I played a game as Vasary Loyalist yesterday, against a Hard AI. I wanted to push into enemy territory, destroy his defenses and colonies and then consume their planets for their resources (to turn them into Dead Asteroids).
That wasn't possible, because the enemy culture didn't go away even though I had a Titan and lots of battleships hovering over their world. Therefore I couldn't colonize and couldn't destroy their planets, even though I destroyed just about all of their colonies.
The AI was a Tec Rebel.
I had built a few broadcast centers on my worlds, and upgraded one of them for socialization, but that didn't push back their culture.
Is there another way to remove their culture or is it just impossible?
Otherwise, would it be possible to add the ability to stripmine a world without first colonizing it?
If there is an sufficient amount of culture centers in adjacent gravity wells, those culture centers will create enough culture that even your Titan and Capitalship fleet cannot mitigate it.
The amount of culture required is excessive..... making this usually an non issue against human players who dont waste mone on culture.
Stripped to the core is one of the most, if not the most powerful ability in this game.
The ability to Kostura jump to any planet, and then strip it is very powerful.
And strong hostile culture is the only immediatly counter, as the enemies fleet likely will be several jumps away.
If you cant colonize it, you have to go to the adjacent planets and destroy culture centers. there.
Otherwise, would it be possible to add the ability to stripmine a world without first colonizing it?
NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO! 
It would make the Vasari even more overpowered.
