Brute

Brutes were synthetic organic creatures the Reapers created by fusing the bodies of krogan and turians and remaking them with Reaper technology. Like the husks and the banshees made from other species, a Brute was a living being twisted into a weapon, but where a husk was a swarming shock trooper, the Brute was a hulking engine of close-quarters destruction. True to its name, it filled the heavy melee role in Reaper ground assaults, charging into the enemy line to break it apart and pummel smaller troops into pulp.

Origin and nature#

A Brute began as krogan and turian flesh. Reaper technology fused those remains and rebuilt them into a single amalgamated creature, drawing on krogan bulk and durability to produce a heavily built synthetic organic horror made for raw physical violence. The result fought purely at close range, with no ranged weaponry of its own, relying instead on its size, its armor, and the killing power of its claws.

Capabilities#

In an assault a Brute led with a running charge that ended in a wide, sweeping claw, both heavy enough to drop a soldier's shields and then their health and to stagger anything in their path; the claw could even strike through intervening cover. It could leap and slam its claws into the ground to throw nearby foes off balance, and it would beat its chest and roar to stagger those who stood too close. Its great right claw could grab a victim and smash them into the ground for an instant kill. Even in death a Brute lashed out a final time, swinging its claw and threatening to crush anyone beneath its falling body.

Defensively the Brute was sheathed across much of its body in thick metallic plates that could be shot away under sustained fire, though the plates armoring its right claw could not. It carried high armor but no barriers or shields, and its head was left unprotected and vulnerable, so a Brute would often raise its right arm to shield its face as it advanced.

Role in the Reaper War#

Commander Shepard first encountered these creatures on Menae, the moon of the turian homeworld Palaven, while searching for General Victus during the Reaper War. From that first meeting the Brutes spread with the invasion, and the galaxy's defenders came to face them on battlefield after battlefield, often fighting alongside banshees and other Reaper creatures as the harvest pressed on.