The Battlestar is the cream of the Colonial Fleet, and is always the flagship of any squadron where it serves. No other ship has ever received as much glamour as the Battlestar, and every Colonial Warrior and young child wants to serve on one.

The Battlestar was developed to be the sign of a revitalised Colonial fleet.
Before that time the fleet was relying on the ageing Heavy Carriers and early cruisers, and these were just getting more and more outclassed with every passing yahren. The fleet needed something new, something big and powerful and something that could carry enough starfighters to hurt the enemy.

The Battlestar grew from this vision. Big, ponderous and able to carry two squadrons of Vipers into battle, the Battlestar grew to be something feared and was seen (initially) as the ending of the Cylon War. The only flaw was an initial lack of heavy offensive weaponry, although several Battlestars (the Pegasus being one) rectified that.

It is a testament to the strength of these ships that the only known surviving Colonial Warships after the war were Battlestars, one of which (the Galactica) was five hundred yahrens old.

Battlestars are the main ships of the Colonial fleet. They are large, and are dedicated fighter carriers. Most are also very old and today there is no such thing as a standard Battlestar. While it is true that they all share similiar characteristics, internally things can be very different. Weaponary too can also be very different from one Battlestar to another. The Pegasus for example, carries heavy missile launchers, the Nova carries large pulsar lasers, while the Atlantia does not carry anything in the way of heavy weapons. As such, there is no class designation for Battlestars, and when describing a Battlestar, the name of the vessel has to be mentioned for any sense to be made.

Battlestars are not just fighter carriers though - they are cities in space with recreation facilities, training centres, repair and manufacturing facilities to last the vessel for yahrens at a time, counselling centres, life centres and more. A Battlestar generally needs no escorting or support vessels, and are almost always flagships of any fleet.

They have two large shuttle/fighter bays which protrude from the side of the ship, and usually carry two squadrons of around 75 Viper fighters each. Each squadron is usually named with a reference to colour (the Galactica has Red and Blue squadrons, the Pegasus had the famed Silverspar squadron).

There is really no such thing as a standard Battlestar. Every ship is constructed to take into account new technology and military attitudes and this means that no two ships are alike, despite the fact that they share a lot of similiar related factors, like performance and defensive weaponry.

Battlestar Types

What do we really know about Battlestars?

Battlestars have two large shuttle bays, and may conduct transfers via (J1.593). Each bay has a launch tube ([J1.54] which will propel a fighter flight to speed 12 and will launch in direction 5 [Alpha bay] or 2 [Beta bay]) and a standard shuttle hatch (launching and landing from direction 4 for both bays).
The shuttle bays are large enough to accept yachts.
The Battlestar has a hyperspeed multiplier of x1.

Colonial Battlestar boarding diagram:

A	B,C	D	E	F	G	H,J	K,M	L,N
10 F.Hull 5 Bridge Variant Mount	10 F.Hull 4 Ph.3	4 Ph.3 4 Lab 3 Aux	4 Ph.3 8 Battery	12 C.Hull	13 C.Hull	6 A.Hull 5 APR 2 Ph.3 15 Warp	4 Shuttle 15 Fighters	4 Fighters 6 Cargo 4 Ph.3

 




---

	GIF file
Battlestar Atlantia SSD	44k
Battlestar Columbia SSD	44k
Battlestar Galactica SSD	48k
Battlestar Nova SSD	48k
Battlestar Pegasus SSD	32k
Battlestar Poseidon SSD	48k
Battlestar Rycon SSD	48k
Battlestar Titania SSD	48k

Master Ship Chart Extract:

Annex #7B: Ships able to land on planets

These ships may not land on a planet.

Annex #7G: Carrier information & Annex #7N: Missile reloads