When the Star League was little more than a twinkle in the eyes of the Camerons, the Draconis Combine was a powerful force in space and on the ground. Their infantry pounded the beats on dozens of worlds, their tanks ground down one rebellion after another, their fighters struck fear in the hearts of their enemies, and their spaceships brought more of them all to focus where ever they were needed. The Samurai was the primary fighter, the symbol of Combine space and air power, for hundreds of years. It flew over hundreds of worlds, dispensing the Dragon's justice on rebels and enemies alike.
         Through corporate espionage, the Terran Hegemony stole the design and began building it themselves. Their gift of a large number of their Samurais to the backwards Outworlds Alliance was simply one more of many slights that the Combine never forgave that entity for. When the Star League fell, they waited very little time before sending operatives to destroy the Hegemony factories and Samurais throughout the Human Sphere began to break down. Unfortunately for the Combine, their Samurai factories also became a victim of the Succession Wars, and as the centuries passed the symbol of Combine might began to fade from the skies.
         After the Jihad ended,   Coordinator Ricol came to the conclusion that the design had to be recovered to show that the Combine was still a force to be reckoned with. He gathered what surviving Samurais he could and looked for someone capable of rebuilding the fabled design. His gaze soon struck upon Vanguard Engineering Firm, a new company created by Rurik Drascir and several other engineers that had helped rebuild the Combine's OmniMech force during the Jihad.
         It only took Vanguard a few months to return with a working prototype, built on the chassis of a six hundred year old Samurai. Rurik Drascir is the only person to have piloted that fighter since then, and its original owner was gifted a newly-built Samurai SL-31 by Rurik himself.
         The Coordinator approved of the new Samurai and gave its designs to Wakazashi Enterprises, the company that has built it ever since.

         The new Samurai keeps the impressive speed and fuel bunkerage of its ancestors, allowing it to maintain position over its targets for much longer than most fighters. Its armor has been replaced by new Chatham "Obakemono" Glaze Laser Reflective armor, making it highly resilient to energy grid weapons fire. The greatest change however was performed on the design's weapons grid.
         The smaller lasers were removed entirely, while some of its main lasers were also pulled out. In the twin nose cones, Dragon's Fury light particle cannons were placed, giving it a better firing range against both ground targets and air and space targets.
         Unlike most fighters, the Samurai's cockpit is in the rear of the craft, nestled between the fighter's giant engine thrusters and over the main nuclear power plant. While this arrangement can take some getting used to, especially to pilots that have only piloted fighters with cockpits in the nose, many pilots swear by the Samurai's arrangement. While the vibration of the engines and power plant can be annoying until gotten used to, most pilots consider them soothing after a time. They also love what they call the "free armor" surrounding their cockpit from every direction except above. Many pilots have survived hits that would have killed them in another fighter, and give full credit of their survival to the Samurai's design.

         The Samurai has been deployed to every major Combine unit, and most militias also use at least a few of them. Any assault into Combine space should expect to run into one or more of these fighters, and should never underestimate the danger they pose.