OOM-9/Legends

OOM-9 was an OOM-series command battle droid in the Trade Federation's army during the blockade and invasion of the planet Naboo.

He technically had a 100% success rating during the Naboo campaign, but was thwarted by his lack of independent thought and deactivated when the Trade Federation's Droid Control Ship was destroyed during the Battle of Naboo.

Invasion of Naboo
Originally a standard OOM-series battle droid, OOM-9 was created by the Trade Federation some time prior to 32 BBY to serve in their Droid Army under the Neimoidian Viceroy Nute Gunray, along with his senior staff Rune Haako and Lott Dod. In 32 BBY, Viceroy Gunray, having led the Trade Federation into a pact with the Dark Lord of the Sith Darth Sidious, initiated a blockade of the Mid Rim planet Naboo as a protest to the new taxation of trade routes. The Sith Lord, however, had an ulterior motive&mdash;the blockade would serve to undermine the leadership of Galactic Republic Supreme Chancellor Finis Valorum. In anticipation of the imminent invasion of Naboo, OOM-9 was specially programmed to serve as a command droid and lead Trade Federation forces against the Naboo and Gungan population. His first assignment as a commander was to organize the Trade Federation forces for the invasion.

Supreme Chancellor Valorum, hoping to resolve the crisis, sent two Jedi&mdash;Jedi Master Qui-Gon Jinn and his apprentice, Obi-Wan Kenobi&mdash;to settle the dispute. This bold action had an adverse affect&mdash;on Sidious's instruction, Gunray stepped up the invasion plans and ordered his forces to begin landing. However, the Jedi were able to stow away aboard one of the Federation's C-9979 landing craft and reach the surface of the planet. As OOM-9 oversaw the disembarkation of his forces from their landing craft, he was contacted by Gunray and Haako to inform him of the Jedi's escape. OOM-9 assured his superiors that, if the Jedi were on the planet, his forces would find them and ordered the patrol grid for Single Trooper Aerial Platforms and ground battle droids to be doubled.

The Jedi, however, were able to elude capture by OOM-9's forces. Unconcerned by this failure, the Trade Federation continued their invasion. Fearing that the Naboo would try to contact the Republic capital world of Coruscant to plead for help, Gunray promptly ordered the destruction of Naboo's offworld communication capabilities. OOM-9 was selected to lead the mission. Gunray gave OOM-9 his orders personally: occupy the Naboo settlements of Parrlay, New Centrif, and Vis, and raze their communications buildings to the ground. His small force of STAPs, beetle droids, battle droids and his personal Armored Assault Tank was unprepared for a major fight and was told to avoid direct confrontations with the Naboo until reinforcements could arrive. Since the Trade Federation could not afford to alert the Naboo to their presence on the ground, they could not risk conducting long-range scans, leaving OOM-9's forces to locate the settlements without reconnaissance data.

They soon came upon New Centrif, but the settlement was too heavily defended and OOM-9 decided to continue on and seek reinforcements before attacking. Upon reaching the smaller settlement of Vis, OOM-9 was contacted by Gunray to alert him to the arrival of the promised reinforcements. OOM-9 led his forces into the town, converging upon it with the newly arrived forces, including droidekas. After destroying Vis's transmitter, OOM-9 took his combined forces back to New Centrif before moving towards his final goal, the larger town of Parrlay, encountering several Naboo patrols along the way. After locating Parrlay, OOM-9 was once more contacted by Gunray who instructed him to destroy its transmitter before the inhabitants could contact their capital city, Theed. All Naboo resistance was to be eliminated. To assist OOM-9 in his task, Gunray dispatched further reinforcements, including pummels, and Parrlay was quickly subjugated.

The victory at Parrlay was just the beginning of Trade Federation's plans. The invasion, however, soon caught upon a snag. One of the five droid control programs sent to Naboo with the initial landing force was captured by Naboo troops from Harte Secur when OOM-14 suffered a malfunction. The loss of the control program rendered OOM-14's forces useless. Furthermore, Gunray knew that, if the Naboo could replicate the technology, they could take control of the Trade Federation's own battle droids. With the control program in enemy hands, the Trade Federation could not risk a large force to retrieve it. Instead, Gunray contacted OOM-9 and told him to escort a Neimoidian technician to the research center near Harte Secur where the control program was being held, retrieve it and use it to reactivate OOM-14's forces and their command center. Once they were reactivated, he was to lead OOM-14's forces in the destruction of Harte Secur and the nearby Harte Secur Airbase. He was assigned a group of droidekas to assist in the attack, while Gunray ensured that Harte Secur's transmissions were blocked to prevent it summoning reinforcements.

The attack on the research center proceeded quickly and the technician was soon able to reactivate OOM-14's forces. Despite the threat of Harte Secur Airbase, along with a nearby Gungan settlement, OOM-9 was able to gather his forces and swept into Harte Secur, destroying much of the city's architecture and obliterating its town center. Gunray complemented the droid on the impressive nature of the victory and announced that he had been selected to spearhead the attack on Spinnaker.

Spinnaker was Naboo's chief supply center and most goods being transported between Naboo and other worlds passed through the coastal town's spaceports. With the Trade Federation's blockade in place, the spaceports were fully loaded with valuable materials, including valuable nova crystals which could be used to fund the invasion. Gunray wanted to see direct evidence of Naboo's wealth and ordered OOM-9 to lead an attack on Spinnaker, occupy the town and collect its supplies of nova crystals to present to the viceroy. A small Trade Federation presence had already been established near Spinnaker, under the command of YIN-762. OOM-9, however, led his forces into a lightly defended Naboo village outside the town. The pacifist villagers, following their queen's lead, offered little resistance and the village quickly surrendered to the battle droids, relinquishing their resources and personnel to OOM-9's command. Despite counterattacks from the Royal Naboo Security Forces based in and around Spinnaker, OOM-9 was ultimately successful in pacifying the town and capturing its resources. The Trade Federation forces began preparing to take Theed and end the campaign, using Spinnaker as a launching point for the impending First Battle of Theed.

With the surrounding countryside occupied, the Trade Federation forces approached Theed. Queen Amidala ordered Captain Panaka and his Royral Naboo Security Forces to stand down, but a signal jammer in the city prevented the approach of the Trade Federation's droid starfighters and transports. OOM-9 was ordered to lead a battalion of elite units into the city to eliminate the jammer and allow reinforcements to be sent in. He was also instructed to eliminate any military facilities they encountered and to avoid civilian casualties, so as to prevent full-scale resistance. Despite Amidala's orders, the battle droids encountered scattered resistance from the Naboo military forces as they made their way through the city to the signal jammer. With OOM-9 leading the way from his AAT, the battle droids fought their way through the city to the signal jammer and quickly eliminated it. With the signal jammer destroyed, reinforcements were sent in and OOM-9 was given a new objective&mdash;to proceed to the Theed Royal Palace, capture it and prepare for Gunray's arrival. The droid once again proved capable of the task and led his forces through the city and into the palace grounds, securing it, despite heavy counterattacks from Naboo forces.



Occupation
By the time of Gunray and Haako's arrival, the capital was firmly under Trade Federation control. OOM-9 remained in Theed, serving as personal guard to the viceroy. It was in this capacity that he was present when Gunray met with Amidala and her senior aides. Gunray required Amidala to sign a treaty legitimizing the occupation but, when she proved uncooperative, he instructed OOM-9 to take her for processing. Rumors passing through the Federation-controlled Theed about an amphibious species residing out in the swamps, however, led OOM-9 to consider finding this threat to be his top priority. He therefore delegated escorting the queen to a detention camp to a squad of his troopers. OOM-9 monitored the operation on a secure channel while remaining in the Palace with the Neimoidians to remotely control the search for the Gungans. The transport operation, however, did not go as planned when Amidala was rescued by the two Jedi, who escorted her safely off Naboo.

OOM-9 got a lead on the Gungans' location when a captured mariner from Harte Secur informed his captors of a Gungan named Boss Ganne based near the Rellias channel. OOM-9's forces set out to begin the search there and were joined by Sidious's apprentice Darth Maul, recently arrived on Naboo. With the Sith Lord's help, the battle droids were able to locate and capture Boss Ganne. Maul then used the Force to manipulate Ganne into opening the Gates of Rellias, the only obstacle preventing Federation forces from accessing the Rellias channel. After eliminating all resistance from several small Gungan communities, the troops proceeded to the channel.

Maul's participation was short-lived and the Sith Lord soon departed in search of the escaped Queen Amidala. OOM-9, however, continued to Lake Paonga, location of the Gungan city of Otoh Gunga. On the shore of the lake, the Trade Federation established an outpost and OOM-9 sent patrols to locate any Gungan settlements on the mainland and the islands located in the lake. Resources collected on the land were being used to supply Otoh Gunga, so OOM-9's forces destroyed the settlements and secured the resources, cutting the supply lines to the underwater city. The Gungans retaliated by sending their naval forces to attack the Trade Federation outpost, but OOM-9 was able to repel the counterattack and his forces soon located Otoh Gunga itself. Though scans quickly determined that the city had been virtually abandoned, OOM-9 proceeded to eliminate the remaining resistance and laid waste to much of the city. With the apparent defeat of the Gungans, Naboo was firmly under Trade Federation control.

OOM-9 returned to Theed, but was soon called into action once more. Queen Amidala had returned to Naboo after failing to secure help from the Galactic Senate and united the scattered Naboo forces with the Gungan Grand Army. The Gungans had been recapturing city after city and were gathering near the swamps in preparation for an assault on Theed. OOM-9 led the Trade Federation forces which finally engaged the Grand Army at Grassy Plains. OOM-9 ordered his AATs to open fire on the Gungan forces, but the Gungans' deflector shield successfully absorbed the barrage. Seeing the ineffectiveness of the attack, OOM-9 eventually ordered his forces to hold fire and deployed his battle droids, sending them through the shield to engage the Gungans. He proceeded to demolish the outgunned Gungans, sending them into a retreat after their shield finally fell to the onslaught and having his troops round up the survivors. Only the actions of Anakin Skywalker, in the Naboo Space Battle that was raging above, cost him this final victory. Skywalker unintentionally managed to destroy the Trade Federation's Lucrehulk-class Droid Control Ship, deactivating OOM-9's army and the commander himself.

Characteristics
Like all battle droids, OOM-9 was created solely to wage war. The droid's programming was based around collecting and compiling tactics and plans for battle, and his personality was limited. Starting out as a regular battle droid, OOM-9 was retrofitted following his promotion to command. He wore markings painted a dull mustard yellow, designating him as a commander. His original back plating was removed and replaced with the standard command backpack, including an advanced power supply and several antennae to allow him to communicate with the Central Control Computer located in orbit of the planet. In battle, OOM-9 coordinated the Trade Federation forces from his personal Armored Assault Tank, which was fitted with additional weaponry and enhanced armor.

Behind the scenes
OOM-9 was voiced by Charles Martinet in the game Star Wars: Galactic Battlegrounds.

OOM-9's name shares a resemblance to the name of the state-sanctioned Deity OMM 0910 in Lucas' film THX 1138.

Appearances

 * Star Wars: Galactic Battlegrounds
 * Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace / novel / comic
 * LEGO Star Wars: The Video Game
 * LEGO Star Wars: The Complete Saga
 * Jedi Quest: The Way of the Apprentice