Arbiter

The arbiter is a protoss psionic support vessel, a costly and powerful craft that fights less through its own weapons than through the abilities it grants the forces around it. It carries only a low-powered direct attack, relying instead on a strong shield, a healthy reserve of hull strength, and the escort of allied units to survive the front lines. Its true value lies in three psionic powers: a cloaking field that hides nearby allies, a stasis projection that freezes enemy formations in place, and a recall ability that teleports friendly forces across great distances in a moment.

A vessel that fights through others#

The arbiter is a high-cost offensive-support craft whose strength is psionic rather than martial. It mounts only a low-powered direct attack and depends instead on a fairly high shield, considerable hull strength, and the protection of allied escorts to endure the front lines, where a vessel of its expense could not survive on its own armament. In protoss doctrine the arbiter is therefore never sent forward alone. It moves with the fleet, lending its abilities to the warriors and warships around it while they keep the enemy off it in turn.

Cloak, stasis, and recall#

The arbiter's passive cloaking field conceals all nearby friendly units, though notably not the arbiter itself. This quirk shaped a common protoss tactic: arbiters and observers were attached to a group of carriers or corsairs, which attacked from beneath the cloak while warding off the strikes that fell upon the uncloaked arbiters above them.

Its stasis ability could cut an enemy attack wave in half, suspending part of a hostile force so that allied troops might eliminate the foe in smaller, more manageable groups. A favored use was to lock down high-threat units, such as siege tanks or devourers, while the protoss destroyed the weaker enemies around them and returned for the frozen targets afterward.

The recall ability offered a powerful means of strategic movement, teleporting allied forces across the field to the arbiter's position in an instant. With it, a protoss commander could recall a strike force directly into an enemy base, circumventing whatever defenses guarded the approach. Together these three powers made the arbiter a vessel that decided battles by reshaping where and when the fighting happened. Among the named hero arbiters recorded in protoss history is the Danimoth.