. They are immune to reaper attacks, and therefore can be used both to block the path of the reapers and to attack. The fact that vehicles is almost always equipped with explosive weapons makes it an even more successful solution in the fight against them.

Autopsy Data

Autopsy info as shown in-game:

The Reaper is a six-foot tall insectoid nightmare with chitin blades strong enough to pierce steel and a particularly horrific method of reproduction. It is a biological weapon of mass destruction, a monster that spreads death and terror in equal measure.

Each Reaper is a parasitic creature that reproduces through implanting larvae inside other living organisms. These larvae secrete a chemical that disrupts the nervous system of the victim, leaving them shambling around in a state of damned half-life while the larvae gestate rapidly inside their body and metabolise it from within. Within a couple of minutes a fully-developed Reaper will burst free from the remnants of its host and head off in search of fresh victims (an implausibly short gestation period to occur naturally, so presumably alien technology has been used to accelerate it in some manner). In any case, this ability is highly troubling; the unfortunate host is likely to find the process unpleasant in the extreme, and it potentially allows these creatures to multiply quickly on the battlefield.

They are well adapted to the role finding and infesting their victims, possessing well-developed sensory organs and the ability to move across the battlefield with inhuman speed. Wiry but extremely strong, the beasts can easily generate enough force to penetrate personal armour with the large blades protruding from their shoulders. These blades are actually hollow, containing a muscular tube that houses the larvae and neurotoxic fluid to be injected into the victim once the blades have torn an opening into their flesh. A single attack is all that is required to reduce the victim to a hideous zombie, whatever personal armour they may be wearing.

Despite this, these primal horrors have obvious weaknesses. A lack of ranged weaponry and the relative fragility of their chitin plates leaves them vulnerable if caught in the open or sighted at a distance. They also possess only rudimentary swarm intelligence, making them fearless and difficult to suppress but incapable of advanced tactics. This is truer still of the zombified hosts, which apparently simply lumber towards the nearest target and attempt to club them to death with their swollen fists.

Analysis Data

Analysis info as shown in-game:

I consider it prudent to preserve our captive alien specimens in case further analysis is required. The Reaper was an exception - I had it incinerated the moment we concluded our studies on it. The thought of a creature such as this breaking loose in our cramped underground facility is the stuff of nightmares.

In any case, it hardly made a good captive - it was extremely aggressive and clearly had no more than animal-level intellect. Simply walking past the holding tank would see the creature flinging itself at the glass walls in a violent frenzy, a flurry of scything blades and slashing talons. This was particularly irritating given the fiends in engineering installed our new coffee machine only a few feet from the beast, ensuring the glorious silence of our labs was regularly punctuated by screams and the noise of shattering crockery.

Nevertheless, our work was useful: it confirmed our initial suspicions that Reapers are highly mobile and have excellent sensory awareness. We also discovered a number of weak points in the otherwise durable chitin shell of the creature. These have been summarised and issued to your troops, boosting damaged inflicted by roughly ten percent.

We were able to observe the horrific Reaper reproductive process first-hand by introducing cattle into the holding tank. It appears the victim is doomed the moment that it is speared and injected with larvae, turning them into a bloated mass of flesh (aptly referred to as a "zombie" by your men). The larval growth process begins the growth process, but its not actually required to complete it - if the zombie is terminated before gestation is complete, an immature Reaper bursts free of the host's corpse and springs into action. These immature Reapers mature in a matter of minutes and seem just as combat-effective as adult Reapers, so bear in mind that gunning down a zombie may not be beneficial in every situation. While I am not sure what the aliens have done to enhance the original Reapers, there is no doubt that they have evolved into the very definition of a terror weapon.

Unit characteristics

• The reaper
• The Alpha Reaper

Reaper on the battlefield

Action Points 70 Resilience 80 Strength 60 Accuracy 200 Reflexes 60 Bravery 100

Alpha reaper on the battlefield

Action Points 80 Resilience 120 Strength 60 Accuracy 200 Reflexes 60 Bravery 100

Reaper claws stats (their "weapon")

Base Damage (radius)	Mitigation	Range	Magsize	Weight	Reaction Modifier	Recoil	Reload AP Cost
100	500	1000	999	1.0	1	0	10
Fire modes
Fire Mode	AP Cost (% of TU)	Base Accuracy	Shots Fired	Suppression (Radius)
Snap	35	1000	1	0 (1)

• Despite the fact that, according to the technical characteristics, the range of use of the claws is 1000, the "isMelee" modifier does not give the reapers the ability to attack at such a big distance.
• The files contain 2 types of claws - claws for reapers, and for alpha reapers. However, they are identical in all characteristics.
  

Gallery

(Item) Body of dead both reaper/alpha reaper

(Item) Body of stunned both reaper/appha reaper

See also

Zombie