stationary gas drones would be really nice. like sentries in reverse. fly close to the cloud and dump em. siege up for boosts. give them gas harvesting bonuses while under boost like the mining drones.
maybe give them 5k range or whatever but you have to be within range for the transfer to the command ship.
pros and cons.
do not make em move like mining drones. gas sites being 100k+ in diameter would suck trying to retrieve these drones when they run out of control range. =)