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StarCraft
The full Koprulu Sector reference: every faction, every campaign, every Xel’Naga relic, and the real story of what the Overmind was actually trying to do, with primary-source citations to the games, novels and Blizzard’s published canon.
308 entries published, drawn from the StarCraft games and novels, across the 11 cross-referenced topic categories below.
Pillar deep-dives
Long-form pieces under a named byline. The kind of article we wished existed when we first read the canon.
Long read · joe
321st Colonial Rangers Battalion
The 321st Colonial Rangers Battalion was an elite Terran Confederacy unit formed on Turaxis II during the Guild Wars. Under the corrupt Colonel Vanderspool it gave rise to the Special Tactics and Missions Platoon, nicknamed Heaven's Devils, which counted Jim Raynor and Tychus Findlay among its members.
Long read · joe
Aal Cistler
Aal Cistler was the privileged son of a Terran Dominion Treasury Ministry leader, pushed into the Ghost Academy on his father's influence despite a low psionic index, where his drug trafficking and self-interest made him a recurring problem across three training teams.
Long read · joe
Abathur
Abathur was the zerg evolution master, the Swarm's living DNA library, spun by the Overmind from many species. He designed the Queen of Blades, perfected countless strains for Sarah Kerrigan, and later betrayed Overqueen Zagara to reignite the wars he believed the zerg needed to evolve.
Long read · joe
Adept
The adept is a protoss officer-class infantry warrior, a trained battlefield commander armed with glaive cannons and a psionic transfer ability that projects the warrior's mind across the field.
Long read · joe
Adjutant
Adjutants were the non-sapient artificial intelligences that served terran commanders across the Koprulu sector as advisers, navigators, and keepers of data. Humanoid in form but bereft of social grace, they descended from the original ATLAS coding and offered commanders an ever-present strategic eye over the field of battle.
Long read · joe
Adun
Adun was a revered protoss executor of the Discord who secretly sheltered the rogue tribes the Conclave ordered him to execute. He burned away saving them as they were exiled, leaving no body behind, and passed into protoss legend as the Twilight Deliverer.
Long read · joe
Aeon of Strife
The Aeon of Strife was a millennia-long civil war among the protoss, called the bloodiest civil war in galactic history. It followed the departure of the xel'naga and the loss of the protoss psychic link, and ended when the scholar Khas rediscovered the khaydarin crystals and founded the Khala.
Long read · joe
Agria
Agria was a terraformed colony world and botanical preserve of the Terran Confederacy and later the Terran Dominion. During the Second Great War its population was evacuated by Raynor's Raiders ahead of a zerg invasion.
Long read · joe
Aiur
Aiur was the homeworld of the protoss, a verdant world on the galactic fringe engineered by the Xel'Naga and seat of the Protoss Empire. It was overrun by the zerg in 2500 and reclaimed by the Daelaam after the defeat of Amon.
Long read · joe
Alan Schezar
Alan Schezar was a smuggler and crime lord whose Scavengers raided Aiur for protoss technology and learned to control zerg cerebrates, drawing the wrath of the Terran Dominion and the protoss before he died fighting on behalf of the dark archon Ulrezaj.
Long read · joe
Alarak
Alarak was the highlord of the Tal'darim, once First Ascendant in the Chain of Ascension under Ma'lash. A master manipulator who turned his people against Amon after the Dark God betrayed them, he allied with the Daelaam, overthrew Ma'lash in Rak'Shir, and led the Tal'darim on a path of conquest.
Long read · joe
Aldaris
Aldaris was a Khalai protoss of the Judicator Caste, a fierce believer in the Khala who judged others by a strict reading of its tenets. He served as advisor to the executors during the Great War and died exposing Sarah Kerrigan's corruption of Matriarch Raszagal on Shakuras.
Long read · joe
Alexei Stukov
Alexei Stukov was the vice admiral of the United Earth Directorate Expeditionary Fleet and tactical advisor to Admiral Gerard DuGalle. Murdered on the orders his own commander gave at Samir Duran's urging, he was resurrected through zerg infestation and spent the rest of his existence as an infested terran in the service of Sarah Kerrigan.
Long read · joe
Alpha Squadron
Alpha Squadron, nicknamed the Blood Hawks, was an elite Terran Confederate military formation under General Edmund Duke that defected to the Sons of Korhal during the Great War and went on to serve the Terran Dominion.
Long read · joe
Amon's Forces
Amon's Forces, also called the Forces of Amon, were a union of terran, protoss, zerg, hybrid and Void creatures subservient to the fallen xel'naga Amon during the End War. Bound to his will, they sought the eradication of all the xel'naga's creation and an end to the Infinite Cycle.
Long read · joe
Amon
Amon was a malevolent xel'naga who turned against the Infinite Cycle of his kind and sought to end all life and remake it in his image. He created the Overmind and the Zerg Swarm, enslaved the Tal'darim, and was finally destroyed in the Void by an ascended Sarah Kerrigan during the End War.
Long read · joe
Angus Mengsk
Angus Mengsk was a senator of Korhal and a member of the Old Families who turned against the Terran Confederacy, declared Korhal's independence, and was assassinated with his family by Confederate ghosts. His murder set his son Arcturus on the path that would forge the Terran Dominion.
Long read · joe
Annihilators
The Annihilators, officially the 22nd Confederate and later Dominion Marine Division, were a small ground-based special forces unit famed for the highest zerg kill rate in the terran armed forces. They served first the Confederacy and then the Terran Dominion.
Long read · joe
Antiga Prime
Antiga Prime was a terran fringe world in the Antiga system, the site of an open revolt against the Terran Confederacy that the Sons of Korhal turned into a zerg massacre, and a world later repopulated under the Terran Dominion.
Long read · joe
Arbiter
The arbiter is a protoss psionic support craft that cloaks the allies around it, freezes enemies in stasis, and recalls distant friendly forces across the battlefield in an instant.
Long read · joe
Archon
The archon was a heavy protoss being formed when two high templar merged their bodies and minds into a single creature of raw psionic energy. Devastating in battle and short-lived once formed, it was a weapon made by sacrifice.
Long read · joe
Arcturus Mengsk
Arcturus Mengsk led the Sons of Korhal to bring down the Terran Confederacy and crowned himself Emperor of the Terran Dominion, ruling through cunning, propaganda, and brute force until his death during the Second Great War.
Long read · joe
Ardo Melnikov
Ardo Melnikov was a young Confederate Marine Corps private whose memories of his home on Bountiful were rewritten by neural resocialization. Discovering that the Confederacy, not the zerg, had stolen his past, he died on Mar Sara buying time for civilian transports to escape.
Long read · joe
Argus Stone
The Argus stone was a powerful xel'naga artifact found in the ruins of Taledon on Aridas. Protoss, Terran Dominion, and zerg forces all converged on the world to claim it, and the stone passed from hand to hand before the zerg carried it to Char.
Long read · joe
Ariel Hanson
Ariel Hanson was a selfless bio-engineer from the colony of Agria who joined Raynor's Raiders after they evacuated her people from the zerg. She worked to cure a zerg infestation among the colonists, and was killed by Jim Raynor when the virus consumed her.
Long read · joe
Artanis
Artanis was the Hierarch of the Daelaam, a renowned warrior who rose from executor during the zerg invasion of Aiur to lead the reunited protoss. He forged the Khalai and Nerazim into one people, reclaimed Aiur, and led the alliance that banished Amon from the Khala.
Long read · joe
ATLAS
The Artificial Tele-empathic Logistics Analysis System, or ATLAS, was a revolutionary supercomputer that selected which prisoners would survive the journey that founded the Koprulu sector colonies. Fragments of its code still survive in terran adjutants.
Long read · joe
Augustgrad
Augustgrad was the capital city of Korhal and seat of the Terran Dominion, rebuilt from Confederate ruins and named for Augustus Mengsk. The most heavily fortified city in the Dominion, it was the site of Arcturus Mengsk's death at the hands of the zerg.
Long read · joe
Baneling
The baneling was an explosive zerg strain evolved from the zergling through a brief chrysalis phase, its body remade to carry sacs of highly corrosive acid. A living suicide bomber, the baneling ruptured among enemy formations in a shower of searing acid that devastated both structures and ground forces.
Long read · joe
Banshee
The AH/G-24 Banshee was a terran ground-attack aircraft built by Procyon Industries for the Terran Dominion. Designed for counter-insurgency, it became a cloaked raider notorious as a Dominion terror weapon.
Long read · joe
Battle of Antiga Prime: the uprising that broke the Confederacy
The Battle of Antiga Prime was the campaign fought on the Confederate colony world of Antiga Prime during the Great War, in which the Sons of Korhal backed a colonial revolt, turned General Edmund Duke's Alpha Squadron to their cause, and lured the zerg onto the Confederate blockade with a psi emitter before the protoss purified the world.
Long read · joe
Battle of Char
The Battle of Char was fought during the Second Great War between a joint Terran Dominion and Raynor's Raiders force and the Zerg Swarm. Instigated by Prince Valerian Mengsk and led by Jim Raynor, it ended with the de-infestation of Sarah Kerrigan by a xel'naga device.
Long read · joe
Battle of Korhal
The Battle of Korhal was the final battle of the Second Great War, a joint assault by Sarah Kerrigan's Zerg Swarm and Jim Raynor's Raiders on the Dominion capital. It ended with the death of Emperor Arcturus Mengsk and the destruction of much of Augustgrad.
Long read · joe
Battle of Tarsonis
The Battle of Tarsonis, also called the Fall of Tarsonis, ended the Terran Confederacy. The Sons of Korhal lured the Zerg Swarm to the Confederate capital with psi-emitters, abandoned Sarah Kerrigan to the zerg, and cleared the way for Arcturus Mengsk to found the Terran Dominion.
Long read · joe
Battlecruiser
The battlecruiser was the terran sector's capital ship, a heavily armed and armored warship dating back to the early Confederacy that served as both a general-purpose combatant and a fleet command vessel.
Long read · joe
Behemoth-class battlecruiser
The Behemoth-class was the most common terran battlecruiser of the Great War, an improvement over the Leviathan-class that could travel through warp space, operate in atmosphere, and land on planets. It was the class of the famed Hyperion and remained in service well into the Second Great War.
Long read · joe
Bel'Shir
Bel'Shir was a jungle world whose terrazine shrines gave protoss their psionic power, sacred first to the Templar Caste and then to the Tal'darim, and later the refuge of the exiled scientist Egon Stetmann.
Long read · joe
Bhekar Ro
Bhekar Ro was a remote terran Fringe World settled by colonists fleeing the Confederate inner worlds, where a buried xel'naga artifact awoke in 2500 and drew protoss and zerg into the Battle of Bhekar Ro.
Long read · joe
Braxis
Braxis was an inhospitable ice world in the Koprulu sector, colonized by the protoss as Khyrador during the Golden Age of Expansion before it passed to the Terran Confederacy and then the Terran Dominion. It became a major battleground during the Brood War, was purified by the protoss, and later refroze into a fortified Dominion training hub.
Long read · joe
Brood Lord
The brood lord is a massive manta-like Zerg flyer morphed from the corruptor, used by the Swarm as an aerial siege creature that rains living broodlings down onto ground targets. It serves only in the largest of conflicts.
Long read · joe
Brood War
The Brood War was a zerg civil war between Sarah Kerrigan and the cerebrate Daggoth over the succession of the Overmind, fought against the backdrop of an invasion by the United Earth Directorate. It ended with Kerrigan supreme over the Koprulu Sector and the Directorate destroyed.
Long read · joe
Broodmother
Broodmothers were powerful, intelligent queens created by the Queen of Blades to replace the cerebrates, tasked with guarding and leading the broods of the Zerg Swarm. Independent enough to survive their creator's fall, they fragmented the Swarm when Kerrigan was deinfested and warred among themselves for control.
Long read · joe
Bucephalus
The Bucephalus was a Gorgon-class battlecruiser and Terran Dominion flagship, built at the Ursa Shipyards to replace the stolen Hyperion. It carried Crown Prince Valerian Mengsk through the campaign on Char and the rogue flight that followed Kerrigan's rescue, and later served as Valerian's command ship during the Defenders of Man Insurgency.
Long read · joe
C-14 Impaler gauss rifle
The C-14 Impaler gauss rifle was the standard issue weapon of the Confederate and Terran Dominion Marine Corps, a gauss-assisted rifle that fired hypersonic armor-piercing spikes and remained the most common firearm in the Koprulu sector.
Long read · joe
Candore Colony
Candore Colony was a settlement on the Terran Dominion world of Candore. In 2502 a Dominion Marine Corps force arrested or massacred its colonists for sheltering the Knights of Freedom, an atrocity uncovered by embedded reporter Kate Lockwell.
Long read · joe
Carolina Davis
General Carolina Davis was a Terran Dominion officer and lifelong loyalist of Arcturus Mengsk who came to lead the Defenders of Man insurgency against his son Valerian. She engineered zerg attacks on Dominion worlds to discredit the Emperor before Nova Terra brought her down.
Long read · joe
Carrier
The carrier was the great protoss capital ship, a mobile fortress that carried no weapons of its own but launched swarms of robotic interceptors. It served the Golden Armada, the Tal'darim, and the Purifiers across the Koprulu sector's wars.
Long read · joe
Castanar
Castanar was a nondescript planet on the fringe of Dominion space, notable as the site of a secret Terran Dominion research installation that cloned protoss-zerg hybrids as part of a clandestine breeding program.
Long read · joe
Cerberus Program
The Cerberus Program was a Terran Confederacy black ops unit formed from the remnants of the Cerberus Recon Squad. Under Tamsen Cauley it defected to the Terran Dominion, and after the death of Arcturus Mengsk it went underground as a renegade outfit devoted to enslaving zerg broods for sale to the highest bidder.
Long read · joe
Cerebrate
Cerebrates were the intermediate commanders of the zerg, created by the Overmind to lead individual broods and oversee the Swarm's evolution. Bound to the Overmind for their reincarnation, they were hunted to extinction after the Brood War and replaced by Sarah Kerrigan's broodmothers.
Long read · joe
Char
Char was an inhospitable volcanic planet in the Koprulu sector that became the primary hive world of the zerg. It was the site of Sarah Kerrigan's rebirth as the Queen of Blades and, years later, of her restoration to human form.
Long read · joe
Chau Sara
Chau Sara was a Confederate colony in the Sara system, the smaller sister world of Mar Sara. It was one of the first terran worlds infested by the zerg and the first to be incinerated from orbit by the protoss, marking humanity's first contact with both alien species.
Long read · joe
CMC Powered Combat Suit
The CMC Powered Combat Suit was the standard armored exoskeleton of terran infantry across the Koprulu sector, an enclosed hardskin worn by marines and firebats of the Confederacy, the Terran Dominion, and the Kel-Morian Combine. Its successive models defined the appearance and survivability of the human foot soldier from the Guild Wars through the End War.
Long read · joe
Cole Hickson
Cole Hickson was a terran outlaw and soldier scarred on the left side of his face, a sniper and frequent leader of the War Pigs. He once saved Jim Raynor's sanity in a Kel-Morian prison camp, then years later was resocialized by Tamsen Cauley into an unwitting assassin sent against Raynor.
Long read · joe
Colin Phash
Colin Phash was a young terran with powerful psionic gifts, the son of the Dominion senator Corbin Phash. Hunted for his abilities and forced into the Ghost Academy, he was eventually freed and became the youngest known member of the Umojan shadowguard.
Long read · joe
Colonial Fleet
The Colonial Fleet was the naval branch of the Terran Confederacy's armed forces, older than the Confederacy itself. It provided air and orbital support from its Tarsonis platforms until the fall of the Confederacy folded its remnants into the Dominion Armada.
Long read · joe
Colossus
The colossus was a towering protoss robotic walker built purely for war, dating back to the Kalath Intercession. Outlawed by the Conclave after the slaughter of the kalathi, it was unearthed and returned to service against the zerg and became, to the Terran Dominion, a symbol of the protoss themselves.
Long read · joe
Conclave
The Conclave was a small body of Judicator elders that ruled the Protoss Empire from Aiur. Conservative and secretive, it banished the Dark Templar, enslaved the Purifiers, and was destroyed during the zerg invasion.
Long read · joe
Connor Ward
Connor Ward was a Confederate marine who lost his family to a Kel-Morian attack during the Guild Wars and joined the military consumed by revenge, serving in the squad that became known as Heaven's Devils alongside Tychus Findlay and Jim Raynor.
Long read · joe
Corruptor
The corruptor is a squid-like Zerg flyer bred to destroy enemy aircraft and capital ships, dousing its targets in matter-disrupting parasite spores and capable of morphing into the brood lord once the Swarm wins the skies.
Long read · joe
Corsair
The corsair was a protoss air-to-air fighter fielded during the Brood War, built around a rapid splash-firing weapon and the Disruption Web ability that could blind an enemy's ranged defenses.
Long read · joe
Covert Ops Crew
The Covert Ops Crew was a Terran Dominion covert operations team turned vigilante group, given by Emperor Valerian Mengsk to Ghost Agent Nova Terra to fight the Defenders of Man. Operating from the stealth ship Griffin, the crew followed Nova into open defiance of the Dominion and became a loyal force answering to her alone.
Long read · joe
Creep
Creep was a living zerg superorganism, a viscous purple substance that nourished zerg structures and strains, bound entire colonies into a single organism, and could consume a whole planet within days if left unchecked.
Long read · joe
Cybros
Cybros was the home warship and space platform of the Purifiers, a command vessel held in stasis above the moon Endion until Artanis reactivated its robotic warriors during the war against Amon.
Long read · joe
Cyclone
The cyclone was a fast terran assault vehicle developed by the Dominion to keep personnel out of harm's way, armed with twin Typhoon missile pods and a lock-on system that let it fire on the move. It began as a robotic drone before becoming a piloted machine.
Long read · joe
Daelaam
The Daelaam was the unified protoss government that bound the Khalai, Nerazim, Purifiers, and some Tal'darim together after the fall of Aiur, led by Hierarch Artanis through the End War against Amon and the reclamation of their homeworld.
Long read · joe
Daggoth
Daggoth was one of the Overmind's greatest cerebrates and master of the Tiamat Brood, the largest and most powerful brood in the Swarm. After the Overmind fell, he took command of the surviving cerebrates and built a Second Overmind, perishing when Kerrigan destroyed them.
Long read · joe
Dark Archon
The dark archon was a being of living psionic energy formed when two dark templar merged, wielding powers of the Void far beyond those of an ordinary archon. Its creation was outlawed among the Nerazim for a thousand years.
Long read · joe
Dauntless Plateau
The Dauntless Plateau was a raised position on Char from which General Horace Warfield directed the Dominion purge of the zerg after Kerrigan was deinfested. The reforming Swarm overran it, killing Warfield and reclaiming the world for the Swarm.
Long read · joe
Defenders of Man Insurgency
The Defenders of Man Insurgency was a conflict fought after the End War between the Terran Dominion and the separatist Defenders of Man, who lured feral zerg onto Dominion worlds to discredit Emperor Valerian Mengsk. It was exposed and crushed through the efforts of the ghost Nova Terra.
Long read · joe
Defenders of Man
The Defenders of Man was a terran separatist group that claimed to protect humanity from alien threats. Secretly led by General Carolina Davis, it lured feral zerg onto Dominion worlds to discredit Valerian Mengsk before being exposed.
Long read · joe
Defiler
The defiler is a rare, silverfish-like Zerg breed that synthesizes virus-like biochemicals from the leftover genetic material of other strains, shrouding allies in living swarms and corroding enemies beneath toxic plague clouds.
Long read · joe
Dehaka
Dehaka was a primal zerg pack leader from Zerus and one of the last of his kind before the Swarm's return. He allied with Sarah Kerrigan to gather essence, fought across the Koprulu sector, and led the primal zerg against Amon during the End War.
Long read · joe
Delta Emblock
Delta Emblock, designated Agent X10128B, was a Terran Dominion ghost who rose from poverty on New Sydney to become a precognitive operative and, after a campaign of deception by the Defenders of Man, a member of Nova Terra's Covert Ops Crew.
Long read · joe
Devourer
The devourer was the anti-air aspect of the zerg mutalisk, slower than its parent strain but more resilient. Its attack flung corrosive acid spores that clung to enemy aircraft, weakening their armor and slowing their fire.
Long read · joe
Diamondback
The diamondback was a fast terran hover armored fighting vehicle able to fire on the move. First prototyped by the Confederacy, it was revived by Raynor's Raiders, who used its speed to hunt Dominion trains on Tarsonis.
Long read · joe
Disruptor
The disruptor is a protoss artillery construct of the Purifier Program, controlled by a high-level artificial intelligence and armed with directed spheres of unstable energy that devastate clustered enemy forces.
Long read · joe
Dominion Armed Forces
The Dominion Armed Forces were the military of the Terran Dominion, built from the Sons of Korhal and the conscripted remnants of the Confederacy. Across the Brood War, the Second Great War, and the war against Amon they grew into the most powerful terran military in the Koprulu sector.
Long read · joe
Ghost Academy
The Ghost Academy was the administrative and training center for the ghost programs of the Terran Confederacy and later the Terran Dominion, where psychically gifted recruits were forged into covert operatives over years of conditioning.
Long read · joe
Dominion Marine Corps
The Dominion Marine Corps was the ground combat branch of the Terran Dominion's armed forces and the backbone of nearly every Dominion deployment. Drawn from volunteers, conscripts, and the resocialized, it fought in every major war of its era.
Long read · joe
Dominion Royal Guard
The Royal Guard were an elite unit within the Terran Dominion, drawn from Arcturus Mengsk's most loyal followers and entrusted with the security of Korhal Palace. Also known as the Elite Guard and Imperial Guard, they grew out of the Sons of Korhal.
Long read · joe
Donny Vermillion
Donny Vermillion was a Universal News Network anchor and devoted loyalist of Arcturus Mengsk who spread Dominion propaganda during the Second Great War. A breakdown, a crisis on the infested world of Tartarus, and a brush with rogue spectres slowly humbled his pro-Mengsk fervor.
Long read · joe
Dragoon
The dragoon is a protoss four-legged walker that gives a second life to Templar too gravely wounded to fight on foot. The crippled warrior is transplanted into the exoskeleton, where their psionic mastery directs its ranged phase disruptors.
Long read · joe
Drone
The drone was the zerg worker strain, gathering resources and morphing its own body into the living structures of the Swarm. A single drone, descended from one surviving larva, could seed an entire reborn zerg colony.
Long read · joe
Dropship
The dropship was a heavily armored terran aerospace transport built to ferry troops and vehicles into combat. Designed by the Confederacy and in use by 2480, it was carried forward by the Dominion before most were converted into medivac dropships.
Long read · joe
Dylar IV
Dylar IV was a planet in the Koprulu sector that served as a Core World of the Terran Confederacy and the home of the Dylarian Shipyards. Once the site of an ancient protoss mining colony, it passed in turn to the Confederacy, the zerg, and the Terran Dominion.
Long read · joe
Dylarian Shipyards
The Dylarian Shipyards were a vast orbital complex above Dylar IV, used by the Terran Confederacy to build and maintain warships. They were the site of Raynor's Raiders hijacking the Hyperion and of a later United Earth Directorate raid that destroyed the yards.
Long read · joe
Earth
Earth, called Old Earth by the terrans of the Koprulu sector, was the birthworld of humanity and the seat of the United Powers League and its successor, the United Earth Directorate. It exiled the prisoners who founded the Koprulu colonies and later sent a fleet to conquer them.
Long read · joe
Edmund Duke
Edmund Duke was a Terran Confederacy general in command of Alpha Squadron and a member of one of the Old Families of Tarsonis. After his rescue by the Sons of Korhal he defected to Arcturus Mengsk, becoming the chief military tactician of the Terran Dominion until his death at Sarah Kerrigan's hands.
Long read · joe
Egon Stetmann
Egon Stetmann was the chief science advisor of Raynor's Raiders, a brilliant and eccentric young scientist who fled the Terran Dominion after sabotaging a cyborg program. Years stranded on Bel'Shir under terrazine exposure unhinged his mind and led him to build the Mecha Swarm.
Long read · joe
Ehlna
Ehlna was a moon sacred to the Dark Templar, the first world they settled after their exile from Aiur. Home to a Xel'Naga warp gate and the shrine of Alys'aril, it held khaydarin crystals shaped by the moon's unique energies.
Long read · joe
Emil Narud
Emil Narud and Samir Duran were two of the many names worn across the millennia by a xel'naga in service to Amon. Posing as a Confederate warrior, a UED advisor, and a Dominion scientist, he manipulated the wars of the Koprulu sector to engineer the hybrid and resurrect his master.
Long read · joe
Emperor's Fall: the UED conquest of Korhal
Emperor's Fall was the climactic battle of the United Earth Directorate's invasion of Korhal, in which the UED stormed Augustgrad, toppled Arcturus Mengsk, and seized the Terran Dominion capital. Though Jim Raynor and a protoss fleet snatched Mengsk from execution at the last moment, the UED took the planet and made it the staging ground for the rest of their campaign.
Long read · joe
End War
The End War was the galaxy-wide crusade waged by the fallen xel'naga Amon after his resurrection. It saw the corruption of the Khala, the fall of Aiur and Shakuras, the unification of the protoss under Artanis, and the final destruction of Amon in the Void by Sarah Kerrigan.
Long read · joe
Endion
Endion was a forest moon orbiting Bellum IV that served the protoss as a secluded research retreat for millennia. During the End War it was infested by Amon's brood and ultimately scoured of all life by a purification beam fired from Cybros.
Long read · joe
Essence
Essence was the genetic information carried by all life and the key to zerg evolution. By consuming or assimilating their prey, the zerg took the essence of other creatures and folded their desired strengths into the Swarm, an ability that first drew the fallen xel'naga Amon to enslave them.
Long read · joe
Eye of the Storm
Eye of the Storm was the final battle of the Great War, in which a combined protoss and terran force struck at the Overmind in its nesting ground on Aiur. Executor Tassadar sacrificed himself by driving the Gantrithor into the creature while channeling dark templar energy, destroying the Overmind and setting the stage for the Brood War.
Long read · joe
Fall of Aiur
The Fall of Aiur was the zerg invasion of the protoss homeworld during the Great War, fought at the same time as the Protoss Civil War. Tassadar destroyed the Overmind, but the Swarm had already claimed too much of Aiur, killing seventy percent of the protoss and forcing the survivors to abandon their world.
Long read · joe
Fenix
Fenix was a protoss zealot and praetor of the Protoss Defense Forces, one of the most celebrated warriors in protoss history. He fell at Antioch and was reborn in a dragoon shell, died again to Kerrigan's betrayal on Korhal, and was later replicated as the purifier Talandar.
Long read · joe
Feral Zerg
Feral zerg were zerg that had fallen outside the control of any higher entity, reverting to predatory instinct and attacking everything around them. Drawn to psionic emanations and able to survive without creep, they recurred across the Koprulu Sector wherever a cerebrate, broodmother, or the will of Kerrigan was lost.
Long read · joe
Firebat
The firebat was a terran close-quarters infantry trooper armed with arm-mounted flamethrowers, fielded from the Confederacy through the Dominion and drawn largely from resocialized criminals and pyromaniacs.
Long read · joe
Gabriel Tosh
Gabriel Tosh was a terran spectre, once a devoted Dominion ghost whose psyche was shattered on Shi and reshaped by terrazine into a nihilistic rebel. He led Project Shadowblade against Arcturus Mengsk and allied with Raynor's Raiders before Nova Terra killed him.
Long read · joe
Gerard DuGalle
Gerard DuGalle was a highly decorated admiral of the United Earth Directorate who commanded the Expeditionary Fleet sent to subdue the Koprulu sector during the Brood War. Manipulated by Samir Duran into ordering the death of his lifelong friend Alexei Stukov, he was defeated by Sarah Kerrigan and took his own life as the fleet fell.
Long read · joe
Ghost Program
The Ghost Program was the project for the training and use of terran ghosts, psychically gifted operatives trained from infancy as commandos, assassins, and nuclear strike coordinators. Created by the Terran Confederacy and later adopted by the Terran Dominion, it relied on memory wipes and psychic limiters to enforce loyalty over its conscripts.
Long read · joe
Ghost
Ghosts were the feared psionic covert operatives of the terran sector, drawn from psychically gifted individuals, trained from infancy as assassins, and used to guide nuclear strikes for the Confederacy and the Dominion.
Long read · joe
Glacius
Glacius was an oceanic world that housed a secret Khalai Caste research facility where the Purifier Revival Program was developed. During the End War the Daelaam fought the Tal'darim there to recover the prototype Purifier data.
Long read · joe
Glassing
Glassing, also called planet cracking or purification, was a protoss war technique used to destroy all life on a planetary surface, usually to eradicate the zerg. Carried out by ships firing massive energy beams, it could disperse a world's atmosphere and burn through its crust.
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Golden Armada
The Golden Armada was the greatest fleet of protoss vessels ever constructed, based on Shakuras and built by order of Hierarch Artanis to retake Aiur. After spearheading the invasion of the protoss homeworld, it was corrupted by Amon and turned against the Koprulu sector before being freed.
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Goliath
The goliath was a bipedal terran combat walker armed with twin autocannons and Hellfire missiles. Built for both ground and air defense, it served the Confederacy, the Sons of Korhal and the Terran Dominion across the sector's major wars.
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Gorgon-class battlecruiser
The Gorgon-class was the most powerful battlecruiser ever fielded by the terrans of the Koprulu sector, larger than the Behemoth-class and able to withstand multiple Yamato cannon hits. Its best-known example was the Bucephalus, outfitted as the Terran Dominion flagship.
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Grand Preserver
The Grand Preservers were the highest of the protoss preservers, rare Khalai who held the memories of every protoss ever joined to the Khala. They advised the Conclave, urged the building of the arkships, and in Grand Preserver Rohana survived to guide the reclamation of Aiur.
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Great Fleet
The Great Fleet was the principal military space force of the protoss, the fleet that carried their power across the stars. Built around the carrier and tended by the Auriga Tribe, it was shattered in the fall of Aiur and rebuilt over the wars that followed.
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Great War
The Great War was the first open conflict between the protoss and the zerg in the Koprulu Sector, with the terrans caught between two ancient enemies. It saw the fall of the Confederacy, the rise of the Terran Dominion, the infestation of Sarah Kerrigan, and the death of the Overmind over Aiur.
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Guardian
The guardian was the anti-ground aspect of the zerg mutalisk, a long range artillery flier converted from an existing mutalisk. In numbers it could lay waste to a base and ground force, but it had no defense against enemy aircraft.
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Guild Wars
The Guild Wars were the economic and military conflict between the Terran Confederacy and the Kel-Morian Combine over the mineral wealth of the Koprulu sector. Fought from 2485 to 2489, they ended in Confederate supremacy, the appropriation of the mining guilds, and the founding of the Umojan Protectorate.
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Gystt
Gystt was a world purified by the protoss and long thought irreparable, until Overqueen Zagara restored it to life using the adostra. It became the site of the One-Day War and, afterward, Zagara's hive world.
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Hank Harnack
Henry "Hank" Harnack was a hot-tempered Confederate Marine Corps firebat of the Heaven's Devils during the Guild Wars. A rival turned friend of Jim Raynor, he wielded his flamethrower through the campaigns on Turaxis II until he burned to death during the Devils' final desertion.
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Haven
Haven was a temperate world near protoss space where refugees from Agria resettled during the Second Great War, only to draw a protoss purification fleet when a zerg infestation virus surfaced among them.
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Heaven's Devils: the famed First Squad of the Guild Wars
The Heaven's Devils were the most celebrated squad of the Confederate Special Tactics and Mission Platoon, formed at the Battle of Turaxis II during the Guild Wars and counting Tychus Findlay and Jim Raynor among its members.
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Hellbat
The hellbat, formerly called the battle hellion, was a transforming terran flame tank built by the Terran Dominion as an upgrade to the hellion. It could reconfigure between a fast vehicle and an armored mechanized walker armed with a napalm-spraying flamethrower.
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Hellion
The hellion was a fast, lightly armored terran raider built on a four-wheel chassis and armed with an infernal flamethrower, used by the Dominion Armed Forces as its primary scouting vehicle and later upgraded into the transforming hellbat.
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Hercules
The Hercules-class dropship was a terran heavy airlift vehicle, a Raynor's Raiders combat variant of a commercial cargo transport with a reinforced superstructure derived from zerg biology, capable of carrying far more troops and vehicles than a standard dropship.
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High Templar
High templar are the most honored members of the protoss race, veteran Templar who forgo physical combat to develop their psionic powers into potent weapons. They wield psionic storms, drain energy from their foes, and may merge with another to become an archon.
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Horace Warfield
Horace Warfield was a Terran Dominion general and commander-in-chief of the Dominion Armed Forces during the Second Great War. A longtime friend of Arcturus Mengsk, he led the war against the zerg, was saved by Jim Raynor on Char, and was killed by Sarah Kerrigan defending the wounded of his command.
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Hostile environment suit
The hostile environment suit, also called the skinsuit or stealth suit, was the standard combat gear of terran ghosts, a light-refracting nano-fiber suit that augmented its wearer's strength, channeled psionic power, and granted the cloaking ability for which ghosts were feared.
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Hybrid Reaver
The hybrid reaver was an extremely powerful zerg-based hybrid, capable of basic speech and able to exert mind control over zerg and terrans alike. It served as a staple of Amon's hybrid armies throughout the End War.
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Hybrid
The hybrid were a perverse fusion of protoss and zerg, engineered as the ultimate weapons of the fallen xel'naga Amon. Described as false xel'naga, they were central to his plan to end the Infinite Cycle and remake creation in his image.
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Hydralisk
The hydralisk was a versatile zerg combat strain evolved from the peaceful slothien, armored in carapace plates and able to launch volleys of armor-piercing spines from its upper body. Forming the backbone of the Swarm's onslaughts, the hydralisk symbolized zerg power to terrans more than any other strain.
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Hyperion
The Hyperion was a Behemoth-class battlecruiser that became the flagship of Jim Raynor and his Raiders, a souped-up warship capable of warp jumps from within a planetary atmosphere.
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Immortal
The immortal is an advanced protoss cybernetic war machine that succeeded the dragoon, housing some of the most revered and venerable warriors of the protoss military. Consecrated in the name of Adun, immortals are protected by hardened shields and a dying breed.
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Infested Terran
Infested terrans were a breed of zerg created when the Swarm infected a human with a hyper-evolutionary virus, consuming the victim's mind and remaking the body. Most became disposable suicide bombers, but the zerg eventually perfected sentient infested terrans who served as consorts, generals, and living weapons.
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Infestor
The infestor is a burrowing Zerg support strain evolved from the borbu matriarch, capable of moving while burrowed, seizing control of enemies with a neural parasite, and disgorging infested marines and larvae on the battlefield.
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The Infinite Cycle
The Infinite Cycle was the great pattern by which the xel'naga renewed themselves, seeding the universe with life until two species of purity of form and essence merged to inherit their power. Amon's refusal to die for the cycle set off the wars of the Koprulu sector.
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Izsha
Izsha was a one-of-a-kind zerg advisor in service to Sarah Kerrigan, grafted to her leviathan, where she stored the Queen of Blades' memories and filtered the Swarm's endless sensory data. She stood as a midpoint between Kerrigan's cold reason and the feral nature of the zerg.
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Jackson Hauler
Jackson Hauler, also known as Doctor Cole Bennett, was a powerful psychic who murdered his way into the Confederate Marine Corps and rose to command the black-ops Nova Squadron. Betrayed by the Terran Dominion, he plotted a coup against Arcturus Mengsk before dying at Gehenna Station.
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Jacobs Installation
The Jacobs Installation was a Confederate facility on Mar Sara where the Terran Confederacy experimented on captured zerg and stored secret weapons data. A raid led by Jim Raynor seized that data, which the Sons of Korhal used to build the psi emitter.
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Jake Ramsey
Jacob Jefferson Ramsey was a maverick terran archaeologist who became the unwilling host of the protoss preserver Zamara. Carrying her memories and hunted by Valerian Mengsk, the dark archon Ulrezaj, and the Queen of Blades, he was drawn into the secret history of the protoss and the xel'naga.
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Jim Raynor
James Eugene Raynor was a farm boy turned Confederate marine, marshal, and rebel who helped bring down the Terran Confederacy and later fought its successor, the Terran Dominion, becoming one of the few terrans to ally long-term with the protoss.
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Judicator Caste
The Judicator Caste was a collection of protoss tribes who acted as the leaders and statesmen of their people, descended from the first tribes to join the Khala. Governed through the Judicator Assembly and the Conclave, they shaped protoss policy until the caste was shattered and finally dissolved.
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Kaldir
Kaldir was a frozen moon of Midr IV, among the coldest places in the Koprulu sector, where Sarah Kerrigan infested the world to make the Swarm resistant to cold and clashed with a stranded protoss expedition.
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Karass
Karass was a protoss high templar and praetor of the Daelaam whose mastery of psionic powers was considered legendary. On the eve of the Second Great War he led a force to Ulaan and sacrificed himself and his troops to cover the escape of Dark Prelate Zeratul.
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Karax
Karax was a Khalai phase-smith and one of the most precise of protoss engineers. Over the war against Amon he rose above his worker origins to command the Spear of Adun's systems, was named a templar in defiance of the caste system, and helped build the means of Amon's defeat.
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Kate Lockwell
Kate Lockwell was a reporter and later chief anchor for the Universal News Network. Long a loyal supporter of the Terran Dominion, she gradually confronted its propaganda, publicly challenging Arcturus Mengsk and covering the Koprulu Sector through decades of war.
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Kath Toom
Kath Toom was a telepathic terran ghost, a member of the Ghost Academy's Team Blue alongside Nova Terra and Gabriel Tosh. Mind-wiped into Agent X52735N, she was later captured and transformed into a spectre by Project Shadowblade before General Cole Bennett killed her.
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Kel-Morian Combine
The Kel-Morian Combine was a terran business conglomerate that governed Moria and its colonies and controlled the sector's mining guilds. One of the three major terran nations, it fought the Confederacy in the Guild Wars and survived as a corporate power into the Dominion era.
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Kerrigan's Swarm: the Zerg Swarm under the Queen of Blades
Kerrigan's Swarm was the faction of the Zerg Swarm led by Sarah Kerrigan, the Queen of Blades, formed when the death of the Overmind split the leaderless zerg and Kerrigan seized control of the broods she would command through the Brood War, the Second Great War, and the war against Amon.
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Keystone
The Keystone, also known as the xel'naga artifact, was an ancient relic that could channel and redistribute energy, matter, essence, and consciousness. A major catalyst of the Second Great War, it de-infested the Queen of Blades, was twisted toward Amon's resurrection, and was finally used to banish him.
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Khala
The Khala was the communal psionic link and guiding philosophy of the Khalai protoss, founded by the mystic Khas to end the Aeon of Strife. It bound its adherents in shared emotion for over a thousand years until Amon corrupted it, forcing the protoss to sever it forever.
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Khalai Caste
The Khalai Caste were the working class of the Protoss Empire, the artisans, scientists, and builders who formed the great majority of the protoss population. Long regarded as the lowest of the three castes, they were dissolved during the End War when the age of the caste system came to an end.
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Khalai
The Khalai were the protoss who followed the Khala, the kindred also known as the Aiur protoss or Templar. United by the Khala out of the Aeon of Strife, they founded the Protoss Empire, fled to Shakuras after the fall of Aiur, and endured the loss of the Khala during the End War.
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Khalani
Khalani was the telepathic language of the protoss, spoken mind to mind rather than aloud and rendered in writing through a glyph-based script. Both the Khalai and the Nerazim spoke it, and its words gave name to the deepest concepts of protoss culture, from the Khala itself to the honorific En Taro.
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Khalis Crystal
The Khalis is a khaydarin crystal shard cut by the xel'naga and entrusted to the Sargas Tribe, infused over time with Nerazim energies and carried into exile by the Dark Templar. With its Khalai counterpart, the Uraj, it activated the xel'naga temple on Shakuras during the Brood War.
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Khaydarin Crystal
Khaydarin crystals were psi-active psionic artifacts left behind by the xel'naga on many worlds. Used by the protoss to power their technology and strengthen their psionic bond, the crystals restored the Khala at the end of the Aeon of Strife and remained central to protoss civilization.
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Koprulu Expeditionary Force
The Koprulu Expeditionary Force was the protoss fleet, commanded by Executor Tassadar, that first answered the zerg invasion of the Koprulu sector and was ordered by the Conclave to burn the infested terran worlds.
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Koprulu Sector
The Koprulu sector was a remote region of space on the galactic fringe, settled by exiled humans and once spanned by the Protoss Empire. It became the battleground of the terrans, protoss, and zerg across the Great War, the Brood War, and beyond.
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Korhal
Korhal, often called Korhal IV, was a wealthy Confederate core world whose bid for independence triggered the Rebellion of Korhal and its destruction by nuclear bombardment. Rebuilt by Arcturus Mengsk, it became the heavily fortified capital of the Terran Dominion.
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Larva
The larva was the base zerg unit from which all other strains and structures were born. Carrying the genetic code of the entire Swarm in its DNA, a single larva could pupate into any breed the hive required, and the first zerg the terrans ever encountered.
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Leviathan-class battlecruiser
The Leviathan-class was an early type of terran battlecruiser that had largely been replaced by the Behemoth-class by the start of the 26th century. It could travel through warp space, but its auxiliary craft ports sat dangerously close to the bridge, leaving the class vulnerable to enemy boarding actions.
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Leviathan
The leviathan was a massive airborne zerg breed that served as the Swarm's equivalent of a capital ship. Measured at around eleven kilometers long and capable of deep-space and warp travel, it became Sarah Kerrigan's mobile base of operations after her return to the zerg.
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Liberator
The liberator was a terran air unit developed to secure aerial superiority, armed with twin anti-air missile launchers and able to transform into a stationary platform mounting a heavy plasma cannon strong enough to pierce a thor's armor.
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Lio Travski
Lio Travski was a hab-addicted ghost trainee whose technopathic gift let him command machines with his mind. After dying at the Ghost Academy, his consciousness survived as an artificial intelligence, and he became a key agent first for Project Shadowblade and later for Nova Terra.
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Lisa Cassidy
Petty Officer Lisa "Doc" Cassidy was a Colonial Fleet medic attached to the Heaven's Devils during the Guild Wars, a skilled doctor and crab addict coerced into spying on the platoon by Colonel Javier Vanderspool. Her betrayal exposed the squad before she was killed in the crossfire at Korsy.
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Long Sleep
The Long Sleep was the centuries-defining journey during which four supercarriers loaded with cryogenically frozen prisoners were exiled from Earth, drifted blind through warp space, and crash-landed in the Koprulu sector, founding the colonies from which all terran civilization descended.
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Lurker
The lurker is an arachnid Zerg strain evolved from the hydralisk that attacks only while burrowed, erupting waves of super-dense spines from beneath the ground to impale anything caught above it.
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Malcolm Kelerchian
Malcolm Kelerchian was a terran detective turned ghost wrangler, the man responsible for bringing Nova Terra into the Ghost Program. Bound to a job he hated, he survived Tarsonis and the spectre crisis and grew close to the agent he had once hunted down.
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Mar Sara
Mar Sara was a backwater mining colony and Confederate core world in the Sara system, among the first planets overrun by the zerg and later glassed by the protoss. It was where Jim Raynor's open rebellion against the Terran Dominion began.
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Marauder
The marauder was a terran heavy infantry unit developed by the Dominion to support marines against armored targets, an armored trooper firing Punisher grenades from twin arm-mounted launchers.
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Matt Horner
Matthew Horner was an idealistic Sons of Korhal recruit who became captain of the Hyperion and Jim Raynor's loyal first officer, serving as the conscience of Raynor's Raiders before rising to admiral of the reformed Terran Dominion fleet.
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Max Zander
Max Zander was a Confederate marine of the Heaven's Devils during the Guild Wars, a slum-born mechanic and grenadier known for his oversized loadout and his habit of risking himself to protect civilians. Colonel Javier Vanderspool murdered him for witnessing his treachery.
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Medic
The medic, or combat physician, was a terran support trooper who healed friendly biological ground units with arm-mounted trauma gear and medical nanobots, fielded from the Confederacy through the Dominion and considered an indispensable battlefield asset.
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Medivac
The medivac was a terran aerospace transport that doubled as a flying triage station, healing wounded troops while ferrying personnel and vehicles into combat. Ordered into service by Arcturus Mengsk, it became a Dominion staple.
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Meinhoff
Meinhoff was a high-UV mining planet where Rory Swann's outfit fought free of Kel-Morian control. Once a paradise world, it became a refugee staging point during the Second Great War and the scene of a zerg virus outbreak cleared by Raynor's Raiders.
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Mengsk's Uprising
Mengsk's Uprising was the rebellion waged by Arcturus Mengsk and his Sons of Korhal against the Terran Confederacy. It overthrew the Confederacy as the dominant terran power of the Koprulu sector and laid the groundwork for the Terran Dominion.
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Michael Liberty
Michael Liberty was a terran news reporter whose pursuit of the truth carried him from the Confederate press to the Sons of Korhal and finally into open defiance of the Terran Dominion. Through pirate broadcasts and the Liberty Manifesto he became the most persistent voice against Arcturus Mengsk.
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Mira Han
Mira Han was a terran mercenary, crime lord, and leader of Mira's Marauders. Forced into marriage with Matt Horner after a poker game, she ruled the underworld of Deadman's Rock and lent her forces to the rebels and later the Dominion against Amon.
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Moebius Corps
Moebius Corps was the military arm of the Moebius Foundation. After the death of Emil Narud and the rise of Amon, its soldiers were enslaved by the hybrid and turned into mindless thralls who waged a crusade to destroy all life in the sector.
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Moebius Foundation
The Moebius Foundation was a research group ostensibly devoted to archaeology and the study of xel'naga sites. Owned by Valerian Mengsk and led by Doctor Emil Narud, it secretly bred protoss-zerg hybrids and was ultimately enslaved by Amon.
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Mohandar
Mohandar was the aged leader of the Nerazim and a member of the protoss Hierarchy, a close ally of Matriarch Raszagal who guided Vorazun and held the dark templar within the Daelaam until his death at rebel hands.
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Monlyth
Monlyth was a protoss shrine-moon held by the Tal'darim, a site of ancient xel'naga relics and a hidden piece of the Keystone. During the Second Great War it was laid waste as the Swarm and Raynor's Raiders fought over the relic it guarded.
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Moria
Moria was an exceptionally large mining world in the Koprulu sector, settled by the survivors of the crashed supercarrier Argo and grown into the industrial base of operations of the Kel-Morian Combine.
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Mothership
The mothership was among the most powerful warships in the protoss arsenal, a vast support vessel that served as the flagship of the Golden Armada. Designed during the Golden Age of Expansion as a deep-space explorer, it was later armed and turned to war.
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Mutalisk
The mutalisk was the primary airborne strain of the zerg, evolved from the mantis screamer and able to travel through atmosphere and deep space alike. Communicating by scent and attacking with parasitic glaive wurms, mutalisks wheeled across the skies in vast numbers over zerg nests and forces.
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Narud
Narud was a xel'naga who served the fallen dark god Amon, and who used the aliases Samir Duran and Emil Narud across millennia of manipulation. He goaded the terran, protoss, and zerg into war, bred the hybrid, and engineered the events that would resurrect his master.
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Neosteel
Neosteel was an exceptionally durable material used by the terrans for everything from battlecruiser hulls and CMC armor to bunkers and personal weapons. Its manufacture required catalytic elements, and to be "like neosteel" was a terran idiom for great strength of will.
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Nerazim
The Nerazim, known to outsiders as the Dark Templar, are the protoss tribes who shunned the Khala, severed their nerve cords, and drew their power from the Void instead. Banished from Aiur, they became masters of shadow and exile before reuniting with their kin under the Daelaam.
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New Folsom
New Folsom was a deadly, geologically rich planet whose Confederate mine became New Folsom Prison, a high-security penitentiary that held members of the Sons of Korhal and was later broken open by Raynor's Raiders.
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New Recruit Processing and Acclimation Center
The New Recruit Processing and Acclimation Center was the facility where applicants to the Dominion Armed Forces sat an entrance exam gauging their reaction to stress, after which each recruit was assigned to a unit and told where to report for active duty.
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Nova Terra
November Annabella Terra was an Old Family heiress whose latent psionic powers erupted when rebels murdered her family, leading her into the Confederate underworld, the Ghost Program, and a career as one of the Terran Dominion's most powerful covert agents.
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Nydus Worm
The nydus worm was a zerg transport strain that tunneled beneath a battlefield to deliver Swarm forces to distant locations. An evolution of the nydus canal, it stretched its own body to line the tunnels it dug and emerged to disgorge zerg warriors far behind enemy lines.
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Nyon
Nyon was an executor of the Tal'darim who guarded sacred xel'naga relics during the Second Great War. He suffered a long string of defeats to Raynor's Raiders as they stole the components of a xel'naga device, and he died aboard his mothership trying to stop them.
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Observer
The observer was a small, stealthy robotic protoss reconnaissance drone, built to survey space, record events for the protoss archives, and reveal what was hidden. Cloaked and fragile, it was prized as much for what it could see as for what it could not be seen doing.
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Odin
The Odin was a Terran Dominion heavy combat walker and the prototype from which the smaller thor was derived. Developed in secret on Korhal, it was stolen by Raynor's Raiders and used to expose Arcturus Mengsk's war crimes.
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Old Families
The Old Families were the descendants of the commanders of the colony ship Nagglfar and the dynastic ruling houses of Tarsonis. Through control of the media, the economy, and the Confederate Council they dominated the Terran Confederacy for generations, until they were largely wiped out in the Fall of Tarsonis.
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Oracle
The oracle was an agile protoss support warship piloted by an order of young Nerazim devoted to understanding time, whose temporal sight let them detect hidden foes and whose pulsar beam struck hard at ground targets.
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Overlord
The overlord is a Zerg flyer evolved from the assimilated Gargantis proximae, serving the Swarm as a coordinator of lesser strains, a long-range sensory scout, an unmatched psionic transmitter, and a deep-space transport.
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Overmind
The Overmind was the sentient hive mind of the Zerg Swarm, created by Amon to assimilate the protoss. Though bound by an overriding directive, it secretly worked to free the zerg from its maker, engineering the Queen of Blades before falling to Tassadar above Aiur.
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Overseer
The overseer was a zerg strain evolved from the overlord, covered in highly evolved optical receptors that let it detect hidden and burrowed enemies. Through incorporated terran DNA it could also spawn changelings to infiltrate enemy forces.
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Phoenix
The phoenix was a protoss air superiority fighter built for speed and aerial harassment, rapidly replacing the older scouts and corsairs. Its patrols swept the outer rim of protoss territory, and its pilots developed dangerous tactics to survive when outnumbered.
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Preserver
Preservers were a very small group of Khalai protoss who held the memories of the dead within the Khala. Able to reach into the gestalt's deepest layers, they advised the Conclave for millennia until Ulrezaj's campaign hunted them nearly to extinction.
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Primal Zerg
The primal zerg were a zerg subspecies of the planet Zerus who never fell under the Overmind's control, retaining the physical and psychological traits of the original zerg. Reptilian rather than insectile, individual rather than hive-bound, they pursued an endless Darwinian struggle to ascend the evolutionary ladder.
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Project Shadowblade
Project Shadowblade was a classified Terran Dominion research program that used the psionic reagent terrazine to forge spectres, the volatile super-soldiers meant to surpass the ghost. Born under Arcturus Mengsk, it spawned a rebellion and outlived its creator.
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Protoss Civil War
The Protoss Civil War was an internal conflict that erupted on Aiur as the zerg overran the world, pitting Tassadar and his Dark Templar allies against the Conclave. It coincided with the Fall of Aiur and ended when Tassadar destroyed the Overmind.
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Protoss technology
Protoss technology blended psionic power with material engineering to produce the most advanced civilization in the galaxy, from energy weapons and teleportation armor to anti-gravity craft and the crystal sciences rooted in xel'naga learning.
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Protoss-Zerg Hybrid
The protoss-zerg hybrid was a fusion of the protoss and zerg species, bred as the ultimate weapon of the fallen xel'naga Amon and key to his plan to remake creation in his image. Described as false xel'naga, the hybrids were a perversion of the Infinite Cycle.
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Protoss
The protoss are an ancient, psionically gifted humanoid species native to Aiur, uplifted by the xel'naga and bound together by the Khala. Among the three dominant species of the galaxy, they are the most technologically advanced, and the most divided by their own history.
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Psi blade
The psi blade, or psionic blade, was an incandescent energy weapon manifested through psionic power, channeled by zealots and high templar through forearm focusers. It cut through almost any material, cauterized as it cut, and gave rise to the dark templar warp blade and to terran imitations.
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Psi emitter
The psi emitter was a portable terran device that broadcast the amplified neural imprint of a ghost to draw the zerg across interstellar distances. The Terran Confederacy built it as a containment weapon, and Arcturus Mengsk used it to annihilate the Confederacy at Tarsonis, an atrocity that haunted the Koprulu sector for years afterward.
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Psionic matrix
The psionic matrix, also called the psi-matrix, was a field of energy emanating from Aiur that powered protoss structures and units. Tapped through pylons and nexus links, it was first sparked in 500 B.C.E. and later dismantled to deny Amon the Golden Armada.
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Psionic powers
Psionic powers, also called psychic powers, were the ability to use the mind to induce paranormal phenomena. Present to varying degrees across the protoss, terran, zerg and hybrid, they underpinned the Khala, the Ghost Program and much of the technology and conflict of the Koprulu sector.
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Psionics
Psionics is the psychic power that runs through the three great species of the galaxy. It is the foundation of protoss civilization through the Khala and the Void, the latent gift that makes terrans valuable to the zerg, and the medium through which the Swarm itself communicates and is controlled.
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Purifiers
The Purifiers were an ancient robotic race created by the protoss Conclave, built from the recorded consciousnesses of the greatest warriors in protoss history. Once enslaved and banished, they were reactivated to fight Amon and joined the Daelaam as equals.
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Queen
The queen is a Zerg support strain derived from the Arachnis brood-keeper, bred to administrate hive clusters, oversee maturing broods, and serve as an infestation specialist. Two distinct forms exist across the history of the Swarm, the flying Great War queen and the ground-bound hive-master engineered after the Brood War.
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Raid on Char
The Raid on Char was a protoss strike on the zerg homeworld during the Brood War, mounted to recover the Khalis crystal from beneath the infant Overmind. Artanis and Zeratul, aided by Sarah Kerrigan, took the crystal and escaped.
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Raszagal
Raszagal was the Matriarch of the Dark Templar until the Brood War and one of the most powerful psychics in the galaxy. A survivor of the Discord who was saved by Adun, she dreamed of a reunited protoss race before Sarah Kerrigan enslaved her mind.
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Raven
The Raven was a terran support aircraft built around a powerful onboard AI and an internal manufacturing plant. Developed by the Terran Dominion to replace the costly science vessel, it served as a detector, defender and engineer.
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Raynor's Raiders
Raynor's Raiders were a terran military formation once led by Commander Jim Raynor, born from the wreckage of the Sons of Korhal after Arcturus Mengsk abandoned Sarah Kerrigan at the Battle of New Gettysburg. Flying the battlecruiser Hyperion, they fought the zerg, the United Earth Directorate and the Terran Dominion across two wars before helping bring Mengsk down.
Long read · joe
Raynor's Raiders: the rebel band of Jim Raynor
Raynor's Raiders were the terran rebel formation led by Jim Raynor, born from Raynor's Rangers after Arcturus Mengsk abandoned Sarah Kerrigan at New Gettysburg, waging a long insurgency against the Dominion from the battlecruiser Hyperion.
Long read · joe
Reaper
The reaper was a terran jet-pack infantry unit specializing in hit-and-run close-quarters combat, drawn largely from criminals resistant to neural resocialization and organized into the Dominion Reaper Corps.
Long read · joe
Reaver
The reaver is a protoss siege construct that carries no weapon of its own. Instead it houses a micro-manufacturing plant that produces small robotic drones called scarabs, and a single reaver can level a colony in minutes.
Long read · joe
Rebellion of Korhal
The Rebellion of Korhal was a terran independence movement based on the Confederate colony of Korhal IV, founded by Senator Angus Mengsk and later led by his son Arcturus. After the Confederacy destroyed Korhal with nuclear fire, the survivors reorganized as the Sons of Korhal.
Long read · joe
Reclamation of Aiur
The Reclamation of Aiur was the opening battle of the End War, an attempt by the Daelaam to retake the lost protoss homeworld. It ended in failure when Amon corrupted the Khala, and instead opened the way to a far larger conflict.
Long read · joe
Redstone III
Redstone III was a volcanic planet in the Koprulu sector contested by terran mining guilds before the Guild Wars. Abandoned by the Kel-Morian Combine during the Second Great War, it later hosted Gabriel Tosh's jorium mining operation.
Long read · joe
Reigel
Reigel was a cybernetically armed Terran Dominion scientist and weapons specialist who aided Nova Terra against the Defenders of Man. A former Moebius Foundation researcher driven to do good for the sector, he became a fugitive alongside Nova and later clashed with her over the fate of a cache of spectres.
Long read · joe
Resurrection IV
Resurrection IV was a semi-canonical episode of the Brood War era in which Jim Raynor and the ancient protoss Taldarin tracked the infested Alexei Stukov to Braxis, cured him of his zerg infestation with an Artanis-provided serum, and fled as the protoss purified the world.
Long read · joe
Roach
The roach was a heavily armored zerg ground strain evolved from the fast-healing zantar slug, able to spit corrosive acid and regenerate grievous wounds at high speed while burrowed. Tough and nearly impervious to small-arms fire, the roach anchored the Swarm's ground assaults alongside the zergling.
Long read · joe
Rory Swann
Rory Swann was a one-armed engineer and former miner who became the chief engineer of Jim Raynor's battlecruiser Hyperion. The soul of the ship, he kept the Raiders armed and operational through the Second Great War and went on to serve the new Dominion under Valerian Mengsk.
Long read · joe
Ryk Kydd
Ryk Kydd, born Ark Bennet of the Old Families, was a Confederate Marine Corps sniper of the Heaven's Devils during the Guild Wars and a friend of Jim Raynor. After deserting with Raynor and Tychus Findlay, he became an assassin for hire and was killed by the bounty hunter Ezekiel Daun.
Long read · joe
Samir Duran
Samir Duran and Emil Narud were two of the many names worn over the millennia by a xel'naga in service to the fallen Amon. Posing as a Confederate soldier, a UED advisor, a consort to Sarah Kerrigan, and a Dominion scientist, he manipulated terran, protoss, and zerg alike to engineer his master's return.
Long read · joe
Sara system
The Sara system was a star system in the Koprulu sector, unusual for holding two habitable planets, Mar Sara and Chau Sara. It was a Confederate frontier holding whose worlds became the first targets of the protoss purification that opened the Great War.
Long read · joe
Sarah Kerrigan
Sarah Kerrigan was a psychic terran who began as a Confederate ghost, rose to be second-in-command of the Sons of Korhal, and after Arcturus Mengsk abandoned her on Tarsonis was captured and infested by the Zerg Swarm to become the Queen of Blades.
Long read · joe
Science Vessel
The science vessel was a terran starship built for exploration and research that doubled as a battlefield support craft. Its detection, EMP and irradiation abilities made it valuable in war before the Dominion replaced it with the raven.
Long read · joe
Scourge
The scourge is a blind, suicidal aerial strain of the zerg that detonates itself against enemy starships in both atmosphere and the vacuum of space. A single scourge can destroy a fighter, and a handful can breach a starship hull.
Long read · joe
Scout
The scout is a protoss aerospace superiority and reconnaissance starfighter that served as the point guard of the protoss fleet from the Golden Age of Expansion until it began to give way to the phoenix.
Long read · joe
SCV
The T-280 space construction vehicle, or SCV, was the terran general-purpose engineering walker used across the Koprulu sector to build outposts, maintain space platforms, and harvest resources, and was regarded as a foundational unit of terran forces.
Long read · joe
Second Age
The Second Age was the era of protoss history that followed the founding of the Khala, when the warring tribes were reorganized into a unified caste society, rebuilt their homeworld of Aiur, and resumed the spacefaring expansion that carried their civilization across the stars.
Long read · joe
Second Great War
The Second Great War broke out in 2504 between the Zerg Swarm and the Terran Dominion, four years after the Brood War. It saw Sarah Kerrigan deinfested and then reborn in primal form, the death of Arcturus Mengsk, and the resurrection of the fallen xel'naga Amon.
Long read · joe
Selendis
Selendis is the protoss High Executor, a celebrated warrior who rose as the protege of Artanis to command the combined military forces of her people. She led the Golden Armada, fell briefly under Amon's thrall, and struggled to find purpose after the loss of the Khala.
Long read · joe
Sentry
The sentry is a protoss combat drone that supports frontline warriors by weaving light into force fields, guardian shields, and solid holograms. It was developed to offset the diminishing population of the protoss race.
Long read · joe
Shakuras
Shakuras was the twilight desert homeworld of the Nerazim, the Dark Templar who settled it after their exile from Aiur. It sheltered the Khalai refugees during the Brood War and was destroyed by its own people to deny it to Amon.
Long read · joe
Shel'na Kryhas: those who endure on Aiur
The Shel'na Kryhas, meaning "Those Who Endure," were protoss survivors stranded on Aiur after the warp gate was shut during the evacuation. Led by the templar Ladranix and composed mostly of Khalai, they sheltered in the ruins of Antioch and held out against the zerg.
Long read · joe
Siege Tank
The siege tank was a terran armored vehicle that could switch between a mobile combat mode and a static long-range artillery emplacement, developed by the Confederacy and carried forward by the Dominion.
Long read · joe
Sigmaris Prime
Sigmaris Prime was a Terran Dominion planet of the Koprulu sector. Its moon Valhalla housed a Dominion weapons center.
Long read · joe
Skygeirr Station
Skygeirr Station, also called Skygeirr Platform, was a secret Terran Dominion research facility where Doctor Emil Narud bred protoss-zerg hybrids in service of the fallen xel'naga Amon. It was destroyed when Sarah Kerrigan's Swarm attacked it during the Second Great War.
Long read · joe
Slayn
Slayn was the capital world of the Tal'darim, a dark and storm-wracked planet rich in the sacred gas terrazine. Once a jungle world, it became a barren bladeworld where the Tal'darim communed with Amon and waged the rite of Rak'Shir along the Chain of Ascension.
Long read · joe
Sons of Korhal
The Sons of Korhal was a terran resistance movement led by Arcturus Mengsk and dedicated to toppling the Terran Confederacy. Born from the destruction of Korhal, it grew into the dominant terran power and was reorganized into the Terran Dominion.
Long read · joe
Spear of Adun
The Spear of Adun was a protoss arkship, built during the Golden Age of Expansion to preserve protoss civilization through a great calamity and buried beneath Aiur for a time of need. Raised by Hierarch Artanis, it became the flagship of the Daelaam in the End War against Amon.
Long read · joe
Spectre
Spectres were terran special forces operatives whose psionic powers were enhanced by the reagent terrazine. Created in secret under Project Shadowblade, many were former ghosts pushed toward protoss levels of psionics, at the cost of addiction and unpredictable side effects.
Long read · joe
Stalker
The stalker is a Nerazim cybernetic war machine, a metal body animated by the shadow-essence of a Dark Templar warrior. Developed after the fall of Aiur, it can teleport across the battlefield and tears its targets apart with Void energy.
Long read · joe
Stone
Stone, codenamed Agent X74996R, was a powerful Terran Dominion ghost whose unusually resilient memory survived repeated mind wipes, and whose loyalty was bent and rewritten by the Defenders of Man before he chose, finally, to walk away from the program.
Long read · joe
Swarm Host
The swarm host was a zerg siege strain that burrowed into the ground and birthed an endless supply of short-lived locusts from an incubator on its back. Adapted by Abathur from the primal hosts of Zerus, it gave the Swarm a living artillery piece.
Long read · joe
Tal'darim
The Tal'darim were a warlike sect of protoss taken from Aiur by Amon before the Aeon of Strife. Calling themselves the Forged and the Chosen, they spent ages worshipping the fallen xel'naga as their god until Highlord Alarak turned them against him.
Long read · joe
Talandar
Talandar was a protoss purifier built from a brain scan of the Templar hero Fenix. Awakened during the End War believing himself to be Fenix, he came to accept that he was a separate being and chose his own name, becoming a leader among the purifiers of the Daelaam.
Long read · joe
Tal'darim: the fanatical protoss sect of Amon
The Tal'darim, known as the Forged or the Chosen, were a fanatical and warlike sect of protoss taken from Aiur by Amon before the Aeon of Strife, who served the fallen xel'naga for ages before Highlord Alarak turned them against him.
Long read · joe
Taldarin
Taldarin was an ancient protoss praetor and a personal friend of the hero Adun. Mortally injured long ago and preserved in stasis, he became the first warrior ever transferred into a dragoon shell so that he could continue to fight the enemies of the protoss.
Long read · joe
Talen Ayers
Talen Ayers was a famous research geneticist and author whose bestselling books on xenobiology made him a household name before he was abducted into the Dominion's secret Project Blackstone, where his doubts about Arcturus Mengsk and the fate of his daughter slowly hardened.
Long read · joe
Tarsonis
Tarsonis was the cradle of terran civilization in the Koprulu sector and the seat of the Terran Confederacy. Its fall to the zerg in 2500, engineered by Arcturus Mengsk, brought down the Confederacy and left Sarah Kerrigan to the Swarm.
Long read · joe
Tassadar
Tassadar was a protoss high templar and executor who led the expeditionary force that made first contact with the zerg. He broke with the Conclave to spare humanity, allied with the Dark Templar, and sacrificed himself aboard the Gantrithor to destroy the Overmind above Aiur.
Long read · joe
Tempest
The tempest is an immense protoss capital ship developed to answer the long-range weaponry of the zerg and terrans. Its kinetic matrix launches a charged projectile across distances that exceed the ship's own sensors.
Long read · joe
Templar Caste
The Templar Caste was the order of protoss warriors who followed the disciplines of the Khala to ever-escalating pinnacles of psionic power. In service first to the Protoss Empire and then to the Daelaam, they produced some of the most powerful individuals in the Koprulu Sector.
Long read · joe
Terran Confederacy
The Terran Confederacy, also called the Confederacy of Man, was the dominant human government of the Koprulu sector before the Great War, ruled by the Old Families of Tarsonis and brought down by the zerg invasion and the Sons of Korhal rebellion.
Long read · joe
Terran Dominion
The Terran Dominion was the human empire founded by Arcturus Mengsk on the ruins of the Terran Confederacy, crowned from Korhal and ruled first through oppression and propaganda, then reformed under his son Valerian after the Second Great War.
Long read · joe
Terran Marine
The marine was the foundational infantry unit of the terran nations of the Koprulu sector, an armored soldier in a powered combat suit who formed the bulk of most front-line forces from the Confederacy through the Dominion.
Long read · joe
Terran technology
Terran technology was the engineering of humanity in the Koprulu Sector, a paradoxical middle road that advanced through constant conflict and gave the terrans adaptable armies, FTL transmission and sensors, and an ever-growing arsenal of weapons and vehicles.
Long read · joe
Terran
The terrans are the descendants of a failed 23rd century colony mission from Earth, a young and highly factionalized species with latent psionic potential. Despite endless wars among themselves and with their alien neighbors, they stand as one of the three dominant species of the galaxy.
Long read · joe
Terrazine
Terrazine was a potent psionic reagent of Void origin, sought by protoss, zerg, and terrans alike. The Tal'darim revered it as a sacred gift from the xel'naga, while terran researchers used it to forge the unstable psychics known as spectres, at terrible cost to the minds of those exposed to it.
Long read · joe
Thor
The thor was a huge and heavily armed terran siege walker, one of the most powerful mechanical units in the Dominion Armed Forces, derived from the Odin prototype of the Terran Dominion Thor Project.
Long read · joe
Tychus Findlay
Tychus Findlay was a terran marine with a larcenous streak, an old friend of Jim Raynor from the Guild Wars who became an outlaw, served decades in prison, and was released by Arcturus Mengsk on a secret mission to assassinate the Queen of Blades.
Long read · joe
Typhon XI
Typhon XI was a remote, sparsely settled planet of the Koprulu sector that was destroyed in 2504 when its star went nova. Raynor's Raiders raced to recover a fragment of the Keystone from its Tal'darim guardians before the supernova struck.
Long read · joe
Tyrador
Tyrador was a terran system whose co-orbiting outer worlds, Tyrador VIII and Tyrador IX, served as core worlds and luxury resorts. Tyrador IX, ancient homeworld of the Ihan-rii protoss, became jointly owned by the Ihan-rii and the Terran Dominion after a zerg invasion.
Long read · joe
UED Expeditionary Fleet
The UED Expeditionary Fleet was the human strike force the United Earth Directorate sent to seize the Koprulu Sector during the Brood War. Commanded by Admiral Gerard DuGalle, it captured the second Overmind and briefly ruled the sector before being annihilated by the zerg.
Long read · joe
Ulaan
Ulaan was a moon once inhabited by the xel'naga, where fragments of an ancient prophecy were kept in separate shrines. In 2504 it drew both Zeratul and the Queen of Blades, whose forces clashed over the relics.
Long read · joe
Ulnar
Ulnar, the Temple of Unification, was the colossal xel'naga temple from which the ancient race seeded the universe with life. A resting place of the xel'naga and a portal to the Void, it became the stage for Amon's final ambush during the End War.
Long read · joe
Ulrezaj
Ulrezaj was a protoss dark archon formed from seven of the most powerful Dark Templar, bent on vengeance against the protoss who exiled his people. He founded the Aiur Tal'darim, hunted the preservers, and was finally trapped in a crystal alongside the preserver Zamara.
Long read · joe
Ultralisk
The ultralisk was the most powerful ground strain the zerg possessed, a massive living battering ram evolved from the docile brontolith and armed with near-indestructible kaiser blades. Heavily armored and able to charge through protoss force fields, the ultralisk served as the Swarm's siegebreaker.
Long read · joe
Umoja
Umoja was a fertile world in the Koprulu sector and the capital of the Umojan Protectorate, a fiercely independent terran nation known for its small government, cutting-edge technology, and long opposition to the Terran Confederacy and Dominion.
Long read · joe
Umojan Protectorate
The Umojan Protectorate was the nationalized militia and interstellar political entity of Umoja and nearby independent colonies. Fiercely independent and technologically advanced, it opposed the Confederacy and the Dominion while sheltering refugees and dissidents.
Long read · joe
United Earth Directorate
The United Earth Directorate was the militaristic government of Earth that sent an expeditionary fleet into the Koprulu sector during the Brood War to enslave the second Overmind and subjugate the terran factions, only to be destroyed by Kerrigan's Swarm.
Long read · joe
Universal News Network
The Universal News Network, or UNN, was the dominant terran media organization of the Koprulu sector. Headquartered on Korhal and Tarsonis, it veered between acting as a Confederate mouthpiece and antagonizing the government, and it served the Terran Dominion in the same fraught role.
Long read · joe
Uraj Crystal
The Uraj is a khaydarin crystal shard cut by the xel'naga and entrusted to the Akilae Tribe, infused over time with the energies of the Khala. With its Dark Templar counterpart, the Khalis, it was used to activate the xel'naga temple on Shakuras during the Brood War.
Long read · joe
Urun
Urun was the proud, traditionalist leader of the Auriga Tribe and a member of the protoss Hierarchy who later commanded the carrier Saalok's Eye and died fighting the Niadra Brood on Adena.
Long read · joe
Valerian Mengsk
Valerian Mengsk was the archaeologist son and heir of Arcturus Mengsk who allied with Jim Raynor to deinfest Sarah Kerrigan, succeeded his father as Emperor of the Terran Dominion, and sought to rule more justly than the man before him.
Long read · joe
Valkyrie
The Valkyrie missile frigate was a United Earth Directorate anti-fighter spacecraft that arrived in the Koprulu sector during the Brood War. Armored and salvo-firing, it later served terran factions and inspired the Liberator.
Long read · joe
Vardona
Vardona was a temperate core world of the Terran Confederacy and later the Terran Dominion, the birthplace of General Carolina Davis and the base from which she ran the Defenders of Man before her downfall.
Long read · joe
Vespene gas
Vespene gas was a hydrocarbon compound and the most plentiful high-performance fuel in the galaxy, one of the foundational resources of the Koprulu sector. Prized by terrans for its energy rating, consumed raw by the zerg, and used by the protoss to power their psi-driven machines, it fueled the wars and economies of three races.
Long read · joe
Viking
The A2 Viking Armored Mechanical Hybrid was a terran combat vehicle that could transform between a ground assault walker and an air-superiority fighter, developed by the Terran Dominion to close gaps in terran anti-air defense after the Brood War.
Long read · joe
Viper
The viper was a zerg support flier evolved from the defiler template and perfected by Abathur. It blinded and disabled enemies, snatched them from high ground with a regurgitated proboscis, and siphoned energy from zerg structures to return to the fight.
Long read · joe
Void
The Void was a dark, cold manifestation of space separate from the material universe, the wellspring from which the Nerazim drew their psionic power and the realm in which the minds of the xel'naga endured after the death of their bodies. Its energy was unpredictable and lethal in sufficient quantity.
Long read · joe
Void Ray
The void ray was a protoss escort ship born from the union of Nerazim and Khalai technology, one of the first joint creations of the reunited protoss. It channeled the energies of both the Void and the Khala into a beam that grew more devastating the longer it burned.
Long read · joe
Void Seeker
Void Seeker was a star relic and the personal starship of the Dark Templar Zeratul. A small, dull-black vessel hidden by powerful illusions, it carried him across the galaxy in his long pursuit of the prophecy of Amon, until it was destroyed on Aiur.
Long read · joe
The Void
The Void was a dark, cold manifestation of space separate from the material universe, the birthplace of the xel'naga and the source of the Nerazim's shadow powers. It was also the only place a xel'naga could be killed for good.
Long read · joe
Vorazun
Vorazun was the Nerazim matriarch, daughter of Raszagal, and a skilled warrior fiercely devoted to her people's culture. She defended Shakuras, rose to Matriarch after the death of Mohandar, and became something close to a second-in-command to Artanis in the war against Amon.
Long read · joe
Vulture
The vulture was a lightly armored terran hover bike built for speed and scouting. Fast, reliable and cheap, it served as cavalry for the Confederacy and later the Dominion, and remained a favorite of pirates and raiders.
Long read · joe
War Pigs
The War Pigs were a band of terran mercenaries, originally a Confederacy penal program that sent condemned criminals on expendable missions. Hard-drinking and chaotic, they became some of the most dependable killers in the Koprulu sector.
Long read · joe
Warp gate
The warp gate, derived from the gateway, was a protoss structure that opened a rift to teleport warriors across light-years in seconds. Built on reverse-engineered xel'naga technology and powered by the psionic matrix of the pylons, it let the protoss reinforce distant battlefields almost instantly.
Long read · joe
Warp Prism
The warp prism was a flying protoss machine that carried troops across the battlefield by converting them to energy, and could deploy as a mobile focus for the psionic power matrix that sustains protoss structures.
Long read · joe
Widow Mine
The widow mine was a remotely controlled terran support weapon, a quadrupedal device that burrowed into the ground and launched a sentinel missile at any enemy that drew near. It was introduced into Dominion service as the next step in automated weaponry.
Long read · joe
Wraith
The Wraith was a terran cloaking-capable space superiority fighter used extensively across the Koprulu sector from the Guild Wars onward, prized for its maneuverability and stealth before being gradually supplanted by the Viking and Banshee.
Long read · joe
Xel'Naga
The xel'naga were a god-like race from the Void who seeded life across the universe and sought to perpetuate themselves through the Infinite Cycle. They created both the protoss and the zerg, and the rogue xel'naga Amon's bid to end the cycle drove the central conflicts of the Koprulu Sector.
Long read · joe
Xil
Xil was a barren desert world whose biosphere had been wiped out overnight long after a visit by the xel'naga. Its ruins drew the Tal'darim, a Moebius Foundation expedition, and Raynor's Raiders, who fought through the executor Nyon for an artifact buried in a xel'naga temple.
Long read · joe
Zagara
Zagara was the first of the broodmothers, created by Sarah Kerrigan on Char, and rose to become Overqueen of the Zerg Swarm. Once a merciless believer in the old ways, she inherited the Swarm after the End War and turned it toward the rebuilding of worlds.
Long read · joe
Zasz
Zasz was a clever and loyal zerg cerebrate who led the Garm Brood during the Great War. His assassination by Zeratul opened a fatal psionic link that revealed the location of Aiur to the Overmind.
Long read · joe
Zealot
Zealots are the lower-ranked Templar who form the backbone of the protoss military. Trained for decades in martial discipline and armed with psionic blades, they have served since before the Discord and are forbidden from using alien tissue or weaponry in combat.
Long read · joe
Zeratul
Zeratul was a revered Nerazim mystic and dark prelate who allied with Tassadar against the zerg, slew the cerebrate Zasz, and was manipulated by Kerrigan into killing Raszagal. His decades-long pursuit of the xel'naga prophecy shaped the fate of the protoss, and he gave his life freeing Artanis from Amon.
Long read · joe
Zerg Crusaders
The Zerg Crusaders were a zerg force active during the Great War that fought across Aridas to recover the Argus Stone, channeling it into the Supreme Being on Char after defeating a combined terran and protoss effort to stop them.
Long read · joe
Zerg technology
The Zerg Swarm did not build machines but evolved them, channeling its mastery of genetics, regeneration, and creep into living weapons and structures that served in place of the manufactured technology of the terrans and protoss.
Long read · joe
Zerg
The zerg are a ravenous collective of biologically advanced aliens who evolve by assimilating the essence of other species in pursuit of genetic perfection. Created by Amon's xel'naga on Zerus and bound to the Overmind, they grew into one of the three dominant powers of the galaxy.
Long read · joe
Zergling
The zergling was the most numerous warrior strain of the zerg, a fast, sickle-clawed creature evolved from the Zz'gashi dune runner and spawned two at a time from a single larva. Zerglings served as the Swarm's frontline assault troops, overwhelming foes through sheer weight of numbers.
Long read · joe
Zerus
Zerus was a jungle world in the central Milky Way and the birthworld of the zerg, where the first Swarm arose from the spawning pools and was bound to the hive mind by the xel'naga. Left a wasteland after the Swarm departed, it healed into a jungle ruled by the primal zerg.
Recently published
321st Colonial Rangers Battalion
The 321st Colonial Rangers Battalion was an elite Terran Confederacy unit formed on Turaxis II during the Guild Wars. Under the corrupt Colonel Vanderspool it gave rise to the Special Tactics and Missions Platoon, nicknamed Heaven's Devils, which counted Jim Raynor and Tychus Findlay among its members.
30 May 2026
Aal Cistler
Aal Cistler was the privileged son of a Terran Dominion Treasury Ministry leader, pushed into the Ghost Academy on his father's influence despite a low psionic index, where his drug trafficking and self-interest made him a recurring problem across three training teams.
30 May 2026
Abathur
Abathur was the zerg evolution master, the Swarm's living DNA library, spun by the Overmind from many species. He designed the Queen of Blades, perfected countless strains for Sarah Kerrigan, and later betrayed Overqueen Zagara to reignite the wars he believed the zerg needed to evolve.
30 May 2026
Adept
The adept is a protoss officer-class infantry warrior, a trained battlefield commander armed with glaive cannons and a psionic transfer ability that projects the warrior's mind across the field.
30 May 2026
Adjutant
Adjutants were the non-sapient artificial intelligences that served terran commanders across the Koprulu sector as advisers, navigators, and keepers of data. Humanoid in form but bereft of social grace, they descended from the original ATLAS coding and offered commanders an ever-present strategic eye over the field of battle.
30 May 2026
Adun
Adun was a revered protoss executor of the Discord who secretly sheltered the rogue tribes the Conclave ordered him to execute. He burned away saving them as they were exiled, leaving no body behind, and passed into protoss legend as the Twilight Deliverer.
30 May 2026
Aeon of Strife
The Aeon of Strife was a millennia-long civil war among the protoss, called the bloodiest civil war in galactic history. It followed the departure of the xel'naga and the loss of the protoss psychic link, and ended when the scholar Khas rediscovered the khaydarin crystals and founded the Khala.
30 May 2026
Agria
Agria was a terraformed colony world and botanical preserve of the Terran Confederacy and later the Terran Dominion. During the Second Great War its population was evacuated by Raynor's Raiders ahead of a zerg invasion.
30 May 2026
Aiur
Aiur was the homeworld of the protoss, a verdant world on the galactic fringe engineered by the Xel'Naga and seat of the Protoss Empire. It was overrun by the zerg in 2500 and reclaimed by the Daelaam after the defeat of Amon.
30 May 2026
Alan Schezar
Alan Schezar was a smuggler and crime lord whose Scavengers raided Aiur for protoss technology and learned to control zerg cerebrates, drawing the wrath of the Terran Dominion and the protoss before he died fighting on behalf of the dark archon Ulrezaj.
30 May 2026
Alarak
Alarak was the highlord of the Tal'darim, once First Ascendant in the Chain of Ascension under Ma'lash. A master manipulator who turned his people against Amon after the Dark God betrayed them, he allied with the Daelaam, overthrew Ma'lash in Rak'Shir, and led the Tal'darim on a path of conquest.
30 May 2026
Aldaris
Aldaris was a Khalai protoss of the Judicator Caste, a fierce believer in the Khala who judged others by a strict reading of its tenets. He served as advisor to the executors during the Great War and died exposing Sarah Kerrigan's corruption of Matriarch Raszagal on Shakuras.
30 May 2026
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- Carrier
- Castanar
- Cerberus Program
- Cerebrate
- Char
- Chau Sara
- CMC Powered Combat Suit
- Cole Hickson
- Colin Phash
- Colonial Fleet
- Colossus
- Conclave
- Connor Ward
- Corruptor
- Corsair
- Covert Ops Crew
- Creep
- Cybros
- Cyclone
- Daelaam
- Daggoth
- Dark Archon
- Dauntless Plateau
- Defenders of Man
- Defenders of Man Insurgency
- Defiler
- Dehaka
- Delta Emblock
- Devourer
- Diamondback
- Disruptor
- Dominion Armed Forces
- Dominion Marine Corps
- Dominion Royal Guard
- Donny Vermillion
- Dragoon
- Drone
- Dropship
- Dylar IV
- Dylarian Shipyards
- Earth
- Edmund Duke
- Egon Stetmann
- Ehlna
- Emil Narud
- Emperor's Fall: the UED conquest of Korhal
- End War
- Endion
- Essence
- Eye of the Storm
- Fall of Aiur
- Fenix
- Feral Zerg
- Firebat
- Gabriel Tosh
- Gerard DuGalle
- Ghost
- Ghost Academy
- Ghost Program
- Glacius
- Glassing
- Golden Armada
- Goliath
- Gorgon-class battlecruiser
- Grand Preserver
- Great Fleet
- Great War
- Guardian
- Guild Wars
- Gystt
- Hank Harnack
- Haven
- Heaven's Devils: the famed First Squad of the Guild Wars
- Hellbat
- Hellion
- Hercules
- High Templar
- Horace Warfield
- Hostile environment suit
- Hybrid
- Hybrid Reaver
- Hydralisk
- Hyperion
- Immortal
- Infested Terran
- Infestor
- Izsha
- Jackson Hauler
- Jacobs Installation
- Jake Ramsey
- Jim Raynor
- Judicator Caste
- Kaldir
- Karass
- Karax
- Kate Lockwell
- Kath Toom
- Kel-Morian Combine
- Kerrigan's Swarm: the Zerg Swarm under the Queen of Blades
- Keystone
- Khala
- Khalai
- Khalai Caste
- Khalani
- Khalis Crystal
- Khaydarin Crystal
- Koprulu Expeditionary Force
- Koprulu Sector
- Korhal
- Larva
- Leviathan
- Leviathan-class battlecruiser
- Liberator
- Lio Travski
- Lisa Cassidy
- Long Sleep
- Lurker
- Malcolm Kelerchian
- Mar Sara
- Marauder
- Matt Horner
- Max Zander
- Medic
- Medivac
- Meinhoff
- Mengsk's Uprising
- Michael Liberty
- Mira Han
- Moebius Corps
- Moebius Foundation
- Mohandar
- Monlyth
- Moria
- Mothership
- Mutalisk
- Narud
- Neosteel
- Nerazim
- New Folsom
- New Recruit Processing and Acclimation Center
- Nova Terra
- Nydus Worm
- Nyon
- Observer
- Odin
- Old Families
- Oracle
- Overlord
- Overmind
- Overseer
- Phoenix
- Preserver
- Primal Zerg
- Project Shadowblade
- Protoss
- Protoss Civil War
- Protoss technology
- Protoss-Zerg Hybrid
- Psi blade
- Psi emitter
- Psionic matrix
- Psionic powers
- Psionics
- Purifiers
- Queen
- Raid on Char
- Raszagal
- Raven
- Raynor's Raiders
- Raynor's Raiders: the rebel band of Jim Raynor
- Reaper
- Reaver
- Rebellion of Korhal
- Reclamation of Aiur
- Redstone III
- Reigel
- Resurrection IV
- Roach
- Rory Swann
- Ryk Kydd
- Samir Duran
- Sara system
- Sarah Kerrigan
- Science Vessel
- Scourge
- Scout
- SCV
- Second Age
- Second Great War
- Selendis
- Sentry
- Shakuras
- Shel'na Kryhas: those who endure on Aiur
- Siege Tank
- Sigmaris Prime
- Skygeirr Station
- Slayn
- Sons of Korhal
- Spear of Adun
- Spectre
- Stalker
- Stone
- Swarm Host
- Tal'darim
- Tal'darim: the fanatical protoss sect of Amon
- Talandar
- Taldarin
- Talen Ayers
- Tarsonis
- Tassadar
- Tempest
- Templar Caste
- Terran
- Terran Confederacy
- Terran Dominion
- Terran Marine
- Terran technology
- Terrazine
- The Infinite Cycle
- The Void
- Thor
- Tychus Findlay
- Typhon XI
- Tyrador
- UED Expeditionary Fleet
- Ulaan
- Ulnar
- Ulrezaj
- Ultralisk
- Umoja
- Umojan Protectorate
- United Earth Directorate
- Universal News Network
- Uraj Crystal
- Urun
- Valerian Mengsk
- Valkyrie
- Vardona
- Vespene gas
- Viking
- Viper
- Void
- Void Ray
- Void Seeker
- Vorazun
- Vulture
- War Pigs
- Warp gate
- Warp Prism
- Widow Mine
- Wraith
- Xel'Naga
- Xil
- Zagara
- Zasz
- Zealot
- Zeratul
- Zerg
- Zerg Crusaders
- Zerg technology
- Zergling
- Zerus
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