The Blood Pack Pyro is a member of the Blood Pack mercenary group armed with a flamethrower. These troops are always vorcha. They are encountered on many worlds and are always accompanied by other vorcha troops and sometimes krogan.
Capabilities
Offensive
Pyros are relatively non-threatening until they get in range to use their flamethrowers, which can force Shepard or the squad from cover and constantly stagger them, leaving them vulnerable to enemy fire. On harder difficulties, this usually spells death.
Defensive
They gain a weak layer of armor on Hardcore and Insanity difficulties, and have consistent health regeneration on all difficulties. Pyros may retreat or take cover if their armor is destroyed, and will sometimes use the vorcha special ability to restore their armor, though much more rarely than Blood Pack Troopers do. The armor restoration ability can be suppressed by Flashbang Grenade for over 40 seconds at any rank of the power.
Tactics
General
- Warp, Incinerate, Reave, Incendiary Ammo, Inferno Grenade, and Neural Shock will prevent health regeneration. Incinerate and Overload used on an unprotected Pyro without armor will instantly detonate its fuel tank, killing it and dealing heavy damage to nearby enemies while burning and panicking them at the same time. The Arc Projector can halt their health regeneration if it damages their health—but doing this will also overload their fuel tanks and detonate them, making the first effect rather academic.
- Hitting an unprotected Pyro's gas tank with almost any weapon will puncture the tank causing the Pyro to panic and eventually explode. Using a high-powered weapon like a Sniper Rifle will cause the Pyro to explode instantly as long as any armor protecting it was penetrated by the shot damaging the health (and the tank) underneath. An ammo power effective against armor can make this easier to accomplish.
- Biotic powers such as Singularity and Throw are useful to prevent Pyros from approaching but their armor must be stripped.
- Using Dominate also makes them exceptionally useful: Their flame weapons will quickly burn through armor, and prevents regeneration on any vorcha or krogan it hits, and they're typically already in range of allies.