I've done it a couple of times. One time, it was a TDM modpack game, and the Sergetti were isolated from everyone else so they weren't exterminated early.
I had researched far enough, designed a lean design, and built it at one of my many huge breathable jubilant max pop worlds. I picked a close by system
Build time: 2.2 years. 22 turns. Sheesh.
I shut off the turn begin log and the verify end turn message and just hit F12 half a dozen times. Then turned on emergency build for another 11 times.
Then I warped it to their star, they had no ships in their home system that could attack my doomsday device. It was a black hole creator. Everything was destroyed. Whee.
In the meanwhile, while I was not reading log Messages, they had actually built a ship and glassed one of my airless tinys -- cheeky bastards. And they colonized it to, so I had divert one of my 100 dreadnoughts to totally exterminate them. Whoo-pee
This could have been a shorter post
Yeah, I've done it. But build time is so slow, maintenance is so high, and the ship needs support from attack. I don't think it has a real use as a combat tactic. YMMV
One thing's for sure, the AI knows what a stellar manipulator can do. If I send a fleet of attack ships, with a planet killer in it on "Don't get hurt" to take the planet out just in case the troops don't work, all attacks make a beeline for the manipulator. Size, speed, has weapons -- the ships don't care, thay attack the manipulator.
I built 10 fleets, and the planet killers ended up being nothing but decoys.
[ November 28, 2002, 13:12: Message edited by: Arkcon ]