The Prometheans are powerful mechanical warriors appearing as major antagonists the Reclaimer Saga in the Halo series. They were led by The Didact. They were once Forerunners, and later humans, but during a conflict with The Flood, they were converted to digital intelligence by the Didact via a device called the Composer.
History[]
Origins[]
The title of Promethiean was used to describe an entire elite faction within the Forerunners' Warrior-Servant caste, but with the extinction of the race the title was inherited by the remaining automated forces.
Mechanical Prometheans[]
Promethean Soldiers and Crawlers, originally known as Armigers are Forerunner combat drones invented by the Didact for boarding action and raids in the Human-Forerunner war. Most Armigers were destroyed in the Forerunner-Food war or corrupted by the logic plague. However, some were left to guard key Forerunner sites such as the lesser Arc and survived to the events of the Halo series. Many Crawlers were stationed with the Prometheans on Requiem.
Knights[]
The Composer was a device designed to bridge the physical and digital realms. However, attempts to return biological beings to their original state were unsuccessful. Nevertheless, the technology would continue to be applied for covering organics into digital form for various purposes such as storing and transferring memories and creating AIs. During the Forerunner-Flood War, the Ur-Didact recruited an army of loyal Promethean volunteers to be composed and become the first Knights, making him immune to Flood infection. Although the digitized army proved an effective force against the Flood, their small numbers made no difference in the war at large. Desperate to create a larger army, and in an act of personal vengeance, the Didact forcibly composed most of the serving human population to create the vast majority of existing Knights. Before he could wield this army, The Didact's wife, the Librarian captured and imprisoned him on the Requiem. She re-programmed the Knights to guard his resting place on the Shield World until he was ready to be awakened. Watcher Sentinels seem to have been developed in conjunction with Knights to support them in battle and developed the ability to create the Crawlers as scouts.
Pseudo-Prometheans[]
The Pseudo-Prometheans are a variant type of Promethean constructs created by Abaddon which these constructs are based on the standard Crawlers with an addition of Aggressor Sentinels but are more pseudo-organic after being implanted with a more advanced version of its own logic plague it utilizes in them as they are under its command, becoming monstrous machines as its minions. They were sent by it against Bornstellar and his group of surviving Forerunners at the capital world of Maethrillian. Eventually after Abaddon's termination, it can be presumed that the remaining Pseudo-Prometheans died with it.
2500s[]
Promethean Soldiers were first encountered by the major species of Halo on the Lesser Ark in 2555, when the caretaker of the Installation 000 Tragic Solitude used them, as well as the installation's wildlife to fight off a Human-Sangheili task force sent to disable the Halo array. The remaining forms would be encountered July 2557, when John-117 and Cortana came across Requiem while drifting in the UNSC ship, Forward Unto Dawn. They and a Storm Covenant force were forcibly pulled into Requiem and crashed on the surface. They then encountered and fought the Promethean constructs inhabiting the shield world. The Didact immediately took control of the Prometheans after he was accidentally awakened by John-117. He also allotted control of the Prometheans to the Covenant leader Jul Mdama.
Bent on preventing humanity's ascendance to the Mantle in the Forerunners' place, The Didact immediately retrieved the Composer from Halo installation 03 and then moved to wipe out humanity at Earth. Master Chief and Cortana were able stop the Didact and destroy both the Composer and his ship Mantle's Approach as well as any Prometheans stationed onboard, but not before the Composer was used on the city of New Phoenix, digitizing its entire population. The composed essences were transferred back to requiem to await their conversion. The storage unit containing the composed humans was retrieved by the UNSC several months later in February 2558.
Promethean constructs continued to battle the UNSC forces alongside Jul 'Mdama's Covenant for as long as the next eight months. In this period of time during a battle on the planet Oban, the Knights, as well as many of the Promethean weapons underwent a mutation which changed their structure and combat capabilities signifigantly. It is believed this was an adaptation to non-flood combatants. By October of 2558 the Prometheans had fallen under the control of Cortana and The Warden Eternal, becoming the footsoldiers of the AI lead faction, The Created. They would attack any persons near the Guardians regardless of hostility.
Cortana was not able to take control of the Armigers and Sentinels on the Lesser Ark due to precautionary measures from human elements stationed there. The Armigers on the Ark have remained inactive and have not been encountered since the skirmish in 2555.
Even after Cortana's destruction and the Guardians' deactivation, the Promethean constructs remain operational but also scattered in Created remnants now each one ruled by an Human AI and continue to oppose the UNSC.
Types[]
- Knights: These are the most common Promethean forces. They are bipedal, and their left hand carries a sword that channels hard-light and their right hand carries a long-ranged weapon.
- Knight Lancer: These knights have long ranged weapons, great tracking capabilities, and great mobility. They earned their name "night ranger" from this trait.
- Knight Commander: These knights lead Knight squadrons. They have heavy armour, but their rank was bestowed by need.
- Knight Battlewagon: These knights have heavy armour. Their hulking frames protect them from most attacks, and these monsters can use their Incineration Canons to deal heavy fire damage.
- Knight Bannerman
- Knight Luminary
- Crawlers: These Prometheans walk on all fours, but they can use their Boltshot to deal damage.
- Crawler Snipe: These crawlers try to go somewhere that gives their target a disadvantage to spot them. Once s/he finds hirs hiding spot, the Crawler tries to open fire via a Promethean Binary Rifle.
- Crawler Prime: These crawlers are the leaders of the crawlers. They line their backside with hard-light spikes.
- Pseudo Crawlers: Technorganic versions of the Crawlers as they behave like the originals but are far more aggressive, ruthless and protective under Abaddon.
- Watchers: These flying prometheans have a Boltshot. They shield their allies with hard-light.
- Soldiers: These Promethean robots have a humanoid build compared to other prometheans. They are purely artificial intelligence driven. Soldiers can communicate, often when something happens, their speech pattern similar to the Covenant.
- Soldier Captain: These soldiers are stronger. They lead their brethren into battle. Their red highlights make them distinct from the common Promethean Soldier.
- Soldier Sniper: As does the Crawler Snipe, these soldiers try to find a place where they can get a good shot from their Binary Rifle at their target with little danger of their target trying to attack them.
- Hydra Soldier: These soldiers are fought during the battle of Noctus in Halo 5. They use their Hydra MLRS and their Suppressor rifle as their main weapons. One of them appears in the game, and he is fought as a mini-boss.
- Sentinels
- Aggressor Sentinels: While despite technically being Forerunner constructs themselves, a majority of them in the Mantle's Approach are seen neutral towards both Master Chief and the Prometheans though some of them will appear colored orange while emerging from the Escorts near the Composer and counted as an enemy during the final battle but still unable to be in combat.
- Pseudo Aggressor Sentinels: They are modified to be technorganic constructs as part of the Pseudo-Prometheans under Abaddon's command as they are aggressive, ruthless and protective along with the Crawlers.
Trivia[]
- In spite of being orange, there are a couple of times when they have a distinct coloring in their variety.
- In Halo: Spartan Strike, the Prometheans have different colors as the Knight and Crawler Prime are shown to glow yellow, glowing red in Knight Battlewagons and Snipers, and gold in tne Knight Commanders while the Watchers are white.
- In the Warzone Firefight mode of Halo 5: Guardians, they have 2 more distinct coloring varieties of each Promethean unit where the Mythic Prometheans are red and the Legendary Prometheans are cyan.
Gallery[]
