hi,
not entierly sure what you mean by control points, but if you hold shift whilst moving you can stack, also works for attack.
e.g.
you tell your bombarding ships to move to somwhere safe, then shift right click the planet and they'll start attacking when they get there.
as for the benifits of moving them out side the gravity well, i means you can jump out quickly if needed, you should really be doing this with your carriers unless there's a repair bay you want the to use.
hope that helps
MrL