Icarus

"Relies on a huge jet packed attached to its back, with laser blasters mounted into his shoulders."

- Quake 2 Manual

In Quake 2, an Icarus is a humanoid Strogg with a jetpack built into its upper back, with twin Blasters mounted onto its shoulders. Whilst it is only ever seen in flight, it does have legs, which is suggestive of a need to land on a regular basis, probably to refuel, rearm and take in some Stroyent.

Icarus are essentially Flyers, but with much higher health and without a melee attack.

Icarus first appear in the Prison hub, and are an uncommon Enemy throughout the rest of the game.

Strategies

 * Alone, an Icarus is easy to kill. Take out a Rocket Launcher, Machine Gun, Grenade Launcher, Shotgun, Super Shotgun, Railgun, Chain Gun or Hyperblaster, then open fire. Make sure to keep moving so that it's laser bolts don't touch you.
 * With other enemies, the Icarus can be quite annoying. It tends to stay far away from the battle and take potshots at you from a distance, making it difficult to harm it while harming other enemies. Unless you have really low HP, wait and take it out last. It's not worth dedicating your time to kill a pest when you could be fighting off serious threats, like Gunners and Gladiators.

Death Message

 * Player was blasted by an Icarus

Trivia

 * The jetpacks of the Icarus are used by Strogg teams in Quake Wars: Enemy Territory for temporary aerial combat and flight. The Strogg at the time of the first invasion of Earth hadn't developed any of the units later seen on Stroggos as they weren't as technologically advanced at this time, hence the separate jetpack module.
 * The enemy is named after Icarus from Greek mythology, who attempted to escape Crete by flight but flew too high and caused his wings to melt, falling to his death afterwards.
 * There's an unused animation for the Icarus walking slowly (due to its heavy jetpack) and taking off into the air.
 * Sometimes when hit with a strong weapon, an Icarus will show its unused walking animation instead of pain animation.