I may also suffer from a fundamental misunderstanding here. You decide.
This is and has been my experience many a time in this game. During the first week of playing I kept telling myself that I'd figure out how to do better with the tools at hand. During the second week I've realized that I could not. Now I'd like to spell out how I would want the game to play for me:Here's the/a scene: "So there's a battle on the horizon. I make a last cup of tea and hit the go fast button to get the scene into scanner range. Once the blips the blips show up on the horizon I stop the ship to figure out what's going on."
Now, forced to fly with the keyboard, i hold down Ctrl and aim the reticule at the first stranger out there. Nothing happens. I get no target information. I try missile-lock, hit the telescope, bang on the prev/next target buttons. And nothing. Nothing of relevance at least. The missile has locked onto a fuel station that I passed minutes ago. I can not tell who's ahead. I do not dare to fire and hit or kill someone by skill alone.
Now I move closer. Banging missile lock and unlock and prev/next target while flying straight at someone centered in the reticule I still can not get a positive ID for the ship and I have no idea if they are a system-vessel or a pirate.
By the time I have locked a nasty I'm already under attack and afterburnering my way through the cloud of ships and then switching to rear view to do some blasting.
Here prev/next target would select other targets based on their distance from the reticule's center. under no circumstance would they ever select planets or installations during red-alert. The telescope's navigation function would kick in and spin me to the next nearest target by distance should I want to.As I'm approaching the fog of ships ahead i release 'target-lock' which was still tracking the system's main station - and sweep the reticule over whats 20 clicks ahead. Immediately I see ship details and after a quick survey I decide on a target. I hit 'target-lock', queue up a missile fire it and hit the after burners to have it trail me. then I start blasting from the front and back until the confused target is dead and i'm positioned for another run.
If its already playing like that for you, then do suggest the error of my ways to me. But if your play experience is anything like mine, please hold the justifications and realize that its just terrible.
Thanks for pondering.. and hi!