Hold on people! I think you misunderstood me. I didn't mean that you should put the thing in the heart of the enemys teratory. All you do is put it in the middle of the map. It'd be better in a smaller map so you can take full advantage of the extended range.
That's the way ya do it. And no I haven't had time to test it out. I hope I solved a few isuse for you.
Zman out.
I don't see anything magical about the "middle of the map." The problem with military satellites is that, except on the smallest maps, very often no battles will take place there and all that money will be wasted. I don't see how this idea helps that.
You'd want to produce ships and transports near the front line - wherever that happens to be. Several normal planets close to the front with 2 billion pop will produce troops and transports a lot faster than any one "super" planet. And, if you're advancing, the best placement will be relative to wherever the front line happens to be - not relative to the middle square of the map. If you focus all your efforts onto one "super" world, then it (and all of its lovely defensive satellites) will just get left behind.
As for letting ships repair, they should be safest just a bit behind your front lines - again, as long as you're advancing. You'll have plenty of ships there to screen them. If enemy ships are flooding into your territory, you have no buisiness building Transports or capturing planets 'till you get that cleared up.