Metalorn was a Mid Rim Territories planet that became a famed industrial world by the time of the High Republic Era. It was inhabited by immigrated Skakoans, such as Wat Tambor, the future foreman of the Techno Union merchant guild. A vital Techno Union world by the Clone Wars of 22 BBY to 19 BBY, Metalorn was under the control of the Separatist Alliance, which was supported by the resident Skakoans. The Galactic Republic eventually attacked Metalorn in the final year of the war.
Following the Clone Wars, the Republic became the Galactic Empire, which enslaved Metalorn's Skakoan population as punishment for their prior Separatist sympathies, in return causing some of them to join the Rebel Alliance. Metalorn also went on to be a key industrial location for the Empire, and the Alliance considered it a potential target during the Galactic Civil War. By 5 ABY, the world was under New Republic control and produced probe droids for that government.
Metalorn was a harsh terrestrial planet located in an intersecting portion of the Mid Rim Territories and the Slice. It was situated in grid square R-8 of the Standard Galactic Grid.
By the time of the High Republic Era, Metalorn was famed as an industrial world. In 200 BBY, Jedi Master Mostima briefed her apprentice, Sean, on the Oplovis sector's Aakaash system, informing him that in the preceding year, the remote system had surpassed Metalorn in terms of its industrial production capacity—for which Metalorn was well known. Metalorn was a vital world of the Techno Union technology merchant guild by the time of the Clone Wars between the Galactic Republic and the Separatist Alliance, which began in 22 BBY. At that time, the Techno Union was tied to the Separatist Council, and Metalorn was subsequently a Separatist world.
Metalorn was part of the Foundry of the Confederacy (pictured) during the Clone Wars.
During the Clone Wars, the Separatists incarcerated many of their prisoners at Unreal City, a private prison on Metalorn. Metalorn was also part of the Foundry of the Confederacy, a region containing a number of Separatist-aligned factory worlds that fell within the Slice and spanned parts of the Mid Rim and Outer Rim Territories. The Techno Union defended the world with a mixed fleet of overstock and prototype starships, including starfighters, from its member corporations and design firms, such as SoroSuub Corporation. Swarms of Hardcell-class interstellar transports were also deployed to defend Metalorn. In the final year of the Clone Wars, the Republic led its Outer Rim Sieges campaign, and its 12th Sector Army set its sights on the Foundry of the Confederacy, including Metalorn. The super tactical droid General Linwodo led the Separatists' defense when the Republic attacked Metalorn.
Metalorn was among the Empire's key industrial centers.
After the Clone Wars ended and the Republic transitioned into the Galactic Empire in 19 BBY, the Empire dissolved the Techno Union and absorbed its assets, including Metalorn. During the Galactic Civil War between the Empire and the Rebel Alliance, the manufacturing world was a key Imperial industrial location.
In 3 ABY, the Alliance's 61st Mobile Infantry attacked a number of lightly defended Imperial logistical hubs in order to weaken the defenses of the Kuat Drive Yards, the primary manufacturing and repair hub of the Imperial Military, for a final attack—a campaign dubbed Operation Ringbreaker. While Alliance Intelligence distantly vetted the campaign, Alliance General Crix Madine saw Operation Ringbreaker's early success and produced a galactic map of other major Imperial shipyards, drydocks, and mining centers that the Alliance could target if Operation Ringbreaker was successful, a proposal that was addressed to the Alliance's Commander-in-Chief Mon Mothma. Metalorn was listed on the map as a medium-production and medium-security target. The 61st ultimately abandoned Operation Ringbreaker before reaching the Kuat Drive Yards.
The Alliance transitioned into the New Republic in 4 ABY following a decisive victory against the Empire at the Battle of Endor. Metalorn soon fell under the control of the nascent Republic, which forced the Empire to become splintered into remnants and holdouts throughout the galaxy by 5 ABY. In order to search for the hiding place of much of the Empire's remaining forces, the New Republic used probe droids manufactured on Metalorn and the planet Troithe.
A Skakoan, Wat Tambor immigrated to Metalorn to begin a career in technology.
Metalorn was inhabited by members of the sentient Skakoan species, humanoids that were native to the Core Worlds city-planet Skako. Of the few Skakoans that left that world, most tended to be technological industrialists. At an early age, the Skakoan Wat Tambor left Skako to begin a career in technology on Metalorn, going on to become foreman of the Techno Union who represented the organization in the Republic's Galactic Senate. The Skakoan population of Metalorn supported the Separatists, although the resident Techno Union officially declared neutrality during the Clone Wars. Tambor and other Skakoan business interests also sided with the faction out of fear of Republic overreach, providing the Separatists with indirect support.
Tambor's expansionist leanings turned the Republic against Skako, and following the foreman's assassination and the dissolution of the Separatists, the Empire inherited the Republic's prejudice, with the Skakoans finding themselves shunned as enemies of Emperor Palpatine. The Empire enslaved Metalorn's Skakoan population for having supported the Separatists. As a result, some Skakoans joined the Rebel Alliance in order to avenge their fallen comrades; others joined as they knew that hiding from the galaxy would neither save them nor their homeworld.
Metalorn was the site of Unreal City, one of the many private prisons in which the majority of prisoners taken by the Separatists were incarcerated.
Metalorn was first mentioned in the current Star Wars canon in the 2016 reference book Star Wars Character Encyclopedia: Updated and Expanded, written by Pablo Hidalgo. The planet Metalorn originated in the Star Wars Legends continuity, where it first appeared in the thirtieth issue of Marvel Comics' 1977 Star Wars comic run, written by Archie Goodwin, illustrated by Carmine Infantino, and released on September 25, 1979.
- Star Wars Character Encyclopedia: Updated and Expanded
- Forged in Battle
- Star Wars: The Force Awakens Beginner Game
- Star Wars: The Rebel Files
- Star Wars Character Encyclopedia, New Edition
- Rise of the Separatists
- Collapse of the Republic
- The High Republic Free Digital Sampler
- Star Wars: Battles that Changed the Galaxy
- Star Wars: Character Encyclopedia, Updated and Expanded Edition
- Star Wars Galaxy Map