Warblades, or Sith swords, were melee weapons used by the Sith. Though similar to the swords utilized by the Bendu and ancient Jedi, warblades were distinguished from such bladed weapons by their fundamental nature; both powered by and empowering the dark side of the Force.
Description[]
Warblades were constructed through various metallurgical and arcane means, transmuting base metals into an alchemical alloy possessing an unusual affinity for dark side energies. A user skilled in the dark side could alter the weapon's molecular structure, making it stronger and sharper than normal, and reverse its magnetic polarity, turning it into a high-temperature superconductor that could resist lightsabers in much the same manner as phrik alloy and Mandalorian iron while deflecting blaster bolts, laser beams, and other coherent energy or particle weapon emissions. Perhaps most significantly, the weapon served as a focus for the dark energies of its wielder, amplifying their power and refining their control until they became a walking nexus of dark side power.
The weapon's magnetic properties, combined with its attraction to the dark side of the Force, caused it to react unusually to discharges of Force lightning; the blade would attract and absorb the energy, storing it like an electric capacitor until the blade made contact with a substantial physical object, whereupon the amplified electrical energy was discharged to an extremely devastating effect.
History[]
The origin of the first Sith sword ever constructed is unknown, but the weapon existed as long ago as 28,000 BBY, predating the earliest lightsabers by several millennia. Developed by the ancient Sith, the weapon continued to be used by later generations of Sith following the Great Hyperspace War and Sith Purge, finding wielders among Freedon Nadd and Exar Kun's Sith. After the fall of Kun's Sith Empire, however, the use of warblades fell into disuse. For millennia to follow, any remaining examples of Sith swords in the greater Galaxy persisted as mere historical curiosities, archaic relics of a dead civilization and their extinct culture; even the Neo-Sith of Ruyn Phanius' New Sith Empire eschewed the alchemically forged weapons in favour of the more compact lightsabers.
The use of warblades saw a resurgence after Anakin Skywalker created the Resurrected Brotherhood of the Sith. Collecting many of the weapons from old Sith worlds and battle grounds, the Lord of the Sith gifted them to most of his disciples, renewing the ancient tradition.
With the fall of the Resurrected Brotherhood and Skywalker's tranformation into the Dark Lord Darth Vader, the Sith sword once again fell into disuse. In the decades following the death of Vader and the fall of the Galactic Empire, however, one of Vader's apprentices -- the Dark Lady of the Sith Lumiya -- made the warblade the de facto weapon of choice when she established her Sith Order, ensuring that the venerable weapon would continue to be wielded by the Sith in the many centuries and millennia to follow.