Is there any way to play this game using keyboard and Joystick?

Is there a way to cheese this mission or something? Ive been trying to beat it over and over using the ingame hints as well as the one walkthrough on IGN, but to no avail. Im not exactly a newbie at this, have most of the base game patches, but this mission is a bit annoying and I just cant help shuttle falcon, or corvette shantipole from blowing up/getting disabled. Ive gotten to the point where I can defeat all ships but shantipole gets disabled. why on earth cant it repair itself?...

I'm stuck on tour 1 mission 4, and looking at guides says I can give commands to my wingmen during missions. Problem is, I don't know how to set up wingmen or if they're receiving my orders. Any help?

X-Wing and Tie Fighter Special Edition both are choppy and laggy to the point of being unplayable and i would really love to get this resolved. Does anyone know of any fixes or is it just a lost cause?

How difficult is X-Wing for a semi-newbie gamer? I used to play it in high school and loved it, but I'm just getting back into things and the learning curve is steep.