Capturing Ion Cannons

[Collic]

Hey, just bought the game and I'm enjoying it immensely. I'm currently playing my first game (AI6 random\easier) and I was wondering if anyone has any advice on how best to capture a lvl 4 world with the ion cannon intact. My intial attempt was to send in an emp warhead, then take out the enemy command post. For some reason i thought this would disable the cannon. It didn't of course, but i've almost recovered and rebuilt my fleet after my bordering world got pounded (I was expecting this, but I completely under prepared).

The world has been reinforcing for some time, so there are a lot of forces there, even after i repelled their counter attack. Any advice ?
I assume I'll have to put up my own command station to capture it, so would i be advised to try and take out as many guard posts as possible before attempting this?

[carlosjuero]

Quick strikes

Do a warp gate strike to stop reinforcements, after regrouping and resupplying do a command station strike to get rid of control and supply - make sure you have HEAVY defenses ready when you do that though.

If you can get most of the ships to come through and attack you (preferably via a wormhole you have well covered) send your fleet in with a FF - once the FF is through the wormhole, send in a few engineers to keep it alive and to help build a colony ship. Send through a mobile builder and immediately start construction of the colony ship.

With the Ion Cannon there I would suggest at least 6 Mk II engineers - 3 to focus on keeping the shield alive, the other 3 to keep the construction of the colony ship going. There are ships that are immune to the ion cannon strike I believe (not sure but maybe Raid Starships?) - send those in to help mop up on stragglers. Once you have your orbital command station built sit back and watch the carnage as the Ion Cannon mops up the enemies remaining .

Considering its a Mk IV world you will definitely lose many ships so try and go in with a min of Mk III as your vanguard for the strikes.

This is just a suggestion, and it may or may not work (the AI is frikkin sneaky at times).

[Collic]

I hadn't considered using forcefields, thanks for the reply. I managed to brute force my way through in the end, since my initial raid took out the command center. Those tips will make the next time that much easier.