Wookieepedia:Featured article queue/June 28, 2011

The Sith battlelords, also known as Battlelords, were a class of warrior who served the Sith Lord Darth Rivan during the New Sith Wars. Sith battlelords were leaders within Rivan's armies and, through a series of complex rituals involving the application of Sith magic, were bonded to the troops they commanded via the Force. The use of Sith battlelords reduced desertion rates within the Sith armies and, for a time, seemed likely to turn the tide of the New Sith Wars in the favor of the Sith. However, Rivan's battlelord forces were annihilated by a Force storm generated by an artifact known as the Darkstaff, and the Sith ultimately abandoned the practice of creating battlelords.

Over time, the precise details of how to create Sith battlelords was lost, and, during the Clone Wars, the slaver Phylus Mon and the Dark Jedi Karae Nalvas sought to rediscover the knowledge of battlelord creation. The pair traveled to Rivan's fortress on the planet Almas and discovered a secret chamber within the facility, where they found a tome that detailed the stages of the battlelord rituals. However, their attempts at carrying out the rituals were unsuccessful.