Analyzing Dovin Basals: The Yuzhan Vong bio weapons

What is a Dovin basal?

• Dovin Basals are biological weaponized creatures used by the invasive alien race species the Yuzhon Vong. They are used to generate gravity wells, gravity fields, and act as the propulsion of Yuzhon Vong ships.

The gravitational fields what are they exactly?

These are what the gravity fields the dovin basals project are described as.

• They are referred to as having voids and singularities:

He felt it enter the void, felt which of the many singularities it was.And he seized upon that void, directing all his Force abilities and discipline against it.It was like using a thin metal rod to push a grounded landspeeder. Too much pressure and it would bend, becoming useless. Too little and nothing would happen. He had to find the right pressure to budge it, to set it into motion and keep it going that way...For a moment, the only things in the universe were him, Jaina, and the void. He moved the void, turned it around, moved it back the other direction.Then he was himself again, in the cockpit, watching the flank of the interdictor distort. The void had moved back and touched the interdictor, and now the interdictor elongated into it, extending what looked like a pliant extrusion of what he knew to be hardened yorik coral into the singularity. -Enemy lines:Rebel Dream

• Called gravity wells

Gravity wells are what are also the word used when referring to black holes like my scan above.

• Finally called black holes, as well as noted to even have event horizons.

Dovin basals power: Sernpindals Destruction

• One single dovin basal can pull down an entire moon it's g pull so strong making it move so fast the entire moon is erupted in flames and smash against the planet so nearly the entire planets hemisphere even stripping the planet of it's atmosphere.

That thing’s bringing down Dobido?” the old man asked incredulously.

“Get back,” Anakin instructed, taking aim. The old man didn’t move, but Anakin, so entranced by this completely alien and undeniably powerful life-form, didn’t notice. He leveled the blaster and fired.

The energy bolt ripped down into the crater and then … disappeared. Just flickered out, like a candle in a strong wind. He fired again and again, but the bolts seemed to have no effect. “What is it?” the old man asked again, more emphatically. “Get in the landspeeder and go back for my father,” Anakin instructed, pulling the lightsaber from his belt. “The ugly one or the big hairy one?” the old man asked. Anakin ignored him and moved one foot to the very edge of the crater. And then he and the old man went flying away, jolted by a sudden and violent thrust of the ground. The young Jedi scrambled about, to see dirt and stones flying from the crater, a volcanic eruption, it seemed, without the lava.

It ended abruptly, and Anakin rushed back, only to see a deep, deep hole where the creature had been. He understood: the creature had recognized the attacks and had reversed its gravity pull, probably latching on to the core of Sernpidal, and was now far, far below.

What was he to do now?

“The creature’s down there,” Anakin replied, pointing to the crater. “It’s a living thing!” -Vector Prime

Han shook his head. “Doesn’t matter anymore,” he replied with a wry twist of his lips, and Anakin understood. For Sernpidal, it was too late. Even if they somehow managed to kill this creature or stop its tractor beam, Dobido’s orbit was lost, and the moon would come crashing down.-Vector Prime

"I felt Sernpidal break and suffocate. Now I know what Alderaan was like."-Star Wars chewbacca

In the official guide Star Wars the essential Atlas: Sernpindal is described as having having been split near completely in half removing one side of the hemisphere in doing so having it's atmosphere lost.

• So yes a single basal is capable of planetary destruction

Superior to deflector shields and defenses

• Dovin Basals are outright shown and stated to overpower deflector shields, ripping them apart.

• Deflector shields are known to block incoming physical attacks such as blaster bolts, basically lasers and physical attacks in general. These very shields are so powerful that they can withstand orbital bombardments from Star destroyers which is a pain in the ass for them( ship shields planetary shields are the same thing but with different names due to what they are used for.)

The dedicated seige platform, the Torpedo Sphere, is designed to accomplish one mission - to knock out a planet's shields. Planetary shields, whether full or partial, protect a world from orbital bombardment. It takes a lot oftroops to assault a planet. It is easier and far less expensive to simply pound a planet into submission with the weapons of a Star Destroyer. But planetary shields prevent this.- Imperial Sourcebook

• Note Star destroyers even Victory class ones which are smaller and weaker than the ISD conventional ones we know and usually see's fire power is so strong they reduce unshielded planets to molten slag.

Even lesser powerful ships such as Acclamators used by the republic can do this.

• Shields are such a pain in the ass that a certain galactic military built a giant space station just for that purpose. One which destroys the shields as well as the planet turning it to tiny asteroids potentially ash.

• Fun fact a Yuzhan Vong Yammosk can also cast planetary shields.

Now that that's been established time to address counter arguments:

Counter arguments:

• "Dovin basals die to torpedoes and blaster fire".

Not only is that one such argument missing context it's also very bad to assert and easily debunkable.

Dovin basals no sell beam and torpedoes eating them for breakfast. The only reason they die to such things when hit by them is because the dovin basals do not scale to the gravity fileds they emit they are weak physically. they are what's overpowered not the gravity wells. and the only reason such seen cases in which they were overpowered and killed by such were because they're fields were interfered with which is what allowed torpedoes and beams to kill them.

Pilots used tactics that employed stutter fire(to stress they're bodies) and ball bearing missiles that disrupted their ability to accurately disable proton torpedoes and such. In other instances Luke had to manipulate them to also allow torpedoes to kill them. Also think about it if basic blaster fire could kill them they wouldn't be such a big problem in the first place overall practically useless especially in space warfare. Where they're heavily utilized.

• "Dovin basals need hundreds to replicate planetary-large planetary masses and g pull to pull ships from hyperspace"

A. First off that's not true as seen with the other instances I provided with the shields and planet destruction B. You can't quantify how much of Large Planetary masses is replicated especially when there's no mention of needing hundreds for them as well as regarding the fact Dovin basals comes in many sizes the largest of them being as big as they're ships and even star destroyers

B. Old Republic ships utilized generators that deployed large planetary masses that would pull ships from hyperspace; however by Modern republic standards they are deemed worthless and ineffective to use against ships which makes this type of thing consistent considering the size of said black holes the small Dovin basals generate.

• "The moon the dovin basal pulled down was 20 kilometers" "that process took 3 days" "it was Sernpidals gravity that finished the job because the basal stopped before it crashed down".

So? And? The impact still wrecked the entire planet. There's also no evidence pointing to it taking 3 days to happen in fact it's shown happening so fast the moon was in complete flames. The novel even seems to describe it as happening really fast too. But sure, let's say it did take 3 days. It's been calculated that our moon, if it were to ever fall to just fall earth, would take days as well approximately 3-4. and considering if the earth were to pull on it to make it fall straight to it would take an unquantifiable amount of time regarding the distance. Just like how its gravity causes the moon to move further away from earth each year and that's by mere inches.

• This is what dobido looked like coming down. when not even in orbit.

Yo'gands core is also a tactic that has been used before that has devastated countless planets.

The Dovin basals gravity was established as the reason as I say once again, Just because it stopped does not mean it shouldn't scale for the crash. The dovin basal doesn't want to remain on a planet that's gonna be destroyed and the fact it willingly stopped it's action shows it was capable of continuing its action. It should still scale due to 2 reasons.

• 1. G pull still lingers even when it's stopped pulling on an object via the law of gravity potential energy where objects in a gravity field possess energy by virtue of they're possession relative to one another the energy associated with that gravitational interaction would remain.

• 2. Inertia: Inertia is independent of gravitational pull dependent on the object's mass/energy. Even if it were to stop the inertia would have it continue to move at a constant velocity in a straight direction until countered by an opposing force which happened to be the planet, in which said planet was wrecked.

Now that's been taken care of now to move onto the lower iq takes

• "Those black holes are used with ships"

And? So what, that doesn't debunk it's capabilities, that's like saying the large planetary masses emitted by tractor beam generators debunks it because they were utilized by ships(and I'm dead serious that has been used as a contention)

• They're small"

Size isn't everything, even the smallest of black holes have more mass than a planet a black hole the size of a penny has been estimated to have a mass larger than Earths. Dovin basals also range in varying sizes.

• "Not real black holes"

Called voids, singularities, gravity wells, suck in bodies to consume, have event horizons replicate masses yada yada yada While I do admit they aren't naturally made but instead are ability generated it still qualifies via feats and description moving on.

That's that I honestly didn't know how to conclude this thread but it seems it's over I guess. If you have any questions or maybe better yet counters just put them down in the comments just be respectful about it.

The fall of Dobido took 7+ hours, since that's how long it had left to fall when Han and Chewie arrived:

Yogand's Core takes several Dovin Basals amping the planet's gravity to make a moon fall:

New Jedi Order Sourcebook

B. Old Republic ships utilized generators that deployed large planetary masses that would pull ships from hyperspace; however by Modern republic standards they are deemed worthless and ineffective to use against ships which makes this type of thing consistent considering the size of said black holes the small Dovin basals generate.

They simulated large planetary masses. Besides that, they also work differently from Dovin Basals, as typical gravity-well generators don't prevent real space travel while Dovin Basals do influence real space travel like when they influence missiles.

@sunshinedobbs: Nice post. Also check your PM.

Nice thread. Tbh I never understood whole "not real black holes", black holes have 2 main components, event horizon and singularity it hides within. Event horizon, which black holes generated by Basals have, is defined as "the boundary where the velocity needed to escape exceeds the speed of light" and in order for that to happen, you need black hole like gravity. Weaker gravity will not do, even neutron stars, which have monstrous gravity( strongest after black holes) has escape velocity well bellow speed of light, even they do not have an event horizon.

@sunshinedobbs: thanks for the timeframe context

This one only had one Dovin basal and they technically do generate those masses as it’s mentioned here. Especially considering dovins have locked on to planets millions of kilos away

Simulate means to imitate replicate or just copy in general so it still counts if your saying it’s fake if that’s what you mean then it’s not as it would technically be pointless to use and are you referring to outer space or hyperspace tho both dovins and the generators still do that either way technically.

@supreme101:

This one only had one Dovin basal

We have no objective context saying that. Anakin Solo thinks that, sure, but objective sources tell us that Yogand's core takes several Dovin Basals.

Especially considering dovins have locked on to planets millions of kilos away

The fact that Dovin Basals can lock on specific objects goes against them being actual black holes. But besides that, there's nothing that can help quantify what "locking on" to Helska 4 means for the power of the Dovin Basals. We also know that many Dovin Basals are used to propel worldships, not a single one.

are you referring to outer space or hyperspace tho both dovins and the generators still do that either way technically.

Generators only prevent hyperspace travel, while Dovin Basals are also able to prevent real space travel of certain ships, though in a limited way.

@sunshinedobbs:

We have no objective context saying that. Anakin Solo thinks that, sure, but objective sources tell us that Yogand's core takes several Dovin Basals.

Then that's just contradictory we see just one doing that in the official story.

The fact that Dovin Basals can lock on specific objects goes against them being actual black holes. But besides that, there's nothing that can help quantify what "locking on" to Helska 4 means for the power of the Dovin Basals. We also know that many Dovin Basals are used to propel worldships, not a single one.

They are the ones controlling the gravitational field so it can be assumed they can.

Generators only prevent hyperspace travel, while Dovin Basals are also able to prevent real space travel of certain ships, though in a limited way.

And how is that done with the hyperspace travel?.......by simulating large planetary masses. I was also just referring to that aspect.

@supreme101: @sunshinedobbs: The Complete Encyclopedia and Ultimate Visual Guide, state it was only the one Dovin Basal. In fact all other instances of this apart from Sernpidal basically just has it being one Dovin. The NJO sourcebook is in error there, as other sources say it's just 1, not multiple Dovin.

The Complete Encyclopedia and Ultimate Visual Guide, state it was only the one Dovin Basal. In fact all other instances of this apart from Sernpidal basically just has it being one Dovin. The NJO sourcebook is in error there, as other sources say it's just 1, not multiple Dovin.

The Complete Encyclopedia says it's multiple:

The Ultimate Visual Guide is vague and only mentions a "Gravity Weapon". I think it could very easily be argued that "Gravity Weapon" here means the array of multiple dovin basals as a whole, and not just one individual dovin basal.

@supreme101:

Then that's just contradictory we see just one doing that in the official story.

It's not? Anakin only locates and sees one. That's it. There's no contradiction with the book at all.

And how is that done with the hyperspace travel?.......by simulating large planetary masses. I was also just referring to that aspect.

I thought you were referring to the ability to stop ships in realspace, my bad.

@sunshinedobbs:

It's not? Anakin only locates and sees one. That's it. There's no contradiction with the book at all.

If Anakin located one how he would have not found more especially regrading the fact it was found via scanner and trraced to that one basal causing it It's said in the atlas guidebook and a comic even the novel a single dovin basal pulled down that moon and destroyed the planet.

I thought you were referring to the ability to stop ships in realspace, my bad.

It's cool bro

@sunshinedobbs: That's not the Complete Encyclopedia quote I was using, I was using the Yo'gand's Core Quote, which says the Vong drop a single Dovin onto a planet. It lists the examples of Ygziir and Sernpidal. In fact even on the Dovin Basal section within the Complete Encyclopedia, also says a single one was used. Even on the Complete Encyclopedia describing Sernpidal says it was a single Dovin Basal, not multiple. The Encyclopedia describing the moon Dobido, says that it was a single Dovin. Heck even for the Ygziir Encyclopedia quote, it says a single Dovin Basal was used.

The quote you have doesn't really say that multiple used, all it's doing is saying what weapons that the Vong use, which were Dovin Basals. Whereas other quotes within the Encyclopedia, all say it was just 1 Dovin Basal used.

@supreme101 Nice writeup, forgot to mention.

Neat!

@wolfrazer:

The quote you have doesn't really say that multiple used, all it's doing is saying what weapons that the Vong use, which were Dovin Basals. Whereas other quotes within the Encyclopedia, all say it was just 1 Dovin Basal used.

I think the wording in the quote I used implies pretty directly that multiple were used, but you're right that it's contradicted by the other quotes.

Very nice thread and subject, thank you very much.

@masma94: Thanks

Nice thread. It's good to have all this info in one place.

@the_wspanialy: Yeah I did my best if it's not there you gotta make it yourself tho I can thank the wiki for the directions to find some.