It would be nice to have a third mouse-mode that works more like how a joystick works. Basically, you'd have the view orientation linked to the ship orientation the same as it is with mouselook turned off. There would be an indicator on the screen that corresponds to your mouse position, and an unmarked circular region at the center of the screen which would be a neutral zone. When the mouse is within that zone, no rotational force would be applied, just like a centered joystick. When the mouse is outside that zone, the ship would rotate in that direction at a rate proportional to the distance outside the zone. Unlike mouselook mode, the ship would continue rotating in that direction and never "catch up" to the cursor, and it wouldn't stop rotating just because the mouse stopped moving.

This way, moving the mouse cursor off center and releasing the mouse would behave the same as holding a joystick off center. Ceasing movement would require moving the mouse back to the neutral zone, analogous to recentering a joystick.

The size of the neutral zone and the rate at which the rotation speed scales up should be configurable parameters.

+1

This would be neat for trackball users. :)

Actually I am a trackball user and I would find that this defeats the point of having a trackball as the intention is to have lots of mouse movement with little to no arm / wrist strain. While this might be more useful for mouse users since it will limit the need to move your mouse a huge distance to get the required effect, I don't believe trackball users will particularly benefit from this.

However in saying that, I believe it would be useful for accessibility and lazy people ;)

I mean thumb style like my Logitech M570.

"Actually I am a trackball user"

That explains why you can't aim.

+1. Definitely nice for big ships like loaded behemoths and tridents, though the arrow keys suffice.

+1

As a trackball user, I agree this would be better for mouse people. The benefit of a trackball is we do not run out of desk-space.

Yeah, but keeping the ball spinning constantly for big heavy ships that turn slowly is kind of annoying with a thumb-style trackball. Not as bad as a mouse where you have to keep picking it up and moving it, but still annoying.

For the finger type you and Kierky use, this doesn't seem like a very good feature.

+1 Great idea