I don't recall feeling any auto-aim, but you do not need to "lead" the target at this time.
Auto "aim adjust" is more accurate. Aim directly at your target and you don't have to worry about compensating for its trajectory.
Honestly I really dislike the auto aim. The part I enjoy the most is trying to read your enemy and guess where he's going next. Completely removed 
(In a competitive capacity).
Yeah. When using the standard "absolute" mouse control mode (gimballed weapon aiming) I felt I could mostly disregard the feature if I wanted to and lead targets like I would normally, though when targets started moving slowly and stopped in one spot in relation to where your aim was you can't help but use it even if you're trying not. But what I don't like about that mode is how much it restricts your maneuvering - turn ship or aim and shoot, very challenging to align yourself to the target and do both at once. For some reason it was more fluid and intuitive for the ship's turning to be the only way my weapons could aim (and I killed things quicker that way), but of course in that case I was entirely relying on the auto-lead. All the "mouse is OP my $500 flight stick needs buffed" grass is greener hubbub on the forums is a bit premature.
I pity people who play this with a mouse and keyboard. M&K control scheme is complete rubbish. Joystick/gamepad on other hand, while feeling laggy (similar to ARMA2) it has a lot of potential. Problem is that m&k is simply more effective combination, despite crappy feel. They should really separate flying from aiming. Mouse should aim guns and keyboard should fly the ship. That way mouse users will end up being more precise but will have crappy maneuverability as it should be in the first place.
It feels okay to me. Mouse in absolute mode already has crappy maneuverability in comparison, partly because of the deadzone in the middle of the screen you have to pass through every time you want to change your bearing. It's a virtual joystick with all the drawbacks that implies and then some. The upside of course being finer control of where your guns are shooting, but the advantage is only slight when the game has automatic target-leading-adjustment for every control style. I had an easier time killing things quickly in relative mode because I had more responsive control over where my ship was going, which lead to easier tracking of fast-moving targets at close range.
It would be neat to try out keyboard-only movement and mouse-only aiming, but I don't think that should be the only option for keyboard/mouse.
Playing space sim with mouse and keyboard is like playing driving sim with keyboard or even worse, like playing FPS and RTS with gamepad/joystick. Makes no sense.
Partly agree, but the mouse doesn't feel that poor to me (compared to, say, controller with a FPS which is awful always). The ease of use of not having to fiddle with alternate controls (i.e. laziness), learning them or getting them set up and plugged in, is also good. So far it doesn't ruin my immersion as much as it did back on TIE Fighter, though that was when most games had no proper mouse support and you had to use keyboard for everything. (I still have the old joystick I bought for that game lying around, but by god I have no idea what that type of plug is called)
They're not going to change the fact that you can use whatever control input you want and that's perfectly fine with me. At this point, I'm not convinced any of them are "balanced' more or less poorly than others. I
like mouse and keyboard, but I would try out a joystick.
Hopefully being able to change control schemes and new control/UI options (such as disabling the auto-aim-trajectory-lead-correction-thing) happen soon.
I woke up today and had the urge to play the game some more, that's a good sign. I got through the first two waves of Vanduul swarm in less than 11 minutes compared to the 30~some it took me the first time I was playing. A combination of practice and liking the feel of the relative mode controls better, I reckon. I also managed to ram
multiple ships to death after my lasers broke from collision with an asteroid. Fuck yeah.
(the second ramming destroyed my ship in the process: BANZAI!)I am looking forward to being able to play against real people.
