Pheropods

"The Freeman will do wise to heed our extraction of the Myrmidont's aromatic pheropods. The process is not entirely hygienic. Therefore, stand aside."

- Vortigaunt

"Bugbait" is the nickname Vortigaunts and Resistance members use for the pheropods harvested from dead Antlion Guards and used to control Antlions. Bugbait is highly valued in Antlion infested areas and some Resistance members on the coast travel considerable distances to reach the Vortigaunt Camp, where supplies of it can be obtained. Possessing pheropods prevents regular Antlions from attacking, as they are fooled by the scent into believing the holder is an Antlion Guard. However, other Antlion Guards are either not fooled, or react aggressively to an unfamiliar individual's scent in their territory.

Tactics
Pressing the primary fire button throws a pheropod, while secondary fire squeezes the pheropod to summon nearby Antlions. Throwing a pheropod at an object or location will cause it to splat and form a small cloud of pheromones, identifying it as a target. This can be used to command the Antlions to go to a specific place or attack a specific target. Throwing a pheropod at combine soldiers will stun them temporarily, in addition to summoning the Antlions to their position. When the Pheropod is squeezed, it will summon 4 Antlions though there is a rare glitch that summons at least 8 antlions at one time during the assault on Nova Prospekt.

Bugbait is only useful in one level, "Nova Prospekt", after that the player leaves Antlion grounds and the weapon is more or less useless for the rest of the game, although it can be used to stun Combine Soldiers for a few seconds, which may be useful on occasion.

The Bugbait can be considered the Snark of Half-life 2 since it gives control of the enemy.

Trivia

 * When a pheropod is thrown it is destroyed and cannot be used again. Even so, Gordon's supply of them appears to be infinite. It is unknown how stocks of them are replenished.
 * Whether Antlions consider Gordon friend or foe appears to be determined by a trigger in the level itself, not whether they possess any bugbait or not, so even if the player uses cheats to get bugbait outside of the few chapters where they are supposed to have it, Antlions will still attack.
 * It is safe to use another weapon while in the possession of the pheropods, but the player will still need to switch back to it to give commands.
 * Whenever the player encounters an Antlion Guard while in possession of the Bugbait, regular Antlions are nowhere to be found, so it is unknown whether they can tell the difference between the player and a "real" Antlion Guard.

List of appearances

 * ''Half-Life 2

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