I play with the built in controls, I use a slightly modified version of the mouse profile. I constantly switch between touch screen and trackpad control and I personally don’t have a problem with it.

I don’t think there are any mods that revamp the ship. The ship isn’t really that important for the game. In the mobile version the ship just flies on its own

I personally would start with planet erekir, it focuses less on defense and more on producing and commanding troops. Also I really recommend pvp.