Reaper War

Combatants| * Citadel races
	+ Asari Republics
	+ Salarian Union
	+ Systems Alliance
	+ Turian Hierarchy
		- Vol Protectorate
	+ Illuminated Primacy
	+ Courts of Dekuuna
* Migrant Fleet
* Geth
* Krogan Clans
* Batarian Hegemony (remnants)
* Terminus Fleet
* Rachni
* Leviathans
	+ Collectors
	+ Cerberus (via indoctrination)

Commanders| * Citadel Council
	+ Councilor Tevos
	+ Councilor Valern
		- Dalatrass Linron
	+ Councilor Sparatus
		- Primarch Fedorian†
		- Primarch Victus
	+ Councilor Donnel Udina† (double agent)
		- Admiral David Anderson†
		- Admiral Steven Hackett
		- Commander John Shepard
* Quarian Admiralty Board
	+ Admiral Daro'Xen vas Moreh
	+ Admiral Han'Gerrel vas Neema
	+ Admiral Tali'Zorah vas Normandy
	+ Admiral Shala'Raan vas Tonbay
	+ Admiral Zaal'Koris vas Qwib-Qwib
* Warlord Urdnot Wrex
* Ka'hairal Balak
* Aria T'Loak
* Rachni Queen
* Illusive Man†

Strength| *
* Billions of Indoctrinated, Husks, etc

The **Reaper War** was a brief but devastating interstellar conflict between the races of the Milky Way against the Reapers.

## Prelude

As with almost every "cycle" of 50,000 years since approximately 1 billion BC, the Reapers harvested spacefaring organic sapient races, both in order to propagate and to achieve their primary programming of ascertaining how to achieve true peace between organics and synthetics.

The previous cycle, that of the Protheans, proved abnormal in a number of senses, most importantly in that a small group actually managed to survive their genocide, and formulated plans to break the cycle. Chief among their actions were the sabotaging the Citadel's automated signal to awaken dormant Reapers lying in dark space, and leaving a number of "beacons" to warn future civilizations of the Reaper threat.

Nonetheless, the Reaper Sovereign, in this cycle the one designated to remain in the galaxy, eventually managed to figure out what had occurred through indoctrinated intermediaries, most prominently Saren Arterius. Together, they masterminded the Eden Prime War, inadvertently setting up their downfall by involving one Commander John Shepard. Sovereign was destroyed at the Battle of the Citadel, and Shepard was again forced to avert the Reapers' invasion several times, all the while attempting to prepare the Citadel Council and other governments, to little avail.

## History

For all of Shepard's efforts, the Reapers still arrived.

## Aftermath

The Reaper War irreversibly changed galactic society. With the destruction of the Mass Relay network, most beings were essentially trapped in whatever system they were located, or at least the local star cluster. Mass starvation occurred on most non-self-sufficient worlds and stations.

The Allied Fleets which had participated in the battle over Earth faced the same conundrum. The enormous force spent two years of stockpiling resources (chiefly element zero) and a brave few attempted to reverse-engineer Reaper FTL technology, despite possible risk of indoctrination. After completing their preparations for their respective journeys ahead, the fleets departed for their homeworlds, using cryostasis to freeze their armies for their decades to centuries-long treks.

After centuries of rebuilding, a small semblance of the status quo was regained, especially in the Attican Traverse, where the highly-advanced, benevolent Chozo chose to aid the stricken worlds, and eventually formed something of a successor state to the Citadel Council, the Galactic Federation.

## Trivia

The events of ME3, as with most other events of the Mass Effect trilogy, occurred with Paragon choices, and the Destroy ending, the most likely to be canon ending.