First Look: Starcraft Tabletop Miniatures Game – The Terran Armed Forces
By Aaron Kamakawiwoole
Hey Reader!
The Starcraft Tabletop Miniatures Game is now available for preorder! After almost 10 months of waiting, reading up on how the game would be played, and joining in the beta tester program, I’m excited that miniatures are soon coming to stores near you – and can be ordered to your house right now!
Today we’re looking at what’s available to you for the Terran Armed Forces: the forces of humans that first arrived in the Koprulu Sector as a prison colony given a new chance at freedom, but over the centuries has now become several full civilizations carving out a living on new planets among alien races.
I. Terran Units
The Terrans start with access to four units: Marines (the brave men with rifles that form the backbone of Terran armies), Medics (the saving grace and guardian angels of the infantry), Marauders (grenade launcher infantry for anti-armor support), and Goliaths (combat walkers designed for direct support for infantry).
Unlike the other races in Starcraft, the Terrans are a skirmish-focused army: they’d prefer to move around and shoot the enemy all day instead of getting into close combat melees with enemy forces. And who can blame them: humans (even in power armor) are fragile by comparison to the creatures they are fighting, and often far smaller, so why not rely on guns, autocannons, and missiles to do the dirty work for you?
This makes them a very asymmetric force so far in the tabletop game: they focus heavily on the Movement and Assault Phases, and suffer what they must in the Close Combat Phase, while the Zerg and the Protoss tend to play well in all three (though they are generally not as good at shooting as the Terrans).
Your Marines are the backbone of your army: not the highest amount of damage individually, but for volume they can’t be beat. While you can technically build a force without marines, you’re typically better off having at least a few squads of these to hold the line and provide the volume that you’ll need to reliably winnow down units.
Marauders are a cheap way to get both durable models for holding objectives, but also pushing back against enemy armor. While there are only a few armored units currently present in the game, the value of your marauders is going to grow over time, especially when massive enemies like the Ultralisk, Immortal, and Thor arrive in the future.
Medics are a support unit with the ability to both blind enemies at range (hopefully keeping them from hitting your men) and heal your biological units at close range, keeping more of your men in the fight for longer. And with powerful biological options coming in the future in the form of Ghosts and Reapers (who knows, maybe Firebats will be powerful too when they arrive later on this year!), I think the Medic is here to stay for a while.
And finally, Goliaths are an infantry support walker, packing autocannons and a machine gun for effective damage against lighter units (and reasonable volume against armored targets), along with anti-air missiles that can be used against ground targets with an upgrade or two. It is not the most durable unit in the Terran roster, but as we first walk into the game, you could do a lot worse than taking a few Goliaths for a bit of staying power and reliability.
II. Terran Hero: James Raynor
But of course, what would a game be without heroes that we all recognize from the games? So fittingly the first released Terran hero is our first protagonist from the ’90s, James “Jim” Raynor, former Marshal of the Mar Sara Colony, and leader of Raynor’s Raiders:
Sporting two separate build options (C-14 rifle for volume of fire against weaker targets, or a sniper rifle for high-impact damage against larger targets) and a point defense drone for knocking down ranged attacks against your forces, Jim brings both firepower and support abilities to your force to secure victory against superior forces.
III. What Is Coming?
So with a well-rounded start to your forces, what’s coming down the line for Terran? 2026 is going to be an exciting year:
Not only will we be seeing the Siege Tank (everyone’s favorite ground unit, and a beast on a 150mm base!), we’ll also see the advent of the Raven (a scouting vessel that sports air-droppable autoturrets and missiles, among other things), Firebats for turning up the heat against close combat units, and Arcturus Mengsk (one of the most complex characters in the series) among others!
You’ll also find unit reviews on the YouTube channel below; if you’re interested in seeing unit walkthroughs here (once my models arrive), let me know!
Until next time,
Centaur
YT: @CentaurGaming (Starcraft and more)
YT: @ZurnCentral (Bolt Action)