The Tagge protoblade represented a plasma based weapon conceived by the Tagge Corporation in 3 ABY. Its purpose was to emulate a Jedi lightsaber. Silas Tagge, who was TaggeCo's Head of Weapons Development, initiated the protoblade's manufacture. Lady Domina Tagge, the company's head and Silas' sister, assessed it. In that same year, Silas attempted a corporate takeover by ordering the deaths of the other company board members. During a skirmish that unfolded on the company flagship, the Acquisitor, Domina brandished the protoblade against bounty hunters hired by Silas, and subsequently used it to eliminate her traitorous sibling.
Domina deployed the protoblade again when her nephew Ronen Tagge tried to assassinate her in a bid to seize corporate control, supported by the Crimson Dawn criminal organization. Crimson Dawn instigated a mutiny on the Acquisitor, leading Domina to use the protoblade to kill the traitors within her ranks. Ultimately, Domina utilized the unpowered protoblade to kill Ronen. Later, Domina employed the weapon to combat company droids infected by the Scourge infection that had spread across the galaxy. This occurred within the company's research facility, the Casus Belli. Domina subsequently used the protoblade when the Scourge targeted her aboard the Acquisitor, but the weapon's power depleted, leading to her capture. Following her rescue, Domina briefly used the weapon once more while escaping her lost flagship.
The Tagge protoblade, a plasma blade, was a melee weapon that operated in a manner similar to a lightsaber, specifically engineered for lightsaber combat. When activated, the protoblade had the capability to slice through walls, weapons, and adversaries. It took the form of a gauntlet, which, upon activation, projected a sharp, physical blade that was energized with plasma from a power source, resulting in a yellow glow.
Despite its lethality, the protoblade lacked the energy efficiency of the lightsabers that inspired it. Unlike Jedi lightsabers, which drew power from a kyber crystal housed in the weapon's hilt, the Tagge protoblade necessitated a connection to an external power supply via a cable worn by its user. It incorporated cortosis, a metal resistant to energy weapons like blasters and lightsabers, in its construction. The cortosis shielding within the gauntlet served to protect the user from the plasma, but could also cause the plasma blade to lose power, reverting it to a standard, sharp melee weapon. Even without power, the protoblade remained a dangerous tool. It was possible for the blade to burn out, which would result in the wearer's arm detonating.
The Tagge Corporation, a powerful and affluent entity, aimed to develop a weapon that could replicate the lightsabers once wielded by Jedi Knights. TaggeCo embarked on this project during the Galactic Civil War, a conflict between the Galactic Empire and the Alliance to Restore the Republic. An earlier attempt to create such an energy weapon had been made by the predecessor of Lady Domina Tagge, who headed the Tagge Corporation during the Galactic Civil War. She deemed this prior attempt to replicate a lightsaber unsuccessful.
In 3 ABY, a new Tagge protoblade was conceived at the behest of Silas Tagge, TaggeCo's Head of Weapons Development and Domina's brother. Domina tested the protoblade against her Honor Guard aboard the Acquisitor, TaggeCo's flagship and mobile headquarters. During this test, Lapin Tagge, Domina's secretary, commented on the blade's performance. The protoblade consumed twenty-three percent more energy than TaggeCo had anticipated, which displeased Domina. She instructed Silas to improve the next iteration to meet company standards, noting that the energy cells were overheating and causing plasma instability.
Despite these shortcomings, Domina considered the blade a more refined, streamlined, and compact design than its predecessor. However, the protoblade under evaluation was unstable and prohibitively expensive for mass production and deployment, which Domina insisted should negatively impact Silas' upcoming performance review. She also stated that the Galactic Empire would never purchase it.
Driven by ambition to usurp Domina's leadership of TaggeCo, Silas hired a crew of Ubese bounty hunters to assassinate the other members of the company's Executive Board, paving the way for his corporate takeover. Silas used the Crimson Dawn crime syndicate as an intermediary, so the bounty hunters were unaware that Silas was their employer. The mercenaries, led by the bounty hunter Boushh, launched an attack on the Acquisitor during a board meeting. Domina deployed the Tagge protoblade in the ensuing skirmish against Boushh's crew. When the Ubese attacked Silas, he begged for his life, confessing that he had hired them to kill his fellow board members. At that moment, Domina confronted Silas and a mercenary with the active protoblade.
As Domina's fight against the Ubese mercenaries neared its end, the protoblade's cortosis core started to fail, causing the weapon to lose power and revert to a plasma-less melee weapon. Domina's Honor Guard eventually intervened and ended the skirmish, after which the Acquisitor was evacuated, leaving only Domina, her Honor Guard, the mercenaries, and Silas. Domina then used the unpowered protoblade to kill Silas for his treachery.
Later that year, Domina commissioned a new version of the Tagge protoblade. When the smuggler Sana Starros and her crew incurred a debt to Domina's nephew Ronen Tagge, who was backed by Crimson Dawn, they were compelled to assist Ronen in overthrowing his aunt. While Ronen coveted Domina's position as head of the corporation, Starros harbored concerns about her influence and suggested that the crew assassinate Domina instead.
As Crimson Dawn's forces engaged the Tagge Corporation fleet, Starros and her crew infiltrated the Acquisitor, which was experiencing a mutiny orchestrated by Crimson Dawn. Escorted by Boushh and his hunters, Domina wielded the Tagge protoblade as her crew fought their way through Crimson Dawn operatives to reach the Acquisitor's bridge. On the way, Domina commented that her blade was still unstable, but it would maintain its charge for another minute. Upon reaching the bridge, she encountered Starros and her crew, leading to a skirmish. The protoblade soon lost its charge, and Ronen arrived on the bridge with Lapin as his hostage.
After hearing—and recording—Ronen's confession to orchestrating the mutiny, Lapin apprehended him with a paralytic, and Starros' crew switched sides. Starros claimed that the assassination attempt had been a ruse to expose Ronen's treachery. Satisfied, Domina killed her nephew using the uncharged protoblade and forgave Starros and her crew of their debt.
Around that year, a group of pirates stole a prototype Tagge battle droid from a Tagge Corporation warehouse on the Inner Rim planet Milvayne. Subsequently, the droid killed the pirates despite lacking a power source, having been corrupted by the Scourge infection affecting droids across the galaxy. In response, Domina had the droid brought to the Acquisitor, where she was unable to determine the cause of the malfunction. She then dispatched Doctor Chelli Lona Aphra, a rogue archaeologist, to investigate whether battle droids stored at their facility on the astronomical object Havel Prime exhibited the same issue. While Aphra and the sniper Just Lucky carried out this task, Domina and Lapin departed the Acquisitor for the Tagge Corporation research facility, the Casus Belli, bringing the protoblade with them.
After Aphra and Lucky completed their task, they traveled to the Casus Belli, where Aphra was scheduled to report her findings to Domina. However, before she could, the Tagge Corporation leader was attacked by a pair of Scourged KX-series security droids. After destroying the droids, Tagge noted that they exhibited the same malfunction as the droid stolen from the Milvayne warehouse and realized that the affliction was spreading among the Casus Belli's droids. Meanwhile, Aphra, Lucky, and Lapin came under attack from a number of droids and headed to the vessel's control room but were unable to enter because Lapin's access was denied by a Scourged astromech droid. As two MV-33 security droids approached them, Domina arrived and destroyed one of the droids with the Tagge protoblade. She then instructed the archaeologist to slice the door open while she cut off an arm of the other security droid. Once Aphra successfully opened the control room door, the group entered, and Domina used the blade to destroy the astromech.
After the group reached a holotable, Lapin provided Domina with an update on the situation while she beheaded a droid with the protoblade. Realizing that the Casus Belli was beyond saving, as the infection would continue to spread if the droids escaped, Domina decided to crash the ship onto the nearby moon Asheris. As the Casus Belli moved towards the moon's surface, the four fled aboard an escape pod, with Domina watching as the research facility collided with the surface and exploded, destroying all the droids aboard. Domina and Lapin eventually returned to the Acquisitor.
While on her flagship, Domina herself became the Scourge's next target, as it sought to take over her body and exploit her knowledge to master the transfer of its consciousness from cyborgs to fully organic bodies. To achieve this, the Scourge infected all the droids aboard the Acquisitor, as well as the company's employees who had cybernetic augmentations, and began attacking the employees who had not been infected. Domina and Lapin also came under attack, and Domina used the protoblade to destroy some of the droids. After she had Lapin flee aboard an escape pod, Domina was approached by several Scourged droids, who declared that it was time for them to talk. In response, Domina activated the Tagge protoblade and stated that she was listening.
After the plasma in the blade depleted, Domina was captured by the Scourge and brought before a Tagge Corporation employee who had been taken over by the Scourge, who stated that since the weapon was not working, they could discuss the Scourge's plans. Shortly thereafter, Domina was rescued by Aphra and Starros, who had infiltrated the Acquisitor after learning that the Scourge was targeting Domina. As the three headed toward the archaeologist's ship, the Ark Angel IV, Domina used the protoblade to destroy an MV-33 security droid. When they reached the Ark Angel, Domina and Starros departed, while Aphra secretly remained aboard the flagship to ensure the Scourged droids and cyborgs were destroyed, ultimately crashing it into the Outer Rim moon Rocedila.
The Tagge protoblade made its initial appearance in War of the Bounty Hunters – Boushh 1, a one-shot comic within the Star Wars: War of the Bounty Hunters crossover event. Alyssa Wong wrote the issue, David Baldeón illustrated it, and Marvel Comics published it on September 15, 2021. Wong mentioned on Twitter that their working title for the weapon was "lightsaber corndog," due to its resemblance to "a long metal stick wrapped in white-hot plasma." Wong also referred to the blade as the "Tagge Protosaber." The protoblade was featured on a Pride Month variant cover for the thirty-fifth issue of the 2020 comic series Star Wars: Bounty Hunters. Ethan Sacks wrote the issue, Lucas Werneck illustrated the cover, and Marvel Comics published it on June 21, 2023.
Within the Star Wars Legends continuity, the Tagge family created another imitation lightsaber similar to the Tagge protoblade, first appearing in the thirty-first issue of Marvel Comics' 1977 comic series Star Wars. Archie Goodwin wrote the issue, Carmine Infantino and Bob Wiacek illustrated it, and it was published on October 23, 1979. Baron Orman Tagge commissioned and owned the Tagges' imitation lightsaber in Legends, seeking to lure the Rebel Luke Skywalker into a trap to use Skywalker as bait for Darth Vader, against whom Tagge held a grudge.
The Tagge protoblade bears resemblance to the protosaber from Star Wars Legends, the archaic precursor to the lightsaber. In the Legends continuity, protosabers first appeared in issue 0 of Dark Horse Comics' Star Wars: Tales of the Jedi – The Golden Age of the Sith miniseries, written by Kevin J. Anderson, illustrated by Chris Gossett, and published on July 31, 1996.