Gaze Electric

The flagship was initially constructed in 382 BBY, intended to serve as a mobile home and temple for the Path of the Open Hand. The cult eventually departed their original homeworld of Dalna on the Gaze Electric, but returned after the Battle of Jedha. Following the fall of the Path in the Night of Sorrow, the Gaze Electric was taken over by Marda Ro of the Ro family, who went on to found the Nihil.

Eventually, the vessel was commanded by Asgar Ro, who served as the Eye of the Nihil, a major position among the anarchist marauders, and by 232 BBY, the position of Eye and ownership of the Gaze Electric had passed to Asgar Ro's son, Marchion Ro, who saw it as a "palace and fortress". Unlike other vessels utilized by the Nihil, the Gaze Electric was crewed by droids and hired personnel rather than by Nihil themselves, as Marchion was unable to trust the members of the group. The Gaze Electric was home to the medical pod of Mari San Tekka, a hyperspace prospector, whom Marchion used to generate the Paths that the Nihil utilized in their operations.

Prior to the Trymant IV disaster, Marchion did allow Nihil on the Gaze Electric as its crew. Later, aside from his aide Thaya Ferr, he again decided against keeping Nihil aboard as the crew, replacing them with droids at the same time as the destruction of Starlight Beacon. Afterward, however, Ro would ultimately allow Nihil back on the Gaze Electric, where they could be guards or simply members of its audience.

The Gaze Electric was created for the Star Wars: The High Republic multimedia project to serve as the flagship of the Nihil faction and was designed by illustrator Nick Brokenshire. The ship's design was based off of concept art for the MC30C frigate by art director Joe Johnston from the 1983 film . Brokenshire, at the request of Lucasfilm Ltd., based the interior of the Gaze Electric on the interior of the U.S.S. Cygnus, a space vessel from the 1979 science fiction film The Black Hole. It first appeared in the novel The High Republic: Light of the Jedi, which was written by Charles Soule and published by Del Rey on January 5, 2021, and was first pictured in an episode of the animated web series Characters of Star Wars: The High Republic centered on the Nihil that was released on January 26 of the same year.