as i say i went a tad off topic there... but the fact remains that atm the controls are geared towards simmers. i personally didn't buy the game because i could fly a plane around. perhaps you should get rid of the anteworld section of the board till your engine is working the way you want it if your not going to start adding/modifying it for the anteworld game and only want us to be testing the outerra engine.
Hey, who said we don't want easy keyboard control? I'm tuning it for you, already released a patch etc. Nobody wants you to swap controllers, but it's true that keyboard control is always some kind of approximation, and there will be always someone screaming because of this and that.
And "silly penalties" are part of the gameplay. You can have automated trucks carrying stuff, but if the player takes over, he could be faster. There's a motivation in that.
Now, a player who uses most of the automatic systems that effectively turn off the external effects, so he can put a brick on the pedal and go, would be only as fast as the automatic driver. Regardless of whether he's using a keyboard or a wheel. But is a 5% difference such a big deal for you?
Anyway, it's just an idea. But I can imagine that someone comes wanting auto-aiming so he can just press enter to shoot the Things. Penalty or not?