Vulture droid starfighter

Vulture droid starfighter
Production information
Manufacturer	Haor Chall Engineering Baktoid Armor Workshop Kraechar Arms
Model	Variable Geometry Self-Propelled Battle Droid, Mark III
Class	Droid starfighter
Technical specifications
Length	3.5 meters
Maximum acceleration	3,900 G
Maximum speed (atmospheric)	1,200 km/h
Hyperdrive system	None
Armament	4 laser cannons 2 torpedo launchers
Crew	Integrated droid brain
Consumables	Fuel for 35 minutes, later modified to one hour
Usage
Affiliation	Trade Federation Confederacy of Independent Systems Yanibar Guard

Description

Like the droideka, the Vulture droid starfighter, more properly referred to as the Variable Geometry Self-Propelled Battle Droid, Mark I, was originally a Trade Federation product designed and developed by a technically gifted alien civilization who modeled the battle droid on their own likeness. In the case of the Vulture droid, it was the Xi Charrians of Haor Chall Engineering who provided the design of one of the most notorious fighters of the Clone Wars. Years after the end of that galactic conflagration, Vulture droids would again see service, this time in the hands of the Yanibar Guard Fleet after being recovered, repaired, and modified by arms company Kraechar Arms.

Small and agile, Vulture droids had a sleek streamlined body with pincer-shaped wings protruding from each side. They had two red streak-shaped photoreceptors across the central control module located on the fuselage. For weaponry, each wing mounted a pair of laser cannons, while a pair of torpedo tubes were mounted on the main body with two to three missiles apiece for those in Yanibar Guard service. The ships were unshielded and did not come with hyperdrives—they were designed as short-range expendable fighters.

Their wing geometry was variable, as each wing was fully articulated and could pivot independent of the main body. This allowed Vultures to fold their wings with the tips pointed down and walk across surfaces, as the pincer tips separated to allow for greater stability while walking. They lost the use of their laser cannons while doing so, but required much less energy to operate while walking or standing—an important consideration considering that Trade Federation models only had enough fuel in their concentrated solid fuel slugs to maintain sustained flight for thirty-five minutes.

To remedy this limitation, Kraechar Arms spent a year working on a tweaked engine design that allowed for easier refueling and more fuel capacity, increasing their flight time to an hour. This upgrade also gave the Vulture droids an enhanced communication suite to let it interface with new Kraechar Arms command and control computer cores. These upgrades had little effect on the overall appearance of the craft externally—a couple of new fairings were added for the communications, while a larger nacelle fairing denoted the engine change. Most of the changes were internal, and despite the three percent performance loss in high-speed maneuvers, the Yanibar Guard Fleet appreciated the improved model, which was referred to officially as the Variable Geometry Self-Propelled Battle Droid, Mark III, as a prototype Mark II droid had been deployed by the Trade Federation years earlier but never saw widespread service.

History

Vulture droids started as part of a legal deal between the Trade Federation and Haor Chall to help deal with pirates and other raiders. However, little did the Republic know that the Federation was controlled by the Sith Lord Darth Sidious, who soon was able to instigate the Trade Federation into invading the peaceful world of Naboo. Swarms of Vulture droids participated in the invasion, swooping down on the lightly defended planet. Though the invasion was thwarted by a coalition of Naboo, Jedi, and Gungans, droid starfighters were there to stay. They were employed in the underhanded destruction of the Outbound Flight project years later, and continued to serve in Trade Federation ranks. When Sidious, via his apprentice Count Dooku, persuaded the commerce guilds and trade guilds to join with the Trade Federation in forming the Confederacy so as to provoke the Republic into an all-out war aimed at bringing the Sith to galactic power, Vulture droids were part of their ranks.

As the Clone Wars broke out, Vultures saw combat on hundred of battlefields from Geonosis to Coruscant. The deadly were agile, heavily armed and—most importantly—numerous. Their swarming attacks and programmed relentless inflicted countless losses on the Republic and their Jedi leaders. Though the droids could be easily destroyed by laser cannon fire, shrapnel, or, as Jedi Knight Selusda Kraen found out, a few strokes of a lightsaber, they almost always attacked in groups and made excellent suicide weapons when the need arose. Incidentally, Selu's lightsaber-based technique for defeating Vultures worked well, provided the droid didn't explode violently under one's feet after using a lightsaber on it. This happened to Selu Kraen during the final Battle of Coruscant in the Clone Wars and nearly killed him.

After the Clone Wars ended in 19 BBY, Vulture droids were largely shut down with the rest of the droid armies. A few Separatist holdouts managed to engineer the deactivated droids to respond, employing them to limited effect in pathetic guerilla efforts. Most of them were seized by the Galactic Empire. The lethal Xi Charrian-made droid fighters had no place in the clone-populated ranks of the Imperial forces, so they were simply destroyed, melted down for scrap. A few were used by Separatist holdouts, such as those led by Ardo Romierr on Zeru Neimoidia.

However, in 15 BBY, the Force exile refuge on Yanibar was founded by Selu Kraen, as was its defense force, the Yanibar Guard, and Kraechar Arms, a Yanibar-based defense company with hundreds of Xi Charrian engineers and technicians in its employ. When the Yanibar Guard discovered an old Confederacy weapons cache, including dozens of Vulture droids, the Xi Charrians were quickly able to re-enable the craft. Unfortunately, while the Yanibar Guard had many droids available, the computers that controlled them needed significant reprogramming and repairs. This meant that only a few dozen were online at once for the first few years of their service.

The Vultures saw action in the Yanibar Guard in 12 BBY when a group of Blue Star pirates landed near the nascent refuge. With over half of the Vulture droids loaded onto Wan-Shen-class transports and offworld on a mission to Utapau, the Yanibar Guard Fleet didn't dare send their thirty-six remaining Vultures on an attack mission against the pirate vessels. Instead, the Yanibar Guard dispatched a lone infantry squad to spot surgical airstrikes on the pirate ships once they set down. The Vultures were successful in wreaking devastation on the pirate ships, disabling half of them in the first run alone. The pirates were ultimately defeated, and the refuge was saved from their menace, and though two Vultures were damaged in action, they were quickly repaired. Having received their baptism of fire and performed with flying colors, the Yanibar Guard Fleet quickly placed a priority on adding more Vultures to their ranks even after Freedom's Sons were integrated into their ranks, bolstering their manpower and materiel.

Vultures were used in 9 BBY in an expeditionary role in a raid on a Zyegerrian Slavers Guild ship over Toola. Launching from Wan-Shen transports, four squadrons of Vultures were used to attack the slavers' support craft. The operation was deemed a success, at the cost of seven Vultures.

Vultures remained in service as late as 4 ABY, when they were used in swarms on a frontal attack on an invading Zann Consortium fleet. The mass attack of eighty Vultures was largely thwarted by the anti-missile systems of the Zannists, though, and did little damage. After the first pass decimated the ranks of the Vultures, the remaining droids were ordered to make suicide runs into enemy ships, which was somewhat more successful, knocking out four corvettes and weakening the anti-starfighter screen. Twenty reserve fighters were also used to strafe Zann Consortium ground vehicles during the battle, with heavy losses. They were relegated to second-echelon roles after the battle due to their poor performance against modern fleets.

A formation of them was used to defend the carrier Vigilant Refuge in the Battle of Rishi during the Yuuzhan Vong War. The Vultures primarily served as a temporary screen for the Yanibar Guard fleet, as the Yuuzhan Vong coralskipper fighters tore through them easily. Later, when Yuuzhan Vong reinforcements arrived, Yanibar Guard Commodore Arystek launched her remaining sixty-four droids, but against the numerous fighters, the droids were easily swept away with little damage to the Yuuzhan Vong formation. Following the Battle of Rishi, the Vultures were phased out with no replacement.

Behind the scenes

Vulture droids were first mentioned in the Force Exile Series as part of the battle droids that Selusda Kraen faced in the Clone Wars as adversaries. They were later re-introduced after Atarumaster88 needed a way to provide a tiny Yanibar Guard with more starfighters. The fact that the Yanibar Guard had already been established to have seized abandoned Separatist weapons caches, together with the Xi Charrian technicians in Kraechar Arms, made the Vulture the fighter of choice over other Separatist models.

Appearances

• Force Exile I: Fugitive
• Force Exile III: Liberator
• Force Exile IV: Guardian
• Force Exile V: Warrior
• Thunderchief
• Yanibar Guard Sourcebook