ChiefCurrahee is absolutely right, you do only live in a world of extremes Betelgeuzah. There absolutely is a middle ground between the two, you're just too blind to see it. Auto-attack does not mean that the game itself or combat is automated in all manners. It simply means that the basic attack is automatic, nothing else. You will still have to use all the secondary attacks (Stab, Light Strike, Heavy Thrust, etc...) and skills manually.

You seem to think that auto-attack means that battle is completely automated and the player has to do nothing which is entirely untrue. One function is automated, there is still strategy in the multitude of others such as positioning, secondary basic attacks, skills, buffs, target priority.