Having used a hotas, gamepad, and mouse/keyboard setup to do combat in elite I found that for me the biggest limiting factor when using a gamepad is that button real estate becomes a juggling act on the gamepad. For a lot of combat this doesn't necessarily become a huge detriment though, as many of the most common functions can be bound to your gamepad with the rest being accessible via in game menus and I've never found a joystick to be much more accuracy than a gamepads joystick when using gimballed/turreted weapons.
I don't really see any balance issues for players using a gamepad vs. hotas. vs. Mouse/Keyboard for any other aspect of the the game. The more cerebral parts of the game are slow enough that just about any setup is going to suffice.
I don't really see any balance issues for players using a gamepad vs. hotas. vs. Mouse/Keyboard for any other aspect of the the game. The more cerebral parts of the game are slow enough that just about any setup is going to suffice.
