AH/G-24 Banshee

The AH/G-24 Banshee is a terran air unit in StarCraft II.

Overview
The Banshee is a terran aircraft designed by Procyon Industries in response to the Terran Dominion's requirement for a dedicated ground attack aircraft. Experience had shown that it was unlikely that adapting an existing design would prove satisfactory. Thus, Procyon designed an entirely new craft. By 2502, it was in service by the Dominion and within the same year, the Kel-Morian Combine. The Banshee is heavily optimized for its intended role. Armament was limited to air-to-ground Backlash cluster rockets, eschewing any anti-aircraft weapons. As the Banshee was never intended to operate outside of an atmosphere, only relatively low-thrust turbofans were fitted, wholly unable to achieve escape velocity, but much cheaper than engines capable of achieving space flight. Later Banshees were fitted with cloaking devices taken from wraiths. Kel-Morian Banshees differ from this loadout to an extent in that they have rapid-firing projectile weaponry capable of striking aerial targets.

The Banshee has proven successful in service. Easily transported from world to world, its mobility and firepower has proven most useful, especially in inhospitable terrain and against hostile irregular forces. The Banshee has also acquired a reputation as a Dominion terror weapon, a result of a significant number of civilians being killed by Banshees employed in urban combat.

Game Unit
Banshees can quickly destroy buildings, even powering through anti-air defenses. Other races should deploy specialized anti-air units like corruptors and phoenixes to keep them in check. Ground unit counters include s, thors, hydralisks, stalkers equipped with blink and psionic storms.

Banshees bank on turns like some other air units.

Development
In early builds, the Banshee delivered an area of effect attack, though this has since been removed as of March 2008.

The Banshee was made to be both similar and different to the Wraith, the key difference being the nature of their attack. As many cloak detector units are aerial, this would prevent the Banshee from attacking the units which presented the greatest threat to it. As such, the Banshee fulfills the role of a base raider of a "combined-arms" terran force.

The original portrait was female, but was replaced by a male as of April 2009. By June 2009, the portrait was female again but at some stage, switched back to being male. However, with the release of the StarCraft II beta, the portrait had again gone back to being female. In addition, a variant Banshee profile was avaliable for players in the StarCraft II beta, used instead of the in-game one. The portrait was later updated.