The Dark Trooper initiative, also referred to as the dark trooper scheme, represented a project by the Imperial Department of Military Research with the objective of producing a unit of specialized soldiers designated "Dark Troopers" for service within the Galactic Empire. Initially, the program was conceived as a means of equipping humans with advanced armor. The initial iteration of the Dark Trooper involved augmenting clone troopers through the integration of cybernetics.
The Imperial Military evaluated the experimental Phase II Dark Trooper during the period of the Galactic Civil War. By the time the dark trooper design had reached its third generation, the vulnerability of the pilot was identified as the last remaining flaw. Consequently, the decision was made to transform the dark trooper into a type of battle droid. A platoon of these third-generation dark troopers saw deployment by Moff Gideon's Imperial remnant circa 9 ABY, measured in year. Scientists from the IDMR were stationed aboard Gideon's light cruiser to provide maintenance for these dark troopers, which were maintained in cold storage due to their significant energy demands.
The following models were products of the Dark Trooper initiative:
- Dark Trooper [5]
- Phase II Dark Trooper [6]
- Phase-III Dark Trooper [4]
- Dark Trooper phase 4 [8]
The dark trooper initiative was initially referenced within Star Wars canon in Dawn of Rebellion, a 2018 sourcebook for the Star Wars Roleplaying Game published by Fantasy Flight Games. Its on-screen debut occurred in "Chapter 12: The Siege," the twelfth installment of The Mandalorian. The concept itself originated in the 1995 Star Wars Legends video game Star Wars: Dark Forces.
Dawn of Rebellion characterizes the dark trooper initiative as an Imperial endeavor aimed at developing Imperial battle droids, which ultimately resulted in failure. This failure contributed to the Joint Chiefs losing interest in the deployment of combat droids, with the KX-series security droid being a notable exception. However, the majority of canon sources depict the dark trooper initiative as initially focusing on combat suits before transitioning to the creation of combat droids.