Dossier: Archangel

Archangel is a mercenary commander whose operations are noted for their technical expertise and strategic brilliance. He is responsible for high-profile attacks on gang leaders on Omega and can likely be found there.

Acquisition
This mission becomes available after the mission on Freedom's Progress. It is part of the first group of dossiers provided by the Illusive Man.

Walkthrough
Commander Shepard travels to Omega to recruit Archangel.

This mission is the only mission in the game in which Shepard will have to fight members from all three mercenary groups (Eclipse, Blue Suns and Blood Pack). Be sure to pick your squad members so that you are able to deal with all three defense types (shields, armor, and the occasional barrier), regeneration, and mechs. This is even more important on Hardcore or Insanity difficulties, when all opponents will have one of these three defenses. Miranda is particularly useful here, as she can deal with all three.

Afterlife
Upon arriving on Omega, Shepard will be instructed to speak to Aria T'Loak, the station's ruler. She tells Shepard about Archangel, stating that he is a dangerous individual who has been killing large numbers of Omega's plentiful criminals. Three mercenary groups, (Blue Suns, Eclipse, and Blood Pack) are preparing to kill him.

Aria directs Shepard to a small side room on the upper level of Afterlife to sign up for the merc mission. Upon entering the small room, and if Shepard is female, the merc recruiter speaks in a rather condescending and presumptuous manner to her, allowing for a renegade interrupt to set things straight. In any case, Shepard signs up as a freelancer and can thus travel deeper into the station by talking to a merc at the transportation station. Just as Shepard leaves the room, the player has a chance to earn a few morality points through dialogue options and an interrupt involving a young man who plans to sign up.

Upon arriving at the merc base of operations Shepard has the opportunity to learn about the groups by talking to the local leaders. EDI tells the Commander that she can find no other way to Archangel than the one the mercs plan to take on their assault, and that the mercs are using YMIR mechs, LOKI mechs and a gunship to pin him down. EDI recommends sabotaging them before leaving. In the room with the local Eclipse boss, Jaroth, Shepard picks up a data pad that Aria would like to see. Doing so initiates this assignment: Omega: Archangel: Datapad Recovered.

If Grunt is in the squad there are a few interesting options with the Blood Pack Leader Garm. Before reaching Garm, however, there is a room with a Diagnostic Station where an YMIR mech can be sabotaged. Take the opportunity to do so.

Sabotaging the heavy mech will cause it to turn on its masters after it is unleashed on Archangel.

When walking around, various credits from pads, and Medi-gel can be picked up. In a side room there is also a research scan. If Zaeed is in the group, there is some alternate dialogue with the Blue Suns leader Tarak.

The Attack
Once Shepard enters the area with the gunship and talks to Sergeant Cathka the player is locked into going beyond the barriers. It is not possible to go back to the previous areas after this. The conversation with Cathka can be long or short, but either way, at a certain point Cathka will receive a signal to begin the attack. The rest of the freelancers run out and Cathka resumes work on the gunship. A Renegade interrupt will involve Shepard taking a welder and sticking it in Cathka, thus rendering him unable to fully repair the gunship.

Shepard vaults over the barricade and immediately turns on the other mercs. Dialogue options lend a few more morality points. While traveling through the area open to Archangel's fire, Shepard can be hit by a single sniper shot which will knock out the Commander's shields, but do no other damage. Shepard's squad then clear out all the freelancers and make it up to Archangel's sniping location. Once the freelancers are out of the way, Archangel removes his helmet and reveals himself to be none other than Garrus Vakarian.

A conversation follows that will give Garrus' history over the last few years and can lend a few points of morality. At the end Garrus gets up and uses his sniper rifle to see what is going on. A Renegade interrupt is briefly available when Garrus hands the rifle over to Shepard, eliminating one of the LOKI Mechs with an opportunistic headshot. Shepard and Garrus must now fight their way past the three mercenary groups. The Eclipse appears to be tired of waiting and attacks first.

An M-15 Vindicator Assault Rifle can be picked up either before or after talking to Garrus. It is a big improvement over the M-8 Avenger. Nonetheless, there is a weapons locker in the basement where weapons can be switched after the Eclipse attack.

The Eclipse Attack
Jaroth is getting more frustrated by the second and sends in his own troopers and LOKI mechs against Shepard's fortified position. It is advantageous to stay on the second floor, but even with SMGs this fight is not very hard, as all the enemies stream over the bridge. Most of the mercs will simply bum-rush the sniper perch, disregarding cover, but Eclipse Heavies will take cover occasionally on the sides of the bridge to cover their comrades with rockets, meaning that they must be killed before they reach cover. If any mercs get into the base, Shepard can move across and take them out before they reach the second floor. Garrus will give an audio cue if Eclipse mercs manage to reach the base and the rear stairs. Eventually Jaroth will have had enough and sends in the YMIR mech. If it was sabotaged earlier, it will fight against its own. WARNING: if it stays alive for too long, it will revert to is original programming after a few waves.

Jaroth, having lost a large number of mercs, enters the battle himself. If the salarian is kept on the bridge, he will be no trouble at all. He has a submachine gun which may damage the shields of Shepard and the Commander's squad-mates if not watched. Afterwards, Garrus will tell Shepard to come and find him. Before talking to him, thermal clips can be collected from around the base.

The Blood Pack Attack
While talking with Garrus an explosion is felt throughout the base. It appears that the bombs mentioned earlier, if Shepard talked with the merc leaders, went off and breached the tunnels Garrus had closed off. Shepard must make a decision: take the whole team or go two and two. It is recommended to leave one squad-mate behind to help cover Garrus; his health drops faster otherwise.

The Blood Pack attack consists of krogan and vorcha. Weapons and ammo powers should be used appropriately. Most enemies are without shielding, so headshots can be efficient. Some have armor however, but most of these are vorcha, whose armor collapses quickly.

Afterwards, Garrus tells the Commander to go to the basement—through the door under the stairs. If not done before, an Omni-tool can be scanned on the way for a research bonus. Once in the basement, Garrus will tell Shepard that three shutters need to be closed in order to secure the lower level. The first, right in front of Shepard's squad, can be closed without much effort if Shepard runs. However, if there are any enemies under the shutter, Shepard is past the shutter or under the shutter once the 10 second countdown ends, the shutter will not close.

The other two shutters are north and south. It is most tactical to take the northern one last, because of the amount of cover and number of enemies; it is more controlled than the south one.

The shutter to the south one is in Garrus' garage, which contains a lot of crates, and a lot of open space. The shutter is across the room from the entrance. The covers should be used to advance across the room. Be on the lookout for explosive crates and canisters; enemies can use them too. Advance to the shutter and close it off while keeping the Blood Pack at bay. A steady stream of varren, vorcha and krogan will pour through the shutter, so crowd control tactics are necessary to keep them from interfering with the shutter closing. Once this one is closed, pick up any ammo and proceed north.

The way to the northern shutter has a lot of cover that both Shepard's group and enemies capitalize on. The enemies should be taken out as they pop their heads up, and the Commander's team should advance once a squad is down, or Shepard will run out of ammo quickly. Around a corner about halfway to the shutter controls there is a Blood Pack Pyro. Team-mates can be used as fodder, and Adrenaline Rush can be activated if Shepard has it. Any enemies should be taken out here, Shepard's squad-mates should be sent to the barrier, and then Shepard should follow. The squad will then reach the last shutter.

Garrus will contact Shepard immediately after the third shutter is closed and tell the Commander that Garm and his Blood Pack have breached the base on the main floor. Shepard's squad should run back up as quickly as possible and deal with the Blood Pack. In addition to the troopers there will be varren as well, which should be taken out at a distance. Shepard should then get upstairs as fast as possible to defeat Garm. Having left a squad-mate with Garrus earlier proves to be a good idea here, because they will already be up there and will often have Garm's barrier down to at least 50% before Shepard arrives. Garm should be killed as fast as possible, and before talking to Garrus again, all ammo should be refilled, as it will be needed for the fight with the Blue Suns.

This is the last oportunity to pick up the M-15 Vindicator Assault Rifle from the couch

The Blue Suns Attack
Talking to Garrus this time fills Shepard in on his history with Garm and both agree to fight through the Blue Suns to make it out. However, before they can make a break for it, they get ambushed by Tarak and his gunship. If Shepard took the time to zap Cathka, the gunship will be half armored. Because the gunship only has armor, its health is 50%. The gunship will fly around firing at Shepard, and covering Blue Suns infantry. Shepard should keep fighting off the infantry until Jentha, the Blue Suns Lieutenant, shows up in one wave; she has both shields and armor and is equiped with a M-76 Revenant, so she is a formidable opponent. Once she is down there are Blue Suns mercs on the main level who must be dealt with.

After clearing out the main floor, a cutscene shows that Tarak gets the drop on Garrus and wounds him. Garrus tries to fight back but instead takes a few more bullets that leave him bleeding out fast. Shepard should take down the gunship as fast as possible and leave squad-mates to focus on the infantry that appear. If the gunship goes down, the battle is over.

Normandy
Having eliminated the third mercenary gang, Shepard, Garrus and the Commander's squad-mates will return to the Normandy. Here, Garrus receives medical attention with cybernetics, but will carry a wound on his face and damage to his armor for the rest of the game. Garrus will take up residence in the Normandy's main battery past the sleep pods on the crew deck.

Email
Nalah Butler who lives on Omega, wrote an e-mail with subject header Take care of Garrus, to Commander Shepard regarding Garrus' role as Archangel.

Enemies

 * Blood Pack
 * Garm
 * Blood Pack Pyro
 * Blood Pack Trooper
 * Blood Pack Warrior
 * Blue Suns
 * A-61 Mantis Gunship (Tarak)
 * Blue Suns Centurion
 * Blue Suns Commander
 * Blue Suns Heavy
 * Blue Suns Legionnaire
 * Blue Suns Trooper
 * Jentha
 * Eclipse
 * Eclipse Engineer
 * Eclipse Heavy
 * Eclipse Trooper
 * Eclipse Vanguard
 * Jaroth
 * Freelancer
 * LOKI Mech
 * Mercenary Bomb Technician
 * Varren
 * YMIR Mech

Mission Summary

 * Debriefing:
 * Extracted Archangel from mercenary siege and recruited him for the team. Unclear whether injury to Archangel will impair his ability to assist in the mission. Regardless, revelation of identity as Garrus Vakarian useful in keeping Shepard comfortable.
 * Experience: 1,000 (1,250)
 * Credits: 40,000
 * Cerberus Funding: 20,000
 * Credits Found: 20,000
 * Weapons:
 * M-15 Vindicator Battle Rifle
 * Resources:
 * Element Zero: 500
 * Upgrades:
 * Tech Damage (Multicore Amplifier)
 * Submachine Gun Damage (Microfield Pulsar)

Trivia

 * There is a small graphical bug during the mission. After the revelation that Archangel is Garrus, Garrus hands Shepard his sniper rifle, an M-92 Mantis. If Shepard has sniper-rifle training, and has any sniper rifle other than the Mantis equipped, the gun will switch to whatever rifle Shepard has equipped, and then switch back to a Mantis when Shepard hands it back to Garrus.
 * Another slip-up appears after Eclipse's attack is repelled. When Shepard goes to speak with Garrus, he is no longer holding a Mantis, but a Viper instead.