Ship maneuvering/tactical combat is not likely to be added for several reasons:
1. it would be far too easy for it to become a way to exploit the game to win - i.e. there would likely be tactics a human could use that the AI couldn't, thus making it possible to win by 'cheating'. This has been the case in almost every TBS game with tactical combat - the player had to use tactical combat in order to have at least an even chance of winning (the computer would mess up the combat otherwise), and if the player used tactical combat, the computer generally didn't have an even chance.
2. This game is based on fairness - the AI doesn't cheat and doesn't treat the human any different from another AI, and the AI also has access to the same capabilities and information (no more, no less) as the human player. For tactical combat to be fair, the AI has to be capable of using it as well, and it would be hard to program this well.
