Dark Trooper

A Dark Trooper from The Mandalorian

A Dark Trooper is an elite type of Stormtrooper devised by the Galactic Empire.

Video Games

Dark Troopers originate in first-person shooter video games developed by LucasArts. In the games, they are elite Stormtroopers with a limited degree of training to use the Dark Side of the Force. Their armor is also substantially superior to that of typical stormtroopers, consisting of power armor with jump jets and some built-in weaponry.

Tare three types of Dark Trooper (the first two really being prototypes for the 3rd), all of which had much stronger armor then that of a standard stormtrooper.

• Phase I is armed with a riot shield and a vibrosword. This variant's weapons make it look more like it was designed for riot control as opposed to warfare.
• Phase II featured even stronger armor that functioned like power armor, giving added physical strength, and wielded a large gun specifically designed that functioned as an automatic weapon with added ability to fire rockets. As a drawback, the type II armor made the wearer much larger then a normal stormtrooper and therefore not suited for more enclosed environments.
• Phase III was the most powerful variant, and it was intended to serve as the next generation armor for the Imperial Army. It possessed even stronger armor than the type II, greater physical strength, and a pair of shoulder mounted rocket launchers that could be armed with variety of ordnance in addition to possessing the same deadly gun as the Phase II. Like the type II, however, it's oversized, standing nearly 3 meters tall (over 8 feet), so its sheer size would mean it wouldn't be able to replace the standard armor.

The Empire was never able to put Dark Troopers into mass production, as the head of the Dark Trooper project, General Rom Mohc, and the ship Arc Hammer the served as the initial production facility, were both destroyed by the rebel hero Kyle Katarn. As result, very few Dark Troopers were deployed.

The Mandalorian

In The Mandalorian series from Disney+, Dark Troopers take the form of combat droids. According to Moff Gideon, humans made the Dark Trooper concept flawed due to their unreliability. The droid troopers are absolutely loyal. Naturally, the droids do not have any Force-related abilities.

The Dark Trooper droids are substantially taller than a human and have armor sufficient to resist blaster fire. This may indicate that beskar was used in their construction, although if so, it is alloyed in a way that makes it unable to resist lightsaber cuts.

The droids carry blaster rifles as their main armament. They are also dangerous close combatants, being strong enough to break through blast doors given enough time. They also had rocket propulsion systems that allowed them to fly in atmosphere and maneuver in space. They proved to be no match for a trained Jedi Knight, however.