Star Wars Fanon
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What sort of clanker is that!? It looks like a knock-off Super!
—A Clone trooper upon seeing an SBDE-1

The SBDE-1 super battle droid (SBDE-1 standing for Super Battle Droid, Earth, 1st model) was a model of Battle droid produced by the Techno Union's Earth Division for use by forces of the Solar System loyal to the Confederacy of Independent Systems, the SBDE-1 was effectively a TUED analogue of the B2 super battle droid, also produced by the company, the SBDE-1 being intended to be cheaper and easier to mass produce, resulting in a greater number of droids produced for not as much expense, the savings meant that roughly two SBDE-1s could be produced for the price of one B2, which was attractive to customers, however these savings gave the SBDE-1 several flaws when compared to their B2 counterparts, TUED inteded the SBDE-1 to be a simplified and cheaper "substitute standard" to the B2, as such the SBDE-1 kept the B2's combat processor and many of its internal workings, but skimped on largely cosmetic, unneccesary or complex parts, e.g. wrist-mounted weaponry, torso armour, limb armour etc, in order to save costs and weight.

A comparison between the SBDE-1 and the B2 revealed several disadvantages to the SBDE-1 which were inherent to the cost-saving measures implemented in the design of the SBDE-1, the SBDE-1 wasn't as bulky as the B2, not having as much armour, especially around the torso, which made them more susceptible to horizontal attacks from lightsabers, the SBDE-1 also didn't possess any arm-mounted weapon, but also having unusual fingerless horseshoe-shaped hands, meaning that special weapons like the SBDEBR-1 blaster rifle, had to be developed in order to allow the SBDE to use weapons, the central processor of the SBDE-1 was also not buried quite as deep in the chassis as that of the B2, as a result the SBDE-1 was more susceptible to headshots than the B2, though the SBDE-1s processor wasn't quite as exposed as those of the B1 battle droid or BDE-2 battle droid.

A distinct characteristic of the SBDE-1 was its pronounced "humpback", leading to some Earthlings to nickname the SBDE-1 droids "Quasimodos" or the "Quasimodo Droid", after a fairy tale character from Earth's culture, in fact there was a unique SBDE-1 called Quasimodo.

Despite these flaws the SBDE-1 was still a deadly opponent to the soldiers of the Union of Earth States and the Clone troopers of the Galactic Republic. Due to the similar design of the SBDE-1 to the B2 some clones referred to the SBDE-1 as the "Knock-Off Super".

The flaws of the SBDE-1s design led TUED to choose a radically different design and processor for the SBDE-2 super battle droid, the SBDE-2 was substantially more dangerous than the old SBDE-1, despite this SBDE-1s were in service as late as 40 ABY, some models belonging to the Confederate States Army were seen fighting the Battle of Earth against the forces of the Galactic Federation of Free Alliances/Union of Earth States.

Behind the Scenes[]

  • The SBDE-1 is based on the SentryBot from TimeSplitters 2, the writer is a fan of the series.
  • Whilst the SBDE-1 was intended to be a simplified "substitute standard" to the B2 super battle droid, the SentryBot appears to have been inspired by the B2.
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