Ambush on the Vulture's Claw

|width=
|prev=Battle of Bothawui
|conc=*Battle of Angmar
|next=Mission to suspected Confederate space
|name=Ambush on the Vulture's Claw
|image=
|conflict=War of the Ring
|date=July 10, 1981
|place=Vulture's Claw, Bothawui Prime's asteroid belt
|result=*IG-86 sentinel droids defeated
*The Jedi leave the Vulture's Claw without finding R2-D2
|side1=Galactic Republic
|side2=Independent scavenger
|commanders1=*General Frodo Baggins
*Commander Eowyn
|commanders2=Gha Nachkt
|forces1=2 Jedi
|forces2=2 IG-86 sentinel droids†
|casual1=None
|casual2=Both assassin droids
}}
The Ambush on the Vulture's Claw took place in 1981, the opening year of the War of the Ring, when Jedi General Frodo Baggins and his Padawan, Eowyn, attempted to recover the astromech droid R2-D2. The astromech droid had gone missing during the previous Battle of Bothawui, so Baggins and Eowyn set out aboard the freighter Twilight and ventured to the droid's last known location: Bothawui Prime's asteroid belt. While scouring the asteroid belt, they happened upon the scavenger Gha Nachkt's salvage ship, the Vulture's Claw, and boarded it disguised as peasant customers. Nachkt showed the Jedi to his wares, but after Baggins's replacement astromech droid, R3-S6—who was secretly a spy for General The Mouth of Sauron of the Confederacy of Independent Systems—activated a pair of IG-86 sentinel droids within the cargo hold, Baggins and Eowyn were forced into combat with the deadly assassin droids. After dismantling their assailants, the Jedi left the Vulture's Claw empty-handed, remaining unaware that Nachkt had salvaged R2-D2 and promised the droid to Mouth of Sauron.
==Prelude==
In 1981, the first year of the War of the Ring, Jedi General Frodo Baggins marshaled a Republic Navy fleet in defense of the strategic planet Bothawui, which was being targeted by General The Mouth of Sauron of the Confederacy of Independent Systems. In the ensuing Battle of Bothawui,Star Wars: The Clone Wars: The Visual Guide Mouth of Sauron's Confederate Navy flotilla suffered critical losses, prompting the Mordor general to flee from the battlefield with Baggins in hot pursuit. However, shrapnel spawned by the disintegrating Confederate frigates wrecked Baggins's Delta-7B interceptor, which consequently veered into the asteroid belt of the gas giant Bothawui Prime.The Essential Atlas Although Clone Captain CT-7567, nicknamed "Rex," rescued Baggins from the asteroids, he was unable to save Baggins's astromech droid, R2-D2. Baggins had developed an attachment to R2-D2 and, as a result, had never wiped the droid's memory, which was thus full of classified Republic Military data.
When High Jedi General Sam Gamgee learned of Baggins's dilemma, he ordered him and his Padawan, Commander Eowyn, to find and retrieve R2-D2, as the information within his databanks would prove fatal to the Republic if it fell into Confederate hands. As Baggins and Eowyn prepared to depart from their flagship, the Venator-class Star Destroyer Resolute, aboard Baggins's personal freighter, the Twilight, they were issued a replacement droid: R3-S6, an R3-series astromech droid with more powerful capabilities than R2-D2's model. However, both Jedi were unaware that R3-S6 was a spy and enemy agent working for Mouth of Sauron, intent on removing Baggins as an obstacle for the Mordor general. Also unbeknownst to the Jedi, the scavenger Gha Nachkt salvaged R2-D2 from the asteroid belt and offered the droid to Mouth of Sauron, who in return promised Nachkt a number of credits. Nachkt concealed R2-D2 in a cockpit compartment aboard his GS-100 salvage ship,The Clone Wars Campaign Guide the Vulture's Claw.
Weaving through the battlefield debris amidst Bothawui Prime's asteroids, Baggins and Eowyn spotted the former's Delta-7B interceptor. Yet the starfighter's astromech socket was empty, and though Baggins believed that R2-D2 had escaped, Eowyn failed to locate the droid on the Twilight scanners. They caught sight of the Vulture's Claw and decided to board the vessel to see if the scavenger had recovered R2-D2. After docking with the Vulture's Claw, Baggins and Eowyn donned simple robes to disguise themselves as peasants, then boarded the craft with R3-S6. Upon greeting his new customers, Nachkt lied and told them that he had not picked up any R2 units for a long time, as war shortages had made the R-series scarce. When Baggins flashed a handful of shiny credits, the greedy Nachkt amended his statement with a smile and told the disguised Jedi that there might be an R2 unit buried in the depths of his cargo hold. He allowed Baggins, Eowyn, and R3-S6 to browse through his wares there, warning them to be careful of his "unique items" before leaving.
==The ambush==
After a short time, Eowyn found the unique items of which Nachkt had spoken: a pair of deadly but inactive IG-86 sentinel droids, which were connected to the ship's systems via cables. As they continued to peruse Nachkt's inventory, Baggins ordered R3-S6 to access the ship's cargo manifest to see if any droids matching R2-D2's description were logged. Suddenly, they heard a sound that Baggins concluded was R2-D2's trademark whistle, and he bolted over to a nearby blast door from which the sound had originated. Although Eowyn was skeptical of whether it had been R2-D2, Baggins told R3-S6 to open the door, but the astromech droid instead flashed on the cargo hold's lights. Exasperated with R3-S6's apparent ineptitude, Baggins activated his Eldar Sword and began to cut through the door himself.
At that moment, R3-S6 switched on the dormant IG-86 sentinel droids, one of which grabbed Eowyn from behind. On hearing his Padawan's cry of surprise, Baggins came to her aid, slicing off the arm of the assassin droid holding Eowyn and then using the Force to telekinetically push both droids into a pile of crates. Eowyn told R3-S6 to shut down the assassin droids, but before R3-S6 could do so, the two droids released themselves from the ship's cables. As the sentinel droids targeted the Jedi with their E-5 blaster rifles, Baggins and Eowyn deflected the oncoming blasterfire with their lightsabers, though their agile adversaries summarily launched themselves onto the adjacent shelves. Baggins and Eowyn soon managed to knock them back to ground level, but Eowyn's one-armed opponent shoved a crate in her direction, pinning her against the shelf behind her. Before the sentinel droid could incapacitate Baggins from behind, Eowyn jumped to her Master's aid, cleanly slicing the droid in half with her lightsaber. Baggins took care of the second assassin droid, beheading it with a single lightsaber strike.
==Aftermath==
Following the ambush, Frodo rounded on R3-S6, criticizing the astromech droid's deficiency; R3-S6 responded by finally opening the nearby blast door. In the room on the other side was a surprised Nachkt. Activating his lightsaber, Baggins threateningly questioned the scavenger regarding the whereabouts of R2-D2, but Eowyn convinced her Master that the missing droid was not aboard the Vulture's Claw. Still irate, Frodo shoved past Nachkt, and Eowyn and R3-S6 followed him back onto the Twilight. Before the Jedi detached from his ship, Nachkt called after them that they owed him for the mess—the butchered sentinel droids—that they had left behind. Shortly thereafter, Nackht holographically contacted Mouth of Sauron and informed him that he was en route to rendezvous with him and deliver R2-D2. Although Nachkt attempted to negotiate a higher payment since R2-D2 was obviously valuable to the Jedi, he acquiesced when Mouth of Sauron did not respond positively to his haggling.
Meanwhile, after hearing Baggins's report of his failure to find R2-D2, Gamgee told him that they had to assume the droid had been destroyed in the explosion that had claimed Frodo's starfighter. Frodo then contacted Jedi Masters Bilbo Baggins and Elrond of the Jedi High Council and declared R2-D2 officially lost in action. Believing that his fleet of Star Destroyers—including the Resolute—could use some modifications, Frodo took them back to the shipyards where they had been constructed to refit them.The War of the Ring: Wild Space Eventually, Gamgee contacted Frodo to relay his next assignment. Republic intelligence had confirmed the existence of a Confederate listening post, and Baggins and Eowyn were to find and destroy it before it could intercept further Republic transmissions. Frodo decided to personally scour the outer corridors of space that was suspected of Separatist activity, while Eowyn and Captain Rex maintained a more central path with the Resolute and the remainder of their forces. Once his starfighter had been retrieved and repaired, Baggins departed on his new mission with R3-S6.
==Behind the scenes==
The Ambush on the Vulture's Claw was created as part of the storyline of "Downfall of a Droid," an episode in the first season of the The Lord of the Rings: The War of the Ring television series. The episode aired on November 7, 2008. Besides being mentioned in various supplementary material for the series, the event was made into a Hasbro Battle Pack entitled Ambush on the Vulture's Claw, which provided the event with a name.
The December 2008 novel The War of the Ring: Wild Space, which made reference to Baggins's unsuccessful search for R2-D2, introduced some continuity problems surrounding the event. The novel stated that after their unsuccessful search, Baggins and Eowyn returned to the Allanteen Six shipyards, and they embarked on their sweeps of suspected Confederate space at the end of the book. This contradicted the events of the episode, in which the Ambush on the Vulture's Claw was immediately followed by Frodo's mission to suspected Confederate space. Furthermore, the novel erroneously stated that R3-S6 was not assigned to Frodo until after his fruitless search for R2-D2, even though R3-S6 had already been issued to Baggins prior to the episode's events aboard the Vulture's Claw. This article assumes that the novel's interpretation of events is correct aside from the chronology error regarding R3-S6's issuance to Baggins.
==Appearances==
*The War of the Ring: Wild Space 
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*War of the Ring Gambit: Stealth 
==Sources==
*Star Wars: The Clone Wars: The Visual Guide 
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*Star Wars: The Clone Wars: Republic Heroes 
*Star Wars: The Clone Wars – The Official Episode Guide: Season 1 
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*Star Wars: The Clone Wars Official Episode Guide Series 1 & 2 
*Star Wars: The Clone Wars: Incredible Vehicles 
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*Star Wars: The Clone Wars: What Is a Sith Warrior?
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==Notes and references==
Category:War of the Rings battles