Tried the Demo and have these questions, thank you

[tinkthank]

I just spend almost two hours fiddling about with the demo, which I found very nice, and have some questions about the full version.

I stumbled across WW by checking the Shrapnel site for Dom3, and saw that on the Dom3 supplier's page, WW download version is selling at slot 5. That made me check out the demo. (Surprising, however, and it makes me somewhat wary, that this forum sees so little traffic.)

This would be a "risky buy" for me, since I prefer "deeper" types of strategy games (some that can go for days, lots of thinking elements, etc.), and WW seems to be made for a different target group. Still, perhaps you can indulge me -- I thought the idea was so well done, so here are my questions:

1. After trying out some games, I am unsure as to the game's lasting replayability, because it seemed from the demo that there are basically two things you need to do: (a) Find those bird-traders (the ones with the beacon) for easy trading, and then (b) get that teleporting warp drive (which for some odd reason also teleports your entire fleet, if you have other ships, but perhaps that is a bug of the demo). Completing a and b as soon as possible means scoring big, and you can finish the entire map without exception in 7-8 years (including boosting up your ship to take on all but the toughest aliens and smacking their ship down). Completing a and b fast has a lot to do with luck, it seems to me. So the question, I suppose, is this: Am I missing something? What big strategic factors are there to "think" about? Besides "more", what will the full version be offering?

2. At least in the demo, the lightspeed engine my main starting ship has determines the speed of the fleet -- regardless of the engine(s) of any other ships in the fleet I may later hire. Maybe this is a feature, but if so, does it mean that I can sell the hyperwarp engines of hired ships?

3. I can't tell for sure, but does the final score count the quality of your ship(s), or just their number, when you return to port? That is, if I upgrade my ships with tons of new weapons and engines, will that give me the same score as if I demount them and put them in my cargo hold?

4. Modding. How difficult is it? (I am a computer idiot.) I cant check out any, so I dont know what is out there, but just curious if you need a degree in computing to get anything done.

5. Combat. I guess I just didnt understand this very well. From what I gather, I am supposed to be able to just point and aim. Nice. But
- why must all of our ships always seem to converge on one another, regardless of my attempts to move in different directions?
- when I select an enemy ship to fire upon, even with long-range weapons, why must I always seem to swing around to face that ship and fly towards it, regardless of my "firing arc"?
- (Is "firing arc" broken in the demo? Seems I can only fire head on)
- Sometimes I dont seem to fire on enemy ships at all, despite long-range weapons.
- I think I accidentally had "ram" instead of "attack" on once; fine. But I couldnt figure out what happened. How does ramming work?
- I had imagined that having different types of weapons (lasers, guns, etc.) and different ranges (short, medium, long) would make for different tactical possibilities: and I am sure that all that happens "behind the scenes" with hidden dice roles and whatnot. But since the game (at least the demo) gives us no information on that, it is hard to tell what tactical features are being used here and what is just pure cosmetic without funcitonality. Wouldnt the point of having, say, long-range weapons be to fire at enemies who cannot hit you, running away, and staying out of range? If so, why are we always converging and why cannot I shoot without moving toward my enemy?
So I suppose my question here is: Are there any "tactics" or rather tactical elements requiring thought (such as in games like SPMBT) that I am (quite obviously) missing?

6. Engines. Not the light-speed engines, but the standard ones. I suppose they are supposed to be good for combat speed? But considering question 5 above -- what use is that exactly?

Well I suppose those are my main questions for now. Thanks very much for your responses. I do like to support Indy makers of what appear to be novel games, but since those games arent really cheap, I do need to be somewhat selective. Thanks very much!