This is something we can discuss about for sure.
As I said, nothing is perfect, otherwise it would be reality. Me and
@PhilS13 have a long story of discussing such things and his feedback is always very valuable.
Anyway let's see.
I believe the hard can be useful in situations like Mugello (looong very fast turns) at a high Italian summer temperature (say over 27°C). But I'll double check if that is not the case. But if this is to be taken into perspective. If you are in such situation (27 or 35°C in Italy or Barcelona is not that rare) and you don't have such a hard tyre, what will you do? So this is the other end of the spectrum.
Ok I know what you mean (I think), but you also understand that those two affirmations are in conflict between them. You're saying that if you're in the soft compound, you have to nurse it and be very careful. But on the next paragraph, you say you don't have to nurse the tyres, mediums on proper conditions for them, which is most of the time and means that there is a compound that works "most of the time".
Also, the thing about "easy on the tyres" is very subjective. It is. For example, a very aggressive driver that does also many errors, or simply trying to oversteer at every single turn, will get quite a performance penalty in AC right now.
What you're probably after, is also "penalizing" drivers that drive properly but push a lot. Which I understand, but again it is hard to pin point, because as soon as, for example, make you happy, I'll get thousand of others complaining that now it is too penalizing. I will also get others that will still complain that it is too permissive.
Keep in mind, that in real life, those cars are driven by gentelmen drivers and professionals and the tyres have to suit most of them (and also many different cars with different configurations... ask Porsche about the trouble they have
).
Now, one of the things that might be good to look at, is how the tyres wear out, as it seems we don't have enough tyre wear. But then again, it is still complicated. AC tyres let you drive even when the tyre is consumed and sometimes you only understand things are getting worse, just by the laptimes. Which is correct, as in reality. But on the other hand, I understand that sometimes people do not "feel" the danger of the consumed tyre and think that the tyres do not need to be taken care of.
Again I'm not saying it's perfect, needs work as everything. But it's a fine line now. When we were at v7 I was in a hurry because I knew we had various problems and wanted to get done as much as I can, as fast as possible. Nowadays with v10, I prefer to "take my time" and research things as much as possible, before I commit to any changes for the public version. That doesn't mean we are not working behind the scenes though. Certainly, it is not a "snap and ready for next day" kind of things.
cheers