Battlestar Galactica (2003)/Cylon Basestar

Cylon Basestar

Cylon Basestars (also known as "baseships") are the most powerful battle vessel known to exist in the Cylon fleet. Basestars are larger than their Colonial counterparts, and were commonly used for ambush-style attacks where a single basestar would jump in close to a Colonial vessel such as Galactica and fire on the ship with nuclear missiles, although the Cylons seem to have become more reticent about single-ship raids since the destruction of the Resurrection Ship, instead preferring to stack the odds in their favor such as with their ambush of the Pegasus, where they sent three basestars to deal with a single battlestar.

Basestars' armaments seem to be limited to missile batteries and massive swarms of Cylon Raiders launched from slots lining each spoke of the star, and are thus somewhat ineffective against battlestars such as Galactica, which can throw up a thick protective shield of flak and destroy many missiles before they can hit their targets. This renders basestars vulnerable to close-in attack by Colonial ships, as seen in the Resurrection Ship battle where Colonial battlestars Pegasus and Galactica destroyed several basestars without sustaining any significant damage themselves.

Basestar launching Raiders

Basestars appear to be the Cylons' primary large warship, or if not, at least the only ones the Colonials have encountered. Basestars were utilized heavily in the attack on the Twelve Colonies, as well as in an attempt to destroy the Galactica and its rag-tag fleet at Ragnar Anchorage as it completed its resupply. A fleet consisting of basestars dogged Galactica's heels for the next several days, appearing every 33 minutes and firing on the fleet with missiles. This fleet or another like it, charged with defending a Cylon Resurrection Ship, continued to follow Galactica until its destruction at the hands of Galactica and Pegasus.

A Cylon Basestar being destroyed

Cylon Basestars appear to be internally organic. During the Kobol mission, a raptor crewed by undercover Cylon agent Sharon "Boomer" Valerii and Margaret "Racetrack" Edmondson infiltrated a basestar using a captured Cylon transponder, sneaking a nuclear warhead aboard the ship with the intention of destroying it. They found the basestar to have a cavernous biomechanical interior, with walls constructed or grown from a strange fleshy material. The visible insides of the basestar were not dissimilar in appearance to the innards of Starbuck's captured Cylon Raider.

The Cylons later used three basestars to ambush Pegasus after its new commander and former chief engineer, Barry Garner, chose to disregard Admiral William Adama's orders and chase after a pair of missing Raptors. The basestars fired nuclear missiles at Pegasus, severely damaging the ship. Garner relinquished command to Major Lee "Apollo" Adama, his acting executive officer, and Apollo managed to drive off one basestar and give the others enough pause to give Garner the time he needed to bring the FTL drives back online.

Close-up of a Cylon Basestar

The insides of several Basestars were seen after the Colonial escape from New Caprica. They are relatively simplistic in design, although Cylons aboard the ship are able to view the inside of the basestar as looking like anything they want it to, for instance, while walking through the sterile corridors of the ship Six tells Baltar that in her eyes they're walking through a beautiful forest.

The ship itself is controlled by a organic Cylon hybrid with a human upper body and the lower body replaced by mechanical parts and plugged directly into the basestar. The Cylon hybrid controllers speak in a constant jumbled stream of consciousness which most of the Cylons believe to be meaningless, evidence that the hybrids are insane. However, some Cylons such as the Leoben line believe that the hybrid speaks with the voice of God and thus each seemingly-random word has a deep meaning.

Features

• Controlled by a Cylon bio-mechanical hybrid
• Ability to launch hundreds of Raiders
• Ability to fire several nukes and conventional missiles simultaneously
• No visible propulsion, but The Hand of God indicated that Cylons also use refined tylium as fuel