Alright what would everyone think of a ship or stucture that could leech a planets resources dry. Use your imagination for what it could look like, but the concept is that it shoots beams at the planet and drains the resources leaving it barren, providing you with the enormous resources to wage a galactic war.
Sounds like an expensive lategame resource gathering tool. Doesn't fit with the feel of the rest of the game in my opinion.
I assume that the "Planet Leech" takes a long time to steal all of a planet's' resources. If it takes time to leech a planet what's stopping me throwing asteroids at the planet to render it unusable? Your investment into the "Planet Leech" has not payed off and I've just blow up one of your planets. And yes, it's one of your planets. You think I'd let this thing get into orbit around one of my planets? The Planet Leech is what we'd call an "All or Nothing" strategy. It's binary, boring and would only work if your enemy wasn't scouting.
I don't know about leeching the planet itself... But if the planet has a ring instead of a moon i would happly have some mining units ala home-world to mine said ring .
Hooo, a planet cracker... (for those who don't know, it's the USG Ishimura, Dead Space 1)(a jewel of modern Survival Horror by the way, i higly recommand it) You're full of references noaveragejoe... Idea sounds cool, but i see a few flaws in it : - PA is a RTS with an orbital composant, not a Space Simulation "à la Homeworld". Planet Leeching is far more suitable for Homeworld (ressources gathering spike, but at the cost of one of you precioussss planet) than for PA. - Any kind of "structure" that is capable of Planet Leeching would be HUGE, thus hard (read expensive in time & ressources) to create. Ressources spikes are useful in the beggining of a game, not later. - Leeching a Planet is like reducing the size of your playground. Who wants that ? The only point i see for destroying a planet would be to Annihilate my ennemy in the same occasion.