Satele Shan's green-bladed lightsaber

A Jedi Knight, Shan exchanged her normal blue double-bladed lightsaber for a single-bladed weapon sometime after the Battle of Rhen Var near the end of the Great Galactic War with the Empire, and Shan took her green-bladed saber with her to the planet Alderaan when she was sent there as part of a delegation to a peace conference in 3653 BBY. However, when it was revealed that the conference was a sham and that the Sith were holding the Republic's capital of Coruscant hostage in order to force the Republic to accept their terms, Shan drew her weapon and attacked the Sith negotiator Darth Baras. She later utilized it in combat against Imperial attackers when the vessel she was aboard, the Envoy, was boarded in seeming violation of the Treaty of Coruscant and the end of the war. The weapon was used by Shan to battle Darth Baras again on Dantooine a short while later, though the fighting ended with the death of her former Master Dar'Nala and a withdrawal by all parties involved.

By 3643 BBY, Shan was still using the weapon while serving as Grand Master of the Order, and her Padawan Shigar Konshi wielded it briefly alongside his own lightsaber to free Shan from the wreckage of the destroyed vessel Corellia above the planet Sebaddon. Konshi returned the lightsaber to his Master after the rescue, and she wielded it in battle against the droids known as hexes on Sebaddon's surface, an encounter later designated Independent Operation Sebaddon—an unofficial joint venture between the Empire and the Republic to destroy the hexes and prevent them from reaching the rest of the galaxy. However, Shan soon set aside the single-bladed weapon and took up a double-bladed lightsaber again, and she used that weapon throughout the rest of the Cold War and the subsequent Galactic War with the Empire.

Satele Shan's green lightsaber first appeared in the webcomic series Star Wars: The Old Republic, Threat of Peace, which served as a lead-up to the release of the BioWare video game Star Wars: The Old Republic. However, as many of the characters' appearances had not yet been finalized in-game, Shan's appearance and choice of lightsaber was among the many discrepancies in the comic. The novel The Old Republic: Fatal Alliance, which was also released well before the game, stated that Shan continued to use the lightsaber ten years after the events of the comic, though all subsequent material starting with the Hope cinematic trailer portrayed Shan as wielding several different blue double-bladed lightsabers throughout her life. The exception to this would be the novel The Old Republic: Deceived, which begins at the same time as Threat of Peace,

However, the reference guide The Journal of Master Gnost-Dural depicts Shan as wielding a blue double-bladed lightsaber during the skirmish on Dantooine, directly contradicting the already contentious green lightsaber. The first issue of the The Lost Suns comic arc further added to the discrepancy, as Shan seen with a double-bladed saber at Rhen Var shortly before the events of Threat of Peace, and she is also seen in-game with a double-bladed saber not long after the events of Fatal Alliance.