In the Starfleet Command games I, II and III, there is one thing that I liked. It was that vessels had shuttles to order them, for example, to attack enemy ships. I do not know if you've thought about this kind of thing but it's an idea I have.

Yes we have thought about them. They were going to be a feature of our original BOTF2 project, which was lead by Gavin, before he ran off leaving the project to die. This was before the time of Supremacy, however.

Now that the combat system is under development for Supremacy, we've come to realise that Shuttles would simply be too small to be a useful part of the combat. The smallest ship that will be in the game will likely be the Cardassian Hideki class, and we will likely need to increase the size of the model simply so that it will actually be visible in combat. It will be nothing more than a gnat in comparison to the battleships or starbases.

You also have to remember that the Starfleet Command games never had more than 10 ships at a time on a map. We're creating a game where potentially hundreds of ships will be present. Giving ships shuttles would mean adding god knows how many more models to the combat. Computers simply might not be able to cope.

Plus the models would need to be made in the first place, bearing in mind we've got 400+ as it is. So for these reasons, no, there won't be shuttles during combat.

Well, due to size of ships in Supremacy there is reasonable intention that even few minor ships will be dismissed like Suliban Cell, Rakhosan fighter, Bajoran Impulse Fighter and so on.

Mission Creep:

Yes, we need to keep an eye on when complexity in the game might overpower computing recourses and playability. We will address that when we can play test a more complete version of our game. It will be at the end of the alpha testing phase. For now I vote against any more ships than we already have.

I may be an idea that might interest you. The idea of the fighter squadron for the minor races is great but you could assign some custom designs for fighters to these minor races. For example:
- use only the Bajoran fighter as fighter squadron and as planetary defense on Bajor.(not use in the 3d combat).
- use only the Suliban Cellship as fighter squadron and as planetary defense on Sulibar.(not use in the 3d combat). etc.....etc.

The idea is that some minor races have their own designs of fighter squadron to defend their Panet. (Only races that have fighters). Thus, in the battle interface, you would use only the big ships.

Good idea Starfleet

If the fighters prove to hard to see in 3D combat we may want to make them all squadrens of fighters. We had hoped to us fighters and squadrens of fighters in 3D. That could all change.