Second Battle of Isengard

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|prev=Battle of Dorin
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|name=Second Battle of Isengard
|image=
|conflict=War of the Ring
|date=October 20-25, 1981
|place=Isengard, Middle-Earth
|result=Galactic Republic victory
*Primary droid foundry and other key factories destroyed
*Queen Karina the Great and her hive defeated
*ArchdukeStar Wars: The Clone Wars: New Battlefronts: The Visual Guide Poggle the Lesser taken into Republic custody
*Isengard recaptured by the Republic
|side1=*Galactic Republic
*Jedi Order
*Rohan
*Elves
|side2=*Confederacy of Independent Systems
*Isengard
*Geonosians
**Queen Karina the Great's hive
|commanders1=*High General Sam Gamgee
*Senior General Luminara Unduli
*General Gandalf
*King Theoden
*General Frodo Baggins
*Another Jedi Knight
*Admiral Wullf Yularen
*Commander Erza Scarlet
*Commander Barriss Offee
*Commander Eowyn
*Treebeard
*Marshal Commander CC-2224
*Commander CC-1004
*Commander CC-1993Star Wars: The Clone Wars Character Encyclopedia
*Captain Breaker
*Captain CT-7567
|commanders2=*Queen Karina the Great†
*Archduke Poggle the Lesser
*TX-21†
|forces1=*8 Jedi
*Advanced Recon Force troopers
*Clone flame troopers
*Clone naval officers
*Clone tank gunners
*50,025 Clone troopers
**501st LegionThe Essential Guide to Warfare
**Tango Company
**Frodo's team
*15,005 Rohirrim cavalry
*6,000 Elvess
*Clone trooper pilots
*Special ops clone troopers
*330 All Terrain Tactical Enforcers
*200 Ents
*At least 4 AV-7 Antivehicle Cannons
*BARC speeders
*Consular-class cruisers
*350 Low Altitude Assault Transports/carrier
*800 Low Altitude Assault Transports/infantry
**Bad Kitty†
**Dooku Boot
**Lucky Lekku
**Separatist Nightmare†
**The Bug Stomper
*10 Acclamator-class assault ships
*6 Venator-class Star Destroyers
**ResoluteStar Wars: The Clone Wars Comic UK 6.20
*650 BTL-B Y-wing starfighters
|forces2=*Geonosian warrior insurgents
**2 Geonosian royal guards
*"Undead" reanimated Geonosians
*Brain worms
*10 garrisons of battle droids and Uruk-Hais
**9,000 B1-Series battle droids
**10,000 Uruk-Hais
**B2 super battle droids
**9 B2-RP battle droids
**36 BX-series droid commandos
**47 Droidekas
**45 Trolls
**16 DSD1 dwarf spider droids
**1 OG-9 homing spider droid
**1 IG-227 Hailfire-class droid tank
*1 T-series tactical droid
*12 Droid tri-fighters
*2 Hyena-class bombers
*9 Vulture droid starfighters
*J-1 proton cannonsStar Wars: The Clone Wars: Incredible Vehicles
*J-10 dual blaster cannons
*LR1K sonic cannons
*55 Armored Assault Tanks
*45 Mumakils
*Flitknot speeders
*68 Warg Riders
*2 Multi-Troop Transports
*1 NR-N99 Persuader-class droid enforcer
*43 Single Trooper Aerial Platforms
*32 Super tanks
*7 Super tank shield generators
*Nantex-class territorial defense starfighters
*28 Rogue-class starfighters
|casual1=*Heavy losses to clone troopers, Rohirrim, and Elven warriors
*Many landing craft and ground forces
**Most AV-7 Antivehicle Cannons
|casual2=*Many Geonosian and Uruk-Hai warriors and battle droids
*Ground artillery and vehicles, including the super tanks
*Losses to starfighter forces
*Queen Karina the Great
}}
The Second Battle of Isengard took place October 20 to the 25, in the year 1981 during the War of the Ring, when the Jedi Order and the Galactic Republic launched a full-scale invasion of Isengard to shut down several Separatist battle droid foundries that Archduke Poggle the Lesser had built there. Following Senator Padmé Amidala's discovery of the droid factories, the Jedi High Council dispatched a massive Jedi-led detachment of the Grand Army of the Republic to retake Isengard and halt the facilities' production of battle droids and orcs. Tasked with the challenge of arriving on the Fangorn forest and establishing a staging area, the Jedi mounted a three-pronged attack on the Geonosian and Uruk-Hai defenses in what became known as the battle of Point Rain, with Jedi Generals Gandalf, Sam Gamgee, and Frodo Baggins each leading an assault force. After establishing a landing zone at Point Rain, a site close to the factories' Ray Shield Fortress generator, the Republic army regrouped and disabled the factories' ray shield, making way for the rest of the clone trooper forces to safely land.
While Poggle attempted to retake Point Rain and his Ray Shield Fortress, his main orc foundry was targeted by the Jedi. In order to eliminate the factory, Generals Baggins and Luminara Unduli battled the facility's droid defenses in open warfare while their respective Padawans, Eowyn, Erza Scarlet and Barriss Offee, sneaked into the facility via the catacombs beneath it. As their Masters battled Poggle's army—including several newly designed super tanks—on the bridge leading to the factory, the Padawans' infiltration of the foundry was cut short when they were intercepted by Poggle and his tactical droid, TX-21. With their explosive charges stolen, Eowyn, Erza and Offee used a super tank to blow up the facility's reactor and collapse the factory from the inside. Frodo and Unduli rescued their Padawans from the debris once the foundry had fallen. Despite the Republic's destruction of other key factories, Poggle remained at large, having escaped his primary tower of Orthanc before its eradication.
As the Jedi undertook the cleanup of Isengard, they launched a campaign to find and apprehend Poggle. Unduli spearheaded the search and followed Poggle to the abandoned Progate Temple, where she was captured by the archduke and taken to the lair of Geonosian Queen Karina the Great in the catacombs below. Tracking Unduli's last known location, Sam and Frodo set out with a clone platoon to rescue her. Battling hordes of "undead" Geonosian warriors who were being reanimated by the queen's brain worm parasites, the Jedi and their troops found Unduli in Karina's lair. Although Karina wished to induct Unduli and her comrades into her ranks of mind-controlled warriors, Gamgee, Frodo, and their men were able to save Unduli and take Poggle into custody. The Jedi and their troops destroyed much of the queen's lair during their escape, killing Karina the Great and burying her warriors beneath the temple, and the Republic's recapture of Isengard was secured.
==Prelude==
===The new droid foundries===
By late 1981, after the opening battle of the War of the Ring earlier that year on the planet Middle-Earth, the evil fortress of Isengard began building a series of new battle droid foundries on their Rohan territory to expand the Droid Army of the Confederacy of Independent Systems with thousands of more Uruk-Hai troops. Because the Galactic Republic had captured the tower and Isengard at the war's outset, the facilities were kept secret to protect them from the Republic, which greatly underestimated the Geonosians' resistance and their loyalty to the Separatists. Archduke Poggle the Lesser himself oversaw the foundries' progress, particularly the rebuilding of the primary orc foundry, which was intended to surpass in size the original factories that had fallen during the First Battle of Isengard. Poggle himself had been humiliated during the First Battle of Isengard and viewed the factory as his redemption, and he also hoped to exact his revenge on the Republic for the occupation of Saruman's tower of Orthanc and the destruction of many of his factories.
Poggle's factories churned out thousands of battle droids and Uruks a day,Star Wars: Clone Wars Adventures: The Official Guide to the Virtual World and the units were sold to the Confederacy for its war machine. The InterGalactic Banking Clan invested substantial funds in the primary foundry, but after the financial burden became too big to bear, the Banking Clan took on another Separatist-loyal corporation, the Trade Federation, as a co-investor. As Republic Senator Lott Dod of the Trade Federation and Senator Rush Clovis of the Banking Clan delegation prepared to meet on Cato Neimoidia, where Dod resided, to discuss their investments in the foundry, the Jedi High Council—correctly suspecting Clovis of involvement in a Separatist conspiracy—recruited Senator Padmé Amidala to spy on Clovis. Amidala, who had previously been romantically involved with Clovis, agreed to the mission and was able to secure a personal invitation to accompany Clovis to Cato Neimoidia.
With her husband, Jedi Knight Frodo Baggins, as her bodyguard, Amidala went with Clovis on his trip. At Dod's palace, Clovis met in secret with Dod and Poggle the Lesser, who had also arrived to participate in the deliberations. Dod and Poggle both attempted to negotiate for greater shares in the investment, but Clovis refused to change the terms of the agreement. However, Dod, witnessing Clovis's affection for Amidala, secretly poisoned the latter with a dose of lethal manax-root poisonStar Wars: The Clone Wars Official Episode Guide Series 1 & 2 to force the Banking Clan senator to change his mind. Shortly after stealing a disc containing the droid foundry's tactical coordinates from a hologram projector in the palace's library, Amidala fainted from the effects of the poison. Clovis threatened Dod with a blaster and secured the antidote to the poison, which he gave to Frodo. Accordingly, Frodo helped Amidala to her J-type star skiff and administered the medicine, then departed from Cato Neimoidia with Amidala and the disc. Clovis was left behind to face Dod, Poggle, and a squad of B1-Series battle droids.
===Preparations for an invasion===
Following Frodo and Amidala's return to the Gondor capital of Minas Tirith and the report of their findings to the Jedi High Council, Clone Captain CT-7567, nicknamed "Rex," was dispatched with a contingent of the Grand Army of the Republic's 501st Legion to reconnoiter Isengard. Upon arrival in Fangorn forest, Rex and his men were unable to establish contact with the clone troopers on the Isengard's surface but confirmed from preliminary scans that droid foundries, some of them close to completion and others already operational, were being constructed in the world's northern and southern hemispheres. Rex sent his report back to the Jedi Temple with the advisement that a full-scale invasion would be necessary to retake Isengard. Reviewing the report, the Jedi Council decided to send Jedi Generals Sam Gamgee and Gandalf and Senior Jedi General Luminara Unduli to lead the Grand Army's attack on the orc foundries. Since the facilities were a significant threat to the Republic's safety, retaking Isengard would be essential to the Republic war effort. Generals Gimli and Frodo, Admiral Wullf Yularen, and Frodo's Padawan, Commander Eowyn, were meanwhile assigned to reinforce the planet Dorin, which had been attacked by a Separatist fleet led by the Mordor General The Mouth of Sauron in an effort to keep the Jedi's attention away from Isengard.
The Republic forces spent much time in preparation for the assault on Isengard. Gandalf and his clone commander, CC-1993, spent hours studying intelligence reports about Isengard's defenses. CC-1993, nicknamed "Jet," even customized his clone armor for the battle. Gandalf, Gamgee, and Unduli were eventually dispatched to Isengard with a massive invasion fleet consisting of Venator-class Star Destroyers and Acclamator-class assault ships. After the invasion force had arrived in Middle-Earth space and entered the planet's orbit, Frodo, Eowyn, and Yularen—who had successfully repelled The Mouth of Sauron's forces from Dorin—rendezvoused with the fleet, and Frodo and Eowyn joined Gandalf, Theoden and Gamgee on the bridge of a Star Destroyer at the head of the fleet. With their ships in position, the four Jedi and the Rohan king opened a communication to the Republic's Outer Rim Command and conferred with Supreme Chancellor Palpatine and Jedi Generals Unduli, Bilbo Baggins, and Elrond.
Based on intelligence they had received, Gandalf and Theoden concluded that Poggle the Lesser was holed up within his primary tower of Orthanc, which, thanks to his Ray Shield Fortress, was being protected by a massive ray shield. With their primary target being the shield generator at the Ray Shield Fortress, the Jedi planned to execute a three-pronged attack on the Uruk-Hai defenses. Gandalf, Treebeard, leader of the Ents and Jet were to lead the northern advance, while Gamgee and Marshal Commander CC-2224, nicknamed "Cody," commenced the central push. Frodo, Eowyn, Theoden, and Rex, meanwhile, would execute the southern assault with their forces from the 501st Legion, and the Rohirrim armies. The troops would rendezvous at Point Rain, a site that was just a short distance away from the Ray Shield Fortress; there, they would establish a staging area before eliminating the shield generator and setting up a defensive perimeter to their temporary base. Although Eowyn noted that the defenses were heavily fortified, pointing out a large wall armored with numerous artillery emplacements, Frodo believed that their approach would not lead them to the barricade. With their planning complete, the four Jedi split up to mobilize their forces for the coming battle. As the Republic forces were soon to discover, the Geonosians and the Uruks were better prepared to defend their fortress a second time from the Grand Army.
==The battle==
===The Republic invasion===
====Rough landing on Isengard====
The Republic's capital ships descended upon Fangorn and began to disgorge squadrons of BTL-B Y-wing starfighters, LAAT/i gunships, and LAAT carriers ferrying All Terrain Tactical Enforcers to the surface in heavy numbers. While Clone Captain Breaker and a Jedi Knight led the Y-wing starfighter squadrons in repelling groups of Geonosian Nantex-class territorial defense starfighters, Gamgee's assault force was the first to take flight, with Gamgee leading the way in his gunship. Gamgee and his gunships were met with heavy resistance from Geonosian J-1 proton cannons and LR1K sonic cannon emplacements below, as well as the Nantex-class starfighters from above, but they were able to push through with covering fire from the Republic Y-wing starfighters, which also targeted the Separatist gunners on the ground. With Gamgee's forces underway, Frodo's detachment—including Theoden, Rex and Eowyn—departed shortly afterward, followed by the assault group led by Gandalf and Jet from Yularen's flagship, the Resolute. Once all three strike forces had launched, Yularen recalled his fighter squadrons to the Republic's command ship for new orders. The gunship carrying Frodo, Theoden, Eowyn, and Rex was one of the first to be shot down, but the group managed to break free from the wreckage and use the fallen craft as cover from the nearby Geonosian gunners and blaster cannons. Gandalf, meanwhile, ordered Cody to land the AT-TE walkers shortly before Gandalf's own gunship fell to heavy fire as well.
Cody landed with his men and AT-TE walkers to be greeted by incoming Nantex-class fighters. Although Cody advised Gamgee not to land because of the danger posed by the Separatist fighters, Gamgee and his gunship were forced down when the craft was targeted by the Geonosians. The gunship hit the surface and skidded across the ground before coming to a stop, leaving only Gamgee and trooper Trapper alive. An injured Gandalf and Jet pulled themselves out of the remains of their gunship, which was just one of many to have been shot down in the area. Jet reported that Gamgee's forces had been the only ones to reach the landing zone, while Frodo's AT-TE walkers had been decimated in his ongoing firefight with the Geonosians and the Uruks; Jet noted that Frodo would continue to press on to the rendezvous point to meet with Gamgee. Gandalf ordered the injured men among his own special ops forces to be loaded onto the AT-TE walkers with the objective of pressing on to make for a nearby bridge and join the rest of the troops at the rendezvous site.
As all of the Republic's main strike teams were dispatched to battle the Geonosians, Breaker and the Jedi Knight were tasked with another mission. They and an elite crew were to take an LAAT/i gunship behind enemy lines to destroy a key Separatist installation; in doing so, they would sever Geonosian communications in the area and help to ease Geonosian retaliation to the Republic's primary assault. The elite gunship battled through enemy droid forces—including DSD1 dwarf spider droids, Multi-Troop Transports, jetpack-equipped B2-RP battle droids, Vulture droid starfighters, Hyena-class bombers, and droid tri-fighters—before reaching and destroying the Geonosian communications facility. Elsewhere, while overseeing the battle against the Geonosians and the Uruk-Hai in the area alongside Frodo, Theoden and Eowyn, Rex contacted Cody to request reinforcements for Frodo but found that Sam would be unable to give support, as Gamgee's gunship had been shot down. Left on their own, Frodo and Eowyn provided cover for Rex and the rest of Theoden's troops to rush the Separatist blaster cannons. At Point Rain, meanwhile, Cody organized his LAAT/i gunships and AT-TE walkers in a circular defensive formation. In the midst of exchanging heavy fire with the attacking sonic blaster–wielding Geonosians and their Armored Assault Tanks, Cody ordered troopers Waxer and Boil to search Gamgee's gunship—which had been located five kilometers away—for survivors. The two Advanced Recon Force trooper scouts raced across the battlefield, finding and rescuing the wounded Gamgee and Trapper from the gunship's wreckage.
While Waxer and Boil helped the injured Gamgee and Trapper back to the landing zone, Cody had his men and AT-TE walkers provide the group with covering fire from the advancing Separatist tanks and Warg Riders–mounted Geonosians. Upon his arrival, Gamgee was treated by a clone trooper medic and was updated on the situation by Cody. With his men surrounded by the Geonosians and Uruks, Gamgee noted that they simply had to hold out until Frodo and Gandalf arrived for support. Gandalf himself was in the process of cutting through a massive caltrop field so that his AT-TE walkers could move through the obstacles. Jet conferred with Admiral Yularen via comlink to request air support, but all of the starfighter forces were engaged in the planetary invasion elsewhere. Yularen was only able to offer his vantage point from the Resolute as a resource to locate Frodo, whom he found pressing toward the eastern barrier—the site of the Geonosians' armored barricade. Frodo, Theoden, Eowyn, Rex, and their men arrived at the heavily entrenched fortress and were forced to take cover from the assailing B1 battle droids, Uruk-Hai and B2 super battle droids high above. With the large amounts of incoming laser barrages, Frodo and Eowyn each took a backpack filled with thermal detonators and ran toward the adjacent cliff, using grappling hooks to scale the face in order to set their charges to topple the wall. With the rest of the troops continuing to exchange fire with the battle droids, Rex joined Frodo and Eowyn on the top of the barrier, helping them to sever a pair of droidekas that were soon deployed from hatches along the barrier.
Once Frodo and Eowyn had tossed their primed detonator–full backpacks into the hatches, they and Rex jumped off the wall shortly before it exploded. The Jedi used the Force to slow their fall and that of Rex before landing and employing the same method to hold back the rubble. With the wall destroyed, Frodo, Eowyn, and their forces pressed toward Point Rain. Meanwhile, Gandalf split up his own troops, sending his AT-TE walkers to take a longer route to the rendezvous point, while he took a squad to examine a shortcut through a clifftop cave. There, Gandalf and his men were besieged by groups of winged Geonosian warriors who depleted the clones' numbers by attacking them and carrying them into the grotto's depths. Although his men sustained heavy casualties and losses from the Geonosians, Gandalf was able to cut through the cave. At the other side, Gandalf had his clone flame troopers fire their flamethrowers at the Geonosians, killing most of them and unblocking the path out of the cave.
====Securing Point Rain====
Frodo, Theoden, Eowyn, Rex, and their squad, who were making their way to Point Rain, happened upon the clifftop cave where Gandalf's forces were just finishing off the smoldering Geonosians. Joining forces with Gandalf, Frodo contacted Yularen to request air support for the push to Point Rain, where Gamgee was in dire need of assistance. Having spent the time reallocating resources since Jet's previous request, Yularen dispatched an available Y-wing squadron to Point Rain to reinforce Gamgee's depleted strike force, which had become separated from the Republic's main forces. Commanding the small fighter contingent, Captain Breaker and his Jedi Knight compatriot led the Y-wing bombers through small arms fire from the Geonosians' LR1K and proton cannons, Oliphaunts and Armored Assault Tanks. After cutting through the Separatist ground artillery, the Y-wing squadron proceeded to Point Rain, where Gamgee and Cody were suffering numerous casualties at the hands of the Geonosians and the Uruks; the warrior insurgents had surrounded the Republic's staging area and were initiating flying attacks from the sky and speeder assaults on the ground. With his men pushed on all sides, Gamgee prepared to take up arms alongside his men in what he believed would be a final stand against the Geonosians.
At that moment, the Y-wing bombers arrived at Point Rain, dropping their munitions on the advancing Separatist tanks and halting the Geonosians' advance. With the rest of his troops pressing on, Sam was greeted by the arrival of Frodo, Theoden, Eowyn, Gandalf, and their strike teams. The Jedi regrouped and convened with their clone officers on the task still at hand: destroying the factories' shield generator at the Ray Shield Fortress, as the Geonosians were now finally in retreat. It was decided that Frodo would lead a small squad into the shield and jam the Geonosians' scanners, rendering them unable to target the incoming AT-TE walkers. Once the walkers had taken out the shield generator, Gandalf would then bring in the rest of the troops with the gunships. With little time to spare, the Republic forces quickly moved into position; after everything was ready, Frodo and Eowyn initiated their attack, charging through the shield with their men. Though pressed with heavy fire from the Geonosians, the Jedi and clones pushed through the fortress's defenses and took cover in an outcrop close to the generator. From there, the team threw EMP grenades at the proton and LR1K cannons, temporarily disabling the Separatist guns.
Unopposed by the enemy's heavy fire, Cody led the AT-TE walkers in their march through the shield, and the walkers concentrated their fire on the shield generator and its artillery stations. As the shield was deactivated, Gandalf, Rex, and their gunships landed with additional clone reinforcements to secure the Geonosian facility. All of the Geonosians at the Ray Shield Fortress were forced to surrender, and the injured Sam and Gandalf returned to the fleet with the rest of the wounded for treatment. Left in charge of the Republic forces, Frodo and Theoden set out for Poggle the Lesser's primary orc foundry on Isengard with Eowyn, Rex, and their assault force. However, the Republic's hold on Point Rain was not to go unchallenged—Poggle and his T-series tactical droid, TX-21, soon set their sights on Point Rain and launched a surprise counterattack to overrun the Republic's crucial landing zone. With Theoden's forces already on the move, Breaker and his Jedi Knight associate were given command of the ground forces at Point Rain and were tasked with defending the site. As the Geonosians began to march on their position, Breaker had the Republic's engineers prepare some blaster turret defense platforms to hold the line. The Republic forces used their blaster turrets to great effect in eliminating the deployed Separatist forces, which included ranks of BX-series droid commandos, droid-piloted Single Trooper Aerial Platforms, and IG-227 Hailfire-class droid tanks. As the Republic defenses increased in strength, TX-21 sent out more droid forces in retaliation, including shielded Rogue-class starfighters and massive OG-9 homing spider droids, but Breaker and the Jedi Knight were able to secure Point Rain and ensured that it would not fall to Separatist control.
When the Geonosians stopped the Republic's advance toward the orc factories, Yularen and the recovering Gamgee sent the Jedi Knight to clear out the resistance that was halting the clones' assault. The Knight complied and proceeded to the battlefield's front lines, cutting through battle droids and providing support where needed. Elsewhere, Republic troops made significant progress; Frodo's forces closed in on Poggle's primary orc foundry and began preparations for their assault. The Geonosian archduke meanwhile dispatched a battalion of droids to retake the heavily damaged Ray Shield Fortress from Republic control, as putting the facility back online would cut off Frodo's forces. Unwilling to let the Separatists overrun the fortress and subsequently break the Republic's supply lines, Breaker and the Jedi Knight mobilized their forces to defend the facility. Beginning their assault on the Ray Shield Fortress, Poggle and TX-21 dispatched a large wave of droid forces and NR-N99 Persuader-class droid enforcers to recapture the facility, and the Republic forces retaliated with a number of blaster turret emplacements. After having mobile super tank shield generators protect their ground troops, Poggle and TX-21 sent out a large squadron of shielded Porax-38 starfighters for air support. However, the Geonosians were unable to retake the Ray Shield Fortress, and Breaker and the Jedi Knight forced them to recall their depleted troops.
====Assault on the main foundry====
As Poggle's primary orc foundry neared completion, Frodo and Theoden's forces formed a staging area a short way from the only bridge that crossed the deep canyon isolating the heavily fortified installation. Anticipating stiff Geonosian resistance, Republic commanders dispatched Erza Scarlet of the Elves forces, Luminara Unduli and her Padawan, Barriss Offee, with reinforcements for Frodo's assault. Leading the way in their gunship, Unduli, Erza, Offee, and Clone Commander CC-1004, nicknamed "Gree," arrived at the Republic's staging area with more troops and gunships, and Unduli, Scarlet and Offee met with Frodo, Theoden, Treebeard and Eowyn to finalize a plan for the impending attack on the tower of Orthanc. Although Frodo had been preparing for a direct assault on the tower via the bridge, Unduli proposed an alternative plan that would minimize their casualties: using the catacombs under the facility, a team could infiltrate the building and plant explosives at its main reactor, thus effectively destroying the foundry from the inside. As Unduli had already had her Padawan memorize all 200 of the labyrinth's internal junctions, the mission to infiltrate the droid factory fell to Eowyn, Erza and Offee. Frodo and Unduli, meanwhile, would launch a forward assault on the facility's main entrance to distract Poggle and allow the Padawans to complete their assignment. With their strategy in place, the Jedi set their plan into motion, synchronizing chronometers so that the Padawans' progress could be monitored.
While Eowyn, Erza and Offee began to descend the chasm in front of the droid factory to reach the entry point to the catacombs at the bottom of the canyon, Frodo, Theoden, Treebeard, Unduli, Rex, and Gree mobilized their men and elves and marched their troops, Ents and AT-TE walkers toward the bridge parade-style. Despite their risky lack of cover, Frodo, Theoden and Unduli intended to make their frontal assault tempting enough to draw the factory's droid and Uruk-Hai defenders into a fight. With ten garrisons of new orcs ready, Poggle and TX-21 took the bait and deployed a large army of B1, Uruk-Hai and B2 battle droids to defend the foundry. As Frodo, Theoden and Unduli led their men to charge the droids, they found themselves confronted by groups of flying Geonosians launching a surprise attack from several spires behind them, and they were caught in a crossfire. In the canyon, Eowyn, Erza and Offee made it to the other side of the trough, where Offee cut a hole in the canyon wall and opened the entrance to the catacombs. The three Padawans made their way through the dense labyrinth and through a room of sleeping Geonosian warriors, unaware that they were being followed by a Geonosian whom they had accidentally awoken.
Frodo, Theoden and Unduli continued to cut through the opposing battle droids Uruk-Hai, and trooper Buzz used a Z-6 rotary blaster cannon to take out the airborne Geonosian insurgents. With the appearance of several droideka squads, Rex sent trooper Draa forward with a rocket launcher, and Draa quickly destroyed the droids. The Geonosians' and Uruk-Hai advance forces were further depleted by heavy fire from the Republic's AT-TE walkers and Treebeard's Ents. In response, Poggle authorized TX-21 to send out twenty units of their newly developed super tanks. The ray shielded vehicles were deployed from the foundry, and despite the Republic forces' attempt to halt the tanks' advance with AV-7 Antivehicle Cannons manned by clone tank gunners, Frodo, Theoden, Treebeard, Unduli, and their men were unable to stop the shielded tanks' approach. With the battle turning in the Republic's favor, Poggle and TX-21 made one last attempt to outflank Frodo's forces, sending out a droid army to cut off his battle group. Once the Separatists' attack route had been identified, Captain Breaker and his Jedi Knight compatriot set out with a Republic assault force to intercept Poggle's army; the Republic's engineers provided an array of turret defense platforms for use in combating the incoming droids. After breaching the Republic defenses with armored droid tanks, mobile shield generators, starfighter squadrons, and a multitude of ground troops, TX-21 deployed a super tank to compromise the Republic's position.
Although the tough super tank did significant damage to the Republic's turret emplacements, Breaker and the Jedi Knight were able to destroy the droids and the super tank before the latter could move on to target Frodo's forces, and Poggle's deployed army was defeated. In the meantime, Eowyn, Erza and Offee arrived at the primary foundry's control room and planted their thermal detonator charges around the large main generator. Learning of the three Jedi's presence from the Geonosian spy, Poggle and TX-21 personally took a squad of Geonosian warriors and a super tank to greet the intruders. After activating their explosives, the Padawans' escape was cut short by the arrival of the Geonosian archduke and his super tank. Outside the foundry, Frodo and Unduli learned from their chronometer readings that Eowyn and Offee had placed and activated the bombs. Immediately thereafter, the Separatist tanks released a barrage of rockets that annihilated the Republic's artillery line and AT-TE walkers, dealing heavy casualties. While the Geonosians and their super tank kept Eowyn, Erza and Offee occupied in the control room, other Geonosian warriors collected the primed explosives from around the reactor. Poggle entrusted TX-21 and his troops to thwart the Jedi's plan while he departed.
After destroying TX-21 with an explosive charge but barely putting a scratch on the super tank, Eowyn made to retrieve the bombs from the Geonosians, jumping and hanging onto two of the flying warriors before they could escape from the Padawans. However, the Geonosians knocked Eowyn against the reactor, temporarily rendering her unconscious. Forced to defend the fallen Eowyn from the super tank's laser fire, Offee and Erza was unable to prevent the Geonosians from escaping into a hatch with the primed bombs. Meanwhile, Frodo and Unduli ordered Rex, Treebeard, Gree, and their men to fall back in order to lure the tanks onto the bridge, which the two Jedi Generals intended to collapse to eliminate the tanks. The clones' retreat baited the tanks onto the pass, and Frodo and Unduli swung hand-over-hand under the bridge and across its underbelly, planting explosives at key points along its length. Reaching the other side of the bridge, Frodo and Unduli detonated the charges, destroying the span and sending the tanks into the abyss below.
Even with the arrival of evacuation ships, Frodo refused to leave without his Padawan, who was unresponsive to his transmissions. The two Jedi Generals' refusal to retreat forced them to face more B1 battle droids from Poggle's foundry. Inside the control room, Offee cut her way into the super tank and disabled its battle droid operators, commandeering the vehicle and saving Eowyn from being killed by the vehicle's cannon. A revived Eowyn joined Erza and Offee inside the tank, where the trio contemplated their dilemma: without the bombs, they would be unable to destroy the foundry and complete their crucial mission. Eowyn, Erza and Offee chose to instead use the super tank to fire at the generator, despite knowing that they would be unable to escape the subsequent explosion. Once Eowym had relayed that decision to Frodo, Theoden and Unduli, who were battling the droids and orcs outside, she, Erza and Offee opened fire on the reactor, causing a massive chain of explosions to bring the foundry down. Unable to help their Padawans, a saddened Frodo, Theoden and Unduli took cover as their droid adversaries were crushed by the debris from the collapsing orc foundry. After the dust, the dam of the river had settled and the smoke had cleared, Frodo desperately tried to contact Eowyn with his comlink, to no avail. Determined to rescue the buried Padawans from under the waters of rubble, Frodo ordered the Republic's LAAT carriers to begin lifting the debris to search for Eowyn, Erza and Offee.
Trapped with Erza and Offee in the super tank deep below the surface with a limited supply of air, Eowyn used a power cell to boost her communicator's reception and signal Frodo to their position. Frodo, Unduli, and a squad of clones quickly proceeded to the indicated area, and with time running out, Frodo and Unduli used the Force to levitate the heavy debris away from the Padawans' super tank. The freed Eowyn, Erza and Offee emerged from the wreckage, coughing and grimy but alive, and were reunited with their Masters. Following their success and ordeal in destroying the foundry, Eowyn, Erza and Offee were sent back to the fleet for some much-needed rest and accompanied a convoy of LAAT/i gunships ferrying the Republic's wounded troops back for treatment.
===The Geonosians' threat===
Besides putting an end to Saruman's primary Uruk-Hai foundry, the Republic forces were also able to destroy other key factories, albeit at a heavy cost to their troops. The Republic's Tango Company was among the clone units to be involved in the battle. As Unduli and a recovered Sam began a cleanup of Isengard, they mounted an intense campaign to find Poggle, who had escaped his primary foundry's destruction and was evading the Republic's efforts to locate and apprehend him. Little did the Jedi know that Poggle was fleeing to the Progate Temple, the secret lair of the Geonosian queen, Karina the Great. The Jedi sent their clone scouts into the forest, but without any initial leads on Poggle's location, Unduli decided to personally spearhead the search, as Poggle's possession of Separatist information made him a key target. Unduli and trooper Buzz set out on BARC speeders and picked up the trail of the fleeing Geonosian archduke, who was en route to the Progate Temple with a squad of battle droids and two royal Geonosian guards aboard an Armored Assault Tank, bringing along several crates of munitions. Unduli and Buzz tracked Poggle to the western forest, where they found a crate that had fallen from the tank. Reporting back to Gamgee and Gandalf, the latter of whom had also recovered from his injuries, Unduli concluded that Poggle was fleeing to the temple, a site that had been hit by heavy bombardment during the Republic's initial siege. Despite Frodo's warning that a heavy rain was approaching her position, Unduli was intent on completing her mission and was unwilling to let Poggle escape.
Unduli and Buzz followed Poggle through the rain and into the temple, where the pair reported back to Gamgee, Gandalf, and Frodo, who were overseeing the tower of Orthanc at their staging area elsewhere on the region. Before Unduli and Buzz could return to the tower, however, they were attacked, and their transmission was cut short. Buzz was killed, and Unduli was knocked out before being taken hostage by Poggle and several of Queen Karina's "undead" Geonosian warriors who were being reanimated by the queen's brain worm parasites. Once the rain had stopped, Frodo, Sam, and Cody took a platoon of clone and elf troops in a gunship to the Progate Temple to find and rescue Unduli. There, Cody found Buzz's dead body, and Gamgee chanced upon Unduli's lightsaber. Noting his belief that Poggle could not have defeated a Jedi, Frodo noticed a statue of a "bizarre Geonosian," which Sam speculated to be of the long-rumored Geonosian queen. Intent on finding Unduli, Frodo, Sam, Cody, and their men entered the caverns through the temple, using their lightsabers and headlamps to light the way.
Cody's wrist-mounted trackers led the platoon into a tunnel that penetrated deepest into Isengard's crust. Meanwhile, Unduli, who had been placed in binders and was being dragged through the catacombs by Poggle and a group of Geonosian drones, regained consciousness and was able to break free of her captors. Fighting the Geonosian warriors in close combat, Unduli was unable to defeat the already dead guards, and she used her imagecaster holoprojector to hail Gamgee. Unduli urged him and his troops to abandon their search for her, but she was subdued once more after relaying her message. Instead of taking Unduli's advice, Sam and Frodo led their men deeper into the caverns and pressed on, only to encounter and be surrounded by a horde of the Geonosian zombie warriors themselves. The hobbits and the clones opened fire on their adversaries but were unable to stop the insectoids. With his men outnumbered and taking losses, Gamgee ordered the platoon to take out the tunnel's supports and retreat, seeing it as the only way to halt the Geonosians' advance. The hobbits and their troops escaped from the zombie warriors for the time being. Sam and Frodo grimly noted the drone warriors' apparent immunity to all of their attacks and resolved to request reinforcements from Gandalf. Because they were too deep underground to get a comlink signal, Gamgee sent trooper Gearshift and another clone to backtrack to the surface and contact Gandalf.
The two troopers did not get far before being attacked and killed by the Geonosian zombies. Hearing the pair's screams, Gamgee, Frodo, Cody, and the rest of the platoon ran to help their comrades but arrived too late to save them, instead finding their slain bodies. Although Frodo wanted to go to the surface himself to hail Gandalf, Gamgee believed that they could not divide their troops again and noted that time was running out for Unduli. The captive Unduli, meanwhile, woke up to find herself suspended in a containment field next to the throne of Queen Karina the Great, who was in the process of reproducing more Geonosian drones from her undulating and large egg sac, aided to by the reanimated warriors of her hive. Gamgee, Baggins, and Cody finally found the royal chamber and spied on the proceedings from the shadows. Using his infrared headlamp in the dark room, Cody located Unduli next to the throne and Poggle in conversation with the Queen. Frodo was set to mount a full-on attack on the Geonosians, but Gamgee, who was after the reasons behind the queen's abduction of Unduli, devised a different plan. The Jedi set up their clone troopers around the room's perimeter, intending to have their men use their headlamps to temporarily blind the dark-dwelling Geonosians and create enough confusion so that they could rescue Unduli when the appropriate moment presented itself.
While Cody stealthily moved the men into place, Sam and Frodo marched straight into the throne room and through the lines of Geonosians zombies to speak with Karina. Sam spoke with the queen and told her that her rule was at an end, but the shrieking queen refused to recognize the Jedi's authority. Her subordinates took the Hobbit's lightsabers from them, and Karina then revealed her intentions: instead of seeking the Jedi's elimination, she wished to possess them using her brain worms, as the Jedi would make valuable additions to her army of warriors. As Poggle placed one of the parasites on Unduli so that the worms' power could be demonstrated, Sam signaled Cody and the clones to attack. The troopers blasted their headlamps on the Geonosians and temporarily blinded them, allowing Sam and Frodo to retrieve their lightsabers from the drones with the Force. While Gamgee himself took Unduli's brain worm as a sample for study, Frodo freed Unduli and returned her lightsaber to her.
The Ringbearer confronted Poggle, and Frodo shackled the Geonosian archduke in a pair of binders and brought him along with them before knocking Gamgee's worm sample out of his hand and crushing it beneath his boot. Once Sam, Frodo, and Unduli had fled the cave with the detained Poggle, the clone troopers provided cover for them and blasted the chamber's supports, trapping the Geonosians there under layers of rubble and killing Queen Karina the Great. The warrior drones continued to follow the group, and as the clones continued to focus their fire at their pursuers, the Jedi headed to escape the catacombs to the surface. The Republic platoon climbed an air shaft out of the caverns, and the Geonosians pursing the squad were knocked back down and crushed under falling rocks. A geyser of dust billowed through the vertical passage and spewed Gamgee, Baggins, Unduli, Poggle, Cody, and the remaining clone troopers out of the catacombs. The group evacuated the temple shortly before it collapsed. With the ordeal over and Archduke Poggle the Lesser in Republic custody, the Jedi hoped that the queen's deadly brain worms had been buried with her under the temple, though that was not the case.
==Aftermath==
The assault on Isengard finally resulted in success, and the Republic was able to recapture the Separatist-allied fortress, ensuring that its Uruk-Hai factories would no longer fortify the Confederacy's troop lines. The Jedi's encounter with the Geonosian zombies prompted the Galactic Senate and Coruscant Health Administration to issue a warning to the citizens of the Republic concerning the supposed "mystery infection" that was plaguing the Geonosians, urging caution for all inter-planetary travel. While the Jedi ushered the captured Poggle onto a Nu-class attack shuttle at a landing area in preparation to take him to Rivendell for trial, Gandalf received word that Aragorn's defenses on the planet Dantooine had been able to hold out, albeit at a great cost to his men; Aragorn immediately required medical supplies that were waiting to be delivered from a medical station near the planet Ord Cestus. However, Frodo and Unduli believed that it was also of immediate importance to transport Poggle to Rivendell, as the Republic had to begin debriefing him if any useful Separatist intelligence was to be gained from him.
In order to allow himself and the other Jedi Generals to continue with the impending task of transporting Poggle to Rivendell, Frodo proposed that Eowyn and Erza handle the medical supply mission, and the other Jedi Generals agreed. Gamgee assigned the womens to take a medical frigate to the medcenter, planning to rendezvous with them alongside Gandalf, Unduli, Offee, and Frodo for the voyage to Dantooine after delivering Poggle to Rivendell. After Eowyn and Erza departed for the Ord Cestus facility with the Pelta-class frigate TB-73 and clone troopers of Tango Company as their embarked troops, the four Jedi Generals and Captain Rex left with Poggle under heavy guard, bound for Rivendell. The Padawans' routine mission, however, suddenly became a dire fight for survival when Geonosian brain worms—having infected Tango Company trooper CT-9544, nicknamed "Scythe," at the remains of the Progate Temple—attempted to take control of their supply ship.
Following the capture of Poggle, he was brought into Republic custody. Some time later, the Archduke was transferred to a prison on Minas Tirith as a prisoner of war. There, he was repeatably interrogated about a secret superweapon some in the Republic thought the Separatists could be developing.Catalyst: A Rogue One Novel
==Behind the scenes==
The Second Battle of Isengard was the first major battle of the The Lord of the Rings: The War of the Ring television series' 2009 second season, following the Battle of Angmar featured in the first season. It marked the Jedi's return to Isengard after the First Battle of Isengard and was featured across three chapters of a five-part story arc in the season—"Landing at Point Rain," "Weapons Factory," and "Legacy of Terror," which began airing on November 4, 2009 and continued until November 20. The three episodes were followed by the conclusion of the saga, "Brain Invaders," and were preceded by the episode "Senate Spy," which led into the battle by detailing the Republic's discovery of the droid foundries. In December 2010, the battle received its very own mini-game, entitled the "Isengard Saga," as part of the Star Wars: Clone Wars Adventures video game. Besides expanding upon various aspects of the campaign, the game clarified the canonical significance of Point Rain as the Republic's landing zone, which was not established in "Landing at Point Rain" despite the allusion to it.
The battle's span over several television episodes allowed for various pre-existing characters to be introduced into the television series, notably White Wizard Gandalf, Jedi Padawan Barriss Offee, Fairy Tail's Erza Scarlet, and Geonosian Archduke Poggle the Lesser.The Lord of the Rings: The War of the Ring The Complete Season Two, "Return to Isengard" DVD Featurette "Landing at Point Rain," the first chapter in the story arc, was added within the second season's production schedule at Series Producer George Lucas's request for the conflict to begin with a D-day attack storyline plot, with inspiration from World War II. "Landing at Point Rain" itself was used to look at the Jedi's challenges from the war with injuries on the parts of Gandalf and Sam Gamgee.
Overall, the battle was meant to recall the visual sense from classic war films such as The Longest Day, Blackhawk Down, and Saving Private Ryan. The battle represented a major milestone for the television series, from showcasing the visual scale and detail that the series' production team was able to reach in modeling Season Two's animation, to representing the depth and variety that the series' writing team was able to achieve in the story arc's individual yet cohesive plot lines. As of the Spring 2011 conclusion to the television series' third season, the Second Battle of Geonosis has been named by Star Wars Insider as one of the largest engagements seen in the series, with the others being the Battle of Christophsis, the Battle of Ryloth, and the Battle of Kamino.
Several aspects of the battle, including the destruction of the super tanks, were modified before the battle's storyline reached its final version. In "Weapons Factory," Anakin Skywalker and Luminara Unduli were to originally place their thermal detonators directly on the super tanks to destroy them, but at Lucas's instruction, they instead placed their explosive charges under the bridge that the tanks were crossing, thereby eliminating them by compromising the pass.
===Inconsistencies===
The 2011 LEGO Star Wars III: The Clone Wars video game features the Second Battle of Geonosis in several of its playable missions. In addition to portraying the battle in a more comical and humorous manner, the game modifies some of the battle's storylines. During the frontal assault on Poggle the Lesser's primary droid foundry, the Jedi take a BARC speeder to cross the bridge to the foundry, and several cannons and enemy bases guarding the factory must be destroyed to ensure success. In the main versions of the game, Ahsoka Tano and Barriss Offee do not plant explosive charges at the factory's reactor; instead, they directly commandeer the super tank to destroy the facility's core.LEGO Star Wars III: The Clone Wars In the Nintendo DS edition of the game, Tano and Offee engage the factory's defenses on the way to the reactor. Once there, they are able to plant their explosive charges without interference from the Geonosians, and then they simply commandeer the super tank to complete their mission. During Anakin Skywalker and Obi-Wan Kenobi's mission to free Luminara Unduli from underneath the Progate Temple, they must engage both Poggle the Lesser and Karina the Great in combat and defeat them.LEGO Star Wars III: The Clone Wars 
==Appearances==
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*LEGO Star Wars III: The Lord of the Rings 
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*Catalyst: A Rogue One Novel 
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==Notes and references==
Category:War of the Rings battles