Am I missing something here, but I was told if you choose the minor action to glide in starship combat you automatically have to move first in the piloting phase. Is that correct?
You would only be using the Glide minor action if no one is in the Pilot role. From the Helm Phase rules in the CRB, if no one is in the pilot role, your ship's initiative is resolved as though you had a pilot who rolled a 0 on their piloting check for initiative.
Unless another ship manages to end up with a negative initiative, you will move forst.
So if I'm the pilot and I want to fire the ship's weapons and glide I'm not in the piloting role anymore I'm now in the gunner's role and I'm using a minor crew action to fly the ship and the pilot role is not being filled.
Exactly. If you want to be in the pilot role and fire weapons, you need to be using the snap shot minor action.
I was just looking for ways to take advantage of the fact that my character not only is our party's best pilot, but best gunner too. In starship combat we've found that what works best for us is to have as much firepower as possible and just fire everything at the enemy ship every chance we get. However, sometimes our gunners just can't hit the mark so it would be nice if my character could shoot on occasion too, especially when we are launching multiple nukes at the enemy.