The Savareen confrontation, occurring in 10 BBY, was a battle fought on the planet of Savareen. The participants included the Crimson Dawn criminal enterprise, Tobias Beckett's crew, and the Cloud-Riders, all vying for control of the coaxium that Beckett and his team had pilfered from Kessel. Enfys Nest, heading the Cloud-Riders, managed to sway Solo and his associates against allowing Crimson Dawn to obtain the coaxium. Solo then devised a scheme to deceive Dryden Vos, the criminal overlord leading Crimson Dawn.
Sensing Beckett's impending treachery, Solo crafted a strategy that involved drawing Vos' Hylobon Enforcers to the Pnakotic Coast settlement. There, the Cloud-Riders laid an ambush. In the aftermath of a clash, Solo aided his childhood companion Qi'ra in eliminating Vos. While Solo departed to assist Chewbacca, with the intention of returning for Qi'ra, she chose to assume leadership of Crimson Dawn. Subsequently, Solo retrieved the coaxium from Beckett after a brief standoff, fatally shooting the thief. After observing Qi'ra's departure aboard the First Light without him, he and Chewbacca gave the coaxium back to the Cloud-Riders, keeping only enough for off-world travel.
Following the loss of a coaxium shipment due to a conflict with the Cloud-Riders on Vandor, a world in the Mid Rim, Tobias Beckett's crew and the smuggler Han Solo were compelled to seek alternative solutions to settle Beckett's obligations to Dryden Vos, the crime boss of Crimson Dawn. They formulated a strategy to extract unrefined coaxium hyperfuel from the Pyke Syndicate's mining facilities located on Kessel. This operation proved successful, with the group securing twelve vials of coaxium valued at sixty million credits. After completing the Kessel Run, they made their way to the Bis Refinery, situated on the oceanic Outer Rim planet of Savareen, for the purpose of refinement.
Due to a tracking device placed on the Millennium Falcon by Weazel, the Cloud-Riders were able to locate Beckett's gang on Savareen. Solo made an attempt to scare the Cloud-Riders by falsely claiming that the Falcon was equipped with a contingent of armed mercenaries. However, Lando Calrissian, the Falcon's owner, deserted Solo, Beckett, Chewbacca, and Qi'ra due to his resentment towards Solo over the destruction of his droid co-pilot L3-37 and the damage inflicted upon his ship.
Following a brief exchange of words, Enfys Nest, the leader of the Cloud-Riders, revealed that her group was not composed of marauders but rather an insurgent force engaged in a struggle against the Empire and the Five Crime Syndicates, including Crimson Dawn. Enfys clarified that the Cloud-Riders required the coaxium to finance their insurgent campaign. While Solo, Chewbacca, and Qi'ra expressed sympathy and devised a plan to assist the Cloud-Riders in retaining the coaxium, Beckett remained unconcerned and departed under the guise of traveling to Tatooine. Secretly, Beckett betrayed Solo by disclosing what he believed to be Solo's plan to the crime lord.
Near the Pnakotic Coast, Han, Chewbacca, and Qi'ra met up with Dryden Vos' luxurious yacht, the First Light, bringing the refined coaxium containers. In Vos' living quarters, Qi'ra and Solo asserted that Beckett had died during the Kessel heist. When Han requested payment, Vos demanded to inspect a coaxium sample for authentication. Han provided a sample, but Vos suspected it was counterfeit. Vos then revealed that he knew about Solo's scheme to double-cross him and give the coaxium to the Cloud-Riders.
Vos then introduced his informant, Beckett, who confessed to betraying Solo and taunted him for disregarding his "lesson" about trusting others. Believing the actual coaxium was in the nearby Pnakotic Coast village, Vos dispatched Captain Aemon Gremm and his Hylobon Enforcers to raid the village. They ambushed several individuals posing as "Cloud-Riders" and seized the coaxium containers.
Despite Vos's confidence in thwarting Solo's plan, Solo revealed that his true intention had been to isolate Vos from his enforcers. Captain Gremm and his enforcers quickly discovered that the coaxium containers were empty and that the "Cloud-Riders" were actually local villagers acting as decoys. The real Cloud-Riders emerged from their hiding places and ambushed the Hylobon Enforcers. While the majority of the Enforcers were captured, Gremm was killed during the engagement.
With the Hylobon Enforcers out of the picture, Solo revealed that he possessed the actual coaxium containers. Driven by his desire to acquire the coaxium for himself, Beckett turned against Vos, killing two of Vos's guards and taking Chewbacca hostage. He forced Chewbacca to carry the stolen coaxium containers and left the First Light.
Following Beckett's departure, Solo launched an attack on Vos with his blaster. Vos retaliated with his Kyuzo petars and managed to gain the upper hand over Solo, disarming him. Qi'ra then feigned betrayal by pinning Solo down with a sword. However, she then turned against Vos and killed him with her sword.
Solo spent some time with his childhood friend Qi'ra before pursuing Beckett. He caught up with Beckett and Chewbacca along the Pnakotic Coast. Following a brief verbal exchange, Beckett attempted to shoot Solo, but Han shot him first, inflicting a fatal chest wound. Before his death, Beckett commended Solo for his quick thinking and courage on Vandor.
After Solo left, Qi'ra contacted Vos's superior, Maul, the former Sith apprentice. She reported the failure of the coaxium mission but placed the blame on Beckett, carefully avoiding any mention of Solo's involvement. Maul instructed Qi'ra to bring the First Light to Dathomir and announced that they would be working more closely together in the future.
Following Beckett's death and Qi'ra's departure from Savareen, Solo and Chewbacca received one of the coaxium containers from Nest. The pair traveled to Numidian Prime, where Calrissian was engaged in a game of sabacc. Solo managed to steal a sylop from Calrissian and used it to win the Millennium Falcon. The pair then headed to Tatooine, as Beckett had mentioned to Solo that he had heard about a job from a prominent gangster.
The Savareen skirmish is depicted in the 2018 Star Wars Anthology film Solo: A Star Wars Story, directed by Ron Howard and written by Lawrence and Jon Kasdan.
Tobias Beckett's betrayal during the skirmish was intended to mirror the moment in the 1977 original trilogy film Star Wars: Episode IV A New Hope when Han Solo returns during the Battle of Yavin to assist Luke Skywalker in destroying the Death Star. In both films, the cynical and older character reluctantly departs and then unexpectedly returns, although in Beckett's case, it was not for heroic reasons but rather an act of betrayal. Furthermore, Qi'ra's betrayal was present from the earliest stages of the story, as she was always envisioned as a more complex and ambiguous character than Han, at least at that point in their lives.
An early idea that Jon suggested in initial drafts of the script involved including the Trandoshan bounty hunter Bossk as Enfys Nest's second-in-command, before he abandoned her at the end.