Terran ghosts that are sanctioned get some pretty great starting gear (though I admit, with a huge drawback).
Is there going to be a Marine or Marshal starting package, or should we just homerule it? The Terran armor and weapons are incredibly expensive otherwise. You'd think with the thousands of Marines that had died in the various wars that the armor would be commonplace (at least the old stuff) and cheap, even if it was cobbled back together from parts.
It just seems that the Protoss have a huge edge on getting a good set of gear together from the beginning. I would think they'd also all start with a plasma shield crystal instead of the other ones.
Hey, welcome to the site!
The next resource I am working on is the Advanced Terran Training Manual. It is going to have a lot of options for terran character design, including a requisition system for military focused characters such as ghosts and marines. I believe the level 1 requisition is 8,000 credits for such a character. Make sure to take the powered armor training talent!
One of the important design philosophies that the StarCraft RPG has is that it encompasses all possible power levels, although the way to the very bottom. Level 1 characters are essentially civilians with no combat training or expertise, thrust into a life of adventure and danger. These characters are generally very poor, and do not have access to expensive military grade gear as mid-high tier terrans. Thus is the recommendation for people wanting to do the 'StarCraft' experience of regularly fighting enemies in the video games and using advanced weaponry and armor to start around level 5. Powered armor is designed to be earned around the level 5-8 range for normal StarCraft heroes.
I can see your argument, however, for reducing the cost of old models of CMC down a little bit. Perhaps 4-5k for the older CMC-200 powered armor. You still wouldn't be able to start with it, but you could get it in a few levels.
Protoss are complicated because their wealth system is so different than terrans. Basically, their wealth increases much slower, as they can't just pick up additional honor, so I wanted them to have all their essentials early on. In previous builds, low level protoss struggled in having basic gear at low level. Now they start with a great deal of gear, to make up for that it will not get much higher for a time.
Protoss plasma shields are kind of like terran powered armor: its something they earn after they get some experience. As mentioned before, level 1 characters are basically civilians, and do not have access to higher defensive equipment right from the get go. Protoss characters should get plasma shields pretty early, around levels 2-5.
Hope this helps!