oops sorry, totally forgot why I needed to know how to add a spoiler.
Ok, in the Latest "Dread Empires Fall" book the invading race (it's a civil war) captures the orbital ring but the loyalists bring down the cables connecting it to the planet. Since the Orbital ring has been in place for 12,000 years the invaders aren't prepared to be unable to land any other way. On another planet the enemy fire on the loyalist fleet despite being warned not to. The loyalists fire back and destroy the ring with a couple of hundred million people. The ring then falls into the atmosphere causing a nuclear winter and dooming a few billion people. So what would be interesting is if the opportunity to capture the ring but the not the planet is included as well as the risk that if the orbital ring is destroyed it falls into the atmosphere. So it isn't a stellar construction but an expanded base.
Edit: on a related note it might be interesting to have ships destroyed when attacking/defending a world possibly fall into the atmosphere.