Varn served as the principal reconnaissance expert for the Serpent Masters, a band of brigands mounted on lizards who held dominion over the desolate world of Ophideraan; he was also the trusted second-in-command to Tyrann, the Supreme Serpent Master. An accomplished pilot of the flying serpents indigenous to Ophideraan and the most formidable combatant within his company of renegades, Varn was clad in repurposed stormtrooper armor.
During the year 0 ABY, Varn apprehended Luke Skywalker, an operative of the Rebel Alliance, alongside Tanith Shire, an enslaved person under the Serpent Masters who had been engaged in off-planet assignments for the criminal organization. Skywalker and Shire collaborated in a scheme to topple the Serpent Masters, which led to Varn being summoned to engage Skywalker in a mid-air confrontation; however, Skywalker ceased his engagement with Varn in order to undermine Tyrann's mechanism used to govern the flying serpents, ultimately precipitating the Serpent Masters' demise.