The Procursator-class Star Destroyer represented a warship design within the broader Star Destroyer lineage, seeing service under the banners of the Galactic Empire, the Dark Empire, and the New Republic. Throughout the Imperial Era, the Procursator-class participated in numerous fleet operations, notably including gatherings of the Imperial Navy leading up to the Battle of Hoth, the Dark Empire's base at Byss, and a New Republic fleet assembly. During the Battle of Calamari, a pair of these vessels met their end at the hands of the New Republic forces.
The Galactic Empire employed the Procursator-class Star Destroyer, a type of warship. As a member of the Star Destroyer family, it had a length of 1,200 meters, making it smaller than a standard Imperial-class Star Destroyer. The Procursator-class was distinguished by its dagger-like form and a conning tower that housed the bridge. This tower was located at the rear of an expanded command section. For propulsion, the Procursator-class Star Destroyer used three rear-mounted sublight drives, and it featured a ventral solar ionization reactor in the middle of the hull. It had 3 turrets on the central axis, like the Imperial and Allegiance-class. Similar to the Tector and Allegiance-class vessels, the Procursator-class lacked ventral hangar bays.
By 3 ABY, the Procursator-class Star Destroyer was actively serving in the Imperial fleet. At that time, Captain Firmus Piett and Admiral Kendal Ozzel observed three Procursator-class Star Destroyers as part of a highly mobile fleet. This fleet also incorporated Allegiance-class Heavy Star Destroyers, Bellator-class dreadnoughts, along with other ship types. Before the Battle of Hoth, this fleet joined up with Death Squadron. On another occasion, a vessel of this class was undergoing repairs and refurbishment while six VT-49 Decimators flew in the vicinity.
Years later, during the era of the New Republic, a Star Destroyer of this class was observed in formation alongside a Bellator-class dreadnought and several Imperial-class Star Destroyers bearing Republic markings. During the rise of the Dark Empire, a pair of _Procursator_s served as escorts for the Allegiance during the Battle of Calamari in 10 ABY. These three ships were attacked by a New Republic task force and were destroyed. Around the same period, at least one Procursator was seen operating with a Bellator-class dreadnought as part of the Byss Defense Fleet.
This design originated as a fanon creation by Ansel Hsiao, who based it on "anonymous star destroyer #2". This designation was given to ship designs featured in the third issue of the Star Wars: Dark Empire comic book series and on the cover of the series' trade paperback, by Curtis Saxton on his Star Wars Technical Commentaries fan site. The class name chosen by the artist is the Latin term for "skirmisher/forward-runner."
When Lucas Licensing contacted Hsiao to provide artwork for The Essential Guide to Warfare, he submitted his own ship designs and names in addition to new models. According to the artist, the names were recorded in LFL's Holocron continuity database; this was later confirmed by Jason Fry, the author of Warfare.
Hsiao stated that the ship's design wasn't used in one of his own pictures for the book, but it was used in a painting by another artist. He also designed it using leftover parts from the Bellator-class dreadnought to test how quickly he could design and build a Star Destroyer. He completed the ship over a weekend, describing its design as similar to a "no-frills ship" from a "War Emergency Programme."
The design is visible in two paintings, both created by Tommy Lee Edwards. The latter of these paintings uses a picture from Hsiao's personal gallery as a background, where the ship appears blurred, along with another ship of the same class slightly obscured by a TIE Advanced X1. A third ship of the same class is above an Imperial-class Star Destroyer, which is located above and to the right of the aforementioned X1, but much farther away. The Hsiao picture in question was titled "Strategic Reserve".