I've got some rank now, so I have several older ships. Are they really good for anything? Any reason to keep and use them? Their stats are so far below my current ship that I don't think using them would be good. I LOVE the look of the TOS Constitution ship and would keep that one all the time, just for the looks. But its performance is way behind what I have now. So should I just get rid of the old ships?

You can hang onto then for nostalgia and fly them now and then, or use them to store ship gear when your inventory overflows.

You can also strip & sell the equipment and discard to free up ship slots for bigger and better ships...

Thanks guys!

What I'd do is keep the old ships and retrofit them with Mark X or better equipment and go kick some butt!

Sure you may not have as much hull points and boff slots as a Tier IV or V but they are still very fun.

The caveat to this advice is the starter ship can't be reclaimed later if you want it back.

Both the 'Starter Ship', and the ships purchased with 'Rank-Up' ship tokens cannot be reclaimed... but seriously, other then nostalgia/vanity reasons, how many people, once they out-grow the ship, are going to continue flying them...

Always keep your ship slots full for inventory purposes

I'm not 'cutting' any of my ships from my roster for one very simple yet important reason. I have really bad luck!

And my bad luck would suggest that the day after I ditch some of my ships the Devs would introduce a new fleet mechanic for VA's or something that would allow you to promote a BOFF to the captains chair, give them their own ship and have an actual fleet roll with you in missions.

Gonna happen? Prob not...but again my luck....not to great