This is one of the main capital ship used by the Colonies before the destruction of all the colonies. They were built about one thousand years before the destruction of the colonies and are a marvel of engineering and endurance. They have been continuously upgraded throughout their long service and are potent warships. The ships act as both battleships and carriers and are capable of engaging the defenses of many planets. In general firepower and fighter compliment, the Battlestar is less powerful and has a smaller fighter and troop capacity than the Cylon Base-Star. The ship makes up the difference by being armed with heavy missiles and her fighters are superior to cylon raiders. The general crew quality is also far superior for both the ship itself and her fighters. The ship is faster than her Cylon countepart but that is only due to the fact that the ships uses a lot more space for propulsion than the Base-Star does.

There were a total of twelve Battlestars constructed. The battlestars were named Galactica, Atlantia, Colombia, Pegasus, Rycon, Acropolis, Pacifa, Bellerophon, Cerberus, Olympia, Prometheus, and Solaria. There were five known remaining Battlestars when the peace conference and the destruction of the colonies occurred. Galactica, Atlantia, Acropolis, Pacifica, and Colombia (the Pegasus was thought destroyed at that time). It is though that all the Battlestars with the exception of the Galactica were destroyed at that time but it is possible other Battlestars might have survived one of the battles. The survival of the Battlestar Pegasus clearly shows the unwillingness of these ships to die.

Battlestars normally have a crew of 496 and have a total of 75 fighters

Due to the emergency conditions that the Galactica found itself in, the Galactica ended up carrying more personnel and a larger fighter compliment that the ship was designed for. The ship had its crew increased to 1,012 and fighter compliment increased to 120 fighters.

Battlestars are long blocky ships that widens at both the front and the rear of the ship. In front is the bridge and most of the major command and control facilities. The main bridge is in the center and top of the forward section. The rear of the ship is taken up by four ion engines and the ships FTL engine. The ship has two hanger bays that are attached to the sides of the main hull by the means of three supports. The rear of the hanger bay is open and has a semi permeable forcefield to prevent atmosphere from exiting.

The Battlestars are large ships that both act as battleships and carriers. Because of this, the ships are both heavily armed and have a decent number of fighters although the number of fighters is dwarfed by many true carriers within the Three Galaxies.

The ship has two means of propulsion. The first are four powerful ion engines. These engines force particles to very high speeds and use the reaction to propel the ship. The second is the FTL propulsion. The ship moves into hyperspace and then travels via hyperspace propulsion. This propulsion is very expensive. The ship burns 1% of its reaction mass for every ten light year the ship travels. While this means of propulsion was never shown in the "Battlestar Galactica" series, there is no means that the ship can go from one Star System to another without taking several years at the shortest. Hyperspace propulsion was also mentioned in several of the books.

The ship has only light shields when compared to other ships in the Three Galaxies that are as large as a Battlestar but the shields do provide some protection against attacks.

They are armed with a heavy mega pulsar cannons that is often used against other capital ships. The cannon is more powerful than those on some of the largest C.A.F. ships, can destroy frigates and destroyers often in one shot, and is capable of crippling a cruiser with one hit. The ship has forty turbo laser batteries to act as point defense. They are quite capable of destroying fighters within just a few shots and can be used as anti-missile defense as well. The Battlestar carries missile batteries for heavy bombardment and against Basestars and other capital ships.

The Battlestar carries the equivalent in fighters that normally a light fleet carrier would carry. Fighters are organized very differently than most phase world or modern carriers. They are organized in two squadrons of about thirty eight fighters each. Modern carrier squadrons consist of twelve fighters and that organization is very common in Phase World as well, especially within the CAF. Each hanger bay can support up to 60 fighters, allowing some support for a damaged hanger bay. Fighters are launched by electromagnetic catapults that are on the sides of the hanger bays. Fighters land in hanger bays in the rear. The rear of the hanger bay is also where shuttles take off and land.

Notes of game conversion:

Because of the nature of the series "Battlestar Galactica" and the needs to put the Starship into game mechanics, I have given many statistic as two different possible statistics to take this into account. The G that I have seen listed would not be sufficient to get near the speed of light yet many episodes have indicated speeds in this area. In some ways each version is closer to what was seen in the series.

Phase world version uses my revised phase world starship rules and can hold their own against most C.A.F and Kreegor Starships. This version is recommended if you with to put them into Phase World as among equals. See Revised Starship Rules for Phase World for more details.

Moderate version uses Gs of acceleration and reduced weapon ranges. This version is useful for Mutants In Orbit, Phase World if used as a lower tech race, used with my Earth Force ships conversions for B-5, and as a possible crash on Rifts Earth. Listed is the formula to allow player and game masters to calculate the velocity and distance traveled:

Velocity = Acceleration x Time + Initial Velocity
Distance Traveled = Acceleration x ½ x Time ² + Initial Velocity x Time
1 G = 32 feet (9.8 m) per second ²

Brackets [] are for the Battlestar Galactica after the destruction of the Colonies

Model Type: CF-BS
Vehicle Type: Combination Battleship/Carrier
Crew: 496 [1,016 on the Galactica after the destruction of the Colonies]
24 officers [32], 62 gunners [62], 88 fighter pilots [130], 326 crew [612 crew - 72 civilians]
Troops / Passengers: 510 marines or passengers [110]

Vehicles:

M.D.C By Location:

Notes:
[1] In reality this is how much damage needs to be done for a weapon to hit the bridge through the ships armor. This ship also has an auxiliary bridge. Even if both bridges are destroyed, the ship can still be piloted from engineering but ship is -3 to dodge and all weapon systems will be at local control. Weapon hits near the bridge that do not penetrate the ships integrity can injure crew members on or near the bridge.
[2] Destroying the engineering section means that ship FTL propulsion systems are destroyed and maximum sublight acceleration is reduced to ten percent of normal (using navigational thrusters).
[3] Depleting the MDC of the main body will put the Battlestar out of commission. All internal systems will shut down, including life support and internal gravity. The ship itself will be an unsalvageable floating wreck.
[4] Shields positions can be varied and all could be combined in one shield. Shields regenerate at the rate of 5% (1500 MDC) per melee rounds

Speed:
Driving on the Ground: Not Possible.
Sublight:
Phase World Version: Has a special sublight engine that allows the ship to travel up to 60 percent of the speed of light. The Battlestar can accelerate/decelerate at the rate of 0.85 percent of light per melee maximum (Standard is 0.5 percent of light per turn).
Moderate Version: The Battlestar does not have an effective top speed but is limited by acceleration. The Battlestar can reach a top acceleration of 5.5 G but standard is 1.5 G to conserve fuel.
Atmospheric Propulsion: Both Version: The Colonial Battlestar cannot operate within an atmosphere. If the ship enters an atmosphere, it will crash.
Stardrive: Uses a hyperdrive system that allows the ship to reach a maximum of 6 lightyears per hour. The Hyperdrive uses 1% of the ships fuel for every 10 light years the ship travels.
Maximum Range: Both Versions: Conditionally unlimited, while the fusion reactor gives power for a decade of service, the ships propulsion is limited by the ships reaction mass. The ship can be refueled at ground based facilities, space stations, and other star ships as long as they have the special facilities. The ship can also be refueled by fuel shuttles.
The Battlestar carries six month of reaction mass for travel at normal acceleration. Double the consumption of fuel for maximum acceleration. The Battlestar also burns 1% of its reaction mass for every ten lightyears the ship travels in hyperspace. The ship will often accelerate for a period of time and then shut down the engine and travel using the ships velocity but this cannot be done in hyperspace. If the ships uses more than half of its reaction mass when accelerating, the ship will be unable to decelerate fully and the ship will normally only use a third or less of its fuel on accelerating so it does not run into a problem.. If the ship runs out of fuel then it must be refueled by another vehicle traveling faster or be lost.
If the ship has a large amount of flight operations, the ship is limited to about four months endurance at cruising speed from the fighters using the ships reaction mass.

Statistical Data:
Length: 2,002.8 feet (610 meters)
Height: 952.2 feet (100 meters)
Width: 328.3 feet (290 meters)
Weight: 3.1 million tons (2.8 million metric tons)
Power System: The Ship is powered by fusion reactors that will theoretically operate for 40 years and can provide effectively unlimited electrical power. However, it was recommended that the drive and power system have routine maintenance every 5 years. Also, the ship only carries about a six month supply of reaction mass.
Cargo: 20,0000 tons of cargo. Each crew member also has a small locker for personal possessions.
Market Cost: 12 billion to construct, No new Battlestars have been constructed in about a thousand years.

WEAPON SYSTEMS:

1. Heavy Mega Pulsar Cannon (1): Heavy fusion beam weapons that are capable of destroying smaller ships in one shot and devastating larger targets. The Colonial Battlestar does not carry as much heavy beam weaponry as most Phase World Battleships because more space is devoted to missile launchers and the fairly heavy fighter compliment but the Mega Pulsae Cannon is very powerful by itself. Cannon is mounted in a turret that can rotate 180 degrees ad has a 80 degree arc of fire.
   Range:
   Phase World Version: 100,000 miles (161,000 km) in space and 100 miles (161 km) in an atmosphere.
   Moderate Version: 800 miles (1287.5 km) in space and 100 miles (161 km) in an atmosphere
   Mega Damage: 8D6x1000 MDC.
   Rate of fire: Maximum of Two (2) times per melee.
   Payload: Effectively Unlimited.
2. Forty (40) 3 cm Point Defense Turbo Lasers in Double Mounts: used as an anti-Starfighter and missile weapon and weapon mounts are on all sides of the ship Each turret can be controlled by a gunner or on automatic (+2 to strike, 3 Attacks per melee) and each Turret can rotate 360 and has a 180 arc of fire. They cannot be used faster than the speed of light.
   Range:
   Phase World Version: 800 miles (1,290 km) in space and 8 miles (12.3 km) in an atmosphere.
   Moderate Version: 4,000 feet (1,200 m) in an atmosphere and 32,000 feet (9,600 m) in space.
   Mega Damage: Both Versions: 4D4x10 for both cannons. If one cannon is destroyed, damage is reduced to 2D4x10.
   Rate of Fire: Equal to the combined hand to hand attacks of the Gunner (usually 4 or 5).
   Payload: Effectively Unlimited
3. Twelve (12) Anti-Ship Missiles Launchers: These launchers launch much larger missiles than the cruise missile launchers on most ships in phase world. There are two separate descriptions of these missiles because the ship can be used in different settings. These launchers are scattered about the Battlestar and are used against other capital ships such as Cylon Basestars. Missiles have penalties to hit small targets but are all considered smart missiles. Each missile is considered to have 300 MDC and are larger than a Viper starfighter. Because of this, the missiles cannot be carried on starfighters.
   Phase World Version: Effectively very similar to standard Phase World missiles but much larger. Missiles has a top speed of Mach 30 in an atmosphere and in space has an acceleration of 12% of light per turn (far faster than any starship). When drive goes dead, the missile will still cruise unless preset to self destruct or receives a destruct code but has very low odds of hitting star ships (Great for hitting bases and planets because target does not move and torpedoes when dead at -25% to detect.) See Modified starship rules for more details
   Moderate Version: The description of these are close to that used for conventional missiles but are much larger. Missile are assumed to accelerate at 2 times normal mach speed in Gs greater than the starships speed when used in space. Missiles can be launched at non moving targets beyond the powered range of the missiles to hit targets without the chance of the launching ship being hit by missiles itself but penalties exist when launching missiles beyond normal missile range.
   Range:
   Phase World Version: Powered missile range is 16,000 miles (25,750 km) in an atmosphere and 8,000,000 miles (12,874,752 km/ 43 light seconds) in space
   Moderate Version: Missiles have a range of 8,000 miles (12,875 km) in an atmosphere, assume powered range is 8 x normal in space.
   Mega-Damage & Properties: Both Versions: 6D6x1000
   Rate of fire: Volleys of 1 per launcher, per melee round, for a total of 12 missiles per melee. Launchers are reloaded on the same melee and can be fired again on the next.
   Payload: 96 total, 8 missiles per launcher.

[ Phase World TM, Kreeghor TM, and CAF TM are trademarks owned by Kevin Siembieda and Palladium Books Inc. ]
[ Rifts® is a registered trademark owned by Kevin Siembieda and Palladium Books Inc.]
[ Battlestar Galactica is copyright © Universal Pictures.]

Technical Information from Galactica Technical Data!

By Kitsune (kitsune@addr.com ).

Rifts Conversion Copyright © 1998, Kitsune. All rights reserved.